Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Sorted by date Results 1526 - 1550 of 4419
(JTA) - As a British resident born in Dubai to a Palestinian father and Lebanese mother, Heba Nabil Iskandarani had plenty of potential national identities. What she lacked, however, was a passport. A 26-year-old lecturer in architecture at Birmingham City University, Iskandarani has been stateless for most of her life, possessing only a Lebanese travel document that defines her as a Palestinian refugee. But after discovering that her Palestinian father had Jewish roots going back to Spain,...
(JTA) - When Israeli director Yuval Adler saw the script for "The Secrets We Keep," a thriller about a woman who kidnaps a man she believes was her Nazi torturer during World War II, he knew he wanted to make some changes. The story revolved around a Jewish woman who endured horrors at a German concentration camp - a plot Adler found a little stale. He started talking to the lead actress, Noomi Rapace, known for her starring role in the original Swedish "Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" films,...
For most Jews, this year was one of the most unique Yom Kippurs, me included. On Yom Kippur afternoon, I decided to go through a box of old photos in which I found pictures from what had been the most unique Yom Kippur, until now. On Oct. 1, 1987, I landed in Moscow with my friend, Michael, for a 2.5-week trip throughout the Soviet Union. This was not meant to be sight-seeing, but my second trip to help and encourage Jews of the USSR during a period of rampant persecution and discrimination....
(JTA) - I fell in love with Jenn Louis' latest cookbook "The Chicken Soup Manifesto" at first sight. The James Beard-nominated chef has curated a collection of over 100 beautifully photographed chicken soup recipes, which allowed me to vicariously travel the globe with my favorite comfort food as a guide. What more could an Ashkenazi gal with wanderlust wish for? When I got a chance to chat with Louis, she was as vibrant as her book. Like me, her prototypical chicken soup was her mother's...
Two rabbis located in Judea are spreading words of Torah to the nations, preparing the world for the Sukkot feast described by the prophet Zechariah in which all the nations will make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The month of Elul began on Friday night (Aug. 21), ringing the alarm that one month remained to prepare for the intense holiday period of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. There is much to learn in order to observe the feasts in a meaningful manner. In recent years, many people from other...
The challenges that Coronavirus has brought us over the past six months make it easy to forget there are good things around us. One of these stories involves The Jewish Federation of Greater Orlando and Kiryat Motzkin, a small, middle class city north of Haifa in Israel, where the Federation has had an ongoing partnership since 2006. This partnership has been made possible through the generosity of Federation donors. Through this partnership, the Federation supports two important programs that m...
(JTA) - As Jews in the United States prepared to light candles to welcome Rosh Hashanah, they were hit with the last terrible news of a terrible year: the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. At 87, and with a lifetime of accomplishments that few can match, she has earned her rest. But the exquisite, agonizing time of her passing underscored one of the great lessons of her own life and of Rosh Hashanah: how we make use of the time God grants us matters. On the second day of Rosh...
She was special ... And she will go down in history, for sure. I refer to Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who recently passed away. She was an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Ginsburg was nominated by President BILL CLINTON on June 14, 1993 (my birthday!) and has served since Aug. 10, 1993. until just last week. She was born in Brooklyn (like me) and was generally viewed as belonging to the liberal wing of the court. Of course, she should be buried at Arlington National...
(JTA) - The timing couldn't be more prescient for Aaron Sorkin's newest film, "The Trial of the Chicago 7." The movie by the Jewish "West Wing" creator, which is coming to Netflix on Oct. 16, is about the Jewish anti-war activist Abbie Hoffman, who was tried along with six others for conspiracy and inciting to riot for their role in the 1968 protests at the Democratic National Convention. Hoffman is played by none other than the Jewish actor Sacha Baron Cohen. It's his second super-Jewish...
How lucky I am! ... The music, the performers of my time ... thank goodness I grew up in the 40s, 50s and 60s. The great American songbook is the BEST! The performers were the BEST! (If you are willing to admit to being that old, you would agree!) Anyway, I just heard MICHAEL FEINSTEIN singing Gershwin on the radio! (Yup, Jewish.) And I just learned that billionaire MARK CUBAN of "Shark Tank" the TV show, with his great looks and personality is also Jewish! (And he is super rich!) Difficult...
Proof positive that Jewish learning is a life-long commitment as Kinneret resident, Michael Blaher, decided to learn how to blow the shofar this year and did so on the second day of Rosh Hashanah to the delight of the residents....
“ISResilience: What Israelis can Teach The World” is a collection of riveting true stories about people who survived against all odds and the lessons they impart to us all. Written by Michael Dickson, executive director of StandWithUs Israel and Dr. Naomi L. Baum, a pioneering psychologist in the field of resilience research and treatment, the book profiles a diverse group of compelling Israeli personalities and traces the characteristic of resilience that unites them all. From well-known lea...
Ancestry, the global leader in family history and consumer genomics, has completed a significant philanthropic initiative to digitize and make searchable millions of Holocaust and Nazi persecution-related records. Building on its commitment to preserve at-risk history, there are now more than 19 million Holocaust records available globally, for free and in perpetuity as part of the Arolsen Archives Collection. Ancestry also announced on Aug. 26 a new partnership with USC Shoah Foundation to publish an index to nearly 50,000 Jewish Holocaust...
(My Jewish Learning via JTA) - The High Holidays prayer book, or machzor, emphasizes the themes of the Days of Awe - introspection and repentance. Rosh Hashanah as the opening day of a court trial "The great shofar is sounded. A still small voice is heard. This day, even the angels are alarmed, seized with fear and trembling as they declare: 'The day of judgment is here!'" In a loud and trumpeting voice, the cantor describes the shofar's blast, then softly and gently describes a "still, small vo...
The cover of last week’s Rosh Hashanah issue was of Rabbi Jason Weiner who planned to put a mask on his shofar during the High Holidays. Many others have followed suit to ensure that they do not spread the coronavirus when blowing the ram’s horn. The photo is in this week’s issue (on page 10A) in the article “Six months into pandemic, Jews prepare for a High Holiday season of rupture and resilience.” The photo is courtesy of Weiner....
Heritage Jewish News employee Gil Dombrosky is a devout Democrat. Central Florida Publishing employee Johnny Johnson is a devout Republican. Johnson delivers the weekly paper from the printer to the Heritage office every Thursday. Over the years, the two men have developed a good friendship as Dombrosky helps Johnson bring in the papers as well as take out the old issues for recycling. Their political persuasions don't affect their working relationship though and each one takes the other's... Full story
Iran's ban on Israel ... I read this in the World Jewish Congress digest, said to myself "oy vay," and pass it along to you: Iranian President HASSAN ROUHANI issued an implementation order of a law banning any cooperation with the State of Israel, specifically bans on technological products, including computer hardware and software. Following the order, the Iranian interior, intelligence, foreign, and defense ministries, the Supreme National Security Council, and the Judiciary are now required...
(JNS) — A year ago, Jews looked back on 5779 and wondered, after the Pittsburgh and Poway synagogue shootings and a resurgence of anti-Semitism on the right as well as the left, how things in the United States could get any worse. As I do every year, I cautioned that such a turn of events is always a possibility. But 5780 proved me more right on that score than I could have ever imagined. I don’t know about you, but I didn’t have a worldwide deadly coronavirus pandemic that would send a thriving global economy into a near-depression as one of m...
NEW YORK (JTA) - The truth is, there is no commandment in Judaism to dip an apple in honey on Rosh Hashanah. But what would the Jewish New Year be without the custom? It's a question that bedevils vegans, many of whom won't eat honey because it's an animal product. So what's a mock chopped liver/seitan brisket/vegetarian stuffed cabbage kind of Jew to do? Jeffrey Cohan, the executive director of Jewish Veg, explains all the ways that honey production is problematic. In order to produce as much h...
The effort to strike a balance between a particularistic loyalty to Jewish religion and nationhood and a more universalistic commitment to the human community played itself out in the struggle to set a date for the beginning of the Jewish calendar year. The two possibilities were Nisan, the month of Passover, and Tishrei, the month of what is now known as the festival of Rosh Hashanah . In the Torah, the beginning of the year was clearly set at the first of Nisan, in the context of a description of the first Passover. “The Lord said to Moses a...
One of the unique mitzvot of Rosh Hashanah is hearing the sound of the shofar. The tradition of sounding the shofar every morning during the month of Elul, the Hebrew month before Rosh Hashanah is really leading up to and anticipating Rosh Hashanah. If we are praying by ourselves at home we would not be hearing the shofar. Even if we are joining via Zoom or some other similar technology, hearing the shofar through speakers is not the same as hearing the actual sound. In order to address this, th...
Shana Tova! Annually, the Jewish New Year gives us the opportunity to reflect on the lives we have changed and the impact that we have in our community. Through Jewish Family Services of Greater Orlando, our wonderful community has reached thousands of individuals and families in need over the last year. Whether it's through volunteering in the Pearlman Emergency Food Pantry, or by donating canned goods, or funding a client to participate in the Family Stabilization Program - you are changing...
This year's High Holidays promise to be like no other in anyone's living memory. As the "People of the Book," we have celebrated the Jewish New Year under a myriad of circumstances and in nearly every country on earth. We have gathered in peace time and during war. We have gathered at sumptuous tables free from worry in the Diaspora or modern Israel and have also gathered in shivering cold and fear in concentration camps across Europe. We have celebrated with family and have celebrated away...
As Rosh Hashanah approaches campus life is in full swing. Mezuzahs are going up in the dorms, the smell of Chabad's weekly BBQ wafts through the air, and students across campus look forward to Shabbat Dinner. There is something different this year. The BBQ is now socially distanced, the Shabbos meals are "to go," and the Mezuzah delivery comes with masks and gloves. Chabad continues to be there for our students, but there's no question the year is unique. This past year has been a year of...
Like most of our peer institutions, Stetson began fall 2020 in a hybrid model. Some students were on campus, some were at home, and all of them were online in some capacity. As the person charged with building community and helping to transition my freshmen to campus, it occurred to me that engagement - meaningful engagement - was not meant to be done while being physically distant. How for instance, can the community not be together to celebrate the High Holidays (side note: my slogan for this...
