The Forward, in collaboration with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency and Jewish media outlets around the world, is sharing obituaries of people in the Jewish community who have died from the coronavirus or ensuing complications. Do you know someone who has…
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News As COVID-19 rages at San Quentin, a prison rabbi and activist offer comfort and support
Kat Morgan led her last Shabbat service inside San Quentin State Prison on March 13. At one point during that service, and her co-leaders divided the congregants into small groups to share things that bring them joy during darker moments. “These people are experts in resilience,” she said. “They shared gratitude for things like prayer,…
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News Lucille Weiss, 93, Beloved Matriarch With Zest For Life
BOSTON (JTA) — Lucille Weiss had a zest for life, traversing continents and cultivating a home teeming with family and friends — and 17 species of pests, including a skunk and a parrot. At the age of 80, she set out to visit a roost of butterflies in central Mexico. The steep uphill journey required…
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News Sidney Forman, 95, Lived Out A Dream With Performance Of Musical Comedy He Wrote In The 1950s
BOSTON (JTA) – Sidney Forman performed before many audiences over the course of his life. He sang in barbershop quartets, in synagogue choirs and for the ordination of a cardinal. At Boston’s Hatch Shell concert venue, he sang for the legendary Boston Pops maestro Arthur Fiedler. But a year ago, when Forman packed the house…
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News Lenora Garfinkel, 89, Noted Orthodox Architect Who Lost A Son And Grandson To COVID-19
(JTA) — In the world of Orthodox Judaism, men may run the synagogues — but Lenora Garfinkel built them. Garfinkel was one of the first women to study architecture at the prestigious Cooper Union College in New York and went on to build Jewish community buildings across the New York metropolitan area over the course…
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News Efrahim Kopel Meniuk, 82, Led Rio Chapter Of Brazil-Israel Commerce Group
RIO DE JANEIRO (JTA) — Efrahim Kopel Meniuk, the president of the Brazil-Israel Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s Rio de Janeiro chapter, died of COVID-19 on June 22. He was 82. Born in Brazil to Ukrainian Jewish immigrants, Meniuk led the institution since early 2019. Founded in 1959, the chamber promotes commercial ties between Latin…
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News Rievan Slavkin, 85, Beloved Rabbi And Champion Shofar Blower
BOSTON (JTA) – Long before he joined the rabbinate, Rievan Slavkin had an ear for music. Born into a musical family and gifted with perfect pitch, Slavkin led the choir at the Pittsburgh synagogue where he grew up and later became the organist for services during his rabbinic studies at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati….
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News Avraham ‘Bobby’ Katz, 73, Helped Establish Hasidic Community In New Jersey
(JTA) — When Rabbi Meyer Yosef Rottenberg, the leader of the Kosover Hasidic sect, sought to help young families priced out of Brooklyn in Linden, New Jersey, several years ago, he turned to Rabbi Avraham “Bobby” Katz for help. Katz had cycled through a number of jobs in his life already, from postman to stockbroker…
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News Chaim Gantz, 50, Hasidic Social Worker Who Worked With Youth
(JTA) — Chaim Gantz didn’t conform to expectations. Born to Israeli immigrants in the ultra-Orthodox Brooklyn neighborhood of Borough Park in 1970, he attended the more moderate Yeshiva Torah Vodaas and went clean shaven even though he was a dedicated member of the Vizhnitz Hasidic sect. After a gap year in yeshiva in Israel, he…
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Culture An Israeli genocide scholar looks to Israel’s history to understand ‘what went wrong’
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