Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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“Tele-Vangelizing” in Israel?... What else could you call it? The name “tele-vangelizing” seems perfect! This comes from The World Jewish Congress Foundation Digest with my asides: “There’s something stirring in the air over Jerusalem and Israelis are feeling the static. It’s one thing for evangelical Christians to show their fervid support for Israel. It is quite another thing for them to tell Jews to convert in time for the Second Coming.” (Really? Sure, I pretended to convert when I was 5 ye...
Refaeli choice stirs a ruckus NEW YORK—Among Israelis, supermodel Bar Refaeli has been among the more controversial figures. It’s not because people are jealous of her looks. Or friends. Or wealth. Or success. Well, maybe partly. But more Israelis think of her negatively because she dodged the compulsory draft in the country. Refaeli married a family friend in order to be exempted from service. Now she is at the center of a dispute between the Israel Defense Forces and the Israeli Ministry of...
Report: ‘Prisoner X’ spy Ben Zygier tipped off Hezbollah SYDNEY (JTA)—The man known as Prisoner X unwittingly leaked classified information to Lebanese authorities, leading to the arrest of two Hezbollah agents who were spying for Israel. Ben Zygier, an Australian-Israeli citizen who was working for the Mossad, botched an attempt to recruit a spy for the agency, according to an expose in Der Spiegel. Zygier was attempting to restore his reputation in the Mossad by attempting to turn an enemy into an ally, according to the magazine. He had b...
SUNNY ISLES BEACH (JTA)—Sitting outside a Starbucks coffee shop in this small city north of Miami Beach, Paul Hariton recalls the dramatic night in 2002 when he and his wife decided to leave their native Venezuela. Leftist leader Hugo Chavez had just returned to power following a failed coup and the Haritons feared the political fallout. “We thought he was gone already,” said Hariton, 56. “We came back from a big opposition demonstration in the city center where several people were shot, i...
THESSALONIKI, Greece (JTA)—Antonis Samaras stood in the pale morning light coming through the stained glass windows of the only Thessaloniki synagogue to survive World War II and vowed, “Never again.” For Greek Jews marking the 70th anniversary of the destruction of this city’s historic Jewish community, the Greek prime minister’s words were long awaited. So was his presence—the first time a sitting Greek premier had set foot in a synagogue in 101 years. “We have to be very careful to re...
In preparation for my upcoming annual New York trip, I have been scouring the dining pages of the New York Times to find out about all the new, hot restaurants. Getting reservations is always a challenge. Booking weeks in advance is a must, even before your air tickets are purchased. But always, my first and last stops in this city of spectacular restaurants are at a New York deli. I’m not sure if it’s the nostalgia, the legendary wait staff or, as some say, the special New York City water that makes that pastrami sandwich heaven between two...
BALTIMORE (JTA)—Earlier this month, a “Seeking Kin” column concluded with Rozanne Dittersdorf of New York expressing hope that Phyllis Garfunkel, a childhood friend with whom she lost contact in the late 1940s, “found happiness over these years and created a family of her own.” And in a February column, Jerusalemite Sofia Greenberg wondered what became of her grandfather’s brother, Mordechai “Morris” Greenberg, who had left Ukraine for the United States more than a century ago. The missing have...
NEW YORK (JTA)—Trying to interest teenagers in activities is difficult, parents and teachers know well, especially given what technology has done to the attention spans of young people. So how to get them to partake in doing Jewish over other pursuits? The Jim Joseph Foundation commissioned two consulting firms to carry out a two-year study to figure it out. BTW Informing Change and Rosov Advisors mined data from 21 organizations geared toward Jewish and non-Jewish teens. Their conclusions: H...
In the entrance hallway of the Jewish Theological Seminary, Ben Rubin’s new video installation projects light onto Broadway and into the lobby and adjacent courtyard. Suspended from the high ceiling, the screen carries a series of 5,378 colored images, each inspired by a page of the Talmud. Rubin can’t read the text, but has long been drawn to the geometric designs, with blocks of text of different sizes in mostly concentric patterns, and narrow margins providing white space. His installation is part of a new exhibition at JTS, “Reading the V...
(JTA)—Frolicking with her fiance in the cool waters of the Suez Canal, Lilian Abada would never have imagined she was about to experience the first of a string of events that would ultimately lead her to flee her native Egypt for Israel with only one suitcase. When Abada and her future husband, Nisso, emerged from the water that day in 1956, a security agent was waiting for them. The two teenagers were arrested for spying for Israel and interrogated for days. They were released and then r...
It contains pure cane sugar, is chametz-free, may taste better than the year-round beverage—and is effectively off-limits in the state of California. While the story of kosher for Passover Coca-Cola may not be as riveting as God unleashing swarms of locust on the Egyptians or splitting the Red Sea, it’s one that, particularly for Jews in California, could rival at least some of the slower portions of the Passover Haggadah. Why on these eight days does the soda taste different than on all other days? Cane sugar. In its year-round formula, Coc...
With the civil war raging in Syria and Iran’s continued pursuit of its suspected nuclear weapons program, the Hezbollah terrorist group stands as a bridge to those growing threats facing Israel. The Lebanese-based Shi’a terror organization has become one of the most powerful paramilitary organizations in the Middle East. Amid an international effort to stem Hezbollah’s influence and operations, the European Union (EU) continues to pose an obstacle to the unity of that effort through its refus...
NEW YORK—Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai recently came to New York City to talk about his city of sun, sand, skyscrapers, and start-ups. With “just two minutes” on a winter afternoon to introduce the city and its entrepreneurs, he began his presentation with a weather report. Noting the damp, cold conditions, Huldai teased, “I’ve left behind the wonderful weather of Tel Aviv to talk about the start-up culture that began on the day the city was born.” During this event organized by the Consulate G...
Standing behind the podium of the 2013 NAACP Image Awards is a man in a tux with a red tie whose smooth, dark skin is stretched over a frame so long that it cannot fit through a standard doorway. Behind the same podium, a woman comes up to maybe the bottom of that man’s ribcage. She is fair skinned, black haired, ruby lipped, and sheathed in black lace. She looks like a Jewish Snow White. He is the National Basketball Association’s (NBA) all-time leading scorer, an actor, New York Times bes...
(JTA)—Four weeks before he murdered seven people in Toulouse, France, a cheerful Mohammed Merah was filmed laughing and showing off his skiing skills to friends at a popular Alpine resort. The footage, televised on March 6, formed the opening sequence in a controversial documentary about the 23-year-old, French-born jihadist who murdered three soldiers and four Jews last year in a rampage that shocked the country. Aired by public broadcaster France 3 ahead of the anniversary of the killings, the 105-minute film, titled “The Merah Aff...
PARIS (JTA)—Cigarette in one hand and cup of tea in the other, Matisyahu sat down with JTA in his closet-sized dressing room during his European tour to talk about his life, his music, how he’s raising his kids, and the recent changes in his religious outlook and physical appearance. The beatboxing reggae star once known for his signature beard and hasidic garb has left his yarmulke by the wayside, dyed his hair blond and moved to Los Angeles from the hasidic stronghold of Crown Heights, Bro...
MONTCLAIR, N.J. (JTA)—In the space of a single painting, Siona Benjamin juxtaposes feminism, Indian mythology and Jewish imagery. On a three-foot canvas, she’ll paint a portrait of a blue-skinned figure, usually a character from the Bible, with nods to Persian miniatures, Talmudic fables and Vishnu gods. Often there’s a message in Arabic. “I want people to realize there can be a universal message in Jewish art,” Benjamin told JTA. “I didn’t want to just be a Jewish artist, explaining my...
It was eight years ago, on a rainy afternoon at New York City’s Javits Center, while I was covering the annual Kosherfest trade show, that I first met one of the fathers of the modern kosher wine industry. At the time, I had just started writing The Jewish Week’s “Fruit of the Vine” column, and I was still relatively unknown in the industry. While most of the vendors, noticing my press badge, treated me courteously, there was one vendor who gave me the real VIP treatment—not, I think, because I...
