‘In darkness we find light’: As missiles fall, Jews in Ukraine mark Rosh Hashana
Los Angeles Times, By Laura King, Sept. 17
KHARKIV, Ukraine – The tables were laid, the candles were lighted, and the last rainy-day light was dying as prayerful voices rose toward the synagogue’s ornate domed ceiling. The Jewish New Year was beginning.
In Ukraine’s battered second city, Kharkiv, the Rosh Hashana holiday … held special meaning in this second grinding year of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war.
“In darkness we find light,” said Rabbi Moshe Moskovitz, the city’s 59-year-old chief rabbi, who presides over Kharkiv’s landmark synagogue, the largest in the country.
“Our enemy wants us to be hiding and crying in the dark,” Moskovitz said in an interview. “But for centuries we have celebrated our holidays in time of war and hardship — this is so meaningful to us.”
He walked every block of the Bronx and found traces of a vanished Jewish world
The Forward, By Beth Harpaz, Aug. 23
William Helmreich walked every block in the Bronx. And everywhere he went, he found traces of the Jews who made up half the borough’s population less than a century ago.
He found them in small shops, in building names, and in churches whose Stars of David reveal their origins as synagogues.
Helmreich documented all of this in “The Bronx Nobody Knows: An Urban Walking Guide.” The book was published this month. But Helmreich didn’t live to see it. He died at age 74 on March 28, 2020, one of the first Americans killed by COVID-19 in the apocalyptic first wave of the pandemic.
Helaine, his wife, walked every step of the way with her husband, clocking 800 miles over nine months of exploring the Bronx together.
“I could walk with Bill anywhere because he knew how to do it,” she said. “If someone even looked at us in a hostile way, he’d just smile and say, ‘Hey, how ya doin’?’”
He had “this gift,” she added, “of being able to talk to anybody and get them to open up and really respond to him, from the most depressed homeless person on a park bench to a nuclear physicist at a college. And he would always leave them with a joke and leave them laughing.”
Camp brings Jewish youth together in Poland from across the world
Jerusalem Post, By Uriel Peizer, Aug. 30′
The Yael Foundation’s camp held its third year in Poland with both a boys’ camp and a girls’ camp.
Young Jews from a dozen distinct countries spanning across Europe, Africa, and Asia, gathered for the Yael Foundation’s annual summer camp in Warsaw. While they conversed in different languages and wore different clothes, it was clear that these kids shared many more similarities than differences.
What drew these kids together was this renowned Jewish organization’s commitment to advancing Jewish education worldwide, by strengthening Jewish youth’s connection to their Jewish identity and tradition. With a primary focus on strengthening young Jews’ connection to their Jewish roots and customs, the foundation operates across five continents, supporting over 60 Jewish educational initiatives.
Annually, the foundation’s summer camp brings together students from these institutions and programs, from places like New Zealand, Vancouver, Casablanca, and Brazil, to foster an empowering community and connect them to their heritage.
Jewish Community Flourishes In The Cayman Islands,
Offering Synagogue And Kosher Cuisine
By Ethel G. Hofman, Zenger News, Aug. 3
Discover the thriving Jewish community in the Cayman Islands, complete with a synagogue and kosher food.
Are there really Jews who live full-time in the Cayman Islands? Why was I surprised when the reply was a resounding “yes!”
I grew up in the only Jewish family on the Shetland Islands. The only difference: Grand Cayman has a thriving Chabad. For my family, the Greenwalds, there was no rabbi, no synagogue, no other Jews—none of the support system that makes up a community.
In 2022, the islands drew 1,027,668 visitors from around the world, according to the Cayman Islands Department of Tourism.
While the busiest months are March and April, there’s no bad time to go, though there is the threat of hurricanes during the fall.
I was thrilled to learn that between 500 and 600 Jews live on Grand Cayman, the largest of the islands. The Chabad Cayman Jewish Community Center is led by a young, vibrant Rabbi Berel Pewzner and his wife, Rikel.
In the 10 years they have been working and living on Grand Cayman, there’s now a synagogue, Jewish cemetery, Hebrew school, teen club, adult learning programs, Shabbat and holiday services and programs, and plenty of kosher food.
