Susan Inhaber, president, Na’amat Canada (left), with Dalia Margalit-Faircloth, president, Na’amat Vancouver. (photo by Heather Freed)
Na’amat Canada and NA’AMAT USA came together last month to celebrate a milestone: 100 years of community work.
The Centennial Celebration, held in Toronto May 16-18, brought together leaders, members and supporters for a weekend filled with joy, reflection and renewed purpose. The program featured tributes, performances and presentations from Na’amat International leaders. Together, participants honoured a century of activism and achievement while charting the course for the work ahead.
Na’amat was “the first and last women’s organization for which I ever worked,” said the late Golda Meir, national secretary (president) of Na’amat in the 1930s, decades before she became Israel’s prime minister.
Founded in 1925, Na’amat Canada is a Jewish nonprofit volunteer organization dedicated to improving the lives of women, children and families in Israel and Canada through education, advocacy and social services.
“From our humble beginnings as a single organization to the growth of two vibrant organizations dedicated to empowering women and children in Israel, we can take great pride in our rich and storied history,” said event co-chairs Jan Gurvitch (NA’AMAT USA) and Susan Inhaber (Na’amat Canada). “This celebration honours not only the trailblazers who came before us but also the dedicated individuals who continue to give their time and energy to carry our mission forward.”
The weekend began with welcomes and candlelighting, continued with performances and storytelling, and culminated in atribute to Na’amat’s past national presidents, women who helped shape the organization’s direction for generations. Attendees also heard from Na’amat Israel leaders Hagit Pe’er and Shirli Shavit, who shared updates on urgent needs and inspiring progress on the ground.
“Today, as we honour this remarkable milestone, we celebrate not only the achievements of the past but also the enduring partnership that continues to drive our mission forward,” said Pe’er, president of Na’amat Israel and Na’amat International. “Together, we have built a legacy of resilience, compassion and progress that will inspire future generations.”
The event captured the deep sense of community that defines Na’amat: from singing and dancing, to laughter and reflection, to sharing dreams for the next 100 years.
Kanot Youth Village
After wrapping up the centennial, the occasion served as the launchpad for Na’amat Canada’s next major initiative: a fundraising campaign to equip a brand-new middle school building at Kanot Youth Village, a life-changing boarding school for at-risk youth in Israel.
“We help children cross the bridge – from being lonely to being socially connected, from failing in school to succeeding, from mistrust and alienation to belonging, connection and pride in being part of society,” said Dr. Hezi Yosef, director of Kanot, who is an expert in cognitive-behavioural psychotherapy and lectures at educational institutions and organizations in Israel and worldwide.
Founded by Na’amat in 1952, Kanot today serves 700 students, many of whom face poverty, trauma or loss. The new building – a collaborative project between Na’amat Canada, donors and Israel’s Ministry of Education – is nearly complete but, to open its doors in September 2025, it must be fully furnished and equipped.
Na’amat aims to raise $180,000 CAD to provide classroom furniture, lab tools, creative arts supplies and technology to transform the space into a vibrant learning environment.
To learn more about Na’amat’s impact or to support the Kanot campaign, visit naamat.com or call 1-888-278-0792.
A drawing of the new Jewish campus at Oak Street and 41st Avenue. (image from Jewish Federation)
With construction of the new Jewish campus at Oak Street and 41st Avenue set to begin in spring 2026, many in our community still have questions. What exactly is JWest? Is it replacing the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver? What about King David High School? Here are some answers to those questions.
JWest is the name of the redevelopment project and the campaign behind it. It is not a new name for the JCC, whichwill continue to serve as a hub for wellness, learning, culture and community connection. JWest is the vision, planning and fundraising effort driving the creation of a new, integrated Jewish campus that includes a new, expanded JCC and KDHS, and two residential rental towers.
Inside the new JCC
The new JCC will be a six-storey, 200,000-square-foot facility designed with inclusion, flexibility and sustainability at its core. Among its many features, it will include an eight-lane, 25-metre swimming pool and significantly expanded fitness and wellness spaces to support active living for all ages.
Families will benefit from a much larger childcare centre, complete with a rooftop outdoor play area. The facility will also house two full gymnasiums, universal changerooms with private cubicles for added comfort and accessibility, and a multi-function theatre with retractable seating and full wheelchair access – ideal for performances, films and community events.
At the heart of the building, a larger welcoming café will serve as a natural gathering space, while a new, purpose-built home for the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre will provide enhanced opportunities for learning and remembrance.
A drawing of part of the interior of the new Jewish campus. (image from Jewish Federation)
The JCC has long been a home for a wide range of Jewish organizations – and that legacy will continue in the new campus. In fact, the new facility is designed to foster even greater collaboration and increased programming for all ages and interests.
While thelist is still being finalized, most of the community partners and organizations currently housed in the JCC will move into the new building, joined by some new partners who will bring fresh energy and offerings to the campus.
Why a new KDHS
KDHS has been a vital part of Jewish life in Vancouver for decades, but, like the current JCC, the school has outgrown its space. The existing building cannot support further enrolment growth or accommodate the full scope of programs and facilities that today’s students – and tomorrow’s – need to thrive.
Also, the current school and the JCC are separated by a big parking lot and a busy street, which makes it hard to have shared programs, casual interactions, or really feel like part of one community. The new campus changes that. By bringing the school and the JCC right next to each other, it will become a true shared space. With students spending time at the JCC every day, the whole place will be filled with energy, laughter and activity. This kind of daily connection will open the door for more collaboration between teachers, families and community members, and help everyone feel like they belong. It won’t be just a campus but a place where Jewish life can grow and be shared across generations.
The phased approach to construction ensures that both the JCC and KDHS will remain fully operational in their current buildings throughout the project. Each organization will only move once its new home is ready, minimizing disruption and allowing continuity in programs, services and learning.
The residential towers
The two planned residential rental towers are an essential part of the long-term sustainability of the new campus. They are designed to generate stable, ongoing revenue that will help support the operations and maintenance of the entire site. In addition to strengthening the financial foundation of the project, the towers will contribute to addressing Vancouver’s broader need for rental housing. They will include below-market rental units, providing much-needed affordable housing options for members of the Jewish community and others in need.
During construction?
Construction will begin in spring 2026, starting in the current JCC parking lot. Once the new JCC is complete – estimated at about three years – the current building will be removed to make space for the new KDHS, outdoor areas, residential towers and long-term parking. Throughout construction, the current JCC will remain open, and all programs and services will continue.
JWest isworking closely with Grosvenor, the developer behind the Mayfair West project across 41st Avenue, to coordinate temporary parking for JCC members, staff and visitors. While final details are still being confirmed, this location is expected to be the primary parking option during construction. At the same time, drop-off and pick up zones will be provided at the current JCC building for the childcare centre and for people with limited mobility.
Funding for JWest
Thanks to the extraordinary generosity of donors – and major support from the governments of British Columbia and Canada – more than 90% of the required funds have already been raised. As the project prepares to break ground, the final phase of the campaign will soon launch. This next stage is a chance for everyone in the community to take part and help shape the future.
Why this matters
“I truly believe that, together, we’re creating something special – a vibrant new Jewish campus that brings out the best of our community and our city. This is what we do,” said Alex Cristall, chair of the JWest Foundation. “We come together and we invest in our future because we care deeply about it. This new campus isn’t just about buildings – it’s about building a home for Jewish life, culture and values in British Columbia that will last for generations.”
JWest will continue to share updates – including construction timelines, additional parking details and news about the public phase of the campaign – in the months ahead. Visit JWestNow.com.
Ben Shneiderman, a retired computer scientist who lives in Vancouver, is a member of an extraordinary family. Recently, he promoted his Uncle Chim’s photography exhibition at the Zack Gallery, as well as the new English translation of his father’s book about the Spanish Civil War (1937-1939).
Ben Shneiderman (photo from Ben Shneiderman)
It all started with Shneiderman’s grandfather, Benjamin Szymin, a respected publisher of Yiddish and Hebrew books in Warsaw before the Second World War. His daughter Halina (later Eileen) and son David (Chim) grew up surrounded by culture and tradition, inspired by the conversations of the best Polish-Jewish writers, artists and scientists.
“My mother Halina studied at the Warsaw university before she met my father,” Shneiderman said in an interview with the Independent. “After they married, in 1933, they moved to Paris.”
Shneiderman’s father, Samuel, was cut from the same cloth. He is considered one of the first Jewish war correspondents in Europe and America. In the 1930s, he published multiple articles and books in Polish and Yiddish on Jewish issues and social developments in Europe.
Ben Shneiderman remembered that his parents both decided early on that only his father would get a byline. “The times were different,” he said with a smile. “But they worked as a team. Mother did a lot of research. She typed the texts Father dictated, and then she edited and re-typed and fact-checked, until they were both satisfied. When Father went to Spain in 1937 to report on the Civil War, Mother went with him – she had her trusted typewriter with her.”
In 1938, Samuel Shneiderman compiled his reportages from Spain into the book War in Spain, which was published in Yiddish.
“The book included photographs taken by my uncle, Mother’s brother David, the legendary photographer Chim,” said Shneiderman. “Chim was also in Spain at the time, reporting on the war.”
In the past few years, the book has experienced an unexpected revival. “I had nothing to do with it, but I was glad,” said Shneiderman. “The book was published in Polish in 2021. Then, in 2023, it was translated into Spanish. In 2024, the English translation came from the Yiddish Book Centre.”
The English translation’s title is Journey Through the Spanish Civil War (translator Deborah A. Green), and Shneiderman gave a slide presentation on it and his family last month at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver, under the aegis of the Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival. He explained that his parents left Europe just before the Second World War, but they couldn’t get his grandparents out of Poland. The older generation of his family did not survive the Holocaust.
As soon as his parents arrived in New York, they became immersed in the Yiddish writing and journalism milieu, and they both started publishing in English, as well. Together and separately, they covered the themes of postwar Europe,Israel, and Jewish life in the United States. Shneiderman’s father, in addition to writing articles for such publications as The National Jewish Monthly, the New York Times, Hadassah Magazine and The Reporter, also wrote non-fiction books, poetry and movie reviews. Plus, he edited several books by prominent Yiddish writers.
Growing up in a family steeped in writing and journalism, and with his uncle being a famous photographer, it might have been expected that Shneiderman would follow in their footsteps. His older sister did, in a way. “She moved to Israel in 1963 and taught English there,” he said. But he chose a different path.
“I was always interested in photography, like Chim,” he said. “I even won a photography contest in high school.” But, in college, he studied physics and math. “I had a cousin who was a physicist. He influenced me, but I was never much into physics. Mostly, I was entranced with math and with computers. I worked as a programmer for a couple physicists while still in college. I also took psychology classes, and philosophy. I wanted to know everything.”
He kept taking photos as a hobby, and that interest persists to this day. “I photographed many of my colleagues – pioneers of computer sciences. My pictures of them were published by a number of magazines,” he said. “Overall, I have over 40,000 photos. I also published them in my book Encounters with HCI Pioneers: A Personal History and Photo Journal, in 2019.”
HCI stands for human-computer interaction, which is Shneiderman’s primary field of research. “In 1973, I got the first PhD in computer sciences at my college,” he said.
In 1977, as part of an American delegation, he went to Russia on an exchange program. “We visited Moscow and Novosibirsk,” he said. “I met many interesting people there. One of them, a local computer scientist, Simon Berkovich, told me in confidence that he wanted to emigrate to the US and asked me if I could help. I said I would try. When he left Russia some time later, he had a stopover in Rome, like many other Soviet immigrants. Some of them went on to Israel, but Berkovich contacted me, and I wrote him a letter that I needed him for my work. He was able to come to the US with this letter. We even wrote a paper together. He is a professor now at George Washington University.”
Shneiderman recalls fondly his visit to a synagogue in Moscow: “Several of us went. I was concerned about our safety, but nothing bad happened. It was fun,” he said.
On the professional front, Shneiderman has always maintained that the current trend of developing artificial intelligence (AI) as autonomous machines wasn’t the way to go. In 1980 – 45 years ago – he even wrote a book on the subject, called Software Psychology: Human Factors in Computer and Information Systems.
“AI should be a tool, not a creator,” he said. “I don’t think a software should write books or paint pictures or drive cars autonomously. I think it should make people’s jobs easier, assist humans, not replace them. After all, a camera doesn’t take photos – I do. But my smart camera helps me manage the focus, the lighting and other parameters. Apple agrees with me. I worked for them as a consultant for five years.”
Shneiderman has been a firm proponent of this point of view for decades. He has expressed it in his publications and at industry conferences. In 1982, he co-founded what is now known as the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. He also coined the term “direct manipulation,” which is the way we move objects on a screen with a mouse or a finger. He thinks humans should be an integral part of computer interactions, because only humans can make ethical decisions. No AI can ever know what it feels like to be a person. “There is no ‘I’ in AI,” he joked.
Shneiderman and his wife have been living in Vancouver since 2020, when they moved here from Bethesda, Md. “My daughter teaches anthropology at UBC,” he said. “We visited her often for years and even bought an apartment here. We liked it here. Then, COVID happened, while we were visiting, so we stayed in Vancouver. My wife was born in Canada and always had a Canadian passport, and I became a citizen last year.”
From Warsaw at the beginning of the 20th century to Vancouver 100 years later, this family continues to share stories.
“Grandfather told them in Yiddish,” Shneiderman said. “My uncle told them in pictures. My parents told their stories in words. And I told them in data, using computers as my medium. We are a family of storytellers.”
Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].
On June 21, at Ohel Yitzhak in Nahalat Shiva, Gil Zohar celebrated the 57th anniversary of his bar mitzvah. (photo Gil Zohar)
Man plans, God laughs, goes the Yiddish aphorism. For the last half year, I have been diligently learning the trope of Parshat Shelach Lecha (the Torah portion meaning Send for Yourself) to celebrate the 57th anniversary of my bar mitzvah, which I had when I was a boy in Toronto. My wife Randi and I had planned a kiddush at the historic Beit HaRav Kook synagogue near our home in downtown Jerusalem. We are members there, and enjoy the leadership of Rabbi Yitzhak Marmorstein, formerly of Vancouver’s Or Shalom. Alas, the war with Iran started. In accordance with the Home Front Command orders against large public assemblies, the shul closed. And so, we considered canceling the simchah.
While all but Jerusalem’s most essential businesses were locked down tight as a drum, the wartime defence regulations allowed synagogues near a bomb shelter to keep their doors open, with limited attendance. Hence, Ohel Yitzhak, the Sephardi synagogue in our courtyard in Nahalat Shiva, built in 1888, remained open. And so, we switched the venue from the former home and yeshivah of Abraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935) – the first Ashkenazi chief rabbi of British Mandatory Palestine – to the equally historic synagogue where Ben-Zion Meir Uziel (1880-1953) – Kook’s Sephardi counterpart, who served as nascent Israel’s chief Sephardi rabbi until his death – used to pray.
The illustrious Sephardi landmark, resembling a house of worship in a mellah in Morocco, is close to the Herbert Samuel Hotel, which opened its miklat (bomb shelter) to the public as well as hotel guests. So, on June 21, undeterred by the spectre of a ballistic missile salvo, I was called up to chant Maftir and read the Haftarah.
What’s it like when the air-raid sirens sound nightly and warplanes roar through the starry sky? Lori Nusbaum of Toronto, who came with her son, Ryan De Simone, for my second bar mitzvah, has been posting on Facebook:
“The 3rd night in Jerusalem and the 3rd siren alert went off; it was 4:35 a.m. Sleep is hard. You don’t want to be in a deep sleep and miss the [cellphone] notifications so you try to have ‘one eye open.’ There’s something strangely intimate about being in a smallish space with a bunch of strangers, some in bathrobes, carrying pillows and blankets, wearing slippers, with sleep still in their eyes. You aren’t sure if you should make eye contact or not. It’s nighttime, so conversation is not really happening. I think we all want to keep sleep in our brains, hope we can go back upstairs quickly and close our eyes for a peaceful rest of the night.”
Like many guests at the synagogue, Lori found my wartime bar mitzvah intensely emotional. “My somewhat unaffiliated son had an aliyah at one of the oldest shuls in Jerusalem,” she posted on Facebook. “Our friend, whose bar mitzvah we came to witness, literally took the tallit off his back to wrap around my son so he could go to the bimah. With tears in my eyes, so many emotions washed over me. Too many to describe adequately. This is what Israel is all about. The people who in the middle of a war come together, pray, help each other and celebrate life together. And give you the proverbial shirt off their back.”
The grim situation in which we find ourselves today parallels the Torah reading of Shelach Lecha (Numbers 13:1-15:41) and its equally pertinent Haftarah (Joshua 2:1-24).
Returning after 40 days of reconnoitring the Promised Land, the spies sent by Moses reported: “We went into the land to which you sent us, and it does flow with milk and honey! Here is its fruit [showing a huge cluster of grapes hanging from a stave, today the symbol of the Ministry of Tourism, proudly worn by every licensed tour guide]. But the people who live there are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large.”
Then, Calev ben Yefune shushed the crowd declaring, “We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it.”
Ten of his fellow spies (all except Joshua) disagreed – “We can’t attack those people; they are stronger than we are” – and they spread a slanderous report about the land they had probed. Misunderstanding the many funerals they had witnessed because of the plague God had sent so that the spies would go unnoticed, they said, “The land we explored devours its inhabitants. All the people we saw there are of great size. We saw the Nephilim there [the descendants of the giant Anak]. We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them.”
Grasshoppers? They might as well have called the Jewish people cockroaches.
In the words of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks ztz”l, this dibbat ha’aretz (slanderous report about the Land of Israel) is the language of fear and demoralization. They are big, we are small. They are strong, we are weak. They do not fear us, but we fear them. We cannot prevail.
Was this, in fact, the case? As the Haftarah makes clear, the 10 scouts could not have been more mistaken. A generation later, Joshua bin Nun too sent two spies – the same Calev, and Pinchas ben Zimri. They slept on the roof of a house belonging to Rahav the prostitute, which formed part of the walls of Jericho. Hearing about the spies, the city’s king ordered his soldiers to arrest them, but Rahav hid them and misdirected the guards. What is more interesting is what she tells the spies of the feelings of Jericho’s residents when they heard that the Israelites were on their way:
“I know that the Lord has given this land to you and that a great fear of you has fallen on us, so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. We have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two kings of the Amorites east of the Jordan, whom you completely destroyed. When we heard of it, our hearts melted and everyone’s courage failed because of you, for the Lord your God is in heaven above and on the earth below.”
Like contemporary Gazans and Iranians, the people of Jericho were anything but giants – they were terrified of us. The spies of Moses’s day should have known this. They had already said in the song they sang at the Red Sea: “Nations heard and trembled; terror gripped Philistia’s inhabitants / The chiefs of Edom were dismayed / Moab’s leaders were seized with trembling / The people of Canaan melted away.”
How did 10 of the spies so misinterpret the situation? They misunderstood Moses’s instructions: “Alu zeh b’Negev v’alitem et ha-har” – ascend (alu) through the south, and ascend (va’alitem) the mountain. The word “ascend” (aliyah in Hebrew) also means to overcome. (When Martin Luther King Jr. famously said, “We shall overcome,” he was citing this verse.) The spies lacked the faith that the land would be theirs, despite God’s promises, and 39 years of wandering in the desert followed.
The Jewish people, in Israel and the diaspora, experienced a crisis of confidence in 1313 BCE following the Exodus from Egypt, on the eve of entering the Promised Land. Not so today. We have no such hesitations as the Israel Defence Forces battle the regime of the latter-day Haman in Iran and its Hamas, Hezbollah and Houthi proxies. Our response is to follow Moses’s instructions: “Alu.” Ascend. Overcome. Make aliyah.
To that end, I invite you to celebrate Parshat Shelach Lecha with me at Beit Ha Rav Kook (9 Rabbi Kook St.) on June 13, 2026. Next year, in peaceful Jerusalem.
Gil Zohar is a writer and tour guide in Jerusalem.
I recently participated in a conference panel on hope in a time of divisive politics. A friend in the Jewish community couldn’t do it, so she asked me to help instead. I won’t lie, I felt nervous.
I worried that I wouldn’t measure up to some of the speakers, who had big job titles, awards and experience. This was compounded by a few missteps that left me feeling embarrassed and humbled. First, my friend’s name was left on the conference program and mine wasn’t listed, even though organizers had ample time to update the panelists’ names. Second, social media amplified the panel on Facebook and Instagram, but listed my name with incorrect, made-up undergraduate degrees. I’d provided my graduate degrees in religious studies and education because I felt they were relevant. Somehow, five years of education went away due to clerical errors.
The weird part was that my brief talk, and my presence at the panel, was to elevate Jewish experience and Jewish hope in an approachable way. Two academics spoke, using big concepts and bigger words, while minimizing their personal approach to the issues. Then, an amazing African Canadian legal professional spoke of her family’s journey and deep roots in Canada – it was personal, compelling and important. I was up next.
I’d prepared my notes in advance. I spoke from them, but, first, I changed gears. The night before the panel, held at Winnipeg’s Canadian Museum for Human Rights, I encountered members of the Persian community, holding up their lion flags to represent the Iranian people and their opposition to the Islamic Republic. I stopped to tell a young woman holding the flag that our hearts were with her, and we were thinking of her, and hoping the people of Iran were safe. She seemed shocked. Surprised that I saw her, knew what she represented, and embraced this message against extremism and violence of the Islamic Republic of Iran. She asked where I was from, I smiled and only said, “Winnipeg.”
The day of the panel, I struggled with a parking meter. Then I crossed a street, sharing a warm smile with an Indigenous man on a bicycle who passed by. My heart thumped hard. Though I’ve done plenty of public events and teaching, I felt on edge. Maybe it was because I was one of the only representatives of the Jewish community in that multi-faith gathering. Maybe it was because I’d been checking on where the Iranian missiles were landing in Israel right before I came. I worried about repercussions following me into the Canadian Museum for Human Rights.
Pretending to check if the microphone was on, I said, “Welcome. Thank you for coming …” and, looking at the crowd, I greeted everyone with a “Hello y’all!” After that informal start, I made sure to mention the Jewish concept of the world as a broken pot, in which the vessel’s shards, our souls, are in each of us. I talked about tikkun olam, repairing the world, and putting those shards back together, as an act of hope that we work towards, as an act of ongoing creation – a human and divine partnership. Throughout the morning, I took time to look at people, greet them and try to see G-d in each of them. I decided that the way to confront my feelings of embarrassment, and the erasure of my name and credentials, was to fully see others the way I would want to be treated.
At this conference, there were many references to reconciliation. An Anglican bishop who is also a residential school survivor spoke during our panel question period. When I recounted all this later to my family, we recognized an important theme.
As a professor, my husband often attends events with a land acknowledgement. Working with a group of Indigenous students last year, he asked them how they feel about the “workshopped” statement the university uses. They said it was often done by rote and perhaps lost its meaning as a result. They didn’t feel seen by it.
Almost immediately, I recalled that our congregation had changed its Prayer for Canada. The new one feels genuine to me. It includes aspects of a land acknowledgement by mentioning by name the first inhabitants of the land. It also includes the current Canadian political infrastructure. It’s a prayer to maintain our diversity, so that never again will Canada say, “None is too many,” in reference to the antisemitic exclusion of Jewish refugees fleeing Europe during the Second World War.
My husband will meet again this summer with a new group of Indigenous students. He’s considering a different discussion. What does it mean when society suggests that some people’s innate connection to the land must be acknowledged, but others don’t deserve a similar acknowledgement of their homeland? This issue isn’t “just” about Israel, either. What about the Kurds? What about the Druze? The dispossessed list is a long one.
When we moved to Winnipeg 16 years ago, celebrations for Canada Day included enormous festivals and bombastic firework displays. Over time, due to the pandemic and to a change in how we perceive the day, this has changed. Many Indigenous Canadians don’t celebrate Canada Day.
Having my name left out and hard-earned credentials jumbled was difficult, but it reminded me of how acknowledgement works. We can choose, as Canadians, to look up from our phones and really see one another. We all deserve to take up space and be here, recognized for our special contributions, in this land of plenty. We may not be able to control the huge geopolitical events around us, but we can see one another and pray for our loved ones and our neighbours, too, both here and elsewhere. Recognizing the divine, individual spark in each person is crucial.
I’m hoping for a family cookout at home this Canada Day. We might talk about how we connect to Canada, and how we fit in the Jewish diaspora and homeland. It’s a complicated equation, worth talking about during a war. We should also choose to see, greet and value all those we walk with on this land and in the world. Let’s recognize everyone’s names, identities – and souls – as meaningful, too.
Joanne Seiffhas written regularly for the Winnipeg Free Press and various Jewish publications. She is the author of three books, including From the Outside In: Jewish Post Columns 2015-2016, a collection of essays available for digital download or as a paperback from Amazon. Check her out on Instagram @yrnspinner or at joanneseiff.blogspot.com.
Writer Deborah Wilde is more public now about the Jewish elements in her novels, which have always had a Jewish sensibility. (photo from Deborah Wilde)
East Vancouver author Deborah Wilde has been a writer since childhood, when she filled countless notebooks with her stories. Born and raised in Greater Vancouver, she also spent some years in Kitimat; hers was the only Jewish family in town. She read Isaac Bashevis Singer and watched Neil Simon movies. It was an upbringing she describes as being “rich in tradition.”
Wilde started her writing career in TV and film. “I loved it. I got to be in writers’ rooms, it was a real privilege,” she said. However, she added, screenwriters are “part of a machine: you’re hired to work on other people’s stories. I wanted to tell my stories.” These stories, as it turns out, are ones with strong Jewish representation and tough, sassy female protagonists.
With the movie industry being in what she describes as “a terrible state,” Wilde took the leap into young adult fiction. In writing the Nava Katz series, she was pleased to find that many of her screenwriting skills were transferable to this new genre. “Dialogue is my happy place,” she laughed. “I had a great time doing it.”
She knew that she had to have Jewish protagonists. “I was an avid reader as a kid but I only saw myself in Holocaust stories,” she explained. “Where was the Jewish girl falling down the rabbit hole or going through the cupboard into Narnia?”
In Wilde’s books, we meet a Jewish mom from Mumbai, and the love interest in her current series is a Mizrahi Jew. Diversity even within the Jewish community is vital, she said. “I want smart Jewish women who have adventures, who are the object of desire.”
Having embarked on her career in fiction, Wilde has reached her initial goal of publishing five books in three years. It took a lot of stamina and she learned that being an independent (or “indie”) young adult author was “not sustainable.” Setting her sights on an adult audience, she took inspiration from her “love of old Hollywood – it was the banter. And I’d always read romances,” she said, “so I wanted to include that as well.”
Wilde settled on first-person, urban fantasy. A relatively new but extremely popular genre, urban fantasy tales are set in the world we live in but with magical and supernatural elements. Ordinary or “mundane” activities are constantly disrupted by these troublemaking nasties, sometimes with deadly consequences.
And that is where we meet Jewish heroine Ashira Cohen, private investigator. Walking down a Vancouver street, Cohen comes across a “grimy convenience store selling long-distance phone cards and bongs.” A Vancouver scene we probably recognize, but she might also run into a bodyguard who’s been possessed by a demon or a delinquent teen with a talent for vanishing into thin air. Cohen is fast-talking, feisty and funny, but she’s also “someone you’d want to run into at Café 41,” said Wilde.
Meanwhile, Cohen’s finances are in a state, her love life is stagnant and she’s extraordinarily (and creatively) accident prone. The character is unsentimental, caustic and cynically bored. An interview with a young adult client gave her, she says, “all the details about their nauseatingly cute courtship and very little useful information.”
Wilde’s novels bring a big helping of zany chaos, a nod to the screwball comedies of the 1940s, staple viewing in the author’s childhood home. But, while the books conform to established genres – such as the “chosen one” trope, the terribly attractive and just as infuriating nemesis – they’re also full of little winks at the reader: neurotic elders, Jewish idioms, references to Jewish traditions.
Wilde’s talent lies in her ability to layer elements of regular life – like an eye-rolling teen whose statements sound like questions, or the intrusive badgering of Ash’s mother at a moment when tensions are already running high – over the frenzied dangers of the world inhabited by Cohen. The result is fiction that is absurd, surreal and peppered with rapid-fire dialogue reminiscent of the classic film His Girl Friday.
There is also a serious undercurrent. The author seasons her prose with references to history. For example, one of the magical characters, Meryem, is a Turkish magic refugee who has fled the “purges.”
Jewish representation is very important to Wilde. “There is so little fiction and television with strong, tough Jewish characters,” she said. The Jezebel narrative isn’t a Jewish story but, explained Wilde, “it has a Jewish sensibility – because that’s my own. It’s authentic to my experience.”
There has always been a Jewish flavour to Wilde’s writing, but it was more subtle; it could be found in the humour. “Readers would find the Jewish stuff eventually,” she said. “But now I’m talking about it in my ads, or even in certain interviews. I’m more public about it now.”
This is one of the aspects that makes Wilde’s work original. While Greek, Celtic, Roman and Norse tales have been all the rage for years, Jezebel’s Jewish folklore and mythology make it stand out. “I won’t write it if I don’t have something original to say,” said Wilde. And that’s where we find a magical organization called Nefesh, or, in Hebrew, “soul” or “life.”
Wilde is both a prolific writer and a businessperson. Talking about the switch to indie authorship, she describes it as “exhausting and a huge learning curve.” She is now both an author and her own publishing house. She has learned about search engine optimization, how to print and distribute books, the advantages of the different platforms and the wizardry required to publish ebooks online. But, despite all the technology that runs behind the scenes, Wilde finds that “word of mouth is still the best form of advertising – many people comment on my ads with things like, I just bought this book because of all the comments, so it had better be as funny as you all said!”
But she’s not alone in her work: her team now includes her husband (who designed the back end of her online store), an editor, cover designers and a slew of peers on whom she has depended for critical (but kind) feedback, moral support, professional insight and companionship.
Wilde sells her books directly to readers. She explained that, when you buy from Amazon, “you’re actually leasing the book.” Instead, she said, “When you buy digitally from an author, you actually own the book – it’s yours, not just a link you have access to while you have that device.”
Past and present intersect with Wilde’s writing. Most of her grandfather’s family was killed in the Warsaw Ghetto. Of those who survived, she said, “They ended up in a displaced persons’ camp in Germany. My mom was born prematurely in that camp, delivered by a former Nazi doctor.” So, stories about how Jews once lived in Russia, which invaded Poland in 1939 and fully occupied it at the end of the Second World War, “that was my childhood.”
Having been raised by her grandparents, Wilde said, “I know there is absolutely an aspect of me working through this generational trauma, baggage, but, at the same time, there’s also me working through the patriarchal aspect of Judaism.”
Shula Klinger is an author and journalist living in North Vancouver.
“‘You’re dead, Weiss!’ Declan shouted. He turned back to his friends. ‘This is our chance. Let’s get him!’”
And so the chase after sixth-grader Matthew Weiss begins, led by bully classmate Declan Bollard, with Declan’s three followers right behind. It leads to an adventure all the kids might have been happy to forego, but also a lesson in humanity that they all needed, even the bullied Matthew, who discovers not only his self-worth, but that people who seem to have everything going for them probably don’t.
Michael Seidelman’s latest novel for readers around Matthew and Declan’s age – called Imaginary Heroes – is propelled by fear and anger but resolved by putting those feelings to constructive use, refusing to be defined by others, trusting in ourselves and braving the day, whatever challenges we face.
Like the character of Matthew, Seidelman has Tourette’s Syndrome and was bullied growing up because of it, which makes his descriptions of Matthew’s feelings so realistic that readers’ hearts will break a little.
Most kids ignore Matthew’s involuntary actions and sounds, a few laugh, but Declan menaces, with Booker, Booker’s twin sister Sam, and Cricket as an audience. After a particularly nasty incident at lunch, where, thanks only to Booker’s intervention, Declan steals Matthew’s dessert instead of beating him up, Seidelman writes:
“The bell rang, and Matthew did his best to hold back his tears until the lunchroom was empty. Then he let it all out. Every day, he had to deal with those jerks, and this wasn’t even one of the worst days. At least Declan hadn’t hurt him physically this time. So far, at least.”
Arriving just in time for class nonetheless, the teacher berates Matthew for not getting there earlier. The adults – teachers and other kids’ parents – are little help to Matthew, just as they were to Seidelman as he was bullied growing up.
“Though many teachers and school administrators were of little to no help with the bullying I endured, there were a few who stood up for me, and those individuals have not been forgotten,” writes Seidelman in the acknowledgements. “And again, I must thank my parents and family; without their support, I truly don’t know where I would be today.”
The character of Matthew also has a supportive, loving family. And he has two imaginary friends, who not only help get him through the school days, but really step up when he, Declan, Booker, Sam and Cricket find themselves in a literal hole, with no apparent way out. The journey that ensues is a danger-filled adventure during which all the kids find out more about themselves and one another, and what bravery and humanity entail not only in life-threatening moments, but also in life in general.
To purchase an electronic or hard copy of Imaginary Heroes, or Seidelman’s Garden of Syn trilogy, visit michaelseidelman.com.
בתור אחד שגר בישראל ארבעים וחמש שנים אני מכיר מקרוב את היהירות הישראלית שרק הולכת ומתעצמת כל הזמן. הישראלים יודעים הכל, הם מבינים הכל, ישראל היא המדינה החשובה בעולם, והישראלים יכולים להסביר בקלות ללא ישראלים: מה צריך לעשות, כיצד לפעול, מה חשוב באמת ועד כמה הישראלים הם מה שבאמת חשוב
נראה לי שהניצחון הגדול במלחמת ששת הימים שהפך את ישראל למעצמה צבאית עליונה, כאשר כל מדינות העולם מכירות בהצלחתה הגדולה, היא נקודת הציון המשמעותית, כאשר מאותה עת היהירות בישראל הלכה וגדלה, הלכה והתעצמה
אנו זוכרים היטב את הכבוד הגדול לו זכרו הבכירים בצבא לאור הניצחון במלחמה שארכה רק שישה ימים. כל הדלתות נפתחו בפניהם, כולם רצו להיצמד אליהם וליהנות מחברתם. מאז גם מדד השחיתות בישראל החל לעלות וכיום הוא נוגע בשמים
תוצאות המלחמה הביאו את ישראל לשלוט בשטחים הכבושים ומאז נולדה תנועת המשיחיות שהקימה התנחלויות באזורים אלה ופגעה קשות באזרחים המקומיים הפלסטינים. גם אצל המתנחלים שמספרם הולך וגדל במשך השנים, היהירות היא תכונה בולטת אשר גורמת לנזק גדול למדינה ואזרחיה
בין הבודדים שיצא נגד חגיגות הניצחון במלחמה היה פרופ’ ישעיהו ליבוביץ’, שטען כי הניצחון ובעקבותיו אחזקת השטחים הכבושים יביאו נזק גדול לישראל בהמשך הזמן. נביא הזעם ליבוביץ’ צדק וישראל הולכת בכיוון הלא נכון, אזרחיה מפוצלים ללא אפשרות של איחוד, ממשלתה מושחתת והיא מבודדת יותר מתמיד בעולם
לאור היהירות הישראלית בעקבות תוצאות מלחמת ששת הימים, ישראל לא הייתה מוכנה וחטפה על הראש מהמצרים והסורים במלחמת יום כיפור. לממשלה, לצבא ולאזרחים בכלל היה ברור כי אף אחד לא יוכל על ישראל ואין סיכוי שהיא תופתע. המציאות הוכיחה אחרת
אחרי מלחמת יום כיפור ועדת החקירה הממלכתית, חשבנו לרגע שתהיה ירידה משמעותית במדד היהירות הישראלי אך טעינו. לא מעט ישראלים ירדו מהמדינה לאור השבר הגדול שנוצר אז, אך בחו”ל הם המשיכו לנהוג ביהירות ושחצנות לא פחותה מזו שבישראל
ואם לא הספיק המחדל הנוראי של מלחמת יום כיפור, כעבור חמישים שנה שוב היהירות והשחצנות הישראלית, הביאו את המחדל הקשה ביותר בתולדות המדינה והוא של השבעה באוקטובר. בישראל חשבו שהצבא מוכן, שהמודיעין יודע, שהגדר האלקטרונית תגן על ישראל ובעיקר יודעת הכל ממשלת נתניהו היהירה והמושחתת – וכמובן כל המערכות קרסו מול מחבלי החמאס הנוראים
אייר קנדה לא חוזרת לישראל
אייר קנדה חברת התעופה הקנדית, שהייתה אמורה לחדש את טיסותיה לישראל במהלך חודש יוני הודיעה על דחייה נוספת וצפויה לחדש טיסותיה רק בספטמבר. זאת בעקבות המצב הביטחוני והטיל ששוגר מתימן ונחת בשטח נמל התעופה בן גוריון
מנכ”לית אייר קנדה בישראל, רות בן צור, אומרת כי לאחר בדיקה מעמיקה עם גורמי הביטחון, הוחלט בחברה שלא לחדש את הטיסות לישראל. אייר קנדה מחוייבת לישראל ולהמשיך לטוס אליה, כי שהיא עושה כבר למעלה משלושים שנה. כמובן החברה מחוייבת גם ללקוחות הרבים שלה. אייר קנדה תמשיך לפעול בנחישות כאשר יתאפשר לה לחדש את הטיסות לישראל, ולספק את השירות המקצועי והאיכותי שהלקוחות רגילים אליו. אליו הערכים החשובים לאייר קנדה
כזכור אל על הפסיקה את הטיסות הישירות לקנדה במהלך חודש אוקטובר לפני כשלוש שנים. באל על הסבירו את ההחלטה על רקע חוסר כדאיות כלכלית, והמטוסים הוסטו ליעדים רווחים יותר. מדובר בהחלטה תמוהה במקצת לאור כך שבקנדה יש את אחד מהריכוזים הגדול של יהודים וישראלים בעולם
Left to right: Rabbi Philip Bregman, Archbishop Michael Miller and Rabbi Jonathan Infeld. (photo by Pat Johnson)
A lesson from a Jewish professor decades ago has remained with Archbishop Michael Miller all his life.
Miller retired last month as archbishop of Vancouver – head of the region’s nearly half a million Catholics. During his last week in office, he spoke with the Independent about his relationship with the Jewish community.
The new head of the Catholic Church, Pope Leo XIV, has emphasized the need for dialogue between Catholics and Jews, and spoke almost immediately after his election as pontiff about how close the issue is to his heart. But Miller didn’t need a nudge from the Vatican. According to several Vancouver rabbis, Miller has been a stalwart friend to the community since he arrived in the city more than a decade-and-a-half ago.
When Miller was a student, he and a group of other young Catholics were in a professional setting with noted medieval scholar Julian Wasserman, who was Jewish. Someone made a comment that was antisemitic. Miller doesn’t remember the exact context, but he does remember what happened next. No one in the meeting had contested the antisemitic remark and the professor challenged them on it afterwards.
“I remember Julian expressed to us his disappointment,” said Miller. “And that stung, because it was true.”
It wasn’t as though Jews were unfamiliar to Miller. He grew up in a heavily Jewish neighbourhood in Ottawa and attended friends’ bar mitzvahs. At university and in seminary, he had several Jewish professors and he has always had an interest in Jewish topics.
As a member of the clergy, he sees interfaith dialogue as central to his role. “And the first place of dialogue, of course, is with the Jewish community,” he said, “which preexisted Christianity by at least 1,500 years, maybe 1,800 years.”
Miller was named archbishop of Vancouver in 2009. In the hierarchy of the Catholic Church, an archbishop is a bishop who leads an archdiocese. Above them are the cardinals who, among other roles, come together to elect a new pope, as they did last month.
Rabbi Philip Bregman, who leads an interfaith group called the Other People and is rabbi emeritus of Temple Sholom, has been in the city since 1980.
“It wasn’t until I met Archbishop Miller that I actually had a relationship with an archbishop,” Bregman told the Independent. “Even though Pope John XXIII [in the 1960s] had really opened the door of dialogue between Christians and Jews previously closed, it still took time before that concept actually trickled down. Archbishop Miller was the one who really walked the walk and not simply talked a talk.”
Bregman noted that he had heard the new pope speak about the necessity of Catholics renewing relationships with Jews.
“Archbishop Miller has been there for many, many years and we are tremendously grateful,” he said. “This is an incredible man, who has reached out to the Jewish community and has been there in the most open fashion, for dialogue, for consultation, for support.”
Rabbi Jonathan Infeld of Congregation Beth Israel had equally enthusiastic praise.
“His spiritual leadership, because of his forward thinking and his intelligence, goes well beyond the Catholic community and has truly touched the hearts and souls of all religious people in the city, which is really due to his leadership, his insight and his intelligence and we wish him the best of luck in retirement but are sad to see him leave,” said Infeld, who wandered the dozen or so blocks from the synagogue to the archbishop’s office to bid Miller farewell.
The archbishop’s relationship with the Jewish community was strong before Oct. 7, 2023, but has only strengthened since then. Rabbi Dan Moskovitz, Bregman’s successor as senior rabbi at Temple Sholom, has spoken publicly in appreciation of Miller’s support in the days after the terror attacks.
The lesson Miller learned from Prof. Wasserman decades earlier may have ensured he did not remain silent about what happened on Oct. 7.
“The history of the Jews in Germany before the Second World War, before there was blatant antisemitism, there was a lot of silence,” he said. “Even though we now know that a lot of people were uneasy, they were not uneasy enough to say anything. That silence is often very damning. That’s true, certainly, today as well [about antisemitism], but also on other issues where we are not so willing to speak up, [where] we are a little cowardly and we can find reasons to justify it.”
Before being appointed a bishop, Miller was a professor and later president at the University of St. Thomas, in Houston, Tex. In 2003, Pope John Paul II appointed him secretary of the Congregation for Catholic Education, in the Vatican. He came to Vancouver in 2007 as coadjutor – effectively, the assistant to the archbishop and the apparent successor.
Fluent in English, French, Spanish and Italian, Miller has authored several books on Catholic education and the papacy. He is succeeded by Archbishop Richard W. Smith, who previously served as archbishop of Edmonton.
Miller credits his team at the archdiocese office for their commitment to Catholic-Jewish dialogue, and he and Bregman both praised Ann Marie McGrath, who serves as the religion lead at St. Patrick Regional Secondary School in Vancouver. Bregman has connected McGrath with King David High School, and a new relationship is budding between those schools.
Miller has now relocated to Houston. He does not like the term “retirement,” he said, and his first few weeks have been filled with speaking engagements and other responsibilities. He will be sharing his wisdom when invited to do so.
“I’ll probably read more – I look forward to that – and, God willing,” he said, “pray a little more because not every moment will be scheduled as it has been.”
