by Rabbi Peter J. Rubinstein The prophet Jeremiah witnessed Jerusalem set ablaze and the Holy Temple obliterated by marauding Babylonian troops. Despite observing these traumatic events as well as the forcible exile of Israelites to Babylonia, Jeremiah impeccably believed that out of that calamity would arise another formation of the people of the Torah. In his metaphor we could be “like a tree planted by waters, sending forth its roots by a stream” thereby sprouting life anew. (Jer. 17:8) In fact Jeremiah was right. The destruction of the Temple in 586 BCE, the fall of Jerusalem, the exile to Babylon was not our people’s demise. Rather it emerged as a catalyst for the origin of Jewish life as we know and live it today. Our history incorporates destruction and rebirth. When the Holy … Continue Reading
Russian-Jewish Canadian Camp Program is a Success
Ninety teenagers from Russian-speaking Jewish families in the Toronto area spent last week at Camp Gesher, located on Skootamata Lake, Ontario, attending J.Academy Camp. Operating for the second summer, J. Academy is the only sleepover camp program in Canada that is specifically geared to teens from Russian-speaking background families. Through a variety of informal educational and recreational experiences, the program encourages participants to explore their roots and to discover their place in Jewish civilization through the artistic prism. J. Academy offers its participants five areas of specialization: theater, dance, journalism, design and marketing. For the majority of the participants, J. Academy is their first experience with the culture of North American Jewish camps and with Jewish … Continue Reading
Creativity and Cultural Arts in Today’s Jewish Europe
by Smadar Bar-Akiva Who are the target audiences of Jewish artists in Europe? What values are they looking to express and transmit? What is their relationship with the organized Jewish community? Are there boundaries to their creativity? Do the above questions even matter? These are some of the issues that were debated last week at the first ever European Seminar on Innovation and Creativity in Jewish Culture. Taking place at the backdrop of the largest theater festival in Europe, at the medieval city of Avignon, France, the European Association of Jewish Community Centers (EAJCC), the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) and the Jewish Federation of France (FSJU) convened a talented group of some forty cultural arts organizers and artists from across Europe to discuss the … Continue Reading
The Secrets of Jewish Lisbon
by Smadar Bar-Akiva The loads of tourists roaming through the sunny streets of Lisbon hardly know that the quaint neighborhoods of Alfama, Chiado and Baxia were once home to approximately 200,000 Jews, 25% of Lisbon’s citizens. The time was the 15th Century when Jews enjoyed a Golden Age of success and integration, taking part in Portugal’s era of world discoveries and expansions. That renaissance was brutally quenched by the Portuguese Inquisition, following the Spanish one and known to be even more brutal. Then, if you stop for a cup of coffee at the busy Chiado pedestrian mall you may not know that one of the coffee shops was once a meeting point for Jews fleeing Europe at the time of World War II. Ten thousand of them were saved thanks to Aristides de Sousa Mendes, who was a Protugese … Continue Reading
Fresh Eyes On Hungarian Jewish Life
by Zev Nagel Although I am originally from Los Angeles, I’ve spent the past ten years bouncing between Israel, New York, and Boston, so there is no one single place I call home. Before now, I had worked in advocacy and political communications, and was earning my master's degree in international business and conflict resolution. All this time, I knew I wanted to live and work in a foreign country. But I realized that the ideal job would have to combine my interest in international affairs and my passion for Jewish life. I had little real sense of what it means to “be Jewish” outside the United States and Israel. The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) offered that perfect combination. My work in Budapest can be best characterized as community development ... working … Continue Reading
Japanese Living Amidst Continued Quakes, Threat of Nuclear Disaster
by Joshua Runyan and Tamar Runyan As an international effort representing 70 countries and a host of non-governmental organizations directs aid to the troubled island nation of Japan, locals who survived an initial 8.9-magnitude earthquake and devastating tsunami only to face the prospect of the worst nuclear disaster since the 1986 Chernobyl meltdown are living in a near constant state of fear, doing what they can to make it through the day. Electricity and water shortages, spotty telephone and cellular service, and scores of aftershocks as high as 6.2-magnitude underscored the fact that the tragedy continues to unfold. At the Tokyo home of Rabbi Mendel and Chana Sudakevich, each shockwave that thundered through their building sparked wails and whimpers from some of their six … Continue Reading
Deadly Tsunami Appears to Have Spared Tokyo Jewish Community
by Joshua Runyan and Tamar Runyan One year after the tsunami that wasn’t, a massive shockwave spawned by an afternoon 8.9 earthquake off the coast of Japan slammed into the island nation Friday with 13-foot seas and sent tourists and locals almost 4,000 miles away in Hawaii scrambling for higher ground. With news outlets reporting that upwards of 300 people perished in the wall of water - as opposed to few in the quake itself - Japanese authorities warned that the death toll could likely rise. All over the world, friends and family members of anyone in the wave’s path, whether in Asia, in Pacific islands, or along a swath of North American coast stretching from Alaska’s Aleutian Islands to just north of Los Angeles, jammed phone lines to ascertain the condition of their loved … Continue Reading
Explorations in Contemporary European Jewish Philanthropy
The Center for the Study of Philanthropy in Israel has published Explorations in Contemporary European Jewish Philanthropy: The Italian case in context (by Luisa Levi D’Ancona, PhD). Abstract The purpose of this paper is to start exploring the under-researched area of European Jewish philanthropy. Because of the difficulty of thinking of European Jewish philanthropy as a monolithic phenomenon, the paper focuses on one country, Italy, as a starting point to examine challenges and developments of contemporary European Jewish philanthropy, with a vision of further research on Jewish giving in other European countries. This paper explores Italian Jewish giving both diachronically and synchronically. The background on the history of giving by Italian Jews explores the long-term dynamics of … Continue Reading
From Jewish Evacuee to Bosnian Breast Cancer Advocate
Nela Hasic: From Jewish Evacuee to Bosnian Breast Cancer Advocate In 1992, when civil war broke out in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Nela Hasic received a call from a leader in the Jewish community. "We are under attack, and the JDC is airlifting members of the Bosnian Jewish community to safety," she recalls hearing. "You have to be at the airport in half an hour." Nela, whose family roots in Bosnia date back 500 years to the Spanish Inquisition, was reluctant to leave her home and the life she knew. "I did not want to go … I did not want to leave," she said. But her father insisted. Having watched his entire family perish during the Holocaust simply because they were Jews, he felt that waiting was not an option. "War has started," my father told me. "You do not have the right to stay here and … Continue Reading
How I Moved to India and Rediscovered My Judaism
by Jeanine Buzali When I sat down to try to write a short reflection piece about my year in Mumbai as a JDC Jewish Service Corps (JSC) volunteer, I shuddered slightly. The thought of condensing everything I learned there, along with the deep personal connection I developed with members of the Indian-Jewish community, seemed impossible. Being in this line of work, I often found myself explaining what it’s like to be a foreign volunteer entering a community in a country you barely know and getting a ‘job done’ in a cultural setting that is so very different from yours. It requires an acute sense of adventure, fearlessness in the face of the unknown, adaptation, and the willingness to accept that the truths you grew up with turn out to be completely wrong. You also need the ability to laugh … Continue Reading
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