Volume 50, Issue 7

When Rabbi Yonah Geller died on the evening of Nov. 15, after falling two days before from his porch steps in Northwest Portland, a pillar of Portland’s Jewish community was taken away.

The news spread quickly and, while the passing of an 87-year-old man may not have been a surprise, it was sharply stunning in that everyone knew our community had lost one of its brightest stars.

ANNAPOLIS, Md. (JTA)—The most striking concession to emerge from the Palestinian-Israeli talks in Annaopolis, Md., last month came neither from the Israelis nor the Palestinians, but from the Bush administration.

Pam Vergun and her 6-year-old Marshallese daughter Miko and 5-year-old African-American son Isaac found the process of converting to Judaism made easier and more joyful by the free Jewish books they receive from the PJ Library each month.

JERUSALEM (JTA)—The gravestone of Hannah Senesh has been moved to Israel.

Israel’s defense ministry announced that the gravestone, erected in a Budapest cemetery, had been moved next to her former home on Kibbutz Sdot Yam.

Last month, the Community Relations Committee and local American Jewish Committee jointly addressed religion in schools and hunger, while separately AJC tackled the genocide in Darfur and CRC took on hate education in Palestinian schools.

The Nov. 13 Harvest of Hope Breakfast was sponsored by the Oregon Faith Roundtable Against Hunger. OFRAH is one of many projects on which the Oregon Chapter of the American Jewish Committee and the Community Relations Committee of the Jewish Federation of Greater Portland collaborate.

Forty volunteers and staff members gathered Nov. 19 at the Jewish Family and Child Service offices to pack and deliver Thanksgiving food baskets to clients and community members who may have otherwise been unable to obtain a holiday meal.

OREGON AJC honored local attorney Barnes H. Ellis, second from left, of Stoel Rives LLP with the 2007 Judge Learned Hand Award for Lifetime Achievement at a luncheon on Nov. 15.

More than 250 men, women and children from as far away as Eugene and Lexington, Ore., gathered at the Mittleman Jewish Community Center in mid-November for a special Scholar-in-Residence weekend featuring Tziporah Heller of Jerusalem.

Over the past four years, the Department of Early Childhood Education at Congregation Beth Israel has developed enhancement programming beyond the preschool to meet the needs of parents and children in the community.

Halfway through its inaugural season, players are having a ball in the coed Jewish Dodgeball and Drinks League.

The 50 slots available for the first season were filled before the registration deadline.

The B’nai B’rith Camp Alumni Association is reaching out to future campers very early—in fact these future campers are too young to even say camp.

Worms, Germany, is a small, moderately quaint town of about 86,000 people that my husband, David, and I walked in less than a sun-dappled day. The clear, crisp October day we spent there also was a sobering one, from a Jewish perspective.

This Star of David does not connote the location of a synagogue. Rather, here in the Alsace region of France (northeastern France, adjacent along its eastern border to Germany), this symbol hundreds of years ago simply meant you could quaff beer here.

NEW YORK—One of the Jewish calendar’s most widespread and public observances, the Hanukkah holiday has traditionally emphasized two miracles: the military victory of Jewish rebels over Greek invaders, and the one vial of oil that lasted for eight nights

Brandon Roy of the Portland Trail Blazers drives around Shane Battier of the Houston Rockets during a game on Dec. 20, 2006, at the Rose Garden Arena in Portland. One of Roy’s teammates will attend the Young Adult Hanukkah Party at the Hanukkah Jewish Celebration Night at the Blazer’s Dec. 9 game against the Milwaukee Bucks.

Top three reasons to read the Bible even if you’re not religious:

1.    You can’t claim to be well-read otherwise;
2.    Law, societal mores and a huge number of prime-time TV plots are built on its contents; and
3.    James Kugel.

A popular interactive music class for parents and tots led by “Oy Baby!” musician Kim Palumbis debuts at the Mittleman Jewish Community Center at 9:30 a.m. Dec. 14.

Sponsored by the MJCC, the 45-minute class features Jewish sing-along, Hebrew finger plays, creative movement, musical instruments and a Shabbat celebration. The class repeats Jan. 18 and Feb. 15.

Local teens now have the opportunity to perform challenging music at a national festival in March thanks to the formation of a Portland chapter of HaZamir: The International Jewish Teen Choir.

HaZamir Portland meets every Sunday at 12:15 p.m. in the Portland Jewish Academy chapel, 6651 SW Capitol Hwy., Portland. 

Cantor Linda Shivers of Congregation Neveh Shalom will participate in Kol Isha—A Woman’s Voice, a gala concert in celebration of 20 years of women cantors to be held at the Jewish Theological Seminary’s cantorial school Dec. 16 in New York.

Russia to host Annapolis follow-up

NEW YORK (JTA)—Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Nov. 28 that after the Bush administration hosted the conference including Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Annapolis, Md., Moscow would handle the follow-up meeting.

Hodes on ‘CNN Heroes’

JERUSALEM (JTA)—Dr. Rick Hodes will be featured on “CNN Heroes.” Hodes, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee’s medical director in Ethiopia, is a finalist in the “Championing Children” category of the program, which highlights individuals for their extraordinary achievements.

The Israeli government has turned a blind eye to hate education in Palestinian schools, and the imprint on today’s children could derail the peace process far into the future, said Itamar Marcus, director of Palestinian Media Watch, in his Nov. 15 talk at Portland State University.

The Oregon Jewish Museum will host a panel discussion on the Jews of China on Dec. 9 in conjunction with its current exhibit, “Ludwig Salzer: Man of Letters. From Exile in Shanghai to Life in the United States.”

Robert Shlachter, former president of the Jewish Federation of Greater Portland, was recognized in the publication “2007 Oregon Super Lawyers” as one of the top 10 lawyers (and the high

Massada, created in January 2004 to market products made in Israel at a time of curtailed tourism, is closing its doors in Hillsdale by the end of December.

Protesters disrupt Irving’s Oxford speech

LONDON (JTA)—Hundreds of students demonstrated, sometimes violently, at the Oxford University debating society Nov. 26 to protest the appearance by Irving and Nick Griffin, the leader of the extreme-right British National Party.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, during his recent visit to Washington, stated in widely reported remarks that the resurgence of anti-Semitic propaganda and associated violence around the world should not be minimized or explained away, but attacked head-on.

Fledgling bands often have to beg for gigs.  Not so for Def Schlepper, the house band at Congregation Beth Israel. 

Since their debut performance at the 5767 Beth Israel Hanukkah dinner, the home-grown group has played at a variety of venues, including the community-wide Yom Ha’atzmaut celebration at the Mittleman Jewish Community Center, private homes and monthly Family Shabbat services, under the “Shabbat Combo” banner.

NEW YORK (JTA)—At the age of 14, having a great time dropping doughnuts into boiling oil despite the occasional spatter, little did I realize I was decades ahead of the curve.

In my Ashkenazi world, the feisty little potato pancake flecked with chopped onions was the centerpiece of Hanukkah celebrations. My Jewish friends hailed from families who had emigrated from Central and Eastern Europe.

To the editor:

I had to laugh at Naomi Chazan’s lament that the most visible American backers of Israel are Likud supporters and the Christian right (Jewish Review, Nov. 15, page 19, Guest Opinion: “It’s time for Jews to grapple with the ‘real’ Israel, flaws and all”).

NEW YORK (JTA)—Josh Fine grew up Conservative—day school, USY, summer camp, the works. His wife, Julie Geller, grew up Orthodox.

They moved to Denver four years ago and couldn't find a synagogue they liked, so the young couple created their own: Na’aleh, a pluralistic, non-denominational minyan, or prayer community, for young, Jewish-ly literate Denverites.

SAN FRANCISCO (JTA)—A new online survey of the most active Reform Jews reveals a younger generation that is more comfortable with Jewish ritual than their elders but just as committed to comm

BAGHDAD (JTA)—In some ways, this year’s Hanukkah in Baghdad seemed just like Hanukkah any other year.

TEL AVIV (JTA)—It's been a long journey for the brittle pieces of parchment inked more than 1,000 years ago along the shores of the Sea of Galilee.