Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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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."...
(JNS) — Chris Christie, the former, two-term Republican governor of New Jersey who bid unsuccessfully for the GOP nomination in 2016, announced on June 6 that he is running for president in 2024. (See “A Jewish guide to Chris Christie’s presidential campaign” article on page 9A.) Christie, 60, declared his candidacy in a town hall at Saint Anselm College in New Hampshire. Joined by his wife, Mary Pat, four children and father, Christie spoke about the importance of choosing to go big rather than small and to unify the country. “We have cand...
WASHINGTON (JTA) - Until the certification of the electoral vote on Jan. 6, 2021, Mike Pence made sure to stay on the same page as Donald Trump - except, sometimes, when it came to the Jews. Both men delighted the pro-Israel establishment - Trump by fulfilling a long wish list of Israel's right-wing government, Pence by proving himself as a stalwart Christian Zionist through years in elected office. But just weeks after Trump assumed office, the difference in how each man approached Jewish...
(JTA) - Pat Robertson was trying to pay Jews a compliment. "They'd rather be polishing diamonds than fixing cars," he said in 2014 on his show on the Christian Broadcasting Network, the station the Southern Baptist minister founded in 1960 that had grown into an evangelical Protestant powerhouse. Robertson made his observation - while chuckling - in a conversation with a rabbi who was sympathetic to his conservative beliefs, Daniel Lapin. He clearly thought that diamond polishing was a good...
LA PLATA, Argentina (JTA) - The most successful run in Israeli soccer history came to an end on Thursday, as the country's under-20 team lost in the semifinals of the FIFA U-20 World Cup to Uruguay. The 1-0 loss means Israel will play the winner of the other semifinal match between Italy and South Korea in a third place game. Local Jews and Israeli visitors made up a large portion of the crowd of over 27,000 at the stadium in La Plata, Argentina, a city about 40 miles outside of Buenos Aires....
There are many wonderful ways to volunteer with the Jewish Pavilion and Bethanne Weiss has done almost all of them. She has chaired events, assisted with Orlando Senior Help Desk callers, helped with set up for events, sold raffle tickets, participated in holiday festivities, and much more. One of her favorite volunteer activities is to share her dog, Butch, with the seniors. Weiss brought Butch to Oakmonte Village where the seniors enjoyed all their antics but especially enjoyed watching Weiss...
On June 18, 1964, 16 rabbis and a Reform Jewish administrator, in St. Augustine at the request of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., were arrested and held in the St. Johns County Jail. Overnight, they wrote a letter titled “Why We Went to St. Augustine” that will be read by Mayor Nancy Sikes-Kline as part of the commemoration. Sikes-Kline has been a steadfast supporter of the St. Augustine Jewish Historical Society for many years. She is a native Floridian and has lived in St. Augustine sin...
June 21 — America and the Holocaust: A Series of Colloquies, virtual, 4 p.m. – 5:30 p.m. In each program, Dr. Michael Berenbaum will explore this complicated debate over America’s response to the Holocaust. In this final series, Dr. Berenbaum talks with Elliot Resnick on “Representative Sol Bloom: The Moral Conflicts of an American Jewish Congressman during the Holocaust.” Register at holocaustedu.org/events. June 22 — Venerated-Persecuted-Forgotten: Victims of Nazism at FC Bayern Munich An opening wine and cheese reception will be held on Jun...
Rosen JCC offers a STEAM Education The Rosen JCC Early Childhood Learning Center offers a STEAM education. STEAM uses a mix of Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts & Mathematics as its foundation. Children learn how these concepts are part of their lives every day. Lessons provide hands on learning opportunities. The skills they learn provide a strong educational foundation and encourage a child’s natural curiosity. Young children develop a lifetime love of learning and understanding of the world around them. The Rosen JCC ECLC is c...
(JTA) — The city of Miami Beach has agreed to pay $1.3 million to a small Orthodox synagogue that accused it of discrimination by sending inspectors more than once a week on average for two years At the same time, Congregation Bais Yeshaya D’Kerestir agreed to make changes to its parking and noise practices. The agreement brings to a close an extended dispute over whether the congregation, which meets in a single-family home owned by its rabbi, Arie Wohl, was a religious institution or a private gathering. The congregation argued that because i...
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Speaking before one of the leading architects of the Israeli government’s judicial overhaul, Vice President Kamala Harris stressed the importance of independent courts in a democracy. Harris’s speech on Tuesday came after a week in which opponents of the judicial overhaul — which would significantly weaken the Israeli Supreme Court — protested Israeli right-wing politicians at a series of events in New York City and elsewhere. Simcha Rothman, a far-right lawmaker who is a leading proponent of the judicial overhaul, was in at...
(JNS) — Israel’s foreign minister on Wednesday took issue with U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris weighing in on Israel’s judicial reform debate, saying she didn’t know a thing about it. Harris waded into Israel’s domestic political affairs during an event at the Israeli embassy in Washington on Tuesday celebrating the Jewish state’s 75th anniversary. “America will continue to stand for the values that have been the bedrock of the U.S.-Israel relationship, which includes continuing to strengthen our democracies, which as the [Israeli] ambassador...
(New York Jewish Week) — The New York Police Department has reported 100 anti-Jewish hate crimes in the city since the start of the year, a decrease of some 20 percent when compared to the same period last year. Anti-Jewish incidents have comprised nearly 45 percent of the 223 total hate crimes the NYPD has reported this year. Jews are targeted for hate crimes more than any other group in the city and have been the victims of a plurality of hate crimes each month. These incidents include assaults, vandalism such as swastikas being drawn in f...
(JNS) — I understand why universities boast about their most famous graduates. But should a university boast about a graduate who has claimed that members of U.S. Congress are “bought and paid for by the Israel lobby?” Brandeis University, where my daughter Alisa was a student when she was murdered in a suicide bombing in Israel in 1995 and where another one of my daughters graduated a few years later, recently took out a two-page advertisement in the Sunday New York Times headlined “University Quotas Were a Polite Way of Telling Jews Where The...
(JNS) — Have you noticed how many of Israel’s loudest defamers are women? And women from cultures or families that have either forced them to or rewarded them for wearing hijab? (And here I include the Western academic and media world, which has increasingly upheld a politically correct version of Sharia law). I am thinking of Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), political activist Linda Sarsour and Fatima Mousa Mohammed, who delivered a hate-filled, anti-Israel speech at the May 12 graduation ceremony at CUNY Law School. What these three women have in...
The Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and death camp complex is located in the city of Oświęcim about 70 km. (43.5 miles) east of the city of Krakow. It was initially built as a prison camp in 1940 by the Nazis for Polish prisoners. In 1941-1944 it was expanded and designated as the primary slave labor camp and Jew-killing facility as the “Final Solution” because of its convenient central location and good railway links to the main population centers of the Jews in Eastern Europe. This allowed the Nazi regime to “relocate” the large Jewish po...
(JNS) — “Death solves all problems — no man, no problem” Josef Stalin is quoted as having said. A significant number of influential people are now applying the Soviet dictator’s logic to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Their formulation is as simple as it is homicidal: “No Israel, no problem.” Iran’s rulers express their genocidal intentions forthrightly. “We will not back off from the annihilation of Israel, even one millimeter,” Brig.-Gen. Abolfazl Shekarchi, spokesman for the regime’s armed forces has vowed. Hezbollah and Palesti...
(JNS) — Apparently recognizing my intelligence, Google has named its artificial intelligence service after me. Given the current interest in antisemitism generated by the new strategy of the Biden administration which I have found wanting, it seems appropriate to see what Bard would suggest. Here is what (A)I recommend for dealing with the campus: • Increase awareness and education about antisemitism. Many students are unaware of the history and nature of antisemitism, or they may not understand how it can manifest itself in different ways. By...
(JNS) — With the barrage of untruths emanating from Palestinian Authority chief Mahmoud Abbas and his underlings, it is always a welcome and refreshing phenomenon when world leaders recognize and speak the truth about Israel and the Jews. Pat Robertson, who passed away last week, was one such leader. He was a great friend of the State of Israel and will be sorely missed. I am always grateful when leaders clearly state that the Jews are the rightful heirs to the Land of Israel, which was promised by the Almighty to the Jewish people. I a...
MORNING MINYANS Chabad of North Orlando and Chabad of Altamonte Springs are holding in-person minyans. Chabad of South Orlando — Monday - Friday, 8 a.m. and 10 minutes before sunset; Saturday, 9:30 a.m.; Sunday, 8:15 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...
(JNS) — After a week of testimony from survivors in the Pittsburgh synagogue mass shooting trial, a city police officer offered his perspective on the Shabbat-morning attack in October 2018 that left 11 Jewish worshippers dead. Officer Michael Saldutte testified that he drove faster than 100 miles per hour to reach the Tree of Life*Or L’Simcha Synagogue in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood after he learned about the attack. Upon arrival, Saldutte said he smelled gunpowder and saw bodies in pools of blood, the officer testified. The judge ove...
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...
Over 150 guests supported the Jewish Pavilion by attending "Jewish Pavilion on the Lake," a festive happy hour celebration. Eighteen vendors provided delicious appetizers and desserts along with signature drinks. Carina Borkon and Jason Mendelsohn co-chaired the evening and helped arrange for wonderful raffle prizes. The event was held at Venue on Lake Lily/Maitland Civic Center. Several thousand dollars were raised to benefit seniors in long-term care....
(JTA) - As he has launched his long-shot campaign for the Republican nomination, Chris Christie has taken aim squarely at the man he once enthusiastically endorsed: Donald Trump. But alongside portraying the former president as a danger to democracy, Christie has singled out another person for criticism who is not running for president, and who may not even work on a campaign: Jared Kushner, Trump's Jewish son-in-law and senior adviser. The Christie-Kushner feud goes back two decades, dating bac...
