World – Jewish Independent

Israeli crisis line volunteers

Ety Siton, left, director of the Kfar Saba branch of ERAN, also oversees the Toronto volunteers. She is pictured with Sigal Almog, co-founder of Toronto’s ERAN project. (photo from ERAN)

Finding enough volunteers in Israel for the night shift of the country’s emotional crisis hotline, ERAN, proved difficult. So, its chief executive director, David Koren, came up with the idea of looking for Israeli volunteers living in North America to help cover this time period.

ERAN is a confidential service, offered over the phone or the internet, which provides free, anonymous emotional support to people in Israel of all ages, in Hebrew, Russian, Arabic and English.

Sigal Almog and Galya Sarner, both former Israelis living in Toronto, were at a conference in Washington, D.C., in 2017 when they heard of Koren’s mission. They sent out a call for volunteers through their network, and further recruited two social workers, Anat Gonen and Sabina Mezhibovsky, to co-found and open a chapter of ERAN in Toronto last year.

“Right now, in Toronto, we have 16 volunteers,” Gonen told the Independent, adding, “We have around 85 volunteers in the four North American branches. I think they are answering, each month, around 800 calls. So, that is 800 calls that, before we had those volunteers in North America, were unanswered, because nobody was there at night.”

“Just think about the message behind it,” said Sarner. “It’s unbelievable, probably saving the lives of so many in need who couldn’t get help, because not enough volunteers were there to give them the minimum support they were asking for.”

All four Toronto co-founders knew of the ERAN helpline prior to becoming involved with it in Canada, though none had used it themselves.

photo - David Koren, chief executive director of ERAN — David Koren, chief executive director of ERAN. *(photo from ERAN)*

“ERAN is part of daily life in Israel,” said Sarner. “It’s a very distinguished project and, when we heard from Koren that he was looking to expand his global networking and to work with the North American community, we didn’t think twice. We knew we’d do whatever it took to launch the branch of ERAN in Toronto.”

Almog, who was also at the 2017 conference, recognized that this was a great opportunity to connect with and help people in Israel from Toronto. Nearly 80 former Israelis came to the initial information session in the city and, after screening them all, the branch accepted around 20 volunteers, who went on to get special training from ERAN and then started taking calls from Israel.

Volunteers do not need to have any particular degree, but they do need to possess specific skills.

“You need to be able to have some kind of empathy and self-awareness to know how to listen, [and to] understand and have a conversation in Hebrew, Russian, Arabic or English,” said Gonen. “One of the things we also found to be a struggle is that some of the people, especially those who’ve been here many, many years, can’t write in Hebrew. This is also a requirement, as they need to write a report in Hebrew. But, mostly what we need are people who are able to listen, to try not to give advice, and to be able to commit to the process,” to take a number of shifts per month.

“Whenever a volunteer answers the phone, they are told to say, ‘Eran, Shalom’ … keeping it very neutral, as, for some people on the line, it’s not a great evening…. It actually can be a pretty bad one,” said Sarner.

When a person in an emotional crisis dials 1201 from anywhere in Israel, they will be connected to a trained volunteer, who will try to direct them to those who can best help them; for example, a soldier with another soldier, or a Holocaust survivor with someone knowledgeable about the issues survivors face.

North American volunteers are taking shifts between 5 and 9 p.m., and 9 p.m. and 1 a.m., EST. Each volunteer signs into the ERAN system from their own computer and takes calls in their home.

“They have to be at home, because they have to be in a quiet room, a closed room, so nobody can hear the conversation they’re having and nobody interferes with what they say,” said Gonen.

Though the volunteers are in Toronto, they are trained to keep that fact out of the conversation. This way, explained Gonen, the caller is more likely to feel comfortable with them, thinking they are in Israel and able to identify with their struggle.

Running the Toronto chapter has been challenging, as the branch does not receive financial support from ERAN Israel or from the Toronto Jewish community. But, they have received some support from private donors and the Schwartz/Reisman Centre (in Vaughan, Ont.) provides space for ERAN volunteer training.

“We don’t have any kind of money that comes from ERAN Israel and everything we do here we pay for from our own pockets,” said Gonen. “The training … Sabina and I are volunteering to do every month. And, when we meet, all four of us will bring snacks for the meeting or things like that, because we want to make sure people feel appreciated for doing this. So, we’re looking for donations to help us run the branch.”

“We’re looking to expand support from our sponsors, because we did receive very touching sponsorships, mainly in the beginning, during the time of the initial training,” said Sarner. “But, in terms of the monthly meeting, it takes place at Schwartz/Reisman JCC. We’re very lucky to have the support of the JCC, but we definitely need to expand and find more sponsors and donors.”

The feeling shared by the co-founders and volunteers is that of gratitude to be able to have a direct impact on the lives of Israelis in Israel.

“We give a lot to ERAN,” said Almog. “We work many volunteer hours, but I feel like each one of the volunteers gets so much out of it. It’s brought a lot of meaning to our lives here, as Israelis who live outside of Israel.

“The volunteers just told us last week, someone who went to Florida and didn’t participate in the last training, that she really missed ERAN. It has become very meaningful in the lives of each one of us.”

“Anything you do in life,” Sarner added, “you have to do with love – with love and respect – and the respect we have among the four of us, it means so much to me. In Toronto, from the volunteers to the sponsors and the support of the community at large, it makes it even more meaningful to me. It has touched my heart and soul to be part of such an important initiative.”

ERAN is always looking for more North American volunteers and would like to open a chapter in Vancouver. For more information, visit app.etapestry.com/onlineforms/SchwartzReismanCentre/ERAN.html.

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Safe, healthy and respectful

Campers at Pennsylvania’s Camp Havaya. (photo from Camp Havaya)

In Pirkei Avot (Ethics of Our Fathers), Ben Zoma says, “Who is honourable? One who honours others.” The Foundation for Jewish Camp’s Shmira Initiative “aims to make camps safe, healthy and respectful model communities. Shmira, in Hebrew and in the vernacular of Jewish summer camp, means guard duty, embodying the social and individual responsibility every community member has to ensure a safe environment.”

For some camps, the initiative provides practical training that has been needed for some time. But, at Camp Havaya in Pennsylvania, camp director Sheira Director-Nowack told the Independent that they have been operating on the initiative’s principles for many years.

“We have people who go by ‘he,’ by ‘she’ and by ‘they,’ as rabbis, teachers, students, educators, campers and staff,” said Director-Nowack of the camp, which is part of the Reconstructionist movement. “So, for us, the sexual harassment piece is something we’ve always discussed, have always had a policy for. I used to work at a camp that did not have that defined as clearly and they had some real challenges. We don’t have some of those challenges here, because it’s very up front and very clear – how you treat all people, not just insofar as gender, but in all areas of inclusion.”

At Camp Havaya, respect is constantly discussed.

“The name of our camp mascot is Howie Bee,” said Director-Nowack. “We talk about ‘how we be,’ using that as a fairly common statement to talk about how we should treat each other with respect, kindness … better than you’d want to treat yourself, you’d want to treat the other person … and, not just as a Jewish phenomena, but as a human phenomena.”

While Director-Nowack acknowledged that, every so often, they run into power conflicts in a relationship, they try to ensure it never gets near the point of harassment.

At Camp Havaya, she said, flirtation is discouraged. For example, there are strict rules as to what clothing is acceptable. Everyone must wear shirts at all times and clothing should be loose fitting. They also have no boys against girls competitions. Instead, all sports are open to everyone and, while everyone swims together, there are rules about appropriate swimwear.

Language and attitude is another area that is closely monitored at the camp. “We don’t use the word ‘broad’ or ‘chick,’ we don’t use a lot of derogatory terms,” said Director-Nowack. “We don’t make jokes at other people’s expense.

“We want everyone to treat each other how they would treat their own family or themselves…. There’s not a constant need for romance or underlying things that go into that modern love thought and, because of that, we don’t see certain behaviours that other places might see.”

The concepts of the #MeToo movement are discussed at camp, as are other relevant topics, like Black Lives Matter and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“Our constituency is made up of people who are interested in these things … also, things like respect for people with special needs, inclusivity, race, culture and minorities,” said Director-Nowack. “We don’t talk about these things because they’re hot topics. We were talking about them before they were considered cool to talk about.

“We also give the credit to younger people, because it is them who are changing the verbiage, changing ideas. They are bringing them to us and we are bringing them to camp, because, if camp is a microcosm of society, then we want to be part of that.”

If and when the topic of sex comes up, Director-Nowack said she teaches her staff to turn the conversation back to the camper and ask why he or she is wondering about it.

Camp Havaya has a no-sex policy. If inappropriate behaviour is observed, Director-Nowack said, ‘We don’t punish people for behaviour, but I may or may not ask them if camp is the appropriate place for it. I don’t feel like there’s any place at camp where you could be sexual appropriately, and that’s what we talk about.

“We don’t hook up in the middle of the woods – that’s just not what we do. And, we really don’t have a lot of that. I don’t think I’d kick someone out of camp just because they kissed someone. But, I’d say something like, ‘I just walked passed you kissing … not what I want to see, not OK, not cool.’ If it got further than that, it would depend on the kid, the parent, the discussion and the situation. We’re dealing with human beings and we have an environment that’s not constant.”

Still, staff members do talk with campers about consent, in an effort to ensure all of them are comfortable in their own space at all times.

“Our goal is to create young leaders in the Jewish community who are thoughtful and intelligent, and who are, therefore, going to go out and lead a Jewish life and know themselves,” said Director-Nowack. “We love that some people find their love and their relationships at camp. But, I also love that people find their independence at camp … or that they want to lead a more productive Jewish life without a partner…. We want our kids and staff to leave camp as people who are going to make decisions guided by some basic values.”

For more information on the Shmira Initiative, visit jewishcamp.org/shmirainitiative.

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Politicians speak at AIPAC

Clockwise, from top left: U.S. Vice-President Mike Pence, Joe Lieberman, Senator Marco Rubio and Senator Cory Booker address attendees of last month’s AIPAC Policy Conference. (photos by Dave Gordon)

U.S. Vice-President Mike Pence, in addition to other ranking American politicians, spoke of their unwavering support for the Jewish state to 18,000 people at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) Policy Conference, in Washington, D.C., March 24-26.

Speech themes revolved around recent rocket attacks against Israeli civilians, the Golan Heights being recognized as Israeli sovereign territory by the United States, and sanctions against Iran. Every official who mentioned BDS, the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement against Israel, condemned it.

Much was said about the Democratic congresswoman from Minnesota, Ilhan Abdullahi Omar. Her statements – including “Israel has hypnotized the world” and that AIPAC has influenced U.S. policy through money – have been interpreted as antisemitic by some Jewish leaders.

Pence said, “History has already proven [Donald Trump] to be the greatest friend of the Jewish people and the state of Israel ever to sit in the Oval Office of the White House.”

Among the pro-Israel bona fides of Trump, Pence said the United States shut down the Washington branch of the Palestinian Authority as a consequence for funding terror; ended tax dollar funding for United Nations-funded Palestinian schools; moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem; and recognized the Golan Heights as Israeli territory.

“We stand with Israel because her cause is our cause, her values are our values,” he said.

In addition, Pence talked about the end of the “disastrous nuclear deal with Iran” that has been replaced with “a maximum-pressure campaign” of sanctions, thereby causing Iran’s economy to dip.

“There’ll be no more pallets of cash to the mullahs in Iran,” he said.

In a swipe across the political aisle, Pence said, “It’s astonishing to think that the party of Harry Truman, which did so much to help create the state of Israel, has been co-opted by people who promote rank antisemitic rhetoric and work to undermine the broad American consensus of support for Israel.”

Without mentioning her name, he referred to Omar as “a freshman Democrat in Congress” who “trafficked in repeated antisemitic tropes.”

Former U.S. ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley’s first comments were about what she believes is the UN’s hypocrisy.

“You know, what’s interesting is, at the UN, I can guarantee you this morning it is radio silent,” she said, in reference to the rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel. “They are not saying anything about Hamas, they’re not saying anything about the lives lost, they’re not saying anything. But, if it was any [other] countr[y], they’d be calling an emergency Security Council meeting.”

David Friedman, U.S. ambassador to Israel, claimed that Trump is “Israel’s greatest ally ever to reside in the White House” and, to those who think otherwise, “please, take a deep breath and think about it some more.”

How America is now sanctioning Iran was one example of an Israel-friendly policy. Friedman criticized the previous administration for paying the Islamic Republic $100 billion in the hopes that country would “self-correct.”

“What did Iran do with all its newly found treasure?” he asked. “Did it build up its civilian institutions? Did it improve the quality of life of its citizens?” Instead, he said, it “doubled down on terrorist activity in Yemen, in Iraq and in Lebanon. It increased its stock of ballistic missiles and it invested in military bases in Syria, on Israel’s northern border.”

photo - Protesters at this year’s AIPAC Policy Conference, in Washington, D.C., last month — Protesters at this year’s AIPAC Policy Conference, in Washington, D.C., last month. *(photo by Dave Gordon)*

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu delivered an address via satellite, initially planning to take the podium in person, but returning to Israel to deal with the rocket attacks.

“The Golan Heights is indispensable for our defence,” he said of the recognition by the United States of the northern land seized by Israel in the Six Day War, in 1967. “It’s part of our history. When you put a shovel in the ground there, what you discover are the ruins of ancient synagogues. Jews lived there for thousands of years and the people of Israel have come back to the Golan.”

Netanyahu said he thought comments like Omar’s are antisemitic.

“Again, the Jews are cast as a force for evil,” he said. “Again, the Jews are charged with disloyalty. Again, the Jews are said to have too much influence, too much power, too much money. Take it from this Benjamin, it’s not about the Benjamins.”

In the session Canada’s Relationship with Israel, the panel included Liberal member of Parliament Anthony Housefather, Conservative MP Erin O’Toole and former Conservative foreign minister John Baird.

Housefather said he believes Israelis do not think there’s a negotiating partner for peace, but they share some blame in the conflict: “The more they create settlements, the less likely there will be peace … they should think carefully before expanding settlements.”

A questioner asked him when the Canadian prime minister would do something “real” for Israel and Housefather noted that, in recent weeks, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau forcefully condemned the BDS movement in a town hall meeting.

Another audience member asked why the Trudeau government continues to fund the United Nations Relief and Works Agency. While acknowledging that UNRWA has “curricula problems” that involve “anti-Jewish, anti-Israel comments, misogynistic comments and anti-gay comments,” he said that the $50 million in funding was just.

Housefather said he had spoken with the head of UNRWA and voiced his “concerns at the slow pace they are making changes in the curricula,” but added that their schools make children “a lot less likely to become terrorists against Israel.”

“Yes to helping them with UN aid programs; no to funding their schools,” said O’Toole. And Baird agreed.

On the topic of a peace plan, O’Toole said he “kept hearing from Palestinians their want for a ‘one-state solution,’” while their government “exerts violence, and does not take care of the needs of their people.”

“I think you’ll see from Israeli leaders that they’re prepared to experience real pain [in concessions],” Baird said, but “Palestinians have to stop the incitement” and the “hate-mongering.”

While several candidates for the Democratic party’s 2020 presidential nomination skipped the conference, leading Democratic figures were prominent at AIPAC, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who insisted no one will be permitted to make Israel a partisan wedge issue.

Dave Gordon is a Toronto-based freelance writer whose work has appeared in more than 100 publications around the world.

Educating rabbinical students

T’ruah students help plant trees in the Hebron Hills. (photo from T’ruah)

U.S.-based T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights works in Jewish social justice circles in Israel and North America.

“We work with human rights of both Israelis and Palestinians…. We’ve also worked on introducing rabbis and rabbinical students, and also congregations, to what’s happening in West Bank and more,” executive director Rabbi Jill Jacobs told the Independent.

T’ruah, which supports a two-state solution, offers the Year-in-Israel program for rabbinical students.

“Students study in Jerusalem at various institutions,” said Jacobs, “but they don’t necessarily get to see human rights issues up close. We take them once a month to see a human rights issue on the ground, either in the West Bank with Palestinians, in Bedouin Israeli communities in the Negev, asylum seekers, etc.”

At these sessions, students meet with Israeli human rights and other leaders on the ground. The program is held during students’ free time, separate from their regular studies.

“The goal of the program is to help them develop a rabbinic moral voice,” said Jacobs. “As rabbis, they’re going to be called on to speak about Israel. The question is, how do they talk about Israel as a rabbi? Rabbis talk out of their values, and also are generally dealing with politically diverse communities…. So, the question is, how can a rabbi speak in a way that will push people to listen to perspectives they might not otherwise listen to, [based on] Jewish texts and Jewish values?”

Jacobs recognizes that the information they provide is not comprehensive. Their focus is to give students the opportunity to interact with human beings – to meet Palestinians, Bedouins and others and learn from them what their life experience is like.

“It’s also crucial to us that they are meeting with Israeli human rights leaders,” said Jacobs. “Very often, there’s a dichotomy that suggests that being pro-Israel means supporting the right-wing government of [Binyamin] Netanyahu and that being pro-Palestinian means being against Israel. We’re pro-human rights and we want them to meet Israelis working every single day to push for human rights in their own country because they love their country. We want them to see that there are actually people who are changing the situation.

photo - T’ruah students planting trees — T’ruah students planting trees. *(photo from T’ruah)*

“We hear a lot from the students that our program gives them hope. Sometimes, they are so hopeless about what is happening in Israel and then they meet people, both Jewish and Palestinian communities, who are trying to change their situation.”

One T’ruah graduate is Rabbi Philip Gibbs, spiritual leader of Congregation Har El in West Vancouver.

“During my year in Israel, during my second year of rabbinical school, I had the opportunity to then be a fellow with T’ruah for their rabbinical student program,” Gibbs told the Independent. “I really appreciated the opportunity, both because, at least the year I was doing it, there was clearly a huge focus on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But, also because the way, in terms of educating about social justice issues in Israel, they were able to show some of the other issues happening – whether it was meeting with Bedouins, talking to some asylum seekers from Africa … really seeing what their home-grown needs are and seeing how it developed into a strong sense of the how they were fighting for many of those needs through the legal systems in Israel.”

Gibbs met with Palestinians who had been displaced from the Jerusalem area after the 1967 war. “We had the chance to hear their narrative,” he said, “highlighting how their status as refugees during that conflict had really come into question because of both the policies of Jordan, as they were occupying the area, as well as some of the motivations of different settler organizations in their attempt to create a much stronger Jewish presence behind the Green Line… I felt like that was more educating us in understanding the way that the nature of a lot of these neighbourhoods had been going back and forth.

“For the Israeli settlers, they felt they were reclaiming a neighbourhood that was Jewish. For the Palestinians that had been living there, their legal status was caught up in layers of legal confusion of having that area under control of many different authorities over the past 150 years.”

Gibbs has not yet had an opportunity to bring this part of his rabbinical education to his congregation directly, but it has definitely played a role in how he shares his perspective regarding, for example, the upcoming Israeli election.

“I’m making sure there’s a deeper sense of having the recognition that a lot of these questions that are coming up, some of these issues are on the minds of most Israelis … but that, no matter what, a lot of the work that human rights organizations are doing, a lot of that is going through the overt legal system of Israeli government.”

Regarding the many Israelis he has met who work for human rights organizations, Gibbs said he appreciated the way their main motivation was a deep sense of trying to make their country the best it can be, noting that every government needs to be transparent in their treatment of their citizens, allowing for a certain amount of criticism.

“That’s something coming from a place of love and it’s the most ideal way to get things done in a constructive way,” said Gibbs. “People can debate about how much people living outside of Israel are supposed to be making any sort of direct intervention, which happens on both sides of the political spectrum, but, I think, there’s absolutely nothing that we should hide in terms of understanding the full array of political work happening in Israel.”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Couch potatoes, fitness nuts

Most people know there is AIDS in Africa but few people comprehend the scope of the pandemic. In the past 30 years, 30 million people have died and 17 million children have been orphaned. Grandmothers have buried their own beloved children and are parenting again, with few resources. Vancouver’s Tikun Olam Gogos, together with other supporters of the Grandmothers to Grandmothers Campaign of the Stephen Lewis Foundation, are hosting two pledge events for African grandmothers caring for children orphaned by AIDS.

The first pledge event is For the Love of Grandmothers Fitness Challenge. Here’s how it works: you design a fitness challenge for yourself. The event period began March 8, International Women’s Day, and you must complete your self-challenge by Sept. 8, Grandparents’ Day. Choose something you enjoy and do it harder, faster or more often. Your commitment will help you reach your fitness goals.

You can do it once in a big event or work on it day by day. Then, dedicate your challenge to a grandmother you love. Examples of fitness challenges include the Sun Run, Tough Mudder, spinning 100 kilometres in a day or a month, walking or running three times a week for six months, etc. Whatever you imagine, you can do as part of this challenge – register at fortheloveofgrandmothers.weebly.com.

The second fitness challenge, back for the third year, is Solidarity Cycle, on Sept. 8. This ride is open to people of all ages. It has three track options: the Classic is a 100-kilometre cycle from White Rock to Yarrow. The Easy 50 kilometres goes from the lunch stop in Aldergrove over mostly flat, rural roads to Yarrow, and the 100-kilometre loop starts and ends in Yarrow. Stops along the way are hosted by cheering grandmothers offering refreshments and moral support. There is a celebration at the end of the ride with chili and a corn roast in Yarrow for all participants. Registration for Solidarity Cycle opens on May 1, with training and team-building rides offered throughout the summer. For more information, see solidaritycycle.weebly.com.

For both events, participants set up a secure fundraising page and ask their friends and families for contributions. Funds raised will support vital services and programs, from grief counseling to training for income-generation to support for school fees and uniforms

Memory still debated

Dr. Laura Beth Cohen (photo from Dr. Laura Beth Cohen)

Although the Srebrenica genocide – the killing of more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslims by Bosnian Serb forces in July 1995 – occurred more than 20 years ago, it still affects the people of Bosnia and Herzegovina every day, according to Dr. Laura Beth Cohen, director, Kupferberg Holocaust Centre, Queensborough Community College, City University of New York.

Cohen was in Winnipeg on March 8 to speak as part of the Mauro Centre for Peace and Justice: Brown Bag Lecture series. She spoke on the topic Conflicted Walls: Untangling Transitional Justice and Traumatic Memories at Bosnia’s Memorial.

“There was an opportunity to participate in the first fellowship called Summer University Srebrenica and so I decided to go,” Cohen told the Independent. “I learned very quickly – that was in the summer of 2010 – that, to really understand Bosnia, it was not enough to take a course and learn about it from books. It’s very important to understand what’s actually happening there, and the best way to do that is to actually go there. It’s a place with intense beauty, legacy and a wonderful history of different ethnic groups coming together, living in harmony.”

But, the legacy of the last war, which lasted from 1992 to 1995, is still very much present. In fact, she said, the current government is debating about it.

“Here, in America, we talk about the Second World War as if it’s confined to the past,” said Cohen. “But, in many places in Europe, the Second World War, that memory, is very much alive. And, once you’re in an environment like that, it really starts to help you, not only sort out what has taken place, but you can see … because you’re not part of that country, or you don’t belong to that population … you can start to see different ways that those memories of the past are interacting in contemporary life, and are incredibly problematic.”

When Cohen was in Srebrenica, she was taken by how much the memory of the genocide affects the surviving population, how much it is fought over. The country and government are split into two ethnic entities that are a result of the Dayton Accord, which was signed after the massacre in Srebrenica. One side was deemed the perpetrator; the other, the victim.

“It is not a big surprise there are very different perspectives between the sides over what happened in Srebrenica,” said Cohen. “The RS [Republika Srpska] government in the last month has created a new commission on Srebrenica to, once again, reexamine the facts and evidence to determine whether or not genocide took place … even though genocide took place and was proven multiple times, and especially in the international criminal tribunal. So, this debate over what happened and denial over what happened is still occurring within Bosnian society, as well as, particularly, in Srebrenica.”

This, of course, makes it very difficult for the residents of Srebrenica and the region to move forward, she said.

“It’s a place that would really benefit from having a lot of people just step away … and allowing the population to just live, move forward, and gain attention for things that they really need support with – economic relevance, additional support for education, and rebuilding parts of the community,” said Cohen. “But, with the memory so volatile and kept alive, it really overshadows what’s taking place there. You can imagine trying to raise your family, regardless of your ethnicity, in a place where the past is constantly looming, and it’s a grotesque past. How do you bring your children up in that world?”

According to Cohen, the constant and continued fight over the politics and memory of what happened at Srebrenica does not allow people to learn about what happened or why, and that this is preventing coping mechanisms from being put into place; mechanisms that could help stop other massacres from happening.

“We only focus internationally once a year – on July 11, during the annual commemoration of the Srebrenica genocide that takes place at the memorial – so we often don’t understand what’s taking place there the other 364 days of the year,” said Cohen.

“People visit the 9/11 memorial in downtown Manhattan. They visit Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland. They visit Kigali Genocide Memorial [in Rwanda]. These memorials serve as an educational component. For local residents and national citizens of these countries, they also serve as places of memory making,” she said.

In Srebrenica, Cohen hopes to eventually see ways of involving the local community in dialogue initiatives that facilitate the creation of memorials, ones that speak to the locals, helping them repair their communities.

“While we, as Jews, have a view of what Auschwitz-Birkenau is, to the people of Poland, it’s a German extermination camp on Polish soil,” said Cohen. “And, to the local people in Oswiecem, which is the Polish name of the town that the camp was built by, they struggle with having that kind of site in their community.”

When it comes to Srebrenica, she said, “We get stuck in the conversation of the politics over the genocide and what happened. What then happens is, a lot of these issues play out at the memorial. Part of this conversation is theoretical, but part of it is to help us understand that these are not static locations. They are very much interactive places, where memories are not only being promoted, but shaped by the larger discourse where they are situated.”

Cohen said the part of Bosnia, Herzegovina and Srebrenica that has always drawn her is “not only the friends I’ve made, but a vibrancy of life in Bosnia that gets lost in the discussion. The culture is beautiful, the people are beautiful, the relationships that people have with each other are beautiful. And, despite all of the horror of the last war, and despite all the history, and the Second World War and before that, it’s a place where there’s a lot of love and a lot of hope. That’s something that keeps, especially, international activist scholars engaged in what’s taking place there … and that, we can’t lose sight of when we talk about all the politics and things that aren’t going well.”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Making change her business

Elisa Birnbaum, centre, with Laura Zumdahl of Bright Endeavors, left, and Maria Kim of Cara Chicago. (photo from Elisa Birnbaum)

Toronto-based Elisa Birnbaum, editor-in-chief of SEE Change magazine, aims to inspire and give hope in many ways. Her book In the Business of Change: How Social Entrepreneurs are Disrupting Business (New Society Publishers, 2018) is but one of those ways.

“I’m a lawyer by training, but was always a writer on the side, enjoying writing and storytelling,” said Birnbaum, who was born and raised in Montreal in an Orthodox Jewish family. “I decided to try writing out for a little bit and to go back to law after. That was 15 years ago. I never went back to it.

“I was writing a lot about the nonprofit and charitable sector in Canada, as well as in the U.S., and I was also writing a lot about business, a strong interest of mine, too. I noticed how there was a melding of the two – how a lot of challenges in the nonprofit and charitable sector … how they could be helped through business and through business savvy…. So, when I saw what social enterprise was all about and how it was using business to solve social challenges, I realized the importance of that. I became really intrigued and interested. It was an area that, I thought, ‘Hey, this is something I really want to explore further.’”

Birnbaum started pitching stories about social enterprises to any editor who would listen. While some of her work went out via mainstream media, Birnbaum felt more was needed, so she co-founded SEE Change, which is devoted to telling the stories of social and environmental enterprises.

“I thought they symbolized a new way at looking at business,” she told the Independent. “I really felt this was the future, with how we work with business and how communities can tackle social challenges through business, and these types of savvy-ness and skills.”

After years of publishing the magazine, Birnbaum wanted to put together a book of such stories, both to delve more deeply into the phenomenon and, hopefully, to inspire and teach readers how to take on the task of starting a social enterprise.

“A lot of times, I’d get some young people or even older people who were interested in social entrepreneurship themselves, and they’d like advice and tips, and were constantly looking for more information from anyone who’d done it before,” she said. “So, I thought, I could also provide lessons learned, tips, advice and resources … so, a bit of storytelling, as well as a resource for those who are starting up or looking to start their own.”

As far as the response to the book so far, Birnbaum said she has been asked by schools and organizations to speak about the topic. “There were people who had never heard about it before and are now really inspired by the storytelling, which is great,” she said. “There are other people…. I was at a couple of universities recently, and some students there said they picked up the book and were now interested in starting their own social enterprise.”

According to Birnbaum, a very broad definition of a social enterprise is a business, whether nonprofit or for-profit, that has a social or environmental mission at its core, as opposed to a business that has profitability and sustainability at its core. The unique aspect of social entrepreneurship, she said, is that it approaches business in a new way.

In her book, Birnbaum makes a point of highlighting a large array of social enterprises from around the world, including a few in British Columbia. For example, Saul Brown’s Saul Good Gift Co. (itsaulgood.com) creates gift boxes filled with locally made artisan food that people can give their loved ones across Canada, and Reena Lazar’s Willow (willoweol.com) helps with end-of-life planning.

photo - Fresh Roots offers students experiential learning opportunities. — Fresh Roots offers students experiential learning opportunities. *(photo from Fresh Roots)*

Marc Schutzbank, director of Fresh Roots (freshroots.ca), grew up in the United States and moved to Vancouver to finish his education at the University of British Columbia 10 years ago on a Fulbright scholarship, looking at the economic viability of urban farming. This line of study led him to an organization called Plant to Plate, in Pittsburgh, Penn., where he attended University of Pittsburgh.

“As part of my research, I was looking at urban farms in Vancouver – if they were growing, how much food they grow, who they’re sharing it with,” Schutzbank told the Independent. “I have a finance degree, so I was looking at if they were making any money. As I was doing that, there were a couple of people who were doing work in the social space. So the goal wasn’t to grow and sell food; the goal was to share it or to reduce barriers to employment. And so, as I was getting to know them, Fresh Roots was moving from backyards into school grounds.”

One particular backyard caught Schutzbank’s attention. He wanted to know how much food was being grown in such a small space. He discovered, to his amazement, that this one backyard could feed three families. As they expanded to eight backyards, they could feed 35 families.

One of those backyards was adjacent to an inner-city elementary school with a rundown garden plot. The school invited Fresh Roots to develop the plot. As they did, the students, teachers and parents became increasingly interested. The teachers began using the garden as part of their curriculum, as a place to build learning capacity.

“It turns out that, when kids are outside growing food, their academic confidence increases,” said Schutzbank. “They are able to find some success, and this is often in places with kids that are having a hard time finding success inside the classroom [in straight rows]…. Learning like that doesn’t work for everyone.”

photo - Marc Schutzbank, director of Fresh Roots — Marc Schutzbank, director of Fresh Roots. *(photo from Fresh Roots)*

Another benefit of this was that bullying decreased at the school, as kids had a positive physical outlet. As well, Schutzbank found that, as the saying goes, “If you grow it, you eat it.”

Other schools picked up on what was happening and asked Fresh Roots to do the same at their schools. Fresh Roots is now at four high schools and one elementary school.

Fresh Roots also started a salad bar program for students – twice a week, all of the students get to eat the produce from the garden.

“In Canada, we are the only G7 nation that doesn’t have a federal meal program,” explained Schutzbank. “It’s a bit crazy that Canada doesn’t have that. All those kids without lunches are hungry, regardless of how much food is at home. It’s really critical for learning, to have food…. So, at Fresh Roots, our vision is good food for all – so everybody has access to healthy land, food and community.”

In addition to the food they grow, Fresh Roots supports and encourages teachers to have classes outside in the garden. “They need to touch, taste and feel,” said Schutzbank of the students. “Those are really critical parts of our senses and a really important way of learning.”

As well, Fresh Roots provides employment – especially in the summer – for youth who are struggling.

Schutzbank said you can’t grow food without eating and sharing it, so Fresh Roots’ philosophy is “around sharing all the food back through the programs and everything we are doing.”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Synchronizing rhythms

Dr. Shimon Amir researches circadian rhythms and clock genes. (photo from Shimon Amir)

When our circadian rhythm is disrupted, it can cause a brain disorder that manifests in a series of detrimental conditions too numerous to list, but that includes insomnia, depression and Parkinson’s disease.

“Circadian rhythms are daily observations in behavioural, physiological and metabolic processes,” explained Dr. Shimon Amir, professor of psychology, Concordia University in Montreal, and director of the university’s Centre for Studies in Behavioural Neurobiology. “In fact, everything you can measure in an organism follows a daily rhythm – a 24-hour cycle generated by internal clocks present in each and every cell in our bodies. And they are synchronized with the environmental light cycle. So, there is tuning between the internal rhythms and the solar cycle. Those are the rhythms.

“Most people might think that rhythms are driven by the light-dark cycle, but that’s not the case. They are generated by a clock that is present in every cell. The clocks are made of a set of genes called ‘clock genes’ and they oscillate – form feedback logs that last each cycle, with each cycle lasting about 24 hours.”

Amir was born and raised in Israel and moved to Montreal for his PhD. He went back to Israel to work at the Weizmann Institute of Science, but later returned to Montreal to teach and do research on circadian rhythms and now, too, clock genes.

According to Amir, circadian rhythms allow organisms like flies, rats, monkeys, humans and even plants to anticipate and respond to the demands of their environment.

“Rhythms can be disrupted by various means,” he said. “Ones that are most common are traveling across time zones, working shift work and eating at the wrong times. But, the main reason for the disruption is movement across time zones. Your clock is synchronized to your location. So, if you move from, say, Vancouver to Montreal, the clock has to be advanced, as you’ll wake up in Montreal three hours earlier, right? That takes time and the mismatch between environment and internal cycles causes various metabolic, behavioural, cognitive and other problems.”

While there are clocks in every cell of the body, all these clocks report to the master clock in the brain. That clock receives input from the eyes – light information that resets the master clock daily.

When we use lights at night, the master clock gets disrupted. “The clock is very sensitive to light at night,” said Amir. “Say you’re asleep and you want to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. You turn on the light and that causes a disruption of the clock. Another way to disrupt the clock is the time that you eat. Eating should occur during the day.

“The reason light is so disruptive at night is that one arm of the clock is a hormone called melatonin. Melatonin is exceedingly sensitive to light. It is secreted during the night and is suppressed during the day. But, if you turn on the light at night – even very brief exposure to light at night – it suppresses the melatonin rhythm.”

Amir suggested using a sleep mask to keep light away, as well as learning to use the washroom at night without turning on a light. “You can adapt to the dark very quickly and be able to see,” he said.

While Amir’s initial research interest was in circadian rhythm, over the last 10 years, he has expanded his focus to other clocks in the brain – those that control different types of behaviours and pathological conditions, such as depression, anxiety, drug addiction and diseases like Parkinson’s.

Through experiments with mice and rats, Amir has been working to configure which brain clock controls, or affects, how the rodents handle stimulation and what happens if these clocks are turned off or disrupted.

“So, the clocks are made of several particular genes called clock genes,” said Amir. “We have various molecular, genetic and viral tools to manipulate those genes directly … in different regions of the brain…. We’re seeing what happens when an animal that has a brain region that doesn’t have a clock or particular clock gene that stops the clock … how the animal behaves and what are some of the pathological consequences of this condition.”

Amir and team use various animal models of disease, looking into what happens when you take out the clock and if it correlates with enhanced depression and anxiety.

“The circadian rhythm is really a very fundamental system that you can say controls everything,” said Amir. “When the system is disrupted, it has important implications for varied disorders.”

photo - Dr. Shimon Amir — Dr. Shimon Amir *(photo from Shimon Amir)*

The main goal is to understand the evolutionary function of the clocks and what they do to enable adaptation of organisms to their surroundings. But, also, the hope is that, by having better understanding, it will help in identifying new avenues of therapies.

With jet lag being such a hot topic in regards to circadian rhythm, Amir suggested a few ways to keep it at bay. “There are some ways to shorten jet lag, but there’s no way to avoid it,” he said.

“When you go east, you have to be exposed to light in the morning, in order to readjust to the new time zone. When you are exposed to light early in the morning, it induces in the clock a ‘face advance,’ it advances the clock. But, if you go west, you have to be exposed to light at night, early night. The transition between the evening and night, that’s where you have to be exposed to light, and that’s where it is ‘face delay.’ It will delay the face of the clock, because you have to wake up later when you go west.

“You need to be intentionally exposed to light in the evening or have light exposure a bit longer before you go west … or wake up very early, be exposed to light early in the morning, if you go east.

“Going through jet lag is very unhealthy,” he said. “If you do it very often, it will affect you in various ways, negatively, of course. Except, you can’t avoid it … as you go see family and grandchildren, and others, in Israel.”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Milestones … Shapira, Or Shalom, Baumel Joseph, Respitz & Krug

Adi Shapira brought home a silver medal for British Columbia in the 2019 Canada Winter Games. (photo by Peter Fuzessery Moonlight Canada)

From Feb. 15 to March 3, Red Deer and central Alberta hosted the 2019 Canada Winter Games. Among those taking home a medal was Adi Shapira.

Winning the silver in the archery recurve, individual female event, Shapira said in a Team BC article, “It is an amazing reward for all the training I have been doing and it is just an amazing accomplishment.”

photo - Adi Shapira prepares for a shot — Adi Shapira prepares for a shot. *(photo from Team BC)*

According to the Canada Winter Games website, Shapira, “who had taken up archery following a school retreat in grades 8 and 9, fought hard in the gold medal match, but Marie-Ève Gélinas, came back to win the gold for Quebec.”

Shapira, 16, is part of the SPARTS program at Magee Secondary School, which is open to students competing in high-performance athletics at the provincial, national or international level, as well as students in the arts who are performing at a high level of excellence. Last November, she won the qualifying tournaments against other female archers ages 15 to 20 to represent the province of British Columbia in the February national games.

* * *

photo - The 2019 Stylin’ Or Shalom fashion models — The 2019 Stylin’ Or Shalom fashion models. *(photo from Or Shalom)*

Stylin’ Or Shalom on Feb. 20 was not just a beautiful evening: the event raised $1,600 for Battered Women’s Support Services so that they can continue their important work.

Models for the fashion-show fundraiser were Ross Andelman, Avi Dolgin, Val Dolgin, Carol Ann Fried, Michal Fox, Dalia Margalit-Faircloth, Helen Mintz, Ana Peralta, Avril Orloff and Leora Zalik. About 50 people attended and, between cash donations and purchases from the My Sister’s Closet eco-thrift store, this year’s show raised about $600 more than did the inaugural Stylin’ Or Shalom event held in 2017. In addition, many people brought clothing donations, which will be sold at the store, generating further funds for the organization.

* * *

The Association for Canadian Jewish Studies has announced that Dr. Norma Baumel Joseph is the 2019 recipient of the Louis Rosenberg Canadian Jewish Studies Distinguished Service Award. Joseph brings together the highest standards of scholarship, creative and effective dissemination of research, and activism in a manner without rival in the field of Canadian Jewish studies, as well as being a respected voice in Jewish feminist studies more broadly.

photo - Dr. Norma Baumel Joseph — Dr. Norma Baumel Joseph

Joseph’s scholarship is remarkable for her mastery of both traditional rabbinic sources and anthropological methods. Her work on the responsa of Rabbi Moses Feinstein, including an award-winning article published in American Jewish History 83,2 (1995), is based on a close reading of some of the most technical and difficult halachic texts. Her mastery of these sources is also apparent in articles on women and prayer, the mechitzah, and the bat mitzvah. She has used her knowledge of halachah in her academic work on Jewish divorce in Canada, including an article in Studies in Religion (2011) and is a collaborator in a recently awarded grant project, Troubling Orthopraxies: A Study of Jewish Divorce in Canada.

As a trained anthropologist and as a feminist, she realizes that food is also a text and she has made important contributions to both the history of Iraqi Jews in Canada and to our understanding of the history of food in the Jewish community. Her Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)-funded research has resulted in recent essays such as “From Baghdad to Montreal: Food, Gender and Identity.” Her ongoing reflections on Jewish women in Canada, first appearing as early as 1981 in the volume Canadian Jewish Mosaic, are foundational texts in the study of Jewish women in Canada.

Joseph has chosen to disseminate her research and wisdom in a variety of ways. Her undergraduate and graduate students at Concordia praise her innovative student-centred teaching. Recently, she instituted a for-credit internship at the Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish archives, which has been beneficial to both the student and the archive. She is in demand as a lecturer in both professional and lay settings. Her work in film has reached a wide audience. In Half the Kingdom, a 1989 NFB documentary on Jewish women and Judaism, she explores with sensitivity the challenges – and rewards – of being both a feminist and an Orthodox Jew. She served as consultant to the film, and was a co-author of the accompanying guidebook.

Since 2002, Joseph has also committed herself to public education by taking on the task of writing a regular column on Jewish life for the Canadian Jewish News. Her views are based on a deep understanding of Judaism and contemporary Jewish life and are worthy of anthologizing.

Joseph is a founding member of the Canadian Coalition of Jewish Women for the Get and worked for the creation of a Canadian law to aid and protect agunot. As part of her Women for the Get work, she participated in the educational film Untying the Bonds: Jewish Divorce, produced by the Coalition of Jewish Women for the Get in 1997. She has also worked on the issue of agunot, as well as advocated for the creation of a prayer space for women at the Western Wall among international Jewish organizations.

Joseph helped in the founding of the Institute for Canadian Jewish Studies at Concordia, and convened the institute from 1994 to 1997, when a chair was hired. She was also a founder and co-director of Concordia University’s Azrieli Institute for Israel Studies. In 1998, she was appointed chair of the Canadian Jewish Congress National Archives Committee, and has remained in the position since then, under the new designation of chair of the advisory committee for the Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives (CJA). In this capacity, Joseph has been a forceful and effective advocate for protecting and promoting the preservation of Canadian Jewish archival material and for appreciating the professionalism of the staff. She has lent her time and experience to multiple meetings and interventions at various crucial junctures in the recent history of the CJA, during which she has balanced and countered arguments that would have led to the dissolution or extreme diminishing of the archives as we know it. Her work on behalf of the archives has drawn her into diverse committees and consultations. Notably, she contributed her expertise to the chairing of a sub-committee convened by Parks Canada when their Commemorative Places section was in search of Canadian Jewish women-related content. Her suggestions made during the 2005 meetings have resulted in several site designations over the course of the past 12 years.

Joseph has had a unique role in Canadian Jewish studies and Canadian Jewish life, and is richly deserving of the Louis Rosenberg Award.

* * *

In February, Janie Respitz of Montreal won the prize for best interpretation of an existing Yiddish song at the final Der Idisher Idol contest in Mexico City. She performed “Kotsk,” a song about a small town in Poland, which was the seat of the Kotsker rebbe, the founder of a Chassidic dynasty in the 18th century. The win included $500 US.

Respitz holds a master’s degree in Yiddish language and literature and, for the past 25 years, has performed concerts around the world. She has lectured and taught the subject, including at Queen’s University and McGill University, and is on the faculty of KlezKanada, the annual retreat in the Laurentians.

Respitz was among nine finalists, both local and foreign, who were invited to perform at Mexico City’s 600-seat Teatro del Parque Interlomas before a panel of judges and a live audience.

The competition is in its fourth edition, but Respitz only heard about it last year. She submitted a video of her performing “Kotsk” in September and received word in December that she was in the running.

A Yiddish song contest in Mexico City may seem odd, but the city has a large Jewish community, many with roots in eastern Europe, much like Montreal. The winner for best original song was Louisa Lyne of Malmo, Sweden, who’s also a well-established performer of Yiddish works.

– Excerpted from CJN; for the full article, visit cjnews.com

* * *

On March 14, at the New School in New York, the National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) announced the recipients of its book awards for publishing year 2018. The winners include Nora Krug, who was given the prize in autobiography for Belonging: A German Reckons With History and Home (Scribner). “Krug creates a stunningly effective, often moving portrait of Krug’s memories and her exploration of the people who came before her,” said NBCC president Kate Tuttle.

Krug’s drawings and visual narratives have appeared in the New York Times, Guardian and Le Monde diplomatique. Her short-form graphic biography Kamikaze, about a surviving Japanese Second World War pilot, was included in the 2012 editions of Best American Comics and Best American Nonrequired Reading. She is the recipient of fellowships from the Maurice Sendak Foundation, Fulbright, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, and of medals from the Society of Illustrators and the New York Art Directors Club. She is an associate professor at Parsons School of Design in New York and lives in Brooklyn with her family.

The National Book Critics Circle was founded in 1974 at New York’s legendary Algonquin Hotel by a group of the most influential critics of the day. It currently comprises 750 working critics and book-review editors throughout the United States. For more information about the awards and NBCC, visit bookcritics.org.

Raising Jews with Israel literacy

Tal Grinfas-David of the Centre for Israel Education speaks with educators at Vancouver Talmud Torah last month. (photo from VTT)

Educators at Lower Mainland Jewish day schools had the opportunity to consider the relevance of Israel literacy last month, when Tal Grinfas-David, the Centre for Israel Education’s day school specialist, was in town the week of Feb. 18 to deliver a talk on the subject and work with local teachers and administrators. Her keynote speech, titled Teaching Modern Israel – Challenges and Opportunities, was part of a community professional development day.

The CIE, which is based in Atlanta, Ga., received a grant for a three-year initiative to work with nine Jewish day schools across North America and help them enhance their Israel education efforts. Vancouver Talmud Torah and King David High School are two of the nine schools and Grinfas-David spent a day coaching educators at each of them. She will return for the next two years to reinforce the changes CIE is promoting.

The issue, she said, is that, across North America, many graduates of Jewish day school education don’t have enough Israel literacy to grapple with the world, to justify a strong connection to Israel and to inform their Jewish identity.

“The concept we’re promoting is to turn Israel education into something all teachers can support, not just Jewish studies faculty,” she told the Independent. The desire is there, she added. “The Vancouver community is very supportive and wants to see Israel education boosted and incorporated into different subject areas. But it’s going to be a long-term process.”

photo - Tal Grinfas-David — Tal Grinfas-David *(photo from Centre for Israel Education)*

No stranger to education, Grinfas-David comes to her role with a PhD in curriculum and instruction and 25 years as an educator in Israel and the United States. Over the next three years, she will move between Jewish day schools in Denver, Los Angeles, Detroit, New Jersey and Vancouver, coaching their educational teams.

“We’re thrilled to have this grant to visit the individual sites and get to know the different schools’ cultures,” she said. “Each school is different and unique, with strengths and challenges, and this grant allows us to customize and tailor our offerings to specific communities.”

The goal of Israel literacy is to graduate Jewish students who understand the relevance of Israel in their lives and feel confident in their knowledge. They need this, she said, because understanding Judaism means understanding it’s not solely a religion.

“It’s also a belonging to a peoplehood, a nation with a Jewish homeland,” she said. “To understand modern Israel today, we have to see it as a continuation of our Jewish history.”

Grinfas-David said she would need three days to address all the ways that Israel literacy counts significantly in the life of a Jew.

“Israel impacts how Jews live in other countries, like the U.S. and Canada, where we are free. Students at our Jewish day schools have never experienced powerlessness or persecution, as they have the good fortune of being born here and now, with many freedoms. But that’s all the more reason to have them understand it was not always like this for Jews.

“Being part of a nation means there is an obligation to support your people, because of your fortune,” she continued. “There’s a calling to engage and to reflect on what Israel means for these students in their lives. Israel literacy is about having a repertoire of primary sources under your belt, so that when students leave the school setting and hear different narratives, they’ll be critical consumers of information, and they’ll know the facts they need. At CEI, our goal is to give them the ability and the opportunity to have the confidence to be critical consumers.”

Lauren Kramer, an award-winning writer and editor, lives in Richmond. To read her work online, visit laurenkramer.net.