There are worlds right here where God is less concealed
And you know the sound of Her laughter
Worlds here are there are less u-turns made
less need to make amends
Worlds where there’s not as much conflict
Not as much killing, not as much sadness.
Worlds of transcendence, transparency
where questions get answered if you listen to a tickle in your ear
There is holy space here for the downtrodden with racing minds,
Those who strive to align with their truth, and the ones whose truth disapproves
Strange philosophies hidden in dark chat rooms,
glamour, misery, artistry, mastery, pride- each has a home here in You.
Why are we surprised when a holy man dies?
Do we wonder “why him? Why so sudden? Why this affliction?”
How many still wonder why that one doesn’t get punished
when they abuse their power?
Because the joke’s on us in this world.
We’re inside costumes and we don’t remember who we are.
Because our only consent came before the dawn of time
That’s what makes this world so great.
And hard to be in.
On Purim, we see it’s a play.
This world! And all stumble upon the majesty
of the Great Orchestrator’s sleight of hand.
Every grain of sand is called by a name
down to the fledgling molecule, whose inner chambers contain
free-will, good-will, and willingness to submit to what’s entirely pre-determined.
Long after even this world endures, there will be laughter
at the foibles of this Purim shpiel
We’ll see science and faith are not at odds
like how one person has so much while the other starves
God,
do You ever forget we are actors?
Do You ever think, this one really matters?
Is anyone Your beloved more than another?
Are blessing and curse all the same?
I think they are. I think in Your eyes, we are One.
All precious, all play.
All love.
This year, Purim starts the evening of March 23. One way to get ready is to create and send mishloach manot, also known as a Purim basket. These gifts, sent to family and friends, are meant to ensure everyone has enough food and drink for the Purim feast.
Cookbook author Faith Kramer likes to serve and gift infused vodkas at her Purim seduah (celebratory meal) and includes them in mishloach manot.
“With the tradition that one is to imbibe during the holiday until the names of Haman and Mordecai are indistinguishable, I thought shots of my Pink Grapefruit-Rosemary, Lemon Peppercorn and Thai Bird’s Eye Chili vodka, icy cold from the freezer, would add to the party,” Kramer, the author of “52 Shabbats: Friday Night Dinners Inspired by a Global Jewish Kitchen,” told the Journal.
Note: The recipes double well if you need to make larger batches.
“Store the finished flavored vodka in the pantry, refrigerator or freezer in a bottle with a sealable cap, decanting into smaller bottles to share,” Kramer said. “I’ve found two to four days of infusion sufficient, but you might like a stronger or milder flavor, and each batch will vary.”
Pink Grapefruit-Rosemary Vodka
Makes about 1 1/2 cups
1 medium large organic, pink-skinned star ruby or pink grapefruit
1 3″ sprig of fresh rosemary
1½ cups unflavored vodka
Scrub and rinse grapefruit. Peel with a knife into long strips, being careful to not include any of the white pith (which will make the vodka bitter). Reserve the remainder of the fruit for another use. Place the peels into a sterilized glass jar with a lid. Rinse rosemary sprig and add to the jar. Pour vodka in.
Tightly close lid and place in cool, dark place such as a pantry or closet. Shake the bottle once or twice a day. After 48 hours, pour off a sip into a glass (do not sip from the jar). Taste. If not at desired flavor, repeat every day or two until flavor strength is as desired.
Line a strainer with cheesecloth over a 2-cup measuring cup or bowl. Pour vodka through the strainer, discarding solids. Pour flavored liquid back into a clean, sterilized bottle. Close cap or seal airtight. Store in a cool, dark place or in the refrigerator or freezer.
Lemon Peppercorn and Pink Grapefruit Rosemary Vodka Photo: Faith Kramer
Lemon Peppercorn Vodka
Makes about 1 ½ cups
2 medium large organic lemons
½ Tbsp whole peppercorns (black, green, white, pink or brown or try a mix)
1 ½ cups unflavored vodka
Scrub and rinse lemons. Peel with a knife into strips, being careful to not include any of the white pith. Reserve the remainder of fruit for another use. Place the peels into a sterilized glass jar with a lid. Rinse peppercorns and add to the jar. Pour vodka in. Tightly close lid and place in cool, dark place.
Follow tasting, decanting and storage directions for Pink Grapefruit-Rosemary Vodka.
Thai Bird’s Eye Chili Vodka
Makes about 1 ½ cups
½ cup fresh red Thai bird’s eye chilis (or other small, hot fresh red chilis)
1 ½ cups unflavored vodka
Pick very fresh, firm chilis. Discard any with bruises or brown spots. Leave chili stems on. Rinse well. Place in a sterilized glass bottle with vodka. Tightly close the container. Store in a cool, dark place.’
Follow tasting, decanting and storage directions for Pink Grapefruit-Rosemary Vodka.
Note: These flavored vodkas will store almost indefinitely in the freezer; if at any point mold or off smells or flavors develop, discard the entire batch.
Beth Lee’s date thumbprint cookies are a buttery delicious treat, perfect for Purim baskets.
“Perfumed with rose water and orange blossom water, these cookies are the intersection of several cultural cookie recipes,” Lee, a cookbook author (“The Essential Jewish Baking Cookbook”), cooking teacher and OG food blogger at OMGYummy.com, told the Journal.
This includes a Persian cookie (koloocheh) and a Lebanese formed and filled cookie (ma’amul), as well as hamantaschen.
“The date filling will remind you of lekvar (prune filling), the hamantaschen filling so many of us remember from our childhood Purim celebrations,” she said.
Date and Walnut Thumbprints
24 servings
Dough
1 cup unsalted butter or refined coconut oil at room temperature
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 egg
2 tsp orange blossom water
1 tsp rose water
2 cups all-purpose flour or if gluten free: ¾ cup fava bean flour, ¾ cup coconut flour, ½ cup tapioca flour
½ tsp kosher salt
1 tsp ground cardamom
2 tsp baking powder
¼ cup powdered sugar for dusting the cookies after they are baked
Filling
½ cup finely chopped walnuts used for filling and sprinkling
½ cup Medjool dates, pitted and chopped
½ tsp ground cinnamon
¼ cup freshly squeezed orange juice
2 tsp honey
Pinch of kosher salt
Dough
Make the dough first, as it will need to chill and you can prepare the filling while it does.
In an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar on medium-high speed for about 3 minutes, until light and fluffy. Add the vanilla, orange blossom water, rose water and egg, and mix until just combined.
In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour(s), salt, cardamom and baking powder.
Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients in two batches (three or four, if you double the recipe), stopping to scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed. If it doesn’t all come together, use your hands for the last bit of kneading to incorporate all of the flour. Turn the dough onto a piece of plastic wrap and press it into a disk. Wrap and chill in the refrigerator for 2 hours, until firm but still flexible.
Filling
To make the filling, combine ¼ cup of the walnuts with the dates, cinnamon, orange juice, honey and salt in a small saucepan and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer uncovered, stirring often, for 5 to 7 minutes, until the mixture forms a thick paste. Transfer to a plate and let cool to room temperature.
Form and Bake the Cookies
Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
To make each cookie, wet your hands and break off a walnut-sized piece of the dough. Roll into a ball and then flatten between the palms of your hand to about ¼ inch thick and place on a parchment-lined cookie sheet 2 inches apart. Make a hollow in the center of each with your thumb; fill with about ½ teaspoon of the date mixture and then sprinkle some nuts on top. Repeat with the remaining dough and filling.
Refrigerate the cookies for 45 minutes, until firm. While the cookies chill, preheat the oven to 350°F.
Bake the cookies for 25 minutes (20 minutes convection), until the undersides are golden. Transfer to a cooling rack and let cool completely. Dust the cookies with the powdered sugar if you desire and serve. Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days.
Several pro-Palestinian student protesters at the University of Kentucky (UK) disrupted a speech given by Ian Haworth, a British Jewish conservative pundit, on Feb. 27 that included chants of anti-Israel slogans. The fire alarm was also pulled.
Haworth, who hosts a podcast on YouTube called “Off Limits” and whose work has appeared in publications including The Washington Examiner, New York Post and Newsweek, was brought to the campus by the school’s Turning Point USA chapter to discuss Hamas, the Oct. 7 massacre and the explosion of antisemitism worldwide following the massacre. Haworth told the Journal in a phone interview that the disruption occurred toward the beginning of his speech, as he started quoting from the Hamas charter after describing the atrocities of Oct. 7.
“These people started shouting over me,” Haworth said. “At first they were saying, who’s paying me … that I’m lying, this is all Zionist propaganda, that I support genocide, what about the 30,000 Palestinians killed … I tried once or twice to say, ‘Hey, look, thank you for coming, I’m going to show you the respect of sticking around and answering any questions you may have. Don’t interrupt me, this is a public university, I’ve been invited to speak. The heckler’s veto is not freedom of speech.” After Haworth said this, the protesters became “really riled up” and shouted him down, and acted “quite threatening to me and everyone else in the room,” Haworth said. The police escorted everyone out of the event and only allowed those with tickets back inside.
Katie Jefferson, who heads the university’s TPUSA chapter, told the Kentucky Kernel student newspaper, “It was agreed between me and the officer that we were going to continue the event but only for people that had signed up with tickets because we had a ticketing system. That’s not really what they (the officers) did. The officers kind of said ‘It’s canceled,’ and then they brought us back in, that’s not what I thought they were going to say.”
The protesters remained outside and chanted, “resistance is justified when people are occupied” and “Haworth Haworth you can’t hide we charge you with genocide.” Haworth was able to finish his lecture, but as the Q&A session was coming to a close, the fire alarm went off.
“The police told us not to evacuate because they were all waiting for us outside the door; they were obviously trying to get everybody out in the open,” Haworth said. The police secured the building then armed officers safely escorted Haworth and the audience out of the building into the parking structure. “All these people were waiting at the bottom of the parking garage,” continued Haworth. “Some of them followed us to the parking garage … and then they were all waiting at the front screaming and shouting at anyone who left.”
The TPUSA chapter posted a statement to social media that “protesters showed up unannounced without tickets” and “immediately began loudly interrupting, screaming, chanting, vandalizing our property with red paint and insulting our speaker.” Haworth suggested on “several” occasions that the protesters could air their thoughts during the Q&A session, the TPUSA statement said; the chapter added that “there was a verbal warning” that continued disruptions would result in police removing them. “For the next hour, the protesters proceeded to scream, chant, and bang on the door, then pulled the fire alarm in the building,” the TPUSA statement said, adding that attendees exiting the building were harassed and followed by “the mob of protesters.”
Jefferson told the Kernel that the police believe one of the protesters pulled the fire alarm but they didn’t know the identity of the individual.
The Lexington 4 Palestine (Lex4Palestine) group posted a statement to social media saying that “students let [Haworth] know that Zionism and bigotry are not welcome on UK’s campus” and then claimed that the university police “discriminated against students multiple times and lied, telling them that the event was canceled when it was continuing behind closed doors. Students who came after the so-called cancellation were denied entry, simply for being visibly Arab and/or Muslim.” They also alleged that “students were told to evacuate, or they would be taken out in handcuffs” once the fire alarm went off; looking through the building’s windows, they could see the event attendees doing a “photoshoot” before being escorted out by police.
“UKPD’s multiple threats to arrest students for ‘trespassing’ on their own campus, which is a public institution and a site of protected speech, is abhorrent and dangerous,” the Lex4Palestine statement added. “At a time where college students are vulnerable to targeting and hate crimes, the police’s actions were inexcusable. It is unacceptable that a UK organization can host such an event propagating and uplifting genocidal hate speech on our campus.”
Sajida Megariaf, a student at the university who was ordered by police to leave the event or else get arrested for trespassing, told the Kernel that even though the protesters were told the event had been canceled, the event was still ongoing. “Anybody who was visibly brown was not allowed inside,” she said. “The only people in the auditorium that were allowed in and continued to be in the auditorium were white.” She is also quoted in the Kernel as saying: “They had lied to us, profiled us, not allowed us back in and we’re standing there and we’re just like, ‘What is going on?’ And then the fire alarm goes off. Officers were like ‘Everybody needs to evacuate. If you do not evacuate, you’ll be evacuated in cuffs,’ and we were like, ‘Nobody’s resisting to evacuate, but are the people inside going to be evacuated as well?’”
“Amazing how they play victim the second they’ve tried to shut an event down,” Haworth told the Journal. “It’s wild.”
University spokesperson Jay Blanton told the Journal, “Shortly after the event began, students began protesting inside of the hall where the event was taking place. The student organizer of the event read a prepared script, which stated that if any disruptions continued, they would be asked to leave by UKPD. This is standard protocol of any event taking place on campus. After this statement was read, disruptions continued, and after several warnings, the UKPD lieutenant on the scene, per our protocols, temporarily stopped the event and asked all participants the room. Only ticketholders were allowed back inside as the event resumed.” As the event was winding down, “an unknown subject was let into the back of the building by another unknown subject where they proceeded to pull a fire alarm. The building was subsequently evacuated by UKPD in a manner that would keep the two groups separate from each other in the interest of safety.”
No injuries or arrests were made, and the university is investigating the matter.
Haworth told the Journal that it’s not the first time one of his speeches has been disrupted protesters, nor was it the worst (he recalled worse instances when he gave speeches on abortion and free speech at other campuses), but it was “by far the worst” instance of a disruption when speaking about an Israel-related topic.
“People need to realize, this is happening on average, small campuses all over the country,” Haworth said. “Harvard gets all the attention, but there are colleges all over the country where it’s just not safe to be Jewish anymore. I get to go home; these students have to live with these monsters. It breaks my heart. It’s a terrifying time to live in for these students.”
