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High End Stores Near Trump Tower Have Security Apparatus Taken Down

By
Sholom Schreirber
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Trump Tower in midtown Manhattan. Photo Credit: AP

Edited by: TJVNews.com

Now that former President Trump has left the White House for his Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, New Yorkers who want to navigate midtown Manhattan can do so with an ease in restrictions. For the last four years, the block of East 56th Street between Madison and Fifth Avenues had been closed to vehicular traffic because of security purposes but now things have reverted back to what they were prior to the 2016 presidential race.

According to a New York Post report, the people who are most thrilled by this development are the owners of an office building that isn’t even open yet.

For the last four and a half years, vehicular traffic has been banned from the block. According to the Post report, people strolling down the fashionable street where Trump Tower stands as an imposing figure have been faced with “fortress-like zone of steel and concrete barricades, NYPD and Secret Service sheds, and tank-size security trucks.”

The Post reported that now that Trump is no longer residing at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the NYPD reopened the block last week. This comes as a breath of fresh air to such high-end stores like Giorgio Armani, Armani Ristorante and Oxxford Clothes, each of whom are located at 717 Fifth Avenue.

Because of the barricades and security structures, the flow of pedestrian traffic had been curtailed and business was steadily decreasing. An Oxxford manager who wished to remain anonymous told the Post that the situation around Trump Tower was “miserable.” The Post also reported that Trump Tower was also referred to as the “Black House” by employees of Armani Restaurant because of the substantial loss in business that they sustained.

A source told the Post that the restaurant that caters to an affluent crowd lost 50 percent of its business immediately after the 2016 street shutdown. The source revealed to the Post that, “many clients came by car or limousine and they couldn’t get here. We struggled after that to bring at least some of our business back.”

Other happy campers or business owners are the owners of 550 Madison Avenue between East 55th and 56th streets, the vacant former Sony headquarters that Olayan America is spending $300 million to redesign, according to the Post report.

Olayan Group managing director and head of US real estate, Erik Horvat told the Post that the intense security apparatus around Trump Tower “changed the dynamic and the vibe to see the whole street on guard.”

Horvat added, “It’s not a political statement to say that until November, nobody even knew if the street would be closed for four years more.”

Horvat added that the barricades, along with security guards carrying machine guns were “inconsistent” with the health-conscious image the building wanted to project, according to the Post report.

Film Review–The 800 Jewish Holocaust Orphans of Selvino

By
Sholom Schreirber
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The War is Over (La Guera è Finita) is a compelling, newly-released, eight-part Italian miniseries produced by RAI (the Italian national public broadcasting company), now streaming on MHz Choice in Italian with English subtitles. Photo Credit: MHz Choice

The story of an abandoned estate in Italy, and the 800 traumatized orphaned Jewish children who were treated there from 1945-48 before going to Palestine

By: Dr. Phyllis Chesler

Poland’s “dignity” is offended by the truth—but only when that truth exposes a Polish official or citizen for having aided and abetted the Nazis and for having persecuted Polish Jews during the Nazi occupation. The Polish government has never tried any Polish historian or journalist for having described Polish individuals and clergy who fed, hid, and saved Polish Jews.

Isabella Ragonese as Giulia (credit: MHz Choice)

The honor of Poland is at stake and the Poles are deeply invested in presenting themselves as “victims”—of the Russians and of the Nazis, never also as the perpetrators of Jew-hatred and pogroms long before the Nazi armies came to town, and after they were driven out (Jewabne, Kielce).

Down the decades, I have learned bitter but complex truths about the French, Dutch, Belgian, Spanish, Hungarian, Greek, Croatian, Norwegian, and Ukrainian complicity in the Holocaust. Somehow, because I loved Italy (the art, the opera, the landscape, the cinema), I never looked too closely at their role during World War Two. Once, when I hired a guide to take me on a tour of Jewish Italy, she gave me a book which contained a fairly gruesome history of 2,000 years of Italian Jewish sorrows. And once, when I was living in Venice, it hit me hard when I learned that Venice—Venice! had also turned over its Jews to Hitler, albeit, not until 1943.

When I looked into the matter further, I understood that Italy had begun to disenfranchise its Jews in 1938, before Kristallnacht took place in Germany. Jewish children were no longer allowed to attend private schools, Jewish professors were exiled from all universities, from government and military service, as well as from banking and insurance industries. In 1939 and 1940, Jewish peddlers and shopkeepers’ licenses were revoked and all Jews who held stocks and bonds were required to turn them over to “Aryans.” If possible, matters worsened once Germany occupied Italy in 1943. According to Ms. Ilaria Pavan, a former Italian official investigating the “looting of property of Jewish Italian citizens,” as of 2010, such looting “totaled almost 1 billion in today’s values.”

Michele Riondino as Davide (credit: MHz Choice)

As with Poland, all the European histories describe governments and individuals who were eager to expropriate Jewish property (real estate, homes, factories, art work, chinaware, clothing, bank accounts, furniture); eager to hand over the former Jewish owners to Hitler’s gas chambers. There are also accurate accounts of non-Jewish European who saved Jews and who fought Hitler’s armies as partisans.

There were heroes and villains, resisters and cowards, in every country.

What got me thinking about this all over again was my accidental discovery of a very moving eight-part miniseries, The War is Over, which is just now being live-streamed on MHZ in Italian with English subtitles. This RAI film is based on the book by Aharon Megged about the orphaned “children of Selvino,” and relates the true story of the 800 traumatized Jewish children who were rescued from concentration camps and ghettos all across Europe, who had no parents, no families, and who were physically, psychologically, spiritually, and sexually wounded, as well as educationally deprived.

From 1945-1948, the Milanese Jewish community, the municipality of Milan, soldiers of the Jewish Brigade (Moshe Ze-eri and Teddy Be’eri), the Jewish Agency, the Joint Distribution Committee, Youth Aliyah, and former anti-fascist partisan fighters, and Jewish and non-Jewish youth workers all took care of these children in an abandoned estate in northern Italy. They tried to heal them well enough so that they could make the journey to Palestine on those heroically “illegal” immigrant ships that the British stopped, fired upon, and forced to land in Cyprus. Eventually, some of these children joined Kibbutz Tze’elim in the Negev.

Vintage photo of Passover Eve at the Sciesopoli House (credit: Wikipedia Commons)

In 2019, after a seven year campaign, a museum opened in Selvino to commemorate this heroic rescue operation.

The miniseries is beautifully and soulfully acted (Michele Riondino, Isabella Ragonese, Valerio Binasco), but the children will steal your heart. Please watch it. Experience the past present.

Vintage photo of the Sciescopoli Building (Wikimedia Commons)

             (Israel National News)

Prof. Phyllis Chesler is a Ginsburg-Ingerman Fellow at the Middle East Forum, received the 2013 National Jewish Book Award,.authored 20 books, including Women and Madness and The New Anti-Semitism, and 4 studies about honor killing, Her latest books are An American Bride in Kabul, A Family Conspiracy: Honor Killing and A Politically Incorrect Feminist.

By
Sholom Schreirber
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Lone Voice: The Wars of Isi Leibler, a tome by renowned Australian-Jewish historian Suzanne D. Rutland.

New Biography Reveals the Lifelong Battles of Australian-Israeli Warrior Isi Leibler

By: Ruthie Blum

Reading a biography about a friend is a mixed experience. On the one hand, the protagonist is familiar. On the other, he’s a complete stranger, whose story unfolds like that of a fictional character being introduced in a novel.

This is the sense of duality that I had while curled up with Lone Voice: The Wars of Isi Leibler, a tome by renowned Australian-Jewish historian Suzanne D. Rutland.

Before meeting Leibler in person 20 years ago, I knew about the human-rights activist from Australia and his long-standing fight on behalf of Soviet Jewry, his tireless battle against global anti-Semitism and his connection to the World Jewish Congress—an organization from which he subsequently resigned as vice president and whose financial corruption he would launch a campaign to expose.

I was also aware that he possessed one of the world’s largest private libraries of Jewish books, certainly the most extensive in Israel. Visions of a dimly lit room covered floor-to-ceiling in volumes of bibles bound in leather and gold, alongside works of the sages and interpretations of the Talmud, came to mind.

Judging by his aptly named “Candidly Speaking” columns in The Jerusalem Post—all brutally honest and hard-hitting—I imagined the man himself to be a daunting, scholarly figure around whom I would do well to watch my intellectual step.

As subsequently became apparent, however, Leibler would be the first to smile, if not emit his infectious laugh, at the above descriptions. Indeed, neither his library nor his demeanor in any way resembles the picture or conclusions that I had drawn prior to visiting his Jerusalem home and being given a tour of the famous athenaeum.

Though it does contain the ancient manuscripts that I’d conjured, they—and the many thousands of other works by Jewish authors as diverse as Natan Sharansky and Philip Roth—are housed in anything but a dim, antique setting. Instead, they’re lined up in rows of modern, moveable stacks.

As striking as this was at first sight, it was nothing compared to the discovery that not only had Leibler read all of the 40,000 books in his home, but could locate any one of them, within seconds, on demand.

To this day—two decades and many additional titles later—he knows exactly where to find a certain hardcover or paperback, no matter how obscure, among the collection. Of all Leibler’s points of laser focus, this is the one that still makes my jaw drop.

But his biblio-savantism is not what makes him stand out in the public arena. No, it’s the courage to speak his piece—orally and in print, even when doing so ruffles illustrious feathers—for which he is best known.

A religious Zionist, he’s never shied away from criticizing rabbis in that community whom he considers having moved too far in the direction of ultra-Orthodoxy and radicalism.

Nor has he hesitated to express his displeasure with Israeli politicians, including after praising them, when he feels that they have betrayed their mandate or put petty politics ahead of the interests of the state.

Both issues are especially relevant today, in the lead-up to the March 23 Knesset elections, with Israel’s societal divisions heightened as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. These schisms can be seen most vividly in attitudes among and towards the country’s haredi communities, as well as in the split between members of the public supporting the continued leadership of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and those, on the left and the right, in the “anybody but Bibi” camp.

The 86-year-old Leibler, who moved to Israel from Australia in 1999, has always had strong opinions on each of these topics.

As Rutland writes: “Beyond any overarching battle in which he is engaged at any particular moment, Isi [Leibler] has never stopped thinking or writing about theological and political developments in the Orthodox world into which he was born. The trends worry him particularly. The first is that inward-looking rabbis (mostly non-Zionist, sometimes anti-Zionist) in the haredi camp, for whom insularity and ultra-Orthodox stringency are integral to their lifestyle, have achieved political control of Israel’s official Rabbinate, the institution that oversees conversion to Judaism, kosher certification, ritual baths, marriage, divorce, and burial. Isi views the display of haredi power as antithetical to the Zionist ethos and fears that these rabbis are negatively redefining the image of Jewish mores in the eyes of Israel’s non-Orthodox but traditional-leaning majority.”

Where his stance on Netanyahu is concerned, Rutland explains that just as “realpolitik—and not unshakeable ideology—has guided the tactical policies he has advocated,” the same pragmatism is behind Leibler’s positions on the Israeli premier, whom he has known personally for many years.

Rutland describes Leibler’s admiration for Netanyahu’s “capacity and talents as a leader, [which] surpass those of his rivals” as the basis for numerous op-eds promoting the prime minister.

“At the same time,” she adds, “he is never obsequious and has no hesitation about criticizing Netanyahu when it is warranted. In fact, in the aftermath of two failed elections, Isi was the first commentator on the right who openly called for Netanyahu to step down for the good of the country.”

Nevertheless, this was before the defeat on Nov. 3 of Donald Trump—whom Leibler has called “the most pro-Israel president since the state was established”—by Democratic Party contender Joe Biden. It was also prior to the U.S. Congress’s turning blue.

It’s not clear whether the advent of such an administration in Washington—aided by liberal and progressive American Jews who, in Leibler’s words, “seem to be acting like lemmings on a suicide march”—is causing him to harbor second thoughts about the alternatives to a Netanyahu-led government in Jerusalem.

But if it is, he’ll be the first to admit it.

            (www.JNS.org)

Ruthie Blum is an Israel-based journalist and author of “To Hell in a Handbasket: Carter, Obama, and the ‘Arab Spring.’ ”

Jews of Myanmar: 10 Facts

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
Indian Jews soon could be found in Rangoon working as clerks both for British colonialists and Baghdadi Jewish traders. Some Bene Israel workers labored at the docks in the Burmese port of Mandalay.

Here are some little-known facts about Myanmar, Jews, and the Jewish state.

By: Dr. Yvette Alt Miller

 

Early Jewish Visitors

In the early 1800s, Jewish traders – primarily from India and Iraq – began to venture into present-day Myanmar. The first Jew to live permanently in the country is said to have been an Indian Jew named Solomon Gabirol, who served as commissar in the army of King Alaungpaya, the 18th Century Burmese monarch who established the Konbaung Dynasty, which ruled Burma until 1885.

Once British forces entered Burma in the 1820s, there are records of some Jewish traders working in the country. One of them, Solomon Reinman, moved from Galicia to the bustling city of Rangoon in 1851, where he traded teak and bamboo. Reinman later moved to the Indian city of Cochin, which had a Jewish community at the time, married, and spent 25 years there. Late in life, he returned to Europe, moved to Vienna and wrote a Hebrew-language account of his travels called Masot Shelomo, or Travels of Solomon. It was one of the first western accounts of Myanmar.

 

Bringing Baghdad Jewish Culture to Burma

By the mid-1800s a large community of Jews from Baghdad lived and worked in Burma. Writer Ruth Fredman Cernea, author of Almost Englishman: Baghdadi Jews in British Burma (Lexington Books: 2006) notes that these Jewish traders came “as an extended family,” and used their extensive social and familial connections to facilitate trade throughout Asia.

In addition to trading a range of goods, she notes, “They also serviced the ships that docked in the busy Rangoon harbor. Some entered the civil service as government officials and customs officers; others worked as clerks in Baghdadi stores on Mogul or Dalhousie Streets (in Rangoon). Even as they became more comfortable in Burma, the Burma Jewish community was an intrinsic part of the broader Baghdadi world that existed throughout Southeast Asia…. Rangoon or Mandalay (another Burmese city) might be their mailing address, but their ‘home’ could not be so easily defined or confined.” These Jewish traders brought a slice of Baghdadi Jewish life to their new homes overseas.

 

Jewish Cultural Mixing

Soon, other Jews began to settle in Burma. Ruth Fredman Cernea notes that although the Baghdadi Jews were sophisticated traders, their English was often poor and prevented them working for Burma’s new British colonizers. Instead, it was Indian Jews – from the city of Cochin which had long been home to a thriving Jewish community and poorer Bene Israel Jews from smaller towns and villages – who were often more fluent in English and who found it easier to work for the British.

Indian Jews soon could be found in Rangoon working as clerks both for British colonialists and Baghdadi Jewish traders. Some Bene Israel workers labored at the docks in the Burmese port of Mandalay.

 

Arook Thayin: Chicken Croquettes Burmese Style

Food historian Claudia Roden notes that culinarily, “It was Jews of Baghdadi origin who organized the congregation (of Burmese Jews), and it is their style of cooking that influenced the Jewish style that developed locally.” She supplies this recipe as an example of the Burmese style of Jewish cooking that developed in Burma.

  • 4 scallions, very finely chopped
  • ½ – 2 fresh green chilies, seeded and very finely chopped
  • ¼ cup chopped coriander leaves
  • 3 chicken-breast fillets weighing about 12 oz (350 g)
  • 3 T flour
  • 4 eggs
  • Juice of 1 ½ inch (4 cm) piece of fresh ginger, crushed in a garlic press, or the grated pieces
  • Salt
  • Light vegetable oil for deep-frying, about 1 inch (2 ½ cm) deep

Chop the scallions, chilies (“half a chili is enough for me,” Claudia Roden notes), and coriander in the food processor. Hen add the chicken, flour, eggs, ginger, and salt, and process until the chicken is finely chopped and all the ingredients are well blended. Chill, covered, for 1-2 hours.

Deep-fry by the heaping tablespoon (dip the spoon in oil so that the mixture does not stick) in medium-hot oil turning over once, until browned all over. Drain on paper towels. The recipe makes about 14 2 ½ inch (6 cm) fritters and up to 36 tiny ones. Serve hot or cold.

(From The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey From Samarkand to New York, Claudia Roden: 1996.)

 

Azariah Samuel

One of the first Baghdadi Jews to settle in Burma moved to the remote city of Akyab (later called Sittwe), a port city on the Bay of Bengal. Cut off from Jewish communities, Azariah nevertheless came prepared to live a religious Jewish life. He traveled with his own shochet or Jewish ritual slaughterer, to ensure that he and his family could have a supply of kosher meat, and seemingly never compromised his Orthodox Jewish lifestyle.

Azariah’s family eventually numbered five children. He and his wife built a Jewish cemetery, which still exists in Sittwe; one of their sons tragically died in childhood and is buried there. As a Jewish community grew up in the Burmese capital, Rangoon, the Samuel family would sometimes travel there for Jewish festivals, or else host other Burmese Jews in Akyab. By the 1880s Azariah Samuel was a prominent businessman in the town. His son Samuel Haim Samuel took over many of his father’s properties, which included a wine store and cinema. Samuel Haim was also a shochet, having learned the trade from the shochet his father first brought with him to Burma.

The entire Samuel family left Burma in 1931, moving to the Indian city of Calcutta, and eventually moving on to Australia and London.

 

Working in the Royal Court

Other Jews traveled to the royal city of Yadanabon, also known as Mandalay or “The City of Gems” to work in the Burmese royal court there. Jewish merchants Aaron Jacob Elias Aaron and his son David Hai Aaron were royal accountants working for King Mindon.

The beautiful Sofaer building still stands at the corner of Pansodan (Phayre Street) and Merchant Street. The photograph is of an early Sofaer business along Merchant Street.

In 1878 King Mindon’s son Thibaw was crowned. A bloody ruler, he tried to regain his kingdom from the British and was eventually defeated and forced into exile in 1885. Through these long years of fighting and bloody mayhem, a Jewish community managed to hang on in Mandalay.

Saul Reuben Hakham Rabbi Sasson arrived in the royal city in 1878 along with his son Mordechai Saul. The pair had just travelled from Baghdad on a bizarre errand. Mordechai Saul was engaged to marry his teenage second cousin Seema, but Seema and her family fled Baghdad after a bandit – the family said an Arab sheikh – kidnapped Seema’s older sister and held her for ransom.

Reunited in Mandalay, Mordechai Saul and Seema married. Seeking permission to set up a business in the royal city, Mordechai Saul petitioned for an audience with King Thibaw. He wanted to make a good impression, so he brought with him some bottles of expensive perfume he’d carried to Burma all the way from Baghdad, and presented them to Queen Supaylat as a gift. Delighted with the beautiful bottles – and presumably unfamiliar with the concept of perfume – Queen Supaylat opened them, poured the perfume out onto the floor, and declared herself delighted with the beautiful flower-holding bottles which she had placed in front of the palace’s Buddha statue.

Mordechai and Seema Saul quickly travelled to Baghdad to buy more perfume bottles, and for years they operated a store on the palace grounds, selling perfume so that Burmese customers could enjoy the beautiful bottles, just as Queen Supaylat had done.

Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion accompanied by Burmese Former Chief Justice U Thein Mg, in Rangoon December 10, 1961.

 

Musmeah Yeshua Synagogue

In 1854 the small Jewish community of Rangoon built a synagogue, Musmeah Yeshua Synagogue. In 1896, when the city’s Jewish population had swelled to over 200, the community rebuilt the synagogue out of stone. The building bears a striking resemblance to the Magen David synagogue in Calcutta in India: one visitor described it as having a “soaring ceiling, memorial lamps suspended in midair and pale beams over a central carved bimah located in the center of the prayer hall, surrounded by benches for the worshippers. Above them is a women’s gallery.”

 

Glory Days in the 1930s

By the 1930s, about 3,000 Jews lived in Burma, most in Rangoon, the country’s new capital. A second synagogue, Beth El, was built there in 1932. Then known as Yangon, the capital city even had a Jewish mayor in the 1930s: local businessman David Sofaer.

Locals have recalled that “Jewish restaurants, pharmacies, and schools once marked the city’s streets.” Even today, some buildings in downtown Rangoon boast Jewish stars on their facades, a hint that years ago they might have been owned by Burmese Jews.

Burma was devastated during World War II when it was bombed and invaded by Japan. Nearly all of the country’s Jews fled, moving to India, present-day Israel and elsewhere. After the war, a few hundred Jews returned, but they nearly all left the country as it pursued repressive policies. By 2010, only about 20 Jews remained in all of Rangoon.

 

Burmese-Israeli Friendship

Burma and Israel each gained independence in 1948, and the two countries forged a close relationship in the 1950s. In 1955, Burmese Prime Minister U Nu became the first foreign prime minister to visit Israel.

Journalist Joe Freeman notes that this was an immensely important event. “Today, it’s difficult to revive the importance of his act, but at the time, it was highly significant. U Nu was a major figure among leaders of non-Western countries, many of which had opposed Israel’s establishment.” That same year, Israel appointed its first envoy to an Asian country, naming David HaCohen Israel’s minister to Burma.

Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir wrote extensively about Burma in her autobiography My Life (1975). “I think there was no developing country in the world…with which we conducted such an ardent love affair. For years there seemed to be nothing about Israel that the Burmese did not admire or want to emulate…” Golda Meir organized visits of Burmese people to Israel so they could learn from the Jewish state. Sharing a hostile border with China, it was especially instructive for Burmese civilians to learn how Israel managed to survive surrounded by hostile Arab neighbors.

In 1961, Golda Meir and her husband Menachem visited Burma. “I could…hardly believe that I was not dreaming when we landed at a northern airport and all the Burmese wives and children who had once been in Israel greeted me with Hebrew songs and Israeli flags. I don’t think I will ever forget walking up to one of the little houses in Namsang and saying in Hebrew to a young Burmese who stood in the doorway: ‘Shalom, ma nish ma?’ (‘Shalom, how are things?) and hearing him answer, like a real Israeli, ‘Beseder, aval ein maspeek mayim.’ (‘Fine, but there isn’t enough water’.) I might have been in (the Israeli city) Revivim,” Meir recalled.

 

Last Jews in Rangoon

For the past six years, it’s fallen to one man, a Burmese Jewish entrepreneur in his 40s named Sammy Samuels, to maintain Rangoon’s Jewish sites. He took over leadership of Burma’s Jewish community in 2015, when his father Moses, who was the leader, passed away.

Sammy Samuels, second from right, sings at a Hanukkah event with Burmese leaders. Israel’s ambassador to Myanmar, Ronen Gilor, is third from left; between them is Phyo Min Thein, the chief minister of the Yangon region, Dec. 7, 2018. (Charles Dunst)

Sammy’s Burmese name is Aung Soe Lwin, and he’s one of perhaps twenty Jews who still live in the city. These days, nearly the only visitors to Burma’s Jewish sites are tourists. Despite the almost total lack of local Jews, Sammy is optimistic about Jewish life in Burma today. “People (here) would not understand what ‘anti-Semitism’ is,” he explains; “Thank God, there’s no such word here.”

(www.Aish.com)

Thousands of Chabad Women Envision a Better Year Ahead

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
Instead of being staged in a cavernous hall in Brooklyn, N.Y., this year’s Gala Event of International Conference of Chabad-Lubavitch Women Emissaries (Kinus Hashluchos), was held in the limitless halls of the online world.

In an online conference, emissaries discuss moving forward in a post-coronavirus world

By: Aharon Loschak

The dizzying geographical scope of the Chabad-Lubavitch empire of emissaries around the world has long been a topic of conversation—an impressive phenomenon that inspires amazement and admiration on any day. When it comes time for the annual conference of emissaries with so many of them in one room, it is only that much more magnified.

But with such an enormous, far-flung cadre, there will always be someone who is not able to be present. Be it the remoteness of the location, a personal family celebration to attend or other logistical challenge, inevitably, some will not be able to attend.

This year’s iteration of the Gala Banquet of International Conference of Chabad-Lubavitch Women Emissaries (Kinus Hashluchos), however, truly represented every member. Instead of being staged in a cavernous hall in Brooklyn, N.Y., it was held in the limitless halls of the online world. Dubbed the “Gala Event,” much effort was invested to ensure that everyone got in on the action

And they sure did.

Starting with a resounding welcome from around the world, video footage took participants from New Zealand to Nigeria to Israel, and looped back to Uruguay, with the local shluchah (emissary) of each place wishing their welcome from fields, buildings and busy street corners.

The global spin did not relent, as the customary opening chapter of Psalms was recited by young girls bearing the name “Chaya Mushka” from every conceivable corner of the globe. The women’s conference, in its 31st year, takes place around the 22nd of the Hebrew month of Shevat, the yahrzeit of Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka Schneerson, of righteous memory, the wife of the Rebbe—Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory.

 

Defying the Odds From the Veranda

Rivkah Slonim from Binghamton, N.Y., addressed the audience with the many lessons and impressions to be learned from the Rebbetzin. Noting that Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka shied away from the public eye, Slonim recounted how in Leningrad in 1927, it was she who had the courage and the wits to shout from the veranda to her husband-to-be, the Rebbe, that the “Government was visiting!” a coded message that meant that her illustrious father, the Sixth Rebbe, was being arrested by the Communist Regime for his Jewish activities, and that everyone else should leave for safety.

“We, too,” exclaimed Slonim, “must draw the same courage and shout from our verandas that come what may—even a dreaded pandemic—we have the resources, wit and faith to power through.”

Her message was affirmed by Mrs. Henya Yehudis Lazar of Milan, Italy, who spoke of her personal experience surviving the Holocaust as a small girl and emerging all the more firm in faith and resilient in spirit. After poignantly taking pause to remember the shluchos who have passed over this year, raising her glass—a befitting, ornate silver goblet—Lazar movingly blessed her fellow shluchos with health, prosperity and success in their collective mission.

 

‘First Option: Over, Not Under’

The evening’s theme thereafter came to light, with footage from the Rebbe quoting the now-famous adage of the fifth Lubavitcher Rebbe, “The world says that if you face a challenge, first try to climb under it, if you cannot crawl under, then try climbing over it. But I say, Lechatchila Ariber!—‘Jump over it to begin with!’ ”

Indeed, this pandemic year of illness, quarantine and social distancing has made such an attitude the only option. Footage of one shluchah after another declaring the same thing brought this into stark relief: While the world shut down, they just knew that there was no choice other than to steel themselves and jump over any obstacle that may come. How? They may not know, but that they will indeed do it, they did know.

The subsequent feature films of individual stories from across the shlichus landscape broadcasted this theme loud and clear.

 

Ice Mikvah in Tasmania

Quarantine in one of the most remote places in the world with no mikvah? No matter. Chabad of Tasmania was on it—whether it made sense or not.

Mrs. Rochel Gordon of South Launceston, Tasmania, recounted how when the world shut down in mid-March, two thoughts struck her: What would happen with bringing in Passover goods to the island, and what about the mikvah? “For years, I made the exhausting trip to Melbourne every month,” says Gordon, “and it really dictated our life’s schedule here.” But with the specter of the country going indefinitely into lockdown, what was she to do?

“What I really thought about was a young bride-to-be I knew who would not be able to get married without a mikvah,” she says.

There was an old, derelict mikvah in Tasmania that had fallen out of use and was no longer halachically valid. After consulting with rabbinic authorities, the only option to revitalize it was to bring in fresh water in the form of … blocks of ice. Such an item was impossible to procure locally, until out of the blue, on a Friday afternoon, the sole ice factory on the island called and promised to specially produce it for them if paid in full that day.

Needless to say, Gordon rallied, and there is now a kosher mikvah in Tasmania—and the wedding went through.

 

Hebrew School for 40K in a Day

It’s this attitude that makes the impossible happen: when inactivity is not an option, then activity occurs in almost miraculous ways.

In a feature video title “Triumph of Jewish Education,” viewers learned that when most major cities in the United States decided to put a lockdown in place on Friday, March 13, 2020, a large number of shluchos from around the country had one thought: What will happen regarding Hebrew school that Sunday?

The entire world had no idea what “lockdown” or “quarantine” meant. No one knew how long this would last. Yet there they were—a large group of shluchos on a conference call shortly before Shabbat and on numerous WhatsApp chats arranging virtual Hebrew school to open a mere 48 hours later.

With help from Rabbi Zalmy Lowenthal at the CTeen offices of Suite 302 of Merkos L’Inyonei Chinuch and under the directorship of Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, a miracle really did happen: Hebrew school kicked off on Sunday.

Attendance?

40,000 children. That’s thousand, not hundred.

In his address to the conference, Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, vice chairman of Merkos L’Inyonei Chinuch—the educational arm of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement—noted the tremendous feat and how it drove home an attitude Jews everywhere should assume: Obstacles aside, “we are here to do whatever it takes to finally bring about the redemption.”

 

Keynote From Istanbul

In her keynote address, Mrs. Chaya Chitrik of Istanbul, Turkey, elaborated on this theme. With powerful personal stories from her family history as well as life in a Muslim-majority country with such a strong Jewish background, she explained that just as Moses saw a bush that burned yet was not consumed, so it was with this generation’s Moses, the Rebbe. He saw a Jewish nation that had burned in the crematoriums of Europe, yet they were not consumed, she said. Galvanizing the attitude of “always over,” the Rebbe empowered the shluchim and shluchos “to tackle the darkness of this world and demonstrate that there’s never truly an obstacle in the way of G d’s vision for a better tomorrow.”

 

A Jewish Community in Argentina Comes Full-Circle

The final feature of the afternoon told the incredible story of the new shluchimto Bahia Blanca, Argentina. Rabbi Shmuel and Shterni Freedman. It was Jan. 2, 1987, when the new rabbi’s parents—Rabbi Moshe Freedman and his wife, Sarah—heard that the Rebbe had asked that menorahs be lit in all public spaces. Freedman told of the sheer impossibility of pulling off such an event in such short time, yet “If the Rebbe asked, lechatchilah ariber—we’re going to do it!”

Indeed, they did, fashioning a large 12-foot menorah in record time and getting many dignitaries and government officials on board for a large public menorah-lighting in front of city hall. From then on, it became a yearly tradition.

Sadly, in 2016, Moshe Freedman passed at the age of 57, and the community has keenly felt his loss. When his son, Rabbi Shmuel Freedman, and his wife, Shterni, announced that they would be moving back to take the helm of Chabad in Bahia Blanca last year, the community was overjoyed.

And then COVID-19 hit, and it seemed that they would have to wait indefinitely.

            (www.chabad.org)

Parshas Terumah – “One of the Angels”

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
The parashah tells of God’s instructions to make the Tabernacle and its furnishings. Photo Credit: Wikipedia

By: Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb

My grandmother was one of the angels. Like every Jewish grandmother, she loved each and every one of her grandchildren. As her oldest grandchild, I believed that I was surely her favorite. But I eventually discovered that my siblings and cousins were all equally convinced that they were her favorites.

She had a way of making us each feel special. I remember distinctly how even as a very young boy, I knew that in her eyes I could do no wrong. She was a typical grandmother in almost every way.

I say “almost” because in some ways, she was very different from her peers. She was one of the first women in New York State to receive a driver’s license. I vividly remember the newspaper clipping on the bulletin board in her kitchen. It showed her receiving a certificate from some public official under the headline “Brooklyn Grandma is in the Driver’s Seat.” It didn’t mention that said driver’s seat was in a huge Packard, one of the most glamorous cars then on the road.

Something else was unique about Grandmother. She was devoted to synagogue life. She spoke perfect English and rarely spoke to us in Yiddish, but she never used the word “synagogue.” Instead, she called every Jewish house of worship “ah heilige sheel, a holy shul.” She prayed privately twice a day and only attended sheel on the Sabbath and festivals. But those were the most glorious moments of her week.

It is at this time of year, when the weekly Torah portion of Terumah (Exodus 25:1-27:19) is read, that I am reminded of Grandmother’s dedication to the synagogue. Parshat Terumah enumerates the components of the Tabernacle that the Jews built in the wilderness and describes what can be termed the first fundraising campaign in synagogue history.

Grandmother spearheaded synagogue building campaigns wherever she lived: the Lower East Side of Manhattan, Harlem, and finally Brooklyn. But it was not as a community activist that she conveyed her spiritual fervor to me. Rather, it was when she drove me and my cousin, in the shiny black Packard, to purchase kosher groceries in the “old neighborhood” every Sunday morning. She would drive over the Manhattan Bridge, and just as we crossed the river, she would point to a large gray stone building just under the bridge. Her eyes would tear and her voice would choke every time we passed that building. In a very subdued voice, she would deliver this message: “That building was once a sheel, built by angels. Now it is no longer a sheel. It is a kloyster. Non-Jews worship there.”

When we asked her why “we” lost it and whether it was really built by angels, she would respond evasively, in typical grandmotherly fashion, “You are too young for me to answer you. One day, when you are older, you will understand.”

Grandmother passed away more than fifty years ago. Gradually, after her passing, I began to understand who the angels were who built the shul and why “we” lost it. I discovered the angels when perusing the Midrash Rabba on the Book of Kohelet one Sukkot afternoon. I came across this passage:

“Rabbi Chanina ben Dosa observed the people of his city bringing materials for the reconstruction of the Holy Temple. He wished to follow their example. He found a large boulder that would serve well as part of the Temple’s new wall. He sculpted the stone and polished it. But it was far too heavy for him to carry up to Jerusalem. He asked passersby to help him, but they would only do so for a fee, which he could not afford. Finally, he beheld five strangers approaching him. They agreed to carry the stone, but only on the condition that he would place his hand on the stone. He did so and suddenly found himself, and the stone, miraculously transported to Jerusalem. The five men were nowhere to be found. He entered the Temple chamber in which the Sanhedrin sat and inquired after them. The sages told him that they were not men, but angels.”

That passage in the Midrash taught me that those who simply lend a hand to a holy project are granted the assistance of the angels. Angels build synagogues.

That’s the good news. The sad news is that only angels can sustain synagogues once they are built. Only when those who attend synagogue behave like angels, in a decorous and reverent manner, do synagogues endure. Improper behavior in a house of prayer results in its ultimate destruction. More than one of our great sages has identified irreverence in the synagogue as the reason that many former Jewish houses of worship are now churches or mosques, theaters or museums, and often entirely destroyed.

I can hear Grandmother speaking to me today: “Synagogues are built by angels, but we must behave in them as angels would. If we don’t, we lose them.” She recognized that the old grey building in Lower Manhattan may have been built by angels, but it wasn’t maintained by angels. It was maintained by those who came to synagogue to chatter idly, gossip maliciously, and cynically mock the rabbi and the cantor. No wonder “we” lost it.

Achieving proper synagogue decorum has been a perennial problem for the Jewish community. When a community gathers to build a new synagogue, it does so as a group of angels with noble motives. But as we grow accustomed to the synagogue, as it becomes too familiar to us, we lose our “angelic” enthusiasm.

The holy Zohar, the magnum opus of Jewish mysticism, devotes much of its commentary on this week’s Torah portion to this very problem. It is excited by the Torah’s description of a successful building campaign, of men and women generously donating gold and silver to the new Tabernacle. But then the Zohar offers these words of caution: “Woe to the person who engages in mundane conversation in the synagogue. He causes a cosmic schism, a degradation of faith. Woe to him, for he has no portion in the God of Israel. He demonstrates by his levity that God does not exist, and that He certainly is not be found in the synagogue. He asserts that he has no relationship with Him, that he does not fear Him, and that he is indifferent to the disgrace of the Upper Celestial Realm.”

With these words, the holy Zohar expresses in mystical terms what my Grandmother knew with her ample common sense. How well she taught me the lesson of our need to remain “angels” in the synagogue. I can still hear her tearfully grieving for that heilige sheel, and all too numerous other sacred spaces, which “we” lost because of our callous indifference to the Almighty’s presence.

Mrs. Gussie Hartman, Gitel bat Tzvi Hersh HaLevi, rest in peace knowing that I am older, and that I understand, and that many others have just read your heartfelt message.

(Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb is the Executive Vice President, Emeritus of the Orthodox Union)

Parshas Terumah – Building G-d’s Sanctuary

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
In this week’s parsha, we find the commandments to build the mishkan and all the vessels that were contained therein, including the ark, the menorah and the altar. Photo Credit: rabbidunner.com

By: Rabbi Osher Jungreis

In this week’s parsha, we find the commandments to build the mishkan and all the vessels that were contained therein, including the ark, the menorah and the altar. But interestingly enough, as the parsha enjoins us to offer our contributions, it interrupts the sequence by teaching us the ultimate purpose of the mishkan – “so that I may dwell in your midst.” Thus, by connecting the purpose of the sanctuary with the command to build it, the Torah is imparting to us a profound teaching which is at the root of all our mitzvot.

Even as the mishkan, the sanctuary, had to be constructed with reverence, devotion and commitment so that it might be worthy of G-d’s presence, similarly, we must perform all our mitzvot with devotion and sanctity so that through the performance of those mitzvoth, the spirit of G-d may permeate our homes, our very lives.

Every aspect of the construction of the sanctuary is laden with meaning and timeless teaching. Our parsha opens with the puzzling command “Vayikchu L’terumah”–“and take for Me an offering.” This command is puzzling, because it would have been more appropriate for the Torah to say: “Give Me an offering”–“Bring Me an offering”. But HaShem wanted us to understand that when we give, we are, in essence, taking – receiving. Surely, G-d does not require our offering–but in His infinite boundless kindness, He allows us to give, so that through that act, we may become elevated–godlike. The very name of the parsha–Terumah, – offering, testifies to this, for literally translated, it means “elevation”–giving us an opportunity for growth, for becoming better, kinder individuals and lending purpose and meaning to our lives.

The Talmud relates that the Roman tyrant, Turnus Rufus once mocked Rabbi Akiva. “If your G-d loves the poor so much,” he taunted, “why doesn’t He provide for them?”

There is an amazing story about the Chofetz Chaim (the great Torah sage of modern times who died in 1933). The Chofetz Chaim had a yeshiva in Radin, Poland, which was struggling for survival

To which Rabbi Akiva responded that, of course, G-d could easily have eliminated poverty, but in His infinite mercy, He granted man that merit – to give is a privilege. Thus, our sages teach that the poor man does more for the rich, than the rich do for the poor. Again, the very word tzedukah – charity, impresses this upon us, for literally translated, it means “righteousness”, “justice”. Through the process of giving, we become more righteous and more just.

There is an amazing story about the Chofetz Chaim (the great Torah sage of modern times who died in 1933). The Chofetz Chaim had a yeshiva in Radin, Poland, which was struggling for survival. A noted philanthropist volunteered to underwrite the entire budget, but the Chofetz Chaim declined his generous gift, stating that every Jew must be given the opportunity to give, and therefore he could not allow the philanthropist to deprive his fellow Jews of this great merit. So let us appreciate the opportunities to give that come our way. Instead of being annoyed at those who seek our help, let us seek them out and let us say “Thank you for the privilege”.

   (www.Hineni.org)

Escape Cabin Fever with a Pocono Getaway

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
Stay at Kalahari and enjoy free waterpark tickets! Access to America’s largest indoor waterpark is just the beginning: authentic African decor and delicious, themed restaurants also highlight this resort.

By: Emily Whalen

Old Man Winter has visited the Poconos this year, have you? If the weather turned your vacation into hibernation you’re in luck; we’ve got the cure for cabin fever!

Getting stir crazy? The Pocono Mountains has just what you need to snap out of it. Area accommodations offer more than complimentary towels and gift shops. Browse the resorts below to find inclusive stays complete with home-grown activities and special offers.

  1. Kalahari Resorts & Conventions

Want to warm up this winter? Stay at Kalahari and enjoy free waterpark tickets! Access to America’s largest indoor waterpark is just the beginning: authentic African decor and delicious, themed restaurants also highlight this resort.

Wake up and enjoy interactive family happenings and character photos throughout the day, or join the Adventure Club to conquer all daily activities the resort has to offer. Don’t forget about the big game room, including arcade games, mini bowling, a 7-D motion theater and more, before calling it quits for the night.

An overnight stay at Kalahari comes complete with waterpark passes. Plan ahead to take advantage of the Book Early and Save deal, or add extra nights to your trip to enjoy Multi Night Savings. Get ready for a gaming getaway with the Think Warm Wishes package, which includes a $100 arcade card. Don’t delay: this deal is redeemable through February 28!

  1. Skytop Lodge

Since 1928, Skytop Lodge has remained a staple in the Poconos. Known for its picturesque property, immaculate golf course and AAA Four Diamond-rating, Skytop also provides a variety of lodgings, eateries and activities for all.

Since 1928, Skytop Lodge has remained a staple in the Poconos. Known for its picturesque property, immaculate golf course and AAA Four Diamond-rating, Skytop also provides a variety of lodgings, eateries and activities for all.

Nestled into 5,500 private acres and enjoy exclusive activities throughout the grounds. During your stay, experience the shooting center, ice fishing, archery, paddle tennis and the indoor pool and fitness center.

Save on an overnight stay at Skytop through the end of February with deals like the Winter Refresh Package: enjoy daily breakfast and nightly campfire roast with a range of winter activities including snow tubing, ice skating, and snowshoeing. For an even more luxurious getaway, make a reservation for a Winter Suite Escape.

  1. Shawnee Inn and Golf Resort

Set on 250 acres of private property and built in 1911, the historic Shawnee Inn and Golf Resort has been a retreat for generations of visitors. No two rooms are alike, from accommodations in the Main Inn to charming cabins and lodges perfect for the whole family. Let the Shawnee chefs do the cooking: enjoy complimentary breakfast with the Bed and Breakfast Package and choose from a range of on-site dining options for the rest of the day, from the bakery to the brewpub.

Set on 250 acres of private property and built in 1911, the historic Shawnee Inn and Golf Resort has been a retreat for generations of visitors. No two rooms are alike, from accommodations in the Main Inn to charming cabins and lodges perfect for the whole family.

Make your getaway a schoolcation! Shawnee Inn now offers a Monitored Learning Environment, so students can continue remote learning in a safe space with strong WiFi and a recreation schedule including nature hikes, arts and crafts. When it’s time to play, the Delaware River is just steps away, and the ski slopes aren’t far either. On-site amenities include a campfire, indoor pool, axe throwing sessions and lessons, live music and brewery tours.

Looking for a total winter detox and recharge? Try the Spa Shawnee Package, complete with luxury sleep and pillow menu, full breakfast, Swedish massage, and your choice of mini facial or quick mani/pedi.

Shake off the winter blues with a trip to the Poconos! Discover all Pocono Mountains’ places to stay and special offers to help save on your getaway. Be sure to check out our winter day trips and activities to experience while visiting.

            (Pocono Mountains Blog)

Emily Whalen is the Communications Manager for the Pocono Mountains Visitors Bureau. A small town coffee shop connoisseur and lifelong lover of the mountains, she is excited to share tips to help visitors make the most of their stay in the Poconos

High-Tech Lynching at DePaul University

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
Dr. Jason D. Hill, a tenured professor of philosophy at DePaul University in Chicago

Philosophy professor and Freedom Center Shillman Fellow slandered as being “violently transphobic”.

By: Joseph Klein

The Left’s thought police at DePaul University in Chicago have come after Dr. Jason D. Hill, a tenured professor of philosophy and a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. The leftwing fascists treat every expression of views they don’t like on a controversial issue as evidence of bigotry against one or another so-called “oppressed” minority. The censors demand conformity or punishment for dissenting views.

In Dr. Hill’s case, one of his former students, Grace Gallant, charged that he is “violently transphobic.” Gallant claimed the professor “said that we would be discussing ‘if a biological man could ever be a woman.’” Gallant complained that this alleged remark Dr. Hill is accused of making was “not just offensive and hurtful, but it’s so archaic, useless and immature to have these kinds of conversations in class.”

DePaul’s student-run school newspaper, The DePaulia, ran a feature article hyping Gallant’s accusation, which Professor Hill has categorically denied. “The accusations made by [a student] against me… are inaccurate. I do not have a transphobic bone in my body,” Professor Hill said.

Dr. Hill’s accuser would like to see Professor Hill cancelled. “I’m shocked that [Hill] still has a platform at DePaul,” Gallant said, as quoted by the school newspaper. “It’s one thing to be open to all views, which I do value. But when the view is challenging the validity of student’s identities, there is a line crossed.”

The DePaulia school paper not only printed Grace Gallant’s accusation that Professor Hill was “violently transphobic,” which it described as “student testimony” in the headline of its article. The school paper also objected to a tweet by Professor Hill, which it claimed used “harmful language that reduces people to their biology.” Sonal Soni, a junior at DePaul University majoring in journalism and communications who wrote the article, declared that “Hill’s tweet stating trans women are at a physical advantage is largely untrue scientifically.” Soni added that “[T]he idea that people who are assigned male at birth have greater physical advantages is a misconception that is often used to discriminate against trans athletes, specifically trans women.”

Professor Hill rightly took personal umbrage at both the school newspaper and his student accuser. “This feels like continued harassment on the part of The DePaulia newspaper against me that is contributing to a hostile work environment,” he said. “I feel that the student accuser has engaged in a racial stereotype in using the word ‘violently’ and I feel personally violated by that comment.”

Professor Hill is a distinguished philosophy professor, whose academic specialties include ethics, social and political philosophy, and philosophy of education. From his philosophical ethics perspective, he has questioned the fairness of allowing transwomen to compete in athletic contests against biologically born women. But he has done so on social media outside of his classroom, as is his right to do.

On January 21, Professor Hill tweeted: “Trans people should be treated with dignity. Agreed. Trans women ought not to be competing in sports with biological women. Why? Transwomen are still biological men with all the physical privileges of male strength. This move is misogynistic and a declaration of war against WOMEN.” Professor Hill has been careful not to inject this point of view into his classroom teaching.

The university has not yet taken an official position specifically on the transphobia accusation against Dr. Hill. However, a member of DePaul’s public relations team tipped his hand when he said that “The university’s Title IX Coordinator/Director of Gender Equity is responsible for receiving, processing, and investigating a complaint that an employee has engaged in discrimination, harassment, or retaliation on the basis of sex, gender, or gender identity.”

Will the university grant Dr. Hill due process in its investigation? That’s unlikely, based on the university’s track record. This is not the first time that Dr. Hill has been targeted by leftwing censors. A Faculty Council resolution passed in 2019 condemned Professor Hill for his writing of a strong pro-Israel op-ed published in The Federalist. He filed a lawsuit last year seeking redress to vindicate his contractual and due process rights, clear his name, and compensate him for the pain, humiliation, and mental distress that the defendants inflicted upon him with their censure resolution and other actions.

Transgender girls’ competition with biologically born girls in student athletics has real world consequences. For example, Selina Soule is a high school track star from Connecticut who was born a girl. Soule has claimed that she failed to qualify for a spot in the New England track and field regionals because she was defeated by two biologically born boys who identify as girls. She joined two other high school girls in a federal complaint challenging the policy of the Connecticut’s interscholastic athletic organization allowing biologically born boys who claim a female transgender identity to compete in girls’ athletic events.

Professor Hill has questioned such policies on ethical grounds. Others are free to disagree with Professor Hill’s position. However, they should do so with reason and evidence-based arguments, not with character assassination.

Sonal Soni, the college junior who authored The DePaulia article, used her student-run school newspaper platform to repeat Grace Gallant’s loaded accusations against Dr. Hill, evidently without checking their veracity. Soni also claimed there was little scientific basis for “Hill’s tweet stating trans women are at a physical advantage.” The non-science major cited one 2015 study to support her assertion. She also quoted the opinion of Dr. Joshua Safer, an endocrinologist and executive director of the Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery at Mount Sinai Hospital who is a long-time advocate for transgenders. That’s it. The would-be journalist made no effort to do a deep dive into the issue before accusing Dr. Hill of employing a “negative trope” and a “misconception that is often used to discriminate against trans athletes, specifically trans women.” No wonder Dr. Hill feels harassed!

Had Soni done her homework she would have found substantial scientific evidence supporting Dr. Hill’s concern that transgender women, who were biologically males at birth, have a measurable physical advantage in certain athletic contests over biologically born women. Studies have found this to be true even for transgender women who underwent treatments to lower their testosterone levels.

For example, the authors of an article published on December 8, 2020, entitled “Transgender Women in the Female Category of Sport: Perspectives on Testosterone Suppression and Performance Advantage,” performed “a systematic search of the scientific literature addressing anthropometric and muscle characteristics of transgender women.” The authors, who are biologists, concluded “that the muscle mass advantage males possess over females, and the performance implications thereof, are not removed by the currently studied durations (4 months, 1, 2 and 3 years) of testosterone suppression in transgender women. In sports where muscle mass is important for performance, inclusion is therefore only possible if a large imbalance in fairness, and potentially safety in some sports, is to be tolerated.”

Dr. Timothy Roberts, an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine, examined athletic performance data for transgender women in the U.S. Air Force vs. cisgender women (biologically born women). “Transgender women retain an advantage in upper body strength (push-ups and sit-ups) over female controls for 1 to 2 years after starting gender-affirming hormones,” Dr. Roberts concluded from his research. “Transgender women retain an advantage in endurance (1.5-mile run) over female controls for over 2 years after starting gender-affirming hormones,” he added.

Scientists may legitimately disagree as to the extent of the physical advantage and whether it diminishes over time. Ethicists may legitimately disagree about whether it is fair that biologically born girls have to compete athletically against transgender girls. But the thought police accusing Dr. Hill of bigotry for raising a genuine, scientifically based concern are not interested in evidence or reasoned debate. They are censors who insist on silencing anyone who deviates from their dogmatic “woke” beliefs. They are today’s version of the inquisitors who centuries ago treated philosophers questioning the politically correct dogma of their day as heretics and punished the philosophers accordingly.

             (www.FrontPageMag.com)

Best Exercises for Health and Weight Loss

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
If you’ve never exercised before or have been sedentary for a long time, it’s advisable (after consulting with your doctor) to start off slowly and gradually build up to these activity levels. Instead of 30 minutes of walking 5 days a week, for example, start with 5 or 10 minutes and build up from there. Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons

Think a single type of exercise will take care of all your needs? These tips can help you build a comprehensive fitness plan to improve your health and waistline.

Edited by: TJVNews.com

What are the best exercises for me?

For many of us, even when we understand how much regular exercise can improve our mental and physical health, the real challenge lies in developing an exercise routine that we can stick with. It’s much easier to get up and get moving every day when you actually experience the results you’re looking for—whether that’s trimming your waistline, improving your sleep, mood, and energy, or easing symptoms of stress, anxiety, or depression.

Whatever benefits you’re looking for from a fitness plan—and whatever your current fitness level—the key is to mix different types of physical activity. The most effective exercise plans should include a mix of three elements: cardio (or aerobic) training, strength training, and flexibility and balance exercises. This will not only maximize the health benefits, it will also keep your workouts varied and interesting.

Aerobic exercise is any type of cardiovascular conditioning. It can include activities like brisk walking, swimming, running, or cycling. You probably know it as “cardio.” Photo Credit: YouTube

Of course, you can always sign up for personal training sessions at a gym, find workout plans online, or download a fitness app, but developing the right exercise plan doesn’t have to be that complicated or expensive. These simple guidelines can help you make the most of your time and reap all the health and weight loss rewards of regular exercise.

 

How much exercise do I need?

The important thing to remember about exercise is that something is always better than nothing. By simply sitting less and moving more throughout your day, you can experience health benefits. For substantial health benefits, though, government guidelines in the U.S., UK, and other countries recommend that you aim for:

At least 150 minutes (2.5 hours) of moderate-intensity activity per week. That’s 30 minutes a day for 5 days a week, broken down into 10-minute bursts if that’s easier.

 

OR

At least 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity exercise per week will deliver the same benefits, if your fitness level allows you to work out harder. That means running for 15 minutes, for example, instead of walking briskly for 30 minutes.

 

OR

You can combine both moderate- and vigorous-intensity exercise, remembering the general rule of thumb that 2 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise is the equivalent of 1 minute of vigorous-intensity activity.

 

AND DON’T FORGET TO

Include muscle-strengthening activity at least twice a week as part of your weekly totals.

 

Looking to lose weight?

You can gain additional health benefits by exercising for 300 minutes or more at moderate-intensity (or 150 minutes or more of vigorous-intensity exercise) each week. This can be especially beneficial for weight loss.

 

Start slowly

If you’ve never exercised before or have been sedentary for a long time, it’s advisable (after consulting with your doctor) to start off slowly and gradually build up to these activity levels. Instead of 30 minutes of walking 5 days a week, for example, start with 5 or 10 minutes and build up from there.

 

How many days a week should I work out?

A recent study in the UK found that people who squeeze all their exercise into one or two sessions over the weekend experience almost as many health benefits as those who work out more often. However, spreading your exercise sessions across three or more days a week may help reduce your risk of injury and keep your energy levels up throughout the week.

 

Moderate-intensity vs. vigorous-intensity exercise

Whether an activity is low, moderate, or vigorous intensity depends a lot on your personal fitness level. A brisk jog, for example, may be low intensity for a seasoned athlete but vigorous intensity for someone who’s never exercised before.

 

Vary the intensity for faster results

It’s safe to say that the ultimate goal for most people who exercise is to boost fitness while spending less time working out. But while most purported shortcuts are simply too good to be true, “interval training”—bursts of vigorous-intensity activity alternating with lower-intensity activity—can actually deliver results.

For example, once you’ve warmed up, instead of walking at a moderate-intensity pace for 30 minutes, try interval training for 20 minutes. Walk at a moderate-intensity pace for one minute followed by jogging at a vigorous-intensity pace for one minute, then back to brisk walking for a minute, and so on. Or, you could alternate brisk walking with skipping rope or doing push-ups.

Alternating intensity in this way not only delivers cardiovascular benefits but can help you to squeeze a better workout into a shorter period of time. And as long as your doctor has cleared you to safely exercise this way, it can also help you lower your blood pressure, lose weight (especially around your middle), and maintain muscle mass. Interval training can also be a great way to vary your workouts and challenge your muscles in new ways.

 

Element 1: Cardio exercise

What it is: Cardiovascular or aerobic exercises are endurance activities that use your large muscle groups in rhythmic motion over a sustained period of time. Cardio workouts get your heart pumping and you’ll breathe harder than normal and may even feel a little short of breath. Cardio activities include:

  • Brisk walking
  • Running
  • Aerobics classes
  • Stair climbing
  • Basketball
  • Tennis
  • Hiking
  • Cycling
  • Rowing
  • Soccer
  • Dancing
  • Elliptical training
    People playing basketball. Photo Credit: YouTube

Why it’s good for you: Whatever your age, cardio can help to increase your lung capacity, strengthen your heart and muscles, and improve your stamina and endurance. Cardio workouts can also:

  • Help control weight by burning calories and regulating appetite.
  • Lower blood pressure and control blood sugar.
  • Reduce the risk of falls in older adults.
  • Improve memory and thinking; even help prevent mental decline and manage symptoms of Alzheimer’s.
  • Reduce joint pain and stiffness.
  • Release tension, boost your mood, and help you to sleep better at night.

 

Walking: an easy introduction to cardio exercise

Walking briskly for just 22 minutes a day will help you to reach your minimum weekly goal of 2.5 hours of moderate-intensity exercise—and in the process, lower your risk of heart disease and obesity. Walking doesn’t require any special skills or training. Aside from a comfortable pair of shoes, you don’t need any specialized equipment, and it can be done almost anywhere. You just have to resolve to get up and go.

Look for creative ways to fit a brisk walk into your daily schedule. Ditch the car and walk to the grocery store, for example, or take a walk during your lunch hour, or walk while you’re talking on the phone.

Use a walk to clear your head. Use the time to take a break from the stressors of everyday life and give yourself some precious alone time. Fresh air and some time to think can work wonders for your mood.

Or make it a social event and walk with others. Invite friends, family members, or work colleagues to walk with you. Taking a walk can provide a great opportunity to catch up with an existing friend or strengthen the bond with a new one.

Enjoy time in nature. Walking in parks, on beaches, or along hiking trails or riverbanks can add to the mood boost you experience from exercising. Spending time in nature can release endorphins, the brain’s feel-good chemicals that improve mood and relieve stress.

Walk in a mall or on a treadmill. When the weather’s bad, you can walk briskly around a mall while window shopping or use a treadmill in a gym or health club and catch up on your favorite TV show or podcast.

Walk a dog. If you don’t own a dog, you can volunteer to walk homeless dogs for an animal shelter or rescue group. You’ll not only be helping yourself but also be helping to socialize and exercise the dogs, making them more adoptable.

 

Try mindful walking

Adding a mindfulness element to a walk can help break the flow of worries and negative thoughts that many of us experience when we’re stressed, anxious, or depressed. Instead of focusing on your thoughts, focus on how your body feels as you move. Notice the sensation of your feet hitting the ground, for example, or the feeling of the wind or sunlight on your skin, or the rhythm of your breathing.

 

Element 2: Strength training

What it is: Strength training, sometimes called resistance or power training, builds up muscles with repetitive motion using resistance from free weights, weight machines, elastic bands, or your own body weight. Power training is often strength training done at a faster speed to increase power and reaction times.

Examples of strength and power training activities include:

  • Push-ups and pull-ups using your own body weight as resistance.
  • Squats, curls, or shoulder presses using dumbbells, kettlebells, resistance bands or tubes, or even cans of food or other heavy household objects.
  • Deadlifts or bench presses using a weight bar.
  • Exercising with weight machines in a gym or fitness center.

Why it’s good for you: Strength training builds and tones muscle and increases lean muscle mass. Aside from improving how you look and feel, resistance and power training can also:

  • Help manage your weight by burning calories more efficiently and reducing body fat, especially around your middle.
  • Ensure you have the strength to carry out everyday tasks such as carrying groceries, lifting your kids or grandkids, opening a jar, climbing stairs, or hurrying for a train or bus.
  • Help you stay active and independent as you get older.
  • Prevent loss of bone mass.
  • Assist you in avoiding accidents and falls by improving your speed and reaction times.
  • Trigger endorphins that improve your mood, relieve stress, and ease symptoms of anxiety and depression.
  • Improve your flexibility, balance, and mobility.

The do’s and don’ts of strength training

You don’t need to spend hours every day lifting weights to enjoy the benefits of strength training. Exercising the major muscle groups—legs, hips, back, abdomen, chest, shoulders, and arms—in 20- to 30-minute sessions twice a week is enough to deliver results and help keep you toned and strong.

Tai chi is a non-competitive martial art known for its self-defense techniques and health benefits. As a form of exercise, it combines gentle physical exercise and stretching with mindfulness. Photo Credit: medicalnewstoday.com

Neither do you need to invest in a gym membership or buy expensive equipment for use at home. Inexpensive resistance bands can be used to exercise nearly every muscle in the body—and they can also fit easily into a bag or suitcase so you don’t need to put your fitness regime on pause when you’re traveling or on vacation. There are even plenty of exercises you can do using your own body weight as resistance.

 (www.HelpGuide.org)

U.S. Will Have Enough Vaccine for All Americans by Summer: Biden

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
Photo Credit: AP

By: Robin Foster & Ernie Mundell

The United States will have enough COVID-19 vaccines to inoculate 300 million Americans by summer, President Joe Biden announced Thursday.

During a tour of the National Institute of Health’s Viral Pathogenesis Laboratory, where the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine was created, Biden said his administration had secured the delivery of 600 million doses of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines over the next five months, the Associated Press reported.

“We’re now on track to have enough supply for 300 million Americans by the end of July,” he announced.

During an interview on the “Today Show,” Dr. Anthony Fauci said that April will be “open season” for vaccinations, as increased supplies of the vaccines will allow most people to get shots to protect against COVID-19. Photo Credit: AP

The country is already on pace to exceed Biden’s goal of administering 100 million vaccine doses in his first 100 days in office, with more than 26 million shots delivered during his first three weeks in office, the AP reported.

“That’s just the floor,” Biden said. “Our end goal is beating COVID-19.”

If a third coronavirus vaccine, from drugmaker Johnson & Johnson, is approved for emergency use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration at the end of February, the pace of vaccinations should accelerate even further.

Biden emphasized that his administration is doing everything possible to increase vaccine supply and the country’s capacity to deliver injections into arms.

To date, the Biden administration has deployed active-duty troops to man mass vaccination sites in several states, as it looks to lay the groundwork for increasing the rate of vaccinations once more supply is available.

On the NIH tour, Biden was shown the lab bench where researchers sequenced the coronavirus and developed the precursor of the Moderna vaccine, the AP reported.

Just days after Chinese scientists shared the genetic blueprint of the new coronavirus in January of last year, the NIH had sent instructions to Moderna to brew up doses and scientists were already setting up the key lab and animal tests that would eventually prove they were on the right track, the AP reported.

 

COVID vaccines likely available to all Americans by April: Fauci

Any American will be able to start getting vaccinated by April, the nation’s leading infectious diseases expert predicted Thursday.

During an interview on the “Today Show,” Dr. Anthony Fauci said that month will be “open season” for vaccinations, as increased supplies of the vaccines will allow most people to get shots to protect against COVID-19.

If a third coronavirus vaccine, from drugmaker Johnson & Johnson, is approved for emergency use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration at the end of February, the pace of vaccinations should accelerate even further. Photo Credit: YouTube

Fauci, who serves as science adviser to President Joe Biden, added that the rate of vaccinations will greatly accelerate in the coming months. Why? He credited forthcoming deliveries of the two approved vaccines, the potential approval of a third vaccine and measures taken by the Biden administration to increase capacity to deliver doses.

“By the time we get to April,” it will be “open season, namely virtually everybody and anybody in any category could start to get vaccinated,” Fauci noted.

Despite that good news, he cautioned it will take “several more months” to actually deliver shots to Americans, but herd immunity could be achieved by late summer.

Meanwhile, fully vaccinated Americans can now skip quarantines if they are exposed to someone infected with COVID-19, new federal guidelines say.

“Fully vaccinated persons who meet criteria will no longer be required to quarantine following an exposure to someone with COVID-19,” the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in updated guidance posted Wednesday on its website.

There was one caveat: At least two weeks must have passed since the second shot, because it takes that long to build full immunity. But the CDC says it’s not known how long protection lasts, so people who had their last shot three months ago or more should still quarantine if they are exposed or show symptoms, the agency added.

“This recommendation to waive quarantine for people with vaccine-derived immunity aligns with quarantine recommendations for those with natural immunity,” the CDC said. People who have been vaccinated should still watch for symptoms for 14 days after they have been exposed to someone who is infected, the agency added.

That doesn’t mean vaccinated people should stop practicing social distancing, the CDC noted.

“At this time, vaccinated persons should continue to follow current guidance to protect themselves and others, including wearing a mask, staying at least 6 feet away from others, avoiding crowds, avoiding poorly ventilated spaces, covering coughs and sneezes, washing hands often, following CDC travel guidance, and following any applicable workplace or school guidance, including guidance related to personal protective equipment use or SARS-CoV-2 testing,” the agency said.

 

British COVID variant spreading rapidly across U.S.

The highly contagious coronavirus variant that drove Britain into lockdown in December is now spreading quickly across the United States, a new study shows.

What has been dubbed the B.1.1.7 variant is doubling its prevalence every nine days in this country, according to a report posted on the preprint server MedRxiv this week and not yet peer-reviewed or published in a journal. The findings, from a large collaboration of scientists, buttresses a forecast issued last month by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that showed the variant becoming dominant in this country by late March.

The researchers scrutinized genomic analyses of the virus samples from 10 states, including from 212 infections involving the variant, and concluded that the variant has been 35% to 45% more transmissible than other variants in the United States.

“It is here, it’s got its hooks deep into this country, and it’s on its way to very quickly becoming the dominant lineage,” study co-author Michael Worobey, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona, told the Post.

In the study, Florida stands out as the state with the highest estimated prevalence of the variant. The new report estimated the doubling time of B.1.1.7 prevalence in positive test results at just over nine days.

Florida leads the nation in reported B.1.1.7 cases, with 347 as of Friday, followed by much more populous California with 159, according to the CDC. A total of 981 cases have been reported in 37 states, according to the CDC.

Mary Jo Trepka, an epidemiologist at Florida International University, told the Post she is not surprised by the spread of the variant in Florida, because the state has not been strict about mask mandates or other restrictions, while at the same time it is a hub for international travel.

“The message is that we have to work harder to prevent transmission of all these cases of COVID,” she said. “If we don’t, we’ll potentially see more variants. We need to get everybody vaccinated and we need to do a much better job at preventing transmission.”

The variant first appeared in genomic surveys in the United Kingdom in September, but did not get tagged as a “variant of concern” until early December when its rapid spread stunned scientists and prompted lockdowns in southern England.

“What concerns me is the exponential growth in the early stages doesn’t look very fast,” Andrew Noymer, an epidemiologist at the University of California, Irvine, who was not part of the new study, told the Post. “It kind of putzes along — and then goes boom.”

U.S. health officials say they are in a race against time to increase the number of Americans vaccinated as more contagious variants of the virus spread across America. By Thursday, more than 46.4 million Americans had been vaccinated, while nearly 68.3 million doses have been distributed. Just over 11.2 million people have had their second shot, according to the CDC.

 

A global scourge

By Friday, the U.S. coronavirus case count passed 27.4 million while the death toll passed 475,000, according to a Times tally. On Friday, the top five states for coronavirus infections were: California with over 3.4 million cases; Texas with more than 2.5 million cases; Florida with over 1.8 million cases; New York with more than 1.5 million cases; and Illinois with over 1.1 million cases.

Curbing the spread of the coronavirus in the rest of the world remains challenging.

In India, the coronavirus case count was nearly 10.9 million by Friday, a Johns Hopkins University tally showed. Brazil had over 9.7 million cases and more than 236,000 deaths as of Friday, the Hopkins tally showed.

Worldwide, the number of reported infections passed 107.8 million on Friday, with nearly 2.4 million deaths recorded, according to the Hopkins tally.

             (www.HealthDayNews.com)

Former Energy Secretary Brouillette, Texas Power Outage was Due to “Unreliable Renewable Energy”

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
A woman walks through falling snow in San Antonio, Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021. Snow and ice blanketed large swaths of the U.S. on Sunday, prompting canceled flights, making driving perilous and reaching into areas as far south as Texas’ Gulf Coast, where snow and sleet were expected overnight. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

By Sandy Fitzgerald(NEWSMAX)

A severe winter storm that resulted in millions of homes in Texas being without power was an “avoidable tragedy” that could have been avoided if the state had a diverse energy supply, according to former Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette.

“In the previous administration under the leadership of President [Donald] Trump, what he directed me to do and what he directed my predecessor to do, Sec. Rick Perry, was to produce all forms of energy here in America,” Brouillette told Fox Business’ “Mornings With Maria” Tuesday.

“It’s not only that we produced more energy in America, but we also produced different forms of energy that included fossil energy, it included things like natural gas and oil here in America,” he added. The United States is “now the largest producer of those products in the world.”

Electric power was out in more than 4 million homes and businesses in Texas Tuesday morning after temperatures dropped to record lows in the single digits overnight, freezing wind turbines and limiting gas supplies needed to generate enough power.

More than 1 million of the outages are reportedly in the Houston area alone, with more than 300,000 customers in the dark in San Antonio and Austin.

“The important thing about what we are seeing in Texas today is that we need a diverse energy supply,” Brouillette said. “The weather is certainly, behind some of this, but the weather is not the cause of the tragedy, it’s the policies that we’ve decided to follow. We’ve moved away from what is known as ‘baseload electricity’ and we’ve moved to intermittent and sometimes unreliable renewable energy and that technology is not yet ready for prime time.”

Rabbinical group: Omar’s promotion shows ‘Congress willing to tolerate anti-Semitism’

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
Credit: Phil Pasquini/Shutterstock.

(jns) The Coalition for Jewish Values said in a statement on Monday that the promotion of Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) to a senior position on the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee shows that Congress appears to accept anti-Semitism within its midst.

Omar, who has a history of making anti-Semitic remarks and displaying bias against Israel, was promoted to the position of vice chair of the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Global Human Rights on Feb. 11.

Rabbi Steven Pruzansky, Israel regional vice president of the Coalition for Jewish Values (CJV), called Omar’s new appointment “both risible and dangerous.”

“Ilhan Omar’s long-standing hatred for Israel and contempt for Jews and for America make this a mockery of human-rights advocacy,” he said. “I have little doubt that she will abuse the framework of ‘human rights’ to further her campaign to demonize the Jewish state, as the U.N. Human Rights Council does on an annual basis. Rep. Omar should have been stripped of her committee assignments rather than rewarded with a promotion.

CJV president Rabbi Pesach Lerner said “the real concern is that House Democrats are treating anti-Semitism as a political weapon, abetted by the silence and even backing of Democratic Jewish members.”

The Zionist Organization of America also criticized Omar’s “outrageous” promotion and reiterated its calls to remove the politician from the Foreign Affairs Committee.

“Omar should certainly not be elevated to her new leadership position, which will give her an even bigger platform for spewing her hateful anti-Semitism, Israel-bashing and promotion of boycotts against the Middle East’s only human-rights-loving democracy, Israel,” said ZOA national president Mort Klein and chair Mark Levenson. “Elevating Omar to a position overseeing ‘global human rights’ is a dangerous travesty that will help to mainstream and legitimize Israel-hatred and Jew-hatred.”

Bill Gates: ‘Rich Countries’ Should Be Eating 100% Synthetic Beef

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
ap

 

LUCAS NOLAN

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates recently stated that he believes “rich countries,” such as the United States and western Europe, should switch to eating 100 percent synthetic beef.

In a recent interview with the MIT Technology Review, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates discussed his environmental impact efforts and various green initiatives aimed at reducing global carbon emissions. One suggestion Gates proposed was for wealthy and developed nations to move entirely to synthetic beef in efforts to reduce the carbon emissions from livestock.

Explaining the suggestion, Gates told the MIT Tech Review:

For Africa and other poor countries, we’ll have to use animal genetics to dramatically raise the amount of beef per emissions for them. Weirdly, the US livestock, because they’re so productive, the emissions per pound of beef are dramatically less than emissions per pound in Africa. And as part of the [Bill and Melinda Gates] Foundation’s work, we’re taking the benefit of the African livestock, which means they can survive in heat, and crossing in the monstrous productivity both on the meat side and the milk side of the elite US beef lines.

So no, I don’t think the poorest 80 countries will be eating synthetic meat. I do think all rich countries should move to 100% synthetic beef. You can get used to the taste difference, and the claim is they’re going to make it taste even better over time. Eventually, that green premium is modest enough that you can sort of change the [behavior of] people or use regulation to totally shift the demand.

So for meat in the middle-income-and-above countries, I do think it’s possible. But it’s one of those ones where, wow, you have to track it every year and see, and the politics [are challenging]. There are all these bills that say it’s got to be called, basically, lab garbage to be sold. They don’t want us to use the beef label.

Despite what seems like an outlandish proposal, Gates seems confident that meat alternatives will continue to grow in popularity in developed nations, stating: “Now the people like Memphis Meats who do it at a cellular level — I don’t know that that will ever be economical. But Impossible and Beyond have a road map, a quality road map, and a cost road map, that makes them totally competitive.”

Read more at the MIT Technology Review here.

Sen. Johnson: Capitol Breach Didn’t Seem Like an ‘Armed Insurrection’ to Me

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0
AP

BY JANITA KAN(EPOCH TIMES)

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) said on Monday that he doesn’t think the Jan. 6 breach of the Capitol was an “armed insurrection,” while pointing out that the Democrat’s rhetoric was hypocritical.

Johnson made the comments during an appearance on the radio talk show 1130 WISN where he told host Jay Weber that while he thinks the violence at the Capitol was reprehensible, he doesn’t believe the narrative pushed by the Democrats and the media was entirely accurate.

He underscored that the violence was perpetrated by “groups of agitators,” not the tens of thousands of supporters of former President Donald Trump.

“The hundreds of thousands of people that attend those Trump rallies, those are the people that love this country. They never would have done what happened on Jan. 6,” Johnson said. “That is a group of people that love freedom. That is a group of people … we need to unify and keep on our side.”

Johnson acknowledged that unacceptable behavior played out on Jan. 6. He condemned the conduct of the rioters but also took issue with the Democrats’ characterization of the event by calling it an “armed” insurrection.

“When you hear the word ‘armed,’ don’t you think of firearms? Here’s the questions I would have liked to ask—how many firearms were confiscated? How many shots were fired? I’m only aware of one, and I’ll defend that law enforcement officer for taking that shot. It was a tragedy, but I think there was only one,” Johnson said.

Johnson, who has been frequently targeted by the media for being a vocal supporter of the former president, said that he and his colleagues were aware of the hypocrisy surrounding the Senate impeachment trial and the criticism against former President Donald Trump.

He said Trump and other Republicans received “attacks” and scrutiny for doing things that were previously done by Democrats.

“To my mind, while the house managers are making their case … okay you’re accusing Donald Trump of all this stuff, but what about Hillary Clinton telling [President Joe] Biden … never to concede the race, you know. How about all the folks that, you know, never condemned the [Black Lives Matter] and Antifa peaceful protest turned to riots that burned down dozens of buildings in Racine,” Johnson said, adding that some of these lawmakers were supportive of the “defund the police” movement.

“So you’re sitting in that trial, you’re listening to all this, and you understand, it’s just dripping with hypocrisy.”

He also added that the House impeachment managers’ arguments were easily dismantled by Trump lawyers because they did not address the core questions of the trial and took quotes and footage out of context. He also criticized the impeachment prosecutors for allegedly doctoring evidence and selectively editing footage, accusations that Trump lawyers brought up during the trial. Democrats have denied the allegations.

The Wisconsin senator said that while he learned new details about the Jan. 6 incidents from the House’s case, there were still many unanswered questions from the day that Americans would like to know. He added that he has sent letters to the Sergeant at Arms of both the House and the Senate and has not received any responses.

Several House Republican leaders on Monday sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) asking for information about what she knew about the breach prior to Jan. 6.

Lawmakers have indicated that they would like a 9/11-style commission to probe into the Jan. 6 incident in order to prevent it from happening in the future. Pelosi on Monday expressed commitment to establishing such a commission.

Activists Outline Plan to Push Agenda of Black Lives Matter in Classroom

By
Sholom Schreirber
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0

Jarrett Stepman(Daily Signal)

Corporations, nonprofit institutions, the media, and countless individual Americans have expressed support of the Black Lives Matter movement, funneling millions of dollars into organizations that purport to carry out its cause.

But although many Americans support the phrase “black lives matter,” the actual aims of organizations and activists committed to this cause often are far more radical than what Americans hear through the lens of the media.

It’s deeply important that we know what the agenda truly is.

A new book, “Black Lives Matter at School,” lays out how the entire system of K-12 education in America could be transformed to carry out the agenda of the Black Lives Matter movement.

The demand for socialism is on the rise from young Americans today. But is socialism even morally sound? Find out more now >>

“Black Lives Matter at School,” a collection of essays, gives a framework for how the movement aims to shape public education in coming years. The book received a fairly laudatory and sympathetic analysis in The Washington Post.

But much like President Joe Biden’s references to radical critical race theory programs as simply “sensitivity training,” the Post smooths over the radicalism of the work and makes it digestible to a larger audience.

A fair number of left-leaning Americans don’t want to support Marxism and ethnic nationalism, but it’s clear that is what “Black Lives Matter at School” and affiliated groups actually are selling.

The author of one essay in “Black Lives Matter at School” wrote a book in praise of Marxism, and many of the items on the economic and social agenda laid out in the book are quite radically left wing.

When Americans say they support “black lives matter,” do they really want to abolish the nuclear family and boot Abraham Lincoln out of America’s pantheon of heroes?

The New York Times’ 1619 Project already has made its way into classrooms across the country, creating a distorted view of American history. But some activists want to conduct their ideas on a grander scale, placing the ideologies of critical race theory and “anti-racism” at the heart of every student’s education.

It’s important that we know what the agenda truly is. “Black Lives Matter at School” gives a framework for how the movement aims to shape public education in coming years.

The essays in the book were edited by Denisha Jones, a director of teaching at Sarah Lawrence College, and Jesse Hagopian, an ethnic studies teacher at Seattle’s Garfield High School.

Essentially, this series of essays provides a blueprint for the Black Lives Matter agenda, how it has been brought to classrooms, and how it can “radically transform our learning environments,” in the words of Opal Tometi, a co-founder of the Black Lives Matter organization and author of the book’s forward.

‘Anti-Racism’ Goes to School 

Unsurprisingly, the book received an endorsement by Ibram X. Kendi, director of the Center for Antiracist Research at Boston University and author of “How to Be an Antiracist.”

Kendi’s work has received enormous attention over the last year, especially following the death of George Floyd in police custody and the protests and riots that took place over the summer.

As I laid out in my review of Kendi’s book, anti-racism ends up sounding a lot like racism. Racism is redefined by Kendi so that it is no longer an individual act of prejudice directed toward a person or persons based on race, but a collective condition leading to inequities in society.

Hence the left’s new obsession with “equity” instead of inequality.

According to this ideology, unequal outcomes for different racial groups can be explained only by racism; any other explanation at all is, well, racist.

Even colorblindness in how we treat race is racist. The only real way these structural inequalities can be addressed is through reeducation and discrimination.

“The only remedy to racist discrimination is anti-racist discrimination. The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination,” Kendi wrote.

His biggest policy solution—which he laid out in Politico—is an anti-racist amendment to the Constitution so absurdly anti-republican and tyrannical that it would make Big Brother blush.

Week of Action

One of the essays in “Black Lives Matter at School” decries curriculum in American schools as “Eurocentric and even overtly racist.”

The antidote, the book suggests, is a “week of action” to take place in schools across the country each year in the first week of February.

Each day, students would learn a few of the principles laid out by the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, the movement’s main organization.

These action items include a grab bag of left-wing social and economic ideas, most with a twinge of black nationalism.

The lineup of action for a Tuesday, for instance, makes paeans to “diversity” and “globalism,” yet is curiously narrow in focus, instructing students to see themselves as part of the “global black family.”

Wednesday’s agenda is all about uprooting traditional notions of sex and gender, with the top item reading:

We are self-reflexive and do the work required to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift Black trans folk, especially Black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans-antagonistic violence.

So the official Black Lives Matter website may have removed references to abolishing the nuclear family, but that goal still is included in the agenda for the week of action.

The week of action plan instructs those committed to the agenda to “disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and ‘villages.’”

Transforming Curriculum

“Black Lives Matter at School” is of course committed to shaping curriculum. This would in part take place by rewriting America’s past to fit the agenda of the movement.

Among the problematic parts of the way history is taught, according to an article cited in the book, is the “Lincoln-freed-the-slaves myth.” Also, “the failure of the curriculum to account for the centrality of slavery and anti-Black racism in the shaping of U.S. history, North and South.”

It’s not hard to see now why the San Francisco Unified School District recently stripped the name of Lincoln from a local high school because the 16th president was among the “dishonorable” men of our history.

Lincoln, through the lens of this ideology, is just as canceled as any Confederate general.

Much of this reshaping of the American narrative would be conducted by mandated ethnic studies programs.

But what “Black Lives Matter at School” stresses is that the movement’s agenda not be limited simply to history and social studies, nor be talked about only during the week of action:

The principles of Black Lives Matter at School must become part of the broader school culture and permeate all subjects—social studies, English language arts, math, science, music, art, world languages, theater, and beyond—if Black lives are to be truly valued in education.

In 2019, Seattle public schools announced the addition of math to the K-12 ethnic studies programs. This “woke math” had little to do with actual mathematics and instead just found a way to jam ideology into every single aspect of a child’s education.

It’s important to note that the book points to Seattle public schools as the launching point, test bed, and model for the national movement. According to one chapter, the approach has spread to Philadelphia and “more than 40 cities” across the country.

The Agenda

Besides transforming curriculum and young minds, “Black Lives Matter at School” highlights certain policies that are critical for the broader movement’s agenda.

These stem from the “four demands” of Black Lives Matter cited in the book:

End zero tolerance discipline and replace it with restorative justice; implement Black studies and ethnic studies (K–12); hire more Black teachers; and fund counselors, not cops.

Mirroring the “defund the police” activism that went from marginal to mainstream on the left in 2020, “Black Lives Matter at School” aims at both defunding the police in cities and removing police from classrooms if they are present.

Defunding the police serves two goals, according to one chapter of the book. It undermines police departments, described as systematically racist, and it helps divert budget funds to “reimagining justice, education, public safety, and our society.”

This “reimagining” would be carried out by channeling those funds to various programs such as housing, universal child care, and public transit. But the funds also would be used, as a Seattle union recommended, to “hire counselors, social workers, family support workers, student family advocates, restorative justice educators, gender and sexuality educators, ethnic studies educators and curriculum.”

It’s worth noting that the counselors and administrators who would benefit from diverted police funds are conveniently the very people who are the most aggressive and successful in bringing critical race theory to college campuses and high schools.

Defund the police and fund the revolution, apparently.

Another item on the agenda is reimplementing school discipline policies that were nationalized by President Barack Obama’s administration, but ended by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos under President Donald Trump.

The Obama administration threatened schools with civil rights violations if racial discrepancies occurred in the total number of students disciplined in what it called the “school to prison pipeline.”

The Obama policy, according to research by Max Eden at the Manhattan Institute for Policy, unleashed unintended consequences such as drops in academic achievement, higher levels of truancy, and an uptick in more serious crimes committed by students.

And of course, one the book’s authors militantly opposed school choice as a general rule. This despite the fact that many black parents and students have used school choice programs extensively to great benefit across the country.

But this movement, it should be clear, is not at all about the achievement of individual black students.

One chapter of the book rails against the “privatization” of education and the use of school choice to address the problem of failing public schools, which is characterized as a project for the rich:

The alternative to the shock doctrine educational model proposed by the powerful is that of social movements like Black Lives Matter at School and social justice unionism that can fight for a different vision of public school.

That “different vision” of public school is one in which the ideology of Black Lives Matter is wedged into every classroom, subject, and lesson, not just for one week but all year.

It’s not hard to see, given the entire ethos of “Black Lives Matter at School,” that the fundamental issue with school choice is that it means a loss of control over both public resources and, most importantly, the minds of students.

And power over the minds of all young Americans is the point of the whole project.

Have an opinion about this article? To sound off, please email [email protected] and we will consider publishing your remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature.

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