Uncategorized
Judy Heumann, Jewish disability advocate who spurred a movement, dies at 75
(JTA) — In Judith Heumann’s 2020 memoir, the lifelong advocate for people with disabilities describes feeling shocked upon being invited to read from the Torah at her synagogue in Berkeley, California. Not only were women permitted to carry out the sacred task, unlike in the Orthodox synagogue of her Brooklyn childhood, but the bimah, or prayer platform, had been made accessible just for her.
“Oh my God, I thought, I’ve never been asked to do an aliyah,” Heumann wrote, using the Hebrew word for the ritual. “I learned how to do it.”
The moment was just one of many when Heumann, who died Saturday at 75, charted ground that had previously been off-limits to wheelchair users like her. Since contracting polio as a toddler, Heumann broke down barriers for disabled children and educators in New York City schools, protested until federal legislation protecting people with disabilities was passed and advised multiple presidential administrations on disability issues.
A cause of death was not immediately given for Heumann, whose website announced her death on Saturday in Washington, D.C. Heumann had lived there for 30 years, since being tapped by the Clinton administration to serve as assistant secretary of the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation Services.
Heumann was born in 1947 to two parents who had separately fled Nazi Germany as children in the 1930s; all of her grandparents and countless other family members were murdered in the Holocaust.
She said she believed it was her parents’ experience that led them to reject doctors’ advise to have their daughter institutionalized after she contracted polio and lost the use of her legs. “They came from a country where families got separated, some children sent away, others taken from their families by the authorities and never returned — all part of a campaign of systematic dehumanization and murder,” she wrote in her memoir, “Being Heumann.” “Their daughter, disabled or not, wasn’t going anywhere.”
Instead, her parents and in particular her mother, Ilse, set about to advocate for her. When the city school system said Judith could not attend her neighborhood school, Ilse got a rabbi to agree that she could attend his yeshiva if her daughter learned Hebrew. Judith did, but the rabbi did not keep his word. Instead, Ilse lined up an array of activities for Judith, including thrice-weekly Hebrew school classes accessible only if her father carried her in her chair up a flight of stairs, until the city opened a program for children with disabilities.
Judy Heumann attends the 2022 Women’s Entrepreneurship Day Organization Summit at United Nations in New York City, May 20, 2022. (Chance Yeh/Getty Images)
There, Heumann wrote, she first encountered “disability culture” — what she described as “a culture that has learned to value the humanity in all people, without dismissing anyone for looking, thinking, believing or acting differently.” She would experience and then help craft this culture during a decade at summer camp, in a movement captured in the 2020 documentary “Crip Camp,” and then throughout a lifetime of advocacy that earned her the moniker “mother of the disability rights movement.”
One notable win came in 1970, after Heumann graduated from college with a degree in speech therapy. Told that she could not teach in New York City schools because she could not help children leave in case of fire, Heumann sued. She was represented in part by an attorney who would argue Roe v. Wade in front of the Supreme Court, and the case came before Judge Constance Baker Motley, the only woman on the NAACP legal team that argued Brown v. Board of Education. The city quickly settled and Heumann ultimately got a job at her old elementary school.
The public fight propelled Heumann into the leadership of an inchoate disability rights movement. Two years later, she participated in New York City protests in favor of federal anti-discrimination laws that President Richard Nixon ultimately signed. In 1977, she was one of dozens of disability advocates to occupy a federal building in San Francisco in a demonstration calling for enforcement mechanisms. Their advocacy led to Section 504, a federal statute that requires entities receiving government funds to show that they do not discriminate on the basis of disability.
The episode was dramatized on Comedy Central’s “Drunk History.” Heumann was played by Ali Stroker, a Jewish actress who was the first wheelchair user to perform on Broadway. Heumann was also recognized as Time Magazine’s 1977 Woman of the Year in a 2020 retrospective.
Heumann was a cofounder of the Center for Independent Living in Berkeley before returning to the East Coast and the government advisory roles. Through it all, Heumann remained involved with the Jewish communities where she lived, including by having a bat mitzvah ceremony as an adult. In Washington, she was a member of Adas Israel Congregation.
In 2016, she cited tikkun olam, the ancient rabbinical imperative to repair the world, during a 2016 White House event during Jewish Disability Awareness and Inclusion Month. “The Jewish community has an obligation, I believe, to be leaders,” said Heumann, then special advisor for international disability rights in the State Department.
She also traveled as an adult to her father’s hometown in Germany, Hoffenheim, where she was taken to the site of the synagogue that the Nazis destroyed but noted that no one there spoke openly about what had happened to the local Jews.
In “Being Heumann,” she connected the experience to her own efforts to bring people with disabilities into the mainstream. “What a pervasive influence silence and avoidance have had on my life,” she wrote. “Why wasn’t I in school? Silence. Why aren’t we allowed on buses? Silence. Why can’t disabled people teach? Silence. Where are all the Jews going? Piercing silence.
“I refuse to give in to the pressure of the silence,” she concluded.
Heumann’s allies in the Jewish disability advocacy community mourned her death.
“So sad to learn of Judy Heumann’s passing,” tweeted Jay Ruderman, whose family foundation has been a leader in supporting Jewish disability inclusion. “She was one of the preeminent disability rights leaders in our country’s history and her accomplishments made our world a better place. I’ll miss you Judy and may your memory be a blessing.”
—
The post Judy Heumann, Jewish disability advocate who spurred a movement, dies at 75 appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Uncategorized
Antisemitic Beliefs More Common Among Young Social Media Users, Yale Poll Shows
Penn State graduate student Roua Daas, an organizer with Students for Justice in Palestine, speaks at a pro-Palestinian protest at the Allen Street gates in State College, PA on Feb. 12, 2024. Photo: Paul Weaver/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
A new survey from Yale Youth Poll is raising fresh concerns about antisemitism among younger Americans, revealing a significant link between social media consumption and anti-Jewish sentiment.
The Spring 2026 poll, conducted by researchers affiliated with Yale University, finds that Americans aged 18 to 34 are more likely than older generations to agree with statements widely recognized as antisemitic even as many express uncertainty about what qualifies as antisemitism in the first place.
According to the survey, a significant share of young respondents agreed with longstanding antisemitic tropes. Roughly a quarter to a third of the youngest respondents expressed belief in ideas such as Jews having “too much power” or divided loyalty between the United States and Israel. The poll also found that about one in five young respondents supported boycotts of Jewish-owned businesses to express disapproval over Israel’s war in Gaza.
The poll reveals that roughly 10 percent of those 18-34 agreed with all three of these antisemitic sentiments. Conversely, only 2 percent of those above 65 agreed with all three.
While these views are not held by a majority, experts say the numbers are high enough to raise alarms.
Beyond attitudes themselves, the poll also indicates that youth who receive news from alternative media sources, such as social media, are more likely to harbor antisemitic sentiments.
Respondents who rely more heavily on social media platforms, including TikTok, Instagram, and X/Twitter, were significantly more likely to agree with antisemitic statements.
The survey also points to a striking divide based on how young Americans consume news. Respondents who rely primarily on social media platforms such as TikTok, Instagram, and X were roughly 1.5 to 2 times more likely to agree with antisemitic statements than their peers who turn to traditional sources like television or newspapers. On measures such as beliefs about Jewish power or loyalty, gaps of 10 to 15 percentage points emerged between the two groups, with social media–heavy users consistently showing higher levels of agreement.
The pattern is striking enough to suggest that digital information ecosystems may be shaping perceptions in ways that traditional media does not. Further, the underlying pattern can give insight into why opinions on Israel and antisemitism substantially diverge among US youth compared to older generations.
Observers point to the nature of these platforms, where algorithm-driven feeds often elevate emotionally charged, highly simplified content. In that environment, complex geopolitical conflicts, such as the war in Gaza, can be reduced to slogans, viral clips, and narratives that blur the line between political criticism and longstanding antisemitic themes.
In the immediate aftermath of the Oct. 7 slaughters in Israel, a bevy of left-leaning social media personalities immediately condemned Israel and accused the Jewish state of committing war crimes and genocide in Gaza. Several reports indicate that anti-Israel content performs especially well on youth-centric social media platforms such as TikTok and Instagram, incentivizing content creators to intensify public criticisms of the Jewish state. The Yale survey suggests that for many young Americans, views on Israel are increasingly intertwined with perceptions of Jewish people more broadly.
The poll also challenges attempts to place blame on a single political group. The data indicates that both “extremely conservative” and “extremely liberal” individuals are likely to express belief that antisemitism is a “serious problem” in the country. Moderate voters are more likely to express ambivalence, with a plurality indicating that they “neither agree nor disagree” that antisemitism is a significant issue in the US.
Importantly, the survey does not suggest that most young Americans hold antisemitic views.
But it does point to a rising level of acceptance, or at least tolerance, of ideas that were once more widely rejected. Moreover, the poll suggests that young people underestimate the level of antisemitism that persists in the country. For instance, among voters ages 18-34, 29 percent agree with the antisemitic conspiracy “Jews have an extremely organized international community that puts their own interests before those of their home countries” compared to only 17 percent of those age 65. Approximately 8 percent of the 18-34 age cohort believe “people exaggerate how bad the Holocaust actually was” compared to 2 percent of those above 65.
A mere 21 percent of voters aged 18-34 agreed with the notion that Jews experience the bulk of hate crimes in the US, compared to 40 percent of overall voters. Various surveys indicate that Jews have faced the greatest increase in hate crimes over the past two years.
Uncategorized
As Ohio again tries to block Hebrew Union College’s restructuring, a new rabbinical school emerges in Cincinnati
(JTA) — The attorney general of Ohio has filed a second lawsuit against the nation’s largest Reform rabbinical school over the planned shuttering of its historic Cincinnati campus — a controversial move that has also prompted the creation of a new rabbinical school in the city.
Ohio AG Dave Yost, a Republican, says he wants to prevent Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion from closing its 151-year-old Cincinnati campus at the end of the current school year. Yost’s lawsuit alleges that the planned closure would violate state laws intended to protect the original intent of nonprofit donors, who believed they were supporting HUC’s Cincinnati base.
“Hebrew Union accepted millions of dollars in donations based on a 76-year-old promise it now would like to break,” Yost’s office said in a statement accompanying the lawsuit, citing the school’s 1950 agreement to “permanently maintain” a rabbinical school in the city. “We’re suing to keep these assets in Cincinnati where they belong.” The suit asks a judge to bar HUC from closing its doors before a court date.
A request for comment to spokespeople for HUC was not immediately returned.
In 2022, HUC leadership announced that they would be closing degree-granting programs at their flagship Cincinnati campus in order to focus on their other campuses in New York and Los Angeles, which the school claimed were more popular with students. The college has pledged to preserve its archives and library housed on the campus, but has also pursued plans to sell off property across all its campuses as well as, reportedly, to sell rare books from its collection.
The move sparked intense blowback from leaders in the Reform movement, some of whom have argued that the college was abandoning its founding principles by moving out of the Midwest in favor of the coasts.
Some of HUC’s former Ohio figureheads, along with other Reform leaders, have since announced plans to launch their own Cincinnati-based rabbinical school: The College for Contemporary Judaism.
“We believe it is imperative that there be a strong, vibrant rabbinical school in Cincinnati to serve the liberal American Jewish community, especially between the coasts where access to congregational rabbis and rabbinical education is severely limited,” the college’s founders said in a statement Tuesday. “While we cannot comment directly on the lawsuit filed by Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost against Hebrew Union College, it is vitally important that assets subject to the lawsuit are used as originally intended: to support a strong, thriving rabbinical school in Cincinnati.”
The college’s founders include Rabbi Sally Priesand, the first female rabbi to have been ordained by HUC in 1972, who will serve as the new college’s honorary president; and Rabbi Gary Zola, longtime director of HUC’s Cincinnati-based American Jewish Archives, who will now serve as CCJ’s founding president.
The college pledges not to be affiliated with any particular denomination, but will instead commit itself to “Liberal Judaism” with what its site describes as “an unwavering commitment to the existence and well-being of the Jewish and democratic State of Israel.” It will have a particular focus on Jewish communities in the Midwest, South and Mountain West, where its founders say “access to rabbinical education has been severely limited.”
In explaining the decision to base the college in Cincinnati, the school points to some of the Jewish institutions there currently being shepherded by HUC, including the library and archives. It also names the region’s historical importance to American Judaism, as the city where Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise, spiritual forefather of Reform Judaism, chose to base his fledgling movement.
Yost’s latest lawsuit, filed April 10, was the second time the Ohio AG had taken HUC to court over its planned downsizing. He also sued the school in 2024 following reports that leadership was exploring the sale of some of its rare books. The two parties settled the following year with an agreement intended to keep HUC from selling its items without 45 days’ notice to the state.
The post As Ohio again tries to block Hebrew Union College’s restructuring, a new rabbinical school emerges in Cincinnati appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
Orthodox groups ask Supreme Court to hear case of Ohio man barred from hosting home prayer services
(JTA) — Orthodox Jewish groups urged the Supreme Court to take up the case of an Orthodox Jewish man ordered by officials in University Heights, Ohio, to stop hosting prayer services in his home without a permit.
The amicus brief, which was filed Friday by the National Jewish Advocacy Center alongside the Orthodox Union and the National Council of Young Israel, comes years after Daniel Grand, a resident of the suburb of Cleveland, invited a group of Jewish men to his home for Shabbat services starting in January 2021.
At the time, University Heights, citing zoning laws, issued a cease-and-desist order blocking Grand from using his home for prayer.
Grand initially applied for a special use permit to use his home as “a place of religious assembly” in 2021, but later withdrew the application, saying he did not “wish to operate a house of worship as is defined under the zoning ordinance.”
According to the NJAC, the former mayor of University Heights, Michael Dylan Brennan, then encouraged Grand’s “neighbors to watch his home and report any sign of Jewish worship to the authorities.”
“What happened to Daniel Grand is not an isolated incident,” Rabbi Mark Goldfeder, the CEO of NJAC, said in a statement. “It is the latest chapter in a long and documented history of municipalities using zoning laws to suppress Orthodox Jewish religious practice.”
The city’s current mayor, Michele Weiss, who was elected last fall, told JTA that there was currently one residence in the city that had obtained a special permit to host worship gatherings and that another was currently in the middle of applying for one.
“My perspective is that everyone has a right to worship in their home with a small group of people (a minyan) without city involvement, just like a book club might do,” Weiss, who is the first female Orthodox Jewish mayor in the United States, wrote in an email to JTA. “If a congregation wants to worship in a residence with a proper congregation then each city should have a way forward through their planning commission.”
In September 2022, Grand filed a lawsuit against the city and Brennan, alleging that the former mayor was motivated by “animus against Orthodox Jews.” He maintained that the actions blocking him from conducting services in his home were part of a “systematic campaign” to prevent the Orthodox community from growing in University Heights, according to the Cleveland Jewish News.
In January, Weiss told JTA that University Heights’ Jewish community had grown a “tremendous amount” in recent years, and was the “largest Orthodox contingency of residents in the state of Ohio.”
Brennan, who was twice censured by the city council for “inappropriate language,” had previously faced criticism from the city’s Jewish community during his tenure. In November 2024, he drew backlash for criticizing voters in a heavily Jewish neighborhood who supported Donald Trump, and in April 2025, he accused the volunteer-run Jewish ambulance service Hatzalah of “jeopardizing public safety.”
In October 2024, the U.S. District Court of Northern Ohio ruled in favor of University Heights, and the Ohio 6th District Court of Appeals later upheld the ruling in November 2025.
A petition for Supreme Court review is currently pending, and a decision on whether it will be heard is expected in the coming months, according to NJAC.
“This case deserves Supreme Court review because, across the country, Jewish religious practice has repeatedly been constrained through the neutral application of rules in ways that disproportionately burden visible Jewish life,” David Benger, the litigation counsel at NJAC, said in a statement.
The post Orthodox groups ask Supreme Court to hear case of Ohio man barred from hosting home prayer services appeared first on The Forward.