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Jewish Journal

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December 14, 2006

The promise of ‘Peace in our Time’

Leave a Comment / Opinion, Worldwide /

The Iraq Study Group on the face of it seems to be a well-meaning enough document put together buy a well-meaning enough group of elder statespersons.

One of the Study
Group’s co-chairs, Lee Hamilton, is a good, decent and principled man. The other co-chair is James Baker, who is to diplomacy what J.R. Ewing was to oil.

Regardless of what you think or don’t think of the war in Iraq, you will delude yourself if you believe that it is not a major battle in the ongoing war pitting Islamo-terrorism against us. You will delude yourself at your peril. Do not believe me, listen to the terrorists themselves. As soon as the Iraq Study Group’s report was out, out came the response of Abu Ayman, a senior leader of Islamic Jihad, “The report proves this is the era of Islam and of Jihad. It is not just a simple victory it is a great one…. It is a sign to all those that keep saying that America, Israel and the West in general cannot be defeated on the ground, so let us negotiate with them … the next step would be a total defeat on their [American] land.”

What is the strategy suggested by the report, which so encourages Abu Ayman and his like-minded Jihadis? There are three big ideas: Withdraw combat troops by 2008, engage Iran and Syria and include the Israel-Palestinian/Israel–Syria conflict into the mix.

Withdrawing combat troops by 2008 means quite simply that by 2008 you intend to stop fighting. Clerk typists are not going to engage in combat.

Recommendation 10, the issue of Iran’s nuclear programs should continue to be dealt with by the United Nations Security Council and its five permanent members (i.e., The United States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia and China) plus Germany.”

“Recommendation 11: Diplomatic efforts within the support group should seek to persuade Iran that it should take specific steps to improve the situation in Iraq.”

This then is the Jim Baker back-room deal. By committing the United States to assigning the issue of Iran’s nuclear program to the U.N. Security Council, we are virtually guaranteeing that no action will be taken to stop Iran from developing a nuclear weapon! That is, as Daddy Bush liked to say, the quid pro quo. Iran gets a nuclear weapon in return for buying us just enough stability in Iraq to pull out and thus stick the next administration — which would either be a Democrat or John McCain — with the consequences.

But, like the famed Ginsu knife set commercial, that’s not all! What else do you get if you’re one of the first two state sponsors of terror to call the 1-800 number? Well, if you’re Iran and Syria you get Lebanon and the Golan Heights!

Recommendation 13: “There must be a renewed and sustained commitment from the United States on a comprehensive peace plan on all fronts: Lebanon and Syria and President Bush’s June 2002 commitment to a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine.”

Now that’s interesting. What do Israel and Lebanon, Israel and Syria and Israel and the Palestinians have to do with Shias killing Sunis in Baghdad? The tip-off is including Lebanon in these conversations. Lebanon is not at war with Israel, and Israel is not at war with Lebanon. Hezbollah, Iran and Syria’s terrorist army proxy, dragged Israel and Lebanon both into a war which neither one wanted as a way of changing the West’s conversation away from the topics of Iran’s nuclear aspirations and Syria’s assassination of Lebanon’s president!

The only reason for including Lebanon in the conversation at all is to signal to Iran and Syria that it will be offered up for grabs to them on a silver platter as well. It will be done under the guise of encouraging a more representative government in Lebanon, a truer Democracy that recognizes Hezbollah’s legitimate rights and interests.

But that’s not all! No! If you’re amongst the first two callers not only do you get the Ginsu knife set, Shia domination from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean, and the government of Lebanon; if you’re Syria you get the Golan Heights! And again, all you have to do is buy just enough time to give W a fig leaf, and then you can stick it to the next Democrat or John McCain.

The first page of the letter from the co-chairs, at the very beginning of the report, states “Our political leaders must build a bipartisan approach to bring a responsible conclusion to what is now a lengthy and costly war … the aim of our report is to move our country toward such a consensus.”

The tone is remarkably similar to another report presented to another body of legislators “Therefore … we should quickly reach a conclusion so that this painful and difficult operation … might be carried out at the earliest possible moment and concluded as soon as was consistent with orderly procedure, in order that we might avoid the possibility of something that might have rendered all our attempts at peaceful solution useless … every one of the modifications is a step in the right direction.”

That last bit of rhetoric was Neville Chamberlain as he sold out Czechoslovakia to Hitler in order to bring about peace in our time. When you think of it, from his perspective, he may have been cutting a better deal than the present one. He only sold out one country. The Baker report sells out four: Lebanon, Israel, Iraq … and the United States.

Dan Gordon is the writer of such films as “The Hurricane” and “Murder in the First.” In addition, he is the author of numerous articles on the Middle East conflict and served as a captain (Res.) in the IDF during the recent Israel-Hezbollah war.

The promise of ‘Peace in our Time’ Read More »

Healing community rises from life-threatening illness

Leave a Comment / Community, Personal Voice /

“There but for the grace of God go I …,” you think upon hearing of some horrendous freak accident. “There and there and there and there but for the grace of God …,” you recite when hearing about the women in your life who have been diagnosed with breast cancer. For breast cancer has become a disease of epic proportions, a modern-day plague.

One out of eight women develop the disease over a lifetime, and the older a woman is, the higher her risk. From age 40 to 49, one in 68 women get the disease; from 50 to 59, one in 37; and from 60 to 69, one in 26. Approximately 213,000 women will be diagnosed with invasive breast cancer this year, and approximately 41,000 will die.

To make matters worse, Jewish women have a slightly higher incidence of the disease. But no matter how low a risk factor you may have — no family members with breast cancer, you had your children before the age of 35 and eat healthily — the disease will strike some of the best of us.

Enter Rabbi Carla Howard. Howard had a busy schedule as the executive director and co-founder of Jewish Hospice Project Los Angeles, the first Jewish hospice service in the city that offered spiritual care for the dying. She was on faculty at the Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, held workshops throughout the city on hospice care for lay people and professionals, taught at area seminaries for rabbinical and chaplaincy students and oversaw care of more than 600 hospice patients and their families.

But on Oct. 29, 2005 — Howard’s birthday — all that changed. On that day, she was diagnosed with breast cancer and told by her doctors to slow down.

For someone used to being energized by being out in the world, Howard had a hard time swallowing her doctors’ orders. It became clear, however, after visiting with a sick patient soon after her diagnosis, she had no other choice.

“The last person I saw was a 54-year-old woman dying of breast cancer,” Howard recalled the other day while making a hasty lunch. “I thought, ‘OK, I can take a little break. Maybe I need to pull my energy in, see if I can make this go in a different direction.’ I’m so used to pouring a lot out, now I had to rally my energy for my own healing. It was a big change for me.”

Howard started chemo/radiation treatment; she lost her hair and her energy. A good day meant a walk around the park with the dog; a bad day meant staying in bed all day.

She stayed close to home, close to her bed. Often she was unable to eat or cook. She was thankful for her students, friends and family who came by every evening with armloads of food. Although distressed by her condition, her husband and daughter perked up with every new meal.

As she lay in bed, Howard longed for a community of people like herself, who needed spiritual care for what ailed them. She envisioned a place for a multidisciplinary approach to healing.

The space, of course, had to be in a beautiful urban setting — an oasis, a grove — where people could come together to paint, to plant flowers, to pray. There would be meditation rooms, dance and art studios and a garden where people could sit and stare out into space.

Meanwhile, while she was in treatment, the Jewish Hospice Project closed, which freed Howard to create a new venture: the Jewish Healing Center of Los Angeles.

To start, she organized Rfa’einu, a series of nine healing services at Temple Beth Am in Los Angeles for men and women facing serious illnesses or other spiritual challenges, as well as for their family and friends. The first healing service took place this past October. Though the topic was breast cancer, everyone was welcomed.
“Rfa’ein, or heal us, is a call to God to bring wholeness to those in pain,” Howard said.

Sixty participants gathered to chant powerful prayers of healing, with chants drawn from various Jewish texts and liturgy. After the prayers, they spent some time sitting in silence. Participants then broke into smaller groups of four and five and shared their stories.

Dr. Susan Love, who wrote “Dr. Susan Love’s Breast Book,” the bible on breast cancer, was the evening’s guest speaker, lecturing on the state of the art in breast cancer research. The service ended with a healing circle.

Sandra Braun, Temple Beth Am vice president for adult and family planning, hadn’t planned to stay. She intended to check in and then be on her way. Before she knew it, she was joining in the chanting. “It fixes you,” Braun said, trying to articulate how the service had moved her. “I’d never been involved in meditation or spiritual prayer before. It was a really powerful feeling being in a room with so many people who needed healing. [The prayers] came flowing out; you repeated them over and over, and everyone was doing it together.

“Afterward, I felt free. I felt on a different plane spiritually, emotionally and physically,” she said. “I think everyone felt the same thing.”

Braun attended the November healing service on the role of stress, the environment and diet on serious illness, with guest speaker Dr. Soram Singh Khalsa. Braun plans to attend the third service on Dec. 18, as well, which will be a meditative healing service of light for the Chanukah season. She has pledged to support Howard in creating a permanent space for her new mission.

Since her original diagnosis, Howard has completed treatment and her prognosis is good. She is currently concentrating on opening the Jewish Healing Center, which is now incorporated as a nonprofit.

She is confident that if she envisions a community of healing, it will come. But life has not been easy. This year on Yom Kippur, Howard’s older brother was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. He died six weeks later on her birthday.

Healing community rises from life-threatening illness Read More »

Prager; CAIR; Gibson; The Boot!

Leave a Comment / Letters to the Editor /

CAIR

It is getting somewhat boring to read yet another letter in The Jewish Journal from such a disingenuous character as Hussam Ayloush (Letters, Dec. 1). Typical of Ayloush and other CAIR officials, he engages only in ad hominem smears and refuses to deal with the substantive claims. One only needs to do a little research to uncover his obvious fabrications.

First, it is ironic that he says that I “resort to deception” by stating that CAIR has engaged in anti-Semitism in the past. It is notable here that Ayloush conveniently fails to address the fact that neo-Nazi William Baker has been invited to speak at several CAIR events — whose presence at those events Ayloush himself has defended.

Also, Ayloush categorically lies when he states that “CAIR has no connection, direct or indirect, to the event he referred to in New York” in which radical Islamist cleric Wagdy Ghoneim made anti-Semitic statements and led the crowd in an anti-Semitic song. In fact, CAIR’s name is listed on the event announcement, along with several other groups including the Holy Land Foundation, as a co-sponsor. The event itself was sponsored by the Islamic Association for Palestine, which was hit with a $156 million civil judgment — along with the Holy Land Foundation and several other entities — by a federal court in Illinois in a case in which the family of a murdered victim of Hamas terrorism successfully sued U.S.-based Hamas front organizations.

Maybe the problem here is one of language and definition. Perhaps, to Ayloush, neo-Nazis and songs lyrics such as, “No to the Jews, descendants of the Apes” are not anti-Semitic.

Steven Emerson
Executive Director
Investigative Project on Terrorism

Ed. Note: The Journal has invited Steven Emerson and Hussam Ayloush to continue their exchange in an e-mail forum at jewishjournal.com. This letter will be posted there awaiting Mr. Ayloush's response.

Hussan Ayloush has managed to manipulate and use The Jewish Journal as his mouthpiece to discredit Steve Emerson. I wonder if any of the Islamic papers would allow such use of their papers for us to discredit Ayloush.

Steven Emerson has been warning the government about radical Islam long before anyone knew about CAIR and Ayloush. Had our government listened to the warnings that Emerson made them aware of instead of trying to appear politically correct, or just naive, more than 3,000 people would be alive today. We would have been prepared for the promotion of Sharia law, and accommodations made for Islam that are not made for either Judaism or Christianity in the United States.

Your paper has allowed an apologist for terror in the United States as well as in Israel to use your pages to promote his agenda, propaganda and lies. This is just shameful.

Allyson Rowen Taylor
Valley Glen

Prager and the Quran

I don’t know which is worse; Dennis Prager’s virulent intolerance and Islamaphobia or his pathetic ignorance of what our “American values” really are (“Prager Opposition to Quran Congress Rite Draws Fire,” Dec. 8). Surely even he would agree that the U.S. Constitution reflects cherished “American values” to which we can all adhere.

Article VI, on the very topic of the oath of office, says, and I quote in full to give the context: “The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the members of the several state legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several states, shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”

How dare Prager set himself above the Constitution, and claim that anyone who does not take an oath on the Bible can’t serve in Congress?It’s Prager that shouldn’t serve on the United States Holocaust Memorial Council if he does not share the American value of religious free exercise protected by the First Amendment.

Stephen F. Rohde
Los Angeles
The writer is a constitutional lawyer

I wish the journal would do their homework on Keith Ellison. If you simply Google “Ellison Jews” you would find that he defended a colleague’s right to say “the most racist white people are Jews”; that he sat silently while Khalid Muhammand spewed a racist rant; that he defended in writing Farakhan’s not being anti-Semitic; that he his funded by CAIR, a known front group for Hamas. It’s most disturbing that Jewish organizations would defend this guy without knowing the truth.

Joshua Spiegelman
Los Angeles

Apocalypto

Dear Jon Drucker, your suggestion that we sneak into seeing Mel Gibson’s movie “Apocalypto” although we paid to see a different movie is bad advice (“Skip Into Mel Gibson’s ‘Apocalypto’ Now,” Dec 8). It reminded me of last year when I read that Abraham Foxman, the head of the Anti-Defamation League, had snuck into a free preview of “The Passion” without being invited.

As a Jew, I was totally embarrassed by Foxman’s actions. If you want to see the movie, act like a responsible adult and pay the price. You will be providing a better example for everyone, Jews and non-Jews. Leave “skipping” for the kids.

Jeff Shulman
Granada Hills

Booted!

I feel reassured to learn that measures are taken to keep sexual predators, evil opportunists and other dark characters away from shul (“Getting Kicked Out of Shul,” Dec. 8). The safe environment this creates makes for a more spiritual experience without, as a single woman, having to fear for my safety.

I want to take this opportunity to thank all the rabbis for taking on the responsibility of doing what it takes to create the safe and loving environment we enjoy at shul, in addition to their already demanding work.

Talar Toprakjian
Member
Beth Jacob Congregation

Your front-page article of Dec 8 shows that we Jews continue to be our own worst enemy — and sadly, The Jewish Journal is leading the way in making us look nasty or foolish to our own community and certainly to the general L.A. community (“Getting Kicked Out of Shul).

Prager; CAIR; Gibson; The Boot! Read More »

Iran’s Jewish legislator criticized during L.A. appearance

Leave a Comment / Blogs, Community /

A group of local Iranian Jewish activists spoke out in protest of the Dec. 4 appearance of Maurice Motamed, the only Jewish representative to the Iranian parliament, at the Iranian American Jewish Federation (IAJF) synagogue in West Hollywood, where he provided an update on the current status of Iran’s Jewry.

Motamed’s address to an audience of nearly 150 mostly older Iranian Jews painted a positive picture of the lives of Jews in Iran. He described them as generally financially well off and said they are allowed to practice their religion without being harassed. Evidence of this, he said, can be seen in the fact that a new Jewish community center is planned in Teheran on a land recently purchased for $5 million.

However, Motamed’s speech sparked sharp criticism from the Council of Iranian Jews, a small Los Angeles-based Iranian Jewish group whose leadership said welcoming a member of Iran’s current regime provided a forum for the repressive government.

“Our community members clearly know he [Motamed] is acting on the orders of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” said George Haroonian, an activist with the Council of Iranian Jews. “He represents a regime that every day calls for the destruction of Israel, denies the Holocaust as a state policy and is the biggest financial and practical support of groups whose main goal is the murder of Jewish people.”

Motamed dismissed those opposing his presence at the IAJF synagogue and, without naming names, accused them of attacking his character in order to advance their own personal agendas.

“Unfortunately those who say these things approached me three years ago and wanted information about the internal affairs of Iran,” Motamed said in an interview with The Journal. “And since I have not given it to them, they have a personal opposition and vengeance against me.”

Four IAJF board members attended, and Nessah Cultural Center’s Rabbi David Shofet appeared briefly, but no other prominent local Iranian Jewish leaders were present at the event.

Frank Nikbakht, an Iranian Jewish activist and local expert on the treatment of minorities in Iran, claims Motamed’s statements about Jewish life in Iran lack credibility. Motamed “has officially sworn to uphold the interests of Islam and the Islamic Republic upon entering the Islamic Assembly as the Jewish representative, as required by the government’s constitution,” Nikbakht said.

Nikbakht questioned Motamed’s allegiances based on a 24-page Persian-language report authored and distributed by Motamed at an event held at the Nessah Cultural Center during a visit to Los Angeles in 2002. In the report, Motamed outlined his activities as a member of the Energy Committee in the Iranian Parliament as well as his travels to Russia, where he urged Russian companies and officials to complete Iran’s nuclear reactor at the Bushehr location.

IAJF leaders defended Motamed’s current visit as well as his efforts to protect Jews living under Iran’s fundamentalist regime.

“He is in a very sensitive position and is walking a tight rope in trying to keep our community there safe and sound,” said Solomon Rastegar, vice-chair of the IAJF. “There are people here in Los Angeles with insufficient knowledge about life in Iran who try to attack him so they can gain credible for themselves.”

Some local Iranian Jewish activists have been had odds with IAJF leaders who have long advocated keeping criticism of Teheran’s regime to a minimum for fear of retributions that might be brought against the roughly 20,000 Jews still living in Iran.

During the question-and-answer segment of the event, Motamed defended his record as a Jewish advocate saying he had spoken out against comments made earlier this year by Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who denied the existence of the Holocaust. Motamed also said he has been trying to resolve the case of 12 missing Iranian Jews who tried to flee Iran nearly 12 years ago.

Motamed had been slated to speak at the Museum of Tolerance on Oct. 10 during a seminar on the future security of Jews living in Iran. The event was hosted by the Los Angeles chapter of Iranian Jewish Women’s Organization (IJWO), but Motamed cancelled his appearance at the last minute citing scheduling difficulties.

During his speech at IAJF, Motamed denied accusations that his invitation to the Museum of Tolerance event had been withdrawn, and he claimed to have the full support and confidence of Iranian Jews worldwide.

“What is important to me is that I feel the support of the 20,000 Jews in Iran and the Iranian Jewish community outside Iran,” Motamed said. “Therefore everything else that is said is unimportant to me.”

Iran’s Jewish legislator criticized during L.A. appearance Read More »

Obituaries

Leave a Comment / Obituaries /

Estelle A. Schaffer of Los Angeles died Nov. 5 after a long battle with cancer. Estelle had a distinguished career as a television and film production coordinator for programs such as “Canon,” “Cagney & Lacy” and “The Outlaw Josie Wales.” She also worked on many highly acclaimed film projects during her 10 years as a production coordinator for Orion Studios. Prior to her career in the entertainment industry, Estelle served in the publicity department of Young & Rubicam. Her tenure at Y & R included stints in Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Hollywood.

A fervent advocate for the state of Israel, Estelle traveled to Israel with Volunteers for Israel (VFI) on many relief missions. She was a long time board member and volunteer for the Los Angeles chapter of VFI. She counted among her friends many Israeli political and military officials.

Estelle was the daughter of Max and Sophie Schaffer from Sioux City, Iowa. She was the youngest of three children. She is survived by her nieces, Terry Gross of Woodland Hills; Sandi Stamp of Buffalo Grove, Ill.; Renee Barack of Honolulu; and nephew Dr. Randal Schaffer of Palatine, Ill.. She had many friends, cousins and grand nieces and great nephews.

Estelle was laid to rest at Hillside Memorial Gardens in Los Angeles on Nov. 12.

Memorial contributions may be made the American Cancer Society, Volunteers for Israel or Jewish Family Services of Los Angeles.

Jewish Family Services, 6505 Wilshire Blvd. Suite 400 Los Angeles, CA 90048Volunteers For Israel, c/o Louis Goldwitz 2358 Lyric Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027

American Cancer Society, 3333 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 900, Los Angeles, CA 90010. Toll free donation number 800-227-2345.

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Jahangir Bina died Dec. 3 at 85. He is survived by his wife, Mahin; daughter, Jina (Dr. Ata) Rezvanpour; sons, John (Ella), Fred (Venus) and David (Eliza); and five grandchildren. Mount Sinai

Sally Blumfield died Dec. 4 at 82. She is survived by her daughter, Iris (Louis) Newman; sons, Bruce (Ruth) and Brian (Julie); and six grandchildren. Hillside

Ruth Chotiner died Dec. 7 at 90. She is survived by her son Bob (Marsha); granddaughter Melanie Murillo; nieces; and nephews. Hillside

Ralph Cohen died Nov. 25 at 89. He is survived by his daughters, Shelly (David) Permut and Vicky Gordon; son, Larry; six grandchildren; and sister, Stella (Mico) Benveniste. Malinow and Silverman

Ruby Davis died Dec. 1 at 94. She is survived be her son Richard; daughter, Kay Mattson; sister, Ruth (Donald) Holloway; four grandchildren; and seven great-grand children. Hillside

Edith Felderstein died Nov. 28 at 90. She is survived by her son, Kenneth. Malinow and Silverman

David Frankel died Dec. 7 at 85. He is survived by his wife, Helen; son, Allan (Toni); daughter, Judy (Jeff) Gottesman; and grandchildren, Melinda Gottesman and Joshua. Mount Sinai

Sandra Yvette Frankel died Dec. 8 at 69. Survived by her son, Todd; daughter Marla Frankel; one grandchild; and sister Paula Haber. Hillside

Victor Geretz died Dec. 7 at 82. He is survived by his wife, Ester; daughter, Rebecca (Leonard) Friedman; son, Lionel (Petra); one grandchild; brothers, Jack (Chela) and Ephraim (Esther); and sisters, Elaine (Rudy) Levy and Norma Amittai. Mount Sinai

Shirley Gordon died Nov. 25 at 69. She is survived by her husband, Irving, sons, Michael and Robert, sisters, Celia and Edith, friends; nieces; and nephews. Sholom Chapels

Marcia Mae Grace died Nov. 28 at 73. She is survived by her daughter, Marjorie (Jeffrey) Grace-Sayers, Deborah, and Anne (Jim) Blanc; and six grand children; sister, Ruth. Hillside

Marian Gray died Dec 4 at 95. He is survived by his daughter, Brenda (Robert) Seeman; son, Gary (Diane); four grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren. Hillside

Shari Herzoff died Dec. 3, at 66. She is survived by her husband, Edward; mother, Genevieve (Deborah) Simmons; sister, Hildy (David Sprafkin) Simmons; and nieces, Mara Sprafkin and Emily Simmons. Mount Sinai

Ruth Kazan-Carroll died Dec. 6 at 58. She is survived by her husband, George Carroll; sons, Brandon and Jason Carroll; and mother, Fanny Kazansky. Mount Sinai

Edward Krasnof died Dec. 5, at 71. He is survived by his wife, Lea; daughters, Brenda (Ray) Kenneally, Bonnie (Rob) Corlito, Helen Fox and Vivian (Clark) Johnson; sons, Bruce (Rebecca) and Gordon (Brigitte); 16 grandchildren; sister, Marilyn Ward; and son-in-law, Leonard Lebowitz. Mount Sinai

Jeanne Lesser died Nov. 26 at 88. She is survived by her husband, Louis; daughters, Teri (Jack) Ford and Kathy Sanson; Hillside

Seymour “Cy” Lichtman died Dec. 4 at 80. He is survived by his wife, Eve; sons, Jeff (LeeAnne) and Ira (Ondina); daughter, Amy (Robert) Abramson; three grandchildren; and sister, Elinor Schuster. Mount Sinai

Maralyn Malin-Cohen died Dec. 3 at 55. She is survived by her husband, Solomon M. Cohen; brother, Stephen (Barbara) Malin; and sister, Teri (Richard) Vitolo. Mount Sinai

Rose Maller died Dec. 3 at 97. She is survived by her daughter, Sharon (Larry) Klugman; four grandchildren; and six great-great-grandchildren. Mount Sinai

Sylvia Margules died Dec. 9 at 85. She is survived by her sons, Dr Richard (Wendy), Dr Edward (Michelle) and Larry (Lynley); four grandchildren; seven great-grandchildren; and sister, Lillian Zhiss. Mount Sinai

Melvin Margulis died Dec. 5 at 87. He is survived by his friends. Hillside.

Anne Mezerow died Dec. 10 at 92. She is survived by her son, Jerome; daughter, Carol Stander; granddaughter, Stacy; and great-grandchildren, Elyssa and Michael Gavenda. Hillside

William Miller died Dec. 4 at 86. He is survived by his sons, Harold (Colleen) and Paul (Elizabeth); and five grandchildren. Mount Sinai

Bernice Rapp died Nov. 30 at 89. She is survived by her sons, Fred, Merrick and Ronald (Ugyen) Cooperman; brother, Gilbert Turbin; and sister, Marilyn Siegel. Malinow and Silverman

Marjorie Samuels died Dec. 9 at 83. She is survived by her son Roger Orleans; daughter Lynda Klein; grandsons, Jonathan Klein and Andrew Berstein; and brother, Dr. Marshall Kadner (Renee). Hillside

Obituaries Read More »

Second-class Conservative citizens

Leave a Comment / Judaism, Opinion, Personal Voice, United States /

When I first read that there would be a vote by the Conservative movement’s Committee on Law and Standards regarding homosexuality and Jewish law, I was of
course interested.

I’m a gay man, and I have had both personal and professional ties to the Conservative movement since I was a child. In fact, some of my closest friends (and colleagues) are avowed Conservative Jews.

I grew up in the late ’60s and ’70s in a Conservative synagogue in northern New Jersey. It was a dying synagogue due to shifting demographics. My religious school class was made up of about eight students. My venerable, grandfatherly rabbi and the young, well-groomed cantor knew all of us by name. Having always been drawn to Jewish ritual, one year I volunteered my house for the religious school sukkah (much to my parents’ chagrin). My seventh-grade class, along with my teacher, Rabbi Zitter, a 20-something guy sporting tzitzit, built a sukkah in my backyard. The Sunday of Sukkot the rabbi, cantor and religious school principal all visited the synagogue’s “satellite” sukkah. I felt so honored. (And for years after that my family built a sukkah.)

As a middle school and high school student I often attended services at my Conservative synagogue and likely brought the average age of the congregants down to 65. The only other young congregant was a handsome, strapping young college-aged guy who was often called on to lift the Torah. This was the time when I first began to feel the stirrings of same-sex attraction. I didn’t understand it but knew that something was different for me. I imagine that neither the rabbi nor the cantor had a clue that any of his students was beginning to come to terms with anything other than a heterosexual identity. If “gay” was on their radar, I imagine it was “out there,” outside the austere stone building in Paterson, N.J.

I was an active, practicing Conservative Jew. I belonged to USY for a time, I went to USY Summer Encampment, and I went to Israel for the first time with USY’s Israel Pilgrimage. During my college years, I regularly davened with the Conservative minyan at Brandeis University, and upon graduating taught at a Conservative Jewish day school in the Boston area. When I moved to Los Angeles, I began teaching at Adat Ari El in the day school and also taught b’nai mitzvah students there for many years; in addition, I taught at L.A. Hebrew High School. I am currently on the professional staff of Temple Aliyah. My Conservative movement ties run deep.

Honestly, I’m glad that the recent vote of the Conservative movement has opened the door a bit toward acceptance of gay and lesbian Jews. Now that this teshuvah, or legal interpretation, was one of two that received a majority vote, I know that this helps some of my gay “friends and family” squeeze sideways through the now partially open door. I nevertheless remain sad and disappointed that the door has only opened a little, and the idea that it is a qualified acceptance is troubling to me. (Let alone that it rests side by side with a standing ruling of nonacceptance, or that a third accepted teshuvah purports that individuals — I assume “straight” people too — can control their sexual orientation.)

I understand the notion of baby steps, and I understand the notion of compromise in the name of baby steps. But I don’t have to like it. I think this decision perpetuates a system in which gays and lesbians continue to be second-class citizens. It also perpetuates one specific interpretation of a biblical text, which has been interpreted in other ways. Take me for who I am or don’t take me at all. I too am created in God’s holy image.

When I came out I never felt an incompatibility between my Jewish identity and my sexual identity.

Perhaps I was lucky, perhaps naïve. Who knows? I never doubted that God loves me for who I am. I am a Jewish educator and a Jewish communal professional. And I am gay. I hope that my students have experienced me as someone who is caring, compassionate and dedicated. I hope they have seen me as a role model. And I believe that I am these things not despite the fact that I am gay, but in large part because I am gay. My identity as a gay man has helped me to learn to be more empathic, to embrace differences and to overcome my own prejudices.

While I am pleased that the Conservative movement has inched forward in the direction of inclusivity, I find it difficult to rejoice. When I am allowed to sit in the front of the Conservative bus (without being singled out to pass a litmus test; without being subjected to the whim of the driver of that particular bus), then I shall surely rejoice, and I will be at the front of the line chanting the “Shehecheyanu” blessing.

Jeff Bernhardt is a freelance writer living in Los Angeles. He works as a teacher, social worker and Jewish communal service professional with Reform, Conservative and trans-denominational Jewish organizations.

Second-class Conservative citizens Read More »

Victory of a Blessing

Leave a Comment / Judaism, Torah /

There are times in our lives where after periods of struggle and conflict, we seek peace and quiet.

As life would have it, the term of tranquility is short, but we can emerge
from these times strengthened both physically and spiritually.

“Vayeshev Ya’akov — And Jacob settled down in the land where his ancestors had sojourned….”

The opening words of this week’s reading elicited the following comment from our sages: Just when Jacob sought tranquility, the crisis of Joseph erupts.

Jacob, our quintessential ancestor, is indeed a lifelong wrestler. Even before he is born, he is portrayed as wrestling in the womb with his twin brother, Esau.

In fact, his very name, Ya’akov, refers to an ancient wrestling technique. It means one who can strike at the Achilles’ heel of his opponent and cripple him, even while lying on the ground with the enemy’s heel at his own throat. Throughout his life, Jacob will constantly wrestle, and even in his final moments, we find him wrestling with Joseph, his favored son, in order to reverse the blessings between his two Egyptian-born grandsons.

Jacob will become “Israel” as a result of another wrestling match — this time against a mysterious, divine opponent. In this case, all commentaries seem to agree that we are confronted with a profoundly significant metamorphosis. Jacob becomes Israel.

When the patriarch finally succeeds in breaking the grip of the angel and achieves the upper hand, the angel begs to be released, and Jacob utters these famous words: “I will not release you until you grant me your blessing.” These words articulate an authentically Jewish value all too often overlooked.

According to 18th century Italian philosopher Giambattista Vico, heroic thinking in the classical Mediterranean world defined victory as the killing of one’s opponent, which could be restated as:

“Might makes right.” Jacob and the meaning of Chanukah, incidentally, offer us a radically different definition of victory.

Perhaps it could best be expressed as: “Right makes might.” For the Jew, victory must mean receiving a blessing from the enemy, converting him into an ally.

The modern State of Israel never celebrated any of its stunning military victories with parades, parties, celebrations, dancing, etc., as do all other nations on earth.

The late Golda Meir said that we cannot celebrate, because our children had to kill and be killed. The only instance when we witnessed such a great wave of joy in Israel was when the enemy came to bless; i.e., when the late President Anwar Sadat of Egypt came to Israel, extending recognition and the offer of peace.

Sadly, Jacob/Israel must always be alert and ready to take up arms against the “violent hands” of Esau the hunter in order to survive.

As Edmond Jabes, one of the greatest 20th century Jewish writers, remarked concerning the Jewish people: “How inventive his means, how diligent his metamorphosis, deduce, adapt, plan, he can be hounded but not destroyed; Half man, half bird, half fish, half ghost, there is always one half which escapes the hangman…. ”

Our survival can be attributed in great measure to our adaptability but also to our inner spiritual victories.

David Baron is rabbi of the Temple of the Arts at the Wilshire Theatre in Beverly Hills.

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An open letter to the rabbis at the Jewish Theological Seminary

Leave a Comment / L.A. Woman, Personals, Womans Voice /

I want to share with you an email I wrote to Chancellor Elect Eisen as well as Rabbi Joel Roth on the JTS board to support allowing gays to marry and become rabbis:

Dear Mr. Eisen,

I am a 46-year-old woman born and raised in Los Angeles. I am writing to ask that the Conservative movement support gay marriage. As a child, my family was members of the Conservative Temple Beth Am with Rabbi Jacob Pressman at the helm. I am a private person but I wanted to share a bit of my story with you as I know mine is the story of many.

In elementary school I realized I was different. I had no vocabulary for it, but all the books, movies and relationships I saw led me to believe that my feelings were not normal and needed to be suppressed.

I began hiding what was to me a dark and terrible secret that I could not admit even to myself until my 20s. I did not want to be different. In fact, I went to sleep every night for years and years praying that I would wake up and be straight. Of course, that never happened. The thought of coming out and hurting my beloved parents or having them feel ashamed of me was more than I could bear and I thought my only options were either to commit suicide, which gay teens do three times more than their straight counterparts, or move to another city and hide my true self from my family forever.

I stayed in the closet until I was 28-years-old, dating men and sacrificing my youth and happiness trying in vain to fit in. I started having terrible panic attacks and actually thought I was going crazy. I realized one day that it was suddenly more painful to hide who I was than to admit the truth. I tried to prepare myself to lose my family. There were hints all my life that I was gay that my parents either ignored or denied hoping, like myself it wasn’t true or it would simply go away, or perhaps I would grow out of it. Their reactions let me know this would break their hearts.

Mr. Eisen, how different my life would have been had in my early years my temple and temple community openly welcomed gay people or if there were openly gay rabbis to demonstrate that everyone has value.

As Jews we especially understand the pain of being an outsider and of doors being closed to us simply because we were born Jewish. How terrible to think that we ourselves would ever make a fellow Jew an outsider.

By locking gay people out of the rabbinate or of the sacrament of marriage is to send a very strong message that gay people are flawed and not entitled to the same rights and responsibilities as those who happen to be straight.

The reality is that 10 percent of society is gay. With an estimated 14 million Jews worldwide, that’s 1.4 million Jews that happen to be gay. With our numbers dwindling, we cannot afford to lose even one person or make any Jew feel not welcome. I have always felt great pride in being Jewish.

This year I became a bat mitzvah after two years of study. I love Jews and Israel as much as anybody. I do not think it is fair that I am excluded from being a full member of the community I love so much because of the way I was born. It’s like saying people with blue eyes can never marry.

Mr. Eisen, whether we have blue or brown eyes, straight or gay most of us grow up dreaming of the day we will stand beneath a chuppah with our family and friends surrounding us with a rabbi to bless our union.

It is my deep hope that the Conservative movement will make a strong and courageous decision to embrace all of our members so that someday no Jew will ever again feel like an outsider in our own community.

Sincerely,
Pamela Witt

Pamela Witt is a business owner in Los Angeles. She can be reached at pamwittla@aol.com.

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U.S. Jewish Population Rising; California and Israel Join in Tourism Pact

Leave a Comment / Worldwide /

U.S. Jewish Population Rising?

The new American Jewish Yearbook reports that there are 6.4 million Jews in the United States. That’s significantly more than the 5.2 million figure provided by the 2000-2001 National Jewish Population Study.

The yearly survey, published by the American Jewish Committee, is based on a tally of individual Jewish communities across the country. According to the survey, 2.2 percent of the American population is Jewish. New York has the largest Jewish population of any state with 1,618,000, followed by California with 1,194,000, Florida with 653,000 and New Jersey with 480,000, the AJCommittee said in a release.

California and Israel Join in Tourism Pact

The state of California and the state of Israel have jointly established a commission to encourage their citizens to visit each other, proving again that the Golden State is big enough to conduct its own foreign policy. At a recent ceremony at the Los Angeles Convention Center, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Isaac Herzog, Israel’s Minister of Tourism, signed an agreement launching the California-Israel Tourism Commission. Both credited Los Angeles-based media mogul Haim Saban for the initiative to establish the commission.

During the ceremony, Schwarzenegger recalled that he has visited Israel three times, first as a body builder, then to open his Planet Hollywood restaurant in Tel Aviv and last year for the groundbreaking of the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Museum of Tolerance in Jerusalem.

No breakdown was available on the number of Californians visiting Israel, or Israelis visiting California, however, the latest figures from Israeli tourism officials showed that between January-September of this year, 1.5 million tourists came to Israel, of whom 400,000 were Americans. In 2005, Israel had 2 million visitors, among them 533,000 Americans.

— Tom Tugend, Contributing Editor

Iran Hosts Holocaust Deniers Conference

The Iranian government held a conference of Holocaust deniers and skeptics this week, a discussion of whether 6 million Jews actually were killed by the Nazis during World War II.

A report in The New York Times quoted the opening speech by Rasoul Mousavi, head of the Iranian Foreign Ministry’s Institute for Political and International Studies, which organized the event, saying that the conference would allow discussion “away from Western taboos and the restriction imposed on them in Europe.”

Speakers at the event include David Duke, the American white-supremacist politician and former Ku Klux Klan leader, and Georges Thiel, a French writer who has been prosecuted in France over his denials of the Holocaust, the Times reported.

— Staff Report

Seattle Rabbi Regrets Xmas Tree Removal

A Chabad rabbi in Seattle expressed regret that his request to add a menorah to the Seattle-Tacoma Airport’s display of Christmas trees resulted in the trees’ removal.

“I am devastated, shocked and appalled at the decision that the Port of Seattle came to,” Rabbi Elazar Bogomilsky of Chabad-Lubavitch of the Pacific Northwest said in Monday’s Seattle Times.

Last week, Bogomilsky’s attorney Harvey Grad threatened the port with a lawsuit after not receiving a response to a request, first made in October, to install an 8-foot menorah, which Bogomilsky offered to supply.

Port Commissioner Pat Davis told the Times that the commission had not heard about the request until Dec. 7, the day before Grad was to head to court.

An airport spokesperson said it was decided to take down the trees because the airport, preparing for its busiest season, did not have time to accommodate all the religions that would have wanted a display.

The removal resulted in a firestorm of criticism, much of it directed at Bogomilsky, who said he never wanted to see the trees removed.

Thousands March for Hezbollah

Hundreds of thousands of protesters led by Hezbollah marched in downtown Beirut Sunday to demand that Prime Minister Fouad Siniora either cede some government power to the terrorist group and its allies or resign, The Associated Press reported.

Hezbollah has been pressing for increased power since its war with Israel over the summer. Lebanese troops Sunday sealed off Siniora’s compound, as well as the roads nearby. Siniora and most of his ministers have stayed in the complex since Dec. 1, when Hezbollah launched massive protests aimed at toppling Lebanon’s Western-leaning government.

Senate Approves Red ‘Crystal’

The U.S. Senate certified the Red “Crystal,” paving the way for Magen David Adom’s acceptance into the International Red Cross’ bodies. The Red Cross approved the symbol which resembles a playing card diamond earlier this year, ending a decades-long shutout of non-Muslim and non-Christian groups such as Israel’s first responder, which rejected using the Red Cross and Red Crescent symbols as inappropriate. The Red Cross had also rejected the Star of David symbol used by MDA.

The Senate’s certification last Friday, the last day of Congress, protects the symbol’s copyright and follows similar legislation passed last week in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Israeli Hostages Said Wounded

Two Israeli soldiers held by Hezbollah since July were seriously wounded during their capture, security sources said. Israeli security sources last week quoted a declassified military report that said bloodstains and other evidence gathered at the site of the July 12 border raid in which Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev were seized showed the hostages were seriously wounded.

To survive, the sources said, the two army reservists would have required immediate medical attention, something that may not have been available in the custody of the Lebanese terrorist group.

Hezbollah has refused to provide information on the captives’ condition, saying it would only release them as part of a swap for Arabs held in Israeli jails. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has ruled out a swap on Hezbollah’s terms unless the terrorist group provides information on the soldiers’ health. The captives’ families criticized the release of forensic details from the raid.

“I think this may be an attempt by the Prime Minister’s Office to lower pressure to get the kidnapped soldiers freed,” Regev’s brother, Benny, told Israel Radio.

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U.S., Israeli officials see conflicting Iraq study ideas

Leave a Comment / Israel, Politics, Power, United States, Worldwide /

American and Israeli government officials agree on two things: Iraq has nothing at all to do with Israeli-Arab issues.

Except when it does.

From President Bush and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on down, the leadership of the Israeli and U.S. governments are simultaneously embracing and rebuffing last week’s conclusions of the congressionally mandated Iraq Study Group, which makes Israeli-Arab peace progress a linchpin of a successful outcome in Iraq. The crux of their argument is that while it is wrong to blame the Israeli-Arab impasse for any part of the crisis in Iraq, actors in that crisis — chief among them Iran and its allies — are successfully using Israel as a justification for raising the stakes in Iraq.

“We do this not because we are persuaded by some linkage or another, but because it is in the U.S. national interest,” David Welch, the top U.S. State Department envoy to the Middle East, said Friday of U.S. involvement in Arab-Israeli peace when he addressed the Saban Forum, an annual colloquy of U.S. and Israeli leaders.

Another Bush administration official put it more bluntly: “Palestine is not a relevant issue to Iraq, but it is an issue exploited by Iran and extremists throughout the region,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Arab-Israeli peace talks would have a “positive, emboldening effect,” the official said. “If progress among Israel and the Palestinians is manifested, then moderates throughout the region win and extremists lose.”

Conversely, the official said, “We believe that a success in Iraq, a success for moderates against forces of extremism, whether secular or religious, will have a very significant impact in the region, in Syria, in Lebanon, as well as in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”

The Bush administration has welcomed Olmert’s recent overture to the Palestinians, in which he promised a release of prisoners and increased mobility, should a cease-fire hold and the Palestinians prove themselves able to present a negotiating team that renounces terrorism and recognizes Israel’s existence.

Mahmoud Abbas, the relatively moderate Palestinian Authority president, has all but given up on such concessions from the Cabinet, led by the terrorist Hamas group, and has proposed new elections.
Tzipi Livni, Israel’s foreign minister, said at the Saban Forum that Israel and the West should encourage alternatives to the Hamas government, although she did not elaborate.

Bush launched a weeklong review of the Iraq Study Group’s recommendations on Monday, starting with meetings with top State Department officials. Later in the week he was to have met with outside experts, top U.S. diplomats in the region and top military brass.

His primary concern about the report is its deadline for a withdrawal of U.S. combat troops by the first quarter of 2008. Bush has steadfastly resisted timetables until now. However, after meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who is scheduled to tour the region, Bush suggested that he embraces the report’s Iraq-Israeli-Palestinian linkage, counting it as one of three ways to move the Iraq process forward.

“The Palestinian-Israeli conflict is important to be solved,” the president said.

That’s music to the ears of Blair and other Europeans. They enthusiastically welcomed the recommendations of the commission headed by James Baker, secretary of state for Bush’s father, and Lee Hamilton, a former Indiana Democratic congressman.

“The German government shares many of the political observations in the report,” a statement from the German Embassy in Washington said last week on the eve of a U.S. visit by German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier. “The entire Middle East region must move into the international community’s scope. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is of central importance.”

Such views were hardly welcome at the Saban Forum, where the Iraq Study Group’s report lent an anxious irritability to the weekend proceedings. The Saban Center, a Brookings Institution subsidiary funded by American-Israeli entertainment mogul Haim Saban, attracts top names to its annual colloquies. Last year’s was in Jerusalem.

“The Iraqi conflict has very little to do with the Israeli-Palestinian crisis,” Yuli Tamir, Israel’s education minister, said during a break from the conference’s closed sessions. “I don’t think it’s relevant — it’s a good justification but not a reason.”

On Sunday, Olmert, who had earlier suggested that he disagrees with the report’s conclusions, ordered his Cabinet not to comment on it, saying it was an internal American affair.

Livni did not mention the Baker-Hamilton report by name, but its conclusions were clearly the focus of her keynote address at a gala State Department dinner last Friday.

“There is a commonly mistaken assumption that I sometimes hear that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the core of the trouble of the Middle East; that somehow if this conflict could be resolved, so the situation could be different, and we can face a totally different region,” Livni said. “So, this is wrong. This view confuses symptom and cause. The truth is that the conflicts in the Middle East are a consequence, not a cause, of radicalism and terrorism.”

Nevertheless, in the same speech Livni was preoccupied by how Iran would fare in the Iraq crisis — and what a success by its Shiite Muslim protégés in Iraq would bode for Israel and the region.

“The idea of spreading Shiism all over the region is a threat not only to Israel but the region itself,” she said, citing efforts by the Hezbollah terrorist group to topple Lebanon’s Western-leaning government.

Bush expressed wariness about the commission’s recommendations to engage Iran and Syria. He was adamant that those countries are out of bounds until they stop backing terrorists. If Syria and Iran are “not committed to that concept, then they shouldn’t bother to show up” to a regional conference on Iraq, he said after meeting with Blair.

Iran’s ambitions dominated much of the Saban Forum. Israeli Vice Prime Minister Shimon Peres spoke darkly of the possibility of war in a Saturday panel with former President Bill Clinton.

“Iran’s strength derives from the weakness of the international community,” Peres said. “If there was an international coalition, there would be no need to go to war against Iran, and Iran would return to its natural dimensions.”

Israel backs U.S. and European efforts to sanction Iran until it gives up enriching uranium, a step toward manufacturing a nuclear weapon. Peres described a range of options to prevent Iran’s nuclearization: monitoring its missiles with nuclear warhead capability, economic sanctions, limiting its oil production and assisting regime change.

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