Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JTA) – Broadway made a statement about antisemitism Sunday evening, as two high-profile shows on the subject this season — the play “Leopoldstadt” and the musical revival “Parade” — pulled in multiple major Tony awards. Some of the shows’ honorees, in turn, made statements of their own linking hatred of Jews with other forms of hatred, including homophobia and anti-transgender sentiment at a time when trans inclusion is under attack in many places. “Leopoldstadt,” Tom Stoppard’s epic semi-autobiographical play about three generations of...
(New York Jewish Week) — Jews and comic books, two deeply entwined entities, will be the subject of a new pop culture convention coming to New York this fall. Billed as the “ultimate comics and pop culture event,” the first-ever Jewish Comics Experience, or “JewCE,” will take place at the Center for Jewish History on November 11-12. Created by Fabrice Sapolsky, a comic book creator and publisher, and Dr. Miriam Eve Mora, the director of academic and public programs at the Center for Jewish History, the event aims to be “an inclusive c...
(JTA) — Chicago Cubs first baseman Matt Mervis is selling T-shirts and hats emblazoned with his nickname spelled in Hebrew to raise money for the Israel Association of Baseball. “It’s a great cause to help grow the game in Israel,” Mervis told MLB.com on Thursday, “and try to build some fields over there.” Mervis, who is Jewish and a hotly anticipated addition to the Cubs this year, played for Team Israel at the World Baseball Classic in March. He is nicknamed “Mash” because of his homerun hitting power, a moniker that some fans and retailers s...
An exhibit at the new Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., asks visitors, "Who are you? and features a diverse array of Jews, June 1, 2023. Read the article titled "DC's new Jewish museum highlights Jews who shaped the nation's capital, from a Confederate spy to RBG."...
WASHINGTON (JTA) - Washington, D.C.'s new Jewish museum features at least two notorious women from history. One is Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the first Jewish woman to serve as a Supreme Court justice, who was dubbed "Notorious RBG" late in her life by a cluster of fans. When the Capital Jewish Museum opens next week, it will launch with Ginsburg at its center when a traveling exhibit on her life has its final stop here. The other is the 19th-century figure Eugenia Levy Phillips, whom the museum chara...
(JNS) — There could hardly be a timelier book than “Betrayal: The Failure of American Jewish Leadership.” Though antisemitism springs eternal, it has sprung up with particular force in recent years, especially in the United States. As editors Charles Jacobs and Avi Goldwasser put it, “American Jewry is under siege, ideologically and physically. In the media, on college campuses, in the streets of major cities, even in high schools and in Congress, Jews and the Jewish state are smeared, hated a...
(JTA) — Like some Jewish baseball fans, many dedicated Jewish comic book readers keep a running roster of Jewish heroes that have appeared in the “major leagues” of the comic world: Marvel, DC and some independent publishers’ titles. Many know the handful of often-discussed Jewish characters: The Thing, whose adult bar mitzvah and Jewish wedding were major storylines; the Jewish star-wearing X-Men character Kitty Pryde; one-time Batwoman Kate Kane; and the popular supervillain Harley Quinn, to name a few. Moon Knight recently became the fir...
(JTA) — A new Bible translation that eschews gendered pronouns for God is now available through Sefaria, the online library of Jewish texts, prompting backlash on social media from some who see the change as a sacrilege. The Revised Jewish Publication Society edition of the Bible, which the 135-year-old Jewish publishing house has released in partnership with Sefaria, is the first major update to the JPS translation of the Tanakh in nearly 40 years. So far, only the books comprising the Prophets, the Hebrew Bible’s second section, are available...
(JTA) - "The Zone of Interest," a sobering drama about a Nazi commander's behavior during the Holocaust, won the Grand Prix at this year's Cannes Film Festival on Saturday, as one of several new arthouse films about the legacy of antisemitism that premiered at the festival. Based on a novel by Martin Amis, the film is a fictional portrayal of the life of Rudolph Hoess, the real-life Auschwitz death camp commandant. It shows his family's efforts to live blissfully unaware of the atrocities their...
The bladder can change with age. Follow these 13 tips to keep your bladder healthy. Drink enough fluids, especially water. Most healthy people should try to drink six to eight, 8-ounce glasses of fluid each day. Water is the best fluid for bladder health. Ask your healthcare provider how much fluid is healthy for you. Limit alcohol and caffeine. Cutting down on alcohol and caffeinated foods and drinks — such as coffee, tea, chocolate, and sodas will help. Quit smoking. If you smoke, take steps to quit. If you don’t smoke, don’t start. Avoid...
(JNS) - The singer and actor, who was president of ZOA's California chapter, died on May 21 at the age of 95. Some 15 or 20 years ago, Mort Klein, national president of the Zionist Organization of America, saw a man who looked a lot like entertainer Ed Ames at an American Israel Public Affairs Committee policy conference in Washington. "He was tall. He stood out among everyone," Klein told JNS. "I knew it wasn't Ed Ames, because he was at an AIPAC conference. Ed Ames wouldn't be at an AIPAC...
This story originally appeared on My Jewish Learning. (JTA) — The Shavuot holiday that we observed last month commemorates two different kinds of harvests. Originally an agricultural festival, Shavuot marked the culmination of the wheat harvest in the ancient land of Israel. Only later did the rabbis layer on the receiving of the Torah to the holiday. Just as we celebrate the bounty of the land, we celebrate the bounty of Torah — the sustenance that feeds our hearts and nourishes our souls. In ancient days, as the wheat blossomed in its gol...
(JTA) — The Israeli satirical drama film “Concerned Citizen” opens with the sacrosanct rituals of a bourgeois Tel Aviv life: a robot vacuum slides gracefully across the floor; lush house plants are watered; vegetables are blended into green juice. The score from the Bellini opera “Norma” plays in the background. Then a car alarm rudely interrupts the utopia. It only gets worse from here for Ben and Raz, a progressive Israeli gay couple (played by actors Shlomi Bertonov and Ariel Wolf, who are a...
(JTA) - After five seasons, 20 Emmy awards and plenty of Jewish jokes, "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel" aired its final episode. The lauded Amazon Prime show from Amy Sherman-Palladino has enveloped viewers in a shimmering, candy-colored version of New York during the late 1950s and early 1960s - a world in which "humor" has meant Jewish humor and "culture" has meant Jewish culture. But as it comes to an end, the show's Jewish legacy is still up for debate: Did its representation of Jews on...
(JNS) - Israeli President Isaac Herzog met on Monday morning with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, whose ChatGPT has quickly become an international sensation. Launched in November, ChatGPT is an artificially intelligent chatbot that can have human-like conversations, answer questions and assist people in writing assignments. The software has been made available to the public through an app, and millions of users have used it primarily for writing and research. Herzog made waves in February when, while...
(JTA) - On Wednesday morning, Alfred Moses, 94, sat in a small white armchair at a round wooden table in a Manhattan office building as a historian gingerly turned the pages of a more than 1,000-year-old book in front of him. Two weeks earlier, Moses had paid a record-setting sum for the book - more than $38 million in total. But this was the first time he had ever seen it. The book was the Codex Sassoon, the world's oldest nearly-complete copy of the Hebrew Bible, and Moses had purchased it on...
For three weeks my family experienced an unimaginable nightmare from which we could not wake. On June 24, 2021, my world ended as I knew it. At 3 a.m., my mother received a news notification that a building had collapsed by Miami Beach. She had a mother’s instinct that this was the building Nicky and Luis lived in — my beautiful 26-year-old sister and her 28-year-old husband. We immediately drove to Surfside where my sister’s building once stood and saw an image that never stops invading my mind: half a building. I remember counting the floor...
(JTA) — When my wife and I were planning our wedding, we thought it might be cool to hire a klezmer band. This was during the first wave of the klezmer revival, when groups like The Klezmatics and The Klezmer Conservatory Band were rediscovering the genre of Jewish wedding music popular for centuries in Yiddish-speaking Eastern Europe. Of course we also wanted to dance to rock ‘n’ roll and needed musicians who could handle Sinatra for our parents’ benefit, so we went with a more typical wedding band. Modernity won out over tradition. Or did...
Shavuot is a two-day holiday, beginning at sundown following the 5th of Sivan and lasting until nightfall of the 7th of Sivan (May 25-27, 2023). In Israel it is a one-day holiday, ending at nightfall of the 6th of Sivan. Shavuot combines two major religious observances. First is the grain harvest of the early summer. Second is the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai seven weeks after the exodus from Egypt. The first determines the ritual for the holiday, which was one of the three pilgrimage...
As a new member with the North Orlando Chabad in Florida with Rabbi Yanky Majesky and his wife Chanshy, I was elated to be invited to attend Shabbat in the Heights that takes place in Crown Heights, New York City, New York for the Hakhel: Year of Gathering. I had no idea what to expect. I have never been to New York City or in a fully Jewish environment. With the months of Shabbos, Women's Studies and JLI courses at Rabbi Majesky's Chabad you would think that it would prepare you for this experi...
(JNS) — Among all the tales of heroism and death during the Holocaust, how many of us are aware of the rescue of nearly 50,000 Jews by the citizens of Bulgaria? In 1943, despite the planned and already commenced deportation of Bulgarian Jews to the Nazi death camps, thousands were released from the trains bound for Auschwitz and allowed to go home. The newly released “Acts of Resistance” by Dominic Carrillo is a fictionalized account of the actions of Bulgarian citizens that succeeded in stopp...
If a book were a candy store and I was a kid, "Every Generation's Story: 75 Years of American Christian Engagement with Israel" would be my kid in a candy store scenario. As I read page after page, I couldn't help but be inspired and drawn into one author's story after another, wanting more and more. As an Orthodox Jew called to build bridges between Jews and Christians, I am blessed by many, many deep friendships with Christians who love and support Israel unconditionally. Biblically. Even...
Caregiver burn out is real and can be very harmful. How can you take care of a loved one if you are exhausted or not feeling well. Consider options such as support groups, adult day care and hiring a part-time companion. There are many free resources for caregivers. The Jewish Pavilion has the Orlando Senior Help Desk; a free information and referral service 407-678-9363. AARP recommends the following: Create the Good, createthegood.org CaregiverAction Network, 855-227-3640, caregiveraction.org Family Caregiver Alliance, 800-445-8106,...
Standing in front of the Bielefeld, Germany, railroad station in June 2018, Harry Lowenstein traced his fingers over the all-too-familiar names etched into the Holocaust memorial: His father, David. His mother, Bernhardine. His sister, Klaere. Aunts and uncles and cousins. Friends and neighbors. During the Nazis' reign of terror, his family and hundreds of Jews from surrounding areas had stood on the station's platform before being herded onto railroad cars for the thousand-mile journey to ghett...
Bernie Marcus grew up dirt poor. Now he's giving away his fortune. Bernie Marcus is passionate about giving all his money away. The Home Depot founder is a signatory of "The Giving Pledge," a group of billionaire philanthropists who have committed to giving the majority of their money away to charity, during their lifetime or posthumously. Bernie has established a foundation which works tirelessly to support various causes. After he dies, he wants it dissolved and all his money to be given away...
