Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on January 20, 2020

All of the Ashkenazi Jews alive today can trace their roots to a group of about 330 people who lived 600 to 800 years ago.

So says a new study in the journal Nature Communications. An international team of scientists sequenced the complete genomes of 128 healthy Ashkenazi Jews and compared each of those sequences with the others, as well as with with the DNA of 26 Flemish people from Belgium. Their analysis allowed them to trace the genetic roots of this population to a founding group in the Middle Ages.

Ashkenaz in Hebrew refers to Germany, and Ashkenazi Jews are those who originated in Eastern Europe. (Sephardic Jews, by contrast, are from the areas around the Mediterranean Sea, including Portugal, Spain, the Middle East and Northern Africa.) About 80% of modern Jews have Ashkenazi ancestry, according to the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Albert Einstein was an Ashkenazi Jew, as were Gertrude Stein and Carl Sagan. Steven Spielberg and Scarlett Johansson are also Ashkenazi Jews, along with three current members of the U.S. Supreme Court (Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan).

Despite their close ties with Europe, no more than half of their DNA comes from ancient Europeans, the researchers found. Only 46% to 50% of the DNA in the 128 samples originated with the group of people who were also the ancestors of the Flemish people in the study. Those ancient people split off from the ancestors of todays Middle Easterners more than 20,000 years ago, with a founding group of about 3,500 to 3,900 people, according to the study.

The rest of the Ashkenazi genome comes from the Middle East, the researchers reported. This founding group fused with the European founding group to create a population of 250 to 420 individuals. These people lived 25 to 32 generations ago, and their descendants grew at a rate of 16% to 53% per generation, the researchers calculated.

Today there are more than 10 million Ashkenazi Jews around the world, including 2.8 million in Israel, according to the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

The authors of the new study come from nearly two dozen research groups in New York City, Belgium and Israel. Many of the co-authors are not Jewish, but they are interested in studying this group because it is genetically isolated (since Jews have historically married within their faith, their gene pool is closed). That makes it easier to identify genes linked to specific diseases, like Parkinsons and cancer, links that could well apply to non-Jews as well.

The study was funded by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation, along with several private foundations.

Fascinated by genetics? Follow me on Twitter @LATkarenkaplan and like Los Angeles Times Science & Health on Facebook.

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DNA ties Ashkenazi Jews to group of just 330 people from ...

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Posted By admin on January 20, 2020

When Shekhiynah Larks runs an ethnic diversity training program for a Jewish community organization or school, theres one question that never fails to make people uncomfortable. What race are you? she will ask the program participants point blank.

Sometimes theres nervous laughter, or averted glances, or awkward shifting in seats. Its uncomfortable, says Larks, 22, a black Jewish educator and program coordinator forBechol Lashon(In Every Tongue), an organization that promotes ethnic diversity within the Jewish community. Thats why most people step away from the conversation. There are so many incentives not to talk about race.

For the first time this year, Bechol Lashon has releasedspecial educational resources for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, observed in the United States on the third Monday in January, in order to encourage more Jewish groups to start talking about race.

The purpose of the curriculum, explained Bechol Lashons founding director Diane Tobin, is to move away from a superficial celebration of equality and dive into difficult and charged conversations surrounding race.

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People are afraid to say the wrong thing. Its awkward. So people just dont talk about it, said Tobin.

This conversation on many levels is an uncomfortable conversation, Larks added. People would rather not have this conversation. And were all going to make mistakes and continue to make mistakes.

Shekhiynah Larks, pictured here in 2019, is a program coordinator at Bechol Lashon. (Courtesy Shekhiynah Larks/via Times of Israel)

Exacerbating the reluctance to start the race conversation is the complicated Jewish identity, Tobin said.

If youre talking about the history of Jews in America, after World War II, Jews suddenly became white, said Tobin. Jews dont want to think of ourselves as racist, as weve been persecuted ourselves. Its a complex conversation to understand that the persecution is real, that some Jews do not identify as white, and yet yes, some of us do benefit from white privilege. You have to hold both conversations.

Bechol Lashons MLK curriculum approaches the question of race through the telling of stories. The curriculum encourages people to tell stories of their own traditions, culture, and roots, and then read the personal stories of a variety of Jewish leaders and educators who come from diverse backgrounds and countries.

Especially in the age of social media when information moves so quickly, many people are reluctant to even start talking about race issues because they are paralyzed by fear that they might say the wrong thing, unintentionally offending someone or causing others to think that they are racist, Larks said. However, she said, mistakes and misunderstandings will inevitably happen especially when trying to determine the language and labels to use when discussing different racial groups.

I like to tell people that my bad goes a long way, said Larks. Owning your mistake means a lot.

A lot of people need to become more comfortable being uncomfortable, she added. Thats one of the biggest barriers.

Larks, who is from Oakland, California, knew from age 12 that she wanted to convert to Judaism. I grew up in a Pentecostal family with a deep connection with the divine, and they always said to put yourself where you hear God, so I did, she said. Larks said her own story proves that Jewish identities dont necessarily come with a prescribed skin tone. I identify as an Ashkenazi Jew, because those are my traditions and melodies.

Diane Tobin and her son, Jonah Tobin, pictured in 2017. Tobin and her late husband started Bechol Lashon in 2000 to connect with other diverse Jewish families. (Courtesy Diane Tobin/via Times of Israel)

Tobin and her late husband Gary started Bechol Lashon in 2000 after adopting a son, Jonah, who is black. They wanted more resources and connection with other Jews of color, including Jews who are adopted or converted, and Jews who trace their roots to countries other than Eastern Europe.

Bechol Lashon started as a research initiative to document Jews of color, and, with the years, morphed into an advocacy organization educating the larger, mostly Ashkenazi American Jewish community about the diversity of Jewish identities. In the early 2000s, the organization estimated that around 20 percent of American Jews are ethnically and racially diverse, a statistic that also includes Mizrahi/North African Jews and Latino Jews.

The organization runs a summer camp for Jewish children who come from diverse backgrounds, as well as a monthly Family Circle to connect diverse Jewish families with resources and support. Larks said that while she was on her conversion journey, some rabbis assumed she would feel uncomfortable at their synagogue because she didnt match the stereotypical appearance of American Jews. One of the purposes of the summer camp and Family Circle is to connect kids with other Jewish kids who look like them, or at least look different from the so-called typical Jewish look, to stress the idea that Jews come in all shapes and colors.

Bechol Lashons curriculum is aimed particularly at American Jewish communities, because race is so specific to each country. In America, the conversation about race is rooted in slavery, while in Israel racism is much more connected to immigration, said Tobin. Originally, Bechol Lashon tried to expand its resources to support international Jewish communities. But the race conversation in Capetown, South Africa is vastly different from the race conversation in Beersheba, Israel, or Chicago, USA. Today, the organization concentrates its advocacy and education efforts on the United States, while offering other types of support to international Jewish communities in places such as Uganda.

Bechol Lashons two-week overnight summer camp aims to help Jewish kids from diverse backgrounds connect with other kids who dont fit the stereotypical image of what an American Jew looks like. Participants are pictured canoeing during the 2019 summer session. (Courtesy Bechol Lashon/via Times of Israel)

Today, Bechol Lashon works with American Jewish federations, day schools, Hebrew schools, and synagogues implementing their Passports to Peoplehood curriculum. Although the organization has been involved in racial identity and Judaism since 2000, there has been a huge increase in the number of Jewish organizations seeking out Bechol Lashons diversity training since 2016. This echoes a national trend of people being more open to discussing racial issues in the political climate around the election of US President Donald Trump, and the emergence of social movements such as Black Lives Matter.

Tobin said the Martin Luther King, Jr. curriculum is meant to be a jumping-off point, but these conversations require longer periods of time to truly effect change in how people understand race.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (second from right), marches at Selma with Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., Ralph Bunche, Rep. John Lewis, Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth and Rev. C.T. Vivian. (Courtesy of Susannah Heschel/via Times of Israel)

One of the main points of the Passports to Peoplehood program is highlighting the fact that Jews come from all over the world. This is clear to Israelis, where the hodgepodge of Jewish identities from places such as Iraq, Libya, and Iran have influenced all parts of society. But it is less obvious in America, where the vast majority of Jews are Ashkenazi and trace their roots to Eastern Europe and Russia.

Once they see it, they say, Oh yes, of course, there are Jews all over the world, said Tobin. Starting the larger race conversation by learning about diverse Jewish customs is one of the easiest ways to enter the conversation about race. No one objects to Moroccan cooking, said Tobin.

Its the first time theyve considered it of course there are Jews in all different countries and of course they dont look like the Jews in America, said Larks.

The recent deadly anti-Semitic attacks inNew YorkandNew Jerseyhave further complicated racial politics for black Jews, Larks said. In New Jersey, the perpetratorsclaimed an association with the Black Hebrew Israelites, a movement that has many different sects. Larks said sometimes black people assume she is a member of this group, which is not considered Jewish, and both Jews and non-Jews are surprised to hear that she is a convert.

Since the spate of attacks, some of which were carried out by black people, Larks says some American Jews are increasingly wary of her being present in Jewish spaces because she is black. Or people ask me, Why are black people killing Jews? and they assume I have the answers, and I dont, said Larks.

She hopes the Martin Luther King Jr. curriculum will be a springboard for Jewish communities to start having difficult conversations about race, both within the Jewish community and in other parts of society.

This is ultimately atikkun olam[repairing the world] project, said Larks. That was everything King stood for: creating a just world. And we cant do that if we constantly avoid conversations about injustices in society.

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On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Dreams Of A Better Conversation About Race - Atlanta Jewish Times

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Posted By admin on January 20, 2020

Thirty years ago, Kimberl Crenshaw coined the term intersectionality as a way to help explain the oppression of African-American women. The theory of how different forms of discrimination interact is a useful tool to recognize the way privilege and oppression overlap. It can serve to challenge notions about oppressions and hierarchies, class struggles and racial divides.

Identifying Jews as white in the context of American history is not only a perversion of the Jewish past but a denial of its peoplehood. In American politics, white implies one who is a beneficiary of the past 500 years of European exploration and exploitation. It is identified with control, dominance and exclusivity hardly accurate characteristics of Jewish history.

While in the past 50 years American Jews have enjoyed privileges associated with hierarchical whiteness, only a collective amnesia would preclude us from recalling just how recently Jews were still barred from exclusive hotels, unwelcome in select restaurants, country clubs and even neighborhoods, and restricted by elite universities that had a Jewish problem (i.e too many Jews), forcing them to limit Jewish registration by implementing quotas.

It is nearly impossible to imagine that any other group who had one out of every three of its members wiped out in a six-year span would be considered privileged. This narrative, however, is facilitated by the absorption of Jewishness into whiteness, which is both an erasure of Jewish ethnicity and misrepresentation of the dynamic Jewish identity.

Jewishness as whiteness obscures the unique and often oppressed experiences of Jews, including those of Sephardic, Arab, African or Middle Eastern descent. It also accentuates and accelerates antisemitic tropes based on Jewish power.

Although Sarsour tried walking back her word choice, the linking of white supremacism to Israel a country that is distinctively Jewish was intentional. White supremacism is an acceptable identifier even if it obfuscates the Jewish experience and demographic reality whereas Jewish supremacism sounds reactionary and bigoted.

The discourse associating Jews with power based on their perceived whiteness is particularly threatening given the centrality of the myth of Jewish hegemonic pursuit in the repertoire of historic antisemitism.

Along these same lines on the left, Jeremy Corbyn's Labour party has become a safe space for antisemites.

From ancient through medieval times, the fear of a secret Jewish conspiracy to dominate both the economy and government was used to justify antisemitic violence. Later, the Nazis capitalized on old Christian themes of secret Jewish dominance to propagandize and mobilize support for their Jewish liquidation program. Today, that fear has been expanded by modern anti-Semites to the point of caricature to include the media, global markets and geopolitical stability.

Framed according to this trope, a paradox develops: Not only is the Jewish experience lost in whiteness, but Jewishness serves to epitomize whiteness vilest iteration. A white Jew is not only powerful but hyper powerful. He is not only exploitative and manipulative but the arch puppeteer, controlling world affairs.

While intersectionality can be a valuable tool, it has been ineffective in the case of white Jews. The result is a dangerous distortion of the Jewish experience its history, diversity and challenges.

Although Jewish skin comes in every shade reflecting the diversity of a people that spans the globe and is all at once an ethnicity, nation and religion some of its whitest members endured a genocidal program that prompted the world to proclaim Never Again.

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The narrative of intersectionality fails Jews - The Jerusalem Post

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Posted By admin on January 20, 2020

NEW YORK (JTA) Thirty years ago, Kimberl Crenshaw coined the term intersectionality as a way to help explain the oppression of African-American women. The theory of how different forms of discrimination interact is a useful tool to recognize the way privilege and oppression overlap. It can serve to challenge notions about oppressions and hierarchies, class struggles and racial divides.

But the recent spate of anti-Semitism in New York compels us to ask if it also has its demons.

Identifying Jews as white in the context of American history is not only a perversion of the Jewish past but a denial of its peoplehood. In American politics, whiteimplies one who is a beneficiary of the past 500 years of European exploration and exploitation. It is identified with control, dominance and exclusivity hardly accurate characteristics of Jewish history.

While in the past 50 years American Jews have enjoyed privileges associated with hierarchical whiteness, only a collective amnesia would preclude us from recalling just how recently Jews were still barred from exclusive hotels, unwelcome in select restaurants, country clubs and even neighborhoods, and restricted by elite universities that had a Jewish problem (i.e too many Jews), forcing them to limit Jewish registration by implementing quotas.

It is nearly impossible to imagine that any other group who had one out of every three of its members wiped out in a six-year span would be considered privileged. This narrative, however, is facilitated by the absorption of Jewishness into whiteness, which is both an erasure of Jewish ethnicity and misrepresentation of the dynamic Jewish identity.

Jewishness as whiteness obscures the unique and often oppressed experiences of Jews, including those of Sephardic, Arab, African or Middle Eastern descent. It also accentuates and accelerates anti-Semitic tropes based on Jewish power.

The subsuming of Jewishness into whiteness was displayed recently by Linda Sarsour, who was filmed one month ago saying that Israel was built on the idea that Jews are supreme to everyone else and implied that one cannot be against white supremacy unless he or she is against the Jewish state.

Although Sarsour tried walking back her word choice, the linking of white supremacism to Israel a country that is distinctively Jewish was intentional. White supremacism is an acceptable identifier even if it obfuscates the Jewish experience and demographic reality whereas Jewish supremacism sounds reactionary and bigoted.

The discourse associating Jews with power based on their perceived whiteness is particularly threatening given the centrality of the myth of Jewish hegemonic pursuit in the repertoire of historic anti-Semitism.

As law professor David Schraub notes: The Whiteness of the Jewish figure served to cleanse, even validate, arguments that otherwise would reek in their anti-Semitic familiarity.

In fact, a perceived all-encompassing Jewish power, or cabal, is one of the few tropes that unites extremists on the right and left. In November, white supremacist Patrick Little of Idaho declared his candidacy for the general election, running as a Republican. He told the Idaho Press that the only way to challenge Jewish power in this country is with local elections. He also said that the top priority for the Jewish people is to displace white people specifically, adding that the Jews control the media, entertainment industry and politics.

Along these same lines on the left, Jeremy Corbyns Labour party has become a safe space for anti-Semites.

From ancient through medieval times, the fear of a secret Jewish conspiracy to dominate both the economy and government was used to justify anti-Semitic violence. Later, the Nazis capitalized on old Christian themes of secret Jewish dominance to propagandize and mobilize support for their Jewish liquidation program. Today, that fear has been expanded by modern anti-Semites to the point of caricature to include the media, global markets and geopolitical stability.

Framed according to this trope, a paradox develops: Not only is the Jewish experience lost in whiteness, but Jewishness serves to epitomize whiteness vilest iteration. A white Jew is not only powerful but hyper powerful. He is not only exploitative and manipulative but the arch puppeteer, controlling world affairs.

While intersectionality can be a valuable tool, it has been ineffective in the case of white Jews. The result is a dangerous distortion of the Jewish experience its history, diversity and challenges.

Although Jewish skin comes in every shade reflecting the diversity of a people that spans the globe and is all at once an ethnicity, nation and religion some of its whitest members endured a genocidal program that prompted the world to proclaim Never Again.

An intersectional approach can prove useful only if the two identities are separated and if the Jewish experience is articulated rather than subsumed or dismissed. Fighting anti-Semitism will begin when the complexity of Jewish experience is properly portrayed rather than lost in skin color.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of JTA or its parent company, 70 Faces Media.

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Why intersectionality fails the Jews - JTA News

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Posted By admin on January 20, 2020

Most Jews have never heard of the World Zionist Congress, and those that have probably learned about it in history class. It was founded over a century ago by Theodor Herzl.

But the Congress still exists, and its actually really important. Thats because when it meets every five years, elected delegates makes major decisions about two things: how to spend nearly $5 billion that goes to Jewish organizations and programs in Israel and around the world, and who should serve as board members for other influential, affluent organizations, like the Jewish Agency for Israel, the Jewish National Fund and the World Zionist Organization.

And if you are reading this, theres a good chance you can have a say in all this by voting in the World Zionist Congress elections, which are just about to start. The elections are how American Jews will decide who will serve in the Congress.

Heres what you need to know about them:

Yes, because more people are running, and more people are voting. For example: The Reform movement used the last election to get more of a say over whether to buy land in the West Bank, and theyre still working on that issue. (Read more below.) Organizers are expecting turnout to grow this year. 15 parties are running, three more than last year.

There are more slates running across the board; there are more candidates running. Overall theres more interest, which hopefully will lead to more engagement, Herbert Block, the executive director of the American Zionist Movement, which runs the elections, told JTA.

YOU, probably. Voting is open to any adult Jew who is a United States citizen or permanent resident, pays the $7.50 ballot fee ($5 if youre 18-25) and signs a statement affirming that they are someone who views a Jewish, Zionist, democratic and secure State of Israel to be the expression of the common responsibility of the Jewish people for its continuity and future. And yes, registering is basically on the honor system - you dont have to prove any of this.

There will be 500 delegates making those decisions about the fate of $5 billion at the World Zionist Congress, which happens in October in Jerusalem. Voting in the United States will take place online between January 21 and March 11.

Israel, the United States and the rest of the Jewish Diaspora will each be sending about a third of the delegates. That means you get to vote for 152 of them the Americans. Those 152 delegates are decided through a system that works like elections in Israel. In each election, there are parties that make a list or slate of candidates. The overall vote determines how many people from that list get into power. If a party gets 10% of the vote, then it gets to pick 10% of the American delegation. Whichever party gets the most votes will have the most say over what happens at that October meeting of the World Zionist Congress and its money, and its power when it convenes in Jerusalem in October.

(Israels delegates will be determined by the results of its parliamentary elections in March - a party that gets 10% of the Knesset seats will also get 10% of Israels Congress delegates.)

Around 56,000 Americans voted in the last election, in 2015. Thats something like a 1% voter turnout.

In that election, the slate of the Reform movement got 56 of 145 spots, the Conservative movement got 25 and the main Orthodox delegation 24, with the remainder split among smaller parties. Thats roughly in line with American Jewish demographics, though the Orthodox parties overperformed.

The Reform slates strong showing in 2015 allowed it to name board members to the Jewish National Fund. The organization is best known for planting trees in Israel, but its also bought properties in eastern Jerusalem and built settlements in the West Bank, which many liberal Jews think makes the prospect of peace with Palestinians more difficult. The Reform movement claimed last year that even though they had set policies against buying more West Bank land, JNF subsidiaries had done so anyway and then hidden their actions from Reform representatives. So the Reform movement is hoping for an even stronger showing, in order to prevent such things from happening again.

It has a lot to do with the last election, and the Reform movements strong showing. Both the Reform movement and the major non-religious liberal Jewish groups are putting together major publicity pushes to juice voter turnout - they say that this is one of the only ways that American Jews can truly influence Israeli politics. The liberals want money to go toward progressive Israeli groups and away from West Bank settlements. And many right-wing and Orthodox groups are pushing back in response, wanting to ensure that priorities instead go to protecting their causes, like yeshivas or settlement expansion.

American Forum for Israel: This group, affiliated with maverick Israeli politician Avigdor Liberman, advocates for right-wing politics and increased resources for Russian-speaking Jews. Last time, they came in fourth place, with ten seats.

Americans4Israel: Comprised of the youth group Young Judaea and a collection of smaller, center-right and right-wing organizations, American4Israel stresses their independence from larger movements, and wants to reform how the WZO itself is run.

Dorshei Torah VTzion: Affiliated with Open Orthodox groups like the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance and Yeshivat Chovevei Torah, Dorshei Torah VTzion is pushing for improved Israel-Diaspora relations, religious pluralism and more support for womens equality, especially in religious spaces like yeshivot. Their list of candidates is a whos who of the liberal Orthodox world, including Rabbi Avi Weiss, the first modern-day Orthodox rabbi to ordain women, and Rabba Sara Hurwitz, his first female graduate.

Eretz Hakodesh: A new slate led by Pesach Lerner, the head of the Coalition for Jewish Values, a group of hundreds of right-wing Orthodox rabbis. Eretz Hakodesh (Hebrew for The Holy Land) calls for promoting classical Jewish values of Torah in Israel. The Torah community must vote, to prevent values of the liberal movements from infiltrating the Torah atmosphere of Eretz Yisrael, the group says on its website.

Hatikvah: Supported by dovish groups like J Street and the New Israel Fund, Hatikvahs first-time candidates include some of the Zionist lefts biggest figures, like Rabbi Sharon Brous of IKAR in Los Angeles, National Council of Jewish Women CEO Sheila Katz and commentator Peter Beinart. Hatikvah is pledging to move funding away from West Bank settlements and toward peace and coexistence efforts. (Full disclosure: Kenneth Bob, who is first on Hatikvahs list, is also on the Forwards board of directors.)

Herut Zionists: Carrying on the legacy of Zeev Jabotinsky, the ideological father of the Israeli right, Herut calls for a return to the traditional values of Zionism, including funding for West Bank settlements.

Israel Shelanu: A new slate seeking to represent Israeli-Americans - its name means Our Israel - Israel Shelanu calls for a more open and pluralistic Jewish culture, and funding for improved Israeli-diaspora relations and better Hebrew education (which they call Making Hebrew great again).

Kol Yisrael: Kol Yisrael is backed by the Israel advocacy group StandWithUs and the Israeli American Council. These groups are known for their staunch opposition to the boycott-Israel movement known as BDS, but Kol Yisraels platform surprisingly avoids mentioning that and other controversial subjects, instead promising to improve Israel-Diaspora relationships through more funding for summer camps, exchange programs and teen educational initiatives. (Full disclosure: My aunt, Mina Rush, is a Kol Yisrael candidate).

MERCAZ USA: The Zionist organization of Conservative Judaism, MERCAZ pushes for recognition of and funding for its movements programs in Israel, implementing the egalitarian prayer plan at the Western Wall, and a peace agreement with the Palestinians.

Ohavei Zion: Ohavei Zion seeks increased funding for promoting Sephardic Jewish culture, education and spiritual life, and for encouraging immigration to Israel.

Orthodox Israel Coalition - Mizrahi: Backed by the giants of mainstream Orthodoxy like the Orthodox Union and Yeshiva University, the OIC wants to strengthen Orthodox yeshivas in Israel and the Diaspora, fight BDS and encourage West Bank settlement.

Shas Olami: The final party to enter the race, Shas Olami is affiliated with Israels Sephardic Orthodox party Shas.

Vision: This all-Millennial slate is focused on fighting BDS on campus and promoting fresh solutions to Israels conflict with the Palestinians as in, not the two-state solution. As the Forward reported in 2015, its affiliated with Tkuma, a small far-right religious Zionist political party. Visions leader is Rudy Rochman, an IDF veteran who became a controversial pro-Israel activist while studying at Columbia University.

Vote Reform: The largest vote-getter five years ago, Vote Reform represents Americas largest Jewish denomination and its also endorsed by the leaders of what used to be called Reconstructionist Judaism. The slate will oppose racism and discrimination and push for a two-state solution, in addition to recognition of non-Orthodox Judaism in Israel.

ZOA Coalition: Endorsed by many of the top figures in Israels ruling Likud party, the Zionist Organization of Americas slate promises to push the organizations goals: a one-state solution and strengthened settlements, and against BDS and the creation of what it calls a Iranian-proxy Palestinian-Arab terror state.

Corrections: A previous version of this article stated that Herbert Block is the president of the American Zionist Movement. In fact, he is the organizations executive director. Additionally, this article also stated MERCAZ supports a two-state solution. In fact, it calls for a peace settlement with the Palestinians but does not specify that it should be a two-state solution.

Aiden Pink is the deputy news editor of the Forward. Contact him at pink@forward.com or follow him on Twitter @aidenpink

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Your guide to the World Zionist Congress elections, the most important vote you've never heard of - Forward

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Posted By admin on January 20, 2020

Vladimir Putin is considering a pardon for an American-Israeli woman jailed in Russia on drug charges, a Russian media outlet reported Thursday on the eve of visit to Israel.

Naama Issachar was sentenced to seven and a half years in prison after Russian authorities caught her with 9.5 grams of cannabis while on a connecting flight from India to Israel.

As YWN reported earlier this week, Putin is scheduled to visit Israel for the International Holocaust Remembrance Forum at Yad Vashem on January 23 and the unveiling of a monument to the victims of the Siege of Leningrad during World War II.

According to the report, the Kremlin is still extremely displeased, however. with Israels extradition of a Russian hacker to the U.S. late last year.

We wanted this process to be be a two-way street, a Russian official told the outlet.

The report in the Russian media comes hours after Putin spoke with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by phone.

The conversation about recent regional developments also touched on Issachars case, the Prime Ministers Office said in a statement.

The conversation was warm and to the point and strengthened the Prime Ministers optimism that the issue of the release of Naama Issachar is advancing towards a solution, the PM office said in a statement.

Just two days ago YWN reported that Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, HaRav Shlomo Amar wrote a letter to Putin appealing to him to release Naama.

(YWN Israel Desk Jerusalem)

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WILL PUTIN PARDON HER? Reports That Naama Issachar Will Be Pardoned On Eve Of Trip To Israel - Yeshiva World News

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Posted By admin on January 20, 2020

What can a Jewish cookbook from 1946 tell us about the 21st-century Jewish-American experience? Liza Schoenfein, the Forwards senior food writer, and Jane Ziegelman, a culinary historian, took our signature collection of Yiddish recipes off the shelf and found a direct line from the balaboostas of yore to the kitchens of today.

When Regina Frishwasser sat down to write the Jewish American Cook Book, she had a particular reader a mind. That woman was young and recently married, a novice homemaker. Born in America to immigrant parents, she was someone who had grown up on typically Jewish foods, but had never learned the secrets of preparing them. The Jewish American Cook Book would fill the gap in her culinary education.

The idea of a Jewish women who couldnt cook Jewish was something possible only in America. Back in the old country, cooking knowledge which included a full command of the kosher laws was passed from mother to daughter, the two generations standing side by side in the kitchen. In America, in cities like New York, Boston and Chicago, Jewish girls were exposed to a welter of competing culinary influences, giving mother a run for her money. Her most formidable rival was her daughters home economics teacher.

In its original incarnation, home economics was a turn of the 20th century social reform movement led by Protestant, middle-class women. Its main goal was to revolutionize housekeeping by treating it as a science, a composite discipline that involved aspects of engineering, chemistry, biology and bacteriology. Home economists believed that if a woman wanted to do her job effectively, she needed to understand the science behind household tasks. The set of tasks they were most interested in revolved around food.

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The Jewish American Cook Book: Originally published by the Forward in 1946.

In the late 19th century, home economists founded cooking schools that offered classes in nutrition, kitchen chemistry and the processes of human digestion. (Among the best known of these pioneers is Bostons Fanny Farmer, cooking school principal and author whose 1896 cookbook is still in print.) The home economists approach to food was strictly rational. Food was judged in terms of its nutritional content, cost efficiency and digestibility. Their culinary ideal was New England-based, Yankee cooking with its creamy chowders, baked beans and copious amounts of root vegetables. Simple, honest American fare.

By World War I, home economists held teaching positions in cities and towns across America. Those who worked in predominately Jewish neighborhoods encountered special hurdles. First, were the Jewish dietary laws, which they had to be familiar with or risk alienating their students. Second, before they could teach Jewish girls to cook, they had to re-train their taste buds.

Jewish Dietary Problems, a report published in 1919 in the Journal of Home Economics, a publication geared to professionals in the field, told the story in a nutshell. According to the experts, the Jewish diet was over-rich and over-seasoned. Excessively fond of pungent and aggressive flavors, Jews cooked with too much garlic and onion, were too liberal with the vinegar, and consumed way too many fermented foods. They needed more creamed vegetables, milk-based soups, mayonnaise-based salads, and breakfast cereals, like oatmeal. Cultivating a taste for the simpler foods was an uphill climb, but it was deemed worth the effort:

Modification of the dietary tastes of a people is, of course, a slow and often thankless task, but when one realizes the evils attending the constant irritation which the high seasoning produces, one cannot help the desire to undertake it.

Over time, Jewish students absorbed their teachers culinary point of view, leaving them ambivalent about their mothers cooking. Jewish Cooking on the Wane, a 1929 Forward article, described the consequences:

Published in 1946, the Jewish American Cook Book was Frishwassers attempt to reconnect young Jewish women with their ancestral foods. Not that Frishwasser was averse to American influences. On the contrary, her book contains a host of recipes for dishes like Baked Creamed Cauliflower, Cream of Celery Soup, and Lettuce Salad though not at the expense of zestier, more traditional dishes. Included in that category is her recipe for Spicy Pot Roast.

The Forward Association

In Frishwasser We Trust: Regina Frishwasser, the Forwards recipe editor, worked for the newspaper for five decades starting in 1918.

Pot roast (gedempte fleisch in Yiddish) is a venerable Ashkenazi dish, its roots stretching back to the Middle Ages. In an early reference to a pot roast-like preparation, Rashi, the11th century French rabbi, described a dish in which meat was cooked in its own juices and fat and seasoned with onions.

A dish so elemental is bound to show up in more than one cuisine. In this country, recipes for pot roast began appearing in cookbooks in the late 19th century. Not all were for beef. For decades, a pot roast referred to any piece of meat it could be veal, pork, lamb or poultry that was slowly braised in a covered pot. A traditional American pot roast is seared in lard and seasoned only with salt and pepper. Frishwassers Spicy Pot Roast, which is seared in chicken fat and cooked in vinegar, is clearly inspired by German sauerbraten. Its an example of highly-seasoned Jewish food at its most satisfying.

Add to 3 pounds stewing beef 2 cups water, 1 cup vinegar, 12 cloves, 4 bay leaves, and 1 tablespoon salt, and keep in refrigerator over night. Dredge the meat in flour, and brown in chicken fat. Add 2 cups vinegar, 2 cups diced carrots, and 2 cups sliced onions. Cover and simmer for about 2 hours. Add 1 tablespoon sugar, and 2 cups diced potatoes, and cook 20 minutes longer.

Liz Schoenfein

Into the Oven: Slow cooking and low heat will result in a tender pot roast.

I dont remember either of my grandmothers cooking anything highly seasoned or vinegary. And while one grew up in Hungary, the other, my Boston-born maternal grandmother, may well have taken the very home economics classes that contributed to the demise of true Ashkenazi-Jewish fare, as lamented in the Forward of 1929. Certainly that Almighty Salad crisp iceberg lettuce, tomato, sliced radish and shredded carrot always appeared on her dinner table, along with baked fish, broiled meats and a variety of casseroles and jelly molds.

Each grandmother made some type of pot roast or brisket, but there was certainly no sauerbraten, the vinegar-based version from Germany on which Regina Frishwassers Spicy Pot Roast is based. Perhaps my mothers braised beef came closest: For special dinners she often made Julia Childs Boeuf la Mode, in which the meat is marinated and cooked slowly in red wine.

Studying the original Spicy Pot Roast recipe from Jewish American Cook Book, I cringed at the marinating and cooking liquid being made entirely of vinegar and water. My lips puckered just thinking about it. I researched sauerbraten recipes and found that in many cases, red wine and vinegar are combined, often in equal measure. I decided to work with that idea.

I read that this assertively sour dish is often served with a side of braised red cabbage (in addition to spaetzle, potato dumplings or boiled potatoes). I liked the idea of red cabbage, and decided that I might as well cook it together with the meat, along with a variety of root vegetables including carrots, turnips and parsnips, for a well-rounded, one-pot winter meal. (I ended up leaving out potatoes, which could be used in addition to or instead of the various veggies I added. I think Ill toss them in next time.)

The recipe I developed (below) is assertively though pleasantly pungent. If you think youd like to reduce the sourness, you can play with the proportions, adding more wine and/or water and reducing the vinegar.

Liza Schoenfein

Revised Recipe: Our modern take on Spicy Pot Roast gives vegetables as big a role as the beef that once took center stage.

Serves 6

Marinate the meat for at least one day (and up to three) before cooking and consider cooking it the day before you plan to serve it. The meat is easier to slice cold, and the dish is more delicious after the flavors have had a chance to meld.

1 3-pound chuck roast

2 cups dry red wine, such as Chianti or Ctes du Rhne

1 cup apple cider vinegar

1 cup water

12 cloves

6 bay leaves

6 sprigs fresh thyme

3 garlic cloves, minced

2 teaspoons kosher salt

1 teaspoon black pepper

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

6 shallots, peeled and left whole

1 large turnip, peeled and chopped into 1-inch pieces

2 large carrots, peeled and chopped into 2-inch rounds

2 parsnips, peeled and chopped into 1-inch pieces

1 small red cabbage, cut into 6 wedges

1 tablespoon sugar

Fresh dill for garnish

Non-dairy sour cream for serving

Add marinating liquid, including solids, to the pot. Liquid should come about halfway up the meat. (If it doesnt, add more wine, vinegar and water until it does.) Add sugar and 1 teaspoon salt.

Cover pot, put in the oven, and cook for 2 hours. Remove from oven, add cabbage, pressing it down so it is mostly submerged in the liquid, and return to oven for an additional 3045 minutes.

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Of Home Economics, Jewish mothers and pot roast - Forward

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Posted By admin on January 20, 2020

LOS ANGELES (JTA) Over the past century, Jews have endured what filmmaker Yaron Zilberman calls a trilogy of traumas: the Holocaust, the Yom Kippur War and the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

The Israeli-American writer, director and producer has spent much of his career exploring these ordeals, and his latest film is no exception.

Incitement focuses on the 1995 shooting of Rabin in Tel Aviv and specifically on the man who pulled the trigger Yigal Amir, the Orthodox child of Yemenite immigrants. It took Zilberman five years to research the path followed by Amir, from ambitious law student to murderer, and another year to put the film together.

The assassination of Rabin is arguably the most traumatic event in the history of Israel, Zilberman, 53, said in an interview. The murder of a Jewish prime minister was impossible to comprehend, and the circumstances leading to it were not, at the time, investigated in full perhaps to avoid a civil war.

The sense of a nation on the precipice is vividly re-created in Incitement, which takes viewers back to the mid-1990s and powerfully dramatizes the deep fissures then opening up over the pursuit of a peace agreement with the Palestinians.

The signing that year of the Oslo II Accord promised to bring the country closer to a peaceful resolution to the conflict. But since the agreement called for the return of some of the land won by Israel during the Six-Day War in 1967, a determined opposition virulently fought against any concession.

As passions intensified, protesters displayed effigies of Rabin in Nazi uniform or as Yasser Arafat, chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization. Rabin, a former general who had engineered the Israeli victory in the 1967 war, was called a traitor at increasingly vitriolic public demonstrations.

The film shows newsreel footage of Benjamin Netanyahu, then a rising young right-wing politician and now prime minister, encouraging the protesters at one such event though not, he insisted later, advocating violence.

On Nov. 4, 1995, at 8:30 p.m. as Rabin left a peace rally in Tel Aviv, Amir emerged from the crowd and pumped two pistol shots into the prime minister. Rabin was rushed to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Amir is portrayed by Yehuda Nahari Halevi, an actor whose family lived in the same Yemenite neighborhood as Amir and who dominates the screen throughout most of the film. Critics have applauded his performance, but some have observed that his powerful portrayal might elicit the sympathy of the audience, his horrible deed notwithstanding.

That criticism doesnt surprise Zilberman, who co-wrote and directed the film. One reason it took so many years to make the movie was that Zilberman wanted to get into Amirs mind and avoid portraying him as a unidimensional monster.

In Zilbermans retelling, Amirs road to perdition is paved with real or perceived personal slights and the misguidance of certain rabbis and even of his own mother.

The former led Amir to conclude that Jewish law permits, and even encourages, the killing of traitors. Amirs mother, in her short turn, drums it into her sons head that he is super-smart and destined for greatness.

On top of all that, his longtime girlfriend Nava (Daniella Kertesz) breaks up with him, leading Amir to conclude that her Ashkenazi family opposed her relationship with a dark-skinned Yemenite.

Just about every review of the film draws a parallel between the popular mood in Israel in the 1990s and the one in the United States today. Variety writes that the films portrayal of a divided democracy, in which provocative language from politicians and the media lead to lethal violence, is hardly a relic of history.

This plot summary sounds as if it could be ripped from recent U.S. headlines, the magazine said.

Zilberman doesnt dispute the parallels. Both Netanyahu and President Donald Trump are cut from the same political cloth and play off the same book and incite their respective bases while frequently pretending that the victim in a given situation is really the criminal, Zilberman said.

In Israel, the film is known by the punchier title Yamim Noraim literally Days of Awe, the collective name for the holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, a period of self-examination and judgment. Incitement was deemed the best motion picture of the year in Israel and became the countrys automatic entrant for the Academy Award for best foreign film, though it didnt make the cut of the final 10.

Zilberman splits his time between New York and Tel Aviv. He is married to the film producer Tamar Sela and the couple have three children.

Incitement was co-written with Ron Leshem and Yair Hizmi. The film opens Jan. 31 in New York City and Feb. 7 in Los Angeles, to be followed by a rollout in other U.S. cities.

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Posted By admin on January 20, 2020

(JTA) Members of the Cambodian royal family gathered last month at the Raffles Hotel Le Royal in Phnom Penh for a celebration. There was music, traditional Cambodian dance performances and plenty of food.

The occasion? The coming-of-age party of the granddaughter of one of the princesses. Well, a bat mitzvah to be exact.

The celebrant, Elior Koroghli, is the the great-granddaughter of the late King Sisowath Monivong, who reigned from 1927 to 1941. She is also an Orthodox Jew.

The 13-year-old grew up in Las Vegas, the daughter of Monivongs granddaughter Sathsowi Thay Koroghli, who converted to Judaism as an adult, and Ray Koroghli, a Persian Jew. While in Cambodia for the bat mitzvah, the Koroghlis met with the current king and queen mother, and the extended family posed for a photograph, the tzitzit fringes worn by Eliors brothers clearly visible in the frame.

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The festivities reflected the various parts of her heritage. Elior wore both a traditional Cambodian costume and a sparkly bat mitzvah dress. She lit a menorah the celebration took place during Hanukkah and performed a Persian-style candle-lighting ceremony. And she played traditional Jewish, Persian and Cambodian songs on the piano, including the classic Hava Nagila.

Elior Koroghli, right, with her parents, brother Matanel and half-sister Elizabeth Koroghli Damavandi in front of the menorah they lit at the party. (Kang Predi and Teh Ranie/via JTA)

The Koroghlis provided kosher food with the help of Rabbi Bentzion Butman, the Chabad emissary in Cambodia.Chabad.org first reported on the celebration.

It was just incredible how you can bring Cambodian, Jewish and Persian all into one, where we go to Cambodia and Im wearing their costume but Im also lighting a menorah there, and Im wearing tzniusclothing, Elior told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, using the Hebrew word for modesty.

For members of her family who live in Cambodia, it was the first time they had been to a Jewish event of any kind.

Eliors mother, Sathsowi, was born in Washington, D.C., where her father was serving as a Cambodian diplomat. Her mother, Princess Sisowath Neary Bong Nga, was King Monivongs daughter. Sathsowi moved back to Cambodia with her family when she was 2, but most of her childhood was spent in Long Beach, California. She met her husband at a birthday party in Las Vegas.

He just came to ask me to dance and that was it, Sathsowi told JTA in a telephone interview.

Today the couple lives with their three children Elior and her brothers Matanel, 11, and Eliav, 7 in Henderson,a suburb popular amongLas Vegas Jews. Ray works in commercial real estate and Sathsowi is a homemaker.

Though their cultures differ, Sathsowi, who was raised a Buddhist, said religion did not come up much while she and Ray were initially dating. But a few years later, she joined her husband for a lecture by Rabbi Shea Harlig, the Chabad emissary in Las Vegas. Sathsowi only caught the end of the talk, but the rabbis teaching about God being infinite stuck with her.

Elior with relatives and guests during the candle-lighting ceremony. (Kang Predi and Teh Ranie/via JTA)

I was taught about Buddha. And Im thankful for all that I was taught because it made me who I am. It gives me patience, it makes me who I am at [my] core, Sathsowi said. But on the other hand, I just believe that something created all this. So when the rabbi spoke about that, it was just like, whoa, this is how Im feeling. So thats why I wanted to know more.

Sathsowi eventually became a Jew by choice, initially converting through the Conservative movement in 2003. Two years later, she and Ray were married in Israel. The couple would come to embrace Orthodox Judaism and, nine years after her first conversion, Sathsowi had a second one with an Orthodox rabbi. The couple also had a second wedding ceremony performed by an Orthodox rabbi.

It just kind of happened naturally, she said. It took a long time, many years.

The process wasnt all easy. She faced pushback from her mother, who was unhappy her daughter was leaving the religion of her birth. At times she felt like an outsider as the only Asian person in her husbands Persian Jewish family.

It was a desire to reconcile those identities that led Sathsowi to celebrate her daughters bat mitzvah in Phnom Penh. The family had already held a celebration at their home in Henderson a year earlier, but Sathsowi wanted something different.

We want to show her her identity shes Persian, shes Cambodian, shes Jewish, Sathsowi said.

For Elior, the identities seem to go hand in hand easily.

Its just awesome to be part of a little bit of everything, she said, and its all different and they all give me different feelings.

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Posted By admin on January 20, 2020

United Airlines ordered 50 Airbus A321XLR aircraft from Airbus just last month. The aircraft will allow the carrier to open narrow but long-haul routes, potentially offering unique destinations to smaller cities. But where will these routes fly? Let us explore.

In addition to strengthening our ability to fly more efficiently, the A321XLRs range capabilities open potential new destinations to further develop our route network and provide customers with more options to travel the globe. United Press Release

The A321XLR will be also be used to fly to existing United destinations, but we will look at possible new routes that are currently not served by the airline.

We will be looking for cities that are small enough to justify only an A321XLR flight and within range of the aircraft (4700 nautical miles).

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Starting from New York, the A321XLR opens up a range of possibilities.

The first in this list is a little unconventional but hear us out. United already flies to nearby Argentina so it has had the capacity to fly the capital of Uruguay for many years. But yet dont.

Thus we can assume the market has never needed a wide-body aircraft. With the A321XLR, United will now be able to link New York to the capital of the nation Montevideo without having to use a widebody.

Another easy route for United might be to Morocco. There are currently only non-stop flights to Casablanca (with Royal Air Maroc) but not to Marrakech or Fez. There is an opportunity to either be competitive or open up a new tourist route for United.

Croatia has really exploded as a tourist destination in recent years, offering beaches, culture and a vibrant party scene. So much so that Chinese carriers are opening up direct flights between the two countries. United could get ahead of the curve and offer direct routes to Croatia before the competition.

A wild card choice might be to open a route from Los Angeles to the ski capital of Japan, Sapporo. The destination might offer a unique take at Japan for US tourists and offer a quick way for Japanese passengers to reach the West Coast without traveling through busy Tokyo.

Shockingly, United doesnt actually fly to Poland. Poland is one of the most populated countries in Europe next to Germany and France and easily could sustain a healthy A321XLR flight. Krakow is the cultural hub of the country (and a significant source of Jewish and Catholic heritage) and capital Warsaw also offers a good opportunity.

Overall there are many new routes that United can open up from their hub airports thanks to the A321XLR. We look forward to seeing what creative destinations United comes up with.

What do you think? Can you imagine any new routes opened up by the A321XLR?

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Where Could United Airlines Fly Its Airbus A321XLRs? - Simple Flying

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