Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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Once again, the Jewish Pavilion hosted a Tu B'Shevat seder at Arden Court, a live-in facility in Winter Springs for persons with dementia and/or Alzheimer's. The residents were gathered in anticipation of the arrival of Jewish Pavilion volunteers, and they happily participated in the program for the day. In addition to reciting the prayers and enjoying the foods associated with this holiday, they shared some personal stories. Program director Judy Procell asked the residents to tell a story... Full story
Justin Timberlake playing Israel HOLLYWOOD, Fla. (JTA)- While Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters' efforts to stop artists from performing in Israel have been getting plenty of attention lately, the list of upcoming big-name concerts scheduled there continues to grow. The latest additions: Neil Young and Justin Timberlake, joining Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber and, (fingers crossed) the Rolling Stones. First up is Timberlake, who will play Tel Aviv on May 28, according to Haaretz. The official... Full story
I may be mistaken, but... I don’t think I’m mistaken when I say that many, if not most, medical breakthroughs in the last few hundred years were made by Jewish doctors and scientists. Here is another that I recently heard about. This comes from the American Associates of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev: “A cure for diabetes? No, not quite. But for children and adults with type 1 diabetes, researchers at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev may have discovered the next best thing: a combination of drugs already in use for other conditions that... Full story
For American Jews, the birthday of the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. is an occasion to recall the impressive Jewish contributions to the movement for African-American civil rights-from Jewish Freedom Riders such as Schwerner and Goodman, to the rabbis who marched with Dr. King, to the Jewish attorneys who spearheaded the NAACP's legal battles against discrimination. It may surprise some to learn that one of the earliest Jewish protests against racism in America was lodged more than half... Full story
Pete Seeger, the iconic American folk singer and composer of such notable standards as "If I had a Hammer," "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?" and "Turn, Turn, Turn" passed away on Monday, Jan. 27 at age 94. Seeger died of natural causes at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, his record company, Appleseed Recordings, said. Seeger was well known for his liberal politics, working as an environmentalist, protesting against wars from Vietnam to Iraq. He was sentenced to prison for refusing to testify... Full story
BALTIMORE (JTA)-Even at 96, Frank Towers still recalls the stench of the prisoner train when its doors were opened nearly seven decades ago. "Not to be believed," he said. It was April 13, 1945, when the U.S. Army's 30th Infantry Division, to which Towers belonged, freed prisoners from the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Germany who had been packed onto a train 40 to 50 cars long bound for Theresienstadt. They had been on the train for six days before it was stopped at a railway siding near... Full story
TEL AVIV (JTA)- When the Israeli mobile maps start-up Waze accepted a buyout from Google for more than $1 billion in June, each of the company's 100 employees walked away with an average of $1.2 million from the sale. An even bigger check, though, went to Baruch Lipner, a Canadian Israeli who hasn't worked in the high-tech or finance industries for a decade. The acquisition put $1.5 million on his desk. A veteran of the venture capital world, Lipner is now the sole employee of Tmura, a... Full story
The weekend of Jan. 11-12, a brand new 9,000 square foot Hillel was opened at Florida State University. FSU serves nearly 3,000 Jewish undergrads and this marks the second brand new Hillel facility to be inaugurated in the State of Florida in the past six months. Although it hasn't had an official "grand opening" yet, in August 2013 Central Florida Hillel opened a new 20,000-square-foot facility located at UCF to serve the 6,000 Jewish undergrads. Shown here (l-r): Melanie Annis, executive... Full story
A monument to gays persecuted by the Nazis was dedicated in Tel Aviv. The monument, the first of its kind in Israel, was constructed in Meir Park, near the Tel Aviv Gay and Lesbian Association Center in the central part of the city. The monument is made up of a concrete pink triangle along with a bench and a plaque providing information on the persecution of gays and lesbians during the Holocaust. Gays and lesbians were forced to wear an identifying pink triangle on their clothing in the same... Full story
Johansson's Super Bowl ad HOLLYWOOD, FL (JTA)-Scarlett Johansson, faceless in the movie "Her," just landed a gig as the face of an Israeli company. According to The New York Times, the Jewish actress has been chosen as SodaStream's "global spokesperson" and will star in its upcoming Super Bowl ad. In the commercial, airing during the fourth quarter of Super Bowl XLVIII on Fox on Feb. 2, Johansson will show us how the home soda maker works. The point is to "demonstrate how easy it is, how sexy... Full story
A dying language?... Gee, I hope not! This is an article about preserving and sharing Ladino and Sephardic culture. (Married for more than half-century to a Sephardic Jew, this article, directly from the Impact magazine of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel, really caught my interest). I pass it on in part: "According to Dr. ELIEZER PAPO, 'The Ladino language is dying but losing the language doesn't mean you should lose the entire cultural package. That's where the Ladino Center comes... Full story
NEW YORK (JTA)-Mark Bittman is not a religious man by any stretch of the imagination, least of all his own. A longtime food writer for The New York Times who three years ago shifted from cooking to food policy columnist, Bittman has made a living eating the kinds of things frowned upon by Jewish tradition. As he told me recently, "Pork cooked in milk is an amazing dish." Though he was born and raised a Jew-going to synagogue, religious school and Reform youth groups at Manhattan's East End... Full story
NEW YORK (JTA)—During the height of the recession, I moved to Switzerland. I had already lived in France, Japan, India and Israel, and traveled much of the rest of the world. I’d gone global for work, love, spirituality and cultural infatuation, but this last time was for cash: As a teacher in the recession during a hiring freeze, like thousands of other Americans, I became an economic expat. In the land of chocolate, cheese, bankers and income, my fellow New York native teachers and I were able to afford taxi rides, apartments on our own and... Full story
WASHINGTON—Everyone knows Adolf Hitler committed suicide by gunshot in his underground bunker on April 30, 1945. At least, that has been the conventional wisdom. Now comes WND senior staff reporter Jerome R. Corsi’s new book, “Hunting Hitler: New Scientific Evidence That Hitler Escaped Germany.” Examining declassified FBI and U.S. military intelligence files, Corsi makes a compelling case that U.S. investigators suspected from the beginning Hitler had escaped. For political purposes, the evidence indicates, they were willing to go along w... Full story
From the inception of the Jewish state to the present, Israel's military has been anything but a male-dominated institution. On May 26, 1948, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion established the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Less than three months later, the Knesset instituted mandatory conscription for all women without children. Today 57 percent of all officers in the Israeli army are women, according to the IDF. The IDF recently highlighted the stories of a select group of those women on its blog,... Full story
Actress Meryl Streep has reignited a debate that has simmered below the surface in Hollywood for decades: Was Walt Disney anti-Semitic? The occasion was the annual awards event of the National Board of Review, an organization of filmmakers, students, and movie scholars. Streep presented an award to Emma Thompson, for her role in the new movie "Saving Mr. Banks," about the making of Mary Poppins. Thompson co-stars as Poppins author P.L. Travers, alongside Tom Hanks as Walt Disney. Streep took... Full story
(JTA)-When West Bromwich Albion striker Nicolas Anelka exposed British soccer fans to the vaguely Hitlerian salute now sweeping his native France, Jewish groups were confident a strong response was coming. After all, Britain is considered a leader in the fight against xenophobia in sports thanks to its successful education programs and the tough stance of its soccer institutions, courts and police. But their confidence has been shaken by the refusal of British soccer bosses to condemn Anelka... Full story
BALTIMORE (JTA)-The rain dripping from his uniform provided an unceremonious end to London Fletcher's career as the Washington Redskins linebacker headed to the locker room following a recent road loss to the New York Giants. His team's last-place finish was hardly the idealized final walk off the gridiron for Fletcher as a professional player. But his 16-year National Football League career might never have launched were it not for Charlotte Kramer and Leonard Schwartz. The Cleveland... Full story
LaBeouf skywrites apology HOLLYWOOD, Fla. (JTA)—Shia LaBeouf, the 27-year-old “Transformers” star, has been the center of a plagiarism controversy. LaBeouf’s recently released short film “HowardContour.com” appears to be a near replica of veteran cartoonist Daniel Clowes’ 2008 comic “Justin M. Damiano.” Clowes apparently was blindsided by the plagiarism, telling Buzzfeed that he had no idea of the film’s existence until it was released online in December. LaBeouf has been tweeting bizarre apologies for weeks, many of which turned out to be pl... Full story
(JTA)-In less than a year, Dane Kuttler and Rowan Parker exchanged vows in 10 different wedding ceremonies at 10 different venues on two coasts under nine different marriage canopies. In what Kuttler calls "Wedding Tour '13," the introverted Seattle couple wanted to share their celebration with as many friends and family as possible while avoiding the pressures of one big party. "It was fun," Parker said. "We wanted to travel. We wanted to take a big vacation." The couple first exchanged vows... Full story
Something is brewing?... As someone who was alive during the years before World War II (although very, very young), I wonder if a poll of European Jews at that time would have come up with comparable results. This is word for word from the World Jewish Congress Digest (WJC). It is worrisome, to say the least: "A revealing new survey by the EU (European Union) Agency For Fundamental Rights (FRA) has found that hate-crimes against Jews are on the rise and that Europe's Jews increasingly feel... Full story
BALTIMORE (JTA)-Scanning the list of students, Benny Natan wondered if he would recognize any names from his youth in Salonika, Greece. One of the 157 names jumped out: Nissim Tazartes. Natan, a space and aeronautics professor at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, beamed. Tazartes was his first cousin, someone he had heard much about growing up but never met. The list of children who attended the Umberto No. 1 Italian School in Salonika between the world wars was compiled by Antonio... Full story
JERUSALEM (JTA)-To be married in Israel, immigrants must prove their Jewish ancestry to the country's chief rabbinate. Couples can solicit a letter from their hometown rabbis or present their parents' Jewish marriage contracts. Sometimes they even bring a Yiddish-speaking grandmother before a rabbinical court. In the end, every claim has to pass through one man: a midlevel bureaucrat named Itamar Tubul. Tubul, 35, is the soft-spoken rabbi who heads the chief rabbinate's personal status... Full story
On a day where snow still covers the Judean hills, a Jewish doctor from Efrat drives into the neighboring Palestinian village called Wadi Nis. He is greeted by the local Palestinian villagers with smiles and warm hellos. "There's the doctor," says one Palestinian woman to another as Dr. Yitzchak Glick lowers his car window to say hello. To the villagers of Wadi Nis and six other Palestinian villages in the Gush Etzion region, the kippah-wearing Dr. Glick is a familiar and welcome face. The... Full story
Stiller's Western Wall romancing NEW YORK (JTA)-Ben Stiller revealed to Parade magazine that he has some fond memories from visiting Israel as a teen. The actor and director, promoting his new movie, recalled that at 16 he took a father-son bonding trip to Israel with his father, comedian Jerry Stiller, and found himself in a romantic dalliance there. "I met a girl on that trip and we had a whirlwind romance," Stiller told Parade. "Is it blasphemous to say we ended up making out near the... Full story
