Emunah Magazine

That’s a lot of chutzpah!

A Brooklyn rabbi took a fierce beating from teenage punks after demanding they scram from a yeshiva schoolyard where they were bullying students, police said yesterday.

Several students at the Cheder School in Borough Park told their teacher, Rabbi Mayer Gross, at around 3 p.m. Wednesday that two teens in the school-owned yard playing handball were refusing to let them use the playground, cops said.

“Many times, strangers come in to use the park, so we put up a sign that no one should come — private property,” said an official at the privately run religious academy, who would not give his name.

“Any time someone comes to play, we say over the [loudspeaker], please leave. These two guys wouldn’t leave. That’s when Rabbi Gross came. They still wouldn’t leave, so he took out his camera phone to take their picture. That’s when they got angry.”

Police said that one of the teens, 16-year-old Justin Rodriguez, of Bensonhurst, shoved Gross.

The other teen, 17-year-old Shreaf Taha, who lives near the school, picked up a bag containing a teddy bear and water gun and whipped it at Gross, striking him on the head and leaving him with a cut, cops said.

“They cut him on his face. His forehead was bleeding,” said Avrohom Mitnick, a 10th-grader at the school.

But Rodriguez and Taha — neither of whom has a criminal record — said that they were just killing time before Rodriguez had to go to work and that they were the ones who took a beating.

“They said something over the loudspeaker but it was unclear,” Rodriguez said. “Next thing I know, the rabbi charged at me. He kicked at me from behind.”

Members of a volunteer patrol then joined in, the teens said.

“They were hitting us full force,” Rodriguez said, pointing to bruises on his torso, following his arraignment on assault charges yesterday. Taha had welts on his back and neck.

Both were released without bail.

Gross, 36, refused medical attention and declined to comment.

Students said people from the neighborhood often use the school’s yard, even though it was on private property.

Source: NY POST

Bill, Bill, Bill when will you learn that some times you should listen to your kids. Chelsea Clinton has requested from her father former President Bill Clinton to drop 15 pounds for her upcoming wedding this summer. Due to his unhealthy diet Clinton actually had to undergo a cardio-bypass surgery in 2004. She merely requested he look good for wlaking her down the aisle, she told him 15 pounds should do. He has reported that he is halfway there.

The dr. who operated on him reported that since the operation he has made much healthier changes to his diet. He followed with his weekly program and stepped up on exercise. He explained to Jenna Bush Hager, daughter of former president George W. Bush that his biggest problem will be to hold back the tears as Chelsea exchanges vows with Wall Street hotshot Marc Mezvinsky.

Carvel: Free Ice Cream Thursday, Free Flavor Shots
So, hoping to outdo Baskin Robbins’ 31-cent Scoop Day this week, Carvel is offering free cups of their new low fat ice cream at Carvel Stores all across these United States of America on April 29.
Carvel is also launching their new Carvel Flavor Shots, new toppings that you can try, also for free, on your free cup of ice cream. Yay!
Shot flavors include: acai berry, banana, black raspberry, blueberry, bubble gum, cotton candy, mango, mint, orange, peach, pistachio and pomegranate

Muammar Gadaffi, leader of Libya since a 1969 coup has officially made a statement at a recent Israeli-Arab says that a two state solution is “stupid and unrealistic”. He believes the only way the Arabs can protect themselves from expulsion is via mass reproduction. The meeting was held on completely peaceful terms and resulted in Gadaffi allowing Israeli-Arab students to study abroad in Libya.

Gadaffi made a huge point of expressing that he has nothing against Jews but he is against Zionism and the Zionist leaders who are Anti-Palestinian. He feels that in 1948 the Arabs gave refuge to the Jews, and that an attempted occupation of land by the Arabs will only lead to massacres. He also told Israel they were invited to the meeting because “your voices are never heard and we want the world to hear you now.”

He seems to be a realist in noting that these plans which have been going on for years are not getting anyone anywhere. He also wishes that if a solution can be reached that will not involve a bloody trail he would be willing to support it. For this meeting Gadaffi was civil to both groups and led them in a peaceful discussion, this is actually the job of the UN but it is nice to see someone else helping for a change. I feel that if need be Gadaffi could prove to be a loyal friend to Israel if the negotiations aren’t completely thrown out.

Hamas has stooped to a new low. There 3-D cartoon add depicts Gilad Shalit’s father , Noam walking with a picture of his son who was captured before the Second Lebanon War, through the vacant streets of Israel. He then receives a coffin and awakes screaming as if it were all a dream, the words then flash “there is still hope”. This use of Psychological warfare is a new form of terrorism to peoples whose families have been captured it gets into their heads. This was released as an attempt for Hamas to resume negotiations for the release of hundreds of terrorists for Gilad Shalit.
Below is video

The City owned Brooklyn Navy Yard is scheduled to come down! Mayor Bloomberg’s administration has orchestrated a deal in which $60 million will be spent to expand and build a Shoprite supermarket as well as other stores which are tremendously needed in the area. The ShopRite is set to be 55,000 square feet! Members of the neighborhood were ecstatic when they found out about this, since the closet market is over a mile away.

The demolition site will include several buildings with historic status, but the former housing unit and shed will be restored and incorporated into the shopping center. Councilwoman Letitia James was quoted saying “the need for a supermarket far exceeds saving history, because right now this is area is like a food desert!” she made this comment in remarks to the preservationist attempting to save Admiral’s Row. The project is set to begin in early 2012 and to have been completed by 2013; it will create an estimated 500 permanent jobs as well as 500 construction jobs.

The plan is estimated to help boost the local economy with more jobs and more shopping. It also intends to add more industrial space in the newly budding and expanding community. This is only the start of a major industrial revolution set to hit NY in the upcoming decade.

A Jewish entrepreneur from Lakewood NJ has decided that the way to fight poverty is not through charity, but commerce and a new established economy. Mesh Gelman and his business associate Elizabeth Brown began manufacturing T shirts in Port-au-Prince, Haiti in an attempt to help raise money and establish an economy. The production line will create 200 jobs and another 240 when their linen brand Blanket America, is moved there too.

In order to help the failing Haitian market the US in 2006 made a law which allowed all Haitian garments sold in America to be Duty-Free. Only 25,000 people work in Haiti’s textile market but there is a desire for the number to reach close to 150,000. A request for American clothing suppliers so as Wal-Mart and Target to start patronizing these factories will greatly increase the need for jobs.

Blanket America is going to be the first American textile company to move to Haiti since the earthquake. Supposedly other companies such as Pony and Beverly Hills Polo have been seen scouting the area. Gelman is also a long time friend of the Starbucks CEO, Howard Shultz. Gelman has reportedly been attempting to ask Shultz to sell Hatian Coffee to help boost the economy. Although there has officially been no agreement the Starbucks team is now in Haiti improving their beans. It would appear that indeed the best way to help is to stabilize and create a market, the “Choose Haiti” T- Shirts will be sold for $10. Look for them, by buying them you may actually make your donation go farther.

On Mount Ararat in Eastern Turkey, a group of explorers claims to have found Noach’s Tevah (Noah’s Ark). According to the Torah Noach’s Tevah did in fact land on Mt. Ararat, and according to the carbon dating the remains of the wood is 4,800 years old which does in fact match up with the time set in the Torah.

There have been man reported discoveries of the Tevah over the years including one boat shaped object discovered in 1987 by an archeologist named Ron Wyatt. But according to the testing done on this wood they are 99.9% sure they have actually found the real one.

The interior of the structure was reported to have had many compartments with wooden beams that were removable. Most likely the storing location for the animals, the archeologists claim. The Wooden structure is now partially contained inside ice and volcanic rock but is highly suspected to be a huge breakthrough in the religious as well as archeological world!

If this actually is what they think it is then this can help establish the entire basis of the Jewish belief of the flood. I intend to keep my eyes and ears open for more news on this exciting discovery.

All the media attention swirling around supposed death threats against the makers of South Park over a caricature of the prophet Mohammed overshadowed another press story last week that might have a lot more to tell us about relations between the Muslim world and the West.

Back in 2005, the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten famously published a series of cartoons poking fun at Mohammed, which led to a global backlash resulting in the boycott and destruction of Danish products and over a hundred lost lives. A few months later a Pan-Arabist and anti-Zionist organization in Holland calling itself the Arab European League published its own set of cartoons ridiculing the Holocaust on its website in order to illustrate “the double morals of the West during the Danish cartoon affair.” The group wrote among other things:

1- The issue for us is not about depicting the prophet or any other theological consideration. It’s about stigmatizing a whole population of more than one billion Muslims through portraying their symbol as being a terrorist, megalomaniac, misogynic and a psychopath. This is Racist, xenophobic and calling for hatred against Muslims.

2- We do believe in Freedom of speech but we think that respecting sensitivities and being constructive is also an added value to a democratic society. We are against laws oppressing any form of expression no matter how appalling it is. Nevertheless, we condemn the selective indignation of Europe’s intellectual elite and population. When anti-Muslim stances are made or published this is perceived as freedom of speech and cheered and supported but when other sensitive issues to Europe like the Holocaust, anti-Semitism, homosexuality, sexism and more are touched, Europe’s elite is scandalized.

(…)

5- Arabs and Muslims are facing occupation on the hand of the west, oppression on the hand of the dictators often supported by the west and aggressive colonization by the Zionist and appartheid state of Israel. Adding symbolic offence to factual aggression is responsible for the tension that we are witnessing today. Any attempt to understand the cartoon’s issue out of the current international context is completely missing the point.

A Hague-based group calling itself the “Center for Information and Documentation Israel” then filed a formal complaint in Amsterdam, saying that the publication of the Holocaust cartoons was “a nightmare for the thousands of Jewish victims of the Holocaust who are still alive.” The AEL in turn argued it was merely going after the West’s own “sacred cows,” referring to a disclaimer it had posted stating that “in our cartoon campaign we do not endorse any anti-Semitic, homophobic or sexist stands. All we are trying to do is to confront Europe with its own hypocrisy using sarcasm and cartoons.”

Last Thursday a Dutch court ruled in the AEL’s favor, stating that “The context in which this cartoon was published takes away from its criminally offensive nature.” So that appears to be that.

So, are you shocked and appalled and already heading out the door for the nearest courtroom? Or, like me, are you merely surprised at how weak and downright incomprehensible they are? I mean, I’ve seen far better on the pages of (junior) high school newspapers! It beats me why anyone would bother taking these guys to court – couldn’t the money be better spent on giving them a couple of drawing lessons?

And yet – that’s also how I felt about the original Mohammed caricatures. While I will always support a free press as far as I have to go to protect it, it’s a totally non-negotiable issue, the Danish campaign – which was intended as a deliberate provocation – always seemed petty and mean-spirited to me, and the global reaction was a foregone conclusion. There was certainly nothing about those spectacularly unfunny drawings that could ever deserve the name “comics,” and the same goes for the AEL’s trashy Holocaust caricatures. You see, genuine comics charm and delight us. They make us laugh as they teach us about human nature. Thoughtful strips like Doonesbury and Peanuts, and clever political cartoons by such skilful artists as Pat Oliphant and Tom Toles – as hard-hitting as they sometimes are – enrich our lives while exercising our smile muscles. And then there’s the kind of toilet graffiti that tears down and demeans – and no one so much as the “artist” who sprays his or her message out into the world like an unpleasant body odor. And that’s the kind of “comics” I’m talking about here. They just aren’t funny.

Okay, I’m going into utopian mode now. Be sure to close the skylight before I head off through the roof! But it seems to me that if we could somehow harness the power of comics to laugh at our own foibles and take the occasional jab at our respective holy cows – just as Daniel Barenboim is using the power of classical music to bring Israeli and Palestinian young people together in his West-Eastern Divan Orchestra – we would all be a lot farther ahead than we are at the moment.

A while back an old comedian explained to me the difference between German humor and Jewish humor. In German humor, he said, you always need a victim. Whether it’s Jews or Poles or blondes, somebody has to bleed. In Jewish humor, by contrast, you always make fun of yourself. Guess which kind is funnier…?

Police were called to a residence on Quentin Road and East 37th street this afternoon when a woman called NYPD about an attempted robbery. Police came to the scene and one of the suspects took out a weapon and was shot and killed by the police officer before the suspect was able to hurt anyone. The 2nd suspect has fled and is possibly hiding out in a nearby residence and has barricaded himself inside. According to local eye witnesses the police were seen entering the premises wearing full body armor.

Brooklyn – Councilman David G. Greenfield today joined with local elected officials to strongly condemn an act of anti-Semitic vandalism that occurred in the Boro Park Section of Brooklyn. A van belonging to the Hamaspik Assisted Living Facility located on 61st Street in Brooklyn was vandalized in front of that facility by a large spray-painted swastika. This is the second time that this particular facility for disabled Jewish young adults was targeted by a hate crime. Because of the nature of the crime, the NYPD has turned over the case to its Hate Crimes Unit. Greenfield was joined in his condemnation by Councilmembers Sara Gonzalez & Brad Lander, Congressman Jerry Nadler, Senator Marty Golden & Assemblyman Peter Abbate.

“As Americans, we celebrate our diversity,” said Greenfield. “Hate crimes have no place in our community and acts of religious bigotry will not be tolerated under any circumstances.”

Greenfield offered a $1,000 reward for information that leads to an arrest and conviction in this case. If anyone has any information, they should call the anonymous line of the NYPD Hate Crimes Task Force at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477).

“The reason I am offering a cash reward is to send these criminals a clear message: if you commit a hate crime in New York City we will find you no matter what it costs or takes.” explained Greenfield.

Joel Freund, the Executive Director of Hamaspik of Kings County said, “This is an attack on every American child with special needs, and we cannot let this go unpunished.”

Councilmember Sara Gonzalez was clear in her condemnation, “I believe prejudice is the child of ignorance. There’s no place for it in our society and our neighborhoods are united in saying we have zero tolerance for hate crimes. These perpetrators will be found and punished to the fullest extent of the law.”

“This is the third hate crime in or near my district in the four months that I have been in office,” said Councilmember Brad Lander. “I am deeply saddened by these crimes and hope that by coming together as a community we can put an end to these outrageous acts.”

“I am very concerned about the despicable messages of hate found at the Hamaspik Assisted Living Facility in Brooklyn,” said Congressman Jerrold Nadler. “The fact that these messages appeared on the property of a Jewish facility in the heart of our nation’s Orthodox Jewish community is alarming to say the least, and a reminder that we must continue to speak out against anti-Semitism, hatred and intolerance.”

“This is an outrageous crime in the heart of our Jewish community,” said Senator Marty Golden. “There is no place in our community for this. I look forward to working with the NYPD to track down these villains and go down to court with my fellow elected officials to ensure that these villains are brought to justice.”

“I strongly condemn this recent act of hateful vandalism,” said Assemblyman Peter Abbate. “I call on the community to come forward with information so that the perpetrators can be found and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

All of the elected officials stressed the need for the community to share information with the Hate Crimes Task Force on this crime. The anonymous tip line is: (800) 577 TIPS. All information will be kept confidential and a reward of $1000 will be given by Councilmember Greenfield for information leading to the arrest and conviction of those responsible.

Finally, Greenfield lauded the NYPD Hate Crimes Task Force as “the best in the United States,” and was hopeful that this added attention and cash reward will help them find those responsible for the anti-Semitic vandalism.

By Rabbi Shmuley Boteach

Since the public announcement of my upcoming meeting with Pope Benedict this Wednesday at the Vatican, courtesy of my friend Gary Krupp, many of my close Jewish friends have expressed not approval but disappointment. ‘They blamed the pedophile priest scandal on Jews and compared the attacks on the Church to anti-Semitism. How could you, Shmuley?’ ‘The Pope was in the Hitler Youth and he wants to make Pope Pius XII, who never condemned the holocaust, into a saint.’ ‘The Church has always been anti-Semitic. You’re being used.’

Come now. Jewish insularity is the ultimate obstacle to the dissemination of Jewish values, while Jewish contempt for the non-Jewish world because of its past immorality and Jew-hatred is itself immoral and hateful. Pope Benedict is being kicked to the curb in nearly every part of the world. But I as a Jew do not forget that for all his failures in properly handing the abomination of pedophile Priests, for which the Church must atone and repent, Benedict has been a great friend to the Jewish community, visiting an unprecedented three Synagogues in four years as well as the State of Israel. And whom does it benefit to see a mighty Church fall? The millions of orphans the Church tends to worldwide? The schools it runs and the pupils it teaches? The hope its Priests give to the poor, especially in the third world?

I have been one of Pope Pius XII’s foremost critics in the entire world. But Benedict is not Pius and before we holler for his demise let’s recall that as the Cardinal Secretary of State he did more to extend the Church’s hand in friendship to other people’s and faiths than nearly anyone who preceded him.

There is much in Jewish law and tradition that could bring healing to the Church, beginning with the Jewish laws of modesty and sexual seclusion. In Judaism a man and woman who are not married are not allowed to be in a locked room together. When I was Rabbi to Michael Jackson I took this law and applied it his special circumstances. I told him that the only way he could rehabilitate his reputation, after the pedophile accusations against him, was to quite simply foreswear ever being alone with a child. I even grabbed Michael’s shoulders and made him promise me he would never seclude himself with a child not his own. And for the two years we were close to he stuck to the script. When he and I launched our initiative to help children, the focus was on working with their parents to prioritize their kids, rather than with the kids themselves. It wasn’t until Michael stupidly disregarded this simple advice and decided to share a bed – however platonically – with a young child and then brag about it on international TV that he was arrested and started the inexorable decline that ended in his death a few years later.

The Church should embrace the same straightforward rule. No priest should be allowed to be in alone with a child. Period. If a Priest needs to speak to a child alone, the door must never be locked and there must always be the possibility that they can be intruded upon by outsiders. If they walk in a park, it cannot be one that is empty of people. This way we’ll know that any Priest who breaks the guidelines will be punished whether or not they abuse a child. It would significantly curb the potential for any act of child molestation and might even discourage pedophiles from entering the priesthood in the first place.

But more importantly, it’s time for Jews and Catholics to work together to promote new values in America. While our country is gripped in an epidemic of materialism and an orgy of greed, the only values religion seems to talk about is opposition to gay marriage and abortion. But the emphasis on the negative is not going to create much that is positive. We need values that promote family, strengthens marriage, inspires selflessness in children, and advances the cause of a purposeful life that makes us less obsessive about money and career.

This is why I wish to discuss with Pope Benedict the Catholic Church getting behind our ‘Turn Friday Night into Family Night’ initiative, the push for a global family dinner night. Imagine if all the world’s families – Catholic, Jewish, Islamic, Atheist, Agnostic – sat down every Friday night and embraced our ‘Triple Two.” Parents giving their children two uninterrupted hours every Friday night, inviting two guests to teach the children sharing and hospitality, and discussing two important subjects rather than a movie or celebrity gossip. And Friday night is the one evening that unites all. It’s sacred already to Jews and Muslims. Up until Second Vatican Council it was a night where Catholics were forbidden to eat meat. And for the non-religious it’s the beginning of the weekend and sets the tone the activities that will follow. If the family gets together on Friday night, chances are they’ll do more stuff together on Saturday and Sunday as well.

This is the right time for the Catholic Church to own a global family dinner night. The pedophile priest scandal has reinforced the conclusion of some that the Church is an old boys club that at best makes concessions to the weakness of human nature by allowing men and women to marry. The ideal, however, is celibacy and childlessness. The Church must return to its previous posture as a champion of family and what better way than to mandate that all Catholic families worldwide do as Jesus did. Put the worldly stuff away on Friday nights and consecrate it as an evening of holiness and togetherness.

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach is founder of This World: The Values Network. His major book on the universal Jewish values that can enrich the lives of every man and woman, Renewal, will be published by Basic Books on May 14th. Follow him on Twitter @RabbiShmuley.

- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
*Follow Shmuley on TWITTER! http://www.twitter.com/RabbiShmuley
*Shmuley’s on Facebook! http://tinyurl.com/facebook-shmuley
*Buy Rabbi Shmuley’s newest book THE KOSHER SUTRA at http://tinyurl.com/koshersutra
*Join the national “Turn Friday Night Into Family Night” initiative. Go to www.FridayisFamily.com.
*See Shmuley on the web at www.Shmuley.com

Heres a touching video about why you should care about Shalom Rubashkin. The narrator talks about the injustice that Rubashkin is facing versus Toyota CEO.

On The Beat Reporter Shmiel Geffen Submitted this video : send videos to video@emunahmagazine.com

The $258 million Powerball was won by a Missouri convenience store worker. Chris Shaw had a mere $28.96 left in his bank account when he agreed to buy a 1998 Ford Ranger from a friend who agreed to let him pay the $1,000 debt in increments of $100. He now intends to spend the money to pay off his utility bills replace his two missing front teeth and take his children to Disney World.

He declared that he will need a few days before deciding whether to quit his job as a convenience store clerk. He also wishes for people who know about money to tell him whether to take it in 30 payouts over the next 29 years or the lump sum of $124,875,122. He has a 10 year old son and a 7 year old daughter from one woman as well as a 5 year old daughter from another. He wasn’t even going to check his ticket until his girlfriend; Tosha Ewry told him that the winning ticket was purchased at the store he worked in. Shaw also intends to buy several items his kids have asked for since before he won such as a new skateboard and bike, things he says that were hard to buy when you make $7.25 an hour. Also sharing in the celebration will be the 13 and 15 year old sons of his girlfriend whom he considers to be like his own. Just don’t spend it all in one place.

Google’s GPS software which is currently distributed for free and runs on Android devices will soon be available for other phones. The software which displays the traffic, a satellite and first-person imaging of the streets also includes a voice search and car dock mode. Although no timetables were released it is expected to appear soon on the BlackBerry, IPhone, Palm, and possibly the new Windows 7 devices. Garmin Recently released an app that works on many Blackberry models including the popular Tour and Curve. Seems like the market for turn by turn GPS is heading to the freebie zone. Last year after Android started giving away a premium GPS product for free Garmin

has decided to do the same and Nokia’s recent purchase of Navtech may be an indication of where that company is headed with in terms of their GPS producs

A homeless man saved a woman from an assailant carrying a knife. Unfortunately during the scuffle he was stabbed by the attacker who fled from the scene. Hugo Alfredo Tale-Yax died on the streets of Jamaica, Queens after several passersby refused to help or acknowledge him. One individual was actually seen by the security camera of a nearby building taking a picture of Hugo on his cell phone before continuing on. Another man shook him vigorously for a minute attempting to wake him from a suspected sleep before walking on. Firefighters did not arrive until more than an hour and twenty minutes after he collapsed on the street. He was dead long before they arrived, lying in a pool of his own blood unaided and unassisted. This is a tragic example of the lack of concern people have currently, they left a man to die while he was stabbed attempting to save someone. The woman herself who fled upon the assailants attack on Hugo did not even report it to the police.

Here is Some Video Courtesy Of New York Post

This photo was uploaded by our On The Beat Photographer Shmiel Geffen , If you have a funny photo email to photos@emunahmagazine.com

By Susan Danseyar

Brookline, MA — Grunie Uminer said she realizes more than ever that God is the prime mover in this world, putting people into circumstances and places that can bring about unimagined results and change one’s reality.

“You never know who you are taking and interacting with,” said the Brookline resident. “You might be talking to your cousin, relative or even royalty.”

Uminer knows this firsthand after recently meeting relatives she never knew she had, more than seven decades after her Russian ancestors were scattered across the former Soviet Union. Her long-lost cousins came from all over the world and greeted each other for the first time in February at the International Conference of Chabad-Lubavitch Women Emissaries in Brooklyn, N.Y.

The reunion came about after a seemingly unrelated event occurred about a month before in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia. Boris Plaksin was observing the anniversary of his father’s death at the local Chabad house. The rabbi asked Plaksin his Hebrew name so he could be called up to the Torah. When Plaksin said it was Dovber Mendel, the rabbi became intrigued.

“It was a distinctly Hassidic name and the two talked about it,” Uminer said. Plaksin revealed his mother’s maiden name was Duchman, whereupon the rabbi said he recognized it as that of a nurse at a summer camp where his mother worked years before in the United States. He told Plaksin the nurse came from a family with Chabad emissaries around the world.

Plaksin told the rabbi his great-uncles were Chabad Hassidim in Russia, but he thought they died in the Holocaust. Even so, he called his great-niece, Ella Vorovitch. Vorovitch lives in Canada, where she is the rebbetzin (wife of the rabbi) at a Toronto Chabad and the editor of the Russian edition of Exodus Magazine, a publication of the Jewish Russian Community Center of Toronto.

Vorovitch began researching her ancestors and learned that her great-grandmother’s brothers had survived World War II and immigrated to the United States, where they fathered families who run Chabad houses all over, including Turkey, Morocco, China, Florida, Tennessee, Connecticut and New York.

Vorovitch’s great-grandmother was the sister of Uminer’s great-grandfather.

Since learning of the connection, Uminer has been able to piece together bits of information about her ancestors.

“No one talked about the Holocaust when Ella was growing up,” she said. “She would have done this research a lot earlier if she had any information.”

Most amazing to Uminer is that some of the people she recently learned she’s related to are those she was already in contact with through her work with Chabad Center in Chestnut Hill.

“When I realized that one woman and her family — who have been good friends of ours for a few years — attend services at our synagogue and are part of our community, and a second woman — who was our graphic designer for our community calendar for five years — are related to me, I honestly couldn’t believe it,” she said. “It teaches us to really respect each person and afford them dignity; they might end up being connected to us in ways we could never have imagined.”

And one of the distant cousins she recently realized is part of her family was Natalie Naiman, whom Uminer already knew.

“Last year, a couple of days before Passover, Natalie’s father, who had emigrated from Russia and was living in Utah, suddenly passed away,” Uminer said. “Natalie and her husband decided to bury him in Boston and called my husband [Rabbi Mendy Uminer] and asked him to officiate at the funeral. Little did we know that we were extending ourselves to a man we had never met, but who was from our family. We only found out almost a year later that he was my grandmother’s cousin.”

Source: Wicked Local

THE BAN HAS BEEN LIFTED!! Apple’s prized new technological wonder, the IPad will now officially be allowed in Israel. The IPad which was previously banned due to its highly powerful wifi connection is now allowed. The fear was that its wifi (which was set to American standards) would overpower other devices. All of the devices that were confiscated or shipped to America will now be sent back to Israel and given to the owners.