JERSEY CITY, N.J (JTA) — On Jan. 13, 1898, the French novelist Emile Zola published an open letter titled “J’Accuse!” in which he called out the anti-Semitism of the French government and France’s military establishment.

Zola demanded justice for Capt. Alfred Dreyfus, a Frenchman of Jewish descent who was accused by the military of being a German spy, and subsequently suffered imprisonment and public humiliation. Throughout the so-called Dreyfus Affair, the French public remained split between those who believed in the captain’s honor and honesty and those who stuck to the age-old prejudice that a Jew can never be trusted, especially on matters of national security.

Suspicions of dual loyalty and treachery have followed the Jews over the centuries along the path of their migration and exile—from North Africa to Spain, from Spain to France and Germany, from Germany to the Russian Empire and beyond. Those of us who hail from the former Soviet Union know all too well what such suspicions often entail.

Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman is a naturalized U.S. citizen, whose family emigrated from the Soviet Union when he was still a toddler. A decorated army veteran and White House official, he was one of the aides listening in on President Donald Trump’s phone call with Volodymyr Zelensky, in which Trump asked the Ukrainian president to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden. And now, as a result of his congressional testimony, Vindman enjoys the dubious distinction of being just the latest Jew in history to be accused of dual loyalty by political enemies.

In an Oct. 28 Fox News panel, host Laura Ingraham and guest John Yoo launched into a freewheeling attack on Vindman, entertaining the idea that he could be guilty of espionage. On Oct. 29, former GOP Rep. Sean Duffy told CNN’s John Berman that Vindman seems to be more concerned with Ukraine’s military defense than with America’s foreign policy interests.

Many Democrats and Republicans swiftly and strongly spoke out against this vilification of an American patriot. But as praiseworthy as these condemnations were, Jewish Americans — regardless of their political affiliations — should understand the added danger of the smear campaign against Vindman: It not only represents an attack against immigrants, but fuels contemporary anti-Semites looking to breathe new life into tropes of Jewish dual loyalty.

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In April 1945, my great-uncle, Aaron, a Red Army colonel, led his artillery division in the storming of Berlin. After the triumphant battle, most of the participating colonels were promoted to the rank of general. Aaron was denied the promotion because he was Jewish. Jewish generals were a rarity in the postwar Soviet military — Jews could not be trusted.

At the height of Stalin’s postwar anti-Semitic campaign and on the eve of the infamous “Doctors’ Plot,” my father, a young aspiring engineer, was suddenly fired from his job and denied employment until after the tyrant’s death; his duties were deemed too sensitive to be trusted to a Jew. He barely survived on his tiny disability pension and the experience, which included an expectation of imminent arrest, scarred him for life.

My own experiences during the waning years of the Soviet empire were far less dramatic, but the feeling of being an outsider, someone whose loyalty could be questioned and right to belong revoked, was certainly part of it. I’ll never forget passing the newspaper stands on my daily walks to and from school.  The newspapers decried the evils of Zionism and depicted nefarious-looking hook-nosed creatures who were plotting to spoil the party of “progress-loving humanity.” The creatures’ noses looked like mine.

Hundreds of thousands of Soviet Jews arrived in the United States during the Soviet Union’s last two decades, and it seems fair to suggest that most of them liked what they found in this country. They were now free to be Jews without any apparent stigma attached to their identity. Their politics tended to be rooted in the unequivocal rejection both of the Soviet past and of any political movement deemed or imagined by them to be aligned with the abandoned empire.

Transplanted to U.S. soil and, for the first time in their lives, faced with political choices, many of them discovered that they were conservative. They became proud and loyal U.S. citizens and often voted for those who shared their distaste for “socialism” and their passionate attachment to Israel. They hardly saw themselves as Russian or Ukrainian or Moldovan but rather as Russian-speaking Jews who emigrated from the Soviet Union. Which is not to say that they had no affinity for Russian culture and language—many of them did, and sometimes with vengeance.

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There is no person in the United States who should be able to understand the nuances of Soviet Jewish identity and the trauma underlying the Jewish experience in the former Soviet Union better than Alan Dershowitz.

For decades, he has been a figure of admiration among former Soviet Jews. A close friend of the legendary refusenik Natan Sharansky, Dershowitz was one of the most active and influential figures in the movement to free Soviet Jewry.

That is why it was so shocking and disappointing to see the prominent Harvard Law professor stay silent during the now infamous Fox News panel and Ingraham and Woo’s free-wheeling defamation of Vindman. I could not wrap my mind around the uncomfortable fact that someone who had done so much for so many Soviet Jews could sit calmly while the loyalty and integrity of one such Jewish immigrant was being questioned by those who are not worthy of approaching his record of service and excellence.

Thankfully, Dershowitz did eventually speak. In an October 30 opinion piece for the NY Daily News, Dershowitz wrote that he remained silent because he “had never heard of Vindman and had no idea why he was being attacked,” adding that after he “looked up Vindman and found out that he was a great patriot, an American military hero and an immigrant from the Ukraine,” [he] immediately tweeted, “I don’t believe that Vindman is guilty of espionage or other crimes…Vindman is a patriot who served his country. I’ve long opposed the criminalization of political differences.”

In his opinion piece, Dershowitz added that “the unfortunate attack on Vindman is a symptom of a deep malignancy which threatens our body politic.”

John Woo has since backpedaled as well, writing in USA Today that he has “no reason to question Vindman’s patriotism or loyalty to the United States,” but that he “thought the Ukrainian contacts sounded like an espionage operation by the Ukrainians.”

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Those who subscribe to the clichés of the American success story would be hard-pressed not to admire Alexander Vindman’s American odyssey. Yet the moment Vindman resolved to uphold his oath and testify about the apparent malfeasance he observed within the Trump administration, the proverbial gloves came off and the friendly masks fell.

By all available accounts, Vindman is a profile in courage and civil service par excellence, a military man and self-effacing but efficient civil servant. He was also part of the third immigration wave that washed thousands of Soviet Jews onto American shores during the late 1970s and early 1980s.

As was typical of that cohort, he grew up an American patriot, which was not all that difficult considering that his family moved to the United States from Soviet Kyiv when Vindman was 3 years old. While most Soviet Jewish immigrants encouraged their children to follow predictable and safe career paths (medicine, engineering, computer science, law, etc.), the Vindman boys dedicated their professional lives to the military and civil service.

Even if it was not Ingrham’s intention, in the Fox News segment, this wounded war vet and a recipient of the Purple Heart ceased to be an American patriot and became, in the words of Zola (and the ears of today’s anti-Semites), a “dirty Jew.”

“It is a crime,” Zola wrote in J’Accuse, “to poison the minds of the meek and the humble, to stoke the passions of reactionism and intolerance, by appealing to that odious anti-Semitism …”

Are the attacks on Vindman just another case of the ends justifying the means? The joy of being close to power? The attractions of contrarianism?

As a historian, I believe in our ability to connect with the past. I can easily imagine Alan Dershowitz transported to Paris in 1906 and meeting Alfred Dreyfus soon after his exoneration. I see the two of them taking an unhurried walk together along the Seine. It seems to me they would have a lot to discuss.

NEW YORK (JTA) — There is something curious about the media attention given to the recent leak of Richard Spencer’s post-Charlottesville rant, in which he decried “little f—ing kikes” and “little f—ing octoroons,” an anachronistic slur for someone who is one-eighth black, and added that he rules “the f—ing world.”

While it is actually impressive how Spencer manages to be so racist, anti-Semitic and egomaniacal in so few words, the public reaction to it is a reflection of the American view of white supremacists and neo-Nazis.

Spencer’s new recording is a big nothing-burger; his views have been clear since he started the Alternative Right blog in 2010. He’s a white supremacist. White supremacy, by its very nature, entails disparaging people of color, blaming Jews for how things are and laying plans for genocide. This was also the guy who ended a speech with “Heil Trump” and said “peaceful ethnic cleansing” was his plan for America’s future.  Which part of this did people miss?

Many Americans can’t grasp the fact that overt white supremacists are a longstanding part of the American political landscape. The Ku Klux Klan was founded in the 1860s. Nazis have been on our shores since the 1920s. Millions of Americans have joined these groups. And they have killed thousands of people—from lynching black folks and bombing synagogues to shooting up mosques. But to many Americans, white supremacists remain, as Fox News’ Tucker Carlson said in August, a “hoax” and a “conspiracy theory.” According to him, there’s no reason to pay attention to them.

The media savvy alt-right is well aware of this deep-seated desire to deny their existence. They know that journalists, trained to tell “both sides,” will run the most brazen denials—even when they’re delivered with the most ostentatious of smirks. White supremacists know that the country is filled with Tucker Carlsons, eager to grab the flimsiest pretext to pretend white supremacists are a hoax. What anti-Semite—after rehashing tired old stories about Jewish control of the banks, the media and the U.S. Congress—doesn’t inevitably proclaim, “And don’t you dare say I’m an anti-Semite!” Neo-Nazis deny the Holocaust almost reflexively, when you’d think they would brag about this kind of thing. Denial, it seems, runs deep.

I have seen, over and over again, how people will not accept that someone is a white supremacist—as long as they don’t say, “I am a Nazi.” In New York City in 2016, we saw this when a longstanding member of Holocaust denial and white supremacist publishing circles spoke at the Brooklyn Commons, a supposedly “progressive” venue. We see it today when the NYCFC soccer club tolerates fans who have neo-Nazi tattoos and were photographed at Charlottesville in 2017. And we saw it when CNN had Richard Spencer on in July, treating him as some kind of legitimate commentator.

For many Americans, no one is ever a Nazi — unless they have an affidavit, signed and notarized, stating that they are. The good news is that this new recording has hopefully opened people’s eyes.

Now, we just have to deal with the other tens, or hundreds, of thousands of white supremacists who are active in America today.

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, the New York socialites who were supposed to soften the blunt edges of the Trump administration, appear to be taking the gloves off.

After nearly two years of relative silence on the swirling controversies in the White House, President Donald Trump’s daughter and son-in-law, both of whom hold senior advisory positions in the West Wing, seem to be bracing for a fight.

Last month, in a rare media interview, Kushner took an even rarer swipe at one of the president’s opponents, saying he had been busy “cleaning up the messes” Vice President Joe Biden left behind in the Middle East. And Ivanka — whose Twitter feed is best described as part travelogue, part booster of good economic data — recently featured a tweet describing her father as surrounded by “enemies and spies.”

Kushner was responding to a comment Biden had made questioning Kushner’s suitability to negotiate peace in the Middle East. “What credentials does he bring to that?” Biden asked. Kushner shot back, saying Biden was responsible for a punitive law that had crippled the criminal justice system, chaos in the Middle East and trade deals that had shortchanged the United States.

“A lot of the work that the president’s had me doing over the last three years has actually been cleaning up the messes that Vice President Biden left behind,” Kushner said.

Meanwhile, Ivanka Trump has taken a rare swipe of her own. Last week, on the day the U.S. House of Representatives endorsed an impeachment inquiry of the president, Trump quoted Thomas Jefferson:

“…surrounded by enemies and spies catching and perverting every word that falls from my lips or flows from my pen, and inventing where facts fail them.” -Thomas Jefferson’s reflections on Washington, D.C. in a letter to his daughter Martha.
Some things never change, dad!

— Ivanka Trump (@IvankaTrump) October 31, 2019

“‘Surrounded by enemies and spies catching and perverting every word that falls from my lips or flows from my pen, and inventing where facts fail them.’ -Thomas Jefferson’s reflections on Washington, D.C. in a letter to his daughter Martha. Some things never change, dad!”

A source close to the Kushners told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the couple does not seek out confrontation, noting that Kushner’s remark was in response to a question. But the tough tone the couple occasionally takes in public simply reflects the central role they play behind the scenes, watching President Trump’s back, the source said.

The buzz after Donald Trump’s 2016 election was that the couple, both former Democrats who traveled easily in New York City’s liberal circles, would put the brakes on the president’s hardline tendencies. It took about a year for folks to realize that was wishful thinking; Kushner and Ivanka Trump deferred to the president, not the other way around.

Still, the couple (or people close to them) continued to leak their disapproval of Trump’s rollback of immigrant and LGBTQ rights to the media and attempted to maintain credibility with Americans on both sides of the political divide.

So what happened?

One theory is: nothing.

Kushner rarely speaks to the press, a silence that has reinforced the notion that he is the president’s foil. But there has always been evidence that, like his father-in-law, he plays hardball.

Kusher has sought retribution against the people who put his father in prison for fraud. He once expressed admiration for a New Jersey official who shut down the George Washington Bridge as political retribution, saying the move was “kind of badass.” And he said Palestinians deserved the massive cuts in aid that Trump initiated because they criticized his decision to move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem.

Ivanka Trump cultivates an image as a tireless promoter of women, but she chided Cosmopolitan magazine in 2016 for asking her tough questions about her father’s policies related to child care and maternity leave.

The couple appear to be taking the recent criticism personally, and not without reason. The French government this summer released video of a coterie of world leaders side-eyeing Ivanka when she tried to contribute to their conversation. Biden was attacking Kushner not merely for his Middle East policies, but for being a failed dilettante.

What’s notable about the most recent reactions is what they reveal about how the couple perceive themselves. The Trump campaign’s initial response to the Biden jibe was to note that Kushner is the grandchild of Holocaust survivors. In other words, helping Israel is a personal mission for Kushner.

And that Jefferson quote Ivanka Trump tweeted? It was in reply to a letter from Jefferson’s daughter rebuking the third president for his long absences.

With televised impeachment hearings looming, and as the Democratic primary field narrows and candidates begin training their aim more squarely at Trump, things are likely to only heat up further. Already, some in the Washington, D.C., Jewish community say Kushner and Ivanka are ducking public engagement.

“It’s like Trump getting booed at the World Series,” said one insider, a Democrat. “This is what happens when you interact with the actual public instead of carefully curated Trump rallies and guests at the Trump hotel.”

But the source close to the couple said that’s not the case. Because of the crushing schedule they keep they can no longer make every Jewish event. The source also noted that the couple was behind setting up the first Sukkah on White House grounds during the recent holiday.

NEW YORK (JTA) – Rabbi Shmuley Boteach’s Upper West Side apartment was crowded. At least 50 people sat in folding chairs and on a couch in the living room. The front row was mostly taken up by sleek men with buzzcuts in sport coats who appeared to be security for the man in conversation with Boteach: Yair Netanyahu, son of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The walls of the apartment – which doubles as a sort of headquarters for Boteach, the prominent rabbi and onetime Republican congressional candidate – were filled with full-page ads that Boteach’s organization, the World Values Network, has placed in The New York Times. The ads were all aimed at those who had either criticized Israel or in some way called for a boycott of it: Hamas, ISIS, Iran, the pop singer Lorde, Rep. Ilhan Omar, President Obama, Mahmoud Abbas, The New York Times itself.

The ads were a fitting backdrop to the younger Netanyahu’s remarks, since he had his own list of enemies to talk about Wednesday night. Netanyahu’s targets likely sounded familiar to American listeners, especially coming from the son of a right-wing leader: Academia, the media, socialism, left-wing activists. The media, again.

Netanyahu – who has gained notoriety on social media for, among other things, sharing a meme of liberal Jewish philanthropist George Soros holding the world on a fishing line – accused the Israeli press of “lynching” his father and promoting a “blood libel” against his mother.

“That’s when the real serious, vicious, vile media lynch started and pretty much never ended,” Netanyahu said of his father’s first term as prime minister in the 1990s. “It’s from a small group of mainly radical, radical fringes of Israeli society that took control of the mainstream media.”

The Soros meme, which Netanyahu later deleted without explanation, was widely perceived as anti-Semitic. He’s also tweeted that he would “prefer” that all Arabs leave Israel. He got in trouble for a leaked recording of him talking about soliciting prostitutes and pimping out his girlfriend while visiting strip clubs with his friends. (The driver who recorded him recently paid Netanyahu about $8,500 and apologized for the recording as part of a court settlement for defamation and breach of privacy.)

In Boteach’s apartment, Netanyahu was in friendly territory. Boteach pitched him soft questions, like how he feels when his father is attacked in the press, and his thoughts on the movement to boycott Israel. Boteach called Netanyahu’s father “an international superstar.”

Boteach too seemed to enjoy the conversation: He pitched his books (which include “Kosher Sex”) at least five times during the 90-minute event, and peppered his questions with mentions of the time he worked at Oxford University as a campus rabbi. His Oxford stint led to a friendship with senator and presidential candidate Cory Booker, but that friendship is no more: Booker was another target of one of Boteach’s full-page Times ads.

These are not the best of times for the Netanyahu family. Benjamin Netanyahu is facing two intertwined challenges back home — a looming indictment for fraud, bribery and breach of trust, and government coalition negotiations that could see him lose the premiership for the first time in a decade.

But to hear Yair Netanyahu tell it, his father singlehandedly fixed Israel’s economy and saved it from destruction.

“It’s a mission to save the Jewish people from annihilation and to not only make them survive but also thrive,” said Netanyahu, describing his father’s job. “He took a country, back in the 1990s — besides the existential threat that it was in, it was in a horrible, pretty much Soviet-style economy, socialist, primitive economy. No exports, for example, besides, I don’t know, oranges. Very isolated in the world.”

(In the 1990s, Israel exported more than just oranges.)

Yair also name-checked the various right-wing, nationalist leaders who his father has become friendly with, figures that generally don’t get such a welcome reception in Jewish apartments on Manhattan’s liberal Upper West Side: President Donald Trump, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

“A majority of the people of Israel appreciates the tremendous change that he did in the country,” he said. “The prosperity that he brought, the best economical situation in our history, the most secure situation in our history and of course the personal relationship he has with President Trump and with other world leaders like Modi and Bolsonaro and Putin.”

The elder Netanyahu has also attacked the media, tried to do away with parts of Israel’s onetime socialist economy and warned frequently of existential threats that he says he can best combat. He too has touted his relationships with the same leaders. Earlier this year, his Likud party draped its headquarters in Tel Aviv with giant banners showing Trump and Putin shaking hands with Netanyahu.

But Yair Netanyahu sometimes goes a step further. On Wednesday night, he stated his blanket opposition to a Palestinian state in the West Bank — an idea his father opposed, then voiced support for, and now opposes again. Most recently, Benjamin Netanyahu has pledged to annex parts of the West Bank to Israel if he continues in office.

Yair Netanyahu claimed that Gaza, the coastal strip governed by the terrorist group Hamas, counts as a Palestinian state.

“They already have a state in Gaza and they have full autonomy in Judea and Samaria,” said Yair, using the biblical name for the West Bank favored by the Israeli right. “I think doing what we did in Gaza, to do it in Judea and Samaria, that would be the end of Israel.”

But the prime minister’s son gave a hard no when Boteach asked him if he has any political ambitions of his own — perhaps when his father, who just turned 70, eventually leaves office. Yair Netanyahu said he would rather continue doing events like this — speaking out on political issues without seeking elected office himself.

He appeared to be in his element, as did his host. About midway through the event, a group of protesters heckled Netanyahu for his praise of Trump.

“Yair, why do you support President Trump, who endangers Jews?” the first protester said as she was quickly drowned out by boos. Boteach relished the challenge, raising his voice, walking toward the center of the room and declaring that he was “outraged” by this brazen abrogation of Netanyahu’s freedom of speech.

But Netanyahu seemed chill. As Boteach pontificated, he leaned back in his armchair and smirked. When the rabbi later apologized for the interruption, Netanyahu said, “It’s all good.”

AMSTERDAM (JTA) — Connoisseurs can find a wide range of products containing cannabis in the Netherlands, where it has long been practically legal: Cannabis popsicles, lollipops, chocolate and soap are but a few of the products available for purchase in the Dutch capital.

But don’t expect to have an easy time of it if you’re looking for something to hold your lunchtime turkey slices. For that, you will need to take a trip to neighboring Belgium, where a Jewish baker is about to launch Europe’s first commercial line of cannabis bread.

Cannabread will be available for purchase in Carrefour supermarkets in Brussels and two other Belgian cities later in November, according to a report last month in Vice Belgium. The bread is already on sale in at least one of five Lowy’s bakery shops in Brussels.

Lowy’s owner Charly Lowy said about 15 percent of the dough in Cannabread is made from cannabis seeds, but eating the bread will not get you high. The level of THC, the psychoactive chemical in cannabis, is low, which is also why it can be sold without restrictions in Belgium, where marijuana laws are more restrictive. Cannabread is also certified organic and, according to Lowy, full of minerals, vitamin E, Omega 3 and 6, fibers, carotene and magnesium.

“The bread is intended first and foremost for people who just love bread, and different kinds of it,” Lowy told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “But it’s true that cannabis products are in right now.”

Boutique bakers in the Netherlands and beyond have occasionally offered cannabis bread in the past, but Lowy is the first to mass produce it, according to media reports.

While not intoxicating, the bread does taste and smell like cannabis, the Vice report said. Which may be why Belgium’s Federal Agency for the Safety of the Food Chain raided the bakery in 2018 and destroyed Lowy’s entire stock of Cannabread, citing the absence of certificates proving it does not get people high.

Lowy is tall and handsome. The Vice writer found him to resemble Don Draper, the lead character portrayed by Jon Hamm in the hit television drama “Mad Men.” And he has a history of baking innovative breads, including one with beer and a purple bread containing wild rice.

His family story is also a common European Jewish tale of success amid adversity. His late father, Otto, fled to Belgium from his native Austria, when it was annexed by Nazi Germany in 1938. After the Nazis invaded Belgium in 1940, Otto went underground. It was then, during the most perilous period of his life, that he met his wife, Hania, a Jewish immigrant from Poland. They wed in 1942 and had three children. Charly is the youngest.

When Otto died in 1980, Charly, who was then studying political science, took over the bakery and massively expanded the family business that his father had established in 1947.

Back then, the bakery’s motto was: “Bread, that’s all.”

No longer.

Individuals of all faiths, cultures and backgrounds have life cycle rituals and betrothal traditions. Upon divorce, there are rules in place that are based on thousands of years of religious practice. In many communities, including but not limited to Orthodox Jews, traditional Muslim, and Christians, the end of a marriage can be a shameful experience. The rift between the couple is a deep disappointment that affects each individual but also his or her extended family. 

It is not a secret that divorce matters have an emotional intensity that few other legal practice areas have. When you combine stigma, family honor, unresolved anger, and an adversarial legal forum, otherwise simple divorce matters can become very complex to handle. 

When you combine stigma, family honor, unresolved anger, and an adversarial legal forum, otherwise simple divorce matters can become very complex to handle. 

It is vitally important to understand where clients are coming from and to respect the cultural and religious context of their lives and their disputes. The lawyer’s task is to help clients make informed rational decisions that will shape their future.  

The Significance of the Gett

Under New York’s current law, any one married more than six months can file for a “No Fault” divorce. Once a divorce is finalized, the Supreme Court issues a decree, and then either party is free to move on with their lives in every respect, including remarriage.  In 1983, New York enacted Domestic Relations Law § 253, the “Gett Law”, which was intended to resolve the above scenario by requiring the person who commenced the proceeding, the plaintiff, to sign what is known as an “Affidavit Removing Barriers to Remarriage” in order to procure a civil divorce. 

But under Jewish religious law, a civil decree is not enough for a woman to remarry. The religious community looks upon the woman as still married and not released from her husband, no matter what New York State may say. In order to end the marriage, the woman must obtain a Gett, which is a writ of religious divorce. 

But under Jewish religious law, a civil decree is not enough for a woman to remarry. The religious community looks upon the woman as still married and not released from her husband, no matter what New York State may say.

For a divorcing Jewish couple, obtaining a Gett is a Biblical mandate, found in Deuteronomy 24:1-3 and comprising one entire Book of the Talmud. It is also an imperative of the highest order. According to Jewish law, a rabbi may not officiate at the remarriage of either a husband or a wife unless their Gett has been obtained. For someone observant, not obtaining a religious divorce decree effectively means she cannot date and cannot have more children. 

Secular Remedies

New York courts have the authority to impose penalties and sanctions if the husband refuses to cooperate with the Get in a reasonable period of time. Penalties can include counsel fees, increased support awards to the wife, as well as an increased share of assets to the wife. 

Despite the enforcement remedies available, there are still real human casualties. These include victims and their children, whose lives are really torn apart by unfair outcomes in divorce matters. Victims in religious and traditional households stay in abusive situations far longer than their more secular counterparts. 

Despite the enforcement remedies available, there are still real human casualties. These include victims and their children, whose lives are really torn apart by unfair outcomes in divorce matters. Victims in religious and traditional households stay in abusive situations far longer than their more secular counterparts. 

As a civil rights matter, according to the United States Constitution, individuals should not be discriminated against based on their religious practice. Religiously motivated agreements must be interpreted the same as secularly motivated ones, as long as they can be interpreted using neutral principles and without evaluating religious doctrine.

Jacqueline Harounian is a Partner at Wisselman, Harounian & Associates in Great Neck, and a Chair of the WBASNY Matrimonial Committee. She volunteers her time at The Safe Center and UJA Hope Against Domestic Violence Committee.

Jaqueline Harounian is a member of JOFA’s Speakers Bureau. For more information on the Speakers Bureau or to apply to join, please contact dani@jofa.org.

Posts are contributed by third parties. The opinions and facts in them are presented solely by the authors and JOFA assumes no responsibility for them.

If you’re interested in writing for JOFA’s blog contact dani@jofa.org. For more about JOFA like us on Facebook or visit our website.

SAO PAULO (JTA) — Players for one of Brazil’s most popular soccer teams wore Stars of David on their jerseys on Wednesday to remember Kristallnacht, or the 1938 Nazi pogrom that most mark as the beginning of the Holocaust.

The Corinthians team’s players took the field with yellow stars embroidered above the club’s logo. Some 22,000 supporters watched them defeat Fortaleza by a score of 3-2.

Many of the seats in the stadium also displayed yellow stars, with the message “A star not to forget” printed on them. The team additionally opened a photo exhibit about the Holocaust.

On Nov 9-10, 1938, dozens of Jews were left dead and hundreds of Jewish storefronts were ruined, along with other buildings and synagogues in Germany and Austria. Tens of thousands of Jews were arrested by the Nazis in the days following the pogrom. The night’s name, which translates to the “night of broken glass,” refers to the shards of broken glass that littered the streets the following morning.

“In times of so much intolerance, hate speech, xenophobia and racism, this initiative is an example of love for the other, of commitment among peoples and nations,” Rabbi Toive Weitman, head of the Sao Paulo Holocaust Memorial, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

The Corinthians team has the most support among Sao Paulo’s 60,000 Jews. Corinthians was founded in Bom Retiro, the Sao Paulo neighborhood that was once heavily populated by Jewish immigrants who arrived in the early twentieth century and is still today home to several Jewish institutions, including the Holocaust memorial.

The team’s Kristallnacht campaign was financed and promoted by the Holocaust memorial and a private, Jewish-owned advertising agency. The jerseys will be auctioned and the funds donated to the Holocaust memorial.

A Portuguese-language video about the team and why it decided to remember Kristallnacht publicly was premiered before the match and quickly went viral on social media, gaining massive media coverage in Brazil.

“Corinthians’ message shows that Brazil is an example of peaceful coexistence, everyone must respect one another,” Daniel Bialski, who serves as Corinthians’ attorney and is president of the Hebraica Jewish sport club, told JTA.

In January, the Corinthians posed for a photo on their home field holding a poster with the hashtag #WeRemember in honor of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which got some 50,000 likes on social media. In 2018, the team wore uniforms featuring the names of the 11 Jewish victims of the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting.

“I feel greatly represented by the (team’s) message. Fighting the hatred against Jews must be emphasized and disseminated for all,” Persio Bider, president of the Organized Jewish Youth organization, told JTA.

“On behalf of the State of Israel, I would like to praise you for your inspiring decision,” Israel’s Minister of Culture Miri Regev wrote in a letter to the president of the team, Andres Navarro Sanchez, on Thursday. “I hope that many will adopt your most motivating campaign against Holocaust denial, hatred, prejudice, racism and antisemitism.”

Founded in 1910, Corinthians is one of Brazil’s most popular soccer teams with over 30 million fans. It was listed by Forbes as the most valuable soccer club in the Americas in 2017, worth $576.9 million.

 

SAO PAULO (JTA) — Players for one of Brazil’s most popular soccer teams wore Stars of David on their jerseys on Wednesday to remember Kristallnacht, or the 1938 Nazi pogrom that most mark as the beginning of the Holocaust.

The Corinthians team’s players took the field with yellow stars embroidered above the club’s logo. Some 22,000 supporters watched them defeat Fortaleza by a score of 3-2.

Many of the seats in the stadium also displayed yellow stars, with the message “A star not to forget” printed on them. The team additionally opened a photo exhibit about the Holocaust.

On Nov 9-10, 1938, dozens of Jews were left dead and hundreds of Jewish storefronts were ruined, along with other buildings and synagogues in Germany and Austria. Tens of thousands of Jews were arrested by the Nazis in the days following the pogrom. The night’s name, which translates to the “night of broken glass,” refers to the shards of broken glass that littered the streets the following morning.

“In times of so much intolerance, hate speech, xenophobia and racism, this initiative is an example of love for the other, of commitment among peoples and nations,” Rabbi Toive Weitman, head of the Sao Paulo Holocaust Memorial, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

The Corinthians team has the most support among Sao Paulo’s 60,000 Jews. Corinthians was founded in Bom Retiro, the Sao Paulo neighborhood that was once heavily populated by Jewish immigrants who arrived in the early twentieth century and is still today home to several Jewish institutions, including the Holocaust memorial.

The team’s Kristallnacht campaign was financed and promoted by the Holocaust memorial and a private, Jewish-owned advertising agency. The jerseys will be auctioned and the funds donated to the Holocaust memorial.

A Portuguese-language video about the team and why it decided to remember Kristallnacht publicly was premiered before the match and quickly went viral on social media, gaining massive media coverage in Brazil.

“Corinthians’ message shows that Brazil is an example of peaceful coexistence, everyone must respect one another,” Daniel Bialski, who serves as Corinthians’ attorney and is president of the Hebraica Jewish sport club, told JTA.

In January, the Corinthians posed for a photo on their home field holding a poster with the hashtag #WeRemember in honor of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which got some 50,000 likes on social media. In 2018, the team wore uniforms featuring the names of the 11 Jewish victims of the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting.

“I feel greatly represented by the (team’s) message. Fighting the hatred against Jews must be emphasized and disseminated for all,” Persio Bider, president of the Organized Jewish Youth organization, told JTA.

“On behalf of the State of Israel, I would like to praise you for your inspiring decision,” Israel’s Minister of Culture Miri Regev wrote in a letter to the president of the team, Andres Navarro Sanchez, on Thursday. “I hope that many will adopt your most motivating campaign against Holocaust denial, hatred, prejudice, racism and antisemitism.”

Founded in 1910, Corinthians is one of Brazil’s most popular soccer teams with over 30 million fans. It was listed by Forbes as the most valuable soccer club in the Americas in 2017, worth $576.9 million.

(JTA) — For 86 years, Jewish leaders have gathered annually at the Jewish Federations of North America’s General Assembly to discuss pressing issues facing their communities. Some 3,000 people attended last year’s conference in Tel Aviv.

But this year, there won’t be a GA. Instead, Jewish Federations is putting on a much smaller, invite-only event titled FedLab.

The decision to hold the event was made last year, said Jewish Federations CEO Eric Fingerhut, who recently succeeded Jerry Silverman in the post.

Participants in the Nov. 10-12 conference in Washington, D.C., will be on one of three tracks focusing on a major issue facing the Jewish community. The topics are communal security, Jewish engagement and social services to help those in need.

Nearly 900 people, including lay and professional federation leaders, will attend the conference.

“[W]e wanted to take this year and really roll up our sleeves, work in a very intensive manner on these critical issues that we face,” Fingerhut said. “It’s an innovation and one that I’m excited to try out.”

Next year will be back to a regular General Assembly in Chicago. Fingerhut said the organization is still deciding what will happen in future years, with options such as alternating between hosting a smaller conference and a regular GA or hosting both each year.

In the 1990s, the GA was the largest annual conference in the American Jewish community. In recent years, however, federations and other communal organizations have struggled to engage young people. Now the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the liberal pro-Israel group J Street and the Reform movement draw larger crowds at their annual or biannual conferences.