Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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NEW YORK (JTA)—I have mixed emotions about Natan Sharansky’s proposed agreement to expand the public space at the Western Wall to include the currently secluded area known as Robinson’s Arch. As a lifelong Conservative Jew, I applaud any plan that seeks to treat egalitarian worshipers and women’s prayer groups as full members of the Jewish people deserving of a place to pray at Judaism’s holiest site. But I worry that in the zeal to achieve equality, Reform and Conservative Jews are about to shut the door on a unique spiritual experienc...
While the gun control debate intensifies in the U.S., a bipartisan group of lawmakers is pointing to improved treatment of mental health issues, rather than stricter gun laws, as the proper preventive measure for high-profile shootings such as those at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., and a Century movie theater in Aurora, Colo. Understanding the past may yield the solution to this modern problem, as some experts and advocates say contemporary mistreatment of mental health issues...
Logan Schulman, a senior at Seminole High School, who attends Temple Shir Shalom in Oviedo, won a recent poetry contest sponsored by Winter Park Institute at Rollins College. The judge was former U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins. In honor of April as National Poetry Month, the Winter Park Institute at Rollins College and Collins recently hosted an event for local high school students titled A Poetry Conversation. Moderated by Collins, the event featured a poetry panel, consisting of four local...
Dr. Norman Wall, retired Heathrow cardiologist and lifelong Zionist, will be honored Wednesday, May 8 at the Congregation of Reform Judaism, with the announcement of a multi-year fellowship for Israeli heart specialists. The program will bring gifted young cardiologists from the Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer for yearlong study at MedStar Washington Hospital Center and Georgetown University Medical Center. Called The Norman M. Wall, M.D. Fellowship in Cardiology, the program is being...
JERUSALEM—Women praying at Judaism’s holiest site, the Western Wall, need not fear police threats of arrest if seen wearing traditional ceremonial attire associated with the religion’s males following a Jerusalem District Court ruling handed down April 25. The order, which says women may pray with prayer shawls and phylacteries, is seen as a major victory for a group called Women of the Wall, which has been struggling for almost 25 years against police and Orthodox Jewish authorities in charge of the site, for the right to defy tradi...
WASHINGTON (JTA)—He had them until abortion. U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) was addressing the Reform movement’s Consultation on Conscience conference about his passion, human rights and success in creating mechanisms to combat human trafficking and shine a light on global anti-Semitism. The crowd that gathered in a large Capitol Hill conference room on the afternoon of April 23 was transfixed, laughing along with Smith’s practiced self-deprecation and applauding his commitment. Until Joann...
KIEV, Ukraine (JTA)—Marching in formation, six young men in dark jackets approach an anti-government rally in Cherkasy, a city some 125 miles southeast of Kiev. At the appointed moment, they remove their windbreakers to reveal white T-shirts emblazoned with the words “Beat the kikes.” Their jackets carry the name of Svoboda, the ultranationalist Ukrainian political party. A small riot quickly ensues. Angry protestors rip at the T-shirts, but the Svoboda-labeled men give as good as they get....
WASHINGTON (JTA)—In the battle to end the across-the-board budget cuts known as sequestration, it’s all hands on deck. Increasingly for the Obama administration, which is deadlocked over the budget with the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, that means reaching out to Jews. In conference calls and in appearances at Jewish events, administration officials are soliciting Jewish support in their bid to end the congressionally mandated budget cuts that kicked in March 1 and which cri...
Heritage Florida Jewish News is accepting nominations for the 2013 Heritage Human Service Award, which will be presented in August at the annual meeting of the Jewish Federation of Greater Orlando. “For more than 25 years, individuals who have made major, voluntary contributions of their talent, time, energy, and effort to the Central Florida community have been honored with the selection and presentation of this award,” says Jeff Gaeser, editor and publisher of the Heritage. Last year’s recipient was Dr. Zena Sulkes. The Heritage is accep...
The Maimonides Medical and Cardozo Legal Societies of the Jewish Federation of Greater Orlando, in partnership with the Holocaust Memorial Resource and Education Center, are inviting the community to a presentation by Dr. Perry Brickman at 4 p.m. Sunday, June 2. He will speak and present a film documenting the history of discrimination against Jewish students at Emory University’s Dental School between 1948-1961. This story was covered by the New York Times, CNN, and the AP, and has appeared i...
On April 14, the Roth Jewish Community Center of Greater Orlando hosted an Israel Memorial Day Ceremony, or a Yom HaZikaron service, in its Harriett & Hymen Lake Cultural Auditorium. The program featured readings, poems, live performances and prayers in Hebrew and English....
When I was a junior in high school, I decided to skip my senior year and go straight to college. No one questioned my decision. Everyone thought I knew best for myself, in large part because the world perceived me as a really smart kid. Which was true, up to a point. I was also unsure, unclear, with no path before me and no real idea who I was. So I applied to college, without anyone advising me where to go or what to look for. Harvard told me to wait a year. Amherst and Yale turned me down dire...
By Ira Sharkansky Barack Obama has said that Syrian use of chemical weapons is a “game changer.” According to the lead paragraphs in a New York Times article, the President said “…he would respond ‘prudently’ and ‘deliberately’ to evidence that Syria had used chemical weapons, tamping down any expectations that he would take swift action after an American intelligence assessment that the Syrian government had used the chemical agent sarin on a small scale in the nation’s civil war... He was seeking further proof of culpability for c...
At a synagogue talk I recently gave, the topic turned to the treatment of Israel’s Arab citizens. A woman in the audience was obviously upset. “You talk about the Israeli Arabs, but how much more should we give them?” she asked. “They have schools, they get health care, they can get jobs. Isn’t that enough?” This, in my business, is known as a “slow pitch.” “You’re right, you don’t have to give the Israeli Arabs anything,” I said. “But the real question is, what kind of country do you want Israel to be? We call it the only real democracy in th...
CAIRO (JTA)—My first visit to Egypt was eight years ago. My guide was Carmen Weinstein, the head of Egypt’s Jewish community, and on a hot September day we drove through the usual chaotic traffic with our driver to visit 10 synagogues. I am the son of American Jews, the grandchild of Jews from Poland, Lithuania and White Russia, and knew little about the history of Jewish life in Egypt. But the synagogues tell that story. Together, the ancient Ben Ezra synagogue in Fustat; the stately Shaar Hashamaim on Adly Street; the soaring interior of the...
Dear editor: I must respond to Mr. Hassan Shibly, Esq; CAIR Florida; Tampa executive director letter printed April 26, 2013. Make no mistake about it, Mr. Shibly, CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood have a “hidden agenda.” Mr. Shibly cries “crocodile tears” about being misunderstood; about being discriminated against because he is a Muslim; about being the target of disparaging comments. So be it. Let the facts speak for themselves. Mr. Shibly gets very emotional in his condemnation of the truth because he and his ilk don’t want the truth to...
Dear editor: According to RAND Database of Worldwide Terrorism Incidents, the number of deaths as a result of terrorist attacks in Europe and North America from 2000 to 2010 was 4,873. Of those 4,873 people killed, 4,703 were casualties of attacks committed by Muslim terrorists. That is over 96 percent. Terrorism is a violent act used to advance a political agenda. If you look at the constitutions of Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc...they are listed as “Islamic States” under Islamic Law. Islam is politics of expansion. Pol...
Dear editor: There is no doubt that Sandi Solomon went overboard in her condemnation of the entire Muslim religion [Heritage Florida Jewish News, April 12, 2013]. Her interpretations of Quranic text (e.g. “Muslims can lie to non-Muslims…”) seems somewhat reminiscent of hundreds of years of Talmud distortions and libel by anti-Jewish haters of every stripe. However, her denunciation [Heritage Florida Jewish News, April 26, 2013] by Hassan Shibly of the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) is somewhat disingenuous and brings to mind...
Dear editor: Why does a Jewish publication give space to an organization that supports and raises funds for those who wish to destroy Israel and the Jewish people? It was shocking to see the letter in the April 26 issue of the Heritage Florida Jewish News from CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations). The letter was in reply to a letter written by Sandi Solomon published in your April 12 issue. Anyone can research the activities of CAIR on the Internet. Quoted from ZOA (Zionist Organization of America): “CAIR is a Saudi-funded Islamist g...
MORNING AND EVENING MINYANS (Call synagogue to confirm time.) Chabad of South Orlando—Monday and Thursday, 8 a.m. 407-354-3660. Congregation Ahavas Yisrael—Monday - Friday, 7 a.m.; Sunday, 8 a.m., 407-644-2500. Congregation Chabad Lubavitch of Greater Daytona—Monday, 8 a.m.; Thursday, 8 a.m., 904-672-9300. Congregation Ohev Shalom—Sunday, 9 a.m., 407-298-4650. GOBOR Community Minyan at Jewish Academy of Orlando—Monday – Friday, 7:45 a.m. – 8:30 a.m. Temple Israel—Sunday, 9 a.m., 407-647-3055. FRIDAY, MAY 3 Light Shabbat candles at 7:44 p.m. Ah...
Twenty-six seniors and staff boarded the Victory Casino Bus heading to Cape Canaveral on April 23 with the Roth Jewish Community Center of Greater Orlando’s 39ers seniors group. They set sail for four hours beneath the beautiful sky, sun and breeze for a day away from the usual routine. This was the second annual Victory Casino Cruise arranged by 39er chairperson, Alvin Sarnoff. Dr. Sarnoff made all of the arrangements and enthusiastically promoted the program for weeks to the 39ers and S...
Congregation Beth Sholom invites the public to join them as Rabbi Allen leads a special Shavuot Shabbat service at 10 a.m. on Saturday, May 11. A Yizkor Memorial service will conclude the holiday morning observance. Shavuot celebrates the giving of the Ten Commandments and the Torah to the Jewish people. It is customary to stay up studying scripture on the night before Shavuot, as spiritual preparation to receive the Torah personally. On Shavuot, the Book of Ruth is read, both because of its depiction of the grain harvest and because Ruth...
On June 18, 1964, 16 rabbis were arrested in St. Augustine, the largest mass arrest of rabbis in the United States, On June 18, 2013, an African-American student of one of those rabbis will join his voice to the voices of those 16, as the St. Augustine Jewish Historical Society marks the 49th anniversary of the work of those rabbis who were here to be stand with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in his efforts to drive the Ku Klux Klan out of America’s oldest city. The St. Augustine Jewish H...
Rain didn’t stop the Roth Jewish Community Center of Greater Orlando’s Israel Independence Day Family Festival from bringing an Israeli spirit to Central Florida on April 21. The festival, celebrating Israeli’s 65th anniversary, was held at Cranes Roost Park in Altamonte Springs, and was co-chaired by volunteers Rita Isaak, Ashley Lanxner and Samantha Taylor....
Supporters of the Jewish Pavilion proved to be more than “fair-weather friends” on Sunday, April 21, at the Marriott in Lake Mary when more than 250 attendees braved record downpours to attend their annual gala, honoring dedicated volunteers, Debbie Meitin and Cathy Swerdlow. It was an evening marked by moving speeches, combined with a sprinkling of tears, as Meitin, Swerdlow and a host of volunteers shared their heartwarming experiences of bringing companionship and Jewish connections to senior...
