Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Sorted by date Results 4301 - 4325 of 4470
THE HAGUE, the Netherlands (JTA)—On a cold winter night in 2008, Wim Kortenoeven was startled by the crackling of a large fire raging near his home on the edge of this city’s last remaining Jewish enclave. Rushing from his apartment, Kortenoeven walked 70 yards and crossed the line separating his Jewish-owned housing project from the predominantly Muslim borough containing what Dutch media have taken to calling the “Sharia triangle”—Sharia referring to Islamic law. On the seam line, he encoun... Full story
HIGHLAND PARK, N.J. (JTA)—Over the past few weeks, strangers have begun stopping high school computer science teacher Chaim Cohen on the street. A few accuse him of recording them without their knowledge. Even fewer blame him for all of society’s ills. But many just want an answer to a simple question: Is he wearing Google Glass? Cohen is among the approximately 2,000 developers throughout the United States who are trying out the search giant’s much-hyped wearable computer, a futuristic Inter... Full story
In three-part harmony, a group of more than 50 people—mostly women, mostly middle-aged and older—began chanting a verse from Leviticus: Aish tamid tukad al hamizbei’ach; lo tichbeh (“Fire always shall be kept burning on the altar; it shall not go out”). They were led by Rabbi Shefa Gold, who added an overlay of harmony, drumming, and the droning sound of an accordion-like “shruti box.” As the chant continued, it grew more intensely spiritual, less self-conscious, louder and more harmonious. For three hours on May 19, Gold led participants... Full story
‘Kitchen (and PR) nightmares’ NEW YORK (JTA)—An unsavory appearance on Gordon Ramsay’s “Kitchen Nightmares” turned out to be a PR nightmare for Samy Bouzaglo, the owner of Amy’s Baking Co. in Scottsdale, Ariz. But the Morocco-born Israeli appears to have bigger problems than sassing a reality show host and becoming entertainingly unhinged on Facebook (and then blaming the crazy posts on hackers). Bouzaglo, who runs Amy’s with his wife, Amy, could be facing deportation—to Israel. He was in... Full story
BALTIMORE (JTA)—Sabina Faynberg decided recently to visit the grave of her cousin Shalom Schwartzbard on a moshav near the Israeli city of Netanya. Going online to find directions, the Jerusalem woman stumbled upon a “Seeking Kin” column that discussed Schwartzbard, who had murdered Semyon Petliura on a Paris street in 1926. Many Jews of the time had held Petliura responsible for instigating pogroms in Ukraine that killed thousands of their relatives and thus believed the killing was justi... Full story
Shades of Mel Gibson… Television’s Military Channel has been showing many WWII films, mostly in honor of Memorial Day and the week after. One of the series titled “Nazi Collaborators,” shows the gathering of Jews in different cities of the German occupation. In most cases, they were loaded on to railway cars and sent off to concentration camps. You know their fate. Some were lucky enough to survive the war and even make it to Israel! Israel is very special to our people. This fact makes the fol... Full story
Early on in Jodi Picoult’s new novel “The Storyteller” (Atria), Josef Weber comments that Sage Singer doesn’t say much in their grief support group, but when she does speak up, she’s a poet. She answers firmly that she’s no poet, but a baker. His response—“Can a person not be two things at once”—foreshadows this story of Nazis, Holocaust victims, survivors and the second and third generations. “The Storyteller,” which reached the top of The New York Times bestseller list just after it was published, is Picoult’s first novel to touch upon the H... Full story
NEW YORK (JTA)—When Amanda Melpolder began planning her wedding to Jeff Greenberg, she hoped the ceremony would be unlike others. Melpolder had become involved in an independent minyan in Brooklyn after converting to Judaism several years ago, and she and Greenberg wanted their wedding this June to reflect the prayer group’s community spirit and sense of do-it-yourself camaraderie. Friends were asked to lead prayers and narrate the signing of the ketubah, or marriage contract. Melpolder, a che... Full story
The Israel Antiquities Authority recently uncovered a magnificent mosaic dating to the Byzantine period in the fields of Kibbutz Bet Qama, during an archaeological excavation being carried out prior to the construction of a new highway interchange in the area. The Israel Antiquities Authority said the well-preserved mosaic was found among the remains of a settlement that extends across more than six dunams on the kibbutz’s farmland. Dr. Rina Avner of the Israel Antiquities Authority, who is d... Full story
Tasking themselves with the lofty idea of making peace through drama, Jerusalem’s Y Theater attempts to embrace Jerusalem’s beauty and conflicts to enable a public discourse that is self-critical. Y Theater’s latest production is called “Take Away.” Developed by an Israeli and Palestinian over two years of workshops with Israelis, Arab and Jewish, Palestinians and foreign theater types, the play evolved into a metaphor for the city of Jerusalem, which is built on a hill. They were influence... Full story
There are still about 10 minutes until the match starts, but the noise from the sellout crowd inside the Oakland (Calif.) Convention Center has reached a dull roar. As the anticipation builds, referees in zebra-striped shirts amble around the track, making sure everything’s up to regulation standards. Groups of tattooed 20- and 30-somethings make their way to the concession stands for tequila shots, beer and tamales; one biker couple in their 60s scopes out the bleachers for any remaining seats.... Full story
TEL AVIV (JTA)—It was supposed to be the car of the future, a near-silent, battery-powered vehicle that would wean the West off its dependence on Middle Eastern oil and save the environment in the process. And an Israeli company seemed destined to build it. Better Place, founded in 2007 by the exuberantly confident entrepreneur Shai Agassi, was trumpeted as the king of Israeli startups, a company that would keep the air clean and the streets quiet while saving money for its users. Six years a... Full story
OK, let’s face it. One of the burning questions of the day, if you happen to be a Jewish parent, is: How do I get my kids to grow up like those Emanuel boys? You know: Ari, the wealthy L.A. talent agent who inspired an iconic sitcom character; Ezekiel, the bioethicist at The Hastings Center; and Rahm, former right-hand man to a president and now mayor of Chicago. Hurry to your local independent bookstore. Ezekiel has provided a how-to guide. Sort of. Don’t get too excited. “The Brothers Emanuel:... Full story
JERUSALEM (JTA)—Here are some stories out of Israel that you may have missed: Record-setting Shabbat table? The central Israeli city of Bnei Brak set what is believed to be the world’s longest Shabbat table. At 197 feet long, the table set with china plates, crystal goblets and silver candlesticks, as well as traditional Shabbat foods, comfortably seats more than 300, Ynet reported. The municipality, in conjunction with the Bnei Brak-based Coca-Cola Co. and the haredi Orthodox advertising agency... Full story
JERUSALEM—For a tiny country, Israel has a lot to offer: sacred sites, archaeology, beaches, mountains, food, wine—and even eco- and medical tourism. So officials are puzzled and concerned that the number of tourists visiting Israel has not grown much in recent years, topping out at 3.6 million per year. At a conference on tourism held in the capital, Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat said that in the near future he hopes to increase the number to 10 million tourists annually. But a lack of hotel rooms, Israeli bureaucracy and the ongoing vio... Full story
BANI ISRAEL, Senegal (JTA)—He will welcome you into his earthen-floor home, introduce you to his three wives, and let you sample their cooking. But Dougoutigo Fadiga does not want foreigners to come near the sacred tree of his village deep in the Senegalese bush. “The tree is holy grounds,” says Fadiga, president of this remote settlement of 4,000 souls. “Our Jewish ancestor, Jacob, planted it when his people first settled here 1,000 years ago.” The lush kapok tree towers over the parched s... Full story
Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), on June 4 is releasing his new book ‘Viral Hate: Containing Its Spread on the Internet,’ co-written with attorney Christopher Wolf, a pioneer in Internet law. The book discusses how racists and anti-Semites are using the Internet to disseminate their hateful information and poses tough questions about the responsibility of the public to fight against this phenomenon in the U.S., whose laws highly protect free speech. Fox... Full story
By Dan Pine j. the Jewish news weekly of Northern California As a professor of Jewish religion, Steve Weitzman studies the lives of biblical figures from Abraham to Zipporah. Now, thanks to his collaboration with genetics researcher Noah Rosenberg, he may be able to examine their DNA as well. The two Stanford University professors teamed up last semester to offer a course they called “From Generation to Generation: The Genetics of Jewish Populations.” The San Francisco-based Koret Fou... Full story
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... Full story
Sean Penn speaks out for Brooklynite’s freedom Sean Penn’s social activism usually conjures images of the Academy Award-winning actor on a wind-rocked boat rescuing victims of some kind of natural disaster. But on May 20 he was in a congressional hearing room in Washington with a haredi Orthodox Jewish family from Brooklyn pushing for the freedom of a man who has been held for nearly two years on house arrest in Bolivia. Jacob Ostreicher, a haredi father of five, invested money in a rice-growing venture in the South American country and was... Full story
TEL AVIV—Television characters from mob boss Tony Soprano to Liz Lemon on “30 Rock” suggest that power is a gateway to loneliness, corruption and unhappiness. But new findings from two Tel Aviv University researchers are challenging this perception. In a quest to discover whether power inevitably brings misery and emotional devastation, Ph.D. candidate Yona Kifer and her supervisor professor Daniel Heller of TAU’s Department of Organizational Behavior at the Faculty of Management have shown that power can actually make people happier. In thei... Full story
Self-help books encourage us to be optimists. If we don’t actually try new challenges, we’ll never know if it’s possible to accomplish something new or different. The writers of these works assume that the results of our actions will be positive. Of course, there is another point of view, one that sees change and hope as dangerous. This idea can be found in a philosophy offered by a character in Shalom Auslander’s latest novel “Hope: A Tragedy.” Auslander makes a profound statement that intrigued me because it was the opposite of what one mi... Full story
It looks eerily similar… I’m not that old, but I do remember photos of the devastation after the bombing of Berlin near the end of World War II. (I was merely a toddler). I just saw the photos on television of the devastation caused by a monster tornado that hit a town in Oklahoma. It looked eerily similar! Of course, the first thought that comes to mind is that we must help. But where do we start? What should we do? Let me suggest: The Jewish Federations of North America have opened a mai... Full story
Taking classic ’60s-era Jewish comedy albums and turning them into a modern-day musical? That’s a pretty big matzah ball hanging out there. Nothing actor Jason Alexander can’t handle. Best known now and forever as George Costanza from “Seinfeld,” he’s been a man of the theater throughout his long career. Alexander directs “When You’re In Love, the Whole World is Jewish,” a new musical revue that was set for its Bay Area debut with a three-day run starting May 24 at San Francisco’s Marin... Full story
In 1976, Steve Silberman, then a 19-year-old freshman at Oberlin College, took a bus to New York City to see Allen Ginsberg read. With Silberman was his first boyfriend. Silberman had been in the closet throughout high school, one of many reasons he drew inspiration from the outspokenly gay Ginsberg. “I sat in the front row, and Allen comes out, and I had never seen a middle-aged man look so happy and fully present and awake and authentic, and there was just no bullshit about him,” recalls Silberman, 55, now a San Francisco writer and con... Full story
