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Hedda Kleinfeld Schachter, Holocaust survivor and bridal empire builder, dies at 99
(JTA) — Before “Say Yes to the Dress” brought Kleinfeld Bridal to the attention of more than 1.5 million households across America every week, a Holocaust survivor named Hedda Kleinfeld revolutionized the bridal industry, bringing it to life with European designer gowns.
The iconic bridal store, which today boasts about 200 employees, began as an offshoot of Kleinfeld’s father Isidor’s Viennese fur business. Starting in the late 1960s and for the next several decades, Hedda ran Kleinfeld Bridal with her husband Jack Schachter, a talented fur cutter employed by her father.
Nicknamed “Miss Hedda,” Kleinfeld’s foresight to shift the family business away from fur and simple special occasion wear to exclusively carrying wedding gowns transformed the small Bay Ridge, Brooklyn storefront into a multi-million dollar empire.
“She really built Kleinfeld not only as an iconic name but she left an incredible mark on the whole industry with her vision,” Mara Urshel, one of the current co-owners of Kleinfeld, told WWD.
Hedda Kleinfeld Schachter died in Manhattan on March 29. She was 99.
Hedda Kleinfeld was born in Vienna in 1924 to an upper-middle class secular Jewish family. She had a younger sister, Liane. After her father was released from the Dachau concentration camp, where he had been imprisoned for trying to cross the border into Belgium with his brother, the family decided to emigrate, initially with fake visas meant to secure passage to Shanghai. But those papers came in too late, so the family headed to Havana, Cuba, where Hedda and Liane spent their teenage years.
Family photos of the Kleinfeld family in Vienna. In the group photo, Hedda is seen in front at right, with, from left, her mother Regina, her father Isidor, her sister Liane and their nanny. (Courtesy United States Holocaust Memorial Museum/Design by Jackie Hajdenberg)
That’s where the teenage boys of her youth flirted with her and taught her how to dance — a skill she brought with her all the way to Central Park in 2018 when, on the way to a Park Conservancy gala as her granddaughter’s guest, she danced to a local band playing under the shade of the iconic Wisteria Walk, her granddaughter Ilana Schachter recalled.
Though those early memories of Vienna and her escape to Havana shaped much of her life, she never spoke about them much, even with her family.
“She really tried to suppress those memories and box them up and say that was a past life,” Schachter told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “She did not share a lot of experiences from that time period, but she did have happy memories of being a teenager in Havana, which I can only imagine was quite a trip.”
About 10 years ago, Schachter and her grandmother visited Havana and the places of Kleinfeld’s teenage years, including the home she once lived in and the town square where she used to dance.
Hedda Kleinfeld Schachter and granddaughter Ilana Schachter visit Hedda’s teenage home in Havana, Cuba. (Courtesy Ilana Schachter)
It’s fitting, then, that her grandmother chose a career centered on weddings.
“I think she appreciated being a part of an industry that was about celebration,” Schachter said.
Beginning in the 1990s, the Kleinfeld company changed hands a few times, according to a company history, and in 2004 construction began on a 35,000-square-foot store on West 20th St. That’s the location frequently featured in the popular TLC show “Say Yes to the Dress” — in which experts help brides find their perfect gown. The show brought the store’s name into millions of homes. But one home that it never made its way into was that of Hedda Kleinfeld.
“She never saw one episode,” Schachter recalled while laughing. “She had no interest. But she wasn’t bothered by it.”
Another “never” that Schachter says her grandmother couldn’t quite get into, despite being quite computer savvy (she was an early adopter of AOL Instant Messenger), was online shopping.
Hedda Kleinfeld Schachter dances under the shade of the Wisteria Walk in New York’s Central Park in 2018. (Courtesy Ilana Schachter)
“Online shopping was never going to happen for her,” she explained. “You bought things in the store, you felt them in your hands, you assessed the quality and you had to see what it looked like on your body. And then imagine buying something and not putting it on your body.”
Clothing was “sacred” to Kleinfeld.
“There was a sacred act in designing clothing and wearing clothing and honoring the clothing as you wore it,” Schachter said. “And she brought that into her work but also that’s just the way she saw the world.”
Kleinfeld’s husband Jack died in 2008. She is survived by their sons, Ronald and Robert.
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The post Hedda Kleinfeld Schachter, Holocaust survivor and bridal empire builder, dies at 99 appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Mamdani touts ‘Babies not Bombs’ messaging after flexing political muscle in the New York primaries
(New York Jewish Week) — New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani celebrated the victories of the progressive candidates he endorsed in New York’s Democratic primaries describing their success as a “shift in the balance of power.”
Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, the morning after the primaries, Mamdani touted the triumphs as a shift in the balance of power between “working people” and “special interests.”
Mamdani-endorsed candidates Brad Lander, Darializa Avila Chevalier and Claire Valdez won Democratic nominations for Congress. During the press conference, the mayor repeatedly highlighted their calls to restrict U.S. military aid to Israel and redirect federal funding to domestic priorities.
Following Mamdani’s election night sweep in New York, President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social that “America the Beautiful will NEVER be a Communist Country!!!”
The victories offered an early demonstration of Mamdani’s political influence beyond City Hall, as several Democratic Socialist candidates he backed, including Chevalier, defeated established Democratic incumbents in their districts.
“The working person is struggling in our city to afford basic needs,” Mamdani said, adding that Avila Chevalier’s oft-repeated slogan of investing in “Babies not Bombs,” is “the kind of conscience, the kind of clarity, the kind of conviction that has been missing in our politics for far too long.”
Mamdani responded to the president’s post on Wednesday, telling a reporter who asked whether his goal is to make America a “socialist” country that his “goal is to make America a place that every American can afford.”
When asked about federal policies that could be affected by Mamdani’s endorsed candidates, the mayor cited Valdez’s support for “foreign policy that understands human rights for all” and Lander’s commitment to co-sponsoring the Block the Bombs Act, which prohibits the sale of certain U.S.-made offensive weapons to Israel.
Mamdani also dismissed a question about whether he was concerned about how the victories would play out in November as Democrats try to win back the House.
“Every time the fight for working people takes a step forward, you will hear Republicans say that this is actually going to jeopardize the existence of that very fight,” he said.
When asked whether the election of Chevalier, who has faced scrutiny for past social media posts attacking Democrats and her appearance at an Oct. 8, 2023, pro-Palestinian rally in Times Square, could “complicate campaigns for Democrats as a whole,” Mamdani replied “No.”
“[Chevalier] often speaks about a politics of life. She speaks about ‘Babies not bombs,’” Mamdani continued. “What could be a better example of what the people of the district want to see versus what the people of the district have been forced to experience, which is tens of billions of dollars being spent at a national level to bomb children overseas, while children in our own districts are struggling.”
The post Mamdani touts ‘Babies not Bombs’ messaging after flexing political muscle in the New York primaries appeared first on The Forward.
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Jewish anti-Zionist David Orkin defeats incumbent in NY Assembly primary
(New York Jewish Week) — David Orkin, a Jewish anti-Zionist attorney and democratic socialist, defeated incumbent New York State Assemblymember Jenifer Rajkumar in Tuesday’s Democratic primary. Orkin won State Assembly District 38, which includes parts of Queens.
Orkin, an immigrant workers’ rights attorney and union organizer, received 58.8% of the vote, while Rajkumar, who has represented the district since 2021 and is the first South Asian woman ever elected to office in the state, received 40.9%. The district covers a swath of Queens, including parts of Ridgewood, Glendale, Ozone Park, Woodhaven and Richmond Hill.
“Pro-Palestine candidates are sweeping in NYC tonight,” Jewish Voice for Peace Action wrote in a post on Instagram celebrating Orkin’s win Tuesday. “Palestine was on the ballot — and won. David will be a champion for Palestinian freedom in Albany.”
The post from JVP Action echoed a message Orkin had highlighted throughout his campaign.
“It’s so incredibly meaningful to me to be running this race as an anti-Zionist Jew, to be one of the few anti-Zionist Jewish voices that is in an elected seat in the state government,” Orkin said in an Instagram reel posted by Jewish Voice for Peace Action earlier this month.
He added that, if elected, he would be able to go in front of the state legislature and assert that “criticizing Israel for genocide, demanding an end to the occupation, demanding an end to funding war abroad is not antisemitic.”
Orkin’s victory came amid a strong night for democratic socialist candidates across New York City, including left-wing congressional candidates Brad Lander, Darializa Avila Chevalier and Claire Valdez, who also defeated establishment-backed opponents in their primaries.
While Orkin was not endorsed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, whose winning endorsements of Lander, Chevalier and Valdez signaled a pro-Palestinian lurch for the party in the city with the world’s largest Jewish population outside of Israel. Nonetheless, his victory elevated a self-described anti-Zionist to the ranks of New York’s elected officials at a time when debates over Israel have become increasingly prominent within Democratic politics.
While Israel-related issues were not listed on Orkin’s platform, which centered on affordability and immigration, he repeatedly expressed his support for a “free Palestine” and attacked Rajkumar’s record of support for the Jewish state during his campaign.
“In the past several years my opponent AM Rajkumar has walked in the Israel day parade but has said NOTHING against the war in Gaza, occupation of Palestine, or Islamophobic attacks faced by the people of New York,” Orkin wrote in a May post on X.
Rajkumar, who was a close political ally of former New York City Mayor Eric Adams, in her campaign platform vowed to combat antisemitism.
After establishing a Jewish Voice for Peace chapter in Tucson, Arizona, in 2014, Orkin remained involved in pro-Palestinian activism as a member of the anti-Zionist activist group.
“I’ve been involved in the Jewish Palestine Solidarity Movement for 12, 13 years,” Orkin told Democratic Left last month. “I’ve dedicated part [of my] life to making sure that Jewish people are creating religious spaces outside of Zionism, and to making more space for Palestinian organizing to have an impact.”
On the campaign trail, Orkin received a host of endorsements from prominent progressive groups and lawmakers, including Vermont independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, JVP Action and NYC Democratic Socialists for America.
Rajkumar was endorsed by ActJew, the new nonprofit focused on combatting antisemitism, as well as the Queens Jewish Alliance and Assemblymembers Sam Berger, Kalman Yeger and Chuck Lavine.
Orkin received over $290,000 in campaign contributions for the election cycle, including over $156,000 from the office of the state comptroller, while Rajkumar received over $270,000, including $9,000 from health care executive Daniel Lowy.
“I have dedicated my life fighting for immigrants and workers, I am proud to have earned their support in this election, and I look forward to spending the rest of my life winning the beautiful and joyous lives we deserve,” Orkin said in a statement, according to QNS.
The post Jewish anti-Zionist David Orkin defeats incumbent in NY Assembly primary appeared first on The Forward.
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Half of Americans think the U.S. is ‘too supportive’ of Israel
(JTA) — A new survey found that 48% of American voters think the United States is “too supportive” of Israel, the highest since the pollster started asking the question in 2017.
The survey published Wednesday by Quinnipiac University also found that 60% of respondents reported that military intervention in Iran was “not worth it” as opposed to 34% of voters who said it was “worth it.”
The number of respondents who think the U.S. support of Israel is about right is 38%, while just 7% think the U.S. is not supportive enough of Israel, the poll found.
Broken down by party, 66% of Democrats think the U.S. is too supportive of Israel, while 9% think it is not supportive enough and 18% think U.S. support for Israel is about right.
Among Republicans, 20% think the U.S. is too supportive of Israel, 69% think American support for Israel is “about right,” and 6% think the U.S. is not supportive enough.
Among independent voters, 55% think the U.S. is too supportive of Israel, 34% think U.S. support for Israel is about right, and 7% think the U.S. is not supportive enough.
The poll data were released one day after three Democrats critical of Israel swept their House primary races in New York City, and in races around the country even some reliably pro-Israel Democratic candidates distanced themselves from the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC.
A survey last year by Gallup found dwindling support for Israel among Democrats, as well as waning support among Republicans.
Still the party divide was also in sharp evidence in the latest poll. In responses to the question about whether the Iran war was “worth it”, Democrats disfavored military action in Iran at 93% and independents at 66%, while 75% of Republicans surveyed thought it was “worth it.”
Given a list of 10 issues and asked which, if any, they considered priorities in their decision-making process in the election for the U.S. House of Representatives, 41% of voters cited the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, above AI data centers (38%) and Donald Trump (38%). The high cost of living (70%) and health care (59%) topped the list.
The Quinnipiac poll was conducted from June 18 to 22, and includes responses from 1,165 self-identified registered voters.
The margin of error is 3.4 percentage points.
Among those surveyed, 48% said they had an unfavorable view of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Twenty percent said they had a favorable opinion, and 30% “haven’t heard enough” about him.
“Netanyahu gets poor marks from American voters as their appetite for supporting Israel wanes, with the share of voters who think the U.S. is too supportive of Israel hitting a new high,” Quinnipiac polling analyst Tim Malloy wrote in the report.
Voters were also asked about their views on the June 17 memorandum of understanding with Iran, which begins a 60-day negotiation period that does not outline an end to Iran’s nuclear program.
“After months of diplomatic fits and starts, global economic repercussions and a broad loss of life in the region, a majority of voters make their feelings clear: the Iran war was a bad idea,” Malloy wrote.
Voters who are either not confident or “not so confident” that the deal will succeed numbered 59%, and 61% think it is either likely or very likely that Iran will develop nuclear weapons.
The post Half of Americans think the U.S. is ‘too supportive’ of Israel appeared first on The Forward.
