Local News
14th annual Cancercare Manitoba Foundation Challenge for Life returning on August 5
By MYRON LOVE The 14th annual Cancercare Manitoba Foundation Challenge for Life 20KM walk (or 200-minute workout) is back again at its new time – as a result of Covid 19 – with several members of our Jewish community once more playing an active role.
As with last year, participants this year are walking in small groups covering the same distance over two weeks from August 5-17.
“Nineteen people are diagnosed with cancer every day,’ says participant Jason Gisser. “Fifty percent of Manitobans will be touched by cancer at some point in their lives.”
Gisser has experienced a more intimate and longer-lasting relationship with cancer than many of the other Challenge for Life participants. The son of David Gisser and Freda Steel was first diagnosed with cancer when he was 18. The still young lawyer has been fighting cancer for half his life now. Happily, an oral chemotherapy pill he has been taking for the past two years has controlled his cancer and allowed him to return to living a normal life.
He first took up the Challenge in 2019 as a way to give back for all the help that he has received over the years from CancerCare Manitoba staff. This year, thus far, he has personally brought in over $4,000 while his team – also consisting of Debbie Abraham, Nora Fien, Marcia Knight, Lois Tessier and Candace Weselowski – has raised about $5,600 – good for fifth place overall.
On Saturday, August 8, Gisser will be fulfilling his Challenge obligations with a 20 km walk encompassing Fort Whyte, Assiniboine Forest and Assiniboine Park. He says that he will be keeping supporters up to date as to his and his team’s progress.
Several other members of our Jewish community are also making their presence felt.
“Once again this year’s top-ranked “Jewish” team is Nancy’s Nightingales with about $10,000 raised as of mid-July. “We were pleasantly surprised that many people donated more this year,” says team captain Louise Raber. “We were a little concerned that some of our past contributors may have been inversely affected financially by the pandemic.”
For 2021, long time team members Connie Botelho, Joanne Katz, Harriet Lyons and Louise Raber and third year member Rhonda Youell have been joined by original team members Heather Cram and Susan Lipnowski.
The“Nightingales” were named after a nurse – a cancer survivor – who is a friend of Louise Raber – and have been part of the Challenge for Life since the beginning 14 years ago.
Close behind Nancy’s Nightingales – in third place in funds raised thus far is Team Schvesters. So far, the “Shvesters” have raised about $8,000 – as of mid-July – and team captain Benji Harvey herself has brought in $4,500 in donations –9th most among individual participants.
Since the beginning of the Challenge for Life, Team Schvesters has raised a total of $246,060 with Benjii Harvey accounting for just under $55,000 (including donations received as of mid-July this year.
The team was founded by the “Greenfeld girls”, Harvey and her sisters, Lesly Katz and Debby Lewis. Two of the sisters had been diagnosed with breast cancer.
This year, Harvey notes, the team members are Benji, Lesly and Deb, Kim Gray and Jody van de Vijsel.
Team Shvesters members focus on the 200 plus minute workout as much as the 20km walk. As with last year, the team members will combine a 15 km walk with a 30 minute upper body core workout and 30 minute yoga stretch.
“We are a small but heartfelt team,” Harvey says. “Even though COVID has changed the event there are still lots of teams participating in their own way – which is fantastic.”
Perennial fundraising dynamo Serratus Superstars have also been walking the Challenge for Life since the Challenge inception in 2008. Team captain Cathy Moser reported in an interview with the JP&N last year that the group had raised over $450,000.00 in those years – through donations, garage sales, concerts, and bake sales.
This year’s team makeup however is much reduced from previous years. Two years ago, there were 25 walkers under the Serratus Superstars banner. This year, the team numbers eight – Moser and her husband, Jeff Itzkow, Faren Bernstein, Sharon Goszer-Tritt, Steve Moscovitch, Monica Newman, Bernie Rubenstein and Harriet Zimmer.
Moser however remains undaunted. She has raised over $2,500 thus far and the team as a whole has brought in just under $5,400 – good for 7th place among teams.
“We have raised over $425,000.00 over the past 11 years – and hope to make it to at least $450,000.00 this year,” she says.
She adds that “we are looking for team members – if you want to invest in your future, email Cathy Moser at cathy.g.moser@gmail.com..
Rocky Pollack’s wife, Sharon, fought cancer for 14 years before her passing in 2012. During that time, both Sharon and Rocky came to appreciate the care that she received from Cancercare Manitoba and they both became actively involved in the organization and the foundation. Rocky has served in a number of positions with the organization over the years and has participated in the Challenge for Life for the last several years as well.
Last year, the retired Provincial Court Judge and his Team No Judgment (which included 12 of his colleagues) raised just under $6000. “We are going to be doing a number of mini competitions to provide our team members with additional motivation,” he says. “Our goal is to raise more money than last year.”
Sister Act’s team once again this year is composed of Pearl Rosenberg and her daughters, Cindy Yusim and Brenda Dahle.
Pearl Rosenberg, 87 is most likely the Challenge for Life’s oldest participant. She lost two daughters to cancer within about a year of each other. Naomi Palansky passed away in 2010 and Michelle Moyer in 2011. Brenda Dahle notes that Naomi walked with her family in the first Challenge For Life Walk.
(And, readers may recall that Naomi’s children, Noah and Lexi, started their own team of walkers, “Kids Count”, shortly after their mother received her cancer diagnosis.)
“I started taking part in the Challenge for Life on Team Chai in 2008,” Dahle says. “I continue to take part in the 20 k walk with my mom and sister Cindy Yusim, in memory of our sisters whose love, strength, and courage continue to inspire us.”With the Challenge due to Covid restrictions again being an individual rather than a group effort, Dahle reports that she and her mother will be walking a little bit every day between August 5 and 17th in Kildonan Park while her sister will be meeting her obligations through cycling.
“Our goal this year is to raise $3,000,” Dahle says. “My mother has already raised more than $1,000 herself (as of mid July).”
Readers can make donations to their preferred team by going online to CancerCarefdn.mb.ca and clicking on Challengeforlife.ca.
Local News
Who is Rabbi Ephraim Bryks and how did his time in Winnipeg prove so convulsive?
By BERNIE BELLAN (Posted December 30) Thirty-five years after Rabbi Ephraim Bryks left this city his name is now back in the news as the result of a new lawsuit that names Rabbi Bryks, the Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregation – for which Bryks served as rabbi for 12 years, and two rabbinical organizations as defendants. You can read more about that lawsuit and what it alleges elsewhere on this website at “lawsuit filed.“
But, aside from questions about why this lawsuit was filed now – some 38 years after the acts for which Bryks is accused of having committed against the plaintiff, there are still so many unanswered questions about Rabbi Bryks’ time in Winnipeg.
In his seminal history of the Jewish people of Manitoba, Allan Levine wrote: “The biggest controversy in the Herzlia’s history – in fact, arguably the most controversial matter in the annals of the Winnipeg Jewish community – involved Rabbi Ephraim Bryks, the synagogue’s rabbi from 1978 to 1990. Bryks arrived in Winnipeg in 1978 at the age of twenty-four, with his wife Yochevaed…”
Levine noted that “Under Bryks’ leadership, the synagogue’s membership increased. He established new programs for youth and immersed himself in the Jewish community. He also initiated Torah Academy, an Orthodox elementary school that operated out of Herzlia and soon had a sizable (sic.) enrollment (sic.).” (Gee Allan, didn’t anyone check your book for spelling mistakes?)
Levine’s story about Bryks goes on to note that controversy first began to circulate openly around Bryks in 1985 in the pages of what our paper was then called, which was the Jewish Post. (We didn’t become The Jewish Post & News until 1987, which was when we took over what had been The Western Jewish News.)
Bryks had been writing a weekly Torah commentary in our paper until three rabbis – Rabbis Rappaport, Weizman, and Neil Rose, sent a letter to the editor (who was my late brother, Matt, at the time) accusing Bryks of having plagiarized several of his columns from a book by Rabbi Reuven Bulka. Matt investigated and discovered that Bryks had indeed plagiarized at least two columns from Bulka’s book. When Matt reported what he had found, Bryks stopped writing his column for us.
“Far worse was yet to come,” Levine’s section about Bryks continues. “In 1987, several parents of young (male and female) children attending Torah Academy alleged that Bryks had sexually abused their children. The Herzlia board properly investigated the matter and heard evidence. According to a CBC-TV documentary on the case, the parents and their children were accused of being liars.”
Levine goes on to note that Winnipeg South Child and Family Services were asked to investigate the matter by the synagogue board, but the agency concluded that “Bryks’ behaviour of having children sit on his lap while he tickled them was ‘neither appropriate nor professional’, but not illegal. That might have been the end of it, but another allegation was made, this time to the Winnipeg Police by parents of an eight-year-old boy who claimed Bryks had fondled him. The police consulted a Crown lawyer, who decided not to pursue it since it came down to the child’s word against that of a rabbi.
“The case tore the Herzlia congregation apart, and some members left the synagogue,” Levine writes.
In 1990, Bryks left Winnipeg for Montreal, where he had been hired to head a Jewish school until parents there learned of the allegations against him in Winnipeg and the offer of employment was rescinded.
Subsequently, Bryks moved to New York, where he founded another private religious school in Queens – this time for children of Russian immigrants.
In 2003, however, Bryks resigned his membership in the Rabbinical Council of America. According to a report on “Newsday,” Bryks had “been dogged by allegations of sexual abuse against at least one Winnipeg child for more than 15 years.” He had headed two different yeshivas in New York, but no longer did so.
That Winnipeg child’s name was Daniel Levin. He was the son of Martin and Sarah Levin. (Martin Levin had been editor of the Jewish Post until 1983. He later became the books editor of the Toronto Globe & Mail.)
In Allan Levine’s account of what happened, “Daniel Levin had attended Torah Academy from kindergarten to Grade 2. …A troubled teenager, Daniel alleged that Bryks had molested him. According to Sarah Levin, Bryks had given Daniel candy to keep him quiet and told him that God would punish him if he ever told anyone what had transpired. The threat of retribution was echoed by other children who came forward. Daniel (who, by 1993, was living in Toronto) gave a taped statement to the Toronto Police, who inexplicably botched the taping and requested he repeat his statement. He never did. On Yom Kippur, 1993, Daniel, seventeen years old, committed suicide.”
In 1994, the CBC aired a documentary about the Bryks controversy titled “Unorthodox Conduct.” Myron Love wrote a detailed report about the airing of that documentary and the subsequent reaction to it from members of the Herzlia. You can read Myron’s full article on our website simply by entering the name “Rabbi Bryks” in our Search Archive portal. The first two articles to appear will be the first and second pages of Myron’s comprehensive report.
According to information online Rabbi Bryks now works as a mortgage broker in New York. For a time, he was also a self-styled marriage counsellor, providing services to women seeking religious divorces.
In 2018, we spoke with a woman in New York who told us that, 18 or 19 years prior, she had contacted Rabbi Bryks to try to help her get a “get” (religious divorce) from an uncooperative husband. That woman claimed that Rabbi Bryks showed up at her apartment and tried to take advantage of her under the guise of offering to help her obtain a “get” from her husband. As the woman continued her story, she said Rabbi Bryks had forced himself upon her to the point where he pushed her on to her bed and lay on top of her. She was eventually able to break free and demanded he leave her apartment.
There are many other references to Bryks on the internet. The recently filed lawsuit only adds to what is already one of the most controversial stories about a rabbi you’re ever likely to read.
Local News
Former Winnipegger files lawsuit against Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregation, former Herzlia Rabbi Ephraim Bryks, and two other defendants over allegations of sexual abuse and assault by Rabbi Bryks in 1987
By BERNIE BELLAN (Posted December 29, 2025) A former Winnipegger by the name of Ruth Krevsky (née Pinsky) has filed a lawsuit in Court of King’s Bench in Winnipeg on December 9, 2025 naming “Ephraim Boruk Bryks, Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregtion Inc., Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, and Rabbinical Council of America” as defendants.
The lawsuit seeks damages in the total amount of $4,200,000.
In the 30-page statement of claim Krevsky alleges that “In or around 1984, when the Plaintiff was approximately 19 years of age, Bryks sexually abused and assaulted the Plaintiff. The particulars of same include, but not (sic.) are not limited to the following:
” (a) initiated and engaged in physical contact of a sexual nature with the Plaintiff in his bedroom;
” (b) strapped the buttocks of the Plaintiff;
” (c) engaged in other sexual activities with the Plaintiff; and
” (d) in order to facilitate the abuse Bryks engaged in a pattern of behaviour which was intended to make the Plaintiff feel that she was special in the eyes of Bryks and Judaism.
“The abuse occurred in Bryks’ house located in Winnipeg, Manitoba.”
The lawsuit goes on to allege that “After the aforementioned abuse occurred, Bryks exploited his position of seniority and the trust he had cultivated with the Plaintiff to manipulate and control He used this dependency to discourage the Plaintiff from disclosing his actions, including by threatening her and by withholding reference letters essential for her academic and professional advancement.”
The lawsuit further alleges that “In or around 1987, while employed by the Congregation, Bryks was accused by (sic.) of several sexual offences involving young girls and women, including students at the School. (Ed. note, the reference is to Torah Academy, which Bryks started.) Although no criminal charges were filed at the time, the allegations were brought to the attention of the Congregation, the Union (of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America) and/or the Council (Rabbinical Council of America). Since then. additional individuals have come forward with similar allegations of sexual abuse by Bryks.”
The lawsuit also names the Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregtion Inc., as defendant, citing ten different rules that “the Congregation taught the Plaintiff as well as other members of the Synagogue, including
“that it was forbidden to report a Jewish religious figure such as a rabbi to secular authorities and that any such reporting would constitute a serious violation of religious duty and loyalty to Judaism.”
Further, “The Plaintiff pleads that the aforementioned rules, principles and ideologies of the Congregation created an opportunity for Bryks to exert power and authority over the Plaintiff. The power and authority allowed Bryks to engage in the aforementioned behaviour and to continue to engage in same without resistance or question of the Plaintiff, without risk of getting caught, and thereby put the Plaintiff at risk of being abused by Bryks…
“As a result, the Congregation is vicariously responsible and liable for the actions of Bryks.”
The lawsuit goes on to list a series of behaviours in which it alleges Bryks was engaging and alleges the Congregation ignored many aspects of Bryks’ behaviour, including, among others: “Bryks’ difficulties with alcohol” and “Bryks’ difficulties with his sexuality.”
The lawsuit lists a long series of damages the Plaintiff alleges she has suffered as a result of Bryks’ behaviour and the refusal of the other defendants, including the Herzlia Congregation, to take any action against Bryks.
It should be made clear that, at this point, the allegations are unproven and are yet to be defended against and yet to be tested in the courts of Manitoba.
We have reached out to Ruth Krevsky, her counsel, counsel for the Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregation, and the president of the congregation for comment. To date, we have not heard from either Ms. Krevsky or her counsel. We did hear from the president of the congregation, who asked us to refer any questions to counsel for the congregation. We did speak with counsel for the congregation, but at this point he indicated that he had just been recently hired to represent the congregation and was just beginning to acquaint himself with the file.
The Rabbi Bryks story was one that tore the Winnipeg Jewish community asunder. The Jewish Post had a number of stories about the allegations that were levelled against Rabbi Bryks. (You can find those stories by going to our “Search Archive” link and entering the name “Rabbi Bryks.”)
We will have much more about Rabbi Bryks in the days to come. Keep referring to this website as we add to the story.
Local News
Newly announced Vivian Silver Centre for Shared Society to further former Winnipegger’s lifelong efforts to foster Jewish-Arab co-operation in Israel
By MYRON LOVE Vivian Silver (oleh Hashalom) devoted her life to working toward dialogue and collaboration between Arabs and Jews in Israel. The culmination of her efforts was the Arab-Jewish Center for Empowerment, Equality, and Cooperation – Negev Institute for Strategies of Peace and Economic Development (AJEEC-NISPED), which she co-founded 25 year ago with her sister peace activist, Dr. Amal Elsana Ahl’jooj.
Tragically, Vivian was of the 1,200 Israeli Jews, Bedouin and foreign farm workers who were slaughtered during the Hamas-led pogrom of October 7, 2023.
Last month, AJEEC-NISPED announced plans to create the Vivian Silver Center for Shared Society in her memory – a new national hub for Jewish-Israeli Arab collaboration and social innovation in Be’er Sheva – backed by an initial $1 million donation from UJA-Federation of New York, along with support from the Meyerhoff Foundation, the Gilbert Foundation, and other philanthropic partners committed to strengthening shared society in Israel.
“It’s a great honor and a beautiful gesture,” comments Vivian’s son, Yonatan Zeigen, “and I hope it will be a central building for civil society, both in the physical sense, that it will become a substantial home for the organization and for other initiatives that will use the spaced and also symbolically, as a beacon for this kind of work in the specific location in the Negev.”
As this writer noted n an article earlier this year in relation to the announcement of the launch of the Vivian Silver Impact Award by the New Israel Fund (NIF) – of which she was a long time board member, and which was developed in conjunction with her sons, Yonatan and Chen), Vivian made aliyah in 1974. She first went to Israel in 1968 – to spend her second year at university abroad at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, studying psychology and English literature.
In an article she wrote in 2018 in a publication called ”Women Wage Peace,” she related that during her final year at the University of Manitoba, she was among the founders of the Student Zionist Alliance on campus and was invited to its national conference in Montreal. There she met activists in the Habonim youth movement who planned on making aliyah and re-establishing Kibbutz Gezer. The day she wrote her last university exam, she boarded a flight to New York to join the group.
She spent three years in New York, where she became involved in Jewish and Zionist causes, including the launch of the Jewish feminist movement in America.
“It was a life-changing period,” she recalled. “I came to understood that in addition to being a kibbutz member, I was destined to be a social change and peace activist.”
Vivian and her group made aliyah in 1974 and settled on Kibbutz Gezer. In 1981, she established the Department Promoting Gender Equality in the Kibbutz Movement. She moved to Kibbutz Be’eri near the Gaza border in 1990, along with her late husband, Lewis, and their two sons
In 1998, Vivian became the executive director of the Negev Institute for Strategies of Peace and Development in Beer Sheva, an NGO promoting human sustainable development, shared society between Jews and Arabs, and peace in the Middle East. Soon after, she was joined by Amal Elsana Alh’jooj as co-directors of AJEEC-NISPED, winning the 2011 Victor J. Goldberg Peace Prize of the Institute for International Education.
In the article she wrote for “Women Waging Peace,” she noted that “while we later focused on empowerment projects in the Bedouin community in the Negev, initially we worked with Palestinian organizations on joint people-to-people projects. I spent much time in Gaza until the outbreak of the second intifada. We continued working with organizations in the West Bank. I personally know so many Palestinians who yearn for peace no less than we do.”
According to a report in the Israeli newspaper Arutz Sheva, in the November 24th edition, the Vivian Silver Centre – which is expected to open in the spring – will be located within AJEEC-NISPED’s soon-to-open AJEEC House, and will provide a permanent home for programs that promote equality, leadership, and cooperation among Israel’s diverse communities.
“The Vivian Silver Center for Shared Society, within AJEEC’s headquarters, “the Arutz Sheva report noted, “will serve as a regional platform for dozens of Israeli Arab and Jewish social organizations. Through AJEEC’s educational, vocational, and leadership programs, the center will support thousands of young adults each year – offering mentorship, professional training, and opportunities for cross-cultural collaboration.
“These programs,” the report continued, “already reach more than 15,000 participants nationwide, helping young people integrate into higher education and meaningful employment while narrowing social and economic gaps.”
AJEEC House is located in Be’er Sheva’s Science Park, near Ben-Gurion University. The three-storey AJEEC House has been designed to foster cooperation and dialogue. It will host community partnerships, provide shared workspaces for social entrepreneurs, and serve as a hub for initiatives addressing social and economic development across the Negev and beyond.
Readers who may be interested considering a donation can dial into NISPED’s website – – for further information.