Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JNS.org)-New photos posted on the Facebook page of the International Space Station (ISS) paint a detailed picture of Israeli topography. The photos-taken by NASA astronaut Barry Wilmore, commander of the current Expedition 41 to the ISS-were shot as the station passed over Israel from a height of 268 miles. "Israel-completely clear-on Christmas morning from the International Space Station. Astronaut Barry Wilmore woke up early on Christmas to reflect upon the beauty of the Earth and snap some...
Temple L'Chayim, a Reform/Conservative congregation, conducting traditional services in Clermont, Florida, since it was first organized in early 2014, announces the grand opening of their new location within the Clermont City Center as of January 2015. Led by Cantor Isaac Kriger and Rabbi Howard Schwartz, Temple L'Chayim is the only Jewish synagogue with both a rabbi and a cantor in Lake County, Florida. The two clergy provide a very special blend for the spirituality and musical enhancement of...
Ever since her first stage performance, when she was seven, in the JCC Players' production of "Oliver!," Andra London has loved the stage. From that humble beginning, London went on to perform for six years with the Orlando Opera Company Youth Ensemble before forming the singing trio Visions during her teen years with two other local Jewish young ladies. The group made four albums and performed 150 concerts in 80 cities nationwide. "One beautiful byproduct of Visions was the opportunity to trave...
NEW YORK (JTA)—A Palestinian-backed U.N. resolution setting a one-year deadline for a peace deal with Israel failed to garner sufficient votes for passage in the U.N. Security Council. The resolution, which was voted on Dec. 30, was aimed at achieving a full Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank by late 2017. Eight nations on the 15-member council votes yes, two voted no and five abstained. Nine votes were required for passage. Had nine votes been obtained, the United States, which voted against the resolution, was expected to exercise its Secu...
NEW YORK (JTA)-United Synagogue Youth voted to relax its rules barring its teenage board members from dating non-Jews. The amendment was adopted Monday in Atlanta at the annual international convention of the Conservative movement's youth group. The change affects the 100 or so teen officers who serve on USY's national board and 17 regional boards. The thousands of teens who participate in USY programs have not been subject to any such bans. After some debate at the convention, the USY board...
HarperCollins, one of the world's largest publishing houses that sells English-language atlases to schools in the Middle East, made a large, intentional mistake-it omitted labeling Israel. In fact, the Middle East Atlases showed Jordan and Syria extending to the Mediterranean and clearly marked the position of the West Bank. The decision to omit Israel elicited a tremendous amount of anger online, and now HarperCollins is pulling its Middle East Atlas from sale in all territories, and has...
(JNS.org) The Knesset Finance Committee on Dec. 21, 2014 voted to allocate $3.1 million to build a tourism center in the Jewish community of Barkan in Samaria. Committee members from the Likud, Habayit Hayehudi, and Yisrael Beiteinu parties voted in favor of funding the center. “The visitors’ center in question is a crucial asset for Israel,” Likud MK Gila Gamliel said, according to Israel Hayom. “It’s intended to present scientific exhibits to thousands of young people and school pupils.” Responding to criticism of the vote’s result by Lab...
On Dec. 25, 2014, members of Temple Israel gathered for their second annual mitzvah day. In-house projects were started and finished as well as community projects, and it all ended with dinner prepared by congregant Julia Fineberg. The youth lounge was moved and refurbished. Children made blankets for Project Linus, letters were written to both U.S. soldiers and those serving in the IDF, the children baked brownies and cookies for first responders, and clothes/toiletries were collected for...
On Tuesday evening, Dec. 16, Jewish families from Congregation Sinai and Summit Greens lit candles to celebrate the first night of Chanukah. On hand were Lynn and Joe Goldovitz, spiritual leaders, and the children of the Congregation Sinai Religious School and their families. Also attending were about 150 people from Congregation Sinai and Summit Greens. Music was played, songs were sung, Chanuah gelt was passed out to all the children courtesy of the Shalom Club. The dessert table abounded...
It sometimes seems as if the see-saw debate about the true intentions of Mahmoud Abbas and his Palestinian Authority has been with us for an eternity. One day, we’ll be saying that Abbas is genuinely a moderate, that he really is committed to a two-state solution, that perhaps he’s the guy upon whom the cautious, unsentimental Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should risk a bet. The next day, we’ll encounter yet another inciting, spiteful Abbas soundbite and it’s back to the drawing board. I don’t think that Abbas is the Machiavel...
Remember that “arson attack” last month by “Jewish extremists” against a West Bank mosque? Remember how that outrageous assault made headline news around the world? Remember how it showed that “both sides”—not just the Arabs—are guilty of violence, and “both sides”—not only Israelis—are suffering? Well, guess what: it was a lie. The period from late October through late November was a time of escalating Palestinian terrorism against Israelis. On Oct. 22, a terrorist (or, according to the Palestinian Authority, a “hero”) drove his car into a Jer...
The dramatic event often rips away the thin gossamer of protection that keeps a corrupt institution from exposure to the antiseptic of public outrage. Such an event is occurring for the second time in 2014 at Brandeis University. Daniel Mael, a Brandeis student and professional blogger, took to the Internet to expose fellow student Khadijah Lynch’s raw hatred for the New York Police Department, America, and the “Zionist” institution where she is getting an education and serves as a student leader and adviser to impressionable younger stude...
Several months ago, there was some alarm in my local community regarding numerous sightings of coyotes. The trouble was a few cases of missing and dead small animals—cats and dogs alike. In discussing this matter with friends and neighbors, it seems there was a general confusion and puzzlement. How could these wild troublemakers have found their way to the civilized metropolises of College Park and Winter Park? One thoughtful friend suggested that they must have been dropped off from some wild animal park. In the last years, brown bears have tu...
As 2014 draws to a close, I can’t help but reflect on this year’s dramatic increase in anti-Semitic and anti-Israel attacks, and hope that the coming year will see more Jews actively join the fight to reverse these trends. In Israel itself, 2014 saw another round of the now-familiar cycle: Israeli concessions to “advance” the fake peace process, Palestinian Arab rejection, and increased violence against Jews. This year’s violence included the murder of the three teenage boys, car attacks killing adults and infants, multiple murders by stabbi...
The most notorious living perpetrator of genocide can sleep a little easier. The International Criminal Court (ICC), which five years ago indicted Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir for organizing the genocide in Darfur, recently suspended further action on Darfur because of the failure of the United States and other countries to help bring Bashir to justice. Ironically, the ICC’s announcement came just before the 70th anniversary of a long-forgotten double-cross by the Roosevelt administration of its own ambassador to the Allied c...
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, 7:30 a.m.; Saturday, 9:30 a.m.; Sunday, 9 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, JANUARY 9 Light Shabbat...
Arnold Beroth of Orlando, passed away at his residence on Tuesday, Dec. 23, 2014. He was 85 years old. A native of Brooklyn, he spent the greater part of his working career in real estate sales. He was married to the late Betty Beroth, his wife of more than 58 years, who passed away in December 2013. Arnold and Betty relocated to the Orlando area from Margate, New Jersey, in 2012, to be closer to their daughter and grandchildren. Mr. Beroth is survived by his son, Richard (Denise) of Margate, N.J.; his daughter, Connie (Clyde) Edson of...
Paula Fitzer of Longwood passed away Dec. 26, 2014, at Florida Living Nursing Center in Apopka. She was 93 years old. Mrs. Fitzer was born on Nov. 16, 1921, in Manitowoc, Wis., to the late Julius and Dora Graff. After graduating from high school in Manitowoc, she attended the University of Wisconsin and married the late Joseph Etzkin on June 22, 1942. She was active in the Milwaukee B’nai B’rith, and worked as a bookkeeper for several firms in her lifetime, including American Greetings in Cleveland, where she and her husband moved in 1963. The...
Beverly Lessing of Lake Mary, passed away at Central Florida Regional Hospital in Sanford on Dec. 17, 2014. She was 84 years old. Mrs. Lessing was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on Sept.15, 1930, to the late Jack Abram and Claire Jendlin Yaillen. Mrs. Lessing, widow of the late Ralph Lessing, was a high school graduate and homemaker. She is survived by her son, Rob Lessing of Orlando; and daughter, Vicki Stott of Lake Mary; seven grandchildren; and six great-grandchildren. She is also survived by her sister, Fredlyn Shechtman of Miami....
Helen Mausner of Winter Park, passed away on Saturday, Dec. 20, 2014, at VITAS Inpatient Care Unit in Winter Park. She was 92 years old. Mrs. Mausner, a native of New York City, was born on April 5, 1922, to the late Isidore and Dora Blau Henner. She was a high school graduate and homemaker and was the widow of the late Abraham Mausner, who passed away in 2004. According to her family, she was always ready with a quick wit and enjoyed a good party. Mrs. Mausner is survived by her sons, Elliot (Lisa) of Winter Park and Larry of Oviedo; and four...
The Jewish Pavilion is a mobile community center providing outreach to seniors in more than 50 assisted living and nursing homes all over greater Orlando. The Pavilion is not in one particular place, but is a place in the heart that can be found wherever and whenever its volunteers (often with their families) and staff come together to benefit our elder community in long-term care. Still people ask: Where exactly can I find the Jewish Pavilion? While the Pavilion has a tiny business office in...
The “Seeking Kin” column aims to help reunite long-lost relatives and friends. BALTIMORE (JTA)—The ringing telephone that awakened David Rashti early one morning brought with it a jolt the Los Angeles-area resident couldn’t have anticipated. The caller was someone Rashti had never met or even heard of: Rachel Levy, a resident of Safed, Israel. She spoke Hebrew, he spoke English and they were unable to understand one other—until Levy utilized her weak knowledge of Farsi. When Rashti, 47, heard “Iran”—not the country but the name of his long-los...
The Jewish Pavilion will host the Pearls of the Pavilion Luncheon at the home of board member Elaine Gamson on Thursday, Jan. 15, 2015 at 11 a.m. for members who have made a $500 minimum donation to the Jewish Pavilion Membership Appeal (can be paid throughout the year; membership year is September-August). At this luncheon, the Pearls of the Pavilion (POP) will learn about the eye-popping art-work of multi-media conceptual pop artist Stephen Gamson, who will discuss pieces from his new series...
The law of the land?... This article appeared in a recent Issue of the World Jewish Congress Digest (WJC) and I pass it along to you (with asides by me): "A new law was recently approved by the Greek Parliament that sets prison sentences of up to three years and fines of up to $34,000 for individuals and $130,000 for groups convicted of 'inciting acts of discrimination, hatred or violence' over race, religion or disability. It also calls for similar punishment for those who deny or praise the...
JERUSALEM (JTA)—A Palestinian man was crushed to death as he tried to get through a West Bank checkpoint. Ahmad Samih Bdeir, 39, a construction worker from the village of Farun in the northern West Bank, died Dec. 31 at the Efraim checkpoint, the Palestinian Maan news agency reported. Bdeir reportedly was choked to death in the crush of people trying to get through the checkpoint. More than 15,000 Palestinian workers pass through al-Tayba checkpoint every day, Maan reported, citing the Palestinian Federation of Trade Unions. A year ago, a...
