Features
Jewish Life in Canada, seen through the eyes of William Kurelek
By IRENA KARSHENBAUM In December, as I was running up a steep hill in the bitter Calgary cold, which is not as bitter as the Winnipeg cold, I was cursing myself for not having covered my brilliant head with a woollen scarf.
Wearing my 1916 prairie costume, underneath a 25 year-old sheep skin coat that now passes for historic, I scaled the hill at Heritage Park while worrying I might suffer a heart attack triggered by too much vigorous movement in the frigid cold. The angle of the hill dropped down and my brisk pace turned into a slow, penguin-like waddle to steady myself on the ice.
My eyes looked up and facing me, as if on the palm of my hand, was a scene from another time. The sun danced on the dazzling, white snow and in the near distance, across the railroad tracks, stood a little, yellow false-front building, once called the Montefiore Institute, framed by naked, trembling trees, and where I was headed. A horse-drawn wagon turned the corner and slowly crossed along the path. Not being satisfied with just savouring the moment, I grabbed my phone. An image emerged on my screen, worthy of a cozy children’s book, or a William Kurelek painting.
My vision was prescient.
That afternoon, on my volunteer shift as an interpreter, in the kitchen of the Montefiore Institute, which also served as the cheder, I looked through the sideboard buffet that housed a small library. I was searching for a Hanukkah story to read to the children when my eyes rested on Jewish Life in Canada, by William Kurelek and Abraham Arnold.
I flipped the pages of this old book and even though I was familiar with Kurelek’s work, I suddenly could see that the artist’s paintings depicting early Canadian Jewish life looked an awful lot like us, the costumed interpreters bringing Jewish life, to life, to the guests visiting the restored 1916 prairie synagogue. I was momentarily confused, was I a subject of a William Kurelek painting that had magically come alive?
Not wanting the other interpreters to think I am some kind of a book thief (which, of course, I am!) I announced, loudly, that I will be borrowing the book to write my latest story about an out-of-print book — Bernie didn’t know this yet — with promises to return it.
At home, I read the book. Divided into two parts, the first half being the works of William Kurelek (1927-1977), with his own writings about each painting, and the second by, Abraham Arnold (1922-2011) — who served as the founding Executive Director of the Jewish Historical Society of Western Canada — and who contributed a series of essays about various aspects of Jewish life, that read more like a text book.
Kurelek credits “the two Abes of Winnipeg” — Arnold and Abe Schwartz — in his introduction for giving him the support he needed to bring the book project to life.
Kurelek recounts how, in 1973, the idea for the book emerged and was meant as an expression of thanks to the Jewish community for his success as an artist. It was Winnipeg-native, Avrom Isaacs (1926-2016), who first discovered the artist and took the risk of exhibiting his work, a break Kurelek desperately needed having for ten years tried “in vain on my own for recognition.” Isaacs gave Kurelek two opening nights, the first being sponsored by a Jewish women’s organization (he doesn’t say which one) that also bought a few of his pieces. He states that in fact his first art patrons were Jewish and only later, “followed by those of British origin.”
Jewish Life in Canada contains 16 of Kurelek’s paintings, all of which as indicated in the book, are held in the collection of a Mr. and Mrs. Jules Loeb, and was published by Hurtig Publishers of Edmonton in 1976. The book is out of print and unavailable, except through maybe a lucky find at a used book store or on Amazon. My search for a used copy, surprisingly, brought up information that a new edition of a Jewish Life in Canada, this time with writing by Sarah Milroy, will be published by Goose Lane Editions of Fredericton in May of 2023.
Through his paintings, Kurelek, born to a Ukrainian family in Whitford, Alberta, depicts Jewish life in Canada from the east coast, “Jewish Doctor’s Family Celebrating Passover in Halifax,” to the prairies in “Baker’s Family Celebrating the Sabbath in Edmonton” and “Jewish Wedding in Calgary” set in front of the original House of Jacob synagogue, to the west with, “General Store in Vancouver Before World War One.”
Having converted to Catholicism in adulthood, Kurelek doesn’t shy away from religious subjects displaying remarkable knowledge about Judaism’s religious practices. In “Yom Kippur” he shows what the Holy Day looks like with congregants immersed deep in prayer, men wearing their tallis, women praying in the women’s balcony. He paints a white parochet explaining that, “White, symbol of purity, is the dominant colour of this solemn day.” He used Toronto’s Kiever Synagogue as the basis for this work.
Kurelek shows how Jews toiled in their new land with works like “Morosnick’s Market, Dufferin Street, Winnipeg,” “Teperman’s Wrecking Firm in Toronto” with men sorting scrap metal, men sewing in “Jews in the Clothing Business in Winnipeg” and “Jewish Scrap Collector Questioned by a Toronto Policeman,” a composite work inspired by Kurelek’s memories and multiple photographs including one from Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.
Four of Kurelek’s paintings depict Jewish farming life.
In “Pioneering at Edenbridge, Saskatchewan,” Kurelek writes about the history of the colony, which was settled in 1906 by 20 Jewish immigrants, originally from Lithuania, who decided to leave their new-found home in South Africa for a second migration to fertile farm lands along the Carrot River. It is this painting, with its horse-drawn wagon and wooden homes in the distance, that reminded me of the view I encountered at Heritage Park that December day.
In “Bender Hamlet, the Farming Colony that Failed,” Kurelek displays good knowledge of Jewish prairie history, listing all the farm colonies of Saskatchewan and Alberta, even mentioning my beloved Montefiore where the Montefiore Institute originally stood, also Camper, Pine Ridge and Bender Hamlet of Manitoba. He paints Bender Hamlet, founded in 1903, with a few, far away, grey buildings set against a vast sky and yellow, grassy fields littered with rocks. The inspiration for the painting, he notes, came from Abe Schwartz, who gave Kurelek his great-aunt’s diary describing her life farming in North Dakota. Kurelek explains how he incorporated pieces of the diary into the picture frame, “I want to convey the idea that these memories are like voices in the wind as it sighs through the thistles of the overgrown fields and through the chinks of abandoned buildings.”
Kurelek’s Jewish Life in Canada is more than a thanks to the Jewish community, but a gift of memory that reveals a life that once was to future generations.
Irena Karshenbaum, founder of the project that gifted the restored Montefiore Institute to Calgary’s Heritage Park, volunteers as an interpreter in the synagogue and writes. www.irenakarshenbaum.com
Features
Rabbi Gary Zweig’s new book provides humorous and moving accounts of making minyans in unlikely circumstances
By MYRON LOVE The recitation of the kaddish is a central tenet of Jewish religious life. Even members of our community who are largely secular will likely recite the words of the kaddish for a parent, sibling or spouse at some point in their lives – even if only at the grave site.
The kaddish can only be recited publicly in the presence of a minyan – a gathering of ten (men in the Orthodox tradition. The number, as explained by Rabbi Gedalia (Gary Zweig), stems from the number of spies – as written in the Torah – whom Moshe rabbenu sent into the promised land and who came back with negative reports as compared to the two spies – one of whom was Joshua – who said that the land was flowing with milk and honey.
It is this challenge of putting together minyans for a mourner to recite the kaddish in different locales and circumstances – when a minyan in a shul is not possible – that is the subject of Zweig’a newly released book, “Kaddish Around the World” – a 90-plus page compilation of short stories – some humourous, some heartwarming – of successful efforts to recruit enough daveners for a kaddish minyan, ranging in time and space from a Super Bowl game in San Diego to the middle of a game reserve in South Africa to a Jewish museum in Cordoba in Spain – in a city largely devoid of Jews.
Zweig, who hails from Toronto, was in Winnipeg over Yom Tov to lead services – along with Toronto-based Chazan Manny Aptowitser – at the Chavurat Tefila Talmud Torah Synagogue. On the Tuesday just before Yom Kippur, the synagogue hosted an evening to provide the rabbi with a venue to discuss his new book – a sequel to his first book, “Living Kaddish,” which he released in 2007 (and has been translated into Russian and Spanish).
Zweig is one of the original Aish Hatorah-trained rabbis – having attained his smicha in 1982 from Rabbi Noah Weinberg, the founder of Aish Hatorah. He (Zweig) is much travelled, himself having led Yom Tov services in such exotic locales as Bermuda, Barbados and Curacao in the Caribbean, Mexico and Sweden.
Zweig noted that he was inspired to write “Living Kaddish” after his mother passed away in 2002 when, on one occasion, he was not able to find a minyan so that he could say kaddish.
In his presentation at the Chavurat Tefila, he observed that the first Jew to mention kaddish is purported to be Rueven – about 3,500 years ago – on the passing of his father, Yaacov (Israel). About 900 C.E., Zweig continued, kaddish became part of the liturgy and, 200 years later, was included in the siddur.
It is interesting, he noted, that kaddish is said not for the deceased, but, rather, the living. There is no mention of the Lord in the kaddish either. Kaddish is actually a prayer for hope and the future.
For a parent, one is required to say kaddish three times a day – morning, afternoon and evening – for 11 months. For a sibling, child (God forbid), relative or others, the requirement is just 30 days.
One of the stories in “Kaddish Around the World” tells of one of Zweig’s own experiences – after his father died in 20201 at the age of 101. The author happened to be at a family bar mitzvah in Orlando several months later. He fully expected that in a city with a Jewish population the size of Orlando, he wouldn’t have any trouble putting together a minyan for a Sunday morning. He felt even more confident when he noticed that an AMOR Rabbis convention was being held at the same hotel. On inquiring which sort of rabbis these were, he learned that AMOR stood for “Association of Messianic Rabbis”.
Come Sunday morning, most of the bar mitzvah guests had gone home. He could only muster eight for the minyan. He thought he could try the messianic group in the hope that some of them may have been born Jewish. Four of the group offered to help. A Chabad rabbi suggested that Zweig ascertain that each had two Jewish parents. Two qualified.
Zweig quoted one of the two messianic rabbis who said, after the service that ”this was the most moving service I have ever experienced.”
“Maybe Hashem brought me to that particular hotel at that particular time so that I could provide them with little spark of what Judaism is about,” Zweig said.
Another of the stories in the book concerns a shopkeeper in an American mall where many of the other store owners were also Jewish. The individual, Yossi, needed a minyan for mincha (the afternoon prayer) but couldn’t afford to close his business. He figured he could round up enough of the other store keepers to form a minyan. Everyone he approached was willing to come if he were to be the tenth. (In my own years organizing minyans, that was something I heard often enough – “call me if I will be the tenth”). Yossi’s solution was to assure each one he asked that, yes, he would be the tenth.
“Kaddish Around the World” is available on Amazon and also in digital ebook format and as an audio book.
In addition to being a rabbi and author, Zweig also is a singer/songwriter working in his own genre – Jewish rock and roll. He has a band called “The Kiddush Club,” and a CD called “TOYS.” In addition, he has recently launched a YouTube channel called “Living Kaddish”.
Features
The Gaza Peace Plan is not a Done Deal, but an Opening
By HENRY SREBRNIK (Oct. 23, 2025) The idea that Hamas will voluntarily disarm, that international forces will deploy in the Gaza Strip, and that the process of building a Palestinian government by people like former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, in which a disarmed Hamas does not participate, are false hopes, if not fantasies. But does this mean U.S. President Donald Trump’s peace plan was useless? Of course not.
Trump understood the necessity of bringing the war to an end. But he also believed that endless debate among experts or, worse, historian and lawyers, would never produce an agreement. He presented an offer – actually, an ultimatum – to Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas that neither could refuse: immediate, unconditional and complete release of all hostages and missing persons, something the Israeli public longed for, in exchange for a final end to the war, which a humbled Hamas needed.
Two years of war has left Hamas weaker than it had been in decades. Israeli bombardments had shattered the group’s military capabilities and depleted its arsenals. In many neighborhoods, control had drifted to local clan networks and tribal councils. This hinted at something that could one day replace Hamas’s iron grip. To prevent this, Hamas has been ruthlessly murdering all potential rivals in the areas of Gaza it controls since the ceasefire went into effect.
Despite the severe degradation of its military capabilities during the war, Hamas still has more soldiers and weapons than all its rival factions in Gaza combined. Hamas has managed to redeploy approximately 7,000 militants to reassert control over the territory. They have publicized photographs and videos of their forces murdering and torturing; the victims include women and children.
The ceasefire is a temporary reprieve for Hamas: a chance to regroup, rearm, and prepare for the next round of fighting. In Islamist political thought there’s a word for it, hudna — a temporary truce with non-Muslim adversaries that can be discarded as soon as the balance of power shifts. Then the time for jihad will arrive again. Hamas was established in 1987 and isn’t going to disappear.
In fact Hamas also says it expects an interim International Transitional Authority to hire 40,000 Hamas employees, and Hamas spokesman Basem Naim says he expects its fighters to be integrated into a post-transition Palestinian state.
Still, Trump has succeeded in ending the current war in Gaza, where Joe Biden failed. Biden’s national security team, drawn almost entirely from his supposed expert class, didn’t even see the crisis coming. Just five days before the attack, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan had published an article in Foreign Affairs in which he wrote that “the region is quieter than it has been for decades.”
Biden also had insulted the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, by publicly condemning the 2018 murder of Saudi dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi. And, of course, there was Biden’s poor relationship with Netanyahu, and his chronic inability to get the Israeli prime minister to do what he wanted.
By contrast, Trump returned to office with substantially more influence in both the Gulf and Israel, based on his first-term successes in the Middle East, especially the Abraham Accords (for which he’s never been praised by his political enemies).
Four Arab countries formally recognized Israel, beginning with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, followed by Sudan and Morocco. The next stage was intended to include Saudi Arabia. One motive put forward by some analysts for the October 7 attacks was that they were intended to provoke Israel into a response that would derail Saudi Arabia’s admission.
Instead of sitting Israelis and Arabs in a room and expecting them to negotiate an outcome, Trump’s approach has been to exert leverage through other players in the region, especially, Egypt, Turkey, and – most importantly – Qatar.
In Jerusalem, they call Qatar “the spoiler state.” Israelis describe the emirate as two trains running behind the same engine. One, led by the Qatari ruler’s mother and brother, supports the Muslim Brotherhood and is an unmistakable hater of Israel. The other, led by the prime minister, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani and several other senior figures, seeks rapprochement with the West.
The Qataris were shocked when Israeli jets on Sept. 9 conducted an airstrike in Doha targeting the leadership of Hamas. They then signed onto Trump’s peace plan at a meeting in New York Sept. 23, hosted by Trump and Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim Ibn Hamad Al Thani, and attended by the leaders of eight Arab states, along with members of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.
Netanyahu was then browbeaten into accepting the plan (and also forced to apologize to the Emir for the airstrike). It was somewhat ironic that the airstrike made the peace plan possible. As well, Trump’s attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities in June gave this negotiation some very sharp teeth.
“If you would rather leave peacemaking to the historians and diplomats, then you may wait a long time for wars to end,” suggested Niall Ferguson of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, in an Oct. 15 Free Press article. His advice? Go to the “deal guys: They get the job done.”
In a sense, both Israel and Hamas had accomplished their goals. Israel had broken the Iranian axis of terror by eliminating Hezbollah and Hamas as a fighting force, along with the Iranian nuclear threat. Hamas had succeeded in luring Israel into a trap that led it to become hated and isolated around the world. This included the labelling of Israel as genocidal and the global call for a Palestinian state.
The rest of the 20-point peace plan will be addressed in a step-by-step fashion. Meanwhile, Israel must ensure that it retains freedom of action in Gaza, by decisive action against any attempt by Hamas to rebuild its army, its rockets, its battalions and its divisions.
Henry Srebrnik is a professor of political science at the University of Prince Edward Island.
Features
Why Fitness Routines Fall Apart — and How to Rebuild Yours
Every spring, gyms see a flood of hopeful faces. New shoes, fresh playlists, unwavering intentions, by mid-summer? Half of them vanish into the fog of abandoned routines. The story repeats year after year until it starts to feel almost scripted. Why does enthusiasm evaporate? The easy answer involves willpower but that explanation misses the point. Habits don’t fail because people are weak. Life stress, boredom, and monotony ruin routines. Timely lever pulls can change narratives. The hardest part is persevering when motivation wanes.
Mistaking Motivation for Momentum
Most chase that opening surge, the lightning strike of motivation, but then stop searching once enthusiasm fizzles. A scroll through sites like PUR Pharma (pur-pharma.is/) or a glimpse of an influencer’s progress triggers a burst of action: new workout gear ordered, plans scribbled in planners destined for dusty drawers. Yet momentum fades when small setbacks pop up (a late meeting here, rainy weather there). Real progress comes from building systems stronger than any fleeting pep talk. Those who frame fitness as something owed to motivation end up back at square one every time life interrupts, which it always does.
Overcomplicating Everything
It’s tempting to turn wellness into a science fair project with spreadsheets and specialized equipment lined up on day one. This is the allure of complexity disguised as seriousness, a new diet paired with seven types of supplements and four color-coded bottles. Simplicity gets lost in the noise almost instantly. Most successful routines rely on two principles: keep it simple and keep showing up even when everything else is chaos outside those gym walls. Anyone insisting that perfection is required before taking step one has already constructed an excuse not to begin at all.
Forgetting Fun Completely
Who decided exercise must hurt or look like punishment? Somewhere along the line, fun got swapped out for grind culture and “no pain, no gain.” That isn’t just unappealing, it’s unsustainable over months or years. If sessions feel like torture devices borrowed from medieval times, nobody should be surprised when commitment falters fast. Seek activities that actually spark some joy or curiosity, a dance class instead of yet another treadmill session, maybe, or play a pickup game rather than slogging through solo circuits again and again.
Ignoring Recovery (and Reality)
Sleep deprivation, disguised as discipline, fools anyone, except perhaps uncritical Instagram followers. Ignoring recovery turns ambition into tiredness faster than any missed session. Because bodies break without rest, routines must breathe with owners. Cycling, real leisure, and honest self-checks regarding weekly goals build endurance, not continual pushing.
Conclusion
Change rarely arrives by force alone but usually grows quietly from patterns repeated imperfectly over time, even if last month looked nothing like this week so far. Drop the hunt for nonstop inspiration. Instead of breaking behaviors at the first hint of stress or boredom, build habits that last. People who rebuild methodically after every stumble or detour make progress, not those who peak and then fall.