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Abandoning the Kurds in Syria is a Bad Idea

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So, how would the US like to be remembered among the world powers? As one who abandons their allies or supports them during the darkest hours?

Well, as you all know by now, the United States had formed an alliance with Kurdish rebel forces in our multi-year battle against the Islamic State terrorist organization who sought to create a Caliphate in Iraq and Syria.

Now that President Trump wants to withdraw US troops from Iraq and Syria because he believes that ISIS no longer poses the existential threat to Western culture as it did when it first made its appearance on the political scene some years ago, it appears that he has given the green light to Turkey to finish the job.

On Sunday night, the White House issued a rather sudden and startling statement saying that US military personnel would immediately abandon northern Syria to the Turkish invasion.

The move would also place America’s steadfast allies in grave danger. The Kurdish fighters stood shoulder to shoulder in the protracted battle against Islamic State terrorists. Turkey has gone on record as calling the Syrian Kurds “terrorists” and have promised on countless occasions to vanquish them from existence.

We can tell you this, however. Turkey is under the leadership of one of the world’s chief terrorists and his name is Recep Tayyip Edrogan. This Turkish leader has crafted a legacy of jailing and torturing journalists who dare oppose his draconian views.

Erdogan holds palpable malice and visceral animus towards Israel as was evidenced in the Mavi Marmara affair in which supplies were to be smuggled into Gaza for the express use of Hamas terrorists, who objective is destroy Israel.

It was Erdogan who transformed Turkey from a bastion of secular democracy to a radicalized Islamic state in a region that can aptly be called a tinderbox.

Erdogan and Trump have agreed to meet at the White House next month to discuss the creation of a so-called “safe zone” in northern Syria, according to the AFP news agency, quoting the Turkish presidency.

This weekend, Erdogan had warned that Turkey could launch a cross-border offensive “as soon as today, tomorrow.”

The White House said in a statement that:

“The United States Government has pressed France, Germany, and other European nations, from which many captured ISIS fighters came, to take them back, but they did not want them and refused. The United States will not hold them for what could be many years and great cost to the United States taxpayer. Turkey will now be responsible for all ISIS fighters in the area captured over the past two years in the wake of the defeat of the territorial “Caliphate” by the United States.”

This clearly spells great danger for the Kurds and even more to the point, it is possible that because of massacres of the Kurds by Turkish forces, the US will somehow get thrown back into the Middle East imbroglio and find itself in the midst of a war that they never dreamed of fighting.

Letters to the Editor

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Calling for Sovereignty in Judea & Samaria!

Dear Editor:

The name Neriyah Zaroge is undoubtedly an unfamiliar one to most readers. He is a young resident of Yitzhar, a community in the Shomron which I and the AFSI Chizuk missions have visited many times. By command of the IDF Central Commander, Nadal Feden, Neriyah has been served with a military order banishing him from his home in the hilltop outpost, Komi Ori, his wife and two children, and his herd of sheep for a period of three months. There is no legal basis or evidence of any wrong doing on his part. It is part of what appears to be an ongoing program of favoring the land-grabbing Arabs over the Jews who simply want to hold onto Jewish land. As Neriyah wrote to the IDF Central Commander, “Instead of dealing with the non-stop, illegal building of the Arabs in the area, or the daily stone throwing and acts of terror on our highways, you chose to terrorize the Jews.” If Sovereignty was applied to Judea and Samaria, such anti-Jewish discriminatory acts could not occur. They must be ended.

Another example of the military favoring the Arabs over the Jews occurred recently at Amichai, another community in the Shomron, on the outskirts of Shilo, which AFSI has supported from its creation. Born from the need to provide homes for the expelled Jews from Amona, Amichai is a brand new settlement which the government promised and delivered and to which the displaced Jews were able to move. Now they have seen that the Arabs are planning to build a community adjacent to them with the apparent consent of the military. At a recent protest, which was entirely peaceful, the Jews were the ones restrained and threatened, not the Arabs who are violating Israel’s land. Again, we believe this could not happen if Sovereignty was applied to Judea and Samaria. This must be the answer to the many anti-Jewish positions taken by the military. There should be no IDF Central Commander giving orders. The idealistic Jews living in the hilltops, raising their families, and holding onto the land should not have to experience or endure discrimination from their own people.

Sincerely

Helen Freedman
Co-Executive Director
Americans for a Safe Israel/AFSI


Should Cuomo become MTA Chairman?

Dear Editor:

Governor Cuomo continues attempting to portray himself as the second coming of the late President Franklin Roosevelt and master builder Robert Moses.

Cuomo is not an engineer, construction contractor, transportation expert or daily commuter. He does excel at photo-ops when walking New York City Transit, Long Island or Metro North Rail Road tracks continuously ignoring Federal Rail Road Administration safety requirements by not wearing mandated orange protective vests just like all other MTA employees when touring active track areas.

How many times do we see him holding a press conference on an active right of way not wearing either a protective vest or hard hat? NYC Transit, Long Island Railroad and Metro North track employees are required to wear a reflective vest when working or walking near active tracks. They also have to take a mandatory safety certification training course. Has he ever been safety certified to participate in such activities without wearing a safety vest or hardhat as required by the FRA?

If he is bored being Governor and believes he can do a better job managing NYC Transit or MTA, there is an easy solution. His last act as Governor before resigning could be appointing himself NYC Transit President or MTA Chairman.

In the interim, Cuomo still needs to come up with $5.8 billion balance of the original $8.3 he still owes to fund the $33 billion 2015–2019 MTA Five Year Capital Plan.

Sincerely,

Larry Penner

(Larry Penner is a transportation historian, advocate and writer who previously worked 31 years for the US Department of Transportation Federal Transit Administration Region 2. This included the development, review, approval and oversight for grants supporting billions in capital projects and programs on behalf of the MTA, NYC Transit, LIRR & Metro North, MTA Bus, New Jersey Transit, NYC Department of Transportation and 30 other transit operators in NY & NJ)


Congratulating Mariano Rivera!!

Dear Editor:

Allow me to say that I was quite moved to watch President Trump giving baseball legend Mariano Rivera the Medal of Freedom award at the White House. Mariano Rivera was not only considered the best closer in baseball pitching history, but as the POTUS said, he may have been considered the best pitcher that the MLB has ever seen in its very long and storied history.

In addition, Mariano was the only MLB player to ever have been unanimously voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown by a cadre of prominent sportswriters.

So, the great number 42 in NY Yankee history not only graced the baseball mound with tremendous dignity and achieved innumerable records in the game’s history but the most important matter is that he is a man of G-d, a man who has dedicated himself to many charitable and religious causes. He is a man who has visited Israel and has fallen in love with its symbolism, its people, its culture and what it represents for all the major religions around the world.

Yes, Marino Rivera is a true hero!

Sincerely

Morris David Ruskoff


Infertility in the Jewish Community

Dear Editor:

I read with great interest the article on the donor-conceived family’s tri-generational Bat Mitzvah at the Western Wall in Jerusalem. Infertility is such a relevant issue within our community and I’m grateful your paper is progressive enough to have published it. I thought the author’s association with Rosh Hashana… a time for addressing our balance sheets, was most appropriate. As someone who has experienced the pain associated with infertility, I was overwhelmed by the content of the article. I loved the line she drew between the unconventional way of the heroism in Masada and the non conventional way in which she conceived her child. I could sense the love she feels for her daughter. I really can’t say enough about it. Her article referred to history and heritage—and most of all honesty, integrity, pride and family. I hope to see more articles like this one.

Thank you

Orit

Impeachment Investigation Against Trump Parallels Probes Against Netanyahu

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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Donald Trump. Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons

The difference between a flailing democracy and a resilient one

By: Caroline Glick

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s recent announcement that she is opening an official impeachment inquiry against President Trump struck many Israelis as yet another sign that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Trump are in the same boat. Both are being hounded by legal elites who will stop at nothing to oust them from office.

There are parallels between the two leaders.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky applauding during his inauguration ceremony at the parliament in Kiev on May 20, 2019. PHOTO: Vladyslav MUSIENKO / Ukrainian Prime Minister Press-service

Pelosi’s move followed the leak of a whistleblower complaint to the U.S. intelligence community’s inspector general. The complainant alleged that during a telephone conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in July, Trump sought the Ukrainian leader’s assistance in advancing his 2020 re-election prospects. This is arguable.

During the call, Trump asked Zelensky to speak with U.S. Attorney General William Barr about the private cybersecurity company Crowdstrike. Crowdstrike is the private contractor that was hired by the Democratic National Committee in the spring of 2016 to investigate the hack of the DNC’s computer server.

Crowdstrike concluded that the DNC’s server was hacked by entities related to the Russian government. The DNC never permitted federal investigators to take possession of the breached server or receive Crowdstrike’s full report. Despite the fact that they were never given the opportunity to verify Crowdstrike’s claims, those claims were the basis of the U.S. intelligence community’s assertion in December 2016 that the Russian government hacked the DNC server to interfere in the 2016 election. It was also a foundation of the claim that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia against the Hillary Clinton campaign in 2016.

In his conversation with Zelensky, Trump said, “Our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it. I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say Crowdstrike … the [DNC] server, they say Ukraine has it. … I would like to have the attorney general call you or your people and I would like you to get to the bottom of it.”

Vice President Joe Biden. Photo Credit: Wikipedia

Trump also talked with Zelensky about former Vice President Joe Biden, now a Democratic presidential aspirant.

During his tenure in office, Biden was responsible for U.S. ties with Ukraine. As investigative journalist Peter Schweitzer reported, in April 2014, Biden’s son Hunter was appointed to the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian gas company. Over the next 16 months, Burisma paid Hunter Biden $3.1 million. Biden joined the company while Burisma was under criminal probe by British and Ukrainian investigators.

In a post-vice presidency appearance before the Council on Foreign Relations, Biden bragged that he had conditioned the provision of $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees to the Ukrainian government—loan guarantees that had already been approved by President Barack Obama—on the firing of the Ukrainian prosecutor carrying out the investigation against Burisma. Given the stakes, the Ukrainian government bowed to his demand. The prosecutor was fired and the loan guarantees were extended.

Speaking of Biden’s admitted intervention with the Ukrainian prosecution, Trump said, “There’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that, so whatever you can do with the attorney general would be great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it … It sounds horrible to me.”

Democrats claim that Trump’s discussion with Zelensky constitutes an illegal solicitation of foreign assistance for his 2020 reelection campaign. Republicans counter that Trump was reasonably trying to understand what happened to the DNC server in 2016. The story has served as a basis for claims that his presidency is illegitimate, and continuous investigations of his campaign.

Leaving aside the weight of the opposing claims, the fact is that there is nothing unique about Trump’s actions. As Mark Thiessen noted in The Washington Post, in 2018, three Democratic senators urged the Ukrainian government to continue investigations into Trump’s alleged collusion with Russia during the 2016 presidential campaign.

National Review noted that during the 2016 campaign, the Obama administration asked the Ukrainian government to open a criminal probe against Trump’s campaign chairman Paul Manafort. So too, revelations regarding the origins of the Trump-Russia probe which fomented the nearly two-year special counsel investigation showed that the Obama Justice Department based wiretap requests against Trump campaign officials on a dossier paid for by the Clinton campaign and the DNC, and compiled by a former British spy on the basis of contacts with Russian operatives.

Democrats calling for impeachment have never shown the slightest interest in investigating the Obama administration’s actions. No Democratic lawmakers called to impeach Obama or members of his administration.

The criminal probes against Netanyahu relate to actions he took to secure positive media coverage that are similar, if not identical to routine political behavior. The two major probes against Netanyahu—dubbed Case 2000 and Case 4000—allege that Netanyahu acted criminally when he met with media owners in bids to secure more positive coverage.

In Case 2000, Netanyahu is accused of having breached the public faith when he met with Yedioth Ahronoth publisher Arnon Mozes in an effort to secure positive media coverage. Yedioth’s coverage of Netanyahu has been unstintingly negative. In Case 4000, prosecutors allege Netanyahu accepted a bribe in the form of positive media coverage on the Walla news portal from Walla owner Shaul Elovich. As with Yedioth Ahronoth, Walla coverage of Netanyahu has been almost uniformly hostile.

Leading jurists from professor Alan Dershowitz of Harvard University to professor Avi Bell from Bar-Ilan University agree that the legal proceedings against Netanyahu are political and based on prejudicial and selective enforcement of statutes which prosecutors are interpreting inventively.

As is the case with the allegations related to Trump’s dealings with Zelensky, the first problem with the probes against Netanyahu is that his actions were far from unique—although less successful than similar actions by other politicians.

In just one striking example of the inherent bias of the charges against Netanyahu, consider the behavior of the prosecutors in relation to Blue and White Party co-chairman and Yesh Atid Party leader Yair Lapid and his relations with Mozes and Elovich.

Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit. Wikipedia.org

Today, post-election wranglings in Israel over governing coalitions are guided by varied assessments of the likelihood that Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit will indict Netanyahu. During the campaign leading up to the April elections, Mandelblit cast legal norms distinguishing politics from law to the seven winds. He took the unprecedented step of announcing that pending the outcome of Netanyahu’s pre-indictment hearing, which is scheduled for this week, he intends to indict the premier on bribery and breach of trust charges over his dealings with Mozes and Elovich.

Now, as Netanyahu prepares for his pre-indictment hearing, the prosecution has leaked its intent to indict Netanyahu by mid-November. In other words, they have no intention to consider Netanyahu’s defense claims. The outcome is preordained.

For many Israelis, Pelosi’s decision to begin an impeachment investigation parallels moves by Mandelblit and State Attorney Shai Nitzan to fast-track the probes against Netanyahu. But the opposite is the case.

Pelosi’s impeachment bid is a sign that America’s legal system and indeed its democracy is far healthier than Israel’s.

For nearly two years, Special Counsel Robert Mueller and his partisan investigators spent millions of dollars on a massive and barely veiled bid to find a legal excuse to oust Trump. But in the end, they failed. The evidence of collusion between Trump and his campaign and Russia simply wasn’t to be found.

Mueller could have kept going. The media wanted him to. The Democrats wanted him to. But after feeding the media prejudicial leaks against Trump and aggressively prosecuting Manafort and other Trump officials on unrelated issues, Mueller ran out of steam. Although in his final report Mueller tried to provide Democrats with the means to continue the Russia probe on the political level, he closed down his investigation and went home. U.S. practice doesn’t permit the indictment of a sitting president. But even if it allowed for indictments, the materials he had assembled were too weak to justify an indictment.

In other words, Mueller walked his prosecutors to the brink of political interference, and then he walked them back. He did not replace politicians with prosecutors.

Until Mueller submitted his report, Pelosi used his ongoing probe to fend off pressure from the increasingly powerful radical members of her Democratic caucus to initiate impeachment proceedings against Trump. Since then, Pelosi argued, rightly, that impeachment proceedings require a huge political investment and hold little chance for success. Most Americans oppose impeaching Trump. The Republicans control the Senate. If the House votes to impeach Trump, chances of getting the two-thirds majority of senators required to convict an impeached president and remove him from office are effectively nonexistent.

Unfortunately for Pelosi, the Democratic base—including the media and the empowered radical faction of her Democratic caucus—have become deaf to reason. According to a Politico poll, whereas 70% of Democrats support impeachment, only 37% of the public does. The likes of Reps. Anastasia Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib, like The New York Times and The Washington Post, live in an echo chamber. Members of the echo chamber are so cut off from those outside it that just as they cannot fathom anyone objecting to socialism, so they cannot imagine that anyone supports Trump or accepts the validity of the 2016 election results.

It is hard to know how the impeachment proceedings will play out, but a likely scenario is that the proceedings will damage Democrats more than they will damage Trump.

This then brings us back to Israel.

U.S. Attorney General William Barr. Photo Credit: Fox News

Like Pelosi and her colleagues, Blue and White leaders Benny Gantz and Lapid and their colleagues on the left claim that the very fact that Netanyahu is under investigation renders him illegitimate. They refuse to form a unity government with Likud unless Netanyahu is first ousted as Likud leader.

But unlike Pelosi, Gantz and Lapid don’t need to make their claims themselves. Lapid, whose ministers gave preferential treatment to Yedioth through government advertising contracts and received glowing coverage in the paper, does not have to argue the case for impeaching Netanyahu. He stands behind the ostensibly objective state prosecutions.

Pelosi’s decision to open impeachment proceedings against Trump despite the great political risk involved going into an election year indicates that the radical faction has swallowed the Democratic Party. But more importantly, her move is a testament to the abiding power and fortitude of American democracy. The difference between the situation in Israel, where prosecutors happily abuse their legal power for transparently political aims, and the United States, where politically motivated prosecutors backed away from the brink and compelled politicians to take over their political investigations, is the difference between a flailing democracy and a resilient one.

             (Front Page Mag)

Caroline Glick is an award-winning columnist and author of “The Israeli Solution: A One-State Plan for Peace in the Middle East.”

While Erdogan Slammed Israel At U.N., Turkish Support For Terror Was Revealed

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan used his United Nations General Assembly speech last week to blast Israel as the cause of "injustice" in the Middle East and vow that his country "will continue to stand by the oppressed people of Palestine as she has always done."

By: John Rossomando & Steven Emerson

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan used his United Nations General Assembly speech last week to blast Israel as the cause of “injustice” in the Middle East and vow that his country “will continue to stand by the oppressed people of Palestine as she has always done.” But a new report by Israel’s Meir Amit Intelligence and Information Center, as well as new sanctions announced by the U.S. Treasury Department, make it clear that Erdogan is in no position to cast aspersions.

“Turkey turns a blind eye to Hamas’s covert operational and financial activity being carried out from its territory (which has recently been demonstrated in the American sanctions) and regularly denies its existence,” the Meir Amit center reported.

“[T]he latest American designations clearly demonstrate that Turkey continues to be used as a hub for Hamas’s operational and financial activity, even after the departure of Saleh al-Arouri,” the Meir Amit report said. Arouri, a founder of the Hamas military wing and a member of the Hamas political bureau, lived in Turkey until last year.

During his time in Turkey, he helped plot Hamas terror attacks. He claimed credit on behalf of Hamas for the 2014 kidnapping and murder of three Israeli yeshiva students. Later that year, the Shin Bet “uncovered an extensive Hamas military network which operated in Judea and Samaria. Its operatives had planted IEDs in Samaria. They [were] handled by Hamas’s headquarters in Turkey,” the Meir Amit report said. “Hamas’s military operatives who were trained abroad (in various countries, including Turkey) participated in this activity.”

For his part, Erdogan considers Hamas a “liberation movement” and denies that it is a terrorist group.

While it supports the Palestinian-Arab cause, Turkey denies autonomy to more than 15 million Kurds and even represses the use of the Kurdish language. It has bombed Kurdish civilians. It occupies much of northwestern Syria and has engaged in ethnic cleansing against the Kurds there. Turkish warplanes bombed a hospital in Afrin during its invasion of the Kurdish enclave last year, independent analysis by Bellingcat, a citizen journalism organization that focuses on war crimes and criminal activities, showed.

Earlier this month, the U.S. Treasury Department announced sanctions on Hamas leaders and ISIS facilitators living in Turkey.

Those include Zaher Jabarin, who heads Hamas’ finance office from Turkey and manages tens of millions of dollars in Hamas money. Jabarin’s transfers of U.S. dollars “finance HAMAS’s terrorist activity,” the Treasury statement said. Like Arouri, Jabarin was one of the founders of the Hamas military wing in Judea and Samaria. Jabarin was in charge of a Hamas squad that abducted and murdered Israeli border policeman Nissim Toledano in 1992, the Meir Amit report said.

“Jabarin has served as the primary point of contact between Hamas and the [Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp –Quds Force] IRGC-QF. Since 2017, his relations with them were enhanced based on Hamas operatives’ efforts to increase funding from Iran,” the report said.

Treasury also targeted the Turkey-based Redin Exchange as “a key part of the infrastructure used to transfer money” to Hamas. Redin transferred $10 million to the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’ military wing, in March.

Redin also facilitated a $2 million transfer last year from the IRGC-QF and Hezbollah to Hamas. Its deputy CEO, Ismail Tash, was the primary contact in numerous Iran-Hamas money transfers, the Meir Amit report found.

Erdogan’s inner circle has encouraged bloodshed between Israel and the Palestinians by providing assistance to the al-Qassam Brigades. Israel’s Shin Bet arrested two suspects last year linked to the Turkish private military company SADAT, which run by top Erdogan military adviser retired Brig.

Gen. Adnan Tanriverdi. It accused them of helping Hamas’ military buildup by providing money and weapons to the terrorists. SADAT’s website calls for the use of military force against Israel. Meir Amit reported that Jabarin had recruited the men under instructions from Arouri.

“The liaison of Palestine with the globe should not be left at the mercy of Israel. This requires open support by Islamic countries. Every effort should be made, including use of force,” SADAT says on its website.

Erdogan presented Turkey as a terrorism fighter, saying Turkey killed ISIS fighters in areas of Syria it occupies. He glossed over Turkey’s clandestine support for ISIS in Syria.

“Turkey has been the country most influenced by the [ISIS] threat; this terrorist organization has harassed our borders and targeted our cities very near the borders with suicide bombings that have killed hundreds of Turkish citizens,” Erdogan said. “Turkey is the first country that has delivered the heaviest blow to the [ISIS] presence in Syria.”

Internal documents and whistleblowers tell a different story — one of a country that plays both sides when it comes to ISIS. Leaked emails from Erdogan’s son-in-law and current Turkish finance minister, Berat Albayrak, showed his connection to an ISIS oil smuggling operations.

The Treasury Department sanctions also targeted several Turkish companies that “materially assisted … or provided financial, material, or technological support” to ISIS.

Turkey’s intelligence agency, the MIT, conspired to bus ISIS jihadists across Turkish territory, leaked Turkish wiretaps show. At least 15,000 ISIS fighters entered Syria that way, Abdullah Bozkurt, former editor of Turkey’s Today’s Zaman newspaper, told the Investigative Project on Terrorism (where we both work) in February.

Turkish police were told not to arrest ISIS fighters traveling to Syria, said former Turkish National Police official Ahmet Yayla.

Turkey provided ISIS with drones and munitions, an ISIS fighter detained by the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) who was interviewed by the International Center for the Study of Violent Extremism said. He and a Palestinian-Arab ISIS fighter held by the SDF said that Turkish hospitals provided medical assistance to wounded ISIS terrorists.

“Like me, thousands of ISIS members have been treated in Turkey. Everyone knows that Turkey is the mother of all jihadist groups,” said former ISIS fighter Islam Ahmed Muhammed Balusha. “This applies to the jihadist groups in Syria, Iraq, Libya, and even from Palestine to Afghanistan. Turkey has supported the ISIS massively.”

Erdogan’s party, the AKP, allegedly used ISIS to attack political opponents.

EU INTCEN, the European Union’s intelligence arm, reportedly suggested the AKP ordered an October 2015 ISIS suicide bombing at a peace rally in Ankara that killed 109 people.

Erdogan’s pretense of being the savior of the region’s problems belies the fact his government has become a major terrorism supporter and is guilty of everything he criticizes Israel of doing.

  (IPT)

This article originally was published Oct. 1 by the Daily Wire.

John Rossomando is a senior analyst at the Investigative Project on Terrorism and Steven Emerson is its executive director.

BDS is the New Face of the Old Anti-Semitism: What Will We Do to Stop it?

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After more than a decade of deception, new evidence is being presented by a range of governments, international organizations, and media outlets to show that BDS is nothing but a front for anti-Semitic hate groups and terrorists that seek nothing less than the destruction of the State of Israel. Photo Credit: CBN

The report showed how Hamas, Fatah, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine have ties to at least 13 anti-Israel NGOs

By: Adam Milstein

The dishonest proponents of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement have long claimed that they simply aim to further human rights. For years, they were able to recruit many progressives including Jews to support and justify their campaigns. Yet, in recent weeks, the true nature of this hate movement has been acknowledged in unprecedented ways.

the Israeli Ministry of Strategic Affairs and Public Diplomacy released a landmark report “Behind the Mask – the Antisemitic Nature of BDS Exposed that reveals the rampant antisemitism within the BDS movement, including its calls for violence against Jews and the dismantlement of Israel. The report demonstrates how the BDS movement has intensified hatred against Jews around the world and provides 80 examples of antisemitism by key activists in the BDS movement. Photo Credit: 4il.org.il

After more than a decade of deception, new evidence is being presented by a range of governments, international organizations, and media outlets to show that BDS is nothing but a front for anti-Semitic hate groups and terrorists that seek nothing less than the destruction of the State of Israel. It is the new face of the old antisemitism. The world is just waking up to this horrifying truth, which sheds light on what America can do to address this growing hatred around the world.

On September 24, 2019, the United Nations — a body with no love for Israel and a well-documented history of bias against the Jewish State — released an unprecedented report on the worldwide spread of anti-Semitism. The UN acknowledged that anti-Semitism is growing around the world, wearing one of three faces: on the far left, the far right, and among radical Islamists. In the report, the UN recognizes for the first time that “the objectives, activities, and effects of the BDS movement are fundamentally anti-Semitic.”

The next day, the Israeli Ministry of Strategic Affairs and Public Diplomacy released a landmark report “Behind the Mask – the Antisemitic Nature of BDS Exposed that reveals the rampant antisemitism within the BDS movement, including its calls for violence against Jews and the dismantlement of Israel. The report demonstrates how the BDS movement has intensified hatred against Jews around the world and provides 80 examples of antisemitism by key activists in the BDS movement. It documents the true face of BDS: a 15-year-old campaign that promotes demonization and delegitimization of the State of Israel, and, in so doing, has exacerbated antisemitic rhetoric against Jews worldwide.

It followed another bombshell Israeli government report from earlier this year, titled “Terrorists in Suits”, which revealed more than 100 different connections linking Palestinian terrorist groups to BDS organizations. The report documented how Palestinian terrorist groups and the anti-Israel boycott campaign work together in pursuit of their goal to wipe Israel off the map, given that the terrorists view boycotts as a complementary tactic to their violent activities.

The report showed how Hamas, Fatah, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine have ties to at least 13 anti-Israel NGOs, and have managed to place more than 30 of their members, including members who have previously sat in jail, some for murder, in senior positions inside of BDS organizations. The boycott organizations and terrorist-designated organizations fundraise together and share the same personnel. Contrary to popular belief, these officials have not abandoned their support for terrorism, but instead continue to maintain organizational, financial and active ties with terrorist groups.

Now that many in the world are finally acknowledging just how evil BDS is, our Jewish community and fellow Americans must follow suit. Governments and NGOs must adopt the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism. Our local, state and federal government must pass laws and resolutions that condemn and delegitimize the vile hatred of BDS. Photo Credit: 4il.org.il

All of these reports followed a similar acknowledgment last summer by the German Parliament, which likened the BDS movement to the Nazis. It voted overwhelmingly for a resolution, which made clear BDS is not only antisemitic but also deploys methods reminiscent of Nazi-era calls to boycott Jews. The resolution came after the top German intelligence agency published a comprehensive analysis of rising antisemitism stemming from the BDS groups. These BDS groups were found to radicalize all other hate groups to create an ecosystem that breeds violent antisemitic attacks.

Germany now is working to be on the right side of history as they vividly remember when Nazis urged gentiles not to buy products from Jews, a boycott that escalated into outright theft, displacement, and eventually, the slaughter of six million Jews. It is time for others to follow.

The majority of the recent reports on the connection of the BDS movement to both terrorism and antisemitism make many different recommendations on how to stop the growing antisemitism of our era, one of which is of particular note: that countries should accept the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism and uphold its principles and outlaw the BDS Movement.

The IHRA working definition is a concise description of a complex hatred that takes many forms. It reads: “Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”

The people who lead the BDS movement bring many different kinds of antisemitic hatred into our public conversation, and the IHRA definition helps identify the sort of bigotry that they spread. It defines anti-Semitism as accusing Jews or Israel of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust, accusing Jews of dual loyalty, using blood libel to criticize Israel, comparing Israel to the Nazis, holding the Jewish state to a double standard, or, in one of its purest forms of hate, denying the Jewish people the right to self-determination.

Now that many in the world are finally acknowledging just how evil BDS is, our Jewish community and fellow Americans must follow suit. Governments and NGOs must adopt the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism. Our local, state and federal government must pass laws and resolutions that condemn and delegitimize the vile hatred of BDS. Politicians and bureaucrats should stop funding educational programs that include BDS’s bigotry. Financial platforms not to provide services to BDS organizations that publish antisemitic content or that have links to terror, and we shall all demand that social media platforms remove antisemitic BDS content.

After a decade of excuses and inaction about BDS, it seems that some are finally waking up to the danger this movement poses not only to the Jewish people but also the basic values of the liberal societies in which we live.

It is on our leaders to build on the recent momentum to inform the public about BDS’ antisemitic agenda — its shadowy funding sources, its true aim of denying Jewish self-determination, its lopsided and underhanded tactics, and its connection to terrorism.

BDS is the new face of the old antisemitism, and when it comes to fighting antisemitism, the old adage “better late than never” is particularly apt for our moment. It’s time for us all to get to work.

This article was originally published in the Jerusalem Post on October 2, 2019.

Adam Milstein is an Israeli-American Philanthropreneur. He can be reached at [email protected], on Twitter @AdamMilstein, and on Facebook www.facebook.com/AdamMilsteinCP.

A Personal Look at the Yom Kippur War

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Israeli army Southern Command General Ariel Sharon with Defense Minister Moshe Dayan during the Yom Kippur War in October 1973 on the western bank of the Suez Canal in Egypt. Credit: Ministry of Defense

By: Moshe Phillips

As we approach the 46th anniversary of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, I have chosen to look at a book that illustrates the revolution that took place in the short time between the 1967 Six Day War and 1973 war. That revolution was in the way that Jews from all over the world viewed Zionism and the State of Israel, and their nexus with Jews and Judaism.

Today, when many Jews in the US are disconnected from Israel and Zionism, there may not be a better book to read than Letters to Talia, even though its words were penned decades ago. The Hebrew edition of the book was originally published in 2005 and became hugely popular, but somehow the book never achieved the status it so richly deserves outside of Israel. Photo Credit: Amazon

Today, when many Jews in the US are disconnected from Israel and Zionism, there may not be a better book to read than Letters to Talia, even though its words were penned decades ago. The Hebrew edition of the book was originally published in 2005 and became hugely popular, but somehow the book never achieved the status it so richly deserves outside of Israel.

Letters to Talia is eerily reminiscent of Self-Portrait of a Hero: From the Letters of Jonathan Netanyahu 1963–1976. Both reveal the tragic loss that Israel has suffered by sacrificing its best and brightest on the fields of battle for generations: 23,741 soldiers were remembered on Yom Hazikaron, the Day of Remembrance, earlier this year.

Millions of Jews the world over will again mourn for these soldiers this year at Yizkor on Yom Kippur. Letters to Talia is a collection of correspondence between a kibbutz-born secular Israeli high school girl and an Israeli soldier named Dov Indig, one of Israel’s fallen heroes.

Indig fell in combat on October 7, 1973, 11 Tishrei 5734, fighting the Syrian army on the Golan Heights. He was a dedicated yeshiva student and part of the Religious Zionist movement.

Many of the letters in the book center around Talia’s desire to put the Jewish religion in proper context in her life as a modern, thinking young woman, and Dov’s answers to her questions and his army experiences.

What makes the book so moving is not just the emotion that each writer attaches to their search for truth, but the commitment they demonstrate to the Jewish people, their love of the land of Israel, and their faith in the State of Israel.

The topics tackled encompass an entire range of issues from the Israeli surrender of Sinai to women’s rights, and from emigration to the Diaspora to a critique of Western culture. The reader is left to ponder how these young Israelis could have had more common sense than the politicians who surrendered so much of the lands liberated in 1967 that feature so prominently in the book.

Subjects such as religious coercion and the importance of Israeli settlements are discussed at length. The depiction of visits to Sinai are vivid, and leave the reader with a better sense of what Israel lost when this vast area was surrendered to Egypt at Camp David.

Here are a few random quotes that give a sense of the patriotism of these young Israelis:

Talia: I really envy you that you were on the Golan Heights. I love hiking there more than anywhere else in Israel.

Today, when many Jews in the US are disconnected from Israel and Zionism, there may not be a better book to read than Letters to Talia, even though its words were penned decades ago. The Hebrew edition of the book was originally published in 2005 and became hugely popular, but somehow the book never achieved the status it so richly deserves outside of Israel. Photo Credit: Amazon

Dov: How fortunate we are that we are privileged to be soldiers in the IDF [Israel Defense Forces], which defends the lives of Jews in Israel and throughout the world.

Talia: We thought that our amazing victory in the Six Day War would put an end to wars, and that the Arabs would resign themselves to our existence, but it turns out that we made a mistake.

Dov: I am happy to hear from you that most of the kids hold that it is forbidden to give up Sinai and it is forbidden to be tempted by the promises of the Arabs, who until today have broken all of them.

Read the book for yourself; you will be moved by the experience.

Moshe Phillips is national director of Herut North America’s US division. Herut is an international movement for Zionist pride and education. Its website is https://herutna.org/.

“The Emperors and the Jews” Makes History Come Alive

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“The Emperor and the Jews” written by Ari Lieberman (Mosaica Press) is actually comprised of three different parts which are seamlessly woven together to present one picture

Reviewed by: Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein

“The Emperor and the Jews” written by Ari Lieberman (Mosaica Press) is actually comprised of three different parts which are seamlessly woven together to present one picture: Firstly, it profiles important Greek and Roman rulers from the perspective of secular historians. Secondly, it draws from rabbinic literature to offer biographical sketches of the important Jewish figures who interfaced with those Greco-Roman rulers. Finally, it offers traditional Jewish insights and explanations to the stories of those Greco-Roman leaders, and their significance from a Jewish perspective.

Lieberman opens his book with an elaborate description of the Greek king Alexander the Great of Macedonia. After painting a vivid picture of Alexander’s upbringing and tutelage, Lieberman follows the stories of Alexander’s military conquests all the way until his death. Lieberman then segues into Talmudic stories in which Alexander makes appearances, including his interactions with the Jewish sages of his day, such as Shimon HaTzaddik, The Elders of the South, and Geviha ben Pesisa.

As is well-known, after Alexander’s death, the Greek empire split into four kingdoms, which Lieberman shows is a fulfillment of Daniel’s prophecies concerning the Third Kingdom. Continuing in the historical narrative, Lieberman focuses on the first two Ptolemaic kings in Egypt. After presenting the historical facts about the Ptolemys, the focus shifts to Rabbinic accounts of the translation of the Torah into Greek which was said to be commissioned by Ptolemy. Lieberman draws from many Jewish sources to analyze this episode, considering whether this development ought to be viewed in a positively or negatively, and whether there is Biblical precedent for translating the Torah.

The next section of Lieberman’s anthology deals with the Flavian emperors of Rome—Vespasian and his son Titus. Lieberman provides us with the historical background behind Vespasian’s rise to power and why the Romans waged war against the Jews. He then introduces us to the Jewish leader at time, the holy Tanna Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai, who foresaw Vespasian’s ascend to the throne. At that fateful meeting, the holy Tanna negotiated with Vespasian to ensure the continuation of the Jewish People even after Jerusalem was to be sacked by the Romans and the Holy Temple be burnt to the ground. Lieberman also discusses the Talmud’s account of the Temple’s destruction and how Titus was duly punished for his role.

The last section of Lieberman’s book is dedicated to the Roman emperor Antoninus and his relationship with Rabbi Yehuda HaNassi. Although the exact identity of Antoninus mentioned in the Talmud is unclear, Lieberman narrows it down to Marcus Aurelius or Antoninus Pius and gives us the biography of both of those figures. He then provides a bio of Rabbi Yehuda HaNassi—the famous redactor of the Mishnah, known in the Talmud as simply “Rebbi”. Afterwards, Lieberman offers an elaborate analysis of the enigmatic, yet enchanting bond between these two unlikely companions. Many of the sources which Lieberman cites connect this relationship to that of Jacob and Esau, with Rebbi representing Jacob and Antoninus representing Esau.

At the end of the book, Lieberman wrote two helpful appendices: The first provides a running list of the changes that the Sages introduced when translating the Torah from Hebrew into Greek. This appendix is related to his discussion on the Ptolemys and their role in that undertaking. Lieberman draws from a plethora of sources to explain the need for each change, and the implications of those changes. The second appendix deals with the concept of the Four Kingdoms which are destined to dominate the Jewish People, and documents various allusions to these Four Kingdoms in the most unlikely passages.

Lieberman’s work boasts of two different types of notes: Footnotes are marked by Arabic numerals, and generally refer the reader to sources and/or links to websites with much of the relevant primary and secondary sources. Endnotes are marked by Roman numerals which provide the reader with all full Hebrew sources cited in their original.

In addition to drawing from historians who wrote about ancient Greece and Rome, Lieberman’s impressive library includes the Talmud, Midrashim, Rashi, R. Bachaya, Maharsha, Maharal, the Aggadic works of the Ben Ish Chai, and much more. He also make use of traditional Jewish works of history, such as Shalshelet HaKabbalah, Tzemach David, Seder HaDorot, and Dorot HaRishonim.

As alluded to above, Lieberman does not suffice with just reporting the facts, he also provides the reader with more practical lessons and insights. His work is chockful of advice and guidance for potential shtadlanim and askanim gleaned from lessons learned in the past.

All in all, Ari Lieberman’s book is very easy to read and does not get bogged down in tedious details. His liberal use of adjectives make his descriptions come alive, and his masterful use of bullet points both summarize his major arguments and make fresh succinct observations without dwelling on them. Despite engaging with secular historians, Lieberman’s work remains true to Chazal and the spirit of tradition as befits an apparent Torah Scholar like himself. As the venerable Rabbi Dr. Yitzchak Breitowitz observes, “Rabbi Ari Lieberman has written a truly fascinating book on a largely unstudied topic” and in the words of Rabbi Berel Wein, “it belongs in the home of every Jew interested in our tradition and history”.

Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein is the author of the book God versus Gods: Judaism in the Age of Idolatry and of the book Lashon HaKodesh: History, Holiness, & Hebrew. He is a member of the RCA, and currently serves as an editor for the Veromemanu Foundation’s flagship project, the Yalkut Shorashim. He resides in Beitar Illit, Israel and can be reached via email at [email protected].

Manhattan Library to Display Never Before Seen JD Salinger Collection

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The reclusive world of late author JD Salinger is about to be thrown open to the world. Later this month, the New York Public Library’s main branch will be displaying over 200 Salinger items, many of which have never been seen before. Photo Credit: Wikipedia

By: Edward Mackluvian

The reclusive world of late author JD Salinger is about to be thrown open to the world.

Later this month, the New York Public Library’s main branch will be displaying over 200 Salinger items, many of which have never been seen before.

“When the writer JD Salinger died in 2010, his literary agent issued a statement saying that “in keeping with his lifelong, uncompromising desire to protect and defend his privacy, there will be no service,” the Guardian reported. “That was then. Next week, the curtain of privacy behind which Salinger carefully guarded his personal life will be lowered further, with a major exhibition at the New York Public Library. The exhibit, which will be free to the public and is scheduled to run for three months, will present a mix of personal and literary effects, ranging from the original typescript of The Catcher in the Rye, revised by the author, to a bookcase from Salinger’s bedroom filled with books from his personal library.”

The exhibit has been put together by Matt Salinger, the author’s son Matt Salinger; the writer’s widow, Colleen Salinger; and the library’s special collections department.

“He was a famously private man who shared his work with millions but his life and non-published thoughts with less than a handful of people, including me,” Matt Salinger said in a prepared statement. “But I’ve learned that while he may have only fathered two children there are a great, great many readers out there who have their own rather profound relationships with him, through his work, and who have long wanted an opportunity to get to know him better.”

Among the items on display will be the original typescript of “The Catcher in the Rye,” Salinger’s sardonic coming-of-age masterpiece about teenage angst and vulnerability that put him on the literary map — and sent him into seclusion, according to the New York Daily News. “The book, which debuted in 1951, has since sold more than 70 million copies, and still sells a quarter of a million copies a year.

“Other items featured in the Sue and Edgar Wachenheim III Gallery at the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building will be a bookcase from his bedroom filled with books from his personal library, and items from Salinger’s childhood, including a bowl he meticulously made at summer camp when he was about 10 years old, and kept his whole life,” the Daily News added.

The exhibit will also include letters exchanged between Salinger’s friends, fellow soldiers, and authors and editors including William Shawn, William Maxwell and Ernest Hemingway.

Amid Rising Anti-Semitism in NY, Jewish Leaders Ask for More Police Protection

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Borough Park Councilman Kalman Yeger. Photo Credit: council.nyc.gov

By Hellen Zaboulani

Jewish leaders throughout the five boroughs are putting their foot down, demanding more police officers guard Jewish Centers as Yom Kippur approaches. “Enough is enough,” said city Councilman Chaim Deutsch, who represents southern Brooklyn, and the Orthodox Jewish Midwood community. “If they have to bring in 200 cops to patrol our streets to show their visibility, that’s what has to be done.”

As per the NY Post, this year, we have seen a spike in anti-Semitic crimes throughout New York City, in comparison to 2018. There were 161 hate crimes targeting Jews reported between Jan. 1 and Sept. 29. That’s a 50 percent increase over last year, when there were 105 incidents during the same period, as per NYPD statistics.

Last week alone there were two anti-Semitic crimes reported. In Williamsburg, Brooklyn, a synagogue’s window was smashed by two people who threw a metal milk crate and metal mailbox at it during broad daylight, as per surveillance video. Also, in the borough’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood, a Jewish woman’s headscarf and wig were yanked off while she walked with her children. The offense was also caught on camera. Following the attacks, Mayor Bill de Blasio took to Twitter, vowing, “We WILL find the perpetrators and hold them responsible.” The NYPD has said that they still have not made any arrest in the first case, and that second one was never actually reported to them.

Councilman Deutsch, Borough Park Councilman Kalman Yeger, Flatbush Jewish Community Council co-founder Chaskal Bennett and other Jewish leaders planned to meet Monday afternoon to pinpoint security gaps that need to be addressed for this holy day. “There is no community in New York City that appreciates and values the Police Department more than the orthodox Jewish community,” said Bennett. But “we feel that our community is vulnerable and has been subject to an alarming increase in hate crimes. That feeling must be met with the full force and protection of the NYPD.”

“The NYPD has the largest Hate Crime Task Force in the country comprised of the best hate crime investigators,’’ a department spokeswoman said in a statement on Sunday. “During the High Holy Days, there will continue to be an increased police presence — both seen and unseen — around synagogues and Jewish cultural centers to ensure individuals can practice their faith safely, freely and openly.”

Governor Andrew Cuomo also made a statement before Rosh Hashanah. “Out of an abundance of caution and following a number of appalling anti-Semitic incidents over the past year I am directing the State Police to increase patrols at synagogues and other religious centers across our state,” Cuomo said. “We will not allow the cowards who contributed to the recent rash of hateful acts against the Jewish community and other groups to intimidate or divide us.”

Partnership Led by Shvo, Bilgili Group & Deutsche Finance Begin Construction on 9200 Wilshire in Beverly Hills

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Rendering of 9200 Wilshire Blvd in Beverly Hills, California. The sleek mid-rise structure with 54 residences will feature a striking glass exterior and a host of exclusive amenities, including a rooftop pool with views of the surrounding cityscape and mountains. The project will include approximately 6,650 square feet of retail space, wrapping around a central courtyard along Wilshire Boulevard. Residents will enjoy an exclusive living experience in one of the world's most sought-after neighborhoods.

Edited by: JV Staff

The joint venture led by SHVO, Bilgili Group, and Deutsche Finance that owns the property at 9200 Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills has closed on a $190 million construction loan to break ground on the project. The group purchased the residential and retail development site adjacent to the prestigious “Golden Triangle” in May for $130 million. The loan was provided by ACORE Capital, a leading commercial real estate finance company. The financing was arranged by Lotus Capital Partners.

“This is a rare opportunity to build something unique and exceptional in an irreplaceable Beverly Hills location,” said Michael Shvo, Chairman and CEO of SHVO. “With financing now secured, we look forward to creating an iconic property for residents and visitors in Beverly Hills.” Photo Credit: Wikipedia

Comprising a full city block, the project is one of the only active new residential developments in Beverly Hills. The sleek mid-rise structure with 54 residences will feature a striking glass exterior and a host of exclusive amenities, including a rooftop pool with views of the surrounding cityscape and mountains. The project will include approximately 6,650 square feet of retail space, wrapping around a central courtyard along Wilshire Boulevard. Residents will enjoy an exclusive living experience in one of the world’s most sought-after neighborhoods.

“This is a rare opportunity to build something unique and exceptional in an irreplaceable Beverly Hills location,” said Michael Shvo, Chairman and CEO of SHVO. “With financing now secured, we look forward to creating an iconic property for residents and visitors in Beverly Hills.”

“This partnership is on a roll and I’m so proud of the work we’ve already done and the great things to come,” said Serdar Bilgili, Chairman of Bilgili Group. “9200 Wilshire is a gem of a property in the heart of Beverly Hills and this project will help continue to realize this area’s potential.”

“This project represents a great achievement for our partnership with SHVO and Bilgili Group and our sophisticated investor base,” said Jason Lucas, Managing Partner of Deutsche Finance America. “With this visionary partnership, 9200 Wilshire and the rest of our portfolio have exciting futures ahead of them.”

The project is led by developer-owners SHVO with Bilgili Group and Deutsche Finance. Investors include Bayerische Versorgungskammer (“BVK”), one of the largest institutional investors in Germany and a top ten pension fund in Europe. The partnership has invested approximately $1 billion of equity in iconic locations over the last 15 months. The group recently purchased the former Coca-Cola Building at 711 Fifth Avenue. Earlier this year, the group purchased the historic Raleigh, Richmond, and South Seas Hotels in Miami Beach. In 2018, the partnership acquired the office portion of 685 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, which is now being converted into luxury Mandarin Oriental Residences.

 

About SHVO

“This partnership is on a roll and I’m so proud of the work we’ve already done and the great things to come,” said Serdar Bilgili, Chairman of Bilgili Group. “9200 Wilshire is a gem of a property in the heart of Beverly Hills and this project will help continue to realize this area’s potential.” Photo Credit: http://www.hurriyet.com.tr

SHVO brings an atelier-like experience to real estate development, fueled by a discerning eye for design excellence and a passion for quality in every detail. With more than $5 billion under development, SHVO is dedicated to creating extreme value by bringing innovative concepts to life in premier locations for exclusive clientele. Founded in 2004, SHVO has been involved in the envisioning, planning, sales and marketing of more than $15 billion of prime real estate, spanning more than 80 million square feet. SHVO projects have pioneered innovations that continue to be emulated and set new standards throughout the world. Based in New York City, SHVO was founded in 2004 by Michael Shvo, who remains its Chairman and CEO.
www.shvo.com

 

Developer-owners SHVO with Bilgili Group and Deutsche Finance recently purchased the former Coca-Cola Building at 711 Fifth Avenue. Photo Credit: Just Drinks

About Bilgili Group

Bilgili Group is a leading real estate focused Turkish conglomerate and BLG Capital is its independently managed private equity real estate arm founded in 2011. BLG Capital’s investment and asset management team has raised and invested more than $500 million equity in Turkey since 2011 and the two firms have over $3 billion of assets under management combined. The firms have a long track record in real estate investments in different asset classes such as hospitality, student housing, city-center mixed-use projects, office, high end residential and other commercial properties. Backed by its institutional investor base, the companies aim to integrate new and unique concepts into the markets they operate in and also execute strategic partnerships with leading global brands such as Marriott, Soho House, The Peninsula, Aman Resorts and Dogus Group. The investment portfolio includes W Istanbul Hotel, Soho House Istanbul, Galataport, The Peninsula Istanbul, and Aman Bodrum among other high end residential and student housing projects. For further information please visit www.bilgiliholding.com.

 

About Deutsche Finance

“This project represents a great achievement for our partnership with SHVO and Bilgili Group and our sophisticated investor base,” said Jason Lucas, Managing Partner of Deutsche Finance America. “With this visionary partnership, 9200 Wilshire and the rest of our portfolio have exciting futures ahead of them.” Photo Credit: Linked In

Deutsche Finance Group is a global real estate investment management firm established in 2005 and headquartered in Munich with offices in London, Denver, Zurich, and Luxembourg. Deutsche Finance America is a subsidiary company established in 2018 to source, structure and asset manage direct real estate investments in the United States on behalf of Deutsche Finance Group’s institutional client accounts and managed funds. Deutsche Finance America has closed on nine deals totaling more than $1 billion of equity. Additional information can be found at www.dfamerica.com.

 

About ACORE Capital

ACORE Capital, LP is a commercial real estate finance company focused on originating, acquiring and managing first mortgages, B-notes, mezzanine debt and preferred equity throughout the United States. ACORE, which is an acronym for Alpha Commercial Real Estate, specializes in providing borrowers with customized financing solutions at competitive rates and flexible terms. For investors, ACORE is focused on generating alpha through attractive commercial real estate debt investments coupled with superior risk management. ACORE is led by commercial real estate finance veterans Boyd Fellows, Stew Ward, Chris Tokarski and Warren de Haan. For more information, please visit www.acorecapital.com.

Poisonous Pedagogy: Israel Hatred and the Collapse of Liberal Education

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The BDS movement in the US gets its lifeblood from the progressive academy – post-humanist professors with a simplistic ideological narrative, and millennial students who assent to a tweetable narrative they can easily understand

By: Professor William Kolbrener

The BDS movement in the US gets its lifeblood from the progressive academy – post-humanist professors with a simplistic ideological narrative, and millennial students who assent to a tweetable narrative they can easily understand. In this narrative, Israel stands for the evils of Western modernity while a fantasy Palestine, sanitized of religious fundamentalism, intolerance and political extremism, stands for the alternative. An illiberal pedagogy, now dominant in the Humanities, drives home this plainly political agenda.

In the 1960s, the Chilean revolutionary pedagogue Paolo Freire, in Pedagogy of the Oppressed, argued that the ruling class ensure education limits reflection, creativity and innovation among the people.

The resulting lack of historical contextualization of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in Middle Eastern Studies Departments, when combined with the lack of historical memory among millennials, makes combatting BDS a particularly difficult challenge. An undergraduate, for example, will tweet the Irish Times’ Arab-Israeli Conflict in 10 Points’ which fails to mention the dates 1948 or 1973, without realizing the list may be controversial.

And it’s not just the millennial assent to BDS which is problematic. Also damaging is the surreptitious entry of anti-Israel sentiment into more moderate discourses about Israel. Moderation, reason, and liberalism per se are all now held under suspicion. BDS and the progressive coalition that supports it undermine the very language of liberal democracy and the principles of education which have informed it for at least a century. Indeed, it is the collapse of liberalism in America – the emergence of populist left and right – that most challenges Israeli claims to existence.

 

THE NEW PEDAGOGY: EDUCATION AS IDEOLOGICAL INITIATION

The attack on Israel as a central part of a neo-liberal hegemony is inculcated in a distinctive pedagogy in the contemporary post-humanist – the ‘human’ is also a category of domination, apparently – Humanities. Famously, in the 1960s, the Chilean revolutionary pedagogue Paolo Freire, in Pedagogy of the Oppressed, argued that the ruling class ensure education limits reflection, creativity and innovation among the people. Freire opposed this, believing that true education, and indeed civilization, depend upon dialogue, and if the relationship between educator and student is modelled on the Hegelian master-slave relationship, then the possibility of genuine communication is undermined.

Today, a new pedagogy of the oppressed manifests itself in the American academy, taking two forms. First, those enlightened to the colonial usurpation of Palestine by Israel enact the ‘banking model’ of education in which the knowing – ‘woke’ – professor deposits information into the passive mind of the student. This education-as-ideological-initiation parallels the model of education Freire criticized, encouraging acquiescence not initiative.

Second, students certain of the singular narrative they have imbibed, then themselves become agents working against critical reflection, as they refuse engagement or argument with other frameworks – whether in other classrooms, on social media, or at home. Applied to Israel/Palestine, this new pedagogy of the oppressed involves the woke saying to those who disagree with them: ‘don’t you dare communicate with me.’ Indeed the invocation of rational discourse and democracy is viewed as entailing a surreptitious form of intellectual conquest. Skepticism towards liberal values – and to Israel, now framed as the distillation of all the evils of the neo-liberal West – is cast as critical thinking and becomes the most visible and effective form of virtue-signaling.

 

FRANKFURT SCHOOL

Central to the story of how Israel became associated with the historical sins of neo-liberalism, the failure of enlightenment, and the fundamentalism of religion is the work of the Frankfurt School in post-World War Two Germany, particularly of two Jews, Theodore Adorno and Max Horkheimer. Founded in the early years of the Weimar Republic, the Frankfurt School brought together Hegelian philosophy, Marxist political thought, and eventually Freudian psychoanalysis all under the rubric of a critique of Western capitalism. Under the threat of Nazism, Horkheimer and Adorno moved their ‘School for Social Research’ from Frankfurt to Geneva, and eventually to New York in 1935.

Though made up of European intellectuals, including the neo-Freudian Eric Fromm and the sociologist Leo Lowenthal, by 1940 all the members of the Institute had become American citizens, with the Frankfurt critique of Western culture now emanating from Southern California. Outside of academic circles, Adorno became known for the proclamation ‘no poetry after Auschwitz,’ by which he meant that the Nazi Death camps marked the end of any pretense of Western refinement and culture. How, after all, do you write a sonnet in the shadow of Auschwitz?

The pursuit of enlightenment and rational universalism, in Adorno’s view, led directly to the Nazis, with the distinction between civilization and barbarism blurred in the Final Solution. Enlightenment, in this reading, contains the seeds of its own destruction, the eventual domination of the world through a reason that had been rendered fully ‘instrumental’ in the service of the State, leading ultimately to genocide. That is, for Adorno, the promises of enlightenment freedom led to fascism and the death camps.

In a bizarre, even perverse historical twist, the humanists of the 1980s appropriated the Frankfurt School antipathy towards Western enlightenment, providing a legacy for today’s progressives, who have turned their suspicions against Israel and the Jews. Starting in the 1970s, Michel Foucault, the most influential figure in the humanities over the past four decades, adopted the perspective of the Frankfurt School for social and cultural history.

Writing on love, sex, mental illness, and the prison system, Foucault found all aspects of Western life to be in the ‘fields of power,’ with his Discipline and Punish turning the prison into a metaphor for Western cultural domination. For Foucault and his followers, notwithstanding appearances, all social relations are governed by power. All reason is nothing but instrumental reason, whatever its garb, whatever its self-image. In fact, Foucault shows the ways in which the systemic institutional injustices of the civilized West have been pursued in the name of enlightenment values.

A self-acknowledged follower of Foucault, the Marxist literary critic Terry Eagleton gave voice to the still-prevalent academic gospel in his popular Literary Theory of 1983, that reason must be understood as a ‘dominative’ instrument of ‘patriarchy and Enlightenment,’ affirming with the latter pairing that enlightenment shares patriarchy’s bad name.

The Marxist literary critic, Edward Said, still the guiding-spirit of many American Middle Eastern Study Departments in America, re-packaged Foucault, calling the Enlightenment the ‘master-sign’ of both Orientalism and colonialism. In the now canonical Orientalism– bridging between the continental literary criticism of the 70s and Marxist political activism – Said linked Zionism, for him the colonialist project par excellence, and enlightenment rationality. That the real aims of the purveyors of enlightenment are power and domination is writ large in the Jewish State, standing as a symbol for all the excesses of the West.

Comparative Literature and Middle Eastern Studies Departments may currently be dominated by a post-modern ethos asserting the relativity of all values. Yet with the Frankfurt School ethos implicit in contemporary cultural and social critique emanating from Humanities Departments, Israel and the Jews serve as an anchor for a surreptitious new morality and an accompanying sanctimony, as not Nazi Germany but Israel represents the dystopian apotheosis of Western civilization. What starts with Frankfurt School as a critique of enlightenment reason and fascism is now turned against Israel and the Jews.

That newly-elected members of the US Congress are preparing for a visit to Israel/Palestine, expecting to find what the Fatah Central Committee Secretary Jibril Rajoub described as ‘an Auschwitz in every city in Palestine’ shows the extent to which the Frankfurt School language condemning the Nazis has been turned on its head, now applied to Zionists and Jews.

 

THE UNIVERSITY

Progressives schooled in this social theory think of the modern university as complicit in this process of domination; a self-sustaining bastion of privileged ‘neo-liberalism’. In a post in Electronic Intifada, university administrators are said to be ‘deeply embedded’in the ‘project’ of ‘corporate neoliberalism’. Further, Zionism and neoliberalism ‘converge,’ with the contemporary university said to align itself – a page right out of Orientalism – ‘with Zionism as a settler-colonial project’. For progressives, colonialism is not only the privileged lens through which to understand the Jewish presence in the region, but the only one.

For an even more colorful set of (mixed) metaphors, the New Arab website, decries the ‘speaking tongues of liberal Zionism’ upon which ‘Israeli-American neoliberal imperialism hangs its machine guns and parks its drones’. The self-proclaimed ‘objective’New Arabgoes on to associate rampaging Israelis ‘slaughtering Palestinians and destroying their mosques’ with the ‘amalgamation of Islamophobia, liberal Zionism, and neo-liberal imperialism’.

On the pro-Palestinian web, political commentary turns into cartoon allegory. In this story, Israel, the struggling and the admittedly sometimes-challenged democracy is the villain, with the terrorist organization Hamas, remade through the romanticizing progressive lens, a band of heroic freedom fighters. Academics may not express this perspective in such hyperbolic term, but in concert with the BDS movement, they create a moral cosmos, as rigid as any to be found in conventional theologies, in which Israel represents all evils – the colonialist nation-state, the false promises of liberal enlightenment, as well as the fundamentalism of religion.

With the wrongs of the West displaced onto the Jewish State, undergraduates in elite programs in America view the conflict through the allegorical lens provided by their progressive professors and anathamatize Israel. With that lens in place, progressives are taken in by the cynical uses of Islam, with Linda Sarsour the master of this art. Sarsour’s version of Islam, transformed for the Western media into a liberation theology, stands as a protest against the dominating ‘ideologies’ of Western Judeo-Christianity. Islam, however, no less than Judaism or Christianity, carries with it the very hierarchical values against which progressives position themselves most adamantly.

But the Islamic purveyors of BDS mask their theological agenda, claiming their monotheism enacts cutting-edge cultural and political practices, especially when it comes to gender, and on the way convince liberals that all evils of the West are somehow distilled in the support for the Jewish State. Indeed, the BDS movement and its progressive advocates and enablers embrace a version of the very theological movements to which most liberals still have a visceral antipathy.

Left populists, and those liberals embracing ‘progress,’ in their political zeal, forget that the liberal values and institutions they have rejected, in fact enable their political voice and standing –namely the belief in tolerance, a neutral public sphere and free speech. The millennial break with historical memory, which progressive university professors both cultivate and feed upon, fail to acknowledge that free speech is part of a 200-year-old, indeed fragile experiment, attempted in only a few corners of the world (and now failing in many of them).

That the current Israeli government has aligned itself with demagogues, and waged war against democratic institutions makes foregrounding the importance of liberal institutions and democracy even more critical. This emphatically does not mean siding with right-wing populists – Bibi-supporting evangelists and MAGA Trumpers – who are apologists for the idea of liberty and not its practice, but rather showing those committed to democracy that Zionism is an outgrowth of liberalism, not its contradiction.

Enlightenment and Zionism, as Adorno argued, are indeed linked. While the injustices wrought by the single-minded pursuit of enlightenment – the domination of nature by instrumental reason – have not been fully redressed, haven’t we learned in recent years that an imperfect reason is preferable to the savagery of demagogues and absolutists? Can we finally give up that very particular Western notion – which has the status of a given in Humanist education today – that enlightenment is worse than its alternatives?

Today, liberal Jews fail to remember what would have been obvious to Jews before World War Two, habituated to hatred and violence from both Left and Right. Intersectionality excludes Jews not because they represent, among all minorities, an unacceptable form of difference, not to be assimilated into a coalition of the oppressed.

But progressives, with their BDS agenda, push Jews away from their intersectional gatherings, because Israel is seen to represent all the core ideals – Patriarchy, Nationalism, and Enlightenment rationality – against which all other repressed minorities are united. The recent exclusion of Jews from intersectional gatherings is not then based upon a failure to understand Jewish minority claims, but on an ideology-driven image of the Jews – and Israel – as representing the antithesis of all progressive values.

But this war against the Jews, from both Left and Right, is also a war against the democratic traditions of the West. Zionism is part of the civilizational process, part of the liberal tradition. As it was in the 1930s in Germany, today’s hatred of the Jews manifests the West’s own suicidal tendencies, its penchant for the irrational, now abetted by populist extremism on both sides.

Progressives may pay lip-service to the democratic institutions, but antisemitism reveals not only their enthrallment to the world’s oldest hatred, but to a populism that takes precedence over democratic values, and an educational tradition which values ideology over critical thinking. Those of us who are devoted to the traditions of classical liberalism should understand that BDS and its progressive advocates not only undermine the Jewish State, but also the very democratic institutions upon which our civilization depends.     (isgap.org)

This article was originally published in Fathom.

William Kolbrener, professor of English Literature at Bar Ilan University, earned his MA from Oxford and his PhD from Columbia University. He is the author of books on the eighteenth-century British proto-feminist Mary Astell, as well as John Milton, the author of Paradise Lost. He has also written The Last Rabbi on Joseph Soloveitchik, and a collection of personal essays, Open Minded Torah. Kolbrener was a lecturer on the 2019 ISGAP-Oxford Summer Institute for Curriculum Development in Critical Antisemitism Studies.

Soups for the Sukkah

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Warm up your sukkah with these soothing soups.

By: Elizabeth Kurtz

Sukkot kicks of the soup season in our family. I love to start each evening Yom tov meal with a warm and soothing soup, like any of the soups below. For daytime meals, I also serve soup but if it’s warm outside, I always include a cold soup like Chilled Mango Curry Soup or White Grape Gazpacho Soup. Garnish the soups with creative fall ingredients like toasted pumpkin seeds, thick rustic croutons, or a lemon slice. I also like to use a pretty paper napkin in between the soup bowl and the small plate that coordinates with my tablecloth to present the soup with a jolt of color and fun. Use big bold patterns like polka dots, wild flowers, and great stripes. Chag Sameach!

 

LUSCIOUS CREAM OF WILD MUSHROOM SOUP

Warm up your sukkah with these soothing soups.

Serves 6

This soup is smooth and creamy and really decadent. You can make it either pareve or even better as a dairy soup. I love flavorful soups in the sukkah to start a meal. This one is adapted from an Ina Garten recipe.

  • 5 ounces fresh shiitake mushrooms
  • 5 ounces fresh portobello mushrooms
  • 5 ounces fresh cremini (or porcini) mushrooms
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 1 stick plus 1 tablespoon unsalted margarine or butter, divided
  • 1 cup chopped yellow onion
  • 1 carrot, chopped
  • 1 sprig fresh thyme plus 1 teaspoon minced thyme leaves, divided
  • Kosher salt
  • Freshly ground black pepper
  • 2 cups chopped leeks, white and light green parts (2 leeks)
  • 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1 cup dry white wine
  • 1 cup vanilla soymilk or pareve milk or half-and-half
  • 1 cup pareve whipping cream or heavy cream
  • 1/2 cup minced fresh flat-leaf parsley

Separate the mushroom stems, trim off any bad parts, and coarsely chop the stems. Slice the mushroom caps 1/4-inch thick and, if there are big, cut them into bite-sized pieces. Set aside.

Luscious cream of wild mushroom soup

To make the stock, heat the olive oil and 1 tablespoon of the margarine/butter in a large pot. Add the chopped mushroom stems, the onion, carrot, the sprig of thyme, 1 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper and cook over medium-low heat for 10 to 15 minutes, until the vegetables are soft. Add 6 cups water, bring to a boil, reduce the heat, and simmer uncovered for 30 minutes. Strain, reserving the liquid. You should have about 4 1/2 cups of stock. If not, add some water.

Meanwhile, in another large pot, heat the remaining stick of margarine/butter and add the leeks. Cook over low heat for 15 to 20 minutes, until the leeks begin to brown. Add the sliced mushroom caps and cook for 10 minutes, or until they are browned and tender. Add the flour and cook for 1 minute. Add the white wine and stir for another minute, scraping the bottom of the pot. Add the mushroom stock, minced thyme leaves, 1 1/2 teaspoons salt, and 1 teaspoon pepper and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes. Add the soymilk or half-and-half, pareve cream or cream, and parsley, season with salt and pepper, to taste, and heat through but do not boil. Serve hot.

 

RED LENTIL AND APRICOT SOUP

Red lentil and apricot soup

Serves 6

I like to make this all fall and ask the children parsha questions about where Red Lentil soup appears in the Torah. Fun and delicious.

  • 3 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 1/3 cup dried apricots, chopped
  • 2 garlic cloves, minced
  • 1-½ cups dried red lentils, rinsed
  • 5 cups chicken or pareve chicken broth
  • 3 tomatoes, seeded and chopped
  • ½ teaspoon cumin
  • ½ teaspoon thyme
  • ½ teaspoon kosher salt
  • ¼ teaspoon black pepper
  • 2 tablespoons lemon juice

In a large heavy pot, heat the olive oil over medium heat and sauté the onion, apricots, and garlic; do not let them brown. Add the lentils and broth. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat to low, and simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Add the tomatoes, cumin, thyme and salt and pepper, and simmer for 10 minutes more. Stir in the lemon juice and let the soup stand off the heat for a few minutes. Puree half of the soup with an immersion blender. Return to the pot , stir and reheat.

WONTON SOUP

Serves 8

Wonton soup

We order this at Chinese restaurants so often that I thought I would give it a shot at home. I merged numerous recipes to come up with this one that was a big hit and much easier than expected. The uncooked wontons can be frozen for up to 1 month. Do not thaw the frozen wontons before cooking; add them directly to the boiling soup and cook until tender, 6 to 9 minutes.

Wontons

  • 6 ounces ground beef
  • ½ large egg white, lightly beaten
  • 2 medium scallions, minced
  • 1/8 teaspoon black pepper
  • 1 tablespoon soy sauce
  • 1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
  • 1 garlic clove, minced
  • 25 wonton wrappers

Soup

  • 1 tablespoon canola oil
  • 2 ounces ground beef
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 2 garlic cloves, smashed
  • 1 (1-inch) piece fresh ginger, sliced thin and smashed
  • 8 cups chicken broth
  • 1 carrot, peeled and grated
  • 3 scallions, sliced

To prepare wontons:

Combine all ingredients (except wrappers) in medium bowl and mix thoroughly. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and freeze until chilled, about 10 minutes. Line a large rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper. Lay 3 wrappers on dry work surface. Place 1 slightly rounded teaspoon filling in center of wrapper, brush edges lightly with water, and fold wrapper into wonton.

Place wonton on baking sheet and repeat with remaining filling and wrappers. Loosely cover wontons with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 20 minutes or up to 4 hours.

For the soup:

Heat oil in large Dutch oven over medium heat. Add ground beef, onion, garlic and ginger and cook, breaking up meat with wooden spoon, until cooked through, 3 to 5 minutes.

Stir in broth and bring to a boil. Reduce to simmer, cover partially and cook 25 minutes. Strain if you wish.

Return strained broth to clean saucepan and bring to boil. Carefully add wontons, carrot and scallions and simmer until wontons are tender, about 5 minutes. Serve.

 

RUSTIC FALL VEGETABLE SOUP

Rustic Fall Vegetable Soup

Serves 6

This is a super easy soup that is great on yom tov or all winter long.

  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 1 medium yellow onion, diced
  • 1 clove garlic, minced
  • 1 medium winter squash, peeled and diced (use either butternut squash or acorn squash)
  • 1 medium zucchini, diced
  • 1 medium sweet potato, peeled and diced
  • 1/2 cup orzo
  • 1 (28-ounce) can crushed tomatoes
  • 1 teaspoon dried thyme leaves
  • 1 teaspoon dried rosemary
  • 4 cups chicken broth
  • Salt and freshly ground black pepper

In a large heavy-bottomed pot, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add the onion and saute until fragrant and translucent. Add the garlic and saute until golden brown. Add the winter squash, zucchini, sweet potato, orzo, canned tomatoes, thyme, rosemary, and broth. Simmer until the vegetables are soft and cooked through, about 30 minutes. Season the soup with salt, and black pepper, to taste. Serve with sliced crusty bread.

                                                (Aish.com)

Super Simple and Delicious Recipes for Simchat Torah

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Smoky Spiced Chicken with Cauliflower, Apricots & Olives–Photo by finecooking.com

By: Elizabeth Kurtz

We are embarking upon the last days of the Yom Tov season, Simchat Torah and Shemini Atzeret, about 11 Yom Tov meals shopped for, prepared, served and cleaned up. Congratulations! Only a few more to go.

It’s hard to be creative and maintain the same level of culinary enthusiasm at this point. No worries! These super simple and delicious recipes have you more than covered and won’t have you overworking yourself. Relax and enjoy the time with family and friends and reflect back at the efforts and special season of the Yom Tovim.

 

SMOKY SPICED CHICKEN WITH CAULIFLOWER, APRICOTS AND OLIVES

Serves 6

This chicken is two quick steps. Marinate and bake on a sheet pan. It’s best prepared and served with minimal reheating. I marinate it in the morning and bake it shortly before serving it. The flavor combination is bold and yet well balanced, and includes everything from smokiness, sweetness, saltiness, and rich caramelization.

  • 8 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
  • 4 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided
  • 4 teaspoons curry powder, divided
  • ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
  • 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
  • ½ teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1 head cauliflower, cut into florets, or bag of frozen cauliflower, defrosted and dried
  • 1 cup dried apricots, figs, dates or other dried fruit
  • 1 cup pitted green olives
  • In a zip-top bag, combine chicken thighs with 2 tablespoons oil, 2 teaspoons curry powder, ½ teaspoon smoked paprika, cinnamon, vinegar and ½ teaspoon kosher salt. Gently mix to coat chicken with mixture. Marinate for 45 minutes or up to overnight.
  • Preheat oven to 425°F and line a sheet pan with parchment paper for easy clean-up.
  • Place cauliflower, apricots and olives on the sheet pan. Add remaining 2 tablespoons olive oil, 2 teaspoons curry powder, ½ teaspoon paprika, and ½ teaspoon salt and toss to coat. Place chicken and remaining marinade on pan, spacing everything out into a single layer. Roast for about 45 minutes, or until chicken registers 165°F. Serve warm.

 

ROASTED GARLIC, TOMATO, AND BALSAMIC BRICK ROAST

Roasted garlic, tomato & balsamic brick roast. Photo by Peninsula Winery

Roasted garlic adds wonderful depth of flavor to everything. It’s sweeter than fresh chopped garlic and it helps tenderize this roast. If you must, substitute about 6 cloves of fresh chopped garlic for the roasted garlic to save time. I roast a few garlic heads and store them in the refrigerator for recipes like this one. This meat freezes well too. Slice it and return it to the pan sauce. Cover tightly with foil and freeze. Defrost in the refrigerator and skim off some of the fat before reheating.

  • 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
  • 2 onions, sliced
  • 1 (4 ½–5 lb) Brick Roast, Square Roast or French Roast
  • 1 head of roasted garlic* or 6 cloves minced garlic
  • ¾ cup brown sugar
  • 1 cup crushed tomatoes
  • ¾ cup water
  • ¾ cup balsamic vinegar
  • 1 teaspoon orange zest

In a large skillet, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add onions and cook until softened. Place onions in a large roasting pan and put French Roast on top of onions.

Preheat oven to 350°F.

In a small bowl, mix roasted garlic (squeeze out cloves and remaining oil), brown sugar, tomatoes, water, balsamic vinegar, and orange zest. Pour over meat. Cover pan tightly with aluminum foil.

Bake for 2 ½ hours. Remove from oven. Cool and slice thinly and return meat to sauce. Rewarm and serve with sauce.

How to roast garlic

  • 1 head garlic
  • 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Slice off the top each head of garlic to expose some of the cloves inside. Place the heads on a piece of heavy-duty aluminum foil. Drizzle with olive oil and wrap tightly in the foil. Roast until cloves are lightly browned and tender, about 45 minutes.

 

SLOW COOKER “BUTTER” SOFT SEASONED CORNED BEEF

This corned beef gets “butter” soft cooked low and slow in the slow cooker or alternatively in a 225°F oven for 7-8 hours. The seasonings give it exceptional flavor. Serve it with a honey mustard sauce or a store-bought deli mustard.

  • One (4-5 pound) corned beef
  • Dry rub
  • 1 tablespoon freshly ground black pepper
  • 1 tablespoon ground coriander
  • 3 tablespoons light brown sugar
  • 2 teaspoons garlic powder
  • 2 teaspoons onion powder
  • ½ teaspoon smoked paprika
  • ½ teaspoon sweet paprika
  • ½ teaspoon chili powder
  • ½ teaspoon mustard powder
  • ½ teaspoon kosher salt

Remove corned beef from packaging and rinse a few times with cold water to remove pickling spice and excess saltiness. Pat dry and place on parchment paper.

For the rub: In a small bowl mix black pepper, coriander, brown sugar, garlic powder, onion powder, both paprikas, chili powder, mustard powder, and kosher salt. Generously rub mixture all over the corned beef to evenly coat the meat. Wrap tightly in parchment paper and then twice in heavy-duty aluminum foil.

Place the seasoned and wrapped pastrami into the slow cooker. Pour about 1 cup water around meat. Cover and cook on low for 9 -10 hours, or until meat is tender and the internal temperature reaches 200°F.

Remove the wrapped pastrami from the slow cooker and let rest on a baking tray for 15 minutes before slicing.

Serve corned beef with honey mustard sauce or deli mustard.

 

MUSHROOM AND ONION BROWN RICE PILAF

Serves 8

Sometimes store-bought products are worth buying. Honestly, that does not hold true for jarred tomato sauces, dressings etc that contain obscene amounts of sugar and salt. But grain blends and spice blends are often flavorful and still healthy. I like the Lundberg Jubilee blends, available in national markets as well as some of the rice blends from Trader Joe’s. The simple addition of onions and mushrooms with seasonings makes it a company worthy dish.

  • 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
  • 2 onions, sliced
  • 3 portobello mushrooms, sliced or 2 cups sliced mushrooms
  • 3 cloves garlic, minced
  • 3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
  • 3 tablespoons teriyaki sauce
  • 1 heaping teaspoon Dijon mustard
  • 1 ½ cups brown rice blend (like Lundberg jubilee, or Trader Joe’s brown and wild rice blend, or regular brown rice)
  • ½ teaspoon ground black pepper
  • ½ teaspoon kosher salt, optional (taste before adding)

In a large skillet heat oil over medium-high heat. Add onions and cook until translucent and lightly browned, about 6 minutes. Add mushrooms and garlic and cook until softened, about 4 minutes. Add balsamic vinegar, teriyaki sauce and mustard and toss to coat onions and mushrooms. Cook 3 minutes until sauce is slightly thickened. Turn off heat.

Cook rice according to package instructions. When rice is fully cooked but still warm, pour into onion mushroom mixture, toss to coat all rice with sauce. Add pepper and salt, if needed. Best served warm but can be served at room temperature.

            (Aish.com)

Secrets of the Four Species

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On Sukkot, we gather these four species, bind them, and wave them all together. The Lulav is only kosher if all four species are taken together. If one of the species is missing, the entire Lulav is invalid. Photo Credit: OU

The key to joy is success in our relationships. This includes our relationship with other people, with ourselves, and with God

By: Shraga Simmons

Every Jewish holiday is infused with a special energy to help us work on a particular character trait, and to develop certain aspects of our lives. The mitzvot of the holiday are tools to help us achieve the goal of the time.

Often, the key to discovering this focus is found in the prayers. The Siddur (prayer book) refers to Sukkot as Zman Simchateinu, “the Time of Our Joy.” Sukkot is designed as a one-week workshop on joy!

For seven days, we move out of our wall-to-wall carpeted, air-conditioned house, into a little hut called a Sukkah. But how is this supposed to make us happy?!

The lesson is that the physical objects with which we surround ourselves are not what make us happy. A person can live in a gorgeous home and be absolutely miserable. Or, he can live in a shabby hut and be ecstatically happy. The key to joy is success in our relationships. This includes our relationship with other people, with ourselves, and with God.

 

Relationship With Others

The Lulav offers important clues on how to achieve joy through relationships. (Note that “Lulav” refers to the date palm leaf, but since it is the largest, the term refers also to all four species together.)

The Midrash says that the four species of the Lulav represent four different types of Jews:

  1. The Esrog has a good taste and a good fragrance. It represents a person with both wisdom (Torah learning) and good deeds.
  2. The Hadas (myrtle) has a good fragrance, but is inedible. It represents a person who has good deeds, but lacks wisdom.
  3. The Lulav (date palm) is edible, but has no smell. This represents the person with wisdom, but without good deeds.
  4. The Aravah (willow) has neither taste nor smell. It represents a person with neither good deeds nor Torah learning.

On Sukkot, we gather these four species, bind them, and wave them all together. The Lulav is only kosher if all four species are taken together. If one of the species is missing, the entire Lulav is invalid.

A similar principle is taught by the composition of the incense brought in the Holy Temple. There were 11 ingredients, of which one, the chelbanah spice, smelled terrible. Yet, the incense was only valid if all the ingredients were included together. This teaches that we must look at all the Jewish people as a unit, working together.

There may be people we don’t like, but we still have to deal with. We cannot simply say that certain people are not part of our world, or that they do not belong to us. On the contrary, humanity is one indivisible unit. This recognition is basic to happiness because when we realize that we are all interconnected, we can be more patient and tolerant of others.

Note that when the Lulav is held, the Esrog is held next to the willow. The one with the “most” should position himself to be near the one with the “least,” in order to favorably influence him.

This idea finds expression also in the mitzvah of inviting guests into our Sukkah. This year, try inviting some friends over – perhaps even someone who you don’t know very well. The results will astound you!

 

Relationship With Self

Another way to look at the Lulav is mentioned in “Sefer Bahir,” a kabbalistic work almost 2,000 years old. It describes the four species as four parts of a human being:

  1. The Esrog represents the heart, the seat of our emotions.
  2. The Hadas (myrtle) has leaves shaped like an eye.
  3. The Lulav (date palm) represents the spine, from where our actions emanate.
  4. The Aravah (willow) represents the lips, our speech.

The four species must be taken together as a unit. So too, to achieve happiness, one must use all of his faculties in unison. You cannot say one thing and feel another. We must unify our feelings, our actions, our speech and our outlook. With all of these working together, we are well on the path to self-esteem, tranquility and joy.

 

Relationship With God

The four species also represent the Name of God. Aravah (willow), Hadas (myrtle), Lulav (date palm) and Esrog represent the Yud and Heh and Vav and Heh of the four-letter Name of God.

Again, the key here is unity. As we say every day in the Shema prayer: “God is One.” Whether things may appear to us as good or evil, we must realize that it all comes from God. One must deal with various pleasant or unpleasant circumstances – ultimately for one’s maximal growth, but at the root everything comes from God.

Being aware of this keeps our focus and helps us to deal with the issues of life. When we relate to God’s unity, we come closer to achieving joy in the world.

Sukkot is a one-week opportunity to build these relationships and incorporate them into our lives. May we all enjoy great success in this venture!

             (Aish.com)

Sources:

“Sefer HaMinhagim” – Chag HaSukkot I

“Midrash Rabba” – Leviticus 30:12

Talmud – Menachot 27a; “Code of Jewish Law” O.C. 651:12

Talmud – Kritut 6a-b.

“Midrash Rabba” – Leviticus 30:14.

“Chaim B’Yad” – Rabbi Chaim Palatchi, 52

“Rav Pe’alim” – Ben Ish Chai – II Y.D. 32

Parshas Zos Habracha–You Can Never Fool G-d

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As the Pri Tzaddik points out (Simchas Torah 48), there was precedence for this back in the days when Ya'akov Avinu blessed his own sons, the Twelve Tribes, just before he died: And this (V'zos) is what their father said to them . . . (Bereishis 49:28) – Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons

By: Rabbi Pinchas Winston

And this (V’zos) is the blessing which Moshe, the Man of G-d, blessed the Children of Israel before his death. (Devarim 33:1)

The first word of this week’s parshah, “v’zos,” literally means “and this.” However, the word also has a deeper meaning, which could change the meaning of the verse to: Zos is the blessing, meaning that whatever “zos” represents is in fact the blessing that Moshe gave to the Jewish people just before he left This World.

At this point, it is important to introduce two concepts, both of which are found in the following section of Talmud:

Rav Chizkiah said in the name of Rebi Yirmiyah, who said it in the name of Rebi Shimon bar Yochai: I see that the great people are few in number . . . But is that so? The master has said that the first wave that comes to greet The Holy One, Blessed is He, extends eighteen thousand miles, as it says, “All around it should be eighteen thousand” (Yechezkel 48:35). This is not difficult to explain; these see with “Esp’kilarya Hameirah,” and these see with “Esp’kilarya sh’aino Meirah.” (Succah 45b)

ESP’KILARYA: A division that separates between them and the Divine Presence; MEIRAH: like a mirror that you look into; there are some righteous people for whom it does not give off much light and they can’t really see that much. (Rashi)

Although from Rashi it is still not that clear what an “Esp’kilarya Hameirah” is, it is clear that it represents a certain level of vision along the road to prophecy. There will always be somewhat of a division between us and G-d, but there are some divisions that allow one to see beyond them, and some that block vision as well, though one may still have a sense of something beyond them.

According to the Tikunei Zohar 110d, “zos” is not just a word, but it represents a middah–a trait, specifically the trait of “Malchus” (Kingship) that also corresponds to the level of “Esp’kilarya sh’aino Meirah, the lower less clear vision of G-d and His will. Though Moshe Rabbeinu himself was on the higher level of “Esp’kilarya Hameirah” (Yevamos 49b), he did not possess the ability or time to elevate the Jewish people to the same level, and therefore, he settled for the level of “zos,” which was far greater than no level at all.

As the Pri Tzaddik points out (Simchas Torah 48), there was precedence for this back in the days when Ya’akov Avinu blessed his own sons, the Twelve Tribes, just before he died:

And this (V’zos) is what their father said to them . . . (Bereishis 49:28)

For, by blessing his sons with “zos,” and later, Moshe blessing the Jewish people, he caused the trait of Malchus to enter their hearts, and through this, they became merit worthy of the blessings that followed. And, logically-speaking this should be true of all the generations that have followed since then–the blessings can only help us when the trait of Malchus is in our hearts.

If so, then we need to know what it means to have the trait of Malchus in our hearts.

And this (v’zos) to Yehudah . . . (Devarim 33:7)

What better place is there to understand the concept of Malchus itself than from the source of it within the Jewish people, Yehudah, whose blessing happens to begin with the word “zos.”

According to the Rokeach, the words “v’zos l’Yehudah” hint that all kings to descend from Yehudah must always learn Torah. This is because “zos” also always alludes to Torah. However, though this mitzvah may be more stringent by the kings of Yehudah, it is still one that applies to ALL Jews, and one which does not necessarily make Yehudah, the source of Malchus, unique.

To begin with, the Four-Letter Name of G-d is within Yehudah’s name, which spelled, YUD-HEH-VAV-Dalet-HEH, which the Pri Tzaddik explains also corresponds to the level of Esp’kilarya Hameirah. However, that is not the only source of Yehudah’s name, as the Torah reminds us:

She became pregnant again, and gave birth to a son. She said, “This time I will thank (odeh) G-d.” Therefore she called him “Yehudah” . . . (Bereishis 29:35)

In other words, Yehudah’s name was a testimony to Leah’s, Yehudah’s mother, gratefulness to G-d for her fourth son’s birth. His name comes from the Hebrew word “modeh” which can mean “I thank” or “I admit.” In fact, as Rashi points out in this week’s parshah, Yehudah’s blessing followed that of Reuvain because he had taught Reuvain to admit his mistake before his father.

In fact, admission is what Yehudah’s life was all about, or at least his right to the kingship:

Yehudah, you, your brothers will acknowledge . . . (Bereishis 49:8)

You acted correctly when you admitted your guilt in the case of Tamar, and therefore, Yehudah, you, your brothers will acknowledge, for I recognize it too after having wrongly suspected you of killing Yosef. You are therefore chosen to be the king (Bereishis Rabbah 99:9).

What was this trait that Yehudah possessed that is the power of admission, but more importantly, the right to Malchus? If you think about it, admission is based upon the ability to surrender oneself to the moment, and in more general terms, history as a whole. You may be able to fool some of the people some of the time (including yourself), but you can NEVER fool G-d, and even a liar has to know that on some level.

At the moment of a truth, a person stands between two decisions: to save face but damage history, or to damage himself but save history. To save face means to do what is most comfortable for you at the moment, regardless of the long-term effects on history. To save history means to do what must be done for the sake of the bigger picture at that time, even if it means getting hurt along the way.

Yehudah could have lied. He could have denied being the father of Tamar’s children, and they would have killed Tamar and her children, and no one would have been the wiser for it. However, Yehudah knew that one day the truth would catch up to him and that he would be held responsible for the distortion of truth, which would have to be rectified at his expense. That’s the concept of “measure-for-measure,” and given that an innocent woman and her children would die as a result, that was heavy price to pay.

Instead, Yehudah suffered complete embarrassment, and possible disownment by his father, which in the case of the Tribes meant more than just not inheriting one’s financial part of the will. It even meant losing one’s portion in the Jewish people altogether, and all the future rewards to come–also a VERY heavy price to pay.

But he paid it. Yehudah surrendered himself to the moment and to history, and for that, his father Ya’akov told him, he earned the Malchus. For that is the trait of Malchus–the ability to make history more important than our own individual lives, and to make the nation more important than the people who make it up.

It is THIS trait that removes the spiritual “blinders” from a person’s eyes which prevent him from seeing history as it is, and Divine Providence as it really acts. It is THE difference between being able to see with the “Esp’kilarya Hameirah” or the “Esp’kilarya sh’aino Meirah,” the lower less clear vision of G-d and His will. Ultimately, as we learn from the word “zos,” it is the difference whether or not to be able to reap the blessings imparted to us by Ya’akov Avinu at the beginning of our history, and later by Moshe Rabbeinu.

Parshas Vzos Habracha – Making It by Breaking It

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By: Rabbi Mordechai Kamenetzky

The last verses of the Torah encapsulate a glorious career of leadership of the father of all prophets, Moshe, into a few brief sentences. “Never has there risen in Israel a prophet as Moses whom Hashem had known face to face: as apparent by all the signs and wonders that Hashem had sent him to perform in the land of Egypt against Pharaoh and all his courtiers and all his land. And by all the strong hand and awesome power that Moshe performed before the eyes of Israel” (Deuteronomy 34:10-12).

Powerful descriptive. But it is as cryptic as it is powerful. What is the strong hand and that Moshe performed before the eyes of all Israel? Does it refer to the horrific plagues brought on Egypt? Perhaps it refers to the splitting of the sea or the opening of the earth to swallow Korach and his rebellious cohorts?

Rashi tells us that the words “Moshe performed before the eyes of Israel” refers to something totally different, perhaps very mortal. Rashi explains that the posuk (verse) refers to the smashing of the tablets upon descending Mount Sinai and seeing the nation frolic before the Golden Calf. He quotes the verse “and I smashed the tablets before your eyes” (Deuteronomy 9).

Rashi’s comment evokes many questions. Why is smashing the Luchos counted as an awe-inspiring feat? And more important, is this the final way to remember Moshe the man who smashed the Luchos? Is that the parting descriptive of Judaism’s greatest leader?

Rabbi Yisrael Lipkin of Salant, was Rav in a city when a typhus epidemic erupted. Despite the peril of the contagious disease, Rabbi Lipkin went together with a group of his students to aid the sick, making sure they had food and clothing. The roving first-aid committee imposed strict restrictions upon the townsfolk, imploring them to eat properly every day in order to ward off immunological deficiencies.

Yom Kippur was fast approaching, and Rabbi Lipkin decreed that due to the menacing disease, absolutely no one was to fast on Yom Kippur despite it being the holiest day of the year.

The town’s elders were skeptical. They felt that Rabbi Salanter had no right to impose such a ruling on those who were not afflicted. Despite their protestations, Rabbi Salanter was unfazed. In fact he made his point in a very dramatic way.

On Yom Kippur morning, immediately after the shacharis services, he went up to the bimah, made kiddush, drank the wine, and ate a piece of cake!

Immediately, the townsfolk were relieved. They went to their homes and followed suit.

The elders in the town were outraged at this seemingly blatant violation of Jewish tradition. They approached

Rabbi Lipkin to protest his disregard for the sanctity of the day, but Rabbi Lipkin remained adamant.

“I have taken a group of students for the last month, and together we have attended to scores of typhus victims. I guaranteed every mother that each of their children will return home healthy. On my guarantee not one of those students became ill!”

He turned to the elders and declared. “When you are able to make such guarantees then you can tell me the laws against eating on Yom Kippur!”

The Torah ends with the greatness of Moshe. It refers to his great accomplishments as his Yad haChazaka, his strong hand before the eyes of Israel — the breaking of the two Tablets Of Law. Moshe’s greatness was not only knowing how to accept the Ten Commandments, but when to smash them as well. And though not every one of us is equipped with the ability to overrule a practice or tradition, Klall Yisrael knows that when the time to act is called for the great ones will arise to build and cure by smashing what needs to be broken. Because whether it is breaking a fast or breaking the tablets, it takes a great man to understand the time to build and an even greater man to know when it is time to tear down.

(Torah.org)