I’d like to share a personal, not organizational perspective this week.
We woke up last Shabbat, and within a short time, we all knew that the war had started.
That sounds like a statement of fact, but the truth is, it is incorrect.
“I am a Jew, part of the Jewish people, and only after that am I an Israeli - Because the State, as I understand it, was created for the entirety of the Jewish people and in their merit. The thing that sustained the Jewish people throughout all of the generations, and brought forth the sha…
This week, many in the Jewish community, especially those in the advocacy space, were up in arms over a Superbowl ad created by Robert Kraft’s Blue Square Alliance and its campaign to #EndJewishHate.
I’ve since seen and heard a tremendous amount of comment and criticism of the piece. I…
This week’s Haftarah, from the book of Isaiah’s sixth chapter, has a dialogue between the prophet, the Seraphim (angels) and the Almighty. I am fascinated by the fourth pasuk (sentence) which says “And the doorposts shook from the voice of He who called, and the house (the Temple in Je…
This week many of us took off our yellow ribbons and removed our hostage dog tags. The last of the captives, Sgt-Major Ran Gvili, of blessed memory, who fell defending his community (he fought to the last bullet, with a broken arm!) on October 7th, 2023, was located, and he finally came home…
Last week, I shared an explanation of why I don’t write critically about contentious issues in Israel in this forum. Today, I’m going to partially break that self-imposed rule. I apologize for the contradiction, not the criticism.
Last week, a lone IDF soldier who had spent more than 74…
Almost as long as I’ve been writing these messages - give or take three years now - many readers have emailed or messaged me asking me to weigh in or take sides on some of the critical and sometimes contentious issues being debated and even fought over in Israel and among the Jewish people…
Today, my family marks four years since the passing of my sister Sari Shalmon, A’H. As I stood in shul this morning, preparing to say kaddish in her memory, I wondered what she would make of the world that has evolved for us since she left us, far before her time.
As a mother of two wonde…
I often write about the work Federation has done to create a security infrastructure in Rockland, as part of a regional and nationwide network working with Jewish institutions, law enforcement, and government, training and leveraging thousands of volunteers, consulting and accessing tens of …
*For those of you who read my personal posts on Facebook, my apologies as you may have read a part of this already.
On Tuesday, I was grateful for an opportunity to celebrate at the wedding of the son of dear friends. The demands of the moment for those of us who have communal responsibili…
All too often around Chanukah we look around at the celebrations going on in our cultural surroundings - music, lights, decorations and greetings - and we do something a bit strange. Instead of appreciating the seasonal cheer on its own merits - deeply connected to the positive expression of…
Over the last month, I spent almost the entire four weeks away from home. First, I was privileged to bring a group of our Federation Allocations Committee members - for the first time in over ten years - to meet with nine vital organizations in Israel to help us determine how the Federation …
It has been a privilege to spend the last week and a half in Israel, first bringing members of Federation’s allocations committee to meet with a number of Israeli amutot (charitable organizations) to inform our decisions on how we help support and meet the needs of Israeli society in the c…
We often make assumptions in our lives. Each one of us. Most of the time, these assumptions are founded on the evidence we see and experiences we have, so that even when something is not explicit, we can infer an outcome, an explanation, or a solution which often turns out to be correct.
I …
In the past, on occasion, I have used a phrase from the book of Matthew in the Christian Bible to describe many of those who abuse, assault, antagonize and threaten Jews in their writing or pronouncements. The phrase is “fools, liars, and hypocrites”, and you may have seen me use it here…
