Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JTA) — On Tuesday, Feb. 27, I was jolted awake at 3:30 a.m., wrestling with unwelcome consciousness until I eventually exhausted or bored myself back to sleep. Three hours later, I awoke to the news that my friend Ellen Bernstein — author, rabbi and the “birthmother of contemporary Jewish environmentalism” — had died in the middle of the night. I would claim that word of her passing, at the too-young age of 70, was shocking but for the fact that the previous day I visited her in the peaceful, homey Philadelphia hospital room where she was r...
ORLANDO (JTA) — Ethan Smith ranks fifth in his New Jersey high school class, scored high on the SAT and aced a full slate of five Advanced Placement tests last year. On Oct. 1, he submitted his application to a nearby Ivy League school, the University of Pennsylvania. Six days later, Hamas attacked Israel, launching a war that has been accompanied by a reported spike in antisemitism in the United States — including on college campuses. About two months after that, Penn President Liz Magill told Congress that calling for the genocide of Jew...
The instinct for many older people is to stay at home as long as possible. Even if a person at home has visitors, he or she may still be alone most of the time, especially if he or she no longer drives. One option is to hire a companion care company to facilitate your transportation needs. Another option is to contact Go Go Grandparent, 855-464-6872 (an Uber service geared toward the elderly). Jewish Family Services, 407-644-7593, offers a RIDE program for medical appointments, etc. There are also public transportation services such as Send a...
(JTA) — Rob Reiner, best known for his acting role in the 1970s sitcom “All in the Family” and for directing a series of beloved comedies — including “This is Spinal Tap,” “The Princess Bride” and “When Harry Met Sally” — is getting serious in his latest project. “God and Country,” which hits theaters this week, examines what Reiner sees as the troubling rise of Christian nationalism. The Jewish filmmaker produced the documentary, along with his wife Michele and his friend Steve Okin, with Dan Partland as director. The film follows the hist...
BERLIN (JTA) – Israeli director Guy Nattiv and British actor Helen Mirren have received a Dove Award from the Cinema for Peace Foundation for their joint work in the 2023 biopic, “Golda,” in which Mirren stars as Golda Meir, the fourth prime minister of Israel. The film focuses on Meir’s role during the Yom Kippur War in 1973. Nattiv and Mirren attended the awards ceremony in Berlin this week, where their prize was presented by 102-year-old Margot Friedlander, one of the oldest remaining Holocaust survivors. The ceremony took place contemp...
This March, Marilyn Shapiro will be celebrating a milestone in her writing career: the tenth anniversary of her blog, There Goes My Heart. Wait! You don't know she has a blog? And if you knew, you have never typed www.theregoesmyheart.me into your browser? Well, you don't know what you have been missing! In 2014, with only about 10 stories published in the Capital Region, New York's The Jewish World, Shapiro decided that she needed a blog as another way to share her stories and to appease her...
Joe Buchanan, a convert to Judaism inspired by the traditions of Americana music and his faith, will be Artist in Residence on March 1 and 2 at Congregation Ohev Shalom. It was just after a harrowing 2011 visit to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., that Buchanan listened with astonishment as his wife of 13 years, April, revealed something she hadn't yet told him: she was born Jewish because her mother was Jewish. He knew she had been raised in Texas by a Christian father and a...
(JTA) — Was the first antisemitism-themed ad to air at the Super Bowl tactful or tasteless? How much did it have to do with Israel? And what is “Jewish hate,” anyway? Those are some of the questions that have arisen after the Foundation to Combat Antisemitism, the group founded in 2019 by New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, placed a 30-second ad during the game titled “Silence” that featured Clarence B. Jones, the longtime advisor and speechwriter for Martin Luther King Jr. (The organization also replayed a different ad it produced...
(JNS) - "Seinfeld" co-creator Larry David is ending a decade-long gig as a "social assassin," making audiences howl with laughter and squirm with embarrassment at the outlandish predicaments he created for the fictionalized version of himself in 11 seasons of the show "Curb Your Enthusiasm." The 12th and reportedly final season debuted on HBO and the streaming platform Max on Sunday. Nine more episodes will run weekly, concluding with the series finale on April 7. The pop-culture site Vulture...
Transfer Pants are high quality unisex pants designed to move disabled persons safely, easily and comfortably. They have patented handles sewn into the pants and the liner to prevent falls and injuries to mobility challenged individuals. They have been specifically designed with caregivers in mind and have handles on the front, side and back, front zippers, pockets, etc. They are machine washable and durable. Transfer Pants were created by Dr. Rennie O’Brien, a chiropractor in San Francisco who was transferring his 91-year-old mother from a w...
Just now, Friday morning, 10:45 a.m. I am in the kitchen, cleaning, cooking, making room on the refrigerator for a new Shabbat list. So many magnets and photos crowd the refrigerator door…what do I remove to make room. What don’t we need. I love all the photos. Here sticking out and taking up way too much space is a calendar from the Arad Country Club. This is where I swim during the winter. I got my daughter a membership, too. She likes the gym. I’m thrilled that someone in my family enjoys exercise! So many kids are lazy….not my girl! B...
When Alon Fishman visited Israel in early January on a group trip, it wasn't his first time in the country. But Fishman, 23, had never seen Israel like this before. When his Birthright Israel group arrived at the Western Wall, they found it uncharacteristically empty, and the plaza featured a new memorial with the names of the 1,200 victims of the Oct. 7 attack. For Fishman, a native of Rockland County, New York, the muted visit was a poignant reflection of the times - and a powerful emotional...
(JNS) - As the Good Book says ... The musical "Fiddler on the Roof" first proclaimed Shalom Aleichem to Broadway audiences in 1964, with Zero Mostel belting out the iconic "If I Were a Rich Man" song as Tevye the Dairyman, the father of seven daughters (five of whom have roles in the play). Bea Arthur played Yenta in the production, whose Boris Aronson-designed sets evoked Marc Chagall's shtetl paintings. Sixty years later, Tevye's misquotations muddying the Torah, coupled with his witty...
Encourage caregivers to familiarize themselves with some basic tips to help maximize the safety of the seniors in their care while minimizing the risks associated with electricity. Electrical accidents are a leading cause of home fires every year. Electrical fires are more common in older homes with aging electrical systems. Tips: 1. Verify that the home’s electrical system is in compliance with the most up to date electrical codes. Contact a licensed electrician to conduct a quick home electrical safety inspection. The electrician should d...
Last week, the Katzen family suffered the terrible loss of Harry "Hank" Katzen Z"L who succumbed to a cancer that was more stubborn than the man himself and that is saying something! This loss comes on the heels of the loss of Hank's father of blessed memory, Marc Katzen Z"L, who sadly died Dec. 4, 2022. This is a lot for any family to absorb in a short period of time much less because of the outsized role these gentlemen played in the lives of their respective families. However, for the...
When 18-year-old TJ Katz was elected last February to be international president of BBYO after four years of deep involvement with the Jewish youth organization, the New Jersey teen was exceedingly excited. Serving as the face of a movement that reaches over 70,000 teens in 62 countries, Katz told an interviewer, put him in a unique position "to tangibly impact the lives of thousands of people." After graduating high school, Katz deferred admission by a year to the University of Florida to...
Keep a folder of all medical information. It is good to have a binder in addition to a folder on the computer, so you can take critical medical information with you to appointments. Information Needed: • Health insurance cards, Medicare cards, and so on • Appointment reminder cards from health care providers • A list of medications including dosages, frequency, date started and reason • A medical history • A list of emergency contacts, relationship, addresses and all phone numbers • A sheet for recording the date of visits, the provider and any...
(JTA) - Music critic Jeremy Eichler's study of how classical composers made music after the Holocaust was named the book of the year by the Jewish Book Council, which will present the National Jewish Book Awards at an in-person ceremony in March. "Time's Echo: The Second World War, the Holocaust, and the Music of Remembrance" was named the Everett Family Foundation Book of the Year and won both the Gerrard and Ella Berman Memorial History Award and the Holocaust Award in Memory of Ernest W....
(JNS) — At the beginning of the 16th century, my family fled the Iberian Peninsula, which had been their home, according to family tradition, for the better part of two millennia, having been exiled directly from the Land of Israel. They appear to have left soon after the Lisbon Massacre of 1506, an antisemitic pogrom that killed thousands of Jews. This was only 14 years after my family entered Portugal from Spain after the Spanish Jews were expelled by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella’s infamous edict and 12 years since they tried to lea...
(JTA) - Early in the new drama "Origin," the Pulitzer Prize-winning Black author Isabel Wilkerson (played by Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor) calls her cousin from Berlin to share that, as part of her research into American racism, she intends to learn more about the Nazis' treatment of Jews. Her cousin is unimpressed. "Leave Jewish folks alone," Marion (Niecy Nash) advises Isabel. "They don't need you. Write about us." But this movie's version of Wilkerson can't abide by that. In her mind, the fates of...
(JNS) - An exhibition of photographs culled from an international tribute to some of the last Holocaust survivors was held at U.N. Headquarters in New York on Wednesday, three days before International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The event, dubbed "We're Still Standing," showcased 35 carefully selected photographs from a collection of 455 original pieces curated by renowned photographers Jim Hollander and Rina Castelnuovo and compiled in the "The Lonka Project." A panel from the "We're Still Stan...
It's with a heavy heart that Personal Mini Storage announces the passing of our co-founder, Ron Shader, an inspirational figure in the storage industry. Ron passed away peacefully in Dec. 30, 2023, at the age of 91, after dedicating over 40 remarkable years to the company, leaving behind a legacy of kindness, vision, and unwavering dedication to his work and those around him. Ron, along with his late brother Stan, founded Personal Mini Storage in 1982. Over the next four decades, they...
Medigap is only for original Medicare enrollees not advantage plan participants. There are 10 federally approved plans with the letters a, b, c, d, f, g, k, l, m and n. Each letter plan must provide the same basic benefits regardless of the insurer or the location. Policies are sold by private insurance companies and there are a lot of choices. Prices vary dramatically. The best time to buy a Medigap plan is generally when you turn 65. While most seniors face major adjustments when transitioning to an elder-care community, Jewish seniors face a...
(New York Jewish Week) - New York City kitchens are notoriously small. Nonetheless, on Friday Congregation Rodeph Sholom on the Upper West Side unveiled a 35-foot-long challah that they and their partners hope will break a world record. The gargantuan loaf was made in collaboration with the Jewish Federations of North America and the Orthodox Union with the aim of besting the current record-holder: a challah baked in Australia in 2019 that was just over 32 feet. The 35-foot challah - braided in...
(JTA) – The year’s biggest movie phenomenon was a one-two punch of blockbusters with Jewish roots — and they both came up big at Tuesday’s Oscar nominations. “Oppenheimer,” Christopher Nolan’s biopic of the Jewish “father of the atomic bomb,” led the year’s nominations with 13, including best picture and director, and is favored by many prognosticators to win the big prize. The film’s rendition of J. Robert Oppenheimer covers a fair amount of Jewish ground, including his personal animus toward the Nazis; his recruitment of expelled European...
