The Chabad center in Mumbai was the site of a 2008 terror attack that killed six Israeli and American victims, including Rabbi Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg, the emissary couple who headed the Chabad
Moshe Holtzberg was an infant when Pakistani terrorists shot his parents and four other Jews in a Mumbai Jewish community center. Now, at nine years old, he’s returned to Mumbai to dedicate the space as a “living memorial” to his parents, the Times of Israel reported. Surrounded by parents and dignitaries — and the nanny…
I had only two days left in Mumbai before flying back home to the U.S. (with a few days layover in Tel Aviv, where I was born and raised). I had pretty much checked off all the boxes on my Jewish-Indian heritage discovery trip to India. I’d visited almost every single active synagogue in this…
Halwa is a traditional Indian milk custard made by the Bene Israel Indian Jews in Mumbai for Rosh Hashanah. This recipe is an adaptation by the author’s mom, who now lives in Israel. In India halwa is made with “chick,” a wheat gluten, but in Israel, a majority of the community is using cornstarch as…
Moshe Holtzberg, the orphaned son of the Chabad House directors in Mumbai, India, killed by terrorists in 2008, was scheduled to lead thousands of Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries in the recitation of psalms. Moshe, who is nearly 9 and lives with his grandparents in Afula, Israel, was scheduled to lead the recitation on Sunday night in New…
In my country — India — God is everywhere. At school, at work, even in a taxi ride, the average Indian encounters God in a million daily interactions. Instead of steering away from religion, we steer toward it without hesitation. And “religion” here doesn’t always look the way you might expect it to. In Mumbai’s…
“Wow, the ladies here wear saris to synagogue! Is that a Hindu influence?” Nathaniel Jhirad, a 23-year-old Indian Jew in Mumbai’s Bene Israel community, hears this question a lot. Every time, he’s tempted to reply: “You wear skirts; that is not an ancient garment from the Mythical Land of Authentic Judaism!” Jhirad’s fantasy riposte, told…
MUMBAI — On my first morning in India, I found myself staring at an egg. That and a cup of coffee was all my hotel’s “free continental breakfast” amounted to, but I didn’t feel cheated. I felt vindicated. After all, I’d come to India because of an egg. I cracked the hard-boiled shell and peeled…
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NPR Legal Correspondent Nina Totenberg in conversation with Editor-in-Chief Jodi Rudoren. To benefit the Forward.
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