Relations between the Diaspora and Israel \”were torn apart by a lethal combination of rising Orthodox fanaticism and a Netanyahu government that\’s pandering to increasingly crude Orthodox political coercion,\” said Wilshire Boulevard Temple\’s Rabbi Harvey J. Fields, among the American Reform movement\’s most prominent leaders.
T\’shuvah, which in Hebrew translates as \”repentance, return andresponse,\” is not only part of the name of Gateways Beit T\’Shuvah,the Los Angeles halfway house for recovering Jewish offenders andaddicts. \”It\’s very much a part of what we do here,\” ExecutiveDirector Harriet Rossetto said during a recent interview.
\”Israel has 5 million inhabitants and China has 1.2 billion,\” Kaveh said during a visit to Los Angeles last week. \”However, we are both ancient civilizations, which have survived much suffering and mighty empires.\”
Even without the immediacy of the telephone, the fear, wearinessand anguish that Israelis are feeling is as close to us as thenightly newscast or the morning paper.
If anyone had any doubts that the Chabad telethon has become a landmark on the pop culture scene, consider this: The entire cast of \”Friends,\” one of NBC\’s top-rated sitcoms, has produced a segment of the show to air only on the telethon.
One month after two Palestinian suicide bombers killed 14 Israeli civilians in a Jerusalem market, Bethlehem is the only West Bank town still cut off from both Israel and its neighboring Arab communities.
Today the once-legendary Spanish Kitchen restaurant is a study in decay, the \”K\” missing from the neon sign, the arched storefront crumbling and covered with graffiti.
Though the June 3 Los Angeles municipal election has garnered little attention in the general press, there are two races of special interest to The Journal readership.
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