Uncategorized
This 16-year-old turned her grandmother’s Holocaust survival story into a novel
(New York Jewish Week) — In May of 1937, 7-year-old Inge Eisinger lived in a luxurious Vienna apartment with a pantry stocked with favorite foods and a staff to keep her company. Though she had a strained relationship with her mother and an absent father, Inge, who was mostly raised by her maternal grandmother Anna, was living a charmed life.
This is the scene that opens “Running for Shelter,” a young adult novel about the Holocaust written by a young adult herself: 16-year-old Suzette Sheft, who is a junior at the Horace Mann School in the Bronx. In the novel, Sheft retells her grandmother’s story of surviving the Holocaust.
Published by Amsterdam Publishers, which specializes in Holocaust memoirs, the book is a delicate and powerful reminder of the importance of recording one’s family history. It’s a lesson Sheft learned too early in life: Her father died of pancreatic cancer when Sheft was just 13 and she soon realized she was forgetting all the stories he told her about his childhood.
“I fantasized about rewinding time, so I could go back and record my favorite stories about his childhood,” Sheft writes in an author’s note. “I wished I had taken the time to write these stories down when I had the chance, because his death allowed me to understand the vitality of preserving the stories of our loved ones before it is too late.”
In memory of her father, Sheft recorded the story of his mother, her grandmother Monique Sheft, who was once the Viennese school girl Inge Eisinger.
In pre-war Austria, Eisinger had been living a completely assimilated life — so much so that her parents never even told her that she was Jewish. Following the Nazi takeover of Austria, her mother managed to whisk the two of them away to Switzerland, then Paris, but soon abandoned her. After a twisting and tragic story, Eisinger eventually reunited with her grandmother and moved to a village in Central France to wait out the war, changing her name to the more French “Monique.”
Sheft’s novel ends in 1946, when the two are on the boat to New York after the war and Eisinger’s grandmother reveals to her that she and her family are actually Jewish.
In spite of this — or perhaps because of it — Sheft, who lives in Manhattan with her mom, her twin brother and two dogs, is very committed to her Jewish identity. “Although my grandmother never really practiced Judaism, my dad was very involved in the Jewish world,” she said. “He was very passionate about Jewish causes and just Judaism, in general. So I felt very connected to the Jewish world because of him.”
The New York Jewish Week talked with Sheft about what the book means to her, why its subject matter is important and what she learned in the process of putting it together.
This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
New York Jewish Week: What was the process of writing the book; how did the idea begin and how did you collect your grandmother’s story?
Suzette Sheft: I had heard a lot of my grandmother’s stories from my dad. I always had an interest in the Holocaust — I would go to Holocaust museums in every city I visited, and I almost exclusively read books about World War II and the Holocaust growing up. So I kind of knew in the back of my head that I wanted to do something like this, but [my father’s death] sparked and ignited the necessity of doing it as soon as possible.
As for the process, a few summers ago I spent a week with my grandmother, interviewing her every day about her escape from Austria to France. At first she shared physical elements of her life, like her apartment and her family dynamics and her school life, but then she began to talk to me about the time leading up to the war — the years before the Germans invaded Austria. As she spoke, I recorded everything she said in bullet point form and I would periodically stop and ask for more detail. The next day, at the beginning of the conversation, I would recap what we had talked about, and then allow her to elaborate or clarify the story.
Later, I wanted to widen my perspective and uncover other stories and details that she may have forgotten, so I watched an interview she did with the USC Shoah Foundation. This was really helpful because there were some details that she had forgotten or that she had left out.
Even though the book is about your grandmother’s life, you wrote it as fiction. How much of the story came from your grandmother’s details, and how much did you have to research or create on your own?
Every event that happens is true, and everything actually happened to her, but there are some small details that I embellished. For me, it was really helpful because, while I love creativity and writing, I sometimes struggle to pick an idea. So the fact that she had all these little stories, and I could expand from those, was something I loved while writing this. I had to use fiction when describing the atmosphere of certain places and also to write the dialogue because I can’t know exactly what they said or how they said it.
Do you have a favorite story your grandma told you that you made sure to get in the book?
Inge goes to a boarding school [in France] with her host family and there the children play a game where they pick someone to be the “torturer,” who is usually whoever they think the ugliest person is. My grandma had red hair and green eyes, and I guess she wasn’t the traditional standard of beauty. They picked her to be the torturer and she would have to pull people’s hair and scratch them. There would also be a queen, who was usually the prettiest girl with blond hair and blue eyes, and she would be protected. I thought it was interesting because to me it was the children’s way of understanding what was going on in the world around them. It’s a bit complicated, but when she told me this story I was completely shocked. It was really fascinating.
For people your age, why do you think Holocaust education is still relevant and important?
Some people my age don’t know anything about the Holocaust. I recently came across a statistic that talked about how little Gen Z knew about the Holocaust. There’s also been a spike in antisemitism and a decrease in awareness of history. For example, with Kanye West, who has a lot of followers, saying antisemitic remarks, a lot of people are going to just go along with what he says. There’s also just been a lot of hate crimes towards Jewish people, especially during COVID.
Lastly, the number of living Holocaust survivors is diminishing by the day. Gen Z is the last generation probably that is ever going to have the ability and the opportunity to speak with Holocaust survivors before they’re all gone. It’s important that we share this book now and then we educate people now before it’s too late.
—
The post This 16-year-old turned her grandmother’s Holocaust survival story into a novel appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Uncategorized
Fire at Postville, Iowa, kosher meat processing plant shuts down production ahead of the High Holidays
(JTA) — A major fire at one of the largest kosher meat processing plants in the United States is poised to increase the price of kosher meat ahead of the High Holidays, in addition to devastating the plant’s local community.
Investigators in Postville, Iowa, said on Wednesday that the fire that devastated AgriStar Processing started accidentally in the facility’s laundry room. The fire, which began on Tuesday, destroyed at least 75% of the plant and has put more than 600 people out of work, Fire Chief Jeff Bohr told the local TV network KCRG.
The fire has also interrupted a linchpin of kosher meat production, according to OU Kosher, the oversight agency run by the Orthodox Union.
“The damaged facility means a significant portion of kosher beef and chicken slaughtered and sold in the US will not enter the kosher supply chain,” Rabbi Moshe Elefant, the organization’s CEO, said in a statement on Wednesday. “Kosher consumers will feel the impact of the tightening supply with reduction of availability.”
Elefant said OU Kosher was working to “find solutions for ramping up production at other plants” while warning that the crisis could fuel bad actors.
“Unfortunately, when supply is limited, it creates opportunity for unscrupulous individuals who seek to make money by preying on the well-meaning Kosher observant public,” he wrote.
Jarad Bernstein, the executive director of the Jewish Federation of Greater Des Moines, said the fire represented “a terrible situation” in an email to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
“The impact on the local community and the business will be large,” he said.
The fire is not the first time that a crisis at AgriStar has sent the community into a tailspin. In 2008, a federal immigration raid at the plant, then known as Agriprocessors, netted the arrest of hundreds of workers and led to the arrest and conviction of the company’s longtime CEO Sholom Rubashkin on 86 counts of bank fraud, mail fraud and money laundering. It also led most of Postville’s Jewish residents to leave the town, which had developed as an unusual stronghold of Orthodox life in eastern Iowa.
Saying that “many people” believed Rubashkin’s 27-year prison sentence had been excessive, President Donald Trump commuted Rubashkin’s sentence in 2017. Rubashkin’s conviction stands.
Canadian Jewish billionaire Hershy Friedman purchased Agriprocessors and reopened it as Agri-Star. He told JTA in 2016 that he had done so after being urged by Jewish leaders to ensure competition in the kosher meat processing industry.
“It wasn’t done for financial purposes; it was done to really cater to the Jewish community,” he said about the purchase. “During the time Rubashkin was closed, the price of beef roughly doubled. After we acquired it, it came right back down.”
Friedman also said he had shored up the company’s employment practices, which had run afoul of the law, and made improvements to the slaughter process that had made Agriprocessors a target of animal rights activists.
Agri-Star said in a statement on Wednesday that it appreciated the first responders who “worked tirelessly and selflessly to protect lives and contain the fire” and the employees who had shown “inspiring” care for each other. It also indicated that it did not yet know the future of the plant.
“We understand there are many questions about what comes next,” Agri-Star wrote on social media. “While we are still gathering information and evaluating our short-term plans, we are committed to sharing verified updates as soon as they become available. We appreciate your patience as we work through this process thoughtfully and responsibly.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Fire at Postville, Iowa, kosher meat processing plant shuts down production ahead of the High Holidays appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
California law on antisemitism in schools will be enforced after free speech challenge is defeated
(JTA) — A California law to prevent antisemitism in schools will be enforced after a federal judge dismissed a challenge from teachers and students who said it violated free speech.
U.S. District Judge Noël Wise on Tuesday ruled against a lawsuit opposing Assembly Bill 715, which went into effect in January. The new law introduces measures to curb the “widespread surge in antisemitic discrimination, harassment, and bullying” faced by “Jewish and Israeli American pupils across California.”
As part of the law, California is establishing an Office of Civil Rights with a new statewide antisemitism prevention coordinator for public schools, who has not yet been appointed. The law mandates teachers to provide “factually accurate” instruction rather than “advocacy, personal opinion, bias, or partisanship.” It requires local educational agencies to take action if they find that instruction or school-sponsored materials are discriminatory.
A group of teachers, students and the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee filed a challenge in November. They said the law was unconstitutionally vague, chilled speech in the classroom about Palestinians and discriminated against Palestinian, Arab and Muslim students and perspectives.
Wise said it was too soon to consider these claims, given the uncertainties still surrounding the new Office of Civil Rights, its leadership and how it will define and respond to antisemitism. She also said that teachers and students did not provide sufficient evidence of infringements on free speech, and teachers could not claim speech rights on the job.
“Teacher Plaintiffs are not acting as private citizens and therefore do not have First Amendment rights while teaching,” Wise said in her ruling.
She also dismissed the claim that the law would discriminate against non-Jewish students. “The existence of an Antisemitism Coordinator does not change the Office’s overarching purpose to stop discrimination generally; it merely reflects the State’s decision to accord specific funds to a specific problem,” she said.
Malak Afaneh, a staff attorney at ADC, said the group was reviewing the court’s decision and considering its options.
“AB 715 has already caused educators to alter the way they teach out of fear that classroom discussions or activities could trigger complaints or investigations,” Afaneh said in a statement. “When teachers feel compelled to abandon cultural identity projects or avoid discussions about Palestine, it is students who are denied the opportunity to engage with diverse ideas and perspectives.”
The Jewish Community Relations Council of San Francisco celebrated Wise’s decision as “great news.”
“This ruling, and the fact that the case has been dismissed with prejudice, affirms that AB 715 is a strong, legitimate approach to protecting Jewish students — and all students — against harassment and discrimination,” the group said.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post California law on antisemitism in schools will be enforced after free speech challenge is defeated appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
The El-Sayed effect: How Jews and Israel are factoring into Michigan’s other primary races
(JTA) — DETROIT — The intra-party debate over Israel that has dominated Michigan’s Democratic U.S. Senate primary is reverberating further down the ballot throughout the state.
Progressive former county health official Abdul El-Sayed’s bid to lead a swing state as an avowedly pro-Palestinian senator is being mirrored on a micro scale in Michigan’s 7th District — one of the nation’s most hotly contested congressional seats. In addition to endorsing a candidate there, El-Sayed and his movement have also taken aim at a Detroit-area incumbent who has belatedly embraced a pro-Israel platform, while a key architect of the 2024 “Uncommitted” movement is also running for local office.
In contrast, a young Jewish candidate hopes to pick up the mantle of El-Sayed’s rival in the Senate race, centrist U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens — and buck a growing national trend of Democrats turning away from supporting Israel. Jewish Democrats in the state, many of whom are drifting away from the party as a result of the discourse around the primary, are watching closely.
Here’s what you need to know about how Israel and Jewish issues are affecting other races in Michigan’s primary on Tuesday.
A swing district Dems hope to flip is dragged into the Israel debate
In Michigan’s 7th District, William Lawrence, a former climate activist who has called for an end to all military aid to Israel, is challenging two centrist Democrats for the party’s nomination.
The district, which stretches from the state capitol in Lansing into the Detroit exurbs and encompasses Michigan State University, is currently represented by a Republican. But Democrats are eyeing it as a promising pickup; the seat was previously held by Jewish Democrat Elissa Slotkin, who won her Senate election in 2024 even as Donald Trump won the state.
Lawrence’s campaign, though, is far from Slotkin’s staunchly moderate playbook. Lawrence recently rallied with El-Sayed, independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, and New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in Lansing, where he called to “stop arming Israel and bring our money home to invest in housing and social security.”
Both of his major primary opponents, former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink and former Navy SEAL and Obama military aide Matt Maasdam, declined to refer to Israel’s conduct in Gaza as a genocide at a candidate forum, while Lawrence did. Recent polling from two Brink-sponsored firms shows Brink in the lead, while an April poll from the Lawrence-aligned Data For Progress puts him ahead by 6 points. Lawrence’s hopes for the nomination likely rest on Brink and Maasdam splitting the establishment vote.
As with many progressives running this cycle, opposition to Israel makes up a key part of Lawrence’s pitch — which his campaign feels confident about, despite the purple political makeup of the district.
“There is broad support for ending military support to human rights abusers and bringing that money home to fund good jobs, housing, and healthcare here at home,” his campaign told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in an emailed statement responding to a list of questions about his positions on Israel.
Lawrence was a co-founder of the influential climate activist group Sunrise Movement, which has experienced infighting over pro-Palestinian advocacy. His rhetoric on Israel also played a role in the biggest scandal of his campaign to date. Comments he made on a 2024 podcast disparaging Black Democratic leaders as “a pillar, frankly, for establishment, capitalist, imperialist American power” that “defangs the white left” resurfaced shortly before his big-ticket rally earlier this month.
The Congressional Black Caucus condemned his remarks and called on his supporters to “withdraw their support.” In a subsequent statement, Lawrence said he had been referencing “my horror at the genocide in Gaza” and talking about working “to organize Black Americans against the genocide.” (Though she appeared at the Lansing rally with him, Ocasio-Cortez has declined to endorse Lawrence.)
Fewer than 10,000 Jews live in the greater Lansing area, out of a total population of 479,000, according to a 2021 population report from Brandeis University. Local Jewish institutions have expressed alarm about El-Sayed’s movement: When the candidate brought left-wing streamer Hasan Piker to MSU’s campus for a rally earlier this year, the university’s Hillel issued a statement saying it was “deeply troubled” by the appearance of what it called a “known antisemite.”
Asked by JTA about the safety of his Jewish would-be constituents, Lawrence’s campaign responded, “Will takes Jewish safety extremely seriously and stands firmly against anti-semetisim [sic] which is unfortunately on the rise across the political spectrum.” The Brink and Maasdam campaigns did not respond to JTA requests for comment.
After moving from DSA to pro-Israel, this Detroit congressman is fighting to keep his seat
Why is a Detroit-area race between two non-Jews, in a district with few Jews, also pivoting on Israel? The answer reveals the state of intra-left politics today.
In Michigan’s 13th District, encompassing much of Detroit and its western suburbs, state Rep. Donavan McKinney is challenging incumbent U.S. Rep. Shri Thanedar for the Democratic nomination. A member of the Democratic Socialists of America who has been endorsed by, and campaigned with, El-Sayed and national pro-Palestinian figures, McKinney’s campaign literature champions a focus on “kitchen-table issues,” including public health in Detroit.
Yet his website’s major policies also include a large section labeled “Palestine,” in which he pledges to end military aid to Israel and calls on Israel to “release all Palestinians who have been detained.”
A Black politician running against an Indian-American incumbent in a majority-Black district, McKinney has also made racial representation a central factor to his campaign, twinning Black identity with the pro-Palestinian cause as a growing number of other local activists have also done.
McKinney’s embrace of the issue could play particularly well in his race against Thanedar, who has — unusually — ventured from the left to the center on Israel. A businessman and failed gubernatorial candidate (he and El-Sayed both lost the Democratic primary to Gretchen Whitmer in 2018), Thanedar was initially a DSA member himself. As a state legislator in 2021, he co-sponsored legislation calling for an end to U.S. military support of Israel.
He abruptly changed course during his 2022 congressional run, in a redrawn district formerly held by Palestinian-American Rep. Rashida Tlaib. Thanedar then expressed more pro-Israel views on the campaign trail even as pro-Israel lobbyists AIPAC endorsed an opponent. (He largely self-financed his successful congressional run.)
Once in Congress, Thanedar took an AIPAC-sponsored trip to Israel and shifted his views to become a staunch pro-Israel advocate. After the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, he renounced his DSA membership, citing a New York rally hosted by the group praising the attacks that he called “hate-filled and antisemitic.”
“I see this as the biggest murdering of Jews since the Holocaust,” Thanedar told the Michigan Advance, of the attacks, also publicly criticizing Tlaib for her own response. AIPAC, once his enemy, spent more than $2 million on his 2024 reelection campaign, according to federal disclosures. The lobbyists are fundraising for Thanedar again this cycle, though the latest reported federal elections data indicate that AIPAC-aligned spending for him has been a tiny fraction of the millions it has spent in other races.
The battle looks to be bruising. Polling is scant, but a progressive-aligned poll earlier this month had Thanedar a narrow 4 points up. On Monday a handful of Congressional Black Caucus members, breaking with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, endorsed McKinney — a rare measure to take against an incumbent. The caucus’s McKinney backers include Reps. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Summer Lee of Pennsylvania, both hardline Israel critics.
Neither McKinney’s nor Thanedar’s campaigns responded to JTA requests for comment for this article.
A young Jewish LGBTQ legislator may pick up Stevens’ pro-Israel torch
As Jewish Democrats in Oakland County, the affluent, heavily Jewish Detroit suburbs, have bemoaned the state-level Democratic tilt toward anti-Israel rhetoric, many are clinging to a silver lining: state Sen. Jeremy Moss, who is bidding for Stevens’ congressional seat in the 11th District.
Moss, a Jewish and pro-Israel candidate, has a campaign platform of standard liberal issues including gun safety, cost of living and LGBTQ rights (Moss is gay). He has been endorsed by many of the state’s leading Democrats. And while his campaign website platform doesn’t mention Israel or antisemitism, he has angrily denounced antisemitism in both parties.
“The overwhelming majority of Jews believe in a place of refuge in a Jewish homeland. But if you even mention how woven the Jewish religion is with Jewish sovereignty in Israel, today you get called a ‘colonizer,’ a ‘racist,’” Moss said in a 2024 speech from the state Senate floor. “‘Zionist’ is now being weaponized as a slur, and it is infuriating that the same people who will say that also post ‘Happy Passover’ to all who are observing without acknowledging what we’re actually observing.”
Moss called out antisemitism on the left again after the attack on Temple Israel in West Bloomfield earlier this year. Following the state Democratic convention in Detroit, at which a lawyer for pro-Palestinian encampments who had a social media history of praising Hezbollah received the party’s nomination for the University of Michigan board of regents, Moss called the nomination “unacceptable” and said he would refuse to vote for the nominee. Moss’s campaign did not return a JTA request for comment for this story.
Many Jews in the district who back Stevens also have high praise for Moss — though AIPAC, which has broken campaign records in spending for Stevens’ Senate race, has spent minimally for Moss, according to the latest federal elections data. Democratic Majority for Israel made a small donation to his campaign, as have former AIPAC leaders.
Moss probably doesn’t need their support: He has a strong likelihood of prevailing in the primary. Though polling in the district is scant, he dwarfs his competitors in fundraising and name recognition. Some pro-Palestinian progressives, including California U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna, have backed Aisha Farooqi, an attorney who has called to halt military aid to Israel. Her campaign, though, hasn’t caught on with El-Sayed’s supporters on the level of Lawrence’s or McKinney’s. Another fringe candidate, Don Ufford, launched a website called “AIPAC Jeremy Moss” in a bid to target the presumptive frontrunner.
Should Moss prevail in the primary and in the general election, he would return the heavily Jewish district to Jewish representation for the first time since former U.S. Rep. Andy Levin lost his 2022 reelection bid to Stevens — in a redistricted primary that saw AIPAC backing Stevens. Levin, a progressive, is backing El-Sayed in the Senate race.
An ‘Uncommitted’ founder returns … with big-ticket Democratic support
Further down the ballot, a key architect of Michigan’s 2024 “Uncommitted” movement designed to pressure Democrats on Israel is running for state Senate — as a Democrat.
Abbas Alawieh, a Lebanese-American former legislative staffer for both Levin and Tlaib, is making a bid for local office after becoming a national name for his role in pushing Democrats to vote “Uncommitted” over former President Joe Biden in the 2024 state primary ballot. The movement, which began as Listen to Michigan, was based largely on dissatisfaction with Biden’s support of Israel’s war in Gaza.
It attracted a groundswell of support — including from some Jews — and spread to other states, crystallizing a lack of enthusiasm for Biden that built to him stepping off the presidential ticket. Alawieh emerged again as a thorn in the party’s side during that year’s Democratic National Convention, when he and other “Uncommitted” delegates unsuccessfully lobbied to place a Palestinian speaker on the agenda.
As he now emerges as a party hopeful, Alawieh is mending some surprising fences in the establishment. This month he secured the endorsement of Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, and recently sat down for a meeting with former Vice President Kamala Harris — who lost Michigan in her 2024 presidential run, which many analysts chalked up at least in part to “Uncommitted.” (Alawieh himself has said he voted for Harris, though not all of his movement’s co-founders did.)
The former VP “initiated” the meeting after months of phone calls, Alawieh said in a statement, adding that he had urged her to oppose “the Israeli military’s genocide in Gaza” and “ethnic cleansing” in Lebanon.
Alawieh says he doesn’t expect Israel to be a major part of his focus in the state Senate. Still, he recently told the Michigan Advance, “The party was undoubtedly wrong about Gaza in 2024.” His campaign did not respond to a JTA request for comment.
He is running in a district that includes Dearborn, which has a large Arab and Muslim population. Alawieh isn’t the only “Uncommitted”-adjacent figure running for office this primary cycle: In Wisconsin, Francesca Hong, who helped lead the parallel “Uninstructed” movement, has a plausible path to victory in her gubernatorial primary.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post The El-Sayed effect: How Jews and Israel are factoring into Michigan’s other primary races appeared first on The Forward.
