http://www.jstandard.com/content/item/ en _JStandard@js.com Copyright 2012 2012-05-25T07:57:22+00:00 /content/item/23348 http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/site/cardinal_reaffirms_nostra_aetates_centrality_in_catholic-jewish_relati/#When:07:57:22Z Notice: Undefined offset: -1 in /var/www/vhosts/jstandard.com/httpdocs/system/core/core.functions.php(663) : eval()'d code on line 43 Even as Kurt Cardinal Koch was delivering the annual John Paul II Honorary Lecture in Interreligious Dialogue at the Angelicum in Rome, members of the Society of St. Pius X, the traditionalist Catholic breakaway group that the Vatican seeks to bring back into the fold, were delivering quite a different message. Bishop Bernard Fellay, superior general and one of the bishops of the Society of St. Pius X, said the relationship between Jews and Christians is a fundamentally antagonistic one. Jews, he said, were at fault for the Holocaust. He did not attribute such an attitude to “every Jew, as a people,” but to “the religion, Judaism, which is something different.”Even as Kurt Cardinal Koch was delivering the annual John Paul II Honorary Lecture in Interreligious Dialogue at the Angelicum in Rome, members of the Society of St. Pius X, the traditionalist Catholic breakaway group that the Vatican seeks to bring back into the fold, were delivering quite a different message. Bishop Bernard Fellay, superior general and one of the bishops of the Society of St. Pius X, said the relationship between Jews and Christians is a fundamentally antagonistic one. Jews, he said, were at fault for the Holocaust. He did not attribute such an attitude to “every Jew, as a people,” but to “the religion, Judaism, which is something different.” Others within the conservative society offer similar messages. One member, Bishop Bernard Williamson, was convicted of being a Holocaust denier. He also has made anti-Semitic remarks in the past. The Vatican’s attempt to bring the society these men claim to represent back into the church has many Jewish leaders worried. Rabbi Jack Bemporad, who was a child refugee from the Shoah in Italy, said he is unconcerned. People should trust Benedict’s judgment, he said, regarding whether to readmit the society into the Catholic fold. “I think that Pope Benedict XVI in many ways really understood the Holocaust because he was in the German Army. He deserted [the army], his family was anti-Nazi, He was completely opposed to Hitler….How could he in any way accept or welcome someone who denies that Hitler did anything wrong?” The rabbi said Williamson is “one person who is really crazy” and “knows nothing.” The rabbi does not believe that Williamson speaks for the vast majority of society members and added, “The mistake is to take a few people and make them somehow representative of everyone without realizing that that just isn’t true. I think only a small part of this group is so radical. I think the vast majority are very happy and would love to be part of the church.” In recent negotiations with the society, the Vatican has insisted that it accept all the documents of the Second Vatican Council. Koch said that on this issue, “the Holy Father has already clarified his position….Denying the Holocaust, he pointed out, is unacceptable both in the Catholic church and in a fair and honest historical analysis.” General 2012-05-25T07:57:22+00:00 /content/item/23219 http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/site/trial_of_the_last_century1/#When:07:50:52Z Notice: Undefined offset: -1 in /var/www/vhosts/jstandard.com/httpdocs/system/core/core.functions.php(663) : eval()'d code on line 43 The Beilis case unfolded in a climate of change in the United States and Europe. Jews in the United States in the early part of the 20th century were energized by the promise of the good life in “the golden land,” but at the same time aware of anti-Semitism, said Eli Faber, John Jay College professor emeritus specializing in Jewish American history. In those years, young Jews were beginning to go to college and enter the professions. There was a movement away from the Lower East Side. The Yiddish press was vibrant. Yiddish newspapers were not “Jewish” newspapers, meaning newspapers filled with Jewish content. They were general circulation newspapers like the New York Herald, but written in a language other than English (in this case, Yiddish). Among readers of these newspapers there was a “sharp and keen interest in what was going on in America and in the world,” Faber said.The Beilis case unfolded in a climate of change in the United States and Europe. Jews in the United States in the early part of the 20th century were energized by the promise of the good life in “the golden land,” but at the same time aware of anti-Semitism, said Eli Faber, John Jay College professor emeritus specializing in Jewish American history. In those years, young Jews were beginning to go to college and enter the professions. There was a movement away from the Lower East Side. The Yiddish press was vibrant. Yiddish newspapers were not “Jewish” newspapers, meaning newspapers filled with Jewish content. They were general circulation newspapers like the New York Herald, but written in a language other than English (in this case, Yiddish). Among readers of these newspapers there was a “sharp and keen interest in what was going on in America and in the world,” Faber said. “There was a very upbeat attitude about what was possible in America,” Faber said. While youth gangs preyed on Jews on the streets, “pogroms didn’t happen,” he said. At the same time, Jewish communities in the United States saw the Beilis case as a “here we go again” experience, as immigrants from Eastern Europe recalled the horror of pogroms, Faber said. Jewish leaders here were galvanized to press for easier Jewish immigration from Eastern Europe. Hasya Diner, a professor of American Jewish history at NYU, notes that they were motivated by the wave of pogroms in the early part of the century, beginning with the Kishinev pogrom of 1903, and also the Beilis case. Clearly, Russian society was in ferment. The intelligentsia, pushing for liberal reform, was lined up against a repressive government supported by such militant chauvinist groups as the Black Hundreds, said George Pohomov, professor emeritus in Russian Studies at Bryn Mawr College. Russia was growing industrially, with workers leaving farms for the city, he said. Government repression was harsh, with secret police keeping tabs on dissidents. There was a malaise in the country following the loss of the war with Japan and famine, and the government found it useful to shift popular discontent onto Jews as a group. Kiev was the third largest city in the Russian empire and enjoyed at higher level of culture and a blend of nationalities — Russians, Ukrainians, Jews, Poles among others, Pohomov said. General 2012-05-18T07:50:52+00:00 /content/item/23220 http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/site/trial_of_the_last_century2/#When:07:49:01Z Notice: Undefined offset: -1 in /var/www/vhosts/jstandard.com/httpdocs/system/core/core.functions.php(663) : eval()'d code on line 43 “Blood Libel: The Life and Memory of Mendel Beilis,” includes a discussion concerning the connection between the Beilis case and the novel “The Fixer,” the 1966 Pulitzer Prize winner by Bernard Malamud. The discussion is based on a 2010 article written by Jay Beilis, Jeremy Simcha Garber and Mark S. Stein that appeared in the Benjamin Cardozo Law School review, DeNovo. The Malamud plot involves the character Yakov Bok, accused of murder in Kiev in the same time period in which the real Beilis case unfolded. As part of the revised Beilis memoir, the editors include numerous instances of what they allege is plagiarism by Malamud.“Blood Libel: The Life and Memory of Mendel Beilis,” includes a discussion concerning the connection between the Beilis case and the novel “The Fixer,” the 1966 Pulitzer Prize winner by Bernard Malamud. The discussion is based on a 2010 article written by Jay Beilis, Jeremy Simcha Garber and Mark S. Stein that appeared in the Benjamin Cardozo Law School review, DeNovo. The Malamud plot involves the character Yakov Bok, accused of murder in Kiev in the same time period in which the real Beilis case unfolded. As part of the revised Beilis memoir, the editors include numerous instances of what they allege is plagiarism by Malamud. “For most of the items we have listed, Malamud’s only possible source was Beilis’s memoir, in English or Yiddish. The frequent identity of language between ‘The Fixer’ and ‘The Story of My Sufferings’ suggests that Malamud used the English, not the Yiddish, edition,” the book claims. The authors concede that for details that came out in trial, “Malamud could have had some source other than Beilis’s memoir, or some source in addition to Beilis’s memoir.” In Malamud’s fictional account, the character Bok had some unsavory character traits. The real-life Beilis, on the other hand, was described as a hard-working, upstanding family man. “It infuriated the Beilis family” that because of the ‘Fixer’ novel and movie, the real Beilis and the fictional Bok might be equated in the public’s mind.” The revised Beilis memoir lists what it argues are numerous comparisons between the original Beilis text and that of Malamud, showing strong similiarities, and what at times would seem to be nearly verbatim duplication. “To plagiarize, according to the conventional definition, is to copy without attribution. Under this definition, Malamud plagiarized extensively from Beilis’s memoir in writing ‘The Fixer.’ He copied a large amount of verbatim dialogue, verbatim descriptions, states of mind, and events. He failed to credit Beilis’s memoir in any way,” the editors state. In his book, “Bernard Malamud, A Writer’s Life,” biographer Philip Davis cites a statement by Malamud saying he had used “some of Beilis’s experience, but that the ‘The Fixer’ was fiction.” Davis writes “there is no doubt” that Malamud “drew heavily” on the facts of the Beilis story. Davis notes that David Beilis, and his son Jay, “quite properly” noted “close verbal parallels” between Malamud’s work and Mendel Beilis’s words. Davis also writes that Malamud used facts that suited his fiction, but that the novelist was correct in stating that his work was “art, not case history.” Wrote Davis: “When it mattered most, his [Malamud’s] sentences offered a different dimension and a deeper emotion.” The new version of Beilis’s memoir has as one of its goals the creation of a wall separating the fact from the fiction. “I hope that some of the confusion created by Malamud will disappear with the publication of this book on the life and memory of Mendel Beilis,” Jay Beilis wrote in his afterward to the revised memoir. General 2012-05-18T07:49:01+00:00 /content/item/23221 http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/site/trial_of_the_last_century3/#When:07:48:11Z Notice: Undefined offset: -1 in /var/www/vhosts/jstandard.com/httpdocs/system/core/core.functions.php(663) : eval()'d code on line 43 Two other cases in the public eye frame the Mendel Beilis case — “frame” being the key word in more than one sense. In 1894, the French army officer Alfred Dreyfus, who was Jewish, was accused of treason by passing secrets to Germany. He was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment on the harsh prison colony of Devil’s Island. The Dreyfus conviction stood despite evidence pointing to another officer. Such notable writers as Émile Zola and others took up Dreyfus’ cause, even as others in French life on the right stood by his guilt.Two other cases in the public eye frame the Mendel Beilis case — “frame” being the key word in more than one sense. In 1894, the French army officer Alfred Dreyfus, who was Jewish, was accused of treason by passing secrets to Germany. He was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment on the harsh prison colony of Devil’s Island. The Dreyfus conviction stood despite evidence pointing to another officer. Such notable writers as Émile Zola and others took up Dreyfus’ cause, even as others in French life on the right stood by his guilt. The argument raged in the public spotlight. Dreyfus was convicted in a new trial, but was pardoned. He was later exonerated and reinstated in the army, where he served in World War One. He died in 1935. The humiliation of Dreyfus — a “parade of degradation” held in full public view in the courtyard of the École Militaire in Paris — was observed by an Austrian journalist named Theodor Herzl. The horror of that scene and the masses of Frenchmen crying “Death to Dreyfus! Death to the Jews!” led Herzl to write a pamphlet entitled “The Jewish State.” With it, he breathed life into a barely emerging Zionist movement. In the United States, meanwhile, a case involving anti-Semitism had a tragic ending. In 1913, the year of the Beilis trial, Leo Frank, superintendent of the National Pencil Company in Atlanta, was accused of murdering Mary Phagan, 13, who worked at the factory. Frank, who came to Atlanta from New York, was vilified as a Jew from the North. He was sentenced to death, but that was commuted by Georgia’s governor, who came to doubt Frank’s guilt, to life imprisonment. In 1915, a mob, fearing that Frank’s conviction might even be overturned entirely, kidnapped him from his jail cell and lynched him. The Frank case gave birth in 1913 to the Anti-Defamation League. It was a vulnerable time for Jews, said Etzion Neuer, the ADL’s New Jersey director. “Today, many Jews are relatively secure, but certainly anti-Semitism continues to exist,” Neuer said. “The ‘Protocols of the Elders of Zion’ stubbornly remains in print,” he said, referring to a publication fabricated by the czarist secret police alleging a Jewish worldwide conspiracy. “Echoes of the blood libel continue to surface today,” he said. “Our history is forgotten at great cost to ourselves,” he said, noting the Beilis and Frank trials were among the warning shots of the Shoah to come. Indeed, in his afterward, Jay Beilis talks about visitors to the family in the 1960s saying that the trial served as a warning to the Jews, and many left the Russian empire and Eastern Europe and thus escaped the Shoah to come. Still, the Beilis case, arguably, is different than the other two, according to Jeremy Simcha Garber, a New York attorney who helped reissue and expand Mendel Beilis’s own version of what he went through a century ago. The case, he said, is “an integral part of the pillars of foundations of anti-Semitism. Easily the best known. That’s what separates it from Leo Frank and Dreyfus.” General 2012-05-18T07:48:11+00:00 /content/item/23159 http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/site/making_deserts_livable/#When:07:53:36Z Notice: Undefined offset: -1 in /var/www/vhosts/jstandard.com/httpdocs/system/core/core.functions.php(663) : eval()'d code on line 43 Special to The Jewish Standard Israel is famously known as a land of milk and honey, but it is hardly one that is flowing with water. For Israeli scientists today, maximizing water use is a key focus for research and innovation. It may also be key to avoiding the regional war everyone says must happen some day — a war for water. For the scientists, though, the main goal is finding ways to grow plentiful amounts of food in arid lands. In the midst of harsh desert conditions in the Negev and the Arava, Israel’s long, eastern valley, Israeli researchers and farmers have created a flourishing network of high-tech agriculture. Tomatoes, peppers, olives, cheeses, and grapes blossom from arid land despite the fact that annual rainfall totals are measured in mere inches and the proximity to the Dead Sea produces groundwater that is highly saline.Students at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev get a first-hand look at the harshness of the desert — and the challenges it poses. Courtesy BGUSpecial to The Jewish Standard Israel is famously known as a land of milk and honey, but it is hardly one that is flowing with water. For Israeli scientists today, maximizing water use is a key focus for research and innovation. It may also be key to avoiding the regional war everyone says must happen some day — a war for water. For the scientists, though, the main goal is finding ways to grow plentiful amounts of food in arid lands. In the midst of harsh desert conditions in the Negev and the Arava, Israel’s long, eastern valley, Israeli researchers and farmers have created a flourishing network of high-tech agriculture. Tomatoes, peppers, olives, cheeses, and grapes blossom from arid land despite the fact that annual rainfall totals are measured in mere inches and the proximity to the Dead Sea produces groundwater that is highly saline. Naftali Lazarovitch, a specialist in irrigation at the Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU), does much of his experimentation at the Zohar Research Station near the Dead Sea, where greenhouses that resemble white plastic caterpillars serve as indoor fields as well as laboratories. Before Lazarovitch explains the technology that allows crops to grow with saline irrigation water, he offers visitors the fruit of his research — literally: a gorgeous array of orange, purple, yellow, and red bell peppers packed with crispness, crunch, and flavor. The peppers, which are exported to global markets, grow in small containers of perlite, a soil-less culture made of a mixture of stones, coconut powder, and crushed building material. The Israeli-pioneered method of subsurface drip irrigation — which allows water to trickle slowly to the roots of plants — nourishes fat red tomatoes planted in soil, agricultural guinea pigs of sorts for experiments on water use, evaporation, irrigation, and salinity levels. Melons and sweet basil grow in nethouses. The main idea, Lazarovitch explains, “is how to make crops with less drops.” The area is disconnected from the main water supply, and desalinated water is available only by pipe when municipalities and factories have an overage, so farmers have learned to use the saline water below the soil. Sometimes, the unforgiving conditions that Negev scientists tend to call “stress” create good things in plants: more antioxidants, better color. The yield, however, is reduced. On the road south from Beersheva, a grove of 250 olive trees newly planted at the experimental Wadi Mashash Farm has sprouted almost miraculously in seemingly parched sand. Pedro Berliner, director of the Blaustein Institute, explains that modern agroforestry is reclaiming Nabatean methods of water harvesting, a cheap, robust, and efficient system. The amount of rainfall in the area is only four inches, he says, but there are a few “high intensity events.” Instead of being absorbed immediately into the ground, the heavy rains flow to low-lying areas and pool in previously prepared plots surrounded by dikes. The soil slowly absorbs and stores the water so crops can grow throughout the summer. Using the same technology, an adjacent acacia forest provides fodder for animals as well as firewood; corn will be planted in between the trees. The techniques developed at Wadi Mashash are helping third-world countries combat desertification, the further degradation of arid lands. Three dozen ranches in the Negev specialize in olives, goat cheese, and fish, and a dozen different vineyards produce anywhere from 1,000 to 150,000 bottles a year. In the Negev Highlands near Sde Boker, the Kornmehl Cheese Farm represents one of many collaborations between farmers and scientists centering on how to manage water in the desert. Micheal Travis is the Wisconsin-born scientist who moved to Israel in 2005 to get his Ph.D from BGU, specializing in wastewater reuse. Amazingly, 80 percent of water in Israel is reused; the percentage in the United States is tiny. Eighth-generation Jerusalemite Anat Kornmehl and her Argentinian-born husband Danny are the farmers and cheesemakers who moved to the Negev highlands in 1997 and want to grow grass for their 100 Nubian goats. Both Kornmehls are graduates of the faculty of agricultural science at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. They believe that the health of the goats is of utmost importance, and the quality of the milk — 4,000 gallons a year, antibiotic and hormone-free — comes from the goats’ living conditions and good food. The Kornmehls’ land faces remnants of terraces belonging to an ancient farm from the Middle Bronze period (1000-2000 BCE). Their small restaurant, opened four years ago, serves such specialties as goat-cheese pizza, phyllo stuffed with cheese, camembert on potato slices in a garlic yogurt sauce, and Edna cheese sticks served in sweet wine apple sauce. “We are farmers, but we cannot disconnect from tourism,” says Anat. When tourists cannot be accommodated in the restaurant, she sends them to another nearby farm, explaining, “We are all colleagues. There’s no competition.” At Kish Farm, Daniel Kish, a sculptor, has turned his artistry to the creation of boutique organic wines. BGU researcher Aaron Fait works with Kish to test the impact of intense light, temperature, and mild drought conditions on the grapes, and to determine how those variables affect the quality of the wine and the presence of anti-inflammatory compounds like Resveratrol. Kish grows and blends cabernet, petit verdot, shiraz, zinfandel, and merlot grapes, and has named his wines for the four local riverbeds: Paran, Rimon, Neqorot, and Ardon. The low humidity prevents fungi and bacteria, so pesticides are unnecessary. Birds are the biggest nuisance. “If you are the only wet and colorful thing in a desert, you will be eaten!” says Fait. In fact, the combination of technology and agriculture has created quite a lot to eat in the desert. Many of the artisanal foods are served at the luxurious new Beresheet Hotel, built on high cliffs that look down into the panorama of Makhtesh Ramon, often called Israel’s Grand Canyon. The pan-Mediterranean restaurant purchases ingredients from local kibbutzim, farms, and wineries. The hotel has to satisfy the appetites of only its hungry guests, but multiplied exponentially, the scientific and agricultural advances in the Negev have vast potential. As Lazarovitch says, “If we figure out how to solve the combined stresses of drought and salinity, we could feed the world.” General 2012-05-11T07:53:36+00:00 /content/item/23160 http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/site/making_deserts_livable1/#When:07:52:32Z Notice: Undefined offset: -1 in /var/www/vhosts/jstandard.com/httpdocs/system/core/core.functions.php(663) : eval()'d code on line 43 Special to The Jewish Standard A university president is not often expected to be an expert on military security. For Rivka Carmi, president of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, however, protecting close to 20,000 students on the school’s main Beersheva campus from rocket attacks has become a top priority. “For many years, we presented ourselves as the safest place in Israel,” says Carmi. “Most wars were in the north. Operation Cast Lead changed all that. Now we are a real front.” At a meeting this past spring with journalists from the United States, issues of security were front and center, as a barrage of over 100 rockets fired from nearby Gaza in retaliation for the killing of a terrorist leader caused the administration to cancel all classes and exams. Iron Dome, Israel’s mobile air defense system designed to intercept and destroy short-range rockets and shells, demolished most of the rockets.Special to The Jewish Standard A university president is not often expected to be an expert on military security. For Rivka Carmi, president of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, however, protecting close to 20,000 students on the school’s main Beersheva campus from rocket attacks has become a top priority. “For many years, we presented ourselves as the safest place in Israel,” says Carmi. “Most wars were in the north. Operation Cast Lead changed all that. Now we are a real front.” At a meeting this past spring with journalists from the United States, issues of security were front and center, as a barrage of over 100 rockets fired from nearby Gaza in retaliation for the killing of a terrorist leader caused the administration to cancel all classes and exams. Iron Dome, Israel’s mobile air defense system designed to intercept and destroy short-range rockets and shells, demolished most of the rockets. Students and staff, well-trained to follow safety procedures when sirens announce imminent attacks, were unharmed. Within a week, the eerily quiet campus was back to its bustling self. Although the psychological toll from living with the day-today tension is undeniable, says Carmi, “we can’t just shut down an economy and a country.” Rivka CarmiCarmi may be resigned to the need for an Iron Dome, but she has done her best to shatter the glass ceiling. Born with the State of Israel almost 64 years ago (her birthday is in August), she is the first woman to serve as president of an Israeli university (elected in 2006), the first female chair of the Committee of University Heads in Israel, and the first female dean of a medical school in Israel (she headed the faculty of health sciences at BGU, which includes two medical schools). Carmi’s rise in academia and medicine has made her a role model for Israeli women. She received Hadassah’s “Woman of Distinction” award in 2008 for lifetime achievements. Inequality in spite of it all “Israel is considered one of the more advanced countries in terms of gender,” says Carmi, chic in a black suit, heels, and red-framed glasses. “We had the first woman prime minister. But basically we’re not much different from any Western country. There’s still inequality.” Carmi is similarly devoted to the mission of developing the Negev, which in a sense remains “unequal” to the rest of Israel in terms of public perception and physical population. With 630,000 residents — 200,000 of them Bedouin — the Negev has not yet fulfilled the potential envisioned by former Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, who declared that the south would be the future of the country. Carmi, who was born in Zichron Yaakov, 22 miles south of Haifa, agrees wholeheartedly: “The only place Israel has to expand is the Negev,” she says. Today, her pioneering work is focused on shaping BGU’s distinctive role as a regional catalyst for physical, economic, and educational development. “BGU is not like any other university,” she says. “It has a national role. It’s not just an institution of higher education, research, and learning. It has an impact on its neighborhood.” She is proud that BGU was voted the number one choice in undergraduate education by Israeli students, that it participates in many consortiums with government agencies and private corporations, and that it provides outreach to underprivileged Bedouin, Ethiopian, and Russian immigrants. BGU scientists are researching methods to prevent desertification, develop renewable alternative energy, and maximize water efficiency — yet the university also treasures and preserves Israel’s cultural legacy in its institutes of Jewish and Israeli literature and culture. At her initiative, glass panels featuring ancient and contemporary Hebrew poems have been placed around the campus to give it an “extra soul,” she says. Advanced planning Carmi’s goal for the university is to attract the best and brightest researchers who will build their lives in the Negev, and help bring BGU to the forefront of research universities. Despite the stress and tension of rocket fire, expansion is everywhere: New classrooms and labs for biotechnical engineering, engineering, and solar energy are in the works. A new center to house long-standing educational community programming in math, physics, and biotech studies is scheduled to open in 2014. New dorms are in the planning stages. BGU is partnering with Tzahal (Hebrew acronym for Israeli Defense Forces, or IDF), Deutsche Telekom, EMC, and other businesses in building a high-tech technological park in Beersheva. In light of the IDF’s decision to move many of its intelligence and high-tech units to the Negev, Carmi anticipates huge positive change in terms of increased population, demand for services and education, and development of a better infrastructure. Carmi encourages students not to make concessions regarding their future, and to take advantage of opportunities in addition to their studies. Many BGU students, in fact, are highly involved in the community on a routine basis, as well as in emergencies. In collaboration with the city of Beersheva, for example, BGU is developing and training a student cadre of crisis volunteers. A recent questionnaire elicited 400 volunteers in one day for 19 types of positions, including staffing day care centers for children of first responders; providing support for the elderly; opening shelters; working as engineers and security personnel. Carmi was forced to take responsibility early in her own life. Her father died before she was 14 and she says she grew up fast, “almost overnight. I was always independent and assumed the position of helping my mother.” Her parents, from Poland and Germany, had both made aliyah to Israel in the early 1930s as students. Her mother, a social worker, was pragmatic, focused, and down-to-earth. Her father, an accountant by profession, was a scholar, amateur painter, archaeologist, and musician who knew many languages. Focused on Bedouin As a teenager, Carmi became fascinated with the role of chromosomes and genes in determining human life. She cites the influence of Rosalind Franklin, a British biophysicist who contributed to the discovery of the structure of DNA and its role in understanding how genetic information is passed from parents to children. Carmi grounded her own research in a distinctive Negev community — the Bedouin — breaking more barriers and making inroads in genetic research. After graduating from Hadassah Medical School in Jerusalem, she completed her residency in pediatrics and neonatology at Soroka University Medical Center in Beersheva, an unusual move away from the center of the country. Carmi then accepted a two-year fellowship in medical genetics at Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard University Medical School. She was offered a position at Harvard, but chose to return to the Negev. “I wanted to make a change in the health system in general, and in genetic diseases in particular,” she says. “Many researchers were dealing with Jewish genetic diseases, but nobody was doing it for the Bedouin population.” To conduct her research and offer potential solutions, she had to gain access to the community, and earn its trust and confidence. “It took us years,” she says. She found that although Bedouin women stood low on the social ladder, they were the movers and shakers in health care and education — a realization that strengthened her beliefs about women’s empowerment. Her research led to the identification of 12 new genes and the delineation of three new syndromes, including the “Carmi Syndrome,” which describes the mutated gene of babies born without skin who die within two weeks. Most of the disease-carrying genes are the result of inbreeding from marriages between cousins. Carmi and her team not only designed tests to detect abnormalities in early pregnancy, but convinced Bedouin couples to agree to genetic testing. Now, genetic information is even incorporated into the process of matchmaking. In the past 12 years, infant mortality among the Bedouin has dropped dramatically, from almost 20 per 1,000 to six per 1,000. Her work continues BGU’s molecular genetics lab, part of the National Institute for Biotechnology in the Negev, continues the work Carmi began, and has now identified 30 genes. The Israeli government has adopted her program, offering carrier tests for Negev Bedouin and Arabs in northern Israel with genetic problems. In addition, BGU’s concerted outreach to Bedouin teenagers, offering tutoring and other academic assistance so they can meet BGU admission standards, has helped increase the number of Bedouin students at BGU to 300 today; half are women. Graduates include the community’s first female gynecologist and psychologist. Carmi is committed to improving the position of women and often addresses the issues in both formal and informal settings. When she speaks to students about gender inequalities, she says, “it opens their eyes.…Because of the way we were raised and socialized…, most of us have a hidden notion that men are a little bit better than women. We should be aware of this feeling and try our best to put away this bias. Even women have this inner feeling.” On the university level, she heads a committee of the national Council for Higher Education to help female graduate students balance career and family. The committee’s recommendations — on-campus day care, stopping the tenure clock, and more — are scheduled to be implemented soon. Only 12 percent of full professorships at Israeli universities today are awarded to women. Carmi and her husband Lechaim, an emeritus professor of epidemiology, live in Omer, a suburb of Beersheva. Her daughter, Shira Carmi, lives in Brooklyn, where she manages a consulting business for creative businesses called Launch Collective. In two years, Carmi will end her second term as president. After that, she says, she will “figure out what to do next.” She will always continue to champion BGU. “If there’s one university that caters to the future of Zionism in Israel, it’s BGU. It’s in our DNA.” General 2012-05-11T07:52:32+00:00 /content/item/22842 http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/site/the_shoah_after_theyre_gone1/#When:07:55:46Z Notice: Undefined offset: -1 in /var/www/vhosts/jstandard.com/httpdocs/system/core/core.functions.php(663) : eval()'d code on line 43 Shira Sheps remembers walking through an exhibit at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in lower Manhattan and stumbling upon her grandmother’s long-ago school reports alongside family photos and her great-grandparents’ wedding invitation. Sheps, 25, had known that shortly after Kristallnacht, her grandmother, Marion Achtentuch, at age 9, had left Furth, Germany, on a Kindertransport to England. Seeing personal mementos, however, of the life that had been taken from the family, as well as her grandmother’s uncanny resemblance as a young girl to Sheps’ younger sister at that age, “I freaked out,” she says.Shira Sheps remembers walking through an exhibit at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in lower Manhattan and stumbling upon her grandmother’s long-ago school reports alongside family photos and her great-grandparents’ wedding invitation. Sheps, 25, had known that shortly after Kristallnacht, her grandmother, Marion Achtentuch, at age 9, had left Furth, Germany, on a Kindertransport to England. Seeing personal mementos, however, of the life that had been taken from the family, as well as her grandmother’s uncanny resemblance as a young girl to Sheps’ younger sister at that age, “I freaked out,” she says. As a child, Sheps would listen to her grandmother’s stories of a childhood lived during the eve of World War II. The stories, she says, “profoundly affected me. No matter what I do, I come back to it.” Marion Achtentuch, 83, with her granddaughter, Shira Sheps, 25, a social worker in Fair Lawn. Courtesy Shira ShepsA social worker in Fair Lawn who is pursuing her master’s degree at the Hunter College School of Social Work in New York, Sheps has spent the past several years researching and studying the effects of intergenerational trauma. “It gives me an excuse, gives meaning to [my studies]. It’s a fixation,” she said in an interview a few days before Yom Hashoah, which this year began on Wednesday evening. “I’m bearing witness. I’m doing what I was taught for the purpose of remembering.” She is among the many grandchildren of Shoah survivors — often referred to as the Third Generation — who feel an obligation to share memories of the Holocaust. The bond that many in the Third Generation have with their grandparents has been noted by psychologists and researchers who have studied the effect of the Shoah on families. For many survivors, it was easier to share their experiences with their grandchildren than with their children, says Peppy Margolis, director of the Institute of Genocide and Holocaust Studies at Raritan Valley Community College, who recently produced a 30-minute documentary titled “The Second Generation: Ripples from the Holocaust.” Through the dozens of interviews she conducted, Margolis says she found that for survivors in general, the Shoah was “too close” and “many were still processing what had happened and burying the pain in their work and raising their children.” Their experiences also left many ill equipped to be parents, adds Margolis, herself a child of Shoah survivors. “But the majority talked to their grandchildren and not with the same pain and bitterness; enough time has passed and it’s not as traumatic.” While her film explores what it means to be a member of the Second Generation and to grow up with a parent who lived through the Nazi atrocities and World War II, she says it also has helped those of the Third Generation to better understand their own parents. Although his grandfather died before he was born, Aaron Biterman, 29, says the experience of living in a home with a parent suffering from the trauma of surviving the Nazi death camps took a toll on his father and aunt. His grandfather never talked about the Shoah because he was so traumatized, Biterman recalls his father telling him. “He lived, but wasn’t living,” Biterman, a fundraiser in Arlington, Va., says of the grandfather he never met. His grandmother survived the Shoah in Poland and for many years was not eager to share her experiences. Yet after she retired, says Biterman, she began to open up. Eventually, she recorded her story with Steven Spielberg’s Shoah Foundation and began speaking to student groups. Biterman’s desire “to connect with my family history and to my story” was only strengthened by knowing that his father grew up in a home “where something was the matter.” In 2006, he began a Facebook group for grandchildren of the Shoah that today has more than 2,000 friends. “It’s just a network to organize, ask questions, get answers, and educate others,” he says. Education is the key for the Third Generation. “It is important that the past not be forgotten,” Biterman says. JTA Wire Service General 2012-04-20T07:55:46+00:00 /content/item/22843 http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/site/the_shoah_after_theyre_gone2/#When:07:54:10Z Notice: Undefined offset: -1 in /var/www/vhosts/jstandard.com/httpdocs/system/core/core.functions.php(663) : eval()'d code on line 43 TRSICE, Czech Republic – Nearly 70 years after a Czech Jewish family sought refuge from the Nazis by retreating into a nearby forest and relying on non-Jewish locals for help, a New Milford High Schol teacher has helped erect a permanent monument to their memory. Earlier this month, several dozen people went to the wooded site where the Wolf family hid to unveil a modest stone monument that commemorates their struggle to survive and the locals who helped them. For three nightmarish years during World War II, the Wolf family survived by intermittently hiding in the woods, a friend’s shed, and people’s homes — all the while depending on others to provide them with food, fuel, and other supplies.TRSICE, Czech Republic – Nearly 70 years after a Czech Jewish family sought refuge from the Nazis by retreating into a nearby forest and relying on non-Jewish locals for help, a New Milford High Schol teacher has helped erect a permanent monument to their memory. Earlier this month, several dozen people went to the wooded site where the Wolf family hid to unveil a modest stone monument that commemorates their struggle to survive and the locals who helped them. For three nightmarish years during World War II, the Wolf family survived by intermittently hiding in the woods, a friend’s shed, and people’s homes — all the while depending on others to provide them with food, fuel, and other supplies. The details of the family’s ordeal were recorded in a detailed diary by son Otto, who was 15 when they went into hiding in June 1942. The villagers of Trsice, which is about 150 miles east of Prague, knew the story. It was only after Colleen Tambuscio, the teacher, brought a group of New Milford High School students to the wooded hideout four years ago as part of a Holocaust study tour that the wheels were set in motion for a proper memorial. Eva Vavrecka stands at memorial, contemplating the horrific living conditions that her mother and grandparents endured. Courtesy Bruce KonviserTambuscio, who teaches a course on the Shoah, genocide and human behavior at the school, leads an annual Holocaust study tour to Germany, the Czech Republic, and Poland. One of the books she uses in class, “Salvaged Pages,” is a compilation of wartime diaries by young writers. It includes an abridged version of Otto Wolf’s accounting of the family’s harrowing plight. Four years ago, Tambuscio realized during the group’s stop in Olomouc that they would be very close to the Wolf family’s forested hideout. With the help of the local Jewish community, they trekked into the woods and managed to identify the family’s cave-like shelter. Tambuscio said she was deeply moved by their discovery and wondered why it was not marked. “We asked the mayor why isn’t this marked as a historical marker,” she said. “And they really didn’t have an answer other than they just never really thought about marking it.” Tambuscio said she started a fundraising effort to collect the necessary $3,000 while also working through the Czech bureaucracy to acquire the necessary approvals for a memorial. Local villagers had no objections, according to Tambuscio, and four years later she and the village had their memorial. One reason the locals never sought to memorialize the Wolfs’ story is that the aid to them did not come purely out of altruism. The family’s initial benefactor, Jaroslav Zdaril, known as Slavek in the diary, set up the Wolf family in the forest, brought them food and supplies, and later provided them shelter in a primitive shed. He did so in part because he was in love with Otto’s 22-year-old sister, Felicitas. As his love went unrequited, his delivery of food and supplies gradually became erratic. After two years, the relationship had become so frayed and the delivery of food so unreliable that the Wolfs were desperate for an alternative benefactor. They found a lifeline in their former housekeeper, Maria Zborilova, who hid them in the attic of her home. The new accommodations were a tremendous improvement in quality of life for the Wolf family — Otto and Felicitas, and their parents, Berthold and Ruzena — but almost immediately Maria’s husband wanted them out, fearing the repercussions if the Nazis found them hiding Jews. While Maria’s desire to shelter the family initially prevailed, the Wolf family lived in constant fear for nearly a year that her husband would force them out. He eventually did in March 1945. A dentist the Wolfs knew then helped them find shelter in a farmhouse of the Ohera family — complete strangers to the Wolfs. By then, the war was in its final throes, yet there was still plenty of violence and fear. Less than a month before the end of the war, the family was captured by Nazi-sympathizing Kazakhs looking for partisans. Not knowing they had a Jewish family, they kept only Otto, who was then 18 and of fighting age. A few days after being captured, he and others were shot and then put into a barn that was set alight. With violence and tensions rising, the rest of the Wolf family fled back into the forest for the final three weeks of the war. As fate would have it, the weather that April was miserable: cold and windswept rain left the family muddied, wet and shivering. Fittingly, the memorial’s unveiling took place on a raw, gray morning with temperatures in the low 40s. For Eva Vavrecka, Felicitas’ daughter, it was the first time she had ever visited the wooded site. Even though she knew the story, Vavrecka said that she nonetheless was astounded by the conditions under which her mother and family were forced to survive. “It was a difficult feeling, and I was trying to push it away so I don’t get too emotional,” said Vavrecka, 62, of Prague. Petr Papousek, who is head of the Jewish community in Olomouc, the nearby city, says the villagers deserve recognition for not informing on the Wolf family, even if their silence was not always for altruistic purposes. “On the memorial it says that the Wolf family was able to hide because the people who lived in the village kept the secret,” he said. “Now when they see the memorial, they can be proud of their ancestors who were so brave.” During the 1990s, the five individuals who actively sheltered the Wolfs were designated Righteous Among the Nations by the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Museum in Jerusalem. Alexandra Zapruder, author of “Salvaged Pages,” the compilation of young writers’ diaries from the Shoah, says non-altruistic motives do not diminish the end result. The important thing is that three of the four Wolf family members survived. “It doesn’t do us any good to have images of heroes that we have nothing in common with,” Zapruder said. “It doesn’t do us any good to have stories of superhuman people who helped other people and never said a bad word or never had questionable motives because that’s not who we are.” JTA Wire Service General 2012-04-20T07:54:10+00:00 /content/item/21403 http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/site/credits_are_the_answer/#When:07:50:59Z Notice: Undefined offset: -1 in /var/www/vhosts/jstandard.com/httpdocs/system/core/core.functions.php(663) : eval()'d code on line 43 All politics are local. Whatever benefits us takes priority. The Talmud codifies this by putting local needs ahead of others The Orthodox Union (OU) is supporting a scholarship bill in Trenton that will benefit other communities, but not Northern New Jersey. I support any legislation that will help ease the burden of rising day school costs, but I am committed to my community first. There is and has been a vehicle available to us which we should utilize, namely tuition tax credits.All politics are local. Whatever benefits us takes priority. The Talmud codifies this by putting local needs ahead of others The Orthodox Union (OU) is supporting a scholarship bill in Trenton that will benefit other communities, but not Northern New Jersey. I support any legislation that will help ease the burden of rising day school costs, but I am committed to my community first. There is and has been a vehicle available to us which we should utilize, namely tuition tax credits. This is how it works. A community establishes a School Tuition Organization (STO) which is a 501(c)3 entity. The STO is chartered to allocate funds to at least three private/parochial schools. It cannot be set up just for one school. We can have several STOs, or one big one for our region. A bill is introduced into the state legislature allowing citizens to contribute an amount (e.g. $500) of their state tax liability to this STO. It is that simple. It is not a voucher system. This tuition tax credit concept has been working effectively in many states for the past 12 years. Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court found it does not violate the separation of church and state. The Northern New Jersey Jewish community, coupled with the Catholic Church, and groups from other Jewish communities across the state have enough clout in Trenton to get such a bill introduced, passed and signed. There already have been several such laws passed in New Jersey to benefit low income communities. The organized Jewish community (i.e., federations, JCRCs, etc.) has indicated that it does not want to get involved in this effort. It is time for a grassroots organizing campaign to get this done. No local group, regardless of whether it is secular or religious, and if the latter regardless of sect or stream, will raise enough money to make a real difference. The STO money can come from anyone, not just day school supporters and not just Jews. It does not cost individuals any money out of pocket, and it may be eligible for an IRS deduction. Some states have even developed a tuition tax credit program for corporations and businesses. The mechanics of allocating the money and the various formulae employed can be easily worked out. Our community’s children will benefit, as will day schools across the state. Once a bill is introduced, busloads of parents can converge on Trenton to lobby for its passage. Once it is passed, it should not be too difficult to convince anyone who supports day school education to allocate the allowable amount to the North Jersey STO. It may take a few years to catch on, but then the money comes in. Do the math. This is a perfect example of Hillel’s teaching in Pirkei Avot: If I do not advocate for myself, who will? If I am only interested in myself what am I? And if not now, when? Wallace Greene, a veteran Jewish educator, has been a teacher, principal, professor, and most recently, the director of Jewish Educational Services for the Jewish Federation of Northern New Jersey. For many years, he also chaired the National Board of License for Teachers and Principals in Jewish Schools in North America. General 2011-12-30T07:50:59+00:00 /content/item/21350 http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/site/80_million-a-year_business_deserves_serious_scrutiny/#When:07:28:59Z Notice: Undefined offset: -1 in /var/www/vhosts/jstandard.com/httpdocs/system/core/core.functions.php(663) : eval()'d code on line 43 Beginning with this issue, The Jewish Standard begins a weekly column on issues of Jewish education in our area. It is written by noted educator Dr. Wallace Greene. In this first column, he explains why we believe this column is necessary. There are many multi-million dollar businesses in northern New Jersey. When one considers the total amount of tuition and salaries paid, the cost of bricks and mortar, infrastructure, and other ancillary costs, the enterprise known as Jewish education is one of the biggest industries in our community. We estimate it at somewhere around $80 million a year.Beginning with this issue, The Jewish Standard begins a weekly column on issues of Jewish education in our area. It is written by noted educator Dr. Wallace Greene. In this first column, he explains why we believe this column is necessary. There are many multi-million dollar businesses in northern New Jersey. When one considers the total amount of tuition and salaries paid, the cost of bricks and mortar, infrastructure, and other ancillary costs, the enterprise known as Jewish education is one of the biggest industries in our community. We estimate it at somewhere around $80 million a year. Clearly, the staggering costs involved in maintaining our congregational schools, nursery programs, day schools, special needs programs, and adult learning make Jewish education worthy of our attention. Every study has shown that the key to our Jewish future lies in Jewish education. Jewish identity and affiliation after World War II by and large was linked to supporting Israel, opposing anti-Semitism, and creating places for Jewish youth to meet and socialize. That no longer works in the 21st century. Today, there are so many activities competing for our time, resources, and energies. There is not much in popular culture that is in sync with Jewish values. It is no accident that more and more Jewish communal professionals are coming from the ranks of day school graduates and Jewish camp alumni. In fact, if we believe that there should be a Jewish future in which our grandchildren will identify as proud, literate, and engaged Jews, and if that requires an investment in some form of Jewish education, then the multiple portals of entry that comprise Jewish education in our community must not only be supported, but we as a community must ask the hard questions, critically (and lovingly) examine the issues, identify problems, and work together to maximize solutions. That is the raison d’être of this column. Recognizing the multiplicity of options available and the equally multiple opinions of our readers, I shall endeavor each week to present points of view that will focus on specific issues and suggest various approaches to dealing with those issues. Input from readers is encouraged. There are the big issues, such as the day school tuition crisis, communal priority setting vis-a-vis Jewish education, special needs, post bar/bat mitzvah Jewish education, the effectiveness of one- or two-day-a-week congregational schools, Birthright for teens, the importance of informal/experiential learning, the Jewish camp experience, the concept of community educators working in multiple school settings, and how to play the money game. There are also some nuts-and-bolts issues such as curriculum design, what should a student know when he/she graduates, gifted and talented, the average student, technology, homework, why Yoni can’t read (Hebrew), values-based education, bullying, and school mergers. I will also discuss some philosophical issues, such as the status of Jewish educators, teaching Judaism vs. teaching about Judaism, innovative programming in synagogues and schools, adult learning, and parents as partners. The list is not meant to be all inclusive, and I am sure that our readers will contribute more ideas. Not only is Jewish education big business, but it is a growth industry. Like any other business, many factors contribute to success. Sometimes populations shift, age out, and/or move, causing some schools to seek mergers to maintain viability. Other schools are experiencing growth spurts and increased enrollment. Demographics, birth trends, and population shifts will also be explored. Dr. Wallace Greene, a veteran Jewish educator, has been a teacher, principal, professor, and most recently, the director of Jewish Educational Services for the Jewish Federation of Northern New Jersey. For many years, he also chaired the National Board of License for Teachers and Principals in Jewish Schools in North America. General 2011-12-23T07:28:59+00:00