America, I know where you are headed, because I’m already there. We in New Rochelle, N.Y., became the experts at social distance, physical distance, early on. A “hot spot” – “New Roch-HELL” – “a problem area” – throw at us whatever you have because we can take it. Here at a forefront of the pandemic,…
At least 100 people have tested positive for coronavirus in Brooklyn’s Hasidic Borough Park neighborhood, amid intense debates within and around such communities over continued gatherings for prayer, study and celebrations like weddings. The news of the outbreak was first reported by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, which cited an official at Asisa, an urgent-care clinic…
It’s primary day in Florida — a day that’s normally full of energy given the Sunshine State’s plum position as one of the most delegate-rich in the union. Instead, the coronavirus was like a mushroom cloud hanging over polling stations, leading many voters and some poll workers to stay home. At my own polling station,…
On Sunday, the participants of Nativ had a choice: stay in Israel, or go home. Yossi Garr, the director for 15 years of this beloved gap-year program in Israel, told the 53 participants and their parents that despite growing restrictions on public life and movement in and out of Israel, Nativ could continue. They could…
FYI: Reading the Forverts of early winter 1918, with the influenza epidemic ramping up and an election forthcoming, the paper sounds eerily like today’s news. The Forverts reported nearly 3,000 cases of influenza in the city and a commissioner who thought it wasn’t serious (10/10/18). At the tail end of the article, they placed an…
March 21, 2020. That’s the date of my son Leo’s Bar Mitzvah. Aside from having one of the hardest and most boring Torah portions, it seemed like a pretty good date. My wife, Jill, Leo and I had put a lot of work into making the day really special. And I know that every family…
The Israeli health ministry is taking unusual steps to reach out to the country’s growing Hasidic population to help stop the spread of COVID-19, releasing an audio recording and setting up a hotline – both in Yiddish. The audio recording, which was first reported Sunday by the Israeli daily Hamodia, gives specific instructions regarding social…
As the coronavirus pandemic sweeps across countries and continents, scientists, physicians, and public-health officials deploy a combination of strategies to check its advance: quarantine, tests, restrictions on people’s movements, antiseptics. Meanwhile, in labs in the United States and abroad, not least in Israel, the race is on to develop an effective vaccine and antiviral drug…
Bal Harbour, Fla. is famous for its warmth and beauty — gorgeous beaches, posh shops and high-end hotels. Among Jews, it’s also known as the home of a big, thriving and internationally beloved synagogue that meshes perfectly with its surroundings, called simply “The Shul.” The Shul is architecturally grand, its gleaming white facade lined with…
On Wednesday evening last week, Dr. Stuart Ditchek convened an unprecedented meeting. At a synagogue in Midwood, Brooklyn, he gathered 170 rabbis, yeshiva principals and administrators (some streaming in via Zoom) to ask them to make a difficult, but necessary, decision: close their doors immediately to help stop the spread of coronavirus. Ditchek, a pediatrician…
When I got to the freezer aisle of my the Costco in Culver City, Calif., on Friday afternoon, there were nine kosher chickens left. I swung open the glass doors and started piling them in my shopping cart. “May I?” I turned. It was a young woman — I think. Black gloves covered her hands,…
