Category: News

Yom Ha’atzmaut in Ottawa

Ambassador of Israel to Canada Rafael Barak, centre, with his wife Miriam and Foreign Minister Rob Nicholson at the Israeli embassy’s Independence Day reception held at the Chateau Laurier in Ottawa on April 29. The more than 600 attendees included ministers, MPs, senators, Supreme Court justices, members of the diplomatic corps, government officials, rabbis, other clergy, representatives of the Jewish community and other supporters of Israel. (photo from Israeli embassy)

הליגה להגנה יהודית רוצה לפעול גם בוונקובר

חברי הליגה להגנה יהודית לקחו חלק בהפגנה נגד ועידת סביל בחודש שעבר בוונקובר. (צילום: Ariane Eckardt)

מחממת את הקווים: הליגה להגנה יהודית רוצה לפעול גם בוונקובר

הארגון הימני הרדיקלי הליגה להגנה יהודית, בודקת את האפשרות להתחיל ולפעול גם באזור ונקובר. זאת כדי להתמודד עם לא מעט ארגונים פלסטינים ופרו פלסטינים מקומיים שפועלים בעיר, ויוזמים כל העת מבצעי חרם נגד ישראל. פעולות אלו נעשות כמעט ללא הפגנות נגד מצד תומכי ישראל.

המשרדים הראשיים בקנדה של הליגה להגנה יהודית נמצאים בטורונטו. אירועי הלחימה מבצע “צוק איתן” בין ישראל והחמאס, בקיץ 2014, גרמו להפגנות קשות נגד ישראל ותומכיה בקנדה, והביאו אף לגידול משמעותי באלימות ובפעילות האנטישמית נגד יהודים בקנדה מצד מוסלמים. לאור זאת הוחלט בליגה להגנה יהודית להגביר והרחיב את הפעילות גם לאזור נוספים בקנדה. בהם ערים מרכזיות: מונטריאול, ונקובר, אוטווה וקלגרי. במונטריאול נפתח כבר משרד של הליגה, ועתה כאמור גם ונקובר נמצאת על מפת הארגון הימני הקיצוני.

נציגים של הליגה הגיעו לאחרונה לוונקובר וסיכמו בחיוב את הביקור, שמשמש כשלב נוסף בהכנה להקמת הסניף כאן.

בליגה להגנה יהודית המציינים כי מתפקידם לשמור על היהודים, ולאמן אותם להגן על עצמם בפני כל תוקפנות. בראש הליגה בקנדה עומד מאיר ווינשטיין (58), ובארגון חברים כיום קרוב לאלפיים איש.

במרכז לענייני ישראל והיהודים בקנדה לא אוהבים את הרחבת הפעילות של הליגה, ומקווים שלא תהפוך לאקטיבית מדי.

יצוין כי שלטונות צרפת פועלים להוצאתה מהחוק של השלוחה הצרפתית של הליגה להגנה יהודית.

מופע חדש: סירק דו סוליי שנמכר לקונסורטיום אמריקני-סיני תמורת כ-1.5 מיליארד דולר, מגיע לוונקובר

הקרקס הקנדי הידוע בעולם סירק דו סוליי (בתרגום לעברית: “קרקס השמש”) נמכר לאחרונה לקונסורציום בינלאומי (אמריקני-סיני-קנדי), תמורת כ-1.5 מיליארד דולר. עריכת ההסכם המסובך והארוך בוצעה בצורה סודית עד לחתימה הסופית. רק אז הבעלים והמייסד גאי לליברטה, הודה כי הוא מכר את הקרקס לשלושת הגופים. על פי ההסכם: תשעים אחוז ממניות הקרקס שבבעלות לליברטה, עברו לידי הקונסורציום שכולל את חברת ההשקעות הפרטית האמריקנית טי.פי.גי’ קפיטל, תאגיד ההשקעות הסיני הענק פוסן וקרן פנסיה ציבורית מקוויבק אאיסה דה פוט. יצויין כי טי.פי.גי’ קפיטל מחזיקה בעשרים וחמישה אחוז ממניות חברת שטראוס, ואילו פוסן שגם פועל בישראל מנסה לאחרונה לרכוש ארבעים וארבעה אחוז ממניות חברת הביטוח הפניקס.

לליברטה ניסה מזה מספר חודשים למכור את סירק דו סוליי, והוא שכר למטרה זו את שירותי בנק ההשקעות האמריקני הגדול גודלמן סאקס. הוא קיווה שיצליח לקבל כשני מיליארד דולר עבור המכירה אך כנראה שהירידה בהכנסות הקרקס בשנים האחרונות, הורידה גם את שווי אחזקותיו לכ-1.5 מיליארד דולר. עם מימוש העיסקה לליבטרה שמחזיק במיעוט המניות בקרקס, ימשיך לעבוד בחברה שמפעילה אותו על תקן של יועץ.

קרקס סירק דו סוליי הוקם ב-1984 במונטריאול, בסיסו עד היום נמצא בעיר והוא מעסיק כיום כ-4,000 עובדים.

הקרקס יקיים בחודשים הקרובים מספר הופעות של ההצגה “וראקי” בקנדה. החודש הוא יקיים הופעות בוונקובר בן ה-20 ל-24 בחודש. לאחר מכן הקרקס יעבור לויקטוריה ויקיים שם הופעות גם כן החודש, בין ה-27 ל-31. משם הוא ימשיך לאדמונטון ויקיים הופעות ביוני בין ה-18 ל-21 בחודש. אחרי כן יגיע לויניפג גם כן ביוני ויקיים הופעות בין ה-24 ל-28. לאחר מכן יגיע לאוטווה ויקיים הופעות ביולי בין ה-2 בחודש ל-5 בחודש. ואילו בחודש בספטמבר יגיע הקרקס לטורונטו ויקיים הופעות בן ה-2 ל-6 בחודש.

הקרקס יחזור לישראל שוב עם המופע חדש “קוידם” וההצגות יתקיימו ביולי, בהיכל נוקיה בת”א בין ה-2 ל-16 בחודש.

 

A more realistic future

Ari Shavit speaks at Winnipeg’s Shaarey Zedek Synagogue. (photo by Rebeca Kuropatwa)

As part of the Jewish Heritage Centre of Western Canada’s Annual Sol and Florence Kanee Distinguished Lecture Speaker Series, leading Israeli columnist and writer Ari Shavit addressed a packed room of 300 people on the topic Is Peace Dead? The talk took place April 19 at Shaarey Zedek Synagogue in Winnipeg.

Shavit, who described himself a “diehard peacenik,” said he is more comfortable referring to what some call “the Arab Awakening” as “the Arab Chaos.”

He explained, “We were hoping for an Arab Spring. It turned into something else and the result is the Arab Chaos. The old order that ruled over the Arab world has collapsed, but it was not replaced by any liberal democracy. It was replaced with more tribalism, more fanaticism and much more violence. We now see a human catastrophe engulfing a large part of the region and the acute situation of instability. I care about my fellow humans and we have to be saddened that we have such a terrible human catastrophe.”

Even worse, in Shavit’s view, “There is no more chance in the upcoming years to have the old kind of peace we hoped for,” he said. “I don’t think we can have the kind of peace agreement like with Egypt or Jordan in the coming years, because those were peace agreements that were signed with tyranny.”

Shavit used Syria as an example, saying that, back in the 1990s and in early 2000, he very much supported a peace agreement with Syria. But, he said, “Now, there is no one to make peace with.

“The good news is the more clear division within the Arab community. Many Arab moderates are now terrified by Iran, by ISIS, by the Islamic Brotherhood, by Al-Qaeda, by extremists, [so] they actually are closer to Israel than they ever were in the past. So, there is a kind of interesting potential within this sad, tragic, acute situation.”

According to Shavit, the road to peace today begins with the understanding that we cannot reach a two-state solution with the Palestinians in the coming months or years.

“We won’t have the comprehensive peace we hoped for,” said Shavit. “But, on the other hand, we should not accept the status quo. And, I think we should launch a two-state dynamic, which would lead to a two-state state to start with, and eventually lead to a two-state solution.”

Regionally, Shavit stressed the need for Israel to work much more closely with Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf countries and Jordan, as, he said, “They are closer to Israel than they ever were.”

Though Shavit conceded that the likelihood of signing a new formal peace agreement may not currently be in the cards, he encouraged “building a kind of peace based on economic interests, mutual interests and strategic interests.”

What Shavit envisions is “the kind of peace agreement [Israel] had with Jordan before the 1994 peace signing. There were no embassies, there were no Nobel Prizes, no White House ceremonies, but we had a very close, intimate relationship – quite a lot of the time – better than after the formal signing. That should be an example of what can be done in this new chaotic situation.”

Shavit sees potential for “cooperation as opposed to a utopian peace.” Potential partners for this cooperation, Shavit suggested would include “the major Arab Sunni nations led by moderate people…. [People who] are not deeply concerned or interested in human rights or democracy, but they don’t want extremists. Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf States fall into that category. So, the strategic game now is pretty much controlled by two non-Arab countries – Israel and Turkey – and, I would say, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.”

As to whether or not these partners are interested in just cooperation or a more lasting peace, Shavit said, “I think they want to live and they want stability. Therefore, if we promote this new peace concept, I think there’s a chance of having a better relationship. I think many of them see Israel as a partner in that.

“It’s not that they are going to have a religious conversion…. I don’t see a kind of relationship that France and Spain have or Canada and the U.S. do, but, I do see a kind of Middle East-style relationship – the ability to create a structure that can be formed again if we endorse the right ideas.”

Regarding Israel’s recent elections, Shavit feels that the left lost more than the right won. “The lack of a peace plan of action had a lot to do with that. Even the left-wing part[ies] were not very aggressive at promotional peace. The peace talked about in the national community is a kind of peace that is totally detached.”

Shavit is hopeful that Israelis will open their hearts to peace, in the case where “a kind of new peace, a concept that is more realistic, comes around. As long as the community talks about European-style peace, when we have a kind of evil political reality in a large part of the Middle East, Israelis will not buy into that.”

International support is critical to any potential peace progress and, while Shavit loves Canada in many ways, he said, “I appreciate that Canada is supportive of Israel, when there aren’t many that support Israel in such a way. [But] obviously, the real relevant player is the United States.

“I hope that America will endorse a new kind of peace policy and then build a wide coalition – first of all with Canada, then with the European powers and then with the moderate Arabs and Israelis – addressing the issues in a realistic way.”

Shavit believes that the “dysfunctional relationship” of Binyamin Netanyahu and Barack Obama is not advancing the situation. “I hope I can be successful in encouraging an intellectual process to be helpful in bringing some change to that,” he said.

Shavit, like many others in Israel and around the world, is waiting to see what kind of Israeli government will be formed. “If we do have a right-wing government, with [Avigdor] Lieberman being the centre, I worry that we will have unpleasant legislation that will alienate the Arab minority even more and jeopardize the fragile relationship with them. If it will be more moderate in the centre, there is less danger.

“I think the last six months were very troubling, with unprecedented legislation or attempts [to discriminate], though most failed. I hope and pray that our power will not go back to that kind of approach. I think it will endanger Israel’s soul in a serious way.”

Shavit is hopeful that minority rights will not be trampled, as “the tradition of the historic Israeli right always combines nationalism with liberalism, with a deep respect for democracy. I really hope we will not see dark forces in Israel rising to power.”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Raising a network of voices

Ari Ne’eman was diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome at the age of 12. He did not have an easy childhood, being forced to leave his Solomon Schechter day school and, later, being expelled from Camp Ramah.

He is now head of the Autistic Self-advocacy Network (ASAN), and serves as one of President Barack Obama’s appointees on the National Council on Disability. Earlier this year, he received the Ruderman Family Foundation’s $100,000 Morton E. Ruderman Award, which “recognizes an individual who has made an extraordinary contribution to the inclusion of people with disabilities in the Jewish world and the greater public, and is based on past achievements and the potential for future contributions to the field.”

photo - Ari Ne’eman
Ari Ne’eman (photo from rudermanfoundation.org)

In 2006, Ne’eman co-founded ASAN. “Too often in conversations about autism policy or public discussion, researchers and family members are given precedence over autistic voices,” he told the Independent about the need for the organization. “This is due to a tendency not to recognize that a self-advocate perspective is distinct and different from those of family members, providers or researchers.”

The goal of ASAN is to ensure that those on the autism spectrum are represented in the public discourse and have their own collective voice. “People with disabilities are often perceived as incapable of representing themselves or as being unreliable in being the narrators of our own experience,” he said. “Really, both of those perceptions are very inaccurate and unfortunate.

“Unfortunately, society has certain perceptions about people with disabilities – in particular of autistic people and people with developmental disabilities. This often leads them to seek out the voices of our family members or service providers rather than hearing our own voices.”

According to Ne’eman, many people believe autism is a recent epidemic or a tragedy and, as a result, focus on advocacy related to research around causation and cure. ASAN believes the focus should be on services, supports and rights protection throughout their lifespan.

“Many families have been exploited by groups that seek to sell pseudoscientific cures predicated on the idea that autism is somehow connected to vaccination, which has been very thoroughly discredited,” he said. “From our point of view, there’s a need to really debunk those myths and communicate more accurate information to families.”

Ne’eman said that different autism diagnoses can be given to the same person by different doctors, and that these can also differ depending on when in their life a person is diagnosed. “This is partly because, even though there’s tremendous diversity on the autism spectrum, there aren’t clear dividing lines when it comes to different diagnoses,” he said. “We have this idea that there’s this thing called

‘Asperger’s’ and this separate thing called ‘autism.’ But, in fact, there is no clear dividing line between the two. What we have is a single, very diverse autism spectrum.”

ASAN includes people across the spectrum. For example, they have members who need augmentative communication technology to communicate (cannot speak). “We also have members and leaders, like myself, who do [speak],” said Ne’eman. “We have some who can talk in some contexts, but not in others. Some members have intellectual disabilities or various forms of cognitive or behavioral challenges.”

The network has invested largely in leadership development, and is active in lobbying state governments to change the funding of disability services to a more inclusive model. “We are in the process of expanding our work with respect to bringing people to a more integrated form of service provision, and supporting people out of institutions and group homes,” said Ne’eman.

ASAN advocates for students with disabilities, whose treatment varies greatly between districts and schools.

“As a matter of federal law, students with disabilities have the right to receive a free and appropriate education in a least restrictive environment,” said Ne’eman. “There’s a real need for a stronger emphasis on supporting students with disabilities in the general education classroom.

“In adulthood, people with disabilities also have a right to receive services in the most integrated setting under the Americans with Disabilities Act,” he continued. “In the U.S. today, there are 13 states that have eliminated institutionalization for people with developmental disabilities. I’ve seen significant positive outcomes as a result. When you get down to it, people aren’t more disabled in New Jersey, which has a lot of institutions, than they are in Oregon, which has no institutions.”

ASAN also promotes equal wages for people with disabilities. “Right now, approximately 200,000 people with disabilities in the U.S. are paid less than minimum wage under the Fair Labor Standards Act,” said Ne’eman. “If you look at the provision that allows for subminimum wage, it dates back to the 1930s, when there was one set of assumptions about people with disabilities. Today, 25 years after the Americans with Disabilities Act, we have different assumptions.”

Ne’man said that the Ruderman Award “was particularly an honor because of the importance of the foundation’s work in the Jewish community.”

He said, “Growing up, like many Jews with disabilities, I experienced challenges in being accepted in Jewish communal life. Many people with disabilities have to leave Jewish day school and other Jewish communal settings because of an unwillingness to provide accommodations.”

Ne’eman put a significant amount from the award toward a new disability rights-related project that he is not yet prepared to discuss, noting, “Hopefully in the coming year it will become visible.”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Film on fate of Polish town

Filmmaker Haya Newman’s father Ozer Fuks grew up in Wolbrom, Poland. He escaped the town in 1939. (photo from wolbrom.pl)

The town of Wolbrom, Poland, had a population of around 10,000 in 1939; about half of the residents were Jewish. Because it was very close to the German border, it was occupied on the day the Second World War began with the invasion of Poland on Sept. 1, 1939.

Haya Newman, a Vancouver teacher of Yiddish and now a filmmaker, has spent the past several years investigating what happened to the Jews of Wolbrom. On April 14, the evening before the community gathered to mark Yom Hashoah, Newman premièred her documentary Wolbrom: My Father’s Hometown in Poland before a packed audience at Temple Sholom.

Newman’s father, Ozer Fuks, came from the town, and trouble began well before the invasion of the Nazis. When Ozer was 4 years old, his father was murdered in front of his leather goods shop. In 1939, Fuks was in the Polish army and he managed to escape the Nazis through the Soviet Union.

photo - Filmmaker Haya Newman’s father Ozer Fuks grew up in Wolbrom, Poland. He escaped the town in 1939
Filmmaker Haya Newman’s father, Ozer Fuks. (photo from Haya Newman)

The project of assembling information on her father’s hometown began from almost nothing, given that her late father kept his past during the Holocaust secret.

In her attempts to gather information, Newman visited the few remaining members of her father’s family in Israel. When that branch of the family opted to leave Europe for Mandate Palestine, Newman said, the remaining family told them they were crazy, heading to a barren desert. They are the only members of her father’s family that survived.

Newman’s documentary, which was filmed by her husband, Tim Newman, follows her first to Israel and then to Wolbrom, in search of the missing pieces.

The outline of the story of Wolbrom’s Jewish residents is similar to that of Jews in thousands of other Polish villages, towns and cities.

The Jewish residents were rounded up by the Nazis and their collaborators. Some were shot on the spot while the rest were forced on a six-day march that circled back to the same town. The able-bodied who survived were forced into slave labor.

In 1941, about 8,000 Jews from the surrounding area were forced into the ghetto in Wolbrom. Eventually, some were transported to concentration camps. But most of them met a grisly fate closer to home.

A memorial was erected in 1988, apparently by residents of Wolbrom themselves, remembering the 4,500 Jews killed and buried in mass graves outside the town.

“This must be carved in Polish memory as it is carved in stone,” the memorial reads in Polish.

Walking to the site, Newman ran into locals who shared some of the stories that had come down from the older villagers.

Three holes were dug in a clearing, they said, and planks were placed across them. The Jews were ordered to undress and as they individually walked across the planks, they were shot and fell into the ravines. When the dirt was pushed over the bodies, one local recounted, the earth cracked from the movement of those still alive.

A story survives of a boy who did not. A youngster managed to escape through the forest as the murdering was going on. Police chased after him, calling out to local boys who were tending cows to catch him, which they did. An officer stood on the boy’s hands and shot him point blank.

Wolbom’s synagogue was turned into a pile of rubble during the war. The Jewish school is now an agricultural supply store – with Nazi graffiti covering the doors. While Newman said she was largely greeted with warmth during her visit, which took place in 2005, she sensed some defensiveness among Poles.

“The fact of the matter is that 90 percent of Polish Jews were killed and a lot had to do with the Polish population,” she said, adding that hundreds of Jews who had been in hiding and survived were killed after the war by Poles. There are 327 documented cases of killings, either individual murders or in pogroms in the immediate aftermath of the war, but estimates are that as many as 2,000 Polish Jews who survived the Holocaust were murdered after liberation.

The reactions from some of the locals caught on video are intriguing.

“There is nothing to look for,” said one man, “You can’t turn back time.”

Another told her, “Take it easy, it’s all in the past.”

Newman visited the home where her grandmother had lived and the woman who resided there at the time was somewhat nonchalant about the property’s provenance.

“When we bought the house, it was empty,” she said.

Other residents spoke of the horror and upset felt by non-Jewish people at the fate of their Jewish neighbors. One woman said her mother picked up Yiddish playing with the Jewish kids in town before the war. Others provided helpful information to direct Newman to the relevant sites of the former Jewish community.

Overall, the people of Wolbrom were open and very willing to speak with her, she said. “It seemed like they were waiting for me there.”

It has been 10 years since the trip that formed the backbone of the film and Newman noted that it is not only the survivors who are passing away, but the eyewitnesses who can add to the fullness of what happened during that period.

“Within five, 10 years, they are not going to be there anymore,” she said.

Rabbi Dan Moskovitz spoke after the screening and referenced the just-ended Pesach holiday to emphasize the need to tell the stories of the more recent past. Just as the Hagaddah marks the narrative of the Exodus, he said, today’s generation should be recording the narratives of this era.

“We need to tell our stories so our children can tell them the way we tell the Hagaddah,” he said. “Go home, write down and tell your story.”

Newman’s next projects include a documentary about Yiddish on the West Coast, a film about her mother’s hometown in Poland and another about Vancouver singer Claire Klein Osipov.

Pat Johnson is a Vancouver writer and principal in PRsuasiveMedia.com.

Analyzing talmudic sages

Vancouver colleagues and friends, Rabbi Binyomin Bitton, left, and Rabbi Eliezer Lipman (Lipa) Dubrawsky, spent many hours discussing scholarly Torah subjects, and the 300-page Hebrew volume by Bitton titled Rabbi Eliezer Hagadol was released in time for the second anniversary of Dubrawsky’s passing. (photo by Noam Dehan)

Rabbi Binyomin Bitton shared a unique bond with the late Rabbi Eliezer Lipman (Lipa) Dubrawsky, who was educational director of Chabad-Lubavitch of British Columbia in Vancouver. In addition to being personal friends, they spent many long hours discussing scholarly Torah subjects across the board.

In time for the second anniversary of Dubrawsky’s untimely passing at the age of 56, Bitton, co-director of Chabad of Downtown, released a book of in-depth research and analysis on the opinions and mindsets of two talmudic sages, Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus and Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananya, based on the unique approach and teachings of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson.

“The idea first came to me shortly after Rabbi Dubrawsky’s passing,” explained Bitton. “His first name was Eliezer, and his father’s name was Yehoshua. I felt it would be a fitting memorial for two men who dedicated so much of their lives to Torah to explain the positions of two sages whose names they bear.”

While he was not initially sure if he would have enough material for a book, Bitton’s research yielded a robust, 300-page Hebrew volume titled Rabbi Eliezer Hagadol (The Great Rabbi Eliezer), an honorific often used for the talmudic sage, which Bitton said aptly described his great friend and mentor, as well.

image - Rabbi Binyomin Bitton’s new book is dedicated to Rabbi Lipa Dubrawsky, book cover
Rabbi Binyomin Bitton’s new book is dedicated to Rabbi Lipa Dubrawsky.

Following a pattern championed by the Rebbe, the author identifies the prototypical approaches of the two first-century sages, and then goes on to apply those same underpinnings to seemingly unrelated arguments of theirs dotting the talmudic landscape.

“The Rebbe had a unique way of learning, of leshitasayhu” – the notion that the rulings of talmudic sages on disparate subjects are related to one another, explained Bitton, “and this forms the basis of the book. The widely accepted approach to leshitasayhu is that the ruling on one particular subject evolves from another one.

“By the Rebbe, it works on a different, deeper plane. In his view, many opinions evolve from a quintessential point in which the two sages essentially disagree and, from there, their opinion evolves in numerous subjects, which, at first glance, may not be related at all. Accordingly, the Rebbe further explains how the approach of each sage evolves and/or is connected to their Hebrew name, soul, place of residence, responsibilities, position and more. This, too, was incorporated in the book with regards to Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Yehoshua.”

In 45 chapters, Bitton masterfully weaves common threads through the full gamut of human experience, demonstrating how the sages approached dozens of subjects that can be traced to the same fundamental axioms.

The book was released just in time for 27 Nissan, the second anniversary of the rabbi’s sudden passing in 2013. Thus, the book’s second part deals with the two sacrifices that frame the time of year: the Omer barley offering that was brought to the Temple in Jerusalem on the second day of Passover, and the two loaves brought seven weeks later on Shavuot.

Expounding upon a discourse of the Rebbe, Bitton applies the Rebbe’s principles to a number of different aspects of the two offerings – even explaining how they reflect through the kabbalistic lens of Chabad Chassidic tradition.

“Rabbi Dubrawsky dedicated his life to learning Torah and teaching Torah every single day,” said Bitton, “and I truly feel that through sharing Torah with others, we can perpetuate his special life.”

This article is reprinted with permission from chabad.org. To sponsor other works and/or buy Bitton’s, visit chabadcitycentre.com/book.

A moving Shoah memorial

Dozens of Vancouverites who survived the Holocaust were joined by their children, grandchildren and hundreds of others in a solemn, powerful commemoration for Yom Hashoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day.

The catastrophic impact of the Holocaust on individuals, families, communities and the world was made evident through words and music, as stories of survival and loss, and their impacts on the living, were interspersed with Yiddish songs that recalled the civilization destroyed by the Nazis.

The annual event took place at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver on April 15, the eve of Yom Hashoah.

A procession of Holocaust survivors passed through the hushed auditorium, taking their places at the front of the hall and placing candles on a table before Chazzan Yaacov Orzech led the Kol Simcha Singers in a poignant El Male Rachamim, the prayer for the souls of the departed. Chaim Kornfeld led the room in the Kaddish.

Hymie Fox, a member of the second generation, told the audience that his parents, Jack and Freda Fuks (Fox), struggled to keep their experiences from their children, but the Holocaust permeated the family’s life in unanticipated ways.

“During the day, my mother could control her thoughts, her words, her stories,” Fox said. But at night, he would be awakened by his mother’s screams.

He wanted to ask about the trauma that caused the night terrors, he said, but his mother had devoted herself so completely to sheltering these memories from her children that to inquire would suggest that all her efforts to protect her children were for naught.

Fox’s father came from an extended family of more than 70 and was one of 11 children. Just Jack and one brother survived.

Though unspoken, his family’s Holocaust experience was especially present at holidays, when the small family of four would celebrate alone.

“Death was a part of our everyday life,” he said. “Yet, there was nobody to die.”

Kornfeld was the survivor speaker for the evening. He recalled his childhood in a village on the Czechoslovakian-Hungarian border, his early schooling and the strict adherence to Judaism with which he was raised, one that forbade the touching of an egg laid on the Sabbath until after sundown.

In March 1944, when the Nazis occupied the town, they rounded up the intelligentsia, Kornfeld assumes because it would be easier to control the masses if the heads of the community were removed.

A ghetto was established for the surrounding areas and, inevitably, Kornfeld was loaded onto a train car destined for Auschwitz.

An older inmate pointed out Josef Mengele and warned the young Kornfeld to tell the evil doctor that he was 18 years old and a farmer. A week later, Kornfeld was transported in a railcar destined for Mauthausen that was so packed people could only stand.

Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp was a huge constellation of slave labor facilities, intended for the most “incorrigible political enemies of the Reich.” There, Kornfeld was put to work digging caves in a mountain where the Nazis constructed munitions and equipment, unassailable by Allied bombing.

At one point, he developed an abscess on his leg and was unable to walk. He was taken to the infirmary, which was an extremely dangerous situation in a dystopia where only those capable of work survived. One day, all patients capable of walking were ordered to leave the infirmary and a Polish man carried Kornfeld on his back, fearful of his fate should he remain in the infirmary. A German soldier ordered the man to put Kornfeld down. The officer put his hand toward his holster.

“I pleaded with the officer,” he said. “I begged for my life.”

He reminded the Nazi how effective he was as a worker and his life was spared. He was liberated from Mauthausen on May 5, 1945.

After a time on a kibbutz in Israel, Kornfeld came to Canada and learned of an opportunity as a Hebrew school principal in Saskatoon that allowed him to work evenings and study at university in the daytime. He became a lawyer, married and has four children.

Claire Klein Osipov sang and interpreted Yiddish songs that, while often melancholy in themselves, had added resonance as evidence of the people, culture and language that were almost completely extinguished in the Shoah. She was accompanied on piano by Wendy Bross Stuart who, with Ron Stuart, artistically produced the event. The Yom Hashoah Singers – a group of Jewish young people including members of the third generation – delivered a message of both mourning and hope with such songs as “Chai” and “The Partisan Song,” the defiant anthem of Jewish resistance that is an annual tradition on this day. Lisa Osipov Milton also sang, and Andrew Brown, associate principal viola with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, performed excerpts from Milton Barnes’ Lamentations of Jeremiah and Ernest Bloch’s Meditation.

Corinne Zimmerman, a vice-president of the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, which presented the event with support from the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver, the Jewish Community Centre and the Province of British Columbia, also spoke.

Moira Stilwell, member of the B.C. Legislature for Vancouver-Langara, said the day is a time to “learn, mourn and pledge, ‘Never again.’

“Yom Hashoah is not only about learning from history, but about passing those lessons on to the next generations,” she said.

Pat Johnson is a Vancouver writer and principal in PRsuasiveMedia.com.

 

Corrin retires

After 20 years, librarian Karen Corrin retired in March from the Waldman Library. (photo by Olga Livshin)

Karen Corrin retired from her position as a librarian at the Isaac Waldman Jewish Public Library on March 30, after exactly 20 years with the library. She has been with the Waldman from the very beginning.

“There was always a small library at the old JCC,” she remembered. “I took my children there when they were young. The new library opened on the second floor of the new building in 1994. I was studying for my master’s at the library school at UBC then. My program was for two years, from 1993 to 1995, so I didn’t apply to work there, but I was at the opening. I remember Amos Oz speaking. He talked about the importance of words.”

With the new library space came new funding, so the Waldman could hire a librarian and a library technician. Corrin wasn’t among the new hires but when, a few months later, the position of the librarian opened again, her friends urged her to apply.

“I was still at school. I wanted to be a cataloguer when I graduated, but a job was a job, so I applied and got it.” She started working for the Waldman in April of 1995.

Her previous experience, both personal and professional, prepared her for this position. “I have always loved libraries,” she said with a smile. “I would go with my kids to a local library, and we would bring library books home for everyone.” Before she started her program at the University of British Columbia, she worked as a volunteer coordinator and in fundraising. She also had management skills and knew computers. All of this combined made her a perfect fit for her new duties as the Waldman librarian.

“Waldman is almost unique. There are so few JCC libraries in North America,” she lamented. “Most city libraries are funded by the governments, but Waldman is a community library. The funds come from fundraising. That’s why, from the beginning, it was run by volunteers.”

According to Corrin, there are about 30 regular volunteers at the Waldman, and she considers them the best PR people the library could have. “They care about the library, about books and about the community. They have time to chat to the patrons, to explain things, to help everyone find what they are looking for. The value of the library volunteers is great, it can’t be overrated. They are our gems.”

Corrin herself also worked as a volunteer, although not for the Waldman. “About my history with libraries,” she said, “I always volunteered at my children’s elementary schools in their school libraries. First for my son in Richmond and then for my daughter at [Vancouver] Talmud Torah.”

She emphasized that the volunteers who run the front desk of the Waldman liberate the librarians to do their main jobs – fundraising, acquisitions and event planning.

“There are several kinds of events,” she explained. “People would come in and ask us, why don’t we have a book club? So we would start a book club. We saw what events the community centre was running, and if there was something missing, something a library could supply. Another kind of event comes with the Canada Council grant. We would apply for a grant to pay a writer. If we got it, we could invite a writer for an event or a reading. We had a few children’s writers speaking at the library through this grant. We also had some book launches of local authors and sometimes poetry readings – those were often funded by Yosef Wosk. It all comes from what the community wants.”

Recently, the most profound community-inspired change at the Waldman was the introduction of ebooks. Before that, but also during Corrin’s term at the Waldman, it was computerizing the catalogue. “When I started, we still used cards,” she recalled. “Libraries are always reinventing themselves, but I think that the most important purpose of a library is to be a community hub, a meeting place. That’s why we ran educational courses and children’s events at the Waldman. There is always something going on. You’re never bored at the library.”

Surprisingly, the profession of a librarian wasn’t Corrin’s first choice. When she was young, she wanted to be a teacher. “I always thought a teacher has to be perfect. He is the one molding children’s minds. I was afraid I wasn’t perfect enough,” she recalled of her youthful dreams. But the library job gave her a lot of satisfaction, and now she has plans to be a teacher, too. She and her husband plan to travel to Spain as volunteer English teachers. They have already done this in Hong Kong, with high school students, and loved it.

“I have lots of other things I’d like to do now that I have more free time: walking, learning how to play piano, swimming outside at Kits pool. I might come back to the Waldman as a volunteer,” she mused.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].

We walk a little taller

Karon Shear, left, and Marilyn Berger. (photo by Binny Goldman)

Moshe Feldenkrais is quoted as saying, “When you know what you are doing, then you can do what you want!” How appropriate that some of us who spent the two nights of the Passover seders sitting at the table – or reclining, as directed – were now being taught to sit properly.

On April 13, about 50 people gathered at the Oakridge Seniors Centre (OSC) to attend an event co-hosted by Jewish Seniors Alliance of Greater Vancouver to learn the helpful movements of the Feldenkrais Method.

Alexandra Henriques, manager of OSC, graciously welcomed the audience and called upon JSA president Marilyn Berger, who said how impressed she was with the surroundings and the newsletter put out by OSC, and said she would come back to sample some of the lunches being offered at the centre. Berger then acquainted those gathered with the aims of JSA, mentioning its advocacy for the betterment of the quality of life for seniors and the peer-counseling courses being offered.

photo - Feldenkrais instructor Vita Kolodny
Feldenkrais instructor Vita Kolodny. (photo by Binny Goldman)

Berger then introduced Vita Kolodny, a nurse and a movement educator, who gently eased the audience through the mindful movements that can be used to ease back pain. By a quick questioning of the audience, we learned that almost all in attendance had suffered from back pain at one time or another.

We all sit so much during the day, doubling the stress placed on our back compared to when we stand, Kolodny explained. That is why we may prefer to stand when experiencing back pain.

Kolodny led those gathered through the correct way of positioning our bodies and ways of strengthening the skeletal muscles. It is important to reeducate our brains to the new ways of sitting by repeating the movements we learned, slowly and with awareness of how our whole body participates, with a rest in between the exercise.

A question was asked by Lou Segal: “Is it better to train one’s body to sit in the new and correct way, even while resting, so it becomes our natural way of sitting?” The answer was yes.

Dr. Norman Doidge’s book The Brain’s Way of Healing was recommended reading if attendees cared to learn more about neuroplasticity and the Feldenkrais Method.

Some constructive and supportive suggestions were made during the demonstration. For example, sit forward in a chair with feet flat on the floor. A pillow may be placed behind your back, remembering to maintain the arch in your back. As well, it helps to sit on an armless chair, stool or exercise ball while maintaining good balance.

Gyda Chud of JSA thanked Kolodny, using her penchant for alliteration, saying “Vita was vital, vivacious and vibrant in her presentation,” echoing the feelings of the audience, all of whom were visibly sitting upright, already making the changes suggested by Kolodny that afternoon.

Not only were our hearts smiling – as suggested in the theme – but our spines were, as well.

Discussions followed over dessert and hot drinks.

Berger, in thanking “the gregarious Gyda Chud and our ever incredible Karon Shear,” reminded everyone of the JSA Spring Forum on April 26, which will take place at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. The theme is YOLO: You Only Live Once.

So, let’s live it tall!

Binny Goldman is a member of the Jewish Seniors Alliance of Greater Vancouver board.