fbpx

GET HOME DELIVERY! CLICK HERE »

ADVERTISE
pick up locations
HOME DELIVERY
donate

Jewish Journal

Connect. Inform. Inspire.

April 1, 2015

Is U.S.-Israel crisis a speed bump or sign of a long-term conflict?

Leave a Comment / Is Featured?, Mobile, Mobile-Homepage, News, United States /

President Barack Obama’s refusal to accept Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ostensible recommitment to a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has watchers of the U.S.-Israel relationship wondering if the recent crisis is a mere speed bump or a sign of a deeper shift in ties between the countries.

Netanyahu moved quickly last week to emphasize that his statement on the eve of his re-election, that no Palestinian state would be established on his watch, did not represent a policy shift away from a two-state solution. But Obama administration officials were unwilling to accept that clarification, a point the president emphasized in a press conference March 31 when he said differences with Israel were “substantive” and not easily papered over.

“The central question is whether this is a temporary blip on the radar screen or whether there’s something deeper and more structural going on,” said David Harris, the American Jewish Committee’s executive director. “We have to know the answer to that in order to know whether we can put the U.S.-Israel train back on track, as we all would like.”

Along with other Jewish organizational leaders and pro-Israel lawmakers, Harris has been urging the White House to tone down its rhetoric in recent days, but Obama’s recent comments — his most detailed on the rift since the Israeli election — suggest the administration is not heeding those warnings.

“I have conveyed to the White House that it’s time to cool it,” Rep. Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.), the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, said in an interview. “The U.S.-Israel relationship is based on shared values and an unbreakable bond, not on personalities.”

Last week, Israel agreed to release tax revenues to the Palestinian Authority, a step several insiders had hoped to see as a goodwill gesture to help repair the rift with Washington. 

Yet with Obama saying that a re-evaluation of U.S. policy is in the works, it’s unclear whether such a gesture will be sufficient.

“I’m worried things get worse before they get better,” said David Makovsky, a former member of Obama’s Middle East negotiating team and now an analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

The crisis comes as another major bone of contention between Washington and Jerusalem — negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program — overshot Tuesday’s self-imposed deadline for a framework agreement between Iran and the major powers.

Netanyahu’s deep skepticism of those talks — particularly his fears of a so-called sunset clause that would limit the duration of restrictions on Iranian nuclear activity — led to his controversial speech before Congress early last month.

It is the Palestinian issue, though, that now has Obama’s attention. In a press conference this week, the president made clear that while security and intelligence cooperation between the countries would not be affected, he isn’t about to let go of Netanyahu’s pre-election rejection of a Palestinian state arising on his watch.

“This can’t be reduced to a matter of somehow let’s all hold hands and sing ‘Kumbaya,’ ” Obama said.

“I am required to evaluate honestly how we manage Israeli-Palestinian relations over the next several years,” the president said. “Because up until this point, the premise has been both under Republican and Democratic administrations that as difficult as it was, as challenging as it was, the possibility of two states living side by side in peace and security could marginalize more extreme elements, bring together folks at the center with some common sense and we could resolve what has been a vexing issue and one that is ultimately a threat to Israel as well. And that possibility seems very dim.”

What the evaluation means precisely is not entirely clear. But the president would not count out a shift in diplomacy in international arenas, including possibly backing recognition of Palestinian statehood at the U.N. Security Council.

That would represent a major policy shift that has pro-Israel lawmakers worried. Last week, Reps. Ed Royce (R-Calif.) and Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.), respectively the top Republican and Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, wrote to Samantha Power, the U.S. envoy to the United Nations, seeking assurances that the United States would continue to block resolutions critical of Israel.

“Only a solution negotiated directly between the Israelis and Palestinians can result in a lasting peace,” the letter said. “We are seeking an assurance from you that the United States will veto resolutions at the United Nations that are biased and one-sided against Israel.”

In an interview, Engel said it was critical to get beyond the current crisis.

“We need to move on,” Engel said. “We need to emphasize the many close ties we have with Israel, we need to end recriminations and finger-pointing.”

Abraham Foxman, the Anti-Defamation League’s national director, said Netanyahu’s walk-back should be enough to move forward.

“The U.S. now has to climb off, climb down, tone down and find an opportunity to say something positive,” Foxman said in an interview.

But Makovsky said the forthcoming trip to Israel by Republican House Speaker Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio), who helped organize Netanyahu’s speech to Congress without informing the White House, could further inflame tensions.

“Boehner’s visit to Israel is going to reframe this issue in partisan terms, when really, there should be a substantive critique of the Iran talks,” Makovsky said.

Is U.S.-Israel crisis a speed bump or sign of a long-term conflict? Read More »

White House Machers

Leave a Comment / Holidays, Is Featured?, Judaism, Mobile, Mobile-Homepage, News /

WHITE HOUSE MACHERS: The Washington Post recently unveiled a new tool for searching the White House visitor logs for the past several years of the Obama administration. Users are able to search names and also see who else attended the same event or meeting. We’re not entirely sure how accurate the Post’s database search is as certain names are not always spelled the same and some generic names are harder to nail down. But here are a few of the search results we found…

Nathan Diament – 94 visits; David Saperstein – 83 visits; William Daroff – 70 visits; Alan Solow – 64 visits; Andrea Solow – 18 visits; Abe Foxman – 45 visits; Lee Rosenberg – 43 visits; Julie Schonfeld – 43 visits; Malcolm Hoenlein – 33 visits; Eric Cantor – 29 visits; Steve Gutow – 21 visits; Jeremy Ben-Ami – 33 visits; Charles Schumer (not a JI reader though… as he rarely checks email) – 103 visits; Debbie Wasserman Schultz – 64 visits; Eliot Engel – 42 visits; Ted Deutch – 40 visits; Brad Sherman – 22 visits Howard Kohr – 22 visits; Jack Rosen – 25 visits; Abraham Shemtov – 13 visits; Levi Shemtov– 35 visits; Jack Moline – 34 visits; Steve Rabinowitz – 30 visits; David Feinman – 35 visits; David Makovsky – 22 visits; Ira Forman – 21 visits; Martin Indyk – 21 visits; Michael Oren – 20; Andrew Weinstein – 19 visits; Howard Friedman – 12 visits; Karen Friedman – 14 visits; Michael Adler – 15 visits; Jerry Silverman – 12 visits; Ezra Friedlander – 17 visits; Susan Turnbull – 16 visits; Peter Beinart – 16 visits; Sammie Moshenberg – 16 visits; Elie Wiesel – 14 visits; Ron Dermer – 11 visits; Joe Lieberman – 11; Lori Weinstein – 10 visits; Alan Dershowitz – 10 visits; George Soros – 9 visits; Marc Benioff – 9 visits; Aaron Keyak – 10 visits; and Isaac Herzog visited Denis McDonough on Sep 9, 2014.

–The most interesting meeting we discovered took place at 2PM on Oct 22, 2013, between Jeffrey Goldberg and White House Chef Sam Kass. We’re wondering if perhaps Kass taught Goldberg a thing or two regarding chickens. Also attending were Israeli and Palestinian celebrity chefs Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi.

As was pointed out to us, Diament and Saperstein served on the President’s Faith-based Council so arguably Daroff holds the lead for independents (or, as he would say, ‘post-partisans’). Search the database and let us know if you find anything noteworthy. [ White House Machers Read More »

Rabbi Yael Buechler, the nail maven

Leave a Comment / Culture, Holidays /

Of all the Jewish holidays, Passover affords itself best to a manicure. 

“Ten Plagues for 10 fingers!” Rabbi Yael Buechler, founder of the nail art company Midrash Manicures, said with enthusiasm.

Every week since 1996, the 29-year-old Buechler has given herself a manicure corresponding to the weekly Torah portion. That equates to 54 parshiyot a year for more than 18 years — nearly 1,000 manicures and, as you can imagine, a whole lot of nail polish.

Buechler, who lives in New York, is a rabbi-in-residence at Solomon Schechter School of Westchester, where she teaches students in kindergarten to fifth grade. The Conservative rabbi said she uses nail art as a means to educate. 

“It promotes discussion,” she said. 

Her manicure workshops are so successful, she’s expanded her efforts — a Torah lesson followed by a manicure session — bringing Midrash Manicures to camps, schools and even college campuses all across the country.

The stick-on nail decals she offers for Passover and other holidays are a fairly new advent for Midrash Manicures, which she founded in 2011, the same year she was ordained. Simply apply the cartoonish plague decals onto your nails, followed by a coat of clear polish, and voila! You’ve got Ten Plagues on your 10 fingers for up to 10 days. 


Ten Plagues Nail Decals are this Passover’s must-have fashion accessory. Photo by Kristy Leibowitz

Originally, Buechler started the website midrashmanicures.com as a blog to chronicle her intricately designed nails while offering a corresponding word of Torah. Soon, though, people were asking the ambidextrous rabbinical nail maven if decals were available. Midrash Manicures’ success has allowed her to recruit five part-time employees to help her manage the business, which distributes nail decals for all the major Jewish holidays and even some superfluous ones (Thanksgivukah included).

The Passover decals come in packaging that boasts puns and Passover-themed witticisms, such as “Why is this manicure different than all other manicures?” or “Experience the Exodus First-Hand!” 

The cartoonish visuals themselves can be explicit — the plague of blood is illustrated by a dead fish floating in red water, and death of the firstborn is an Egyptian eye crying blood. In case you don’t feel like sticking a decal of boils on your nail bed, there are alternative, family-friendly decals of matzah, Kiddush cups and seder plates incorporated in the set, too. Each set of 44 nail decals is priced at $11.99.

For those bold manicurists who’d rather design their own Passover-themed nails, Buechler suggests using a flat toothpick for minute details and, for the sake of being festive, filing with a Midrash Manicure Matza Nail File (an emory board that looks like matzah). In the event any manicure-related mishaps happen, there’s also Midrash Manicures’ Oy Vey! Klutz Strips
(Yiddishkayt-inspired adhesive bandages). 

Three years ago, Buechler decided to give the Ten Plagues a modern-day makeover. She collected suggestions and debuted manicure designs (not decals) that included hurricanes, fast food and iPhones. These were meant to inspire fellow midrash manicurists to follow suit and hopefully incorporate their manicures into their seders, promoting thoughtful discussion about making biblical stories relevant. 

“How can we, in modern times, connect with the concept of the Ten Plagues that afflicted the Egyptians?” she asked rhetorically.

Buechler recently unveiled her 2015 modern-day plague manicures, which fluctuate between frivolous (Disney’s “Frozen” is represented by the snowman character Olaf “because we were all plagued by ‘Frozen’ this past year”) and weighty subject matter (Ebola is illustrated by a neon biohazard suit, and anti-Semitism by the Eiffel Tower). 

“I think it’s really powerful and very serious in terms of the plagues we’re facing in modern society,” she said. 

Ultimately, Buechler’s hope is a simple one — that Midrash Manicures sparks conversation, bends tradition and embeds new meaning into the seder … one manicure at a time.

Rabbi Yael Buechler, the nail maven Read More »

New research shows Anne Frank died earlier than believed

Leave a Comment / Worldwide /

Anne Frank died earlier than previously believed, according to new research.

Researchers from the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam looking into the last months of the teenage diarist and her sister Margot concluded that they died in February 1945, according to a statement from the Anne Frank House published Tuesday — the 70th anniversary of the official date of the sisters’ deaths set by Dutch authorities after the war.

Their deaths had been marked as sometime during March 1945, the Red Cross concluded at the end of World War II.

The researchers used the archives of the Red Cross, the International Tracing Service in Bad Arolsen and the Bergen-Belsen Memorial, in addition to as many eyewitness testimonies of survivors as possible, the statement said.

The exact date of Anne Frank’s death from typhus in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp is unknown.

New research shows Anne Frank died earlier than believed Read More »

Preserving Yiddish in the seder

Leave a Comment / Holidays, Is Featured?, Judaism, Mobile, Mobile-Homepage, News /

Nowadays, it’s rare to find a Passover seder that doesn’t deviate from the traditional haggadah. But the Erev Shabbos Discussion Group, formed in the San Fernando Valley about 50 years ago, has been doing it its own way for decades — keeping the story secular, social justice-oriented, and drawing from Yiddish and other traditions. 

On March 29, 76* people gathered for a seder at American Jewish University’s Brandeis-Bardin Campus in Simi Valley. The seder combined Yiddish, Hebrew and English poems and songs, and paid tribute to the founders of the community.

Erev Shabbos grew out of the Valley Kindershule and Valley Mittelshule, a Jewish school founded around 1960 by Yiddish-speaking Jews who had recently moved to the area. The school met on Saturday mornings, mainly at the former Valley Cities Jewish Community Center. The Valley shules (Yiddish for schools) were an outgrowth of the existing shule movement that dates back to the 1930s in Los Angeles. While the Valley shules ended around 1980, the former students continue to stay in touch, and several graduates reunited at the seder to sing Yiddish songs from their childhood, such as “In Dem Land Fun Piramidn.”

The kids’ parents wanted to pursue their own formal Jewish education, and so began a Friday night study group in around 1967. Decades later, they continue to meet, now on Sunday mornings. They began hosting seders for their children, with Torah stories geared toward young people. Children would sit on tablecloths on the floor and draw with crayons. Over time, as those children became parents themselves, the seders became more adult-centered. 

“Because we are secular, we don’t include any prayers. We include a lot of songs about justice and freedom and world peace. Certainly the themes might be the same that are included in a religious sense, but it’s from a different perspective,” said Sylvia Brown, 90, a Valley Village resident and founding member of Erev Shabbos along with her late husband, Murray. She also served as the principal of the Kindershule.

Members of Erev Shabbos created their own haggadah, a process that took several months. The group incorporated segments of several haggadot, while adding Yiddish and English poems that were meaningful to the group. It’s been revised every few years. “It’s an enormous amount of work,” Brown said.

Near the beginning of Sunday’s seder, Barbara Bickel read from the haggadah, “Whoever enlarges upon the telling of the Exodus from Egypt, those persons are praiseworthy.”

The Erev Shabbos seder focused on the Holocaust and the resistance movement. The group lit six candles in honor of the 6 million Jews killed by the Nazis in World War II. They also recited “Peysakh Has Come to the Ghetto Again,” excerpted from a Yiddish poem by Inem Heller and translated by Max Rosenfield. One part of the poem reads: 

In face of the Nazi — no fear, no subjection!
In face of the Nazi — no weeping, no wincing!
Only the hatred, the wild satisfaction
Of standing against him and madly resisting.

Also included was the Yiddish poem “Zog Nit Keynmol,” written in 1943 by poet Hirsh Glik in the Vilna Ghetto, which became the anthem of the Jewish partisan movement. One refrain reads:

Never say that there is only death for you.
Though leaden skies may be concealing days of blue.
Because the hour that we have hungered for is near.
Beneath our tread the earth shall tremble: “We are here!”

The haggadah also nodded to other peoples’ struggles for freedom. The group sang the African-American spiritual “Go Down Moses,” itself inspired by the Exodus story. Following the second cup of wine for Elijah the Prophet, the group filled a goblet of water for Miriam, Moses’ sister, who lead the Israelites in singing and dancing after crossing the Red Sea. The Erev Shabbos group brought out tambourines and maracas and sang Debbie Friedman’s “Miriam’s Song,” as the women held hands and circled the room in a line dance.

“Miriam’s Song” was added to the haggadah by Cindy Paley, a Kindershule graduate and music educator, and one of the main organizers of the seder. She said her fellow students received an unusual education, studying Yiddish as well as workers’ rights. 

“It’s a very socialist, left-leaning group. [The tradition] came from the Bund in Eastern Europe. When we were in Kindershule in 1967, we went up to the peace march in San Francisco against the Vietnam War. I remember it was a very political group in those days,” Paley said.

“The shule network in L.A. — which was the most attended Jewish educational system in the city from the 1930s unil the early 1950s — spanned the political spectrum from socialist to communist-affiliated working Jews in the city,” said Yiddishkayt director  Rob Adler Peckerar.

Many of the Kindershule graduates credit that school and their liberal secular upbringing for shaping who they are today.

“It defined how I was Jewish,” said Robin Share, an instructional coach for the Los Angeles Unified School District. “Going to Kindershule and Mittelshule formalized and put a sort of stamp of approval on that experience and the way we understood our role in the world as Jews and as progressives.”

“I think it was my really early introduction to liberal politics,” said Avital Aboody, a community organizer and social justice activist working in San Diego, who attended these seders as a child, when she and her friends would act out the Passover story with costumes and props.

Many of the group’s founding members have died. “We started with about 14 couples. There are only two [of those] men left, and seven women,” Brown said. “This year, we lost two members.”

Another former Kindershule student is Aaron Paley (founder of Yiddishkayt and a co-founder of the popular CicLAvia bicycling events held regularly throughout Los Angeles). He announced to Sunday’s group that he is currently working on “The Shtetl in L.A.,” a documentary about the Valley Cities Jewish Community Center and the Erev Shabbos Discussion Group. He asked the guests at the seder to record interviews with the elders of the community, and to digitize and submit their archival photos and videos, as well as to contribute financially to the project.

“We’ve lost so many people. It’s really something that we’re still here,” said Sabell Bender, 88, a West Hollywood resident and one of the original Erev Shabbos members.

But with the now-grown children and grandchildren attending the annual meal and keeping the community intact, there’s new life to the group. “We hope it’s going to continue with the same spirit that it’s had before,” Brown said.

*We originally reported the number as 60.

Preserving Yiddish in the seder Read More »

Islamophobia: Discovering the Impact on More Than Just Muslims

Leave a Comment / Blogs, Is Featured?, Lead Story, Mobile, Mobile-Homepage, News, United States /

“Before you dump your issues onto me, I am not a Muslim or Arabian.  I am a Sikh from India.”  This was the sign that greeted me when I recently popped into a convenient store on Sunset Boulevard. The man behind the counter, who displayed the sign, was wearing an orange turban, a clear sign that he was Sikh.

After many lootings, shootings, riots and then eventual vigils, the clerk told me that he posted the sign to help protect him because he was being harassed by customers, who thought he was Muslim.  I learned that ever since 9/11, Sikhs have been greatly targeted and victimized.

He added that some of his Muslim friends now were wearing crosses during the day to protect themselves and then removing them at night when they returned home. I was stunned by this revelation. I have been studying and volunteering in the social justice community for several years, and I was surprised that these kind of protections were still needed.

As an alumnus of the fellowship with NewGround: A Muslim-Jewish Partnership for Change, I had learned about the painstaking details of Islamophobia, but I hadn’t known up until that very moment that in our country the ignorance impacted more than just Muslim Americans. My conversation with the clerk reminded of other’s plight, such as the one faced for centuries by my Jewish community: Jews have posed as being a part of another religion for self-protection and the indignation and shame one feels for having to pursue that path.

We keep repeating the sins and mistakes of history. It’s sad that the instances that have come from hate are allowing us to perpetuate that hate among our neighbors and friends. There is a simple solution to all of this – education, which then leads to camaraderie.

Just the night before, my Jewish, Muslim, Hindu and Sikh friends and I broke bread together and talked about Sikhism. I am fortunate that the community I am surrounded by continually seeks knowledge in the pursuit of education, acceptance and understanding. Through this, we are able to find love and support. Through this, I know that the patrons of that convenient store would understand the man’s religion is not Islam, but Sikhism. Even if he was Muslim, there is no room for misunderstanding and hate in our community.

Islamophobia: Discovering the Impact on More Than Just Muslims Read More »

Kerry extends Iran talks, French foreign minister returns

Leave a Comment / Is Featured?, Lead Story, Mobile, Mobile-Homepage, News, Worldwide /

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and his German and French counterparts extended marathon talks in Switzerland on Wednesday for a second day beyond a self-imposed deadline to reach a preliminary agreement with Iran on its nuclear program.

A diplomat close to the talks said late on Wednesday that a deal could be announced within hours but had not yet been reached, and the talks could still collapse.

Kerry and German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier announced they would stay at least until Thursday. In a potentially hopeful sign, French Foreign Secretary Laurent Fabius returned for more talks after flying back to Paris the previous day because progress had been too slow.

Six world powers – the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China – aim to stop Iran from gaining the capacity to develop a nuclear bomb. Tehran wants to lift international sanctions that have crippled its economy, while preserving what it says it its right to peaceful nuclear technology.

The sides were meant to reach a preliminary accord in the Swiss city of Lausanne which would provide an outline for a final deal to be reached by June 30. The preliminary deal was meant to be achieved by midnight on March 31, but the sides are under pressure not to go home empty handed.

The powers and Iran said they had moved closer, but both sides accused the other of refusing to offer proposals that would break the deadlock.

Washington said it was willing to walk away from the talks unless the sides could agree on a preliminary framework.

The talks represent the biggest chance of rapprochement between enemies Iran and the United States since the Iranian revolution in 1979, but face scepticism from conservatives in both Washington and Tehran.

Even if there is a preliminary deal, it will be fragile and incomplete and there is no guarantee that talks on a final deal would not collapse in the coming months.

CHAOS, DISUNITY

After missing the self-imposed March 31 deadline, the negotiators ended talks in the early morning hours of Wednesday with an air of chaos, disunity and cacophony as delegations scrambled to get contradictory viewpoints across.

Both Kerry and Germany's Steinmeier announced their intention to spend another night in Lausanne to build on the progress made.

“We continue to make progress but have not reached a political understanding. Therefore, Secretary Kerry will remain in Lausanne until at least Thursday morning to continue the negotiations,” Kerry's spokeswoman Marie Harf said.

A French official said late on Wednesday that Fabius had decided to return to rejoin the talks, adding that this was not necessarily a sign that a deal was close. ‎

All sides have described the talks as fragile. Asked by a reporter if collapse of the negotiations was a possibility, Germany's Steinmeier replied: “Naturally.”

“Whoever negotiates has to accept the risk of collapse,” he added. “But I say that in light of the convergence (of views) that we have achieved here in Switzerland, in Lausanne, it would be irresponsible to ignore possibility of reaching an agreement.”

He said he would consider further travel plans on Thursday morning depending on how the talks develop. New proposals and recommendations were expected later on Wednesday, he said, but the onus was on Tehran to make them.

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told reporters it was the major powers who must budge, not Tehran.

“Progress and success of the talks depends on the political will of the other party … and this is an issue they have always had a problem with,” he told reporters.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters in Washington “the time has come for Iran to make some decisions”. He repeated a warning that the United States was prepared to walk away from the negotiations before a June 30 deadline if no political framework deal comes out of Lausanne.

But as negotiators from the powers met Zarif again on Wednesday, Iran expressed optimism that an initial agreement was within reach. So did Russia, which is Iran's main sympathizer among the powers.

Senior Iranian negotiator Abbas Araqchi told state television that Tehran hoped to wrap up the talks on Wednesday evening. He added that he expected the parties to issue a joint statement declaring that “progress has been made in the talks and that we have come to a solution on key issues. We will have the solutions in written form.”

Western officials questioned Araqchi's optimism.

“I think we have a broad framework of understanding, but there are still some key issues that have to be worked through,” British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond told the BBC.

The ultimate goal of the talks for Washington is to impose conditions on Iran that would increase the “breakout time” Tehran would need to develop a nuclear weapon if it should decide to pursue one.

That would mean limiting the number of centrifuges Iran can operate to make the enriched uranium that can be used to power a bomb, and reducing its stockpiles.

Washington's allies in the region, especially Israel and Saudi Arabia, are strongly skeptical of any deal.

Diplomats close to the talks said any preliminary deal would include a document with some key figures – such as permitted numbers for centrifuges and uranium stockpiles – though it would remain confidential for the foreseeable future.

A preliminary deal would be a major milestone toward a final accord, but it would only be a first step and reaching agreement on details by June 30 will be difficult.

The talks have stalled on the issues of Iran's nuclear centrifuge research, the lifting of U.N. sanctions and their restoration if Iran breaches the agreement.

Kerry extends Iran talks, French foreign minister returns Read More »

Easy tips for stylish Passover place settings

Leave a Comment / Culture, Holidays, Home, Is Featured?, Mobile, Mobile-Homepage, News /

Setting the Passover table can be overwhelming. Does the seder plate have all the right elements? Where is the afikomen? Did we put out Elijah’s cup? 

So when you reach the point of arranging the individual place settings, you want things to be quick and easy, without a lot of fuss. With these tips, you’ll be able to make place settings that are unique and creative — and as fabulous as the food and company.

Mix and match.

Don’t worry about not having a complete set of matching dishes for all your guests. Do you really want to look like a restaurant? Mix and match the dishes you do have for an effortless look. Even if you do have a few sets of matching dishes, go ahead and mix them up anyway.

The key to successful mixing and matching is balance. If you have a lot of clashing patterns, balance them with some solids. You can also achieve balance by incorporating plain, neutral napkins.

And a few words about white dishes. Plain, white plates are a good staple to have at your disposal, especially for dinner parties. They sell them in stacks at home stores for just this purpose. But even when you’re using these pristine plates, feel free to mix them up with other colors and patterns you might have.

Everything old is new.

What if you have a bunch of old dishes from Bubbe? Lucky you —vintage dishes are so popular right now. The more “granny” they are, the better. Case in point: transferware. These old-fashioned dishes were once relegated to cardboard boxes in the storage locker. Now there are collector’s clubs, and they’re even used as artwork in trendy hotels. Again, mix and match. Mixing older china with more contemporary pieces you have in the cupboard is positively chic.

Even plates from the 1970s and ’80s that were once considered dated are enjoying a resurgence in popularity. So if you’ve got some of these oldies but goodies hiding in your cabinets, take them out and show them off. Guests will think you’re such a hipster.

Keep it simple.

Home magazines and etiquette guides offer a dizzying amount of advice on the correct pieces to include in your place settings. There are so many different forks and spoons, and precise places to put them. Then there are all the glasses for different purposes. My advice: Keep it simple; there are enough items on the seder table as it is. Limit your place settings to just the basics you’ll need for the meal at hand. 

Also, avoid extraneous accessories like chargers. Sure, they look elegant under your dishes, but it’s just another element you don’t need. I love chargers, don’t get me wrong. I have them in both gold and pewter, and I use them all the time. The problem is they add at least an inch on each side of your dinner plate, taking up precious table room. It’s another item you have to stock up on, and another item you have to clean. If you’re having a large group for the seder, they are just too much to worry about.

Try a table runner instead of a tablecloth.

A tablecloth adds both a formal and festive touch to any occasion, but let’s get real — they are a total pain. If you’ve ever ironed a tablecloth, you know what I’m talking about. Instead of a tablecloth, place a table runner along the center of the table. It doesn’t have to be made of anything fancy, or even fabric. Be creative. I’ve used long sheets of butcher paper, decorative wrapping paper, and black-adhesive contact paper made to look like a chalkboard.

Another way to use table runners is to place them widthwise, between guests sitting across from one another, rather than lengthwise. That way, the runners also act as placemats. And if you insist on fabric runners, a great resource for them is the dollar store, where they’re, um, $1.

Incorporate place cards.

I know I’m complicating things a bit by recommending place cards to indicate where everyone sits, but believe me, they make things easier in the end. There’s always that awkward moment when guests arrive at the table and are not sure where to sit, and then they ask you. Suddenly, you are the U.N. ambassador, having to negotiate who likes whom and deciding whether allies need to be together or separated. If you settle all this in advance with place cards, you can skip that awkwardness and get right to the seder service. 

Your place cards can be as simple as names written on folded sheets of paper. They can be tags tied to ribbon around napkins. Personalize each guest’s haggadah and make that the place card. Or write names on pieces of matzah with icing for a unique and edible place card.

Jonathan Fong is the author of “Walls That Wow,” “Flowers That Wow” and “Parties That Wow,” and host of “Style With a Smile” on YouTube. You can see more of his do-it-yourself projects at Easy tips for stylish Passover place settings Read More »

Parents Circle members united by universal love and pain

Leave a Comment / Los Angeles /

Robi Damelin didn’t know what to do when her 28-year-old son David was killed by Palestinian sniper fire in 2002 while serving in the Israel Defense Forces’ reserves.

“My whole life changed, [as did] my sense of priorities,” Damelin told a group at IKAR during Shabbat morning services on March 28. “Things so wonderful for me became irrelevant, and I started to search for something to do to prevent other families from experiencing this pain — and this is the ultimate pain.”

Seated next to her was someone who knows that same pain. Bassam Aramin, a Palestinian, had a 10-year-old daughter, Abir, who was killed by an Israeli soldier’s rubber bullet in 2007.

The pair were in Los Angeles late last month as representatives of the 600-member Parents Circle-Families Forum (PCFF), a bridge-building organization of Israelis and Palestinians whose immediate family members have died as a result of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Members regularly appear at synagogues, mosques, churches and elsewhere to discuss their work.

Damelin and Aramin appeared locally at IKAR, Temple Aliyah in Woodland Hills and Valley Beth Shalom (VBS) in Encino with a message of empathy, reconciliation and forgiveness.

“I am not a Palestinian, I am not a Muslim, I am not an Arab. I am a human being,” Aramin said during the March 29 appearance at Temple Aliyah. “It is very easy to lose your humanity because you don’t want to see the other as a human being.”


Damelin and Bassam Aramin at Temple Aliyah, one of three local appearances.

The Parents Circle was founded in 1995 by an Orthodox man, Yitzhak Frankenthal, and several bereaved Israeli families. It held its first meeting in 1998 with a group of Palestinian families from Gaza, although, currently, members are not allowed to visit Gaza, Damelin said. 

“We can’t go to Gaza. I wish we could — the first Palestinians who joined the Parents Circle came from Gaza,” she explained. 

Still, in 2000, the organization expanded to include Palestinian families from the West Bank and East Jerusalem. 

Damelin, who came to Israel in 1967 from South Africa, said part of the group’s goal is to ensure that the conflict does not create more parents who are eligible to become members of the organization. 

Aramin, for his part, struggled in his life even before the death of his daughter. He said Israelis arrested him at the age of 17, when he was planning an attack on Israeli troops, and that he was tortured in prison. 

“It’s very difficult to keep your humanity and act as a human being [in prison],” he said. But, according to an online biography, he met an Israeli guard in prison and developed a relationship with him, proving dialogue was possible. 

At the March 30 meeting at VBS, Aramin said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s preoccupation with the past, specifically the Holocaust, isn’t helpful in reaching a peace agreement. 

“Netanyahu must mention five times a day the Holocaust,” he said.

Mireille Wolf, a self-described “hidden child” during the Holocaust who sat in the audience at Temple Aliyah, took issue with some of the remarks and said so during the Q-and-A portion. She said the speakers were placing too much blame for the conflict on the Israeli side and not focusing enough on incitement in Palestinian culture. 

“Reconciliation sounds very nice, but when you are reconciling, there are two sides, and one must take responsibility,” she said in an interview. “There will never be peace as long as there is institutionalized hatred in the schools, in the newspaper, by the Palestinian leaders.” 

Damelin argued for inclusion of perceived radicals, such as Israeli settlers living in the West Bank, in conversations about peace. 

“You cannot exclude people from the conversation,” Damelin said. “If you exclude the settlers, they will become more radical. They have to be part of the conversation.”

She acknowledged that dialogue is not always easy: “One of the worst parts is that people don’t want to listen.”

Damelin’s advice to the crowd at VBS was not to take strong pro-Israel or pro-Palestinian stances in response to the conflict. Instead, she suggested, people in the Diaspora should be “pro-solution” if they want to be helpful. Otherwise, they are “importing our conflict into your country.” The audience applauded. 

Each speaker spoke for approximately 15 minutes, then participated in a Q-and-A with the audience. 

IKAR congregant Eliana Kaya, a Woodland Hills resident, attended all three events. She told the Journal during an interview at Aliyah that she has been aware of the organization’s efforts for the past 15 years and is supportive of it. 

“I think it’s powerful work,” she said. “It’s spiritual work.”

Rabbi Joshua Hoffman of VBS moderated the evening at the Encino synagogue, and Rabbi Ron Stern of Stephen Wise Temple, one of the event sponsors, offered a few words connecting Passover and the message of the speakers. The Reform rabbi said holding onto one kind of narrative is enslaving and that it is important to open ears and hearts to new ones. 

“That’s the beginning of going from slavery to liberation,” he said.

Parents Circle members united by universal love and pain Read More »

JFS expands its own heart in the heart of L.A.

Leave a Comment / Los Angeles /

Jewish Family Service of Los Angeles (JFS) is in the midst of what leadership is describing as a “new era,” a $36 million capital campaign that will result in the renovation of its Freda Mohr Multipurpose Center and the relocation of its headquarters there.

JFS plans to take the senior-focused site just north of the bustling intersection of Fairfax Avenue and Beverly Boulevard and more than double the facility’s size to 28,000 square feet, transforming it into the state-of-the-art JFS Lois and Richard Gunther Center deep in the heart of Jewish Los Angeles. 

The lead gift for the campaign came from the local philanthropic couple after whom the new facility will be named. Lois Gunther previously served as JFS board president and is a longtime supporter; her husband is a board member of Americans for Peace Now and New Israel Fund.

“We can’t imagine a more worthwhile organization to support,” said Richard, 90, during a phone interview from the couple’s second home in Santa Barbara. “When we look at this contribution and its historic contribution to the city, we figure this is an important place.”

The Gunthers, who have been married for 67 years and are members of Leo Baeck Temple, declined to disclose how much they donated but said that their gift prompted JFS to begin the campaign. 

“They would not have endeavored to do this without our initial gift, and we gave it with that purpose in mind,” said Lois, 87.

Initially, Lois said, the plan was to purchase a new space as opposed to renovating the Fairfax site, but the decision to renovate instead turned out to be the best move for the organization.

“They thought they were going to buy a building and remodel it. That took a year to decide that it’s not going to work, and now we feel we’re doing exactly the right thing,” she said. “Everyone is enthusiastic. First of all, the building on Fairfax is the right place for Jewish Family Service to be in the city. We’re really recognized there — it’s going to fulfill the needs, and we are going to improve something that has been part of our agency for a long time.”

JFS has raised or secured pledges for just under half of its $36 million target, according to spokesperson David Gershwin.

The nonprofit’s CEO, Paul Castro, expects the renovation to begin in February and last 18 to 24 months, with architect Jay Vanos of Vanos Architects at the helm.

The Freda Mohr Multipurpose Center, built in 1983, offers transportation for JFS clients, home-delivered meals, health care services and more. The center also houses the Eichenbaum Fitness Center, which holds group exercise classes, as well as the Hirsh Family Kosher Kitchen, a place for seniors to dine together and socialize. It was named after the agency’s first executive director. Mohr was hired in 1932 and held the position for 34 years. Mohr led the agency into the fields of mental health and older-adult services, the primary recipients of JFS offerings. The organization also serves Holocaust survivors.

The Gunther Center will have many advantages, according to Castro. For one, it will bring together the JFS staff and volunteers from various facilities under one roof. That will include those who currently work out of the organization’s rented headquarters in Koreatown on Wilshire Boulevard.

This will make it easier for visitors to meet with social workers, Castro said, highlighting one of the many reasons he is excited about the change.

“So, this is going to be our anchor place, where we will put down roots. We will be there for generations or more,” he said. “This is a really exciting time for us; this is something we had hoped for, and through the generosity of the Gunthers and others who have stepped forward as a result of this campaign beginning, we’re looking at the realization of this in the next couple of years.” 

The Jewish flavor of the neighborhood — the Freda Mohr building is located at 330 N. Fairfax Ave., near a variety of synagogues, kosher eateries and the Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust — is part of the appeal of transforming the Fairfax site into an official headquarters, according to Gershwin.

“The JFS building itself is home right in the heart of the Jewish community, Fairfax and Beverly,” Gershwin said in a phone interview. “This represents a new era for JFS, one of the most widely recognized and most philanthropic organizations in Los Angeles here for 160 years … to have a distinct one-stop shop, a readily identifiable home, in the epicenter of the Los Angeles Jewish community, even though we do serve a wider population. 

“It’s a new era for JFS, and it’s going to be better for the agency and it’s going to be better for JFS clients and a beacon of hope for families in need.”

Castro spotlighted plans to construct a three-level underground parking structure, which he said would be available to neighboring operations during the evenings. The site will also house multiple meeting centers that JFS hopes other organizations will use. The second and third floors of the three-story building will feature outdoor terraces, and the building’s aesthetic, based on an illustration provided to the Journal, also includes strong vertical elements and an overhang.

Ultimately, Castro said, the goal is to draw on the Jewish concept of welcoming strangers into one’s home. 

“The idea is to create an atmosphere where visiting people feel that it’s warm, where seniors can come in and wander around,” Castro said. “We will have meeting spaces on all three levels, used by clients and staff, and we want to create a hub of activity and a sense of ownership by all who are coming in to use it.

“Because it’s a community building, we want it not to feel like an office but really to create a feeling that we are part of that neighborhood, part of that community and that everyone who comes in is welcome.”

JFS expands its own heart in the heart of L.A. Read More »