Southern Jewish Life, Deep South, April 2023

Southern Jewish Life

ISRAEL AT 75

April 2023

Volume 33 Issue 4

Israel is turning 75 this month, but in many quarters, there seems to be a malaise rather than a celebratory spirit.

As is typical, there seems to be more Holocaust commemorations than Israel independence celebrations. Why pass over an opportunity to celebrate?

Part of it, no doubt, is the current rhetorical divide between a right-wing Israeli government and a left-wing American Jewry barraged with negative headlines about what is happening in Israel, devoid of context and content.

Over the last few months, many in the American Jewish community have been passionately opposed to the Netanyahu-promoted judicial reforms of Israel’s Supreme Court, warning of fascism and the death of democracy, if not the dangers of overheated rhetoric. The Biden administration, which not too long ago was promoting the idea of expanding the U.S. Supreme Court because of its ruling on Roe v. Wade, felt it necessary to weigh in on another sovereign country’s politics and urge Netanyahu to respect the sanctity of the court.

Most folks here, though, couldn’t articulate what the changes being discussed actually are, and why some feel they are necessary. On our Israel Insight website, there is a three-part analysis of why many of the reforms are actually consensus issues.

Israel doesn’t have a Constitution, and judges currently rule based on what seems reasonable to them and regardless of what the Knesset says. There are also issues with how sitting justices have an effective veto over new members, can take cases from activist groups which would not have legal standing in the U.S., and there is no governmental check on activist rulings, as the balance of power the U.S. has does not exist in Israel.

A couple reforms may have gone too far, like a proposal where the Knesset could void a ruling on a simple majority vote, which seems far too low of a

MESSAGES

Maccabi USA leader praises Birmingham Games

I have had the honor of attending many Maccabi competitions around the world. From Israel to Australia to South America, Europe and the JCC Maccabi games around the United States and Canada, I have logged many miles seeing how sports can be a vehicle to help build Jewish identity, especially in our young.

threshold. But that is easily negotiated. That Netanyahu has been dogged with legal troubles for years certainly doesn’t help the perceptions.

I felt honored to come to Birmingham for the first time and fell in love with not just the city but the people. You have taken Southern hospitality to a new level with your kind and caring approach to the JCC Maccabi Games.

January 2021

Southern Jewish Life

PUBLISHER/EDITOR

Lawrence M. Brook editor@sjlmag.com

ASSOCI ATE PUBLISHER/ADVERTISING

Lee J. Green lee@sjlmag.com

But in truth, the Supreme Court issue is just an excuse, as evidenced by the ongoing demonstrations after Netanyahu shelved the reforms. He is the issue, the Supreme Court was merely a rallying cry. There is also a hefty dose of societal divisions that have gone on for many years — religious versus secular, European versus Mizrahi…

of Netanyahu Derangement Syndrome. It is no secret that the only thing uniting the previous government, the only one in years not headed by Netanyahu, was a vow of “Anyone But Netanyahu.” That sure ended well.

Now, thanks to Israel’s fractious election system, Netanyahu has a somewhat stable coalition, but has to rely on some rather extreme characters.

Led by the Sokol and Helds, your hard-working volunteers were wonderful. They partnered with your outstanding staff, led by Betzy Lynch, to make the 2017 JCC Maccabi games a huge hit. I want to take this opportunity as executive director of Maccabi USA to say thank you on behalf of everyone involved.

V.P SALES/MARKETING, NE W ORLEANS

Jeff Pizzo jeff@sjlmag.com

Part of the problem is that Israel has imported the American view of the past 20 years — that the opposition is no longer merely in disagreement over what is the best path forward for the future of the nation, the opposition is illegitimate and evil, and is to be quashed.

No matter how much Netanyahu says he is reining in the extremists (“they are joining me, I am not joining them”), it can’t possibly be enough for critics. And given how Israeli politicians have never been adept at not saying idiotic things on occasion, embarrassing flash points are a certainty.

I had just returned from the 20th World Maccabiah games in Israel with a U.S. delegation of over 1100, who joined 10,000 Jewish athletes from 80 countries. Back in July the eyes of the entire Jewish world were on Jerusalem and the Maccabiah. This past month with 1000 athletes and coaches from around the world being in Birmingham, you became the focal point. Everyone from the Jewish community and the community at large, including a wonderful police force, are to be commended. These games will go down in history as being a seminal moment for the Jewish community as we build to the future by providing such wonderful Jewish memories.

CREATIVE DIRECTOR Ginger Brook ginger@sjlmag.com

SOCIAL/WEB Emily Baldwein connect@sjlmag.com

PHOTOGRAPHER- AT-LARGE Rabbi Barry C. Altmark deepsouthrabbi.com

On Charlottesville

Clinton was said to be destroying the country, then it was the “illegitimate” Bush who “stole” the election from Gore. Then Obama was the closet socialist who was going to declare martial law and stay in office after 2016, facing an Obama Derangement Syndrome among opponents who felt anything connected to him was automatically suspect. He was followed by Trump, who once again “stole” an election from a righteous Democrat in what Democrats considered the most rigged voting in history, and who going to be the end of democracy.

Editor’s Note: This reaction to the events in Charlottesville, written by Jeremy Newman, Master of the Alpha Epsilon Pi Theta Colony at Auburn University, was shared by AEPi National, which called it “very eloquent” and praised “our brothers at AEPi Theta Colony at Auburn University and… the leadership they display on their campus.”

After four years of Trump Derangement Syndrome, the script was flipped, and after the presumed purest election ever (according to Democrats, but not according to Republicans), Biden “stole” it from Trump, and Biden Derangement Syndrome reigns.

White supremacy has been a cancer on our country since its beginning, threatening its hopes, its values, and its better angels. The events that took place in Charlottesville

In Israel, it is clear that there is a heavy dose

But it isn’t just politics, as the conflict with the Palestinians continues to dominate and get completely misrepresented.

News reports routinely state that 2022 was the deadliest year in a while for Palestinians. It is never mentioned that it is because that year was also the deadliest for Israeli civilians, due to a rise in terror attacks going back to May 2021.

supremacists would like to see pushed back into a corner and made to feel lesser. We stand with and pray for the family of Heather Heyer, who was there standing up to the face of this hate.

The terrorists go after Israeli civilians. Israel goes after the terrorists. But that’s not what people hear. All they hear is “an Israeli operation in Jenin killed six Palestinians.”

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Rivka Epstein, Louis Crawford, Tally Werthan, Stuart Derroff, Belle Freitag, Ted Gelber, E. Walter Katz, Doug Brook brookwrite.com

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Well, yes. Israel isn’t risking the lives of its young people on such operations for the fun of it. These raids typically are against those actively planning imminent terror attacks, and those “six Palestinians” are all, or almost all, combatants, not civilians in the crossfire.

As part of these operations, Israel is often

continued on page 40

We recognize the essence of the American narrative as a two-century old struggle to rid ourselves of such corners, and allow those in them the seat at the table that they so deserve. It is the struggle to fulfill the promise of the Declaration of Independence, that “all men are created equal… endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” We know our work is far from finished, but we know we will not move backwards.

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Outside the area, subscriptions are $25/year, $40/two years. Subscribe via sjlmag.com, call 205/870.7889 or mail payment to the address above.

found ourselves confronted by the issue of civil the fair treatment of all peoples no matter their

Copyright 2023. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or part without written permission from the publisher. Views expressed in SJL are those of the respective contributors and are not necessarily shared by the magazine or its staff. SJL makes no claims as to the Kashrut of its advertisers, and retains the right to refuse any advertisement.

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agenda

interesting bits & can’t miss events

CJFS Hands Up Together celebrates 20th anniversary of personal care program

Twenty years ago, the Lucille Beeson Trust of Canterbury Methodist Church provided startup funding that enabled Birmingham’s Collat Jewish Family Services to begin providing personal care services.

From an initial 10 clients, the program, which provides services that enable older adults on limited incomes to continue living independently, has grown to serve as many as 150 clients each year, and the program’s 20th anniversary will be the focus of this year’s JCFS Hands Up Together event.

Presenting sponsors for the event are the Beeson Trust and Medical Properties Trust; event cochairs are Anne Warren, who helped launch the program through her leadership with the Beeson Trust, and Robert Levin. The event will be on May 2 at 5:30 p.m. at The Farrell in Homewood.

Personal Care team members from CJFS visit clients for 1 to 4 hours each week providing bathing assistance, meal preparation, laundry service, and/or light housekeeping for an average fee around $4 per hour. These regular,

friendly check-ins provide much-needed socialization, in addition to helping clients manage tasks that they could not handle alone.

Esther Schuster served as the agency’s executive director when the Personal Care program was founded. “The idea for the personal care program came from the Jewish Family Services staff,” she recalled. “They were working with older people who wanted to continue living independently in their homes or apartments, but who needed just a little bit of help to make that possible — maybe help with bathing or tasks in the home that were difficult for them.”

The agency tried to find an existing program for those services, “but they all required at least a four-hour minimum per visit. These particular clients didn’t need that much help, and they couldn’t afford it.”

Warren was the founding chair of the Beeson Trust at that time. “The funds that Canterbury received after the death of Lucille Beeson were designated to be used to benefit the needy elderly in Jefferson County,” she recalled. In 2003,

“CJFS came to talk to us about starting the Personal Care program. We agreed that it was hugely needed and that it would make a difference in older people’s lives, allowing them to live in their own homes or apartments independently for longer. For many years, the Beeson Trust has funded this program at its maximum level.”

Most clients in the program reside in subsidized senior housing communities, such as Episcopal Place. Tim Blanton, executive director of Episcopal Place, said if not for the Personal Care program, many of his residents would be unable to continue living in their apartments. These residents cannot do all of the housekeeping that is required of residents in federally subsidized housing, he said. “They can’t afford to have someone do it, and they don’t have family and friends that can help.” Many of them also live very isolated lives, he added. “A lot of times the personal care attendant is the only person they may see.

Tickets are $100, and are available on the CJFS website. Sponsorships start at $500.

Find Your New Orleans Home

“Gary became part of the family. When my husband and I first decided that we would put our toe in the real estate waters, I knew the only person I wanted to represent us was Gary. He’s a real gem!”

“As first time home buyers, my wife and I were very unfamiliar with the process of purchasing a home. From the moment we met Gary to the day we closed he was great about answering all our questions, walking us through the process and being an advocate for us. I recommend Gary to anyone in the New Orleans area looking to purchase a home.”

New

Promoting Courageous Conversations

Danny Cohn, CEO of the Birmingham Jewish Federation, will be on a panel, “Woven Together: Courageous Conversations, Building Bridges to Common Ground” on May 3 at the Lyric Theatre. The 6 p.m. event is presented by the Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham in partnership with the Instruments of Hope Unity Fund and The Aspen Institute.

Part of a series coordinated by the Foundation, the event brings together diverse voices in an effort to build bridges and find common ground in the community, to “bring diverse people together from different lived experiences and belief systems to engage in constructive conversation.”

Also on the panel will be Senator Doug Jones and local businessman Bart Starr, Jr. The discussion will be moderated by Rev. Audrey Price of the Aspen Institute.

The event will also feature Ashley Jones, Alabama’s poet laureate, and musical performances representing different faith traditions. Among them will be the youth choir from Temple Emanu-El, led by Cantor Robby Wittner.

The Instruments of Hope Unity Fund was established by Gail and Jeffrey Bayer, after they co-chaired the Violins of Hope events in Birmingham in 2018, as a way to create a more lasting effort to bring unity and change.

Tickets are $5 and are available online.

Portrait Identity Project shatters the stereotypical Jewish profile

What does it look like to be Jewish in the 21st century?

Tulane Hillel will host an opening reception for The Portrait Identity Project on April 27 from 6 to 8 p.m. Launched in 2021 by Julia Mattis at Tulane Hillel, the project is a series of portraits and interviews of young Jewish adults at Tulane, ages 18 to 26, documenting how they express their Jewish identity, and how their self-identity may or may not shift over time.

The series transcends the definition of the “stereotypical Jew” and shows how identities intersect, and the difficulty in trying to fit people into a particular box.

At the reception, there will be remarks at 6:30 p.m., live music and appetizers.

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In our January issue, we reported on an effort by Children of the American Revolution in Baton Rouge to honor Jewish veterans at the Louisiana National Cemetery. Wreaths Across America places wreaths on veterans’ graves before Christmas, and while there are instructions to just recite the name of the veteran at Jewish graves, as is done at all graves, wreaths are still sometimes placed, often leading to controversy over an inappropriate tribute.

Brittney Kean of Gonzales, senior society president of the Thomas Jefferson Society of CAR, wanted to find an appropriate way to show respect to Jewish veterans, and after consulting with the local Jewish community, figured flags would be appropriate. In addition, to honor the tradition of leaving stones on Jewish graves, her mother crocheted “stone pockets” to attach to each of the eight flag poles that would be needed.

Kean said another DAR member reached out to her after seeing the SJL piece and wanted to bring the idea to her chapter, a ceremony is being planned for Natchez, and the article also made it to New York. She also reports receiving permission to replicate the flag and stone pocket tribute at all four of the National Cemeteries in Louisiana.

New JLI delves into supernatural

Judaism deals with the natural world, leaving superstition behind, right?

The new Rohr Jewish Learning Institute class, offered at Chabad houses around the country, deals with the mysterious, through “Jewpernatural: Signs, Spirits and Superstition in Jewish Belief.”

The four-part course begins in late April, exploring the fascination with these perennial questions. The first session deals with dreams and directions, where dreams come from, and how to keep nightmares away.

The term “mazel tov” is said with barely a thought to its actual meaning — “a good sign,” an astrological term. The class will explore the role of destiny against the belief in free will.

The other two classes will deal with the concept of the “evil eye” and jinxing good fortune, and concepts of the soul, angels, spirits and extraterrestrial life.

The course will use materials in the Talmud, Jewish philosophy and kabbalah to provide Jewish perspectives and guidance.

In Metairie, there will be a free standalone class on April 25, then the course will meet through May 23, except on May 9, which is Lag B’Omer. The options are Tuesdays at 10:30 a.m. at the Goldring/Woldenberg Jewish Community Campus, or 7:30 p.m. at Chabad in Metairie. Registration is $70.

Chabad Uptown in New Orleans offers the course on Wednesdays, starting April 26, at 7 p.m., or Tuesdays at noon, starting on May 23, at Egenberg Trial Lawyers in the CBD. Registration is $70.

Chabad of Baton Rouge will offer the class on Mondays at 11 a.m. at the main library on Goodwood, starting May 1. There is also a Zoom option at 7 p.m. Registration is $98.

Chabad of Alabama plans to offer the course, beginning on April 26, but details were not available at press time. Registration is at myjli.com.

Paper Midrash to keynote annual ISJL educator conference

Comic books and pop culture combine with deep Jewish scholarship?

Isaac and Rabbi Shawna Brynjegard-Bialik will bring a new way of looking at Jewish texts and teaching to the annual Goldring/Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life educator’s conference.

The conference, for congregations using the ISJL standardized curriculum in the ISJL’s 13-state footprint, will be June 25 to 27 at the Sheraton Flowood near Jackson.

Isaac Brynjegard-Bialik does papercuts from comic books, using them to tell the stories of the Jewish people and connect pop culture with sacred texts, and the intersection of art and Judaism. His papercuts have been in galleries worldwide, and he is on the board of Jewish Artists Initiative.

Rabbi Brynjegard-Bialik was ordained as part of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion’s first Los Angeles class, in 2002. She is an adjunct faculty member in the Rhea Hirsch School of Education at HUCJIR in Los Angeles, and adjunct rabbi at Congregation Or Ami in Calabasas, Calif. She has also been on faculty at URJ Camp Newman since 2008.

The conference, which is for educators and congregational leadership, includes speakers and education specialists from across the country. There is no fee for the conference itself, the registration is for the hotel, meals and snacks.

WALLACE BURKE

Collat Jewish Family Services and Community Grief Support will hold a Spousal Loss Support Group at the Levite Jewish Community Center in Birmingham. The 10 weekly sessions will run from April 17 to June 26 at 10 a.m. Registration is required and space is limited, and new members are accepted through the third session.

The next Honor Our Parents Shabbat service, coordinated by Collat Jewish Family Services in Birmingham, will be on April 28 at 11 a.m. at the Levite Jewish Community Center, led by Rabbi Yossi Friedman. There will be a celebration of life for Loretta Newfield, sponsored by the Temple Emanu-El Sisterhood in Birmingham, at Emanu-El on April 30 at 4 p.m.

The Unified Jewish Congregation of Baton Rouge will hold its 23rd Magical Mitzvah Day on April 30. Projects include toiletries packages for the shelters at St. Vincent DePaul, making items for local dog rescue groups, Religious School Buddies projects around the building, and preparing lunch for the rest of the volunteers.

Birmingham’s Temple Emanu-El will have a Mitzvah Day on April 23 at 9:30 a.m., with options including cleaning an area with Black Warrior Riverkeeper, cleanup at Grace Klein Home, helping the UAB Sustainability Garden, and a Tikkun Olam fair at Abroms Hall.

Dothan’s Temple Emanu-El will have a road trip to the Montgomery Biscuits baseball game, April 30, with the first pitch at 3:30 p.m.

The Beth-El Civil Rights Experience in Birmingham will have a soft opening the afternoon of May 7, for a screening of the opening film, a preview guided tour with the docents and a light reception.

Shabbat Halicha, a Shabbat morning hike for Temple Emanu-El in Birmingham, will be on May 13 at Red Mountain Park, meeting at the Frankfurt Drive entrance at 10 a.m.

Bais Ariel Chabad in Birmingham will have Thai Shabbat with Chef Josh Haynes on April 21, with a service at 6:30 p.m. and dinner at 7 p.m. Reservations are $25 for adults, $10 for children and $70 family maximum.

The Not Ready for Anytime Players at Temple Beth El in Pensacola are rehearsing for this year’s camp scholarship fundraiser, “Play It Again, Shmuel!” The trip down Parody Lane will be led by Executive Director Renee Eilen and special guest accompanist Robert Sackheim. The event will be at the Gulf Breeze Recreation Center on May 7 at 7 p.m., with doors opening at 6 p.m. Tickets are $20.

There will be a National Mah Jongg Day event at the Delta State University Archives and Museum in Cleveland, April 30 from 2 to 5 p.m. For those who do not know how to play, there will be a how-to workshop. Pre-registration is needed to play.

The Southern Jewish Voices featuring Madeline Oliff, planned for March at the Levite Jewish Community Center in Birmingham, was rescheduled to April 27 at 6 p.m. After graduating from Tufts, Oliff moved to Birmingham on a Venture for America Fellowship, and during the program she will talk with interviewer Margaret Norman about navigating the South as a Chicago transplant in her mid-20s.

The Springhill Avenue Temple Men’s Club in Mobile will be at Eddie Stanky Field on April 25 at 6:30 p.m. to watch the University of South Alabama baseball team take on the University of New Orleans. The Temple purchased 25 tickets for the game, which are available on a first come, first serve basis, free for Temple members, and $10 per ticket for any non-member guests.

Pensacola’s Temple Beth El will be going camping for Shabbat, and

In March, a swastika was painted on a long-abandoned hospital by the interstate in Ensley, near Birmingham, along with a Patriot Front anti-immigration “invasion” banner elsewhere on the building. It isn’t clear whether the two were done by the same people.

ADL annual audit reports sharp increase in antisemitic incidents

Propaganda drops account for most reports in South

The Anti-Defamation League’s annual audit of antisemitic incidents in the United States hit an all-time high, with 3,697 incidents of assault, harassment and vandalism in 2022, a 36 percent increase over 2021. That means there was an average of 10 incidents per day.

The report was released on March 23.

ADL Southeast, a region that covers Georgia, Alabama, South Carolina and Tennessee, was hit particularly hard in 2022, with a total of 192 antisemitic incidents recorded – a 120 percent increase over the year before.

With 28 antisemitic incidents, Alabama reported more than the previous four years combined. Last year, there were six reported incidents.

Georgia had a 63 percent growth in incidents from 2021 to 2022, from 49 to 80, and its numbers nearly quadrupled since 2020.

The South Central region saw 28 antisemitic incidents, down from 44 in 2021, but a sharp rise in white supremacist propaganda. South Central covers Louisiana, Mississippi and Arkansas.

“While our regional incident numbers may have not surged like they did in other parts of the country, recorded numbers only tell part of the story,” said Linday Baach Friedmann, regional director of the South Central office in New Orleans. “The normalization of hate is often reflected in a lack of reporting when incidents do happen. For this reason, we must encourage our communities to report when antisemitism hits home so we can better understand what we’re up against locally.”

“Whether you’re Jewish or not, the ongoing rise of antisemitic incidents in our region and nation should concern you,” said Eytan Davidson, ADL Southeast’s regional director in Atlanta. “We know trends like this signal increased bigotry overall, and that’s a reality that threatens the well-being and security in every community. It’s incumbent upon us all to combat hate together, especially when we see extremist activity on the rise.”

Nationally, there were 111 antisemitic assaults, a 26 percent increase from 2021. None were reported in the Southeast or South Central regions.

The ADL Audit includes both criminal and non-criminal acts of harassment and intimidation, including distribution of hate propaganda, threats and slurs, as well as vandalism and assault. Compiled using information provided by victims, law enforcement and community leaders, and evaluated by ADL’s professional staff, the Audit provides a regular snapshot of one specific aspect of a nationwide problem while identifying possible trends or changes in the types of activity reported.

The antisemitism statistics did not include votes to boycott Israel, on college campuses or in professional organizations or religious denominations. While the ADL states that “these are antisemitic and contribute to the pressures faced by Jews on campus,” they were not counted because they do not target individuals.

Nevertheless, there were 241 antisemitic incidents that involved refer-

His true story teaches us the Jewish values of uniqueness, respect and kindness.

Oliver never dreamed about having a wheelchair. He showed his people it wasn’t going to slow him down.

ences to Israel or Zionism, down from 345 in 2021.

State By State

Alabama had 28 incidents in 2022, with demonstrations and flyer distributions from White Lives Matter and the Goyim Defense League comprising the bulk of the incidents.

There were also 10 white supremacist events, and 130 instances of white supremacist propaganda, for a total of 150 unique events.

Among the antisemitic incidents, in May, two synagogues in Birmingham received antisemitic phone calls, and “a Jewish institution” in Mobile received numerous harassing text messages with conspiratorial threats. The month before and in February, the Mobile Area Jewish Federation received threatening messages from an individual, and the Levite Jewish Community Center received an antisemitic call that included the statement “gas the Jews.”

In July, antisemitic and racist literature was found glued to library books in Birmingham. In June, a note with an antisemitic slur was left on an individual’s desk at work in Birmingham.

In Montgomery, antisemitic content and the “Happy Merchant” meme were uploaded to the Google Reviews page of a local synagogue in Feb-

Also making the list was the February controversy over the Bellamy Salute lesson at Mountain Brook High School, where students were informed about its resemblance to the “Heil Hitler” salute,” then reenacted it in class. The school then retaliated against the student who made the lesson public.

The rest of the incidents were from demonstrations and leafletting.

In December, six members of White Lives Matter demonstrated outside the courthouse in Centre, and many of the signs were antisemitic. Five members had a flash demonstration outside the courthouse in Oneonta in September, nine had a demonstration in Snead in April, and there was a demonstration in Cullman in March that also included banners from overpasses. Another roadside demonstration took place in Blountsville in February.

Common to the demonstrations were posters claiming that the ADL promotes white genocide.

Four additional WLM events, in Hanceville, Rainsville, Arab and Blountsville, were classified as white supremacist events and not antisemitic harassment.

Literature from GDL was distributed in Gadsden, Cullman, Birmingham, Kimberly, Vestavia, Irondale, Mountain Brook and Florence.

Antisemitic banners were unfurled on overpasses in Hartselle and Hanceville.

The propaganda list was mainly distributions from the Patriot Front. In January, individuals in Cusseta went door to door, asking residents if they could leave copies of their white supremacist materials.

Louisiana had 14 antisemitic incidents, out of 84 overall incidents that includes 73 white supremacist propaganda events.

In February, an antisemitic flyer accusing Jews of sexual abuse was left on a car windshield in Chalmette. The next month, flyers about Jews and the American slave trade were left on cars in a restaurant parking lot in Baton Rouge.

In March, an individual called the ADL office in New Orleans and said “F—the Jews,” and made similar calls to many Jewish institutions in several states. In May, the two Jewish Community Centers in the New Orleans area received antisemitic phone calls, as did Chabad in Baton Rouge and synagogues in New Orleans and Baton Rouge. The JCC in New Orleans also received a bomb threat in June.

In April a man followed a Jewish woman from a store in Lafayette to her home, where he made antisemitic comments. In October in Geismar, an image with a swastika and “F--- Jews” was airdropped by a student to classmates.

There were also WLM events in Baton Rouge in January, and GDL

all my

events in St. Francisville and Shreveport.

The propaganda incidents were mainly Patriot Front, with a couple of appearances by WLM and the League of the South.

Mississippi saw seven incidents of antisemitism and 36 instances of white supremacist propaganda, for 37 unique incidents.

The only incident not tied to organized groups was in Clinton in December, where a student-run Instagram account at a middle school posted a story of a swastika, and when a fellow student asked why, the response was “cause we are nazis.”

The GDL distributed antisemitic materials in Madison, Jackson, Ocean Springs, Gulfport and Waveland, and the neo-Nazi Folkish Resistance Movement distributed stickers in Southaven, including one with a Star of David and the phrase “Break Debt Slavery.”

The propaganda incidents were mostly Patriot Front. The Old Glory Knights, a Klan group, distributed recruitment materials at a Black church in Hernando in May, and in a residential neighborhood in Nesbit in March.

There were 15 incidents in the Florida panhandle in 2022.

In Navarre, an individual threatened to assault a Jewish neighbor in June, while making antisemitic statements that included “go back to Israel.” In September, a swastika was found on a condo wall, vehicles and a public bathroom in Navarre Beach.

Panama City had one incident each of antisemitic harassment and vandalism. GDL distributed materials in June, and a swastika, SS symbol and “NAR town 317” were spray-painted on a dam.

Pensacola had five incidents of antisemitic harassment, out of seven overall incidents of white supremacist propaganda. Three were NatSoc Florida, a neo-Nazi group, distributing materials in August and September. Goyim Defense League accounted for the other two antisemitic incidents, and Patriot Front was behind the other two propaganda incidents.

Propaganda incidents include the Sons of Appalachia distributing “Will2Rise” in Panama City Beach in April, the Patriot Front in Cottondale in October, Pensacola Beach in August and Pace in July.

Arkansas had 179 overall incidents, of which seven were antisemitic. There were 175 instances of white supremacist propaganda, concentrated mainly in the northwest corner of the state. The only antisemitic incident not tied to a group was a Jewish professor in Conway receiving antisemitic direct messages on social media.

Tennessee had 160 incidents, including 40 antisemitic incidents. Included in the list is harassing messages sent to Zionist students in Nashville after a dispute over a pro-Israel speaker on campus.

p r i n g S p r i n g

Culture History

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Rolling Fork Temple building still stands after devastating tornado

Agudath Achim in Shreveport damaged in storm

The March 24 tornado that devastated most of Rolling Fork was the third incident in as many months where a tornado passed near a synagogue in the region.

Though the powerful storm leveled most of the rural Mississippi town, the building that housed the Henry Kline Memorial Congregation was still standing. Established in 1953, the small congregation closed in 1992, with most members shifting to Hebrew Union Temple in Greenville.

Rabbi Debra Kassoff of Hebrew Union reported that all members in the Rolling Fork survived, with their homes still standing. “Considering what most of the rest of the town looks like, it feels like a miracle well worth celebrating,” she wrote in the congregation’s newsletter.

Many early articles focused on the complete devastation on 7th Street. The Temple building is on 3rd Street.

Fred Miller said those wanting to help the area should send monetary donations to the Community Foundation of Washington County, “which has established a great track record for emergency response and resource management.”

On April 1, delegates to the National Federation of Temple Youth’s Southern Region convention at the Henry S. Jacobs Camp went to Rolling Fork to assist in recovery efforts, bringing items donated by several Jewish communities that week, including New Orleans and Jackson.

Earlier in the month, around 5:30 p.m. on March 2, a tornado touched down in Shreveport, damaging a Valero station about 500 feet from Agudath Achim. Mayor Tom Arceneaux’s office reported that the hardest-hit area was the intersection of Youree Drive and Sophia Lane, which is where one turns to reach Agudath Achim and where the Valero is located. Several businesses were damaged in that area.

According to Dave Ginsburg, chair of building and grounds for the congregation, the synagogue had some roof damage, which is still being assessed, but the preliminary indication was that only a portion of the roof was damaged. The power feed line also had to be replaced.

The congregation also lost six small trees and part of a large tree, and the picnic table at the back of the garden area was swept away by the tornado. The seat from one side was found in a lot behind the garden. It took workers two days to remove the tree debris, which is not covered by insurance.

“Any assistance towards covering this unbudgeted expense would be very welcome,” he said.

On Jan. 12, a large tornado went through Selma, cutting a path along 23 miles. It passed a couple of blocks north of Mishkan Israel, which had some “roof issues” that are being worked on, but the congregation has welcomed numerous tourists in recent weeks.

In 2012, a Christmas Day tornado damaged Springhill Avenue Temple in Mobile, lifting the roof an inch or so off the building then putting it back down, necessitating extensive repairs.

Following a friend

Cantor Rebecca Garfein to succeed Joel Colman at Temple Sinai

In February, Cantor Rebecca Garfein of New York took part in a cantorial weekend at Temple Sinai in New Orleans. It looks like she will be staying a while.

On March 28, the congregation announced that Garfein will become their next cantor, succeeding Cantor Joel Colman, who is retiring this summer after 24 years with the congregation. Colman had invited Garfein and Cantor Steven Weiss of Boston for the weekend, which included a cantorial concert and Garfein joining him in the Shabbat evening service, where they concluded the service with “When You Believe” from “Prince of Egypt.”

Garfein was in the class ahead of Colman at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, and they have been close friends ever since.

Garfein has been the first female senior cantor at Congregation Rodeph Sholom in New York City, where she served for 23 years. She also has an extensive stage career, including playing the role of “Fran Drescher” in Abigail Pogrebin’s musical, “Stars of David,” since 2016. Being in New Orleans will be a return to the region for Garfein, who is a native of Tallahassee. Her father, Stanley Garfein, was rabbi of Temple Israel in Tallahassee from 1966 to 2001, and is featured at the Museum of the Southern Jewish Experience.

Prior to cantorial school, she graduated from Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, and while a student there, she was head songleader at Greene Family Camp, where one of the senior campers was Temple Sinai Rabbi Daniel Sherman.

She was ordained as cantor in 1993, becoming the first cantor at Riverdale Temple in the Bronx.

In 1997, Garfein was invited to participate in the Berlin Jewish Cultural Festival, and was the first female cantor to give a solo concert in the same city her grandfather had fled. A CD of that concert, “Sacred Chants of the Contemporary Synagogue,” was released soon after. At the 1998 Berlin Jewish Cultural Festival, she became the first female cantor to preside in a German synagogue.

In 2003, she made her debut at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall in a concert celebrating the release of Dr. Ruth Westheimer’s book, “Musically Speaking.” Westheimer would write the introduction to Garfein’s CD, “Golden Chants in America… Commemorating 350 years of Jewish Music, 1654-2004,” the first U.S. recording spanning 350 years of Jewish music in America.

In 2005, she made her Carnegie Hall debut at a benefit concert for the Folksbiene Yiddish Theater, featuring Mandy Patinkin. She was also in a 2012 benefit with Neal Sedaka and Jay Black.

Garfein has been a featured soloist with the Ra’a’nana Orchestra and the Zamir Chorale at the Jerusalem Theater in Israel and at the 350th anniversary concert of the Curacao Jewish Community in Curacao. In 2016, she was featured at Congregation B’nai Torah in Boca Raton during their Best Divas of American Chazzanut concert.

During the Covid pandemic, she was one of 16 female cantors selected for a video recording of “Yerushalayim Shel Zahav.”

Temple Sinai President Ellen Cohen said Garfein’s “compassion, enthusiasm, talent and experience made her stand out as an individual who will be a wonderful addition to our Temple Sinai clergy team and an inspiring leader for our congregation,” and it was a unanimous decision by the search committee.

“Her broad musical tastes and talents, as well as her insights and passion, will add so much to everything we do here at Temple,” said Sherman.

Garfein said she is “overjoyed to join this wonderful historic congregation and be together for joys and challenges, to celebrate and to be there for life’s journeys. Though we are leaving the New York area, we could not be more thrilled to join the Temple Sinai family and entrench ourselves in the culture of New Orleans.”

She will be joined by her husband, actor Alexander Hatzidiakos, and sons Max and Jake. Jake will have his bar mitzvah at Temple Sinai in September.

There will be a retirement party weekend for Colman from May 19 to 21, and Garfein will officially start on July 1. There will be meet and greet opportunities during the summer and fall.

South Carolina native PJ Schwartz to be new rabbi at B’nai Sholom Congregation benefits from CCAR grant

Rabbi PJ Schwartz is returning to the South as the new rabbi at Temple B’nai Sholom in Huntsville, with a boost from the Central Conference of American Rabbis.

Schwartz grew up in a small community in upstate South Carolina, where his synagogue in Greenville was his Jewish expression. He was active in Hillel at the College of Charleston, and taught at Charleston’s Kahal Kadosh

Beth Elohim, the third-oldest continuous synagogue in the country.

He received a master’s in educational administration, with a Jewish education specialization, at Xavier University, and then was ordained at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati in 2013.

He started his rabbinate as assistant rabbi at Temple Israel in Westport, Conn., and in 2017 became the associate rabbi at Shir Hadash in Los Gatos, Calif. When the interim senior rabbi left abruptly in 2021, he took over that role.

A key element in pursuing Schwartz was a 2023 Heartland Fellowship grant from CCAR. The Heartland grants were made possible by a $1.4 million anonymous donation to the CCAR to help smaller Jewish communities attract and retain rabbis. B’nai Sholom will receive a $40,000 stipend annually for three years to supplement the rabbinic salary and

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In addition, rabbis at Fellowship congregations receive mentoring, training and specialized support from the CCAR to help develop and strengthen the skills needed to lead a solo pulpit in a small congregation.

Julie Lindy, co-chair of B’nai Sholom’s rabbinic search committee, called the grant a “game-changer,” and said that Interim Rabbi Scott Colbert was crucial in the effort. Colbert “helped us rebuild relationships and create more engaged, enriching congregational life during the past year. That success gave us a great story to tell when we created our application.”

The congregation submitted the application in December, when they had already been inter-viewing rabbinic candidates. Dana Averbuch, the other search committee co-chair, said “We were on pins and needles during our search because we knew that the Heartland Fellowship Grant would make such a big difference in the salary and benefits we could offer.”

Schwartz said he is “thrilled” to be joining B’nai Sholom in July. “I’m extremely grateful that I have been afforded the opportunity to be a Heartland Fellow and serve a congregation of my own. This fellowship will help provide me with the resources and guidance to lead TBS into its next chapter.”

Jonathan Jackson to become Dothan’s rabbi

Rabbi Jonathan Jackson was selected as the new rabbi for Temple Emanu-El in Dothan.

For the past year, Rabbi Michael Shields of Tallahassee has been the interim rabbi, since the retirement of Cantor Neil Schwartz in the summer of 2022.

Shields said Jackson “has a spectacular reputation” and he is happy for the congregation.

In a release, Emanu-El President Stefan Zweig “brings to us an outstanding academic back-ground, and a special ability to invigorate membership, to provide congregants with a unique spiritual journey, and to develop interfaith relationships and community activities.”

He is expected to start on May 1.

A Boston native, Jackson earned a degree in religion from Hendrix College in Arkansas, and a master’s in theological studies at Harvard.

Jackson was a cultural anthropologist and lecturer in world religions and Jewish studies at Ithaca College in Ithaca, N.Y., and was a social science instructor at Delaware Valley University in Doylestown, Pa.

He started his rabbinic training at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, finishing at Hebrew Union College, where he was ordained in 2021. During his training, he served communities in Oneonta, N.Y., Philadelphia and Cincinnati. He had an emphasis on interfaith families, LGBTQ families and those looking for a place within Judaism.

After ordination, he became the rabbi of Temple Beth Israel Sha’are Zedeq in Lima, Ohio. He also has been teaching Judaism and Biblical Hebrew at Xavier University in Cincinnati.

Jackson said it is an exciting time to be coming to Dothan because of dynamic growth in the area, and he sees the Jewish community also growing.

He said “Emanu-El in Dothan is a special community, even down to our very name,” which means “God is with us.” The name “reminds us that we together are the hope of the Jews — in the South, in America, and in the world as the people of Temple Emanu-El.”

He has two Catahoula dogs, Oscar and Wendell, and said that after a recent minor blizzard, they quoted Genesis in telling him “Let us go to Dothan.”

U.S. Senate delegation visits Alabama Shop

Undoing Time: Art and Histories of Incarceration considers the foundational roots of confinement from an art historical perspective to better understand the fact that today’s mass incarceration crisis is centuries in the making. The exhibition explores how images throughout time contribute to entrenched cultural beliefs associated with today’s carceral system.

Sen.

at the Alabama Shop in Jerusalem during a February trip

The Jewish Insider recently had an interview with Republican U.S. Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa, who became the first-ever female combat veteran elected to federal office. Co-founder of the bipartisan Senate Abraham Accords Caucus, she was interviewed about her February trip to Abraham Accords countries. This was her response to being asked what was the favorite place she visited on the trip:

“I’m gonna pick this one because it’s also important to my dear friend and brand new senator, Katie Britt of Alabama. In the Old City, one of the little shops in Jerusalem is an actual Alabama store. And so Katie Britt and I, and the rest of the members of the congressional delegation, visited this store and I bought a T-shirt. OK, I’m not an Alabama fan, but I bought a T-shirt from there, because half of it was in Hebrew, the other half in English — it was obviously ‘Roll Tide’ — and it was just a reminder that our countries are so interconnected.”

Hani Imam attended Alabama from 1985 to 1989 and also lived for a time in Huntsville. When he returned to Jerusalem in 1994, he missed the wide open spaces of Alabama and “one of the best football teams ever.” When he took over the family business, he hung a sign as a tribute to the Crimson Tide, prompting questions. He then started making Alabama memorabilia in Arabic, English and Hebrew, evolving into the Crimson landmark.

JCRS returns to its camping Roots for annual gala

After years of themed galas exploring the Jewish Roots of everything from sports to fashion to rhythm and blues, this year the Jewish Children’s Regional Service focused on something it is known for — Jewish summer camp.

“Our mission is very simple,” said JCRS President Michael Goldman. “Every Jewish child in our region that wants to go to a Jewish camp should not be turned away due to a lack of funds.”

One of the largest programs for the social service agency is scholarship assistance for Jewish sleepaway camp. Goldman said that donors to the agency have assisted 3,400 children at 108 non-profit Jewish summer camps across North America over the last decade.

The agency also does financial assistance for college and for special needs, especially for single-parent families or those in isolated areas. They also administer the PJ Library free Judaic children’s book program in much of the region, and a Chanukah gift program for children in need.

The gala was held on March 11 at the Ritz-Carlton in New Orleans, in conjunction with the agency’s annual meeting.

The JCRS grew out of the Jewish Children’s Home in New Orleans, when the orphanage closed in 1948. It had been established in 1855 as the Association for the Relief of Widows and Orphans, and also had a tie to an early form of Jewish summer camping.

The home served all of B’nai B’rith District Seven — Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Texas, the same footprint that JCRS maintains.

The gala showed the interconnectedness of the Jewish Home, camp and the JCRS. Keynote speaker was Macy Hart, iconic longtime director of the Henry S. Jacobs Camp. His father, Ellis, was raised in the Home with two of his three

brothers, and long before then, his paternal grandfather had been founding vice president. And long before JCRS began, the Home itself discovered the power of Jewish summer camp. The gala program had an excerpt adapted from “Fortunate Unfortunates: The Jewish Orphans Home in New Orleans,” Marlene Trestman’s history of the Home, which will be published in October.

In 1916, Home Superintendent Rabbi Leon Volmer proposed getting the 150 youth out of the city’s heat and humidity during the summer. Two years later, the Jewish Federation purchased a waterfront estate in Bay St. Louis, Miss., the J.P. Dart home at 984 South Beach Boulevard. The Home’s board approved a trip to that new facility, and the week went… swimmingly. The week-long trip soon became two, eventually expanding to six weeks, and was the only time many of the kids were able to get out of New Orleans.

Hart gave a brief history of how Jacobs camp overcame the objections of the Reform movement in establishing a camp in a place like Mississippi in the late 1960s. He praised the “zealots,” some of whose descendants were at the gala, for taking the national leadership behind closed doors and letting them know that the camp would be happening, with or without them.

Still, Hart said, the movement felt the camp would fail within a few years, and they couldn’t find someone to run the camp “because of the stereotype” of Mississippi. After an initial summer where 22-year-old Hart learned under “the adult in the room,” Rabbi Sol Kaplan, Hart became director, a position he held for three decades. “The camp never failed, and the camp never had any time where it was in trouble,” he said. “You made it happen.”

He said that while he led Jacobs Camp, JCRS

“was my main go-to place for scholarships. We had children who were in need not only of scholarships, but a safe environment.”

Hart concluded, “Jewish camping for children is a great place for kids to discover who they are, to learn how to stand on their own feet, to be confident about what they say, to understand what friendship means… if it had not been for the JCRS, there were a number of kids who would never have gotten to camp.”

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Alabama Legislature salutes Israel at 75

Alabama Governor Kay Ivey signed Alabama Senate Joint Resolution 8, which honors the 75th anniversary of Israel, and reaffirms the bonds of friendship and cooperation between Alabama and Israel.

The resolution also marks the 80th anniversary of the Alabama Legislature’s call in 1943, in support of establishing a Jewish homeland in the land of Israel. That is regarded as the first such resolution of any state in the U.S.

The bill received widespread bipartisan support, including every senator co-sponsoring it.

The bill was introduced by Sen. Arthur Orr on March 21 and passed the Senate on March 23. It was reported out of committee to the House on April 6, and passed the same day.

A statement from the Alabama-Israel Task Force mentioned that April 6 was the first day of Passover, making the timing even more meaningful. “It was a very special gift to Israel and the Jewish people during Passover, and to the Christian community during Holy Week.”

The resolution notes the 3,000-year history of the Jewish people in the land, supports Israel’s right to self defense, and applauds the recent Abraham Accords agreements, along with the continued peace with Egypt and Jordan.

The resolution also notes that “Alabama and Israel share a commitment to deeply held common values from the history of each shaped greatly through the influence of Biblical faith, in addition to many nationally shared values as the only democratic ally of the United States in the Middle East.”

The resolution honors Israel’s 75th anniversary, commends the people of Israel for remarkable achievements and “Commits to the continued friendship, cooperation, and strengthening of the relationship between Alabama and Israel, for the good of Alabama, Israel, the United States, and the family of nations.”

This is the latest in a series of pro-Israel resolutions, including a May 2021 resolution expressing solidarity with Israel and condemning terrorism from Gaza, an April 2019 resoluttion marking the U.S. embassy move to Jerusalem and recognizing Jerusalem as the “eternal, undivided” capital of the Jewish people, a June 2017 proclamation on the 50th anniversary of Jerusalem’s reunification, and anti-BDS legislation in 2016.

Governor Kay Ivey was slated to sign the resolution on April 14, and plans are being made to present a copy of the resolution to Israeli Consul General Anat Sultan-Dadon, who is at the consulate in Atlanta, during an upcoming trip to Alabama.

Florina’s Homecoming

Five thousand, five hundred and eighty-eight miles from Birmingham, 34 years after she left Moldova as a five-year-old girl, Florina Shilkrot Newcomb, a wife and mother of two, returned home.

In 1989, she and her family exited their native country, not knowing much about where they were headed. All her parents knew was, after years of yearning, they had a chance to escape a place that offered little religious freedom and economic opportunity.

They were driven by what drives parents: Striving for a better life for their children. They wanted Florina and her younger brother, Boris, to grow up as proud Jews and successful Americans with good educations and the chance to pursue their dreams.

It was a gamble; a repeat of the refrain that echoes tortuously through Jewish history: Do we stay? Or do we leave? The Shilkrots left.

Jewish agencies, assisting 1 million emigrating Jews from former Soviet countries, assigned Florina and her family to Birmingham. Their new life began with Florina never fully knowing what her family left behind.

Sally Friedman, Birmingham Jewish Foundation executive director, remembered greeting young Florina and her family at the Birmingham airport when they arrived.

“They were tired and nervous but excited. They had arrived in a faraway land, with little more than hope and determination,” said Friedman. What she remembered most was Florina, a slightly dazed but smiling little girl clinging to a doll. “Though she’s now in her late 30s, other than

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being taller, Florina looks the same.”

Florina’s life in Birmingham became successful. With the help of local Jewish agencies, her family was resettled. Her parents were taught English, employed and helped financially. The Shilkrots became American citizens.

Florina enrolled at the N.E. Miles Jewish Day School. She later attended Birmingham-Southern College, spent time in Atlanta and Memphis, and eventually returned to Birmingham and landed a job with the Birmingham Jewish Federation. Her work has included fundraising, programs and serving as a link to global Jewish agencies including the Joint Distribution Committee, an agency that helped Florina and her family emigrate.

Returning, Reconnecting

Earlier this year, Florina, her husband, Andrew, and two community volunteers, Sheri Krell and Sarah Schaeffer, journeyed to Moldova with a national Jewish group. Their purpose was to learn more about what Jewish agencies, including the Birmingham Jewish Federation, are doing to help Ukrainian refugees, many of whom pass through Moldova.

Returning to Moldova, which borders Romania and Ukraine, and going to Kishinev, the city where her family had lived, was a powerful homecoming. This is clear from talking with Florina as she sat in her office reflecting on her trip.

Arriving in Kishinev, she connected and reconnected, recalling things from childhood. She spoke Russian throughout her trip, a language her family still uses. And she rejoiced over the flourishing of Jewish life in her home community, a vibrancy that has taken hold since her family left.

There was a feeling of coming full circle. She and her family left Kishinev to pursue a path laden with uncertainty. Though they were not fleeing war, she could relate to the daunting and at times chaotic journey those fleeing Ukraine were facing.

Florina knows the chaos first-hand.

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After leaving Moldova, her family spent six months in Italy at a stopping point run by the Joint Distribution Committee. When it came time to depart, the Shilkrots, including four grandparents and Florina’s infant brother, along with other Jewish families, all carrying belongings, were hurried into buses headed for the airport. Small for her age, Florina got lost in the shuffle. Each parent thought the other had her.

As the bus began to pull away, her parents saw her standing on the pavement, a confused and forlorn look on her face. “I came close to being Italian instead of American,” said Florina, a woman with a quick smile and wry sense

of humor. Joking aside, she remembers the confusion and anxiety she felt, the kind many Ukrainian refugees now face, especially children.

When she returned to Kishinev, Florina tried to remember neighborhoods and streets but couldn’t. “Still, when I got there, I felt at home. Everyone spoke Russian. In Birmingham, I don’t have much of a chance to use my Russian. In Alabama, I am always a little different. In Kishinev, I wasn’t different. I looked like the people there.”

What made the trip more meaningful was Andrew joining her. “I’m grateful I saw where my wife and her family came from and what they dealt with,” he said. “Florina had told me about growing up in Moldova. Not until my visit did I fully appreciate where she came from. It was powerful.”

Florina and Andrew spent time with people who had been friends with her family. They greeted her like she was a returning celebrity. They remembered her, this 39-year-old American who looks the same.

In Her Heart

Her mother died of colon cancer when Florina was 19. Going back to Kishinev gave her the chance to reclaim memories she had tucked away in her heart.

“Before we left on our trip, I went through a photo album looking for pictures depicting experiences my mother and I shared when I was little. I thought this might help me recognize things when we got to Kishinev. I hoped to rekindle memories of fun times with my mom.”

Florina and her mother enjoyed going to the zoo and other attractions around town. Today most of those places are gone. She was excited to see the building where the circus had been. “It’s abandoned but it’s still an impressive building. Seeing it made me very happy.”

Their tour bus passed the outdoor plaza where Florina’s parents, Grigory and Lyudmila, married. She and Andrew recognized the site from watching their wedding video. In keeping with a Soviet newlywed tradition, her parents had placed flowers at its memorial for fallen soldiers. Seeing it was an uplifting feeling and one more powerful connection.

“These sites, even ones no longer in use, made me feel closer to my mother. I also thought about my own girls, both young, and how we often go to the zoo. It all made me even more determined, now that I am a mother, to create lasting memories for my children.”

‘What If?’

In the late 1980s, right before Florina and her family left, the Soviet Union, which would eventually crumble, began liberalizing its policies toward Jewish communities. Jewish emigration to Israel, the U.S. and other parts of the world, once tightly restricted by the Soviet government, eased.

Jewish communities throughout the Soviet Union also began reasserting their identities. Jewish organizations, funded by Jewish Federations and other sources, began building a vast network of institutions to renew Jewish life. Seeing the results had a dramatic impact on Florina.

The most emotional moment came when their group visited an activities center for Jewish seniors. There was singing and conversation. The people, language, food and décor reminded Florina of her four grandparents, all of whom came to America with the family. Three are deceased. Overcome with emotion, she had to step out of the room and compose herself.

“All of it was so familiar. I thought about what my grandparents’ lives – and mine – would have been like if we stayed. Moldova went through very hard times after the Soviet Union fell apart. Would we have survived? I couldn’t shake the feeling of ‘What if…’”

A Holocaust memorial has been erected in Kishinev since she left. Seeing it affected Florina deeply.

“As we headed to the memorial, I again thought about my family — those

who had survived the Holocaust, which took its toll on Moldova’s Jewish community, and those who died. Moldovans were antisemitic for a long time. To see a Holocaust memorial – along with a preserved Jewish cemetery and a vibrant Jewish activities center – was very moving,” said Florina.

Andrew, a convert to Judaism, loved the trip, said Florina. “It was overwhelming to have him there. It was emotional for him to see the city where I grew up – for him to see it with his own eyes. Also important was him seeing how Jews help Jews and how much effort that takes. It was powerful for him to witness. The trip wove him more deeply into my own story and Jewish heritage.”

Nagging Guilt

As she grew older, Florina would wrestle with guilt – a nagging sense that she and her family abandoned their home community. Returning and seeing the emergence of Jewish life and institutions assuaged some of her feelings.

Knowing she has devoted a large part of her career – through her work for the Memphis Jewish Federation and now the Birmingham Jewish Federation – to helping Jews in Moldova and other parts of the world adds to her comfort.

“Helping our fellow Jews feels great. It is amazing to work for agencies that do this. My guilt over leaving, especially leaving people behind to grapple with such difficulty, is now offset by being part of this network.”

Of course, the work Federations are doing in Moldova is also personal for Florina. Returning to her native land provided a window into her past and thoughts about what her life might have been. But it also gave her a unique chance to reflect on who she is today and what she has achieved.

“The house I grew up in has been torn down. There are now con-

dominiums in the neighborhoods where my grandparents lived and I played. Yet, there is a Jewish school in the middle of one of those neighborhoods. This blows my mind.”

Did returning to Moldova change her?

“Yes. It brought closure to this chapter of my life. Finally, my guilt was put to rest. I had gone back and seen what had become of my community — and I felt good.”

MSJE hosts discussion of Maurice Schmidt’s Texas Judaic art

Laura Huckaby, curator of the San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts, will discuss the art of Maurice Schmidt, in an in-person event at the Museum of the Southern Jewish Experience in New Orleans, May 11 at 6 p.m. The event is free, registration is requested.

Schmidt’s art is the focus of “God, Goats and Pickup Trucks: Maurice Schmidt’s Visions of Texas,” the first fine art painting exhibit at the museum. It is on display through May 31, on loan from the San Angelo Museum.

Schmidt grew up in New Braunfels, Texas. He studied at the University of Texas at Austin and at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., and taught in the Art Department at Texas A&M for over 40 years. His work has been shown throughout the U.S. and internationally, including in an exhibition in Tel Aviv.

While his works generally have a rural Texas theme, many also have Judaic components.

Huckaby will discuss Schmidt’s art in the context of art history and the artist’s life, and how the collection came to reside in San Angelo.

Levine makes runoff for Orleans Criminal Court

With crime and the local judicial system “in crisis,” Simone Levine is running for Orleans Parish Criminal District Court Section A judge as someone “who is going to know the courtroom from every angle” and use a community-based approach with a balance of fairness and justice.

Levine came out on top of a tight race in March, garnering 34.3 percent of the vote, 8,941 votes, to make the April 29 runoff. Leon Roche also made the runoff with 33.6 percent, 8,768 votes. Diedre Pierce Kelly polled 32.1 percent.

Early voting will be April 15 to 22, except Sunday.

In addition to her legal and law enforcement experience, both as a prosecutor and as a defense attorney, Levine is a survivor of childhood violence, and understands “how difficult it is for crime survivors to speak to law enforcement, and how so many victims never report crimes” because of that.

As judge, “it is incredibly important for me to ensure the community is involved in every stage of court proceedings,” she said. “I believe in absolute transparency.” While some judges are trying to remove the cameras that were installed in courtrooms due to Covid, “I want those cameras up as long as possible,” with public safety being the only exception to access.

She says that New Orleans has not taken care of the community in terms of mental health. In other places, there are numerous interventions that take place before acts of violence occur.

A short term solution is that when there are acts of retaliatory violence or lack of impulse control, “bail needs to be set. We’ve got to look at the risk level an individual poses to the community.”

A major problem is that there is “a small group of individuals who are involved in a retaliatory circle.”

She currently works in the District Attorney’s office, prosecuting “some of our dirtiest and deadliest crimes the city has had.” She noted that retaliatory violence and witness intimidation are real, and not often discussed.

“We are responsible for ensuring that witnesses and victims are provided as much protection as possible so when they are engaged in a courageous act of working with law enforcement, sometimes against the views of their communi-

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ty, that they are protected in that process,” she said.

There has to be confidence in the system so that victims and witnesses feel comfortable coming forward, and input from the community as to whether a defendant poses a threat to the community.

Long term, there needs to be a greater emphasis on mental health programs, Levine said.

She said there are many programs not being used by the city or the courts, and often judges just don’t have the resources to direct people to help.

Such programs can disrupt the retaliatory cycle, she said. “Most defendants have been traumatized themselves” but have never been provided resources. “Often defendants are crime victims who have taken the law into their own hands because they are not confident the system will help them, and they often turn to substance abuse.”

She would like to see social workers in courtrooms, as a resource to help with interrupting crime.

In 2015, she became the leader of Court Watch NOLA, “ensuring the courts themselves were not a machine that ran over people, that it was a body of government that ensured our safety and ensured the constitutional rights of those in front of the court as well as victims.”

There were many problems to confront. She said there was a rape survivor who was “too scared to come testify against the man who raped her,” and the victim was jailed for nine days because of that. There was a policy where the District Attorney could ask the court for a warrant if a crime victim did not respond to outreach from the DA’s office, leading to the jailing of victims. Levine said the majority of domestic violence and sex crime victims don’t report their crimes, and the DA’s policy would only further deter victims from reporting.

Not only that, there were cases where assistant DAs would create phony subpoenas, threatening fines or jail to victims who did not come to the office. Real subpoenas could be signed only by the clerk of court of a judge, and the Fifth Circuit ruled the practice usurped the role of the judiciary.

The group also found judges were not enforcing existing gun control laws, especially hazardous in cases of domestic violence. They convinced the New Orleans Police Department to ask victims of domestic violence, while still at the scene, whether the perpetrator had access to guns.

They also blew the whistle on a judge who required defendants to wear ankle monitors in unnecessary circumstances, often despite prosecution objections. It turned out the judge’s biggest campaign contributor, who had also lent him money, was the contractor for the monitors.

The defendants had to pay $10 per day for the monitors, often up to a year. “These were people who often couldn’t pay to keep the lights on,” she noted, then the company would go after their family, who often were victims, threatening them with jail time if fees were not paid to the judge’s campaign donor, she said.

She has extensive experience working with law enforcement from her time as deputy police monitor under Independent Police Monitor Susan Hutson. She took in complaints about police neglect and misconduct, and monitored interviews of police officers who used force against citizens, ensuring “nothing would be swept under the rug by the department.”

Before that, she practiced criminal defense for a decade, and worked as a public defender.

Levine says she comes at the process “from a pragmatic place, a well-rounded place and a place where I am trying to find solutions.”

She said the court needs a judge who “really knows the system from all different places.”

Levine has been active at Shir Chadash and Touro Synagogue, along with the National Council of Jewish Women. She has been on the Avodah board for 10 years, and last year was honored at the Avodah Partners in Justice jazz brunch.

Remembering the Holocaust

Original “Survivors” featured in Birmingham, Pensacola commemorations

Holocaust commemorations in Pensacola and Birmingham will feature “Survivors,” a play written by Deborah Layman based on the lived of six Birmingham Holocaust survivors. Layman recently moved to Pensacola.

The six survivors in the play, along with other survivors in Alabama, told their stories many times in schools, churches, libraries and synagogues all over the state. Their mission was to influence young people to reject hate in all its forms, to stand up for people who are being victimized and marginalized by hate, and to embrace a mindset of kindness, decency, understanding and acceptance.

Layman became closely acquainted with survivors’ stories through her 12 years of volunteer work with the Birmingham Holocaust Education Center, which was recently renamed the Alabama Holocaust Education Center. She often accompanied the survivors to their speaking engagements, seeing how the students reacted.

The play features the stories of Martin Aaron, Aisic Hirsch, Riva Schuster Hirsch, Ilse Scheuer Nathan, Ruth Scheuer Siegler and Max Steinmetz.

Set in a racially diverse, contemporary high school classroom, the show explores the parallels between the past and the present, with Holocaust stories serving as object lessons about the consequences of hate.

The play was originally commissioned by Keith Cromwell, executive director of Red Mountain Theatre in Birmingham, as part of the 2021 Human Rights New Works Festival.

In Birmingham, it will be the focus of the community commemoration, April 18 at 6:30 p.m. at Red Mountain Theatre. It will be done in the style of a reading, with Birmingham-area actors.

The three Pensacola events will be full performances, presented by PenArts. On April 21 at 7:30 p.m., there will be a performance at the Gordon Community Art Center. A musical prelude will begin at 7 p.m. There will be another performance on April 22 at 6:30 p.m. at Ever’mans Educational Center.

On April 23, the Pensacola Yom HaShoah program, in partnership with the Pensacola Jewish Federation, will be at B’nai Israel at 2:30 p.m., with a memorial ceremony before the performance. All the Pensacola performances are free and open to the community.

Alabama

The official State of Alabama commemoration, which dates back to the 1980s and is now coordinated by the Alabama Holocaust Commission, will be on April 18 at 11 a.m. at the Alabama Department of Archives and History in Montgomery. The state’s proclamation for Days of Remembrance will be read, and Rabbi Steve Silberman of Ahavas Chesed in Mobile will be the keynote speaker.

There will be a Zoom option, and registration is requested at bit.ly/3ZpGcI4.

At Athens State University, a ceremony will be held in McCandless Hall on April 18 at 11:30 a.m. The Curtis Coleman Center for Religion Leadership and Culture is partnering with members of the Jewish community to honor the victims while raising awareness and educating the community. The free event is open to the community.

On April 17 at 6:30 p.m., Temple Emanu-El in Birmingham will screen “Devorah’s Hope,” a docudrama about siblings who supported each other through the Holocaust when the rest of their family was murdered and the world around them was destroyed. Emanu-El will also have a Yom HaShoah Shabbat service with the choir, April 21 at 6 p.m.

Daffodil Campaign

The Alabama Holocaust Education Center has been working on a Daffodil Campaign for the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Partnering with numerous agencies and organizations in Birmingham, the AHEC has made thousands of paper daffodil pins for distribution on April 19 at numerous sites throughout the greater community, and is recruiting individuals to hand them out.

The campaign began in 2013 as the Museum of the History of Polish Jews sought to commemorate the 70th anniversary. Daffodils are associated with Marek Edelman, the last commander of the Jewish Combat Organization. Every year on the anniversary of the Warsaw ghetto uprising he placed daffodils at the Monument to the Ghetto Heroes in Warsaw, and at other sites associated with the extermination of Jews.

The yellow color and shape of daffodils also represent the yellow stars worn during the Holocaust, but also represent hope for the future.

The AHEC set a goal of 7,000 daffodils, as at least 7,000 Jews died during the fighting or hiding in the ghetto, and about 7,000 were caught by the Nazis at the end of the uprising and sent to Treblinka.

Liberator Video

The Yom HaShoah program in Huntsville, sponsored by the Jewish Federation of Huntsville and North Alabama, will feature a video of liberator John Rison Jones giving his talk, “The Liberation of Mittelbau-Dora (Nordhausen) Camp” at Temple B’nai Sholom in 1994. The 2:30 p.m. program at B’nai Sholom will include a presentation by students at the University of Alabama at Huntsville on “Giving Voice to the Victims and Survivors.”

Nordhausen was one of the most notorious concentration camps during World War II, where about 60,000 political prisoners were forced to work on V-2 rockets and experimental weapons. A transfer of 16,000 from Auschwitz and Gross-Rosen in early 1945 brought large numbers of Jews to that camp for the first time.

On April 1, 1945, an Allied air raid began at Nordhausen, and on April 5 most able-bodied inmates were marched out by the Nazis, leaving the sick and dying behind. The U.S. Army arrived on April 11, including Huntsville’s Jones, a private first class in the 104th Infantry, who saw the atrocities first-hand.

Molly Johnson, professor of history at UAH, will connect Dr. Jones’ speech to the contemporary context of Holocaust education, and her

students will read from a selection of survivor accounts, mainly those of Jewish young people from various European countries.

Following the presentations, community members will light candles in memory of Holocaust victims. Rabbis Scott Colbert and Steven Listfield will give related sermons and benedictions.

In Mobile, the Gulf Coast Center for Holocaust and Human Rights Education and the Christian-Jewish Dialogue of Mobile will present “An Alphabet of Soldiers” on April 17 at 6:30 p.m. at Ahavas Chesed. The music is based on the poetry of Auschwitz Survivor Krystyna Żywulska, who escaped from the Warsaw Ghetto and hid her Jewish identity, joining the resistance and helping Jews in hiding. She was taken as a political prisoner in June 1943, composing songs and poetry to deal with the tedium of life in the concentration camp.

Her compositions were produced by Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer through the Music of Remembrance Foundation. They will be presented by performers at the University of Mobile’s Alabama School of the Arts, including mezzo-soprano Lori Guy, soprano Kathryn Hedlund, baritone Patrick Jacobs and pianist Christopher Lovely.

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Holocaust-themed art and writing from local schools will be acknowledged and displayed.

Selma’s Mishkan Israel and St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Selma will hold “Remembrance,” a community event to remember the Holocaust and explore its Selma connections. The service will be at St. Paul’s on April 16 at 2:30 p.m., with Alabama Holocaust Education Center Researcher Ann Mollengarden as the keynote speaker. A reception will follow.

Troy University is hosting “The Americans and the Holocaust” through April 24 at the Troy University Library’s main floor. A traveling exhibit of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, it examines American responses to war and genocide, and challenges the notion that Americans knew little about Nazi atrocities.

Drawing on a collection of primary sources from the 1930s and ‘40s, the exhibition focuses on the stories of individuals and groups of Americans who took action in response to Nazism. It challenges visitors to consider the responsibilities and obstacles faced by individuals — from President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to ordinary Americans — who made difficult choices, sought to effect change, and, in a few cases, took significant risks to help victims of Nazism even as rescue never became a government priority.

A free teacher workshop on the basics of teaching the Holocaust will be held on April 12 from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Logan Greene of Hoover City Schools will facilitate, and registration through the Alabama Holocaust Education Center in Birmingham is required.

At noon on April 12, Amy McDonald will speak on “Determined to Survive: A Story of Survival and One Teacher’s Passion to Bring That Story to Life.” The book is the life story of Max Steinmetz, a Holocaust survivor who made a new life in Birmingham. McDonald teaches at Shades Valley High School.

Tuscaloosa’s Temple Emanu-El will have a program centered on the history of the Holocaust Torah it received and dedicated in 2015. The program, which is by invitation due to security concerns, will be on April 16 at 2 p.m., with a light reception following.

The University of Alabama Hillel and the Division of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion will host a program on April 10 at 6 p.m. to remember the lives of those lost during the Holocaust. Second-generation Holocaust survivor Esther Levy will share the detailed life experiences of her mother, Tobi Kamornik Gerson. Levy also will focus on the importance of learning history and strategies to promote allyship.

After the event, there will be a reception for viewing the Darkness Into Life exhibit, which is on display at the Intercultural Diversity Center through April 28. The exhibit from the Alabama Holocaust Education Center details the memories and triumphs of 20 Holocaust survivors who made their way to Alabama.

Florida Panhandle

There will be a Holocaust remembrance event at Naval Support Activity Panama City on April 18 at 11 a.m. Featured speaker will be Daniel Sterlicht, Distinguished Scientist for Littoral Sensing Technologies at the Naval Surface Warfare Center Panama City Division, and cantorial soloist and religious school director at B’nai Israel in Panama City.

The event will be in Building 350, room 136, the Dive School auditorium. Visitors are to go to the NSA-PC front gate on Thomas Drive and mention the Holocaust remembrance for an escort to the visitor’s center.

Louisiana

Alexandria is resuming its community-wide Holocaust memorial events, centered around the Holocaust memorial downtown, after a Covid hiatus.

The April 17 ceremony will start at the memorial at 6 p.m., then there

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will be a walk to Emmanuel Baptist Church. Featured speaker will be Ira Forman, former U.S. State Department Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism, who will discuss “The How and Why Behind the Resurgence of Antisemitism 80 years after the Holocaust.”

The event will also feature music by choirs from Alexandria Senior High School and Bolton High Conservatory, and Rabbi Judy Caplan Ginsburgh. Rabbi Raina Siroty of Gemiluth Chassodim and Meyer Kaplan of B’nai Israel, will participate as well.

The Baton Rouge commemoration on April 17 at 6 p.m. will be a partnership among the Jewish Federation of Baton Rouge, Unified Jewish Congregation of Baton Rouge and The Episcopal School of Baton Rouge.

The school is displaying “Anne Frank: A History for Today” through the end of April. The exhibit will be available to view starting at 6 p.m., followed by the community Yom HaShoah service at 7 p.m. Rabbi Sarah Smiley will lead the service, which will include a presentation of the winners in the Holocaust essay contests for middle school and high school students.

Holocaust commemorations in New Orleans will feature social psychologist James Waller, the inaugural Cohen Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Keene State College in New Hampshire.

Waller is director of academic programs for the Auschwitz Institute for the Prevention of Genocide and Mass Atrocities, and is the author of six books, most notably his award-winning “Becoming Evil: How Ordinary People Commit Genocide and Mass Killing.”

In 2017, he was the inaugural recipient of the Engaged Scholarship Prize from the International Association of Genocide Scholars in recognition of his exemplary engagement in advancing genocide awareness and prevention.

On April 14 at 6:30 p.m., he will speak at Gates of Prayer on “The Escalating Risk of Mass Violence in the U.S.” The presentation examines what happens when identity politics prevail over democracy, when a paralysis in governance leads to a political vacuum, when de facto social segregation becomes normalized, and when questions of who we are as a society become secondary to who we are not. The talk comes with the backdrop of escalating political violence, the erosion of democratic norms and growing distrust of peaceful political processes.

There will be a dinner at 6 p.m., and reservations are requested by April 11.

On April 16, the community Holocaust remembrance will be at the Uptown Jewish Community Center at 6:30 p.m. Waller will discuss the internal and external factors that can lead ordinary people to commit extraordinary acts

of evil, as outlined in his groundbreaking book.

During the program, the Holocaust Educator of the Year Award will be presented to Cassady Cooper and Samantha Burleigh for their integration of Holocaust education into the curriculum at Belle Chasse High School.

There will be two commemorations on April 18. The National World War II Museum will hold a reception at 5 p.m., followed by a 6 p.m. program in the U.S. Freedom Pavilion: The Boeing Center. The program will be available in person and on Vimeo, and registration is encouraged.

At 7 p.m., Loyola University New Orleans and Touro Synagogue will host a Yom Hashoah commemoration at Touro, co-sponsored by the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans, the New Orleans Jewish Community Center and Yad Vashem. The evening will include remarks from Loyola honorary degree recipient, Anne Levy ‘22, about her experiences as a child in the Lodz Ghetto, the Warsaw Ghetto, and in hiding.

Starting at 5:45 p.m., there will be a viewing of the traveling exhibition “Stars Without a Heaven: Children in the Holocaust,” created by Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Center.

The program will include the world premiere of “I Still Believe: An Anthem for Children’s Chorus,” written by Shoshana Yavneh Shattenkirk Borve and performed by the Holy Name of Jesus School Choir, conducted by Elyse Ptak. The anthem is inspired by Anne Frank’s famous words, “In spite of everything, I still believe that people are good at heart,” a reminder of the power of resilience and hope, even in times of the greatest adversity.

Shreveport’s 40th annual Holocaust remembrance service will be held on April 16 at 3 p.m. at Zion Baptist Church, hosted by Pastor Brady Blade Sr. Guest speaker will be Andras Lacko of Dallas. Born in Budapest in 1936, he contracted scarlet fever in 1944 and was saved from ghettoization and subsequent deportation to Poland. He survived the Holocaust in a military hospital and was later reunited with his mother and father after the Soviet liberation of Budapest.

At the University of North Texas Health Science Center, he has been working on innovative cancer treatments.

There will be a presentation of winners from the annual Literary and Arts competition, with an essay for middle school students, and high school contests in essay, poetry, short story, art and music.

There will be a ceremonial lighting of 11 candles, for the 11 million Jewish and non-Jewish victims of the Holocaust. There will also be a candle lit to represent modern tragedies stemming from hatred and prejudice.

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Mississippi

Beth Israel, Jackson, will hold a Yom HaShoah Holocaust Remembrance Seder, April 18 at 7 p.m. There will be a discussion and commemoration led by Beth Israel’s Kulanu Antisemitism Task Force, with reflections and hope for healing the world. Reservations are due by April 14, and there is a suggested donation of $10.

In Oxford, the University of Mississippi College of Liberal Arts, the Provost’s Office, the Department of Anthropology and Sociology, the Department of Art and Art History, and the Jewish Federation of Oxford are co-sponsoring “The Stages of Memory: Reflections on Memorial Art, Loss, and the Spaces Between,” with Professor James Young, the Distinguished University Professor Emeritus of English and Judaic & Near Eastern Studies at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

His talk, on April 13 at 6:30 p.m., discusses how to have physical memorials to tragedy without trying to fill in the void. The talk traces an “arc of memorial vernacular” from the Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial to Germany’s “counter-memorials” to the Holocaust, from Berlin’s Denkmal for the Murdered Jews of Europe to the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery.

The talk will be at the Jackson Avenue Center’s Auditorium B, and a reception will follow.

Huntsville honors Regina Dembo Community’s sole remaining Holocaust survivor

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The sanctuary at Huntsville’s Temple B’nai Sholom was filled for the Jan. 13 Shabbat service as the community honored Regina Roth Dembo, the area’s sole remaining Holocaust survivor.

The abbreviated service included selections by the B’nai Sholom choir in the styles that would have been in Europe when Dembo was a child.

Mayor Tommy Battle presented a proclamation from the mayor’s office and the city council, honoring her as a “pillar of the community” and recognizing the ceremony at B’nai Sholom.

Dembo, 96, was born in 1926 in Vienna. Life changed in 1938 when the Nazis took over. She and her siblings were eligible for a United States immigration quota of native Austrians, but the paperwork was difficult to obtain. During this, her father was arrested and forced out of Austria, disappearing in Poland. His business, their car and apartment with all their belongings were confiscated by the Germans.

Just days before the outbreak of World War II, her mother received three exit visas for the sisters. Regina was 12 years old, her sisters were 10 and 8. The plan was for their mother and then 4-year-old brother to follow soon after, but that never happened, and their last memory of her was at the train station. They never saw their parents or brother again, and many other relatives were lost in the Holocaust.

She and her sisters arrived in New York on Aug. 21, 1939, not knowing any English. They stayed with an uncle for several months, then were placed in an orphanage. Three years later, the sisters were in three different foster homes. Regina was encouraged to go to college, and later married U.S. combat veteran Michael Dembo.

As he was with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, they lived in several locations, before winding up in Huntsville in 1968. She earned a master’s in education from the University of Alabama at Huntsville, and was a long-time teacher at Weatherly Elementary School, retiring in 1991.

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The first time she spoke publicly about her experiences was at the Huntsville Yom HaShoah program at the Huntsville Museum of Art in 2012. At the time, she explained that “I wanted to be American without a lot of baggage.”

She was part of the Darkness Into Life photography and art exhibit, highlighting 20 Holocaust survivors who made new lives in Alabama. She also recorded an interview with the Alabama Holocaust Education

Center, part of which was screened at the service.

Son-in-law Sol Miller introduced other family members in attendance, and read an essay written about Dembo by his daughter, Isabell. The essay, “Pillows,” won first place for non-fiction in the 2002 White House Project competition.

She wrote about Dembo’s bravery in going around the world at age 12 to an uncertain future, with a feather-filled comforter her mother had placed in her suitcase. When Dembo married, she made pillows from the feathers in the “tear-stained” comforter, but was not ready to explain its history. Only later did she and her mother find out how the pillows were their only tangible remembrance of the ancestor they never knew.

The ceremony concluded with Rabbi Scott Colbert blessing the family in front of the open ark.

Not just Birmingham: Anne Frank Tree in Arkansas dies

Two years after Birmingham replaced a horse chestnut tree at Kelly Ingram Park in memory of Anne Frank, a similar fate has hit the Anne Frank Tree outside the Clinton Presidential Center in Little Rock.

According to the Jewish Federation of Arkansas, the tree could not survive the hot, humid weather in Arkansas and died. The tree was part of an installation about the history of human rights in Arkansas, and was surrounded by five etched glass panels.

The Clinton Foundation and the River Market Sculpture Committee are planning to replace the tree with a sculpture “conveying Anne’s hope in humanity and the protest needed to impact change.” A review of three finalists was scheduled for April 14.

The Birmingham tree was planted in 2010 after the city did not receive one of 11 saplings from the horse chestnut tree outside the Secret Annex where the Frank family hid during the Holocaust. A different horse chestnut tree was located and planted at the civil rights battleground. It died in 2020, due to the heat and humidity of Alabama.

The original saplings were quarantined upon arrival in the U.S., so the Arkansas tree was planted three years after Birmingham’s.

The replacement tree in Birmingham, an American Beech, also died and has been removed. There has not been an agreement on another replacement.

75Israel @

Year of events in Birmingham

The Birmingham Jewish Federation is organizing a year-long celebration of Israel’s 75th birthday.

The two largest events will be at the end of April, with a community Blue and White Party on April 26, and the Jewish Food Festival on April 30.

The Blue and White party will be from 5 to 7 p.m. at the N.E. Miles Jewish Day School. It will include Israeli music, dinner and dessert, activities and crafts, and a chance to win an Israeli gift basket.

The party is free to those who register in advance and $10 at the door.

The Jewish Food and Culture Fest will be at the Levite Jewish Community Center from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. While the festival is an annual event, there will be Israel-themed additions, in-

cluding a recreation of an Israeli shuk, an openair market. A grant from the Jewish Community Center Association of America is adding to the festivities.

The menu will include traditional favorites such as brisket, cabbage rolls, kugel, matzah ball soup, falafel and corned beef. New this year are a Sephardic-style chicken, and Mandelbrot.

Many volunteer shifts are still available for

prep work and the day of. A crowd of about 2,000 is anticipated, according to the LJCC.

Trips to Israel are also a large part of the celebration. In October there will be a combined Alabama mission with the Federations from Montgomery and Mobile. In November, there will be another Momentum group doing a 9-day journey that starts a year-long course for Jewish mothers with children under the age of 18.

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The annual Jewish Community Centers Maccabi Games for teens is being held in Haifa in July, and Birmingham is sending a delegation of six teens to compete in soccer and flag football. They will then spend two weeks touring the country with other delegations from around the world.

With groups going to Israel, there are a couple of classes for those planning to travel, or who are simply interested in the topics.

On May 15, Community Security Coordinator Jeff Brown will lead a Traveler Safety Course, for those traveling to Israel or any other country. The 6 p.m. session will discuss security issues that travelers need to know about, how to not look like a target, and being situationally aware.

On May 22 at 6 p.m., Orly Henkin and the community Shinshinim,

Ma’ayan Elisha and Zohar Shemesh, will lead Tourist Hebrew 101, basic Hebrew phrases that will come in handy.

An Israeli movie series will kick off on May 1 at the LJCC, starting at 1:30 p.m. Movies are in Hebrew with English subtitles, and snacks will be furnished. Registration is required.

The May 1 film is “The Band’s Visit,” a romantic comedy about eight members of the Egyptian Alexandria Ceremonial Police Orchestra who are supposed to perform at an Arab center in Petach Tikvah, but through miscommunications wind up in a small town in the Negev, with no hotel and no transportation out.

On June 5, “Maktub” is about two low-level mobsters in Jerusalem

who survive a bombing and decide to change their ways, deciding to try and fulfil wishes that strangers leave on slips between the stones in the Western Wall. The 2017 film was one of the biggest hits in Israel in two decades.

“The Wedding Plan” on July 3 is about a bride whose wedding is called off, but she decides to keep the reservations while trusting God to provide a husband.

On Aug. 7, “The Women’s Balcony” is a dramatic comedy about a gender rift in an Orthodox community after an accident at a Bar Mitzvah celebration.

An Israeli wine tasting event is being planned for Nov. 4 at the LJCC with Steve Kerbel. The Washington-based educator and Israeli wine expert will lead a virtual tour of Israel and detail Israel’s ancient wine history and modern wine culture. More information will be released during the summer.

A ‘Reading Israel” series for books by Israeli authors is also being planned, and additional events are being discussed.

The year of events kicked off, literally, with a Krav Maga class for ages 8 to 12 at the LJCC in March. On April 3, the Shinshinim and Anna Redensky led an Israeli dance class.

Israel gala honors Alabama supporters

The Alabama-Israel Task Force will honor Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Tom Parker and Chief Larry Smith of the Cherokee Tribe of Northeast Alabama at an Alabama-Israel Leadership Gala honoring Israel’s 75th birthday. The event will be at The Epicenter in Tanner, just north of Decatur, on April 29 at 7 p.m.

The event will also mark the 80th anniversary of the historic resolution passed by the Alabama Legislature in 1943, making Alabama the first state to call for the establishment of a Jewish homeland in the land of Israel.

Eeki Elner, founder and director of the Israel Leadership Institute in Sderot, will present the Israel Leadership Awards, which were selected by the AITF steering committee and the ILI board. The Institute identifies, recruits, trains, mentors and nurtures the future generation of Israeli leaders, integrating its graduates into leadership positions throughout society.

There will also be a special presentation to Anat Sultan-Dadon, Israel’s Consul General to the Southeast, based in Atlanta.

Reservations are $75, with sponsorships available at the $500 and $1,000 level. The evening includes kosher heavy hors d’oeuvres and desserts, and doors will open at 6 p.m. for photo opportunities with the honorees.

The AITF was established in 2014 with leadership from the Christian and Jewish communities “to provide a bridge and catalyst for broader cooperative efforts and help cultivate an even stronger and expanding state-to-state relationship between Alabama and Israel for the mutual benefit of their people.”

New Orleans celebration is “Made in Amharica”

Gili Yalo will headline the Israel Independence Day celebration on April 25 at the New Orleans Jewish Community Center Uptown. The event will begin at 5:30 p.m. with a Yom HaZikaron ceremony, remembering Israel’s fallen soldiers, led by members of the New Orleans Jewish Clergy Council. “Hatikva” will be led by students from the Jewish Community Day School.

At 6 p.m., the celebration begins with a dinner from Dvash Catering, and the concert.

Yalo takes traditional Ethiopian music and incorporates it into contemporary styles, combining Ethiopian roots with soul, funk, psychedelic and jazz. His lyrics are in English and Amharic.

He and his family fled Ethiopia on foot in 1984, in a covert operation

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into Sudan, which was a hostile country. Encouraged by music to keep moving, and singing as a small boy on his father’s shoulders during the journey, they wound up in a refugee camp and found their way to Israel as part of Operation Moses.

He was a member of Pirhei Yerushalaim, a choir for religious boys, and did several European tours with the group. He also served in a musical troop in the Israeli Defense Forces, then sang in cover bands and as lead singer for Israeli reggae group Zvuloon Dub System.

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In 2019 he collaborated with Grammy nominee Niles City Sound to make “Made in Amharica,” a collaboration between Yalo and Dallas-based musicians. His self-titled debut album was released in 2017, two years after he launched his solo career.

The event is free and open to the community. Registration is at nojcc.org/israel75.

StandWithUs and Tulane Hillel will have an Israel Fest on the LBC Quad on April 26 from 5 to 8 p.m., with swag, Israeli music and food.

Also in the region…

Birmingham’s Temple Beth-El will have an Israeli Shabbat Ruach on May 5 at 5:345 p.m., with a musical Kabbalat Shabbat followed by an Israeli dinner and trivia.

Temple Emanu-El in Birmingham will have a Yom Ha’Atzmaut Shabbat service with the band and choir, April 28 at 6 p.m.

The Huntsville Jewish community will host an Israel Birthday party on April 30 from 2 to 4 p.m. at Etz Chayim.

In Mobile, there will be an Israel celebration on April 30, from 3 to 5 p.m. at Ahavas Chesed. There will be Israeli food and drinks, a community mitzvah project for Israeli soldiers, bounce house, a message from special guests and a tree planting.

The Jewish Federation of Central Alabama announced that Consul General Anat Sultan-Dadon will be in Montgomery on April 28. Details were not set as of press time, but plans are underway for an Israel celebration at 4 p.m., a casual event with activities and food, at Agudath Israel-Etz Ahayem. A Shabbat service will be at 6 p.m. at Temple Beth Or, with Sultan-Dadon as guest speaker.

Alexandria’s Gemiluth Chassodim will screen “Heading Home: The Tale of Team Israel,” April 26 at 6:15 p.m. The film chronicles the unlikely 2017 run of Israel’s national baseball team in its first appearance at the World Baseball Classic. Among the team members was pitcher Jeremy Bleich of New Orleans. The underdogs, finally ranked highly in the world, proceeded to capture the world’s imagination during its deep run in the prestigious tournament — something which was not replicated last month in the 2023 edition. A light dinner follows the screening.

JEF honors community leaders

The Jewish Endowment Foundation of Louisiana presented its annual awards at its March 5 event at the Audubon Tea Room.

Jonathan Friedman presented the Helen A. Mervis Jewish Community Professional Award to Leslie Fischman, who retired last year as head of the New Orleans Jewish Community Center, where she began as fundraising special events director 25 years earlier.

A native of Union Springs, Ala., Fischman led the JCC through a $9 million capital expansion and the chaos of Covid closures, and pushed the JCC to its largest membership growth.

Carole Neff received the JFNA Endowment Achievement Award from Lawrence Lehmann. Neff, who co-authored an authoritative three-volume work on estate planning, is a past president of JEF. She chaired the development committee, assisted in the establishment of the Professional Advisory Council, and her term as president coincided with Hurricane Katrina, during which JEF distributed substantial sums to local Jewish institutions to help them get back up and running.

Monroe’s Melinda and Morris Mintz, who received the Tzedakah Award, have a long history of service in Monroe and New Orleans. Melinda Mintz is currently Campaign co-chair for the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans, on the executive committee of the Federation and Jewish Family Service of Greater New Orleans, and chair of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities.

Morris Mintz’s activities include appointments to the Louisiana Economic Development Corporation and the State of Louisiana School Finance Commission, among other board and leadership roles. Currently, he serves as vice chair of the Museum of the Southern Jewish Experience and as treasurer of JEF. President Alan Franco also paid tribute to outgoing president Morton Katz.

castigated — especially by activists — for killing “children” when one of the fatalities is 14, 15… even 17. One gets the mental image of an innocent student on the way to school who is caught up in a military raid.

But most of the time, and in just about every case this year, those “children” were members of terror organizations, specifically recruited for martyrdom, and taking an active part in an operation. After such a death, the organization for which he was affiliated issues a martyrdom poster, glorifying one of their own, and the Palestinian leadership holds these youth up as a shining example for others to emulate.

Recruiting children for terrorism and public relations points. Talk about crimes against humanity. Talk about immorality. No, seriously, talk about it, because nobody else is.

But no, instead we get lectures about Israel’s responsibility to tamp down a so-called cycle of violence, as if rooting out terrorists poised to attack civilians is morally equivalent.

And when terror attacks happen, surveys show a majority of Pales-

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tinians approve of the murder of Israeli civilians, they shoot off fireworks and pass out sweets on the street, and the perpetrators get a life stipend several times higher than the average wage in the territories while being lionized as national heroes. And they are peace partners? No wonder the lectures to Israel by the West are seen as insulting.

Currently, a popular narrative in the news is that Israel is attacking Muslim worshipers at al-Aqsa on the Temple Mount during Ramadan. The reality is completely different.

Israel facilitates visits by as many as 250,000 Muslims per day at the mosque, providing free buses from around the country and working to ensure their safety. A small group of extremists has gone back on written agreements barring overnight stays at al-Aqsa, where they barricade themselves in and have supplies of fireworks, stones and metal rods, so they can try to attack Jews in the morning. When Israel tries to remove them — mostly for the safety of the Muslim worshipers — it is portrayed as “the Jews storming al-Aqsa” and an excuse for Hamas to fire rockets from Gaza.

Israel just barred worshipers from the site over the last 10 days of Ramadan — Jewish ones. Not that it is legal for a Jew to pray there.

Israel has its warts. The United States has its warts. Every country does.

But a lot of what is perceived as Israeli warts has no basis in reality, as Israel is faced with an impossible situation — everyone pressuring it to make peace and ignore belligerence, while not having anyone on the other side who can — or is willing to — deliver peace.

And with the superficial reporting about the region so common in the mainstream press, let alone the execrable coverage of outlets like the New York Times, it is an uphill battle.

A popular current book is “Can the Whole World be Wrong?: Lethal Journalism, Antisemitism and Global Jihad” about how the most outrageous accusations against Israel are believed, and still a matter of public consciousness long after being debunked.

It shouldn’t be seen as an act of courage to celebrate Israel’s existence. That so many seem hesitant, or feel a need to couch their celebration with a statement of how their celebration doesn’t imply agreement with this or that government’s positions, shows just how successful Israel’s enemies have been in turning Israel into a dirty word. The goal of Israel boycotters on campus isn’t to hurt Israel economically, it is to separate American Jews from Israel.

What would the 1930s and 1940s have been like if there had been an Israel? What has Israel meant for millions of Jews kicked out of Arab lands or fleeing the former Soviet Union?

As we wring our hands about the increase of antisemitism here, God forbid we should get to a point where we need a place of refuge.

The generation that feels it in the gut is disappearing. Those who remember a time when there was no Jewish state, or the times when its continued existence was very much in question, are far fewer. Most American Jews today take Israel’s existence for granted, though there are some mullahs in Tehran who beg to differ, and are stoking many of the current flames.

The Israel in the headlines is a narrative that bears little resemblance to reality, and the Israel portrayed by its enemies is an absolute libel that we should not adopt. It is still a vibrant democracy, protecting minority rights in an area where that is unheard of, while dealing with an impossible situation, something that many Arab states who were formerly hostile now recognize.

It is still a miracle and still a place where our collective history comes alive.

It is still a place to celebrate.

Helping a Child with Anxiety Starts With You

We have all experienced the signs of anxiety when facing an intimidating or challenging situation: sweaty hands, heart beating faster or butterflies in the stomach. These feelings are sometimes referred to as “stage fright,” “nerves” or “anticipation.” Scientifically, it is our body’s physical reaction to the stress of the unknown. At the same time our body is physically feeling these changes, our mind is processing as well. It is playing the “what if” game.

What if I forget what I’m supposed to say in the meeting?

What if I mess up on my homework?

What if I say something and everybody laughs at me or looks at me funny?

What if mom leaves and a ghost takes her away?

Optimally, we can stop and figure out which “what ifs” are likely and which are unlikely to occur. However, every human brain functions differently, so we evaluate these questions and possible scenarios in different ways. We may imagine outcomes that do not occur to others, aka “the ghost!”. When thoughts like these become persistent, negative and intrusive, we experience anxiety.

For children and adolescents, these imaginary scenarios can grow

and become so ingrained in daily life that it feels (both for them and for their parents) as if anxiety is taking over. In 2019, the National Institutes of Health said that 1 in 3 teens ages 13 to 18 will experience an anxiety disorder, a 20 percent increase over the 2012 report. And this was pre-pandemic! Whether it is Covid, social media, the internet, over-programming or the many other factors cited for this increase, the pressures of daily life can cause children to lean into their “what ifs” in ways that we as adults may have a difficult time understanding.

Our response as parents is naturally wanting to “make it better,” to find a solution that works for our child and helps just get us all through the day. Eli Lebowitz from the Yale Child Study Center calls these solutions “accommodations.” He wants us to throw these accommodations out the window, and he has research to show us why we should!

I, along with my CJFS colleague Caleigh Alevy, LMSW, recently had the opportunity to train with Lebowitz in his model for addressing childhood and adolescent anxiety, called SPACE. Now, there were no celestial bodies or beings involved, but I was blown away learning about this new evidence-based technique. SPACE stands for Supportive Parenting for Anxious Childhood Emotions. Yes, it is a mouthful! Thus — SPACE.

We spent 16 hours with Lebowitz and clinicians around the U.S. and Canada learning about the SPACE model. He called it a paradigm shifting treatment where we work closely with the parents of children and adolescents with anxiety, not the children themselves. What? Or maybe, Duh!

When he first started talking, I will admit that I was hesitant. How can you treat a child’s anxiety without treating the child? As the sessions went

on, I listened, asked questions, and most of all, I learned. By the end of the training, I understood how the SPACE treatment helps parents respond more supportively to their anxious child, thus reducing the use of accommodations they make for their child’s symptoms. The end result: Children feel less anxious and function better.

How I wish I had been able to work with someone when my husband and I were struggling with getting my kiddo to sleep in her room at night! Or, wait, when my son was having a difficult time going to school each morning.

So what happens in a SPACE program? Parents meet with a therapist to learn skills and tools that will help them respond to their child’s anxiety. The sessions focus on how parents can better manage their own behaviors, which may feel helpful, especially in the moment, but may be actually reinforcing their child’s anxiety.

If you are among the many parents living with an anxious child, I encourage you to check out the website www.spacetreatment.net and learn about the research demonstrating the efficacy of SPACE. If you are ready to give it a try, I welcome the opportunity to work with you.

CJFS Counseling now offers SPACE treatment to parents in an individual and/or couple setting and is exploring interest in a group SPACE program for fall 2023. To learn more, contact Amy Neiman, amyn@cjfsbham.org or (205) 879-3438.

LimmudFest New Orleans featured the debut of the first scene from “Enigma of the Torah.” Written by Helen Stone and Marion Freidstadt, the play is based on their long-time experiences in being part of the Torah study class at Touro Synagogue. Through the class, they explore their Jewishness, contemporary issues and interpersonal conflicts. The cast of eight includes several members of the Torah study group, and is directed by Taylor Meng. The full play will debut on April 26 at 7 p.m. at the Marigny Opera House. Suggested donation is $15 for general admission, $10 for students and seniors, but no one will be turned away.

Gus Mayer brings in line by Israel native

Israeli designer Kobi

Halperin believes that fashion, family and belief are united by tradition.

In 2015, Halperin launched his eponymous, ready-to-wear label, which is now being carried at Gus Mayer stores in Birmingham and Nashville.

“I grew up in Netanya and went to a Yeshiva. We were very religious,” said Halperin. “Both of my parents came to Israel from Hungary. I was deeply inspired my Eastern European roots and heritage. I wanted to bring out that feeling of warm tradition felt in the handcrafted touch and workmanship. It’s a feeling of home and a connection with the past.”

He said while studying for his Bar Mitzvah, he started gaining an interest in fashion, observing what women would wear to services at synagogue. Not long after, a visit to a known designer in Israel lit the fire of inspiration.

“It really felt like a scene from a movie,” said Halperin. “It’s not just about the fashion, it’s about making an emotional connection. It’s a feeling. I wanted to create something for women who celebrate getting dressed every day.”

After high school, Halperin served three years in the Israeli Army. He would go on to earn a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Engineering and Design from Shenker College. Upon graduation, he moved to New York to become the executive creative director at Elie Tahari for 13 years and then for three years in that same role for Kenneth Cole.

Halperin developed some good relationships with some major retailers. “I knew I had a great team and had people that believed in me. Creating my own brand just felt like a natural progression,” he said.

He said his brand honors the past with its handcrafted artisan details combined with a modern femininity. “I want to bring back craftmanship with the idea of something that is stylish and can be worn for many years. I feel that the only way to feel elegant is to feel at ease.”

Halperin said that Gus Mayer is a perfect match for his brand. “I have a big passion for specialty stores. I love stores that have strong relationships with their customers, employees and the community,” he said.

He’s also bringing in 1965 Parisian couture house Ungaro to Gus Mayer. The line was very big in the 1980s and the 1990s, known as a more “dressy” line.

Halperin said mentoring and developing the future of fashion are also very important to him. He is actively involved in cultivating his alma mater’s emerging fashion students, along with mentoring Savannah College of Art and Design students.

“I also want to be a good role model to my daughters” Mika and Gali, said Halperin. “My wife Sagit and my kids are a part of my team. They inspire me and they help shape who I am as a person.”

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the community is invited. From April 28 to 30, they will be at the Naval Live Oaks Group Camp Site, sharing Shabbat, programming, games, bonfires and more. The cost for the weekend, which includes breakfasts and dinners, is $36 per family. Contact Rabbi Joel Fleekop for more information or to reserve.

Rabbi Judy Ginsburgh will offer her annual Introduction to Judaism class at B’nai Israel in Monroe on May 6 from 1 to 4 p.m. The event is free and open to anyone who wants to learn more about Jewish customs, history, worship and holidays. The class will include a tour of the Precious Legacy Museum and a question and answer session. Reservations are required.

The next Torah on Tap for Birmingham’s Temple Beth-El will be on May 3 at 7 p.m. at Cahaba Brewing. It will be a Girls and Guys Night Our with the Sisterhood.

Hadassah Baton Rouge will host a Hadassah Shabbat at the Unified Jewish Congregation of Baton Rouge, May 19 at 6 p.m. Hadassah Southern President Susan Smolinsky will be the guest speaker for “Hadassah: Past, Present and Future.”

B’nai Zion in Shreveport will have a shredding program on April 26 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Shredding will be available for almost any type of confidential material, such as paper, plastic, fabric, metal, magnetic media, CDs and DVDs, hard drives and more. There is a suggested donation of $18 for the first banker’s size box, and $10 per box or batch beyond the first, but any amount is appreciated. Donations will go

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toward the congregation’s safety and security budget.

There will be a reunion for 1960s and 1970s alumni of Southwest Region United Synagogue Youth, the Conservative movement’s youth group, the weekend of June 9 at Congregation Brith Shalom in Houston. The weekend will include a Sunday Zoom reunion with SWUSY alumni living in Israel. Alumni from that era should contact Ronni Colbert Cohen at ronni@universallightsinc.com, or Rabbi Danny Horwitz at rabbidanny@aol.com.

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speaking in plain English. Marror — the bitter herbs — are reminders of the bitter dregs about which Spock sang on Platonius, and the bitter taste one’s left with after watching “Plato’s Stepchildren.”

Last, but not least, not only does the opening of the door early in the seder this year symbolically welcome the eventual Vulcan visitors, its traditional intention of inviting in all who are hungry also aligns with the Vulcan axiom that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

This year’s first seder is exactly 40 years until first contact. And like a million other Israelites at the start of the exodus, we wait for the dawn.

Doug Brook asserts that you can’t disprove First Contact will happen as Star Trek foretells; at least, not for another 40 years. No tribbles were harmed in the making of this column. For nearly several more laughs, listen to the (STILL!) FIVE-star rated Rear Pew Mirror podcast at anchor.fm/ rearpewmirror or on any major podcast platform. For past columns, visit http://rearpewmirror.com/

First Contact Seder

The first night of Passover begins the commemoration of passing over the Israelite homes because of seeing a special sign.

The night of First Contact commemorates the not-passing over of the Earth because of seeing a special sign.

On Passover, the angel of death flew past the Israelites, sparing them of the final plague on Egypt.

On First Contact Day, the Vulcans flew down and landed on Earth after detecting the planet’s first faster-than-light space vehicle.

Each event was a turning point into the dawn of a new era. One freed the Israelites from being confined to Egypt. The other freed everyone from being confined on Earth, into the community of the galaxy.

The first night of Passover, in 2023, is April 5. The night of First Contact is April 5, 2063. It’s exactly 40 years away, much like entry into the Promised Land was for the Israelites just after leaving Egypt.

The Israelites wandered in the desert for 40 years. The Vulcans, from a desert planet in 40 Eridani, much more efficiently traversed their 16.3 light year journey.

That proximity could explain how, while Vulcan people won’t arrive for another 40 years, there is already a Vulcan presence on the planet.

The largest cast iron statue on the planet is a statue of Vulcan, whose gaze passes over Birmingham — not just on this night, but on all other nights as well.

The statue first materialized as Birmingham’s entry in the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis. After a long and arduous trek, it took its place atop Red Mountain in 1939, perhaps as a harbinger of things to come.

No city or historical society officials have denied — or confirmed — or been asked — about whether the statue doubles as an interstellar observation post.

Aside from this year’s convergence of dates, how else is Vulcan related? The Vulcan salute originated from a hand symbol used by the Kohanim in certain Jewish rituals. (Perhaps the Vulcans influenced Aaron thousands of years ago?) One could have seen the Vulcan statue doing the salute, except its hands are cleverly occupied with a spear and hammer.

Another commonality involves the Jewish calendar being based on the lunar calendar. Similarly, the salute offered by the toga-clad Vulcan statue is a lunar salute to the city of Homewood.

There are several special adjustments which turn this year’s first seder into a special First Contact Seder. While the Rabbinic Assembly was too busy kashering their kitchens for Passover, the Rabbitic Assembly put aside their seasonal egg-related activities and hopped into conference to provide the following food for thought.

The seder works in fours: four questions, four sons, four cups of wine (a necessity for anyone with four sons). (Or three sons.) (Or two sons.) The First Contact Seder thus modifies four parts of the seder.

The karpas — the eating of a green plant — symbolizes the Vulcans because they’re vegetarians. Yachatz — the separation into halves of the middle matzah — resembles the separation of the middle fingers in the traditional Vulcan salute.

Maggid — the retelling of the Passover story — becomes reminiscent of how long it takes Vulcans to describe things, and their propensity for not

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Another 40 years of wandering until First Contact is made…