Asked why his group decided to spend the first night of Hanukkah with a Syrian-born imam and his flock to support their bid to build a mosque in the rolling hills of the Temecula Valley in California’s Southwestern Riverside County, Eric Greene replied, “We remember when there were protests in this country against synagogues being…
Seventy-five years ago this month, 5-year-old Rudy Boschwitz, tightly gripping his mother’s hand, gingerly stepped down the gangplank of the S.S. Majestic and onto the dock at New York City. It was the third night of Hanukkah. After two years of wandering from country to country, the future United States senator and his family had…
Yehuda Semel has two wives — at least according to the laws of New York State. Semel, of Brooklyn, married his second wife in a religious ceremony over the summer. The wedding took place about two years after Semel and his first wife signed a get, or a bill of Jewish divorce. But since civil…
When Barry Finestone began working in the private sector in early 2005 after years of service in Jewish organizations, he thought that he had left the “old country” for good. “When I went out of Jewish work, I didn’t think I would get back in,” he recalled. “I was enjoying being out. I was very…
Four years ago, on the morning after Boston businessman Yosef Abramowitz arrived in Israel’s Negev desert for some rest and relaxation, he took a walk that changed the face of Israeli energy. “It was 5 a.m. I came out with my skin burning from the sun, and I said, ‘Wow, this place must be running…
With ratification of the Russian–American nuclear arms-reduction treaty becoming a political football, pro-Israel groups are caught in the middle of a congressional showdown. The Obama administration, seeking to bolster support for Senate ratification of the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, known as START, is privately urging Jewish groups to come out in favor of the…
Hella Moritz was many things to many people. But even though numerous documents key to Jewish affairs carried her handwritten initials, she insisted on being called a secretary. After more than 40 years of indispensability to four consecutive presidents of the World Jewish Congress, Moritz — a “towering figure,” in the words of current president…
Ask any woman what she wore to her prom, her wedding or any other memorable event, and she will describe it for you in excruciating detail. She may even pull the outfit from her closet and force you to admire it with her. Four-time Tony-nominated actress Tovah Feldshuh remembers her bat mitzvah dress: a white…
The desecration of holy texts was among three new attacks on Jewish targets at Indiana University that come in the wake of two earlier incidents. A rock was thrown Tuesday morning through the window of an apartment above the Chabad Jewish student center, located just off the university campus, nearly hitting a student and putting…
It’s that time of year again, when Jewish politicos go latke-hopping from one Hanukkah event to another, making sure to be seen at the right menorah-lighting events. And there are many to choose from in the nation’s capital. First, naturally, comes President Obama’s Hanukkah reception at the White House. This is a tradition handed down…
During a 1988 visit to Nowy Dwór Mazowieck, the town in central Poland where his Holocaust survivor father grew up, David Wluka found a child’s skull lying, unearthed, at the site of what was once the town’s Jewish cemetery. He picked up the skull and smuggled it into the United States. Wluka gave the skull…
