When the spring mission of the Men\’s Division for Israel Bonds went to Israel in June they made a pit stop at Magen David Adom (MDA)\’s Blood Center in Ramat Gan so that all the mission participants could donate blood.
Rabbi Mark Borovitz\’s memoir of how prison Torah study turned an alcoholic grifter and check-kiter into a successful rehabilitator of Jewish cokeheads, gamblers and other addicts is a blustering and grandiose book, marred by clichés and solecisms. And yet, I liked \”The Holy Thief: A Con Man\’s Journey From Darkness to Light,\” very much.
Yom Kippur\’s break the fast is the most anticipated meal of the year. Of course, it\’s because we\’re starving; we\’ve been fantasizing about that first bite for the last 25 hours.
I grew up in a family that never seemed to do anything right. Our approach to Yom Kippur, for example, was mixed: My father and I observed it; my mother and brother did not. Returning from synagogue at the end of the day, Dad and I were starving, so we grabbed a couple of slices of challah and spread chopped liver on top. Without ceremony, we leaned over a kitchen counter inhaling this snack.
Although the experience was a bonding one, by high school I realized that something was wrong with this picture, that something made me feel uncomfortable. Standing on linoleum, I\’d pivot on one of my high heels and contemplate what routine other families followed when they came home from synagogue. How and when did they resume eating?
David Szady, the senior FBI counterintelligence official currently heading the controversial investigation of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), is well-known to senior Jewish communal officials, who assert he has targeted Jews in the past.
Now, an investigation reveals that Szady was involved in a well-publicized case involving a Jewish former CIA staff attorney who sued the FBI, the CIA and its top officials for religious discrimination. Although not named in the suit, Szady headed the elite department that former CIA Director George Tenet admitted in 1999 was involved with \”insensitive, unprofessional and highly inappropriate\” language regarding the case of attorney Adam Ciralsky.
Paul Kurzberg, an Israeli from Pardess Hanna, was in the office of his New Jersey moving company on Sept. 11, 2001, when the first plane hit the World Trade Center.
Like many Israeli movers in the New York area, Kurzberg, who was in his late 20s, was not legally authorized to work in the United States. But on Sept. 11, that thought was distant from his mind as he and his friends piled into a company van after the second plane hit the World Trade Center to find a better vantage point to photograph the historic terrorist attack.
It proved to be a critical mistake.
Pop diva Madonna was among the praying, swaying and singing masses of kabbalah enthusiasts who made the pilgrimage to Israel for the High Holidays, seeking spiritual transformation through a brand of Jewish mysticism.
For the settlers of the Gaza Strip, the left-leaning kibbutzim just over the border with Israel proper are, politically speaking, a world apart.
As Prime Minister Ariel Sharon powers ahead with plans for disengagement from the Gaza Strip, charges are flying between proponents and naysayers determined to gain monopolies on legitimacy, each side accusing the other of trampling democratic norms.
Sixteen years ago, Mark Borovitz was in prison for the second time. A Cleveland native, he began selling stolen goods for the Cleveland mob out of his high school locker, then graduated to con games and hustles. In prison, he came under the influence of Rabbi Mel Silverman and began a return to faith that culminated, after his release, in his earning a rabbinical degree.
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