Friday, December 25, 2015
Dear Reader,
The most popular article on our website right now is a column by a Conservative rabbi who writes about his discomfort with his movement's ban on its rabbis officiating at intermarriages. The policy is going to change -- here's how to do it sensibly, he says.Opinion
The Case For Conservative Rabbis Officiating At Intermarriages
Here's how to take the step with carefully considered standards and practices, instead of chaos.
Steven Kane
Special To The Jewish Week
Steven Kane
I gave a sermon on intermarriage to my congregation in 1994. I did not do so again until this year. No rabbi is in favor of intermarriage, but there are few congregants in Conservative and Reform synagogues (and in many Modern and centrist Orthodox ones) that do not have someone in their family married to a non-Jew. Anything that might be said on this sensitive subject will inevitably touch a nerve and cause hurt, however unintentionally.
I decided to speak on intermarriage during the High Holidays this year, motivated by the frequent requests of my congregants to officiate at their child’s marriage to a non-Jew. These young people grew up at my synagogue with their families attending services regularly on Shabbat and were often involved in USY and Camp Ramah. They wanted me, the rabbi they have known for much of their lives, to be there with them.
I explain that as a Conservative rabbi I am not allowed to officiate at their wedding, or to even attend. I then add with a cringe, “Once you are married, we will welcome you back into our community.” Our synagogue, like most others, happily extends memberships to intermarried families, but our movement prevents the rabbi from engaging with them at one of the most important moments of their lives, their wedding. Before we welcome them, we turn them away. I have often wondered if this is the best approach. Do we really expect married couples whose weddings we shun to feel welcomed into our communities? I am not the only one who wonders. A recent survey on intermarriage of Conservative rabbis by Big Tent Judaism found that 40 percent of the 249 who responded were in favor of some change regarding intermarriages.
I have no doubt that sometime in the not-so-distant future Conservative rabbis will officiate at intermarriages. The question is whether this be done ad hoc and chaotically, or with well thought out standards and practices. It seems to me that having such standards will be a much better way for the Conservative movement to proceed. This will help engage and steer intermarried couples towards meaningful participation in the Jewish community. The Conservative movement is uniquely situated to do just that, if we take a more proactive and visionary approach.
What might the standards be? I proposed the following to my congregation: When a couple comes to their rabbi, an honest conversation should take place about conversion. When conversion occurs, the marriage has fewer hurdles to overcome and is strengthened. If the possibility of conversion is rejected, the couple would then be required to take a class in basic Judaism so that both partners will have a greater foundation of Jewish knowledge. The couple would also be asked to attend services throughout the year. Often, the future non-Jewish spouse is only exposed to the most difficult aspects of Jewish life, such as lengthy Rosh HaShanah services and fasting on Yom Kippur, or the most surface kinds of observances such as lighting Chanukah candles. The joy of Shabbat, Simchat Torah and Purim are left out. It is critically important that the couple be given the opportunity to experience the beauty of Jewish life if they are to be part of a Jewish family.
The wedding ceremony would contain only Jewish rituals and only Jewish clergy would officiate, though the non-Jewish spouse could have his or her clergy speak under the chuppah. Syncretistic practices, such as offering communion during the ceremony, would not be permitted.
The couple would be asked to make the following written pledges: All children would be raised as Jews, celebrating only Jewish life cycle events. This would mean a bris for boys and, if the wife was not Jewish, bringing the child to the mikvah. It would entail a commitment to enroll the children in a Hebrew or day school once they begin their education. And only one religion, Judaism, would be observed in the home. That means no Christmas tree or holiday observances other than Jewish ones. Visits to non-Jewish relatives on their holidays and for their life cycle events would be appropriate, outside of their home environment. Finally, they would be asked to pledge to join a synagogue within five years.
Personal pledges are unenforceable, but those made during the wedding ceremony have a special quality and resonance. Most people take very seriously the pledges they make as they enter into a marriage. I have no doubt that these will be regarded as such.
Intermarriage rates, in spite of all our efforts, will continue to rise. It is perhaps the most serious challenge the American Jewish community faces today. When we reject couples at the exact moment they are reaching out for acceptance, what message does it send to them?
Yet allowing rabbis to officiate without insisting on a meaningful Jewish commitment produces negligible results and does not create active and engaged Jews. The evidence for this is everywhere, most pointedly in the 2013 Pew report. The Conservative movement can offer another way. We can allow Conservative rabbis to officiate in exchange for a serious process that will commit the family to go down a path towards a Jewish future. If couples are ready to undertake that process and make that pledge, we should meet their good will with our own, with the hope that it will translate into a stronger future for the Jewish community. Will our officiating be chaotic or will it be based on a clear and firm strategy to develop Jewishly engaged couples? We still have time to choose.
Rabbi Steven Kane has been the spiritual leader of Cong. Sons of Israel in Briarcliff Manor, N.Y., since 1993.---------------------
In Israel, a divisive issue that has emerged with new vehemence in recent weeks is that of Breaking the Silence, an NGO that publishes soldiers' testimonies as a means of fighting the occupation. We explore both sides of the story.
And managing editor Rob Goldblum says goodbye to the year that was with a look at 10 of 2015's powerful, poignant moments.Israel News
Breaking The Silence Draws Massive Fire
Israeli society is fiercely divided on the group that publishes IDF veterans’ testimonies.
Helen Chernikoff
Web Director
Soldiers serving in Hebron took this photo, part of Breaking the Silence’s first exhibit. Courtesy of Breaking the SilenceDuring his army service, Avner Gvaryahu could have served as a poster child for the Israel Defense Forces. How, then, did he come to be reviled last week as a “foreign agent?”
He entered the IDF as a paratrooper in a special operations unit in 2004, and served his three years in the West Bank wearing the kipa sruga, or knitted yarmulke, of Israel’s religious Zionist class.
But over the years, he captured many Palestinian houses to be used as Israeli bases, so many that he started to wonder why a yeshiva kid like him could lock his elders into one room of their home, especially since the army picked those houses precisely because the people living in them posed no threat.
Gvaryahu’s rabbis taught him to think critically, he said, and that question was one of many he took home after the army.
Soon after, he joined Breaking the Silence, an organization that publishes the testimony of soldiers who served in areas captured during the Six-Day War, to help inform Israelis of what the former IDF members believe are the moral compromises military control of a civilian population requires.
“I see myself as a Zionist, as an Israeli patriot,” said Gvaryahu, who is pursuing a master’s degree in human rights studies at Columbia University in New York this year while working for Breaking the Silence. “I see myself in Israel. That’s where my family is. That’s where my future is.”
Some call Breaking the Silence members heroes; some call them traitors. The organization has become a national Rorschach test, revealing the schism in Israel between those who support or tolerate the country’s military control over the West Bank, and those who say it must end.
Today, Gvaryahu is one of Breaking the Silence’s leaders, and Breaking the Silence is “the most hated group in Israel,” according to Haaretz, Israel’s left-wing daily newspaper.
A group of soldiers who served in Hebron started Breaking the Silence with a 2004 photo exhibit; before that, other groups did similar documentation and publication of soldier accounts. Critics have always accused these groups of weakening military morale and hurting Israel’s image. But not until now has anyone moved to constrain Breaking the Silence’s operations, or used such inflammatory rhetoric, said Yehuda Ben Meir, a lawyer, psychologist and research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies.
Gvaryahu became known as a “mole” last week, along with three other activists, when an Israeli group called Im Tirtzu –- a reference to founding Zionist Theodor Herzl’s words “If you will it, it is no dream” — released an online video about them.
“Before the next terrorist stabs you,” the announcer says, as a spookily-shadowed photograph of Gvaryahu’s face and a brown “Tinker, Tailor”-type dossier loom in the background, “he already knows that Avner Gvaryahu, a planted agent belonging to Germany, will call the soldier who tries to prevent the attack a ‘war criminal.’”
The catalyst of this most recent collective condemnation of the group, said Yagil Levy, a professor of sociology at the Open University specializing in the Israeli military, was Israeli President Reuven Rivlin’s participation in a New York conference hosted by Haaretz and the New Israel Fund at which members of Breaking the Silence also spoke. (The New Israel Fund supports Breaking the Silence.)
Rivlin criticized the group during his keynote speech. But according to Levy, Rivlin’s appearance on the same agenda as Breaking the Silence amounted to tacit support for it, and some on the right responded by moving against the group more forcefully.
The organization has taken testimony from more than 1,000 veterans who have participated in Israel’s military control of territory captured during war: the West Bank and east Jerusalem today, and Gaza before Israel’s withdrawal in 2005.
They say they check each account with either witnesses or other organizations performing a similar watchdog function, such as the human rights group B’Tselem, or both. Most soldiers choose to remain anonymous for fear of retribution from the army or its supporters. An IDF censor approves everything the group publishes. Breaking the Silence also actively disseminates the information: in books, videos, tours in Israel and exhibits and lectures in Israel, Europe and the United States.
“‘It’s something I’m ashamed of. I’m ashamed. I don’t know. It’s, my God, a totally different world there with different rules,’” said one soldier who served in Ramallah in 2008 and 2009, and whose story appears in “Our Harsh Logic,” a book of Breaking the Silence testimonies from the West Bank and Gaza covering the period 2000-2010 and published in 2012 (Henry Holt and Company). The soldier told the story of how he and his comrades blindfolded, handcuffed and put in a corner a Palestinian who repeatedly tried to cross a checkpoint without a permit.
According to the testimony, the army had to put up the checkpoint because in Elkana, an Israeli settlement in the West Bank, they made a mistake in putting up the fence between Jewish and Palestinian houses, leaving one Palestinian house on the Jewish side.
“‘In this world, that story is unacceptable, at least for me … there it’s so natural,’” the soldier said. “‘The rules are so different. No one understands this unless they’ve been there.’”
Words like these touch a delicate nerve in Israel, said Levy.
Breaking the Silence members “are the best people of the IDF, so their voice is considered a grave threat to the Israeli consensus,” he said.
What Breaking the Silence does is dangerous, said Douglas Altabef of Im Tirtzu. By casting Israel’s military in a negative light both at home and abroad, they make diaspora Jews into targets for foreigners who hate Israel, and they inhibit soldiers serving now, clouding their judgment and complicating their decisions.
“Israel and Jews have such an enormous cloud over us internationally, and the assumption is that we’re doing horrible things, so it’s like throwing red meat to a hungry crowd,” Altabef said.
Im Tirtzu uses highly provocative rhetoric; its video prompted scolding even from critics of Breaking the Silence, like NGO Monitor, which also condemns the group’s foreign ties. In 2014, donations from European government bodies made up 61 percent of Breaking the Silence’s budget, NGO Monitor said in a report published on Dec. 20.
Gvaryahu said the number is more like 40 percent, citing the quarterly reports that the government requires Breaking the Silence to file, and that the group posts on its website.
But of the 10,000 meetings, talks or tours the group gives or participates in every year, 85 percent of them happen in Israel, he said.
Following directly on the Haaretz-New Israel Fund conference, Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon announced that he was forbidding the group from speaking to soldiers. On Dec. 15, Education Minister Naftali Bennett said he was banning the group from schools.
In response, Gvaryahu said that Breaking the Silence isn’t interested in working with the active-duty army, and Bennett can’t actually prevent its members from entering schools, but the politicians made their points.
Also looming is the bill proposed by Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked requiring Israeli NGOs that receive more than 50 percent of their budgets from foreign governments or parties to declare that fact.
Shaked’s bill is actually moderate compared to similar pieces of legislation that also aim to defend Israel from undue foreign influence, but still probably won’t pass, because Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu thinks it will look bad to other countries, said Ben Meir of the Institute for National Security Studies.
The bill is also vulnerable to charges that it sets up a double standard that penalizes left-wing NGOs like Breaking the Silence that receive support from foreign governments, said Levy of the Open University. Right-wing groups also depend on foreign money, albeit from individuals, he noted.
Indeed, there are likely limits to the drubbing Breaking the Silence will take. A backlash to the backlash against them is already emerging, said Ben Meir.
On Dec. 22, former Shin Bet security services chief Ami Ayalon and Alik Ron, a retired major general of the Israel Police, published an advertisement in the Haaretz Hebrew edition in which they proclaimed “I too am breaking the silence,” and said Breaking the Silence strengthens the IDF.
“The guidelines meant to silence the group are what damages and weakens the army,” wrote Ayalon and Ron. Aviram Levin, a former commander of an elite IDF unit, and Yuval Diskin, former head of the Shin Bet, also came to the public defense of Breaking the Silence, Haaretz reported.
Breaking the Silence and the military have long cooperated.
“What is interesting is that the military itself is not so bothered by Breaking the Silence,” Levy said. “On the contrary, there are some channels of cooperation between this organization and the military. It brings information to the military to better control its forces and rectify problems. The military understands very well that it should act in a legal way.”
But ultimately, the IDF and Breaking the Silence are at odds.
The group is not trying to reform the army; it is trying to help end Israel’s military control over the West Bank. Soldiers behaving badly is a symptom of the larger problem, Gvaryahu said.
Breaking the Silence overreaches, says Ben Meir, and in this way undermines the impact it could have.
“They’ve tried to show that every action the army does in Judea and Samara is negative, because their very presence is negative,” he said. “It’s not for a soldier to complain whether the IDF should be in the territories or not. This is political. They should not be political.”
Breaking the Silence sees its role differently.
“The problem is not how a soldier acted at a checkpoint, the problem is that there are checkpoints,” Gvaryahu said. “It’s not about how you treat Palestinians in a house, it’s the fact that I could enter any house.”
helen@jewishweek.org---------------------International
Ten Keepers For 2015
What touched us in the year that was.
Robert Goldblum
Managing Editor
Matisyahu: Beats back BDS. Getty ImagesYes, it was a brutal year, from Paris to the streets of Jerusalem to San Bernardino. And yet, as we exit the 2015, we mined the year’s news and came up with a few nuggets that catch the light. Here then, 10 stories that shined:
–We’ll Miss (really miss!)… Abe Foxman, the longtime national director of the Anti-Defamation League who stepped down in July, for being gutsy, unpredictable, stubborn and 1,000 percent Jewish. End of an era.
–We’re Proud Of… Cleveland Cavaliers coach David Blatt, for making the tricky transition from Israeli basketball to the NBA Finals. (OK, having LeBron helped, but still.) … And of the quirkily misspelled American Pharoah, owned by the Egyptian-born Orthodox Jewish (and Teaneck resident) Ahmed Zayat, for winning the Triple Crown and captivating a nation.
–We’re Blown Away… that “Ida,” an austere black-and-white Holocaust-related film about a nun who carries a Jewish secret, won the Oscar for Best Foreign Film, and that it had one of the longest runs of any film at Film Forum. Restores our faith in the power of simple storytelling, and in the sometimes-shallow Academy voters.
–We’re So Thankful For… Lassana Bathily, the Muslim employee of the kosher market in Paris who shepherded Jewish customers into the shop’s basement, thereby keeping them alive. A real hero, in any religion.
–We’re Awed By… the outpouring of grief for slain U.S. gap-year teen Ezra Schwartz, and then the outpouring of support for his family. We feel like he’s a son to so many of us.
–We’re Of Two Minds About… the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College’s decision to admit and ordain intermarried rabbis. Right side of history, or a leap too far?
–We’re Of One Mind About… the Reform movement’s far-reaching welcome of LGBTQ Jews. Right side of history. Period.
–We’re Relieved That… President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu seemed to bury the Iran deal hatchet at their White House meeting in November. Optics matter, though the hard feelings may not be far from the surface.
–We Note The Irony Of… an Israeli-developed immunotherapy cancer drug helping to cure President Jimmy Carter’s melanoma. The ex-prez has been tough (really tough) on Israel; Israel, it turns out, has been tender on him. Then again, Israeli hospitals treat terrorists as well as their victims, so we shouldn’t be surprised by the generous spirit.
–We’re Packing For Barcelona and Lisbon… since both Spain and Portugal this year offered citizenship to descendants of Sephardic Jews. Long time (500-plus years) coming. And speaking of Spain … we’re rapt by rapper Matisyahu’s big-hearted decision to play a Spanish music festival after originally being disinvited because of ugly BDS matters. Art slays politics.
And so bring on 2016.
editor@jewishweek.org---------------------
Shabbat Shalom,
Helen Chernikoff
Web Director
OPINIONWhy I Support Hillary Clinton For President
Menachem Genack
Special To The Jewish Week
Menachem Genack
Editor’s Note: This is the first in a series of opinion pieces advocating for candidates in the 2016 presidential race.
American exceptionalism, the doctrine that the United States, as a people and a nation imbued with democratic values, has the unique ability and responsibility to promote these values on the world stage, needs to be a major component of how our leadership views the challenges facing our country.
As we look forward to the 2016 presidential election and take note of all the dangers that surround us, we realize how important it is for the next president to embrace American exceptionalism with pride. Hillary Clinton is the candidate who will best express the grandeur and bear the responsibility of American exceptionalism.
I am an advocate for the former New York senator and secretary of state based on personal experience, as I have known her personally for years. In 1994, I was invited to accompany the Clintons to witness the signing of the peace treaty between Israel and Jordan. During a luncheon in Jerusalem, the then-first lady expressed an interest in Jewish doctrine, which led to an interesting discussion, including her view on the moral significance of the Akeda, the binding of Isaac. In the course of that conversation and many subsequent interactions, I came to realize that she has an extraordinary intellect, an open mind, a clear vision for the United States, and a deeply rooted friendship with Israel and the American Jewish community.
These are times that cannot afford the absence of American leadership. With the growing threat of radical Islam and the risks posed by a resurgent Iran, the United States needs a foreign policy that will use all of the tools in our power to address these threats. With Hillary Clinton as president, I believe America will be engaged in the world — and to great effect.
She can and will be the leader who will apply deep strategic thinking to deal with the foreign policy issues confronting us. She will put America at the forefront of world leadership.
I personally believe the Iran nuclear deal, in particular, creates great risks not only for Israel, but for the United States. We need a president who will mobilize American power, strategy and policy to ensure that the Iran nuclear deal does not simply become a cover for Iran’s pursuit of nuclear arms. As president, Clinton will take the necessary action to protect against these risks. She has made clear that “there can be no doubt in Tehran that if we see any indication that Iran’s leaders are violating their commitments in the deal not to seek, develop, or acquire any nuclear weapons, we will stop them.” I know she means it. She will not only vigorously enforce the deal; she will also work with America’s traditional allies in the Middle East — Israel, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the Emirates — to stymie Iranian expansionism. This realignment could have other beneficial results as well. With Israel and its Arab neighbors sitting on the same side of the table to address their common strategic concerns, a greater openness to solving the Israeli-Palestinian stalemate will ensue.
From the Senate floor to the Situation Room, Clinton has proven to be a true friend of Israel. She has spent decades developing and nurturing relationships with Israeli leaders that would continue if she becomes president. For example, as senator she successfully helped pressure the International Red Cross to officially recognize Magen David Adom, Israel’s emergency medical service and blood bank, that had been denied recognition for decades. Beginning in 2009, Secretary of State Clinton was Israel’s most steadfast ally in challenging times. She led negotiations in 2012 to establish a cease-fire in Gaza and end Hamas rocket attacks, has requested additional funding for Israel’s security every fiscal year, and took a stand against powerful organizations like the United Nations Human Rights Council that displayed anti-Israel bias.
Clinton has articulated a clear plan for renewing and strengthening what she called the “unshakable and unbreakable” bond the United States shares with Israel. As president, she would expand security and intelligence cooperation with Israel and increase support for Israel’s rocket and missile defense systems. She would oppose any efforts to unilaterally recognize a Palestinian state outside of negotiations with Israel and will oppose the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement. These policy positions are not simply matters of diplomacy — they are personal commitments, a natural outgrowth of her interacting with Israeli leaders and members of the Jewish community throughout her career, listening to their voices and fighting for their rights.
Let me share one more personal incident about Hillary Clinton that demonstrates her extraordinary qualities. Some years ago, when I introduced a friend of mine, Jamie Fox, New Jersey’s former commissioner of transportation, to then-Sen. Clinton, she said to him, “I recently saw your name quoted in an op-ed piece about port security by [Republican Sen.] Lindsey Graham.” I was stunned by her capacity to absorb information, to recall it and put it to use. The incident also brought home her ability to build working relationships. Sen. Graham was one of the managers of the trial to impeach former President Clinton. And yet, Hillary Clinton subsequently worked with the senator on pressing issues, including port security.
Today, we are living in a world where foreign policy issues, conflicts, and negotiations are fraught with complexity, fear and danger. Absent American leadership, the world will be a bleaker and more dangerous place. With Hillary Clinton as president, we will see an engaged America rising to meet these challenges. This is a woman whose life and mind are truly exceptional; she will personify American exceptionalism. There is no one I trust more, and no one better suited than she to keep a level head, protect Israel’s best interests, and lead our country through these trying times.
Rabbi Menachem Genack is CEO of the Orthodox Union’s kosher division and spiritual leader of Congregation Shomrei Emunah in Englewood, N.J. His views do not represent those of the OU.Read More
---------------------
THE ARTS
The 'Fire' This Time
Ted Merwin
Mihran Shlougian as PLO terrorist and Dagmar Stansova as El Al flight attendant.
‘I always wanted to write a play about both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” Argentinian playwright Mario Diament reflected recently, as his new work, “Land of Fire” (Tierra del Fuego), was about to open in New York at the New Yiddish Rep (image: chrome-extension://lifbcibllhkdhoafpjfnlhfpfgnpldfl/call_skype_logo.png[212] 868-4444, smarttix.com). Based on the 1978 attack by Palestinian terrorists of an El Al passenger jet in London, in which one flight attendant was killed and eight crew members wounded, “Land of Fire” runs through Jan. 3 at Theater for the New City in the East Village.
Diament teaches journalism and playwriting at Florida International University in Miami. His dramatic works — including “Blind Date,” inspired by the magical realist novels of Jorge Luis Borges, “The Book of Ruth,” about a Jewish mother dealing with the legacy of Argentina’s Dirty War, and “Lost Tango,” about the film industry in Buenos Aires — have been produced all over the world. “Land of Fire,” which premiered in Stockholm in 2012, has been running in Buenos Aires for the last three years; it opens in Madrid in April.
Directed by Moshe Yassur (who helmed this season’s production of “Death of a Salesman” for the same theater company) and translated into English by Simone Zarmati Diament, “Land of Fire” was inspired by “My Terrorist,” the 2002 prize-winning documentary written and directed by Yulie Gerstel Cohen, a flight attendant who survived the machine gun and grenade attack. In the film, Cohen comes to believe that the occupation causes even more harm to the Israelis than it does to the Palestinians, and that the Israelis can “afford to be forgiving.”
In “Land of Fire,” Yael (Dagmar Stansova), the stewardess based on Yulie, feels compelled to visit the convicted bomber, Hassan (Mihran Shlougian), to try to understand his motivations for committing the crime. When Hassan asks her to write a letter to allow him to leave prison each day to go to a job, she must decide if she, against the bewilderment and outrage of her dead friend’s mother, Geula (Marilyn Lucci), and her own husband, Ilan (Scott Zimmerman), can offer him that aid. The title refers both to Israel and to the archipelago beneath South America, where Hassan has always dreamed of going.
“Land of Fire” asks searching questions about whether or not the indelible scars of hatred and violence can help enemies, as Diament told The Jewish Week, to “confront the consequences and causes” of war and bloodshed in the Middle East.
The playwright said that he was moved by the film’s argument that traumatized Israelis and Palestinians need to talk to each other, “breaking the vicious circle of four generations of Israelis learning to be occupiers and four generations of Palestinians living under the occupation.”
The director, Yassur, echoed his sentiments, saying that “‘Land of Fire’ is a very optimistic play in that it suggests that the situation will be brought to a conclusion. But first, people who are thirsty for power have to relinquish that power.”
---------------------FOOD & WINE
'Hummus Is Palestinian'
Cnaan Liphshiz
JTA
Yuval Gal at his hummus restaurant in The Hague. JTA
A maverick restaurant in The Hague gets lots of press from the political angle.
Cnaan Liphshiz JTA
The Hague, Netherlands — Like many Israelis in Europe, Yuval Gal and Muawi Shehadeh decided to market their hummus restaurant specifically to health-minded vegetarians.
A Jew from Tel Aviv and an Arab-Israeli from Nazareth, the duo this year began peddling their native country’s signature chickpea paste at an eatery in this city called Love & Peas, which Gal, 36, says specializes in “green, healthy foods.”
In this respect, Love & Peas is little different from dozens of Israeli-owned hummus joints that have sought in recent years to capitalize on Europe’s growing demand for exotic health foods. Many of these businesses feature Hebrew names, like Miznon in Paris and Pilpel in London.
But Love & Peas is no typical Israeli hummus bar. For one thing, its Israeli owners decline to identify their food as Israeli, describing it instead as “Palestinian green cuisine.” For another, their open endorsement of the Palestinian narrative has helped generate phenomenal media exposure in Holland and back home in Israel.
Since opening this summer, Love & Peas — which has eight tables, a 1970s retro design and a play corner for children — has been celebrated as a victory for coexistence by the Dutch media, with pieces about the eatery running on three television stations and in six major newspapers.
Love & Peas offers much material for journalists seeking the political angle.
On its wall hangs a large map of Israeli territory labeled “Palestine.” (There used to be a doctored poster of Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin stroking a curvy young woman, but it was taken down after patrons complained it was offensive.) Its falafel balls are made in the “Qudsi” style, a reference to Jerusalem’s Arabic name. And on a counter, a stack of fliers advertises the local branch of the Plant an Olive Tree initiative, a project of the Palestinian YMCA, which supports boycotting Israel.
“Hummus is Palestinian,” Gal said. “Let’s be honest with ourselves.”
Gal, a father of two who left Israel five years ago, says his restaurant has no anti-Israeli agenda and is open to anyone. He notes that Israel’s ambassador to the Netherlands, Haim Divon, dined at Love & Peas with his wife, Linda, shortly after its opening and praised it in an interview with the Israeli daily Yediot Acharonot.
But Gal concedes that he feels uneasy with being labeled an Israeli and was none too happy about the ambassador’s appearance. After the visit, in a bid to make their political views better known, Gal and Shehadeh hosted a benefit concert for the olive tree initiative, which plants trees in the West Bank and Gaza to support farmers who “suffer from the various Israeli policies that put their land and property under the threat of confiscation,” according to its website.
“This restaurant is an attempt to deal with this label, a therapeutic way of dealing with your identity,” Gal said, adding: “What’s important for me is not to whitewash the occupation.”
Love & Peas sells no foods originating from Israel – a policy Gal declined to confirm was an ideological one. He also said Israel was not a real democracy and that leaving felt as though he was being exiled for his views.
Shehadeh, whose father is Muslim and mother is Dutch, says the restaurant is interested in “solving, not complicating, the conflict.” The media interest in the restaurant’s political dimension was “totally unexpected,” according to Gal, and not part of any strategy.
Nevertheless, six months after its launch, Love & Peas is the best-known hummus restaurant in the Netherlands and a huge financial success.
“We surpassed all the projections of our business plan,” Gal said.
Gal and Shehadeh met several years ago at a bar. Shehadeh does the accounting while Gal is in charge of the cooking, in what the duo concedes is a reversal of stereotypical roles.
“Now I’m the Jew with the money and he’s the Palestinian doing the cooking,” Shehadeh told the Omroep West broadcaster last month.
“It’s only true in the jokes,” Gal added about the stereotypes. “I can’t count, can’t bill clients.”
Divon said he regretted the restaurant’s political orientation, which he said was “misguided and unfortunate.” But no matter how the restaurant is packaged, “it serves to underline the actual reality on the ground in Israel, where Jews and Arabs interact on personal and economic levels, where they co-own and jointly operate businesses, till they often gravitate to doing so also abroad.”
Where Divon grew critical was when it came to Love & Peas’ signature dish, a subject that many Israelis take very seriously. In Israel, Divon’s hummus place of choice is in Abu Ghosh, an Arab suburb of Jerusalem.
“I remember the olive oil was great,” Divon said of Love & Peas. “The hummus, well, it was OK. But nothing compares to our hummus back home in Israel.”
Read More ---------------------
Featured on NYBLUEPRINT
Jewish Restaurants With A Twist
JTA
Wikimedia commons
Latke press sandwiches and pastrami quesadillas
JTA
This Week
The successful chef and owner of four buzzy restaurants in Manhattan, Einat Admony recently decided to take on a new challenge.
The Israel-born chef, who runs two Taim falafel joints and modern Mediterranean eateries Balaboosta and Bar Bolonat, wanted to create a casual spot where the focus was on small plates and wine.
She considered fusing her signature Sephardic Israeli food with Mexican cuisine, but decided that Spanish food would be a better complement — thanks largely to its overlapping ingredients like tomatoes, saffron, olives and olive oil.
The result is Combina, which opened to strong reviews this fall.
“I just really like Spanish food and the tapas style,” Admony told JTA.
She’s no expert on Iberian food, she says. Instead, she’s doing her “signature Israeli food with a Spanish twist.” Dishes include Mujadara Paella (a spin on the Lebanese and Spanish dishes) and Sabich Tostada, a melding of the Israeli/Iraqi and Mexican sandwiches.
If it sounds innovative, it is. But Admony is but one of many chefs across the U.S. who are pioneering inventive — and truly modern — ways to merge Jewish and Israeli food with other cuisines from around the world.
In Los Angeles, we’re seeing dishes like pastrami quesadillas at fast food Mexican spot J&S. In Seattle, a food truck called Napkin Friends serves “latke press sandwiches” in decidedly non-kosher varieties like a BLT. In New York and San Francisco, you can order Kung Pao Pastrami at Mission Chinese Food. And El Nosh, a Puerto Rican-Jewish food mash-up that started as a food truck in California, threw a pop-up event in New York as recently as October.
“Jewish cuisine is about taking the long way around and cooking food that is real and homey,” says Laura Frangiosa, owner of The Avenue Delicatessen in suburban Philadelphia, which merges Italian and Jewish foods. “And those are all trends that are popular in dining these days.”
The Avenue — which isn’t in a particularly Jewish neighborhood, notes Frangiosa — serves Italian-style subs topped with schmaltz aioli, Jewish wedding soup — a take on the classic Italian wedding soup, with veal meatballs and matzo balls — and reuben arancini, rice balls stuffed with corned beef and swiss cheese.
Jewish food appeals to the masses, says Macy Hart, president of the Goldring/Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life. He points out that many Southern towns with tiny Jewish communities host popular Jewish food events that are attended almost entirely by non-Jews.
“Little Rock, Arkansas, for example, has an Israeli food festival that people flock to,” he says.
Hart sees it as no surprise, then, that “Jewish-slash-something else” food is becoming popular around the country. “It’s a natural progression of the palate,” he says.
Just as traditional Jewish and Israeli dishes are drawing non-Jewish crowds, these inventive, internationally flavored updates can increase the appeal of classic Jewish food to younger members of the tribe.
“It’s about progression, about tapping into the next generation,” says Steve Auerbach, former owner of the now-closed Stage Deli in New York. “Millennials have new tastes, and those are the ones these chefs are going after. It’s about keeping it current. Young Jews want the occasional corned beef sandwich and potato pancake, but they want something new.”
And in big cities like New York and Los Angeles, where most of these fusion restaurants are cropping up, many customers may well have grown up eating one, or both, of these cuisines.
For many of these fusion chefs — like Frangiosa, who is Italian and married to a Jewish man — the blending of two disparate cuisines is personal. Take Aaron Israel and Sawako Okochi’s Shalom Japan, a Jewish-Japanese restaurant in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. They’ve been serving dishes like matzo ball ramen and a lox bowl with rice, cucumber and Japanese pickle since 2013 — usually to a packed house.
Israel says they get a lot of customers who are like them; one is Asian and the other is Jewish. And while Shalom Japan has been hailed for its ingenuity — “At its best, their food is fusion in the truest sense, seamless and utterly convincing,” according to the New Yorker — such culinary blending is a tradition that long precedes them, he says.
“Jewish people went from place to place and adapted the flavors of new places to their cuisine,” says Israel. “That’s the whole history of Jewish food.”
Hasia Diner, a professor of Hebrew and Judaic studies and history at the NYU Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies, agrees. “It was always fusion,” she says. “Throughout history, Jews created food that reflected the ingredients available to them, and the climate and style of the people around them. And given the ubiquity of Jewish migration, they were always picking up and moving and getting new styles.”
This culinary adaptability made them “culinary cosmopolitans,” Diner says, pointing out that as far back as the late 1800s, Jewish cookbooks featured recipes for Italian food and Chinese food.
“Nowadays it’s just more self conscious and a little ironic,” she adds.
The history of Jewish-Spanish food is of particular interest to chef and restauranteur Alex Raij. Raij is Jewish and her husband, Eder Montero, is Spanish; they already ran two successful tapas restaurants in Manhattan when they opened La Vara in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, in 2011. Through La Vara, Raij explores the Moorish and Jewish legacies of Spanish cooking.
Rajj says she likes to imagine the kinds of foods that would have thrived had Spain’s Jews been able to stay. Many of the traditional Spanish sauces — like the pepper-based romesco — have their origins in Moorish and Jewish foods, she says.
Not far away, in Williamsburg, “Top Chef” alum Ilan Hall recently opened Esh, an Israeli-style barbecue spot. Esh takes the place of The Gorbals, a Scottish-Jewish fusion restaurant Hall opened in Los Angeles in 2009 and in New York in 2014. “That was a representation of my childhood,” says Hall, whose father is Scottish and mother is Israeli.
For his new venture, he decided to stick to more straightforward, Israeli-style grub, something he says is undeniably popular these days — witness the success of Admony’s empire, as well as that of Philadelphia chef Michael Solomonov’s popular, inventive restaurants. Hall says he will be using some Texas-style barbecuing techniques.
“This food is healthy and simple,” he says.
For Richard Kimmel, owner of the the Lower East Side jazz bar and Jewish-soul food joint Kitty’s Canteen (in which Snoop Dogg is a creative partner), the fusion of soul food and Jewish cuisine started for generations ago.
Kimmel, who founded the music venue The Box, is the grandson of Kitty Kimmel — a bookkeeper at a talent agency who used to cook for the jazz greats of the 1930s. Her food, which began as traditionally Jewish, became influenced by soul food, says Kimmel.
Kitty’s Canteen and its recent spinoff, Kitty’s-a-Go-Go, serve matzoh-meal fried chicken and and their signature “Bisgel,” a bagel-biscuit hybrid, which Kimmel says was born when Dizzy Gillespie poked a hole in one of Kitty’s biscuits.
“The combination of Jewish food and soul food is very natural to me. It’s my life,” says Kimmel. “Like jazz, it’s something of an improvisation, but both foods are literally meant to warm your soul. That’s a sentiment we share.”
Read More ----------------------
BLOGSWell Versed
Record Breaking Judaica Sale At Sotheby’s
Sandee Brawarsky
The Complete Babylonian Talmud, printed by Daniel Bomberg in Venice, 16th century. Courtesy of Sotheby's New York
An antiquarian book dealer based in Williamsburg, Brooklyn and Stevenson, Maryland is the new owner of Daniel Bomberg’s 16th century Babylonian Talmud, bought yesterday in auction at Sotheby’s New York. The $9.3 million sales price set a new world record for a single item of Judaica.
Stephan Loewentheil of The 19th Century Rare Book and Photograph Shop acquired the famous and finely preserved edition of the Talmud, a multi-volume series printed in Venice and, according to Sotheby’s, one of the most significant books in the history of Jewish printing. Only 14 complete sets are known to be in existence.
This copy, which had been part of the Valmadonna Trust Library -- a huge and precious private Judaica library assembled over six decades by Jack Lunzer of London -- had been kept for centuries in the Library at Westminster Abbey in London. Lunzer first saw it there in 1956, and spent the next 25 years trying to acquire it.
The Sotheby’s sale was significant in that it had been Lunzer’s wish to keep the entire collection intact and sell it to an institution, but Sotheby’s and Lunzer were not able to complete a deal with any potential buyer. Lunzer is now ill, and the trustees of the Trust decided to go ahead with the sale of certain items.
Total sales of nine lots were $14.9 million, with a Hebrew bible from 1189 selling for $3.6 million and an illuminated edition of the Hebrew Psalms from 1401 Italy was sold for $670,000. This was the most valuable Judaica auction ever held.
Loewentheil is the only buyer who was identified. Other sales were made to private or anonymous collectors. A lawyer who has been building his collection for 35 years,Lowentheil is president and founder of the 19th Century Rare Books & Photograph Shop. They deal in “rare books, manuscripts and photographs representing mankind’s greatest achievements.” One of his areas of special interest is early editions of Shakespeare. His Brooklyn headquarters are in a new tower on the Williamsburg waterfront on Kent Avenue.Read More
---------------------Political Insider
Lindsey Graham
Douglas Bloomfield
All of the GOP presidential contenders claim to be true and loyal friends of Israel, but for most it is a political statement, grounded less in understanding than in their search for contributions from wealthy single-issue Jewish donors.
The rare exception is Lindsey Graham. The South Carolina senator, who dropped out of the presidential race today, had the best comprehension of the issues and record of support among the candidates when it came to US-Israel relations.
He's been an important figure in advancing the strategic relationship and has visited the region many times -- and not just for photo-ops – often with his wingman, Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona), another pro-Israel shtarker.
You don't have to agree on all the details with Graham to appreciate his expertise and thoughtfulness. Unlike so many of the other candidates, when it comes for foreign and defense policy he is a serious person, not an inexhaustible bag of hot air.
He is a retired colonel in the USAF Reserve's Judge Advocate General's Corps and has served in the Congress since 1993.
The rest of the field is far behind. There's Chris Christie who plans to make Middle East policy by séance. He will consult with King Hussein of Jordan, who died in 1999.
Dr. Ben Carson made a quick trip to Jordanian refugee camps and came home confused between Hamas and Hummus. Apparently he plans to fight the pita wars.
Like Sen. Ted Cruz, he's ready to carpet bomb ISIS and just about everyone else in Iraq and Syria, and if they kill tens of thousands of innocent civilians, that's war. Cruz has an orthodox Jewish senior advisor who knows the Middle East well, but he's indicated he'd prefer to avoid the issue, especially the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, unless specifically requested by the Israeli government.
Sen. Marco Rubio is a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, when he bothers to show up for work, and may be the one to pick up where Graham left off.
He and Cruz will talk a lot about supporting Israel because they are they leading contenders for the political largesse of casino billionaire Sheldon Adelson, who by no coincidence is also a prime Netanyahu benefactor.
I want to put in a good word for Gov. John Kasich of Ohio. I knew John when he was in the House of Representatives (he was my family's congressman) and I worked closely with him on Israel-related issues when I was the legislative director of AIPAC. He showed not only an interest but also a real understanding, notwithstanding efforts as Budget Committee chair to cut overall – but not Israel's -- foreign aid spending.
Mike Huckabee has visited Israel more often than rest of them combined, but for him it is more of a religious experience than a thorough understanding of the strategic and diplomatic realities.
The rest of the crowd -- Trump, Fiorina, et al -- will talk the talk but their knowledge and understanding is largely superficial. For Jeb Bush it may be hereditary, but he's already taking about picking up with the war making when his brother left off. And Rand Paul may be too much of an isolationist even for today's GOP, and has spoken of cutting aid to Israel for its own good.
Trump made a TV commercial endorsing his pal Bibi in 2013 and the others may have had photo ops with the PM, but that doesn't make them policy mavens.
They're more interested in raising money than votes. That's because given the rest of the Republican political and domestic policy agenda it is highly likely Jews will once again vote overwhelmingly Democratic.Read More
---------------------
The Jewish Week
1501 Broadway, Suite 505
New York, New York 10036, United States
--------------------
--------------------
No comments:
Post a Comment