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BALLOT RECOMMENDATIONS
Two for the San Diego City Council
SAN DIEGO— San Diego Jewish World endorses two members of our local Jewish community for the San Diego City Council: Marti Emerald and Phil Thalheimer.
We are enthusiastic about Marti Emerald in the 7th Council District because we think she has demonstrated throughout her career as a television reporter great compassion for the less fortunate, fully in keeping with Jewish teachings that we all have a responsibility to try to make the world in some way better than the way we found it.
Emerald is a gutsy woman who, early in her TV career, spent several days posing as a homeless person on the streets to learn about their needs and society’s responsibilities toward them. Later on, she became known as the “Troubleshooter” of KGTV, Channel 10, an assignment in which she helped right various wrongs done to consumers. When applicable, she helped consumers of government services break through bureaucratic red tape. It is her sense of “justice, justice” that gladdens us as we wholeheartedly endorse her candidacy in the Nov. 4th election.
Emerald will give voice to the finer instincts of the San Diego citizenry. As a city councilwoman, she will make all of us proud.
In the 1st Council District, we struggled a little bit before we came to a decision to endorse Phil Thalheimer. In becoming the self-announced Jewish spokesman for keeping the large Christian cross atop Mount Soledad, Thalheimer has alienated large segments of our community. It was, and is, a political position with which we emphatically disagree because we feel the Christian symbol on public mountaintop land represents an unconstitutional government preference for Christianity over other religions in this country.
When we interviewed Thalheimer, a flight school owner, about the issue, he told us that his parents were Holocaust survivors and that he shudders at the idea of any religious symbol being torn down. That is a terrible analogy, because U.S. courts are not Nazi stormtroopers. Nevertheless, we are willing to put the issue aside in light of the dynamics of his race against Sherri Lightner, a neighborhood leader in La Jolla, who built her reputation, in part, on steadfast opposition both to construction of a Hillel House adjacent to the UCSD campus and the stringing of an eruv in the area surrounding Orthodox Congregation Adat Yeshurun and Conservative Congregation Beth El.
Some of the heated rhetoric from Lightner’s group prompted San Diego City Councilman Jim Madaffer to speculate during a public hearing that the opposition to the eruv may have been motivated by anti-Semitism in a section of the city that was once famous for it. We don’t have enough personal knowledge about Lightner to characterize her feelings about our Jewish community, but we have been sorely disappointed that as a candidate she thus far has failed to strongly and clearly disassociate herself publicly from the haters in her midst.
Thalheimer supported the City giving the Jewish community permission to string at its own expense an eruv—a monofilament which enables Shomer Shabbos Jews to symbolically extend the boundaries of their homes so that they may carry items or push a baby carriage in their neighborhoods. After initially opposing the sale of land by the city to Hillel, he now says that the neighborhood should accept a court decision that the sale was legal, and allow Hillel to build upon its property without further ado. Lightner on the other hand is a leader of the ongoing opposition.
With some misgivings, but with confidence that he will be more responsive to Jewish community concerns, we endorse Thalheimer.—Donald H. Harrison
JEWISH COMMUNITY FOUNDATION
October 16 Jewish Community Foundation forum cancelled
Hebrew Instruction at Tifereth Israel Synagogue
GUEST COMMENTARY
Why I support Barack Obama
By Dennis Ross
WASHINGTON, D.C.—It is highly unusual for me to be speaking out politically.
I have worked for Republican and Democratic presidents alike. I was a political appointee during the Reagan administration, serving on the National Security Council staff in the White House. I held a senior position in the State Department during George H. W. Bush's presidency. And, I was Bill Clinton's Middle East peace negotiator -- also a senior appointee position.
I have been largely nonpartisan, living the ideal that politics stopped at the water's edge, and foreign policy should somehow be above politics. So why am I now speaking out and calling on others to support Sen. Barack Obama?
Put simply, because the stakes are so high. For one thing, the financial meltdown has huge implications for our place in the world. We cannot be strong internationally if we are weak at home, with an economy in crisis. Our next president must understand the global economy and financial markets -- and be able to inspire confidence at home and abroad. But he must do so at a time when our standing in the world has, at least in my memory, never been lower.
While we must never rely on anyone else to do for us what we must do for ourselves in national security, there are multiple threats today that we cannot resolve without the cooperation of others. In fact, when it comes to preventing the worst weapons from falling into the worst hands or defeating apocalyptic terror groups or coping with global health challenges or stopping global warming or avoiding an international depression, we cannot do everything on our own. We need others internationally to accept our objectives and be prepared to join their means to ours.
When I was with Obama in Berlin and more than 200,000 people turned out in the heart of Europe to wave American flags, this was an extraordinary development. It reminded us that an American leader who is admired can lead not only our country but also make it easier for others to follow our lead. And, when I look at the Middle East -- where we face our greatest threats today -- we need others to follow our lead in stopping Iran from going nuclear and discrediting radical Islamists.
Today, we are in trouble in the Middle East. Everywhere we look -- whether in the Gulf, Iraq, Lebanon or Gaza and the West Bank -- we see Iran challenging American interests and allies. Iran uses coercion and intimidation -- using groups like Hezbollah and Hamas -- to weaken existing regimes and to employ terror. It is Iran that arms these groups and threatens Israel on a daily basis.
Consider what has happened to Israel's strategic position during the course of the Bush administration. In 2001, Iran was not a nuclear power, but it is today. It could not enrich uranium then but it does so now and has already stockpiled several-hundred kilos of low-enriched uranium -- about half of what it would need for its first nuclear bomb. The Bush policy on Iran has failed, and unless the next president can change Iranian behavior, Israel will face an existential threat. It already faces a dramatically different threat from what it faced seven years ago from both Hezbollah and Hamas.
Hezbollah now has a veto power over any decision the Lebanese government can make and possesses 40,000 rockets -- and those rockets are not only three times as many as it had only two years ago but are more accurate and have longer range than the ones that hit Israel in the summer of 2006. Hamas has taken over Gaza, creating a miniterror state there and today has over 2,000 rockets.
Israel cannot afford four more years of seeing the threats grow against it. It cannot afford four more years of U.S. policies that are tough rhetorically but soft practically. It cannot afford four more years of America being on the sidelines diplomatically.
When I was in Israel a few weeks ago, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey and Sheikh Hamid of Qatar were all visiting Damascus, and Israelis asked me who was there watching out for Israel's interests? Similarly, who was there to watch out for Israel's interests when Qatar brokered the understanding that gave Hezbollah a veto over any Lebanese decision after the fighting in May? Israel can surely watch out for its own interests in the indirect negotiations that Turkey is mediating between Israel and Syria, but will Turkey be as concerned for Israel's interests as America would be?
It should come as no surprise that when America sits on the sidelines in the Middle East, it creates a diplomatic vacuum, and others invariably fill it. Since the Bush administration would not engage Iran, the Europeans have taken the lead on the diplomacy. While their efforts have been serious and genuine, it is clear that they have not generated the pressure that America in the lead might have produced -- and absent that pressure and absent the Iranians being forced to make a choice, Iran will not change its behavior.
I was with Obama in Israel and in Europe, and I saw how he focused on the urgency of the Iranian threat. I saw how he used his discussions in Israel to remind the European leaders that Israelis are justified in seeing Iran with nuclear weapons as an existential threat -- and that for Israel's sake and our own we must put far more pressure on Iran if we are to stop it from going nuclear.
Obama understands that weak sticks and weak carrots -- the current policy -- can't work. We need strong sticks to concentrate the Iranian mind on what they stand to lose, and we need strong carrots, conveyed directly, to show the Iranians they have something to gain by giving up their nuclear weapon pursuit. And, if in the end diplomacy fails, the fact that we engaged directly and Iran was unwilling to alter its behavior creates a very different context for tougher options.
Engaging without illusions might be one way to describe how diplomacy would be conducted in an Obama administration. Just like with Iran, he would engage on Arab-Israeli peace. Not because he knows it will produce peace, but because he again understands the consequences of disengagement. Who gained when the Bush administration walked away from peace making for more than six years and then in its last years pursued it incompetently? Hamas, because like all radical Islamists, they gain when there is hopelessness and frustration. Who lost? Those in the Arab and Palestinian world who favor a two-state solution but need the possibility of peace to make their case and to have the political space to build their authority.
It is my Middle Eastern hat and my attachment to Israel that ultimately inspires my support for Obama. I saw first hand his appreciation for Israel's predicament, its needs and his instinctive and emotional commitment to the relationship. But more than this, I know he understands that neither Israel nor America can afford four more years of Iran and the radical Islamists gaining strategic leverage in the Middle East. Slogans won't prevent that. A fixation on Iraq won't prevent that. But a leader who understands how to use all the elements of American power, revitalize that power and influence and get others to follow us in order to ensure we win the battle for hearts and minds will be able to do so.
In this election, it is clear to me that Obama is that leader.
LIFE & TERM INSURANCE SERVICES
UNITED JEWISH FEDERATION OF SAN DIEGO
TORAH ON ONE FOOT
Did the Holocaust have a purpose?
By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal
 SAN DIEGO—On the first night of Rosh Hashana I discussed Tziduk Ha-Din ("The Justness of the Verdict") that is recited at funerals. Congregants and I studied the text together on the second day of Rosh Hashana.
The very first line of this prayer comes from this week's parasha:
"The Rock!-His deeds are perfect,
Yea, all His ways are just;
A faithful God, never false,
True and upright is he." (Deut. 32:4)
A man once approached the Chazon Ish (Rabbi Avrohom Yeshaya Karelit, 1878-1953) and asked him: "If God is so perfect and just, how do you explain the Shoah and the devastation of European Jewry?"
The Chazon Ish answered: "A person who sees a tailor at work and does not understand the art of tailoring, sees the tailor cutting and ripping the cloth, and thinks he is destroying it. However, the reality is that the destruction is necessary to create a new garment." (Otzar Chaim, Devarim, p. 162)
Without knowing something about the Chazon Ish, this seems a peculiar answer. He says that the destruction of European Jewry was required to create something new. He does not, however, tell us what the "new garment" is that God created.
There is no doubt, however, that the Chazon Ish believed the "new garment" was the renewed Jewish settlement in Eretz Yisrael. Rabbi Avrohom Yeshaya Karelit was born in Kosava and moved to Vilna at a young age. In 1933 he made aliyah to Eretz Yisrael and settled in the ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of B'nei Brak near Tel Aviv. He was renown for his scholarship and his meeting with David Ben-Gurion in which he argued that the needs of the religious community should take precedence over the secular. He was an advocate of the resettlement of our ancient Jewish homeland.
While his explanation of God's role in the destruction of European Jewry is theologically troubling, it is important to note that his response is much different than the other explanations of the Shoah heard in the ultra-Orthodox community. For example, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, former Chief Sephardic Rabbi of Israel, said in the year 2000: "the 6 million Holocaust victims were reincarnations of the souls of sinners, people who transgressed and did all sorts of things that should not be done. They had been reincarnated in order to atone."
Most Jews today understand the establishment of the State of Israel and its recognition by the international community as one of the consequences of the Shoah. Whether or not we believe the murder of European Jewry was an appropriate price to be paid for it is another story.
I would argue "no." But that answer leads to another question: would the State of Israel exist
SOILLE SAN DIEGO HEBREW DAY SCHOOL
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Pease click the ad above to learn more about JFS "On the Go" program for seniors. To read a San Diego Jewish World story on the program, please click here.
Great Activities Offered at College Avenue Senior Center!
AMAZING STORIES OF JUDAISM
The trusting Hebrew women of the Exodus
By Rabbi Baruch Lederman
 SAN DIEGO—Structurally speaking, the Succah is but a mere hut with a leaky roof. Consequently, when we enter the Succah it drives home the lesson that it is not the building that protects us; it is
Hashem (G-d) Who protects us. Bitachon (trust) in Hashem is the cornerstone of our lives and observance as Jews, as the following true story illustrates:
Moshe Rabbeinu had been given a directive from Hashem to build the Mishkan (tabernacle) in the desert. The mishkan was a forerunner to the Bais Hamikdash which would eventually be built in Jerusalem. This task involved many aspects including fundraising. In fact this may be the first example of a Rabbi soliciting donors for a building fund.
The challenge wasn't raising enough money. Once the call went out, the Children of Israel were eager to contribute and much more came in than could actually be utilized. The big challenge was determining which donations to use and which to return. The women gathered en masse to have the privilege of contributing their most prized possession - their copper mirrors. They didn't have glass mirrors like today; they used shiny polished copper to see their reflections.
Moshe was in a quandary. He needed copper for the kior. The kior was a basin used by the Kohanim to purify themselves by pouring the water from inside the kior on their hands and feet before beginning any service in the mishkan. On the one hand Moshe appreciated the deep sacrifice these women were making by offering their copper mirrors. On the other hand, how could copper that was used for mirrors, an object of vanity; be used for the holy kior, a symbol of purity.
The Midrash Tanchuma informs us that Moshe posed this conundrum to Hashem Who directed Moshe to accept them. "These gifts are more precious to me than the rest," said Hashem, "Because through these, Jewish women were able to produce great multitudes in Egypt."
What was Hashem referring to? While the Jews were slaves in Egypt, the men were given backbreaking tasks in the fields. They came home each night physically beaten and emotionally exhausted. Who would have the strength to produce children under these circumstances? Who would want to bring children into such a world?
The Jewish women had unwavering bitachon in Hashem. They used their copper mirrors along with whatever crude makeup was available to them to beautify themselves. Their goal was not for vanity but to make themselves appealing and stimulating to their husbands in order to create generations of Klal Yisroel. The courage and pure faith of these noble women appropriately earned them the honor and the right to have their gifts accepted in the mishkan even before all others.
It is easy to have bitachon when things are easy. We need to be grateful to these valorous women for teaching us what true bitachon is all about; plus, if not for them, we wouldn't be here.
Dedicated by Don Grande in honor of his Eishes Chayil, Barbara Grande.
SAN DIEGO JEWISH ACADEMY
SDJA's Ali Tradonsky a semifinalist in national science fair competition
HOCKEY
A bissel sports trivia with Bruce Lowitt
 OLDSMAR, Florida--Q: What NHL veteran left the Detroit Red Wings on July 1, 2007, the season before they won the Stanley Cup, and signed with the Anaheim Ducks the season after they won it?
(a) Shor Masori
(b) Mathieu Schneider
(c) Jamie Black
(d) Harry Howell
Background: This New York City-born defenseman is entering his 20th NHL season. He played the first seven with the Montreal Canadiens, with whom he won the Stanley Cup in 1993, and was on the USA team at the 2006 Olympics in Turin, Italy.
Please click here for answers
JEWISH-AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE
XLNC-1 RADIO
RHODES MARKETING GROUP
CAMPAIGN 2008
Ballot Recommendation: No on California Proposition 4, a San Diego Jewish World editorial by Donald H. Harrison
Marty Block, a pioneer in educational outreach, seeks 78th Dist. Assembly seat by Donald H. Harrison in San Diego
INTERNATIONAL
Pending leadership changes in Israel, West Bank and U.S. stymy Middle East progress by Shoshana Bryen in Washington, D.C.
Second intifada not officially over, but clearly it has lost almost all its steam by Ira Sharkansky in Jerusalem
Imagine, Israel without any traffic! by Judy Lash Balint in Jerusalem
SAN DIEGO
Sam Sultan was a blessing in our lives by Sara Appel-Lennon in San Diego
ADVENTURES IN SAN DIEGO JEWISH HISTORY
—March 10, 1950: ‘New Americans ’in San Diego by Julia Kaufman
—March 10, 1950:Poet's Corner: "Contented" by Abe Sackheim
—March 10, 1950:Hebrew Home for the Aged
COMMUNITY WATCH
Jewish Family Service—Thanksgiving Day Run for the Hungry benefits JFS Foodmobile, S.D. Food Bank
Lawrence Family JCC— Journalist Sheila Weller presents new book on Carole King, Joni Mitchell, and Carly Simon at San Diego Jewish Book Fair on November 6
San Diego Jewish Academy—Gabriela Stratton, originally from Chile, now directs SDJA Admissions
CAMPAIGN 2008
U.N. won't hamper U.S. defense of Israel, McCain and Obama agree during debate; by Donald H. Harrison in San Diego
Ballot recommendation: Vote No on California Proposition 8; a San Diego Jewish World editorial by Donald H. Harrison
RJC blasts Obama on Iran policy; by Suzanne Kurtz in Washington, D.C.
NJDC ad extols Obama's energy policy; by Aaron Keyak in Washington, D.C.
JUDAISM
Jerusalem sights, sounds of Days of Awe; by Judy Lash Balint in Jerusalem
INTERNATIONAL
The Jews Down Under, a roundup of Australian Jewish news by Garry Fabian in Melbourne, Australia:
—JNF briefs Australian minister on its efforts to provide environmental scholarship
—Shul merger proposal on hold
—Young footballer on international stage
—Best & Fairest Award caps off great season
—MP calls for bi-partisan support for terror conviction
—Uniting Jews of the Asia-Pacific
—Holiday Havoc - How it impacts on business
—Yom Kippur do's and don'ts
—Toben could face jail in Australia and Germany
—Australia's nuclear free agenda
—How elections are run "Down Under"
ARTS
Thursdays* With The Songs of Hal Wingard:
—#295, Time To Think
—#311, Father-Son Advice
—#300, Medical Advice
ADVENTURES IN SAN DIEGO JEWISH HISTORY
—February 24, 1950: Hadassah by Mrs. Louis Bickman
—March 10, 1950: ‘Keep The Miracle Alive’ Will Take $283,000 For S.D.
—March 10, 1950: United Jewish Fund Rally March 21st To Hear Naval Commander
—March 10, 1950: United Jewish Fund Drive {Editorial}
—March 10, 1950: The Cottage of Israel {Editorial}
COMMUNITY WATCH
—Jewish American Chamber of Commerce: Sukkot Mixer on Thursday 10/16 @ 5:30 p.m.
—Jewish Family Service: Free Transportation To Yom Kippur Services for Older Adults!
—San Diego Jewish Academy: Bogomolny and Decker semifinalist in National Merit Scholarship competition |
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INTERNATIONAL/ CAMPAIGN 2008
Israel handled its bank crisis much better; by J. Zel Lurie in Delray Beach, Florida
Now it's nuclear India, front and center; by Shoshana Bryen in Washington, D.C.
JUDAISM
The dramatic story of the Kol Nidre, by Cantor Sheldon Merel in San Diego, with a recording of him chanting the well known Yom Kippur melody
A stereotype in time for Yom Kippur by Rabbi Simcha Weinstein in New York
ARTS
Third Story was about three too many by Carol Davis in La Jolla, California
ADVENTURES IN SAN DIEGO JEWISH HISTORY
—February 24, 1950: Labor Zionist Organization
—February 24, 1950: Inside AZA by Leonard Naiman
—February 24, 1950: Temple Beth Israel Sisterhood by Lillian Heiman
—February 24, 1950: JCRA by Anna B. Brooks
COMMUNITY WATCH
Jewish Family Service: Free Transportation To Yom Kippur Services for Older Adults!
San Diego Jewish Academy: DeTar returns from Bronfman Youth Fellowship summer in Israel
Tifereth Israel Synagogue: Does the Torah Really Say That? - An Exploration of Midrash Agadah
INTERNATIONAL
Democrats, please speak up on Israel! by Donald H. Harrison in San Diego
Israel's justice ministry in disarray about what to do about the Katsav scandal; by Ira Sharkansky in Jerusalem
JUDAISM
55-year quest resumed, circle completed by Sheila Orysiek in San Diego
ARTS
Dying City juxtaposes Iraq war, and wars we fight in our homes by Carol Davis in San Diego
ADVENTURES IN SAN DIEGO JEWISH HISTORY
—February 24, 1950: S.D. Birdie Stodel Bnai Brith, Chapter No. 92
—February 24, 1950: Tifereth Israel Synagogue
—February 24, 1950: Pioneer Women (Negba) Club
—February 24, 1950: Defy Income Tax Blues
COMMUNITY WATCH
Jewish Family Service: Free Transportation To Yom Kippur Services for Older Adults!
Soille San Diego Hebrew Day School: Soille Hebrew Day preschoolers enjoyed sounds, aroma of Rosh Hashanah
Tifereth Israel Synagogue: October 11 Midrash Shabbat Program: The Ushpizin
INTERNATIONAL
Arab, Jewish children join in peace performance in Jerusalem; by Dorothea Shefer-Vanson in Jerusalem
NATIONAL/ CAMPAIGN 2008
RJC, NJDC unveil new ad campaigns (from news releases), with links to video clips
JUDAISM
What about the deeds we failed to do? by Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal in San Diego
Yom Kippur thoughts on foregiveness; by Rabbi Baruch Lederman in San Diego
SAN DIEGO
Award-winning religion writer urges clergy to become more 'relevant'; by Donald H. Harrison in San Diego
SPORTS
A bissel sports trivia with Bruce Lowitt in Oldsmar, Florida
ADVENTURES IN SAN DIEGO JEWISH HISTORY
—February 24, 1950: Who’s New
—February 24, 1950: Brotherhood In Action
—February 24, 1950: Toy Shower
—February 24, 1950: Jewish War Veterans Auxiliary by Binnie Brooks
—February 24, 1950: News of the Fox by John Kluchin
—February 24, 1950: Tifereth Israel Men’s Club
COMMUNITY WATCH
Jewish Community Foundation: Government and Philanthropy - Setting a Common Agenda
Jewish Family Service: Free Transportation To Yom Kippur Services for Older Adults
San Diego Rabbinical Association: San Diego Rabbinical Association tells Kever Avot/ Imahot service schedule
Soille San Diego Hebrew Day School: How Rosh Hashanah was celebrated in Soille’s Hebrew classes
Tifereth Israel Synagogue: Israel Advocacy and Israeli Dance
Link to previous editions
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WASHINGTON, D.C.—
San Diego Jewish Academy ninth grader Ali Tradonsky was recently was chosen as one of 300 semifinalists in the National Intel Middle School Division Science Fair competition. Competing against 1,943 entrants, semifinalists were selected from the top 5th through 8th grade scientists who excelled at their regional or state science fairs.
