Tuesday, February 28, 2023
Florida Jewish retirement community targeted with swastika graffiti
Police in Palm Beach County, Florida are investigating after a swastika was spray-painted on the side of a building in a predominantly Jewish gated retirement community in Boca Raton.
The antisemitic graffiti was found on the side of Fanshaw J building in Century Village. Residents told WPTV the space is a public area containing a directory and mailboxes.
According to the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office (PBSO), there are no surveillance cameras in the area. There are also no witnesses who have come forward.
PBSO said that on Friday night, someone scrawled the swastika on the glass that covers the directory listing residents in the complex. The vandal also drew an arrow that pointed to the listing for the homeowner association (HOA) president, CBS12 reported.
In response, Boca Raton Police are increasing patrols at synagogues and other religious sites in the city.
Century Village has a large and growing Orthodox population, with many newcomers in the last decade from other states. The community has two synagogues on its grounds.
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Monday, February 27, 2023
New York opens probe into city college system for alleged anti-Jewish discrimination
State authorities have opened an investigation into New York City's public college system for alleged discrimination against Jews, part of a running battle over antisemitism at the City University of New York (CUNY).
The New York State Division of Human Rights informed a complainant of the investigation in a letter last week.
The complaint alleges discrimination against Zionist Jewish and Israeli students at the CUNY Law School, due to its faculty's formal support for the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement.
"The boycott adopted by CUNY Law blatantly discriminates against students, prospective students, faculty and employees, and prospective faculty and employees on the basis of creed and national origin," the complaint said.
New York State law prohibits boycotts, blacklisting, and other forms of discrimination due to an individual's creed or national origin. The complaint argues that Zionism is a core belief for many Jews, falling into the state's definition of "creed."
The resolution's blanket condemnation of Israeli entities also discriminates on the basis of nationality, the complaint said, adding that the faculty sets the policy for the law school, including in its grading, admissions, and hiring.
Jeffrey Lax, a Jewish faculty member at a CUNY college and leading figure in the opposition to alleged antisemitism at the school system, filed the formal complaint in July. Lax is the co-founder of Students and Faculty for Equality at CUNY (SAFE CUNY), representing Zionists and Israelis in the school system. The group has also called for a city investigation into the BDS endorsement.
The New York State Division of Human Rights told Lax in a letter last week that it had received his complaint and will open a probe. The department did not respond to a request for further information.
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Friday, February 24, 2023
Thousands of Jewish Teens Meet Up in Brooklyn
With an eight-hour layover in Paris, a group of eleven Nigerian Jewish teens pass the time at the Charles-de-Gaulle airport in lively banter and spirited singing. Mrs. Haya Uzan, Chabad representative in Nigeria, is making the twenty-two hour trip from Africa to Brooklyn, together with the teens, where they will meet up with thousands of their Jewish peers.
It's the annual CTeen Shabbaton weekend in Crown Heights, and the teens—many who come from remote or Jewishly isolated places–thrilled to be sharing a weekend teens from 30 countries around the world in a major Jewish hub, are given to outbursts of song and dance in the streets.
This year's Shabbaton theme, "Meant 2 B," is focused on the art of finding the positive in life's most challenging situations. The idea of trusting in a Higher Power is particularly resonant at a time when they are beset by pervasive complex social and emotional pressures. "The idea that everything is 'meant to be' gives me a real sense of comfort and solace," said a 15-year-old participant. "Having dealt with depression and anxiety, the thought that there's a G-d up there who's looking out for me, has gotten me through some dark moments."
Over the next three days, presenters are scheduled to share personal stories of overcoming obstacles and adversity against the odds. Allison Josephs of "Jew in the City" will be sharing her struggle with mental health challenges. "Life's Tough But I'm Tougher" is the title of Esther Zirkind's talk about her battle with cancer and the untimely death of her son. Shoshana Zaretsky, a teen participant from Eugene, OR, will share a personal story that led her to found "Teens Against Anti-Semitism."
The closing ceremony is set to take place at Carnesecca Arena– a 6,107-seat multi-purpose arena in Queens, home to the St. John's University Red Storm women's basketball team.
"This Shabbaton is a vital opportunity for Jewish teenagers to connect to their Jewish identity with pride and unity, realizing they are part of the global Jewish community," said Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, Vice Chairman of Merkos L'Inyonei Chinuch, and Chairman of CTeen International. "The Rebbe always emphasized the power of the youth to transform the world. We hope this Shabbaton will be the catalyst for positive transformation across the globe."
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Wednesday, February 22, 2023
Hunter College High School adds entrance exam date following outrage from Jewish families over conflict with Passover
Hunter College High School Wednesday announced an alternate day for its entrance exam following backlash from Jewish families over a scheduling conflict with the Passover holiday reported earlier today in the Daily News.
The highly selective public school announced last week that the test will be held on April 5, the day Passover begins at sundown. Families were told their children could not make up the exam on another date — forcing them to choose between the holiday or applying. School policy posted online confirmed no make-up dates were permitted.
But Hunter on Wednesday said it would offer another testing date for religious observance the day before the holiday, on April 4, upon request.
"We always knew we would need to make accommodations," said Hunter spokesperson Vince Dimiceli. "That was not reflected on the Campus School website. It is so now."
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Tuesday, February 21, 2023
New York Times takes heat for its latest report on Hasidic schools: 'Misleading and dangerous'
Leaders of a Hasidic village in upstate New York slammed the New York Times on Monday for publishing a report on their community that they characterized as "false, misleading and dangerous" at a time when antisemitism is on the rise.
The New York Times published a series of investigative stories starting in September 2022 about Orthodox Boys schools, also known as yeshivas, particularly singling out the Hasidic community — a smaller group that falls under the Orthodox Jewish umbrella.
Activist groups and members of the Hasidic community widely denounced the Times' reporting at the time, accusing the paper of publishing "politicized hit pieces" as part of a demonizing "crusade" against Orthodox Jews.
On Monday, The Times published another report on the Hasidic community, this time about a small tight-knit village in upstate New York called Kiryas Joel. The Times report focuses on school-related payments made by the Kiryas Joel school district to the United Talmudical Academy (U.T.A.) of Kiryas Joel. The district was created to serve Hasidic children with disabilities, the Times reports, voicing concerns that a district "created for members of a single faith could never separate itself from their religious institutions."
The Times goes on to accuse the district of conflict-of-interest payments, reporting that auditors discovered two of the school district's board members had voted to "use tens of millions of tax dollars to lease a building from a private religious school organization that they also helped run."
"Since then, the conflicts have grown, a New York Times examination has found, with millions in public education dollars continuing to flow into the same religious school organization and its affiliates," The Times writes.
Citing "thousands of pages of public records," the Times reported that the small public school district is paying more than $2.4 million a year for building leases to companies affiliated with the village's religious private school organization, the United Talmudical Academy of Kiryas Joel, which provides schooling for most of the children in Kiryas Joel.
Kiryas Joel superintendent Joel Petlin pushed back against the Times' reporting in a statement Monday, calling the allegations "colored and spun unfairly to convey a false narrative of a school board ignoring purported conflicts of interests and inappropriately funneling taxpayer money to religious organizations."
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Friday, February 17, 2023
A new album of soulful Hasidic nigunim performed by women
A remarkable new album of traditional Hasidic nigunim, wordless melodies, is giving listeners a taste of the soulful, unadorned way in which rebbes used to sing them in pre-war Eastern Europe.
What's even more unusual is that the singers are all women.
In fact, Kapelye (the Yiddish word for "band") may be the first full-length album of Hasidic nigunim performed by women. In it we hear 22 singers from various Jewish denominations perform traditional Chabad melodies that are publicly sung only by men, due to kol isha — the laws which prohibit men from hearing a woman singing. The 13 tracks on Kapelya blend Hasidic prayers with elements of Yiddish folk and klezmer music, hauntingly resonant of the musical traditions of Eastern European Jewry.
"From a musical point of view it's really significant that they kept it grounded and realistic, like people sitting around and singing, instead of trying to make it sound like art music," said Jordan Hirsch, a musician in the klezmer and Hasidic world who performs frequently for the Chabad community and knows some of the nigunim on the album. "It's clear that they put the nigun, and not the ego of the performers, at the forefront."
The lead singer is 35-year old Chana Raskin who was raised in the Chabad community of Crown Heights and now lives with her husband Dani and two children in Jerusalem. Raskin, who calls herself RAZA when performing, co-produced the album with master musician-singer Joey Weisenberg through his organization, the Rising Song Institute. "Joey was the one who first pushed me to record the nigunim," Raskin told the Forward.
Raskin has loved listening to and singing the sacred melodies of Chabad Hasidim since she was a little girl. Part of the reason has to do with her storied family history which includes a direct lineage to the Alter Rebbe, founder of the Chabad Hasidic movement. One of eight children, Raskin would often accompany her father to farbrengens — joyous gatherings combining words of Torah with the singing of nigunim — on shabbos afternoons.
On Simchat Torah she would sit perched on his shoulders, as he and the other men passionately sang and danced with the Torah scrolls. "It was so powerful, that feeling of connection to the rebbe," she said. She wasn't the only girl taking part in those festive gatherings. "I could see other little girls crawling tsvishn di fis," she said, using the Yiddish expression for "between the men's feet."
"Yiddish was my first language," Raskin said. Her mother was Israeli and spoke a broken English, especially at the beginning of their marriage, but her Yiddish was fluent so that was the most comfortable common language for her parents. "Their Yiddish flowed so naturally that for years I didn't even know it was Yiddish they were speaking!"
As a teenager Raskin often sang nigunim with other girls at her school, Beis Rivka, trying to recreate the heartfelt way that older generations of Hasidim would sing them. She had heard many recordings of nigunim heavily influenced by hip hop and other contemporary musical styles but this was not what she was looking for. Her model wasn't Matisyahu, but rather the Mitele Rebbe Dov Ber (1773-1827), who would invite a musical troupe of vocalists and musicians to perform and sing during special farbrengens, especially on Hanukkah and Lag B'Omer, and sometimes ask them to play and sing for him personally when he needed or wanted to be uplifted spiritually.
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Thursday, February 16, 2023
For Strictly Observant Jews in Brooklyn, the Sabbath Expands
When he moved in 2014 from an apartment in Brooklyn's Prospect Heights to a house he could afford in nearby Crown Heights, Naftali Hanau, a 37-year-old Orthodox Jewish businessman, suddenly found that, even in a secular and tolerant place like Brooklyn, the rigorous tenets of his faith now made it impossible for him to take his toddler son along to synagogue on the Sabbath.
Talmudic law derived from biblical commandments forbids doing 39 kinds of work on the Sabbath. In addition to plowing and harvesting, buying and selling, cooking by kindling a fire, writing and other obvious kinds of employment, carrying any object outside the home — keys, books, prayer shawls, canes or even babies — is forbidden. Pushing a stroller or wheelchair in public on the day of rest is also prohibited.
There is a significant loophole, however, that was developed millenniums ago by the Talmudic sages in Babylon as a way of making the biblical law compatible with the practical necessities of living and honoring the Sabbath as a day to delight in. It is known as an eruv — the Hebrew term for an artificial boundary enclosing an area and demarcated by existing walls, buildings and fencing with gaps filled in by wire, or, in modern times, translucent fishing line strung between lampposts and utility poles. According to the sages, an eruv extends the private domain of a home into the streets.
There were 10 distinct eruvim in Brooklyn at the time that Mr. Hanau moved to Crown Heights, but none of them embraced the block of his new home. He remembered that, as he left for synagogue, his son, who was not yet 2, would cry: "I want to go shul, I want to go to shul."
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Wednesday, February 15, 2023
Bedouin officer killed in terror attack has a Hasidic Jewish cousin
An Israeli-Arab Border Police officer from the Bedouin community who was recently killed in a terrorist stabbing attack has an Orthodox Jewish cousin, Charedim10 reported Tuesday.
On Monday evening, 22-year-old Staff Sgt. Asil Sawaed succumbed to wounds sustained earlier in the day in a terrorist attack at a checkpoint to Shuafat in northeastern Jerusalem.
During the attack, a 13-year-old Arab terrorist stabbed Sawaed after he and a civilian guard had boarded a bus during a routine inspection. The guard then opened fire at the suspect, accidentally hitting Sawaed.
The morning after Sawaed's passing, Israeli entrepreneur Maor Farid eulogized Sawaed and shared his family connection to the slain officer.
"The late Sergeant Asil Sawaed, who was murdered yesterday in the attack, is a relative of mine. No, it's not an expression – for real."
Farid explained that his father-in-law, Rami Ben-David, is a Bedouin convert to Judaism.
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Tuesday, February 14, 2023
Ohio is investigating a Nazi homeschooling network
Ohio's department of education is investigating a homeschooling network that claims public schools are run by "Zionist scum," teaches kids to say "Sieg Heil" in class and instructs fellow parents not to give their kids "Jewish media content."
There are more than 2,500 members of the "Dissident Homeschool Network," a channel on the social network messaging app Telegram. The "dissidents" are a group of Nazi parents who share homeschooling lesson plans extolling the virtues of Hitler and white nationalism — while relying on a popular social media account run by a Jewish woman to provide ammunition for their hatred. The founders of the group were recently unmasked by a hate group monitor as a couple in rural Upper Sandusky, Ohio.
"There is absolutely no place for hate-filled, divisive and hurtful instruction in Ohio's schools, including our state's homeschooling community," Stephanie Siddens, the interim superintendent of public instruction at Ohio's education department, told Vice News. "I emphatically and categorically denounce the racist, antisemitic and fascist ideology and materials being circulated."
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine, along with Rep. Bob Latta, whose district encompasses Upper Sandusky, and Rep. Jim Jordan, all gave statements to Vice News condemning the group. But Ohio officials say that there is little to no homeschooling oversight from the state board of education. Although parents who homeschool are required to submit copies of their lesson plans to the state, a county official who oversees the area where the Lawrences live told HuffPost, "Parents who decide to home educate their child are responsible for choosing the curriculum and course of study."
"We are so deeply invested into making sure that [our] child becomes a wonderful Nazi," the founder of Dissident Homeschool Network, who goes by the pseudonym "Mrs. Saxon," recently said on a neo-Nazi podcast to promote the group. She has been identified by the Anonymous Comrades Collective, an anti-Nazi group, as well as Vice News and HuffPost, as Katja Lawrence, a Dutch immigrant who currently lives in Upper Sandusky, Ohio.
Lawrence is a recently naturalized U.S. citizen who frequently rails against other groups of immigrants on social media; her husband Logan is an insurance agent. The Lawrences are so enamored of Nazidom that Katja uploaded audio of her own kids performing Nazi salutes to her Telegram channel, and baked a cake to celebrate Hitler's birthday.
The journalists and researchers who reported on Dissident Homeschool Network were able to track the couple down after they revealed that they owned a German shepherd named Blondi — also the name of Hitler's dog.
Launched in fall 2021, the Lawrences' homeschooling project is explicitly labeled as a means for neo-Nazi parents to indoctrinate their kids by keeping them away from public school. Lesson plans include teaching cursive by having students write out famous quotes from Hitler and American neo-Nazi George Lincoln Rockwell; building "math" classes around racist manipulations of urban crime statistics; and praising Confederate general Robert E. Lee as "a grand role model for young, white men." In idle chats, members of the group disparaged the Indiana Jones movies as "Jewish revenge porn."
The group also facilitates in-person meetings between like-minded parents and children. Relatives of the Lawrences told HuffPost they found their activities "disgusting" and "heartbreaking for their children."
Despite their near-constant stream of antisemitic invective, members of the Dissident Homeschool Network frequently share memes from the right-wing social media channel Libs of TikTok, which is run by an Orthodox Jew. The account has gained national notoriety for its demonization of LGBTQ people as "groomers," as well as for its constant attacks on public education, a hot target for figures on the right who believe educators are indoctrinating children with "critical race theory" and "gender ideology."
That account's administrator Chaya Raichik, who has recently made her identity public, frequently advocates for parents to homeschool their children. Homeschooling has become a popular choice for conservatives, both for religious and ideological reasons, and lobbyists for the movement together with Republican lawmakers, have made it easier for parents to homeschool their children with little to no oversight.
The "Dissident" group provides parents with instructions on how to teach Nazi material while avoiding scrutiny from the authorities.
On the channel, Katja Lawrence frequently boasts about the size and strength of their Nazi parents' movement: "There is a huge network of people like us."
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Monday, February 13, 2023
More outrageous UN anti-Semitism: High-level official says Israel to blame for Palestinians murdering Jews
A Palestinian resident of East Jerusalem plowed his car into a busy Jerusalem bus stop Friday, killing three Israelis, including 6- and 8-year-old brothers. The response from Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur for the Palestinians: crickets.
Perhaps that's for the best. The day before, Albanese blamed Israel for last month's Palestinian terrorist attack outside a Jerusalem synagogue that left six Jews and one Ukrainian national dead.
In a tweet Thursday, Albanese heaped praise on Barcelona's city council for falsely labeling Israel an apartheid state — a classic example of anti-Semitism by declaring the world's only Jewish state to be a racist endeavor. A Twitter user replied by asking her if she had addressed a murder of Jews, citing a 14-year-old killed in the synagogue attack and a shooting carried out by a 13-year-old Palestinian terrorist the following morning that injured two Jews. Albanese responded that she had — by condemning Israel.
She asserted that the "brutal colonial occupation Israel maintains over the Palestinians (an apartheid regime by default) continues to traumatize millions of people, pushing them into hopelessness & despair, including kids." Truly a master class in victim-blaming. Never mind that Palestinians have been murdering Jews since long before Israel controlled the West Bank.
This is far from Albanese's first anti-Semitic controversy. In December, a review of her social media history revealed several virulent comments: She'd described the United States as "subjugated by the Jewish lobby" and claimed that the "Israeli lobby," directed by "Israel's greed," skewed media coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Top US officials condemned these remarks as anti-Semitic.
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Friday, February 10, 2023
2 dead, Including 6-year-old, in eastern Jerusalem attack
A Palestinian rammed his car into civilians at a Jerusalem bus stop on Friday afternoon, killing a 6-year-old boy and a 20-year-old man in Jerusalem.
An off-duty policeman killed the attacker, a 31-year-old Palestinian from eastern Jerusalem. Reports said at least five others, including an 8-year-old child, were injured in the attack outside Ramot, an eastern Jerusalem neighborhood.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the sealing and demolition of the attacker's home and that "arrests be carried out immediately in the terrorist's circle," a statement from his office said.
The terror attack comes two weeks after another attack in an eastern Jerusalem neighborhood killed seven Israelis on a Friday night, and amid escalating violence in the West Bank. The day after that attack, two Israelis were shot by a 13-year-old Palestinian outside Jerusalem's Old City.
Netanyahu's new government, which includes far-right parties, is considering toughening anti-terrorist measures, including expelling the families of terrorists. One of the proponents of that proposal, National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, also proposed placing a lockdown on Isawiya, the attacker's neighborhood, but was unsure that such a measure would be legal, according to the Jerusalem Post.
The 20-year-old victim, Alter Shlomo Liderman, was a student who had recently gotten married, multiple Israeli outlets reported. The child who was killed has not yet been identified.
Multiple Israeli publications reported that a Facebook account that appears to belong to the attacker features praise of Palestinian terror attacks.
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Thursday, February 09, 2023
Ex-Orthodox teacher Leifer's trial behind closed doors
The trial of a former ultra-Orthodox Jewish school principal accused of raping three former students has moved behind closed doors.
Malka Leifer, 56, is facing 29 charges over the alleged sexual abuse of Melbourne sisters Nicole Meyer, Dassi Erlich and Elly Sapper when she was head of religion and principal at the Adass Israel School in the city's eastern suburbs.
Leifer, a mother of eight, has pleaded not guilty and is facing trial in the Victorian County Court.
The court was closed on Thursday when the first of the women, Meyer, was expected to begin her evidence.
It's believed to be the first time any of the women was in the same room as Leifer in 15 years.
The court is expected to remain closed in the coming days as Erlich and Sapper also give their evidence in the case.
Prosecutor Justin Lewis opened the case against Leifer in front of a jury of 15 on Wednesday, alleging Leifer had a tendency to act in the way alleged.
"It is said she has a tendency to have a sexual interest in girls when they were teenage students at the school and when those same girls were student teachers … to take advantage of their vulnerability, their ignorance in sexual matters and her position in the school," he said.
She's accused of raping all three women, now in their 30s.
Other charges include indecent assault and sexual penetration of a child aged 16 or 17.
After allegedly raping Meyer shortly before her wedding, Lewis said Leifer told her "this will help you for your wedding night".
She's also accused of sexually abusing Meyer and Erlich when the trio shared a room on a school camp.
Leifer also allegedly told the youngest sister, Sapper, after abusing her on multiple occasions that "this is good for you".
Leifer's barrister Ian Hill KC said the defence position was that the allegations are "erroneous, imagined and/or fabricated".
"Mrs Leifer denies all of the criminal conduct alleged by each of the complainants," he said.
"You will hear that in 2008 she said to a fellow teacher … that she had done nothing wrong."
He said jurors were expected to hear there was a positive, glowing and appropriate relationship between Leifer and the sisters.
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Wednesday, February 08, 2023
‘Dangerous’ Christian missionary family dressed as Hasidim seeking Israeli citizenship
A family of missionaries who have been previously exposed for pretending to be religious Jews and infiltrating ultra-Orthodox communities in the hopes of converting them to Christianity is currently living in Jerusalem and attempting to fraudulently obtain Israeli citizenship, a watchdog group warned.
The anti-missionary Beyneynu organization raised the alarm about the Dawson family, which fabricated Jewish roots to ingratiate themselves within religious Jewish communities throughout multiple states in the U.S.
Over the last 12 years, the Dawsons, who changed their name to Isaacson presumably to sound more Jewish, have repeatedly presented themselves as observant Jews.
Michael and Calev Dawson, a father and son, have even falsely claimed they are rabbis. They conducted conversions, wedding ceremonies, and other Jewish lifecycle events that are now considered invalid under Jewish law.
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Tuesday, February 07, 2023
Fired staff attorney awarded over $1.1M for firing after she sought time off for Jewish holidays
A fired attorney and magistrate in Ohio has been awarded more than $1.1 million in her First Amendment lawsuit against a judge who fired her after she sought time off for the Jewish High Holidays.
Federal jurors in Cincinnati on Friday found a violation of Kimberly Edelstein's First Amendment right of free exercise of religion. She was awarded $835,000 in back pay, $250,000 in compensatory damages, and $35,000 in punitive damages, report Law360 (via Above the Law) and the Journal-News.
Edelstein has claimed that Judge Greg S. Stephens of Butler County, Ohio, took steps to fire her a day after her July 2016 request to take off eight nonconsecutive days in October 2016 for the Jewish holidays. Edelstein said Stephens yelled, "Holy cow, eight days!" when she made the request, according to an August 2019 opinion in the case.
Stephens has said he fired Edelstein because of tensions between her and other staff members. Edelstein has said Stephens fabricated the problems, according to the Journal-News.
"We strongly believe the evidence did not support the verdict, and we are considering our options," Linda L. Woeber, a lawyer for Stephens, told Law360.
Woeber told the Journal-News that there was no religious bias, and the employee who replaced Edelstein was Jewish.
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Monday, February 06, 2023
Jewish communities embrace security staff in face of rising antisemitism
During one of the recent rainstorms in Los Angeles, a security guard at Amanda Kronstadt's Jewish high school reminded her to wear her rain jacket on her way home. It was a small thing but the freshman appreciates him going the extra mile.
He's "always looking out for the students," she said.
It's important to her that she feels cared for in this way, especially since the late-2022 wave of antisemitic threats targeted Jewish institutions, including schools. In a 17-day span in October and November, at least 14 United States Jewish day schools reported receiving suspicious phone calls or bomb threats, according to the Anti-Defamation League.
Schools, Jewish community centers and synagogues have come to rely on their security staff. While security at synagogues used to be an afterthought, said Jason Moss, the executive director of the Jewish Federation of the Greater San Gabriel Valley and Pomona, now, "it's part of all planning and into every aspect of a synagogue."
After a gunman took hostages at a synagogue in Colleyville, Texas in January 2022, Moss spent time looking at security staff in the Jewish world. "They play a vital role in keeping the community secure," he said. "That it's something to be commended for, especially for helping to defend a place that is not a part of who they are in some cases."
Melissa Levy says she couldn't do her job as director of congressional engagement at Pasadena Jewish Temple without the security staff.
"They're a part of the family," said Levy. "Because they are keeping their eyes and ears open and making sure that we stay safe, we can do the rest of our jobs and really help build community here."
In 2021, there were 61% more attacks against synagogues and Jewish community centers compared to 2020, according to the Anti-Defamation League. Additionally, antisemitic incidents reached an all time high, with 2,717 occurrences of assault, harassment and vandalism.
The Anti-Defamation League also found that there has been a dramatic spike in belief in antisemitic tropes since 2019.
"In the last several years, there has been not only a rise of antisemitism and hatred overall," said Moss. This "has caused there to be a greater sense of urgency to take all of these threats seriously."
Due to rising antisemitism, 54% of synagogues surveyed had some form of armed security guards, a 2018 study found. Only 17% of non-Jewish houses of worship had security guards. The religious buildings that were closest to synagogues in the percentage of security guards were mosques with 28%.
Keeping regular security does not come cheap. Rabbi Daniel Bogard in St. Louis, Missouri estimated that security at synagogues costs at minimum $50,000 and can even be near $150,000 in his 2022 interview with Business Insider. Jason Moss said that many synagogues struggle with funding security because it's an additional expense.
Because of the costly price tag of security, synagogues can apply to receive assistance from the federal Nonprofit Security Grant Program. In 2022, the program had $250 million available, a $70 million increase from 2021. Despite the quarter billion dollars, only 52% of applicants received funding as requests totaled almost $450 million, per Jewish Insider. Per request of Jewish community leaders, President Joe Biden proposed a $360 million budget for the program in 2023, according to The Jerusalem Post.
Mike Sayegh has provided security to the Pasadena Jewish Temple and Center for nearly four years. Along with his brother, the two run Power House Security, a protection service. The company provides the synagogue a security guard when large groups are on campus, a task he often takes upon himself.
Throughout Sayegh's work at the Pasadena temple, he has learned more about Judaism and made connections with congregants. As a Christian, he said his work opened up new perspectives and gave him a sense of familiarity with the religion and culture.
Not everyone is on board with beefed-up security at synagogues, especially when guards are armed and in uniform. Some think it undermines the welcoming aspect of a Jewish institution, and many Jews of color and their allies say a heightened security presence can make them feel less safe.
But while acknowledging these objections and somber reasons for having security at synagogues, many congregants have been able to embrace their security team as a part of their community.
That rings true for Samuel Svonkin, a 16-year-old member at Pasadena Jewish Temple and Center. Svonkin has seen security become more prominent at his synagogue in recent years. "Synagogue security doesn't only benefit the congregation physically but also makes simply existing and being Jewish in the synagogue a more pleasant experience," he said. "Security does more than protect the synagogue. It allows it and its members to function as one."
At Carla Kopf's synagogue, security guards high-five the men, let children jump into their arms and address congregants by name. Kopf, the director of k-12 education and engagement at Temple Isaiah in Los Angeles, California, has witnessed the connection between security and congregants for the past 29 years. "The [care] and love these guys have for our staff and our membership is quite amazing," she said.
Security guards at Kehillat Israel in Pacific Palisades, California have also built strong connections with their community. Rabbi Carrie Vogel of Kehillat Israel in Pacific Palisades, California said, "Our community has had armed guards for maybe 7-8 years and they have been widely embraced by our community. They know the names of the [Early Childhood Center] kids, wave to everyone and are a friendly and helpful presence when people enter our building," said Rabbi Carrie Vogel, the director of the Jewish Experience Center at Kehillat Israel.
As Jewish communities embrace their security, the guards embrace them back. "I love it here. I feel appreciated here," said Sayegh. "I've been thanked more times than I can count. I've been thanked by people I've never met."
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Friday, February 03, 2023
New York Blocks Payments to 20 Firms That Serve Hasidic Schools
New York City education officials are blocking payments to 20 companies that provide education services, primarily for students in yeshivas.
The move marks a change in the city's approach to education contracting, particularly in cases involving parents of private school students with disabilities who seek city-funded services. While there is a process — parents must ask a hearing officer to order the funding — the city has until now assented to most such requests. Now it will fight those that would channel payments to any of the 20 companies.
My colleagues Brian M. Rosenthal and Eliza Shapiro write that together, the firms collected $60 million to provide special education last year alone.
The shift comes after Martin Handler, an executive at some of the city's top-earning special education providers, was arrested last month and charged with stealing millions in public money that was supposed to go for early education for low-income children. He has pleaded not guilty.
Officials say the 20 firms all have ties to Handler or at least one of his co-defendants. Two of the companies are linked to Handler in public records — Special Education Associates and Kids Domain Childcare Centers — and operate from the same building in Borough Park, Brooklyn, as Handler's child care businesses.
Handler's attorney did not respond to a request for comment, nor did representatives of many of the companies now shut out of funding.
The indictment of Handler and his co-defendants, and the city order barring payments to the 20 companies, followed a New York Times article in December that revealed that many special education providers in the Orthodox Jewish and Hasidic communities had received a windfall of taxpayer money in recent years. The money covered services that were sometimes not needed or even provided. In response to the article, city officials said they were scrutinizing requests more closely.
The Times had reported in September that scores of Hasidic boys' yeshivas across Brooklyn and the lower Hudson Valley have collected about $1 billion in taxpayer money in recent years while failing to provide their students with a basic secular education.
Last month, the state Education Department told Mayor Eric Adams's administration that a long-delayed investigation into the quality of secular education at more than two dozen Hasidic yeshivas in Brooklyn must be completed by June. That was the latest signal that the state is stepping up pressure on the city to improve yeshiva education. Betty Rosa, the state education commissioner, ruled in October that one Brooklyn yeshiva was violating a state law requiring private schools to provide basic English and math instruction. That ruling overturned an earlier determination by the city that the school was in compliance.
This week Nathaniel Styer, a spokesman for the Education Department, said the city would meet the deadline set by Rosa. He said that officials have visited all the yeshivas in the original complaint and plan to visit each school at least once more.
The criminal case against Handler and his co-defendants could take months to work its way through the court system. According to an indictment unsealed last month in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, he stole money through child care firms, some of them secretly owned, including by creating what prosecutors called a "fake after-school program" and billing for services that he never provided. Handler used the money to deal out no-show jobs, buy real estate and purchase an array of historical religious artifacts at auctions, prosecutors said.
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Wednesday, February 01, 2023
Jewish couple smashes gravy boat made in Nazi Germany
"We're going to smash it to bits and give it the treatment it deserves," said a hammer-wielding Florida woman, of the porcelain gravy boat the Jewish couple was given with markings from Nazi Germany.
The couple's son, Adam Feldman, posted the video to TikTok, writing, "My Jewish parents found an old gravy boat from Nazi Germany so this is what they did."
Feldman told Storyful that his parents' neighbor found the old gravy boat wrapped up at the bottom of a closet.
When that neighbor heard that his mother's family had endured loss when Nazi Germany invaded Poland during the Holocaust, during which six million Jews were murdered, the neighbor gave the gravy boat to his parents to do with whatever they saw fit.
"They didn't want it in the house. They contacted a few museums but there was no interest in it," because the item was mass-produced and held little historical value. "They could have sold it for a few bucks but my mom said it would feel like blood money," Feldman told Storyful.
Fearing that it might turn up in the hands of collectors with "dubious political sympathies," the couple decided the gravy boat's fate – smash it.
Just one swoop of the hammer shattered it to pieces.
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