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These almost-too-cute-to-eat hamantaschen are baked for a good cause
(New York Jewish Week) — Baker Michal Prevor, the founder and owner of Babka Bailout, makes hamantaschen at her Jersey City bakery all year long, not just for Purim. Her inventive fillings of the triangular-shaped cookie include guava jam, dulce de leche and date nut.
Ahead of the festive holiday of Purim this year, which begins on the evening of March 6, Prevor decided to kick the creativity up a notch: She’s gone a bit wild, offering a collection of hamantaschen that are decorated to look like animals.
“When I was a little girl I ate with my eyes,” Prevor, 47, told the New York Jewish Week. “I always wanted to buy anything that looked like a character.”
Inspired by some googly eyes that she had leftover in her kitchen from Halloween, Prevor created the fanciful cookies, which sell for $6 each. Decorated as bunnies, kittens, giraffes and bears, the hamantaschen are almost too cute to eat. But make no mistake: Iced with white chocolate or dark chocolate and filled with a choice of nutella, dulce de leche or cookie butter — fillings she feels kids would like — the cookies are meant to be consumed and enjoyed.
As both her animal-themed hamantaschen and the unusual name of her bakery business might suggest, Prevor is not one to do the expected: The mom of two founded Babka Bailout in May 2020 at the height of the pandemic — despite the fact that she had never baked a babka before. Rather, her motivation was to help a friend who had fallen on hard times during lockdown and was having trouble feeding her family of five.
The plan, said Prevor, was to make and sell homemade babka and give the proceeds to their friend. Prevor, who lived in Hoboken at the time, went on a local moms’ Facebook group and wrote that she was selling babkas to help her friend. Within five minutes of posting, she sold 40 nutella or cinnamon babka at $14 each.
“The name for the company was my husband’s idea,” said Prevor. “Some people didn’t have the government to bail them out. Lots of people were left behind and not in great situations. The name was a fun spin — the babka would bail my friend out.”
Prevor’s husband, Grant, a home builder who bakes as a hobby, made that first batch of babka, while Prevor watched and learned. Their two daughters, Ariel and Amelie, who were 15 and 12 years old at time, pitched in, too. “Everyone was working,” said Prevor. “All hands on deck. It gave us a schedule, and it made my kids busy at a time when a lot of kids were very depressed.”
From there, Prevor started baking every week. “I was making hundreds of babkas a week from home,” she said. “It was quite an adventure. I had to start very early — the babkas had to rise. The oven could only fit eight babkas at a time, and it took 45 minutes to bake the babkas in the home oven at 350 degrees.”
“My oven door literally fell off from all of the opening and closing,” she added.
Prevnor had never baked babka before she launched Babka Bailout in May 2020. Since then, she’s expanded her menu with inventive creations. (Michelle Gevint)
Two months after Babka Bailout launched, Prevor began experimenting with different babka flavors, like cereal milk and oreos-and-nutella (both suggested by her daughters). In March 2021, she added hamantaschen for Purim. Prevor tested more than 40 different recipes for hamantaschen until she came up with an amalgamation that she felt was best — and decided to keep what she calls her favorite cookie permanently on the menu.
For flavor inspiration, Prevor said she draws upon the diverse populations of New York and Jersey City, in particular, as well as her own multi-cultural background: Prevor spent the first six years of her life on a moshav (an agricultural cooperative) in the Sinai Peninsula where her father, Ofer Rozenfeld, grew melons and flowers.
In 1981, ahead of Israel’s impending withdrawal from from the Sinai, the family moved to Santo Domingo, the capital of the Dominican Republic, where her father continued his farming. Then, a few years later, when Prevor’s older brother turned 18, the family returned to Israel so that he, and the other four children in the family, could eventually serve in the Israel Defense Forces.
Following her service, Prevor moved to New York where she attended New York University and double majored in political science and journalism. A year after graduation, she married Grant, a fellow Spanish-speaking Jew who grew up in Puerto Rico. In 2005, when their first daughter was 10 months old, the family moved to New Jersey.
Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, Prevor sold irrigation equipment designed by her father. She had her last business meeting via Zoom in March 2020 — and two months later, she came face-to-face with her friend’s financial problems and decided to help. “Giving back to the community and tzedakah have always been indoctrinated into my upbringing,” Prevor said. “My parents took care of anybody they came into contact with who needed help. And I think that is part of having a Jewish soul.”
Babka Bailout’s business has continued to grow — in addition to online orders via their web site, Prevor’s products can be found at Butterfield Market, a gourmet grocery store on Madison Avenue and 85th Street.
Last September, Babka Bailout moved to a commercial kitchen in Jersey City, where Prevor and her family now live. She now has a storefront connected to the bakery where passersby stop in to buy treats — many Manhattanites place advance orders and make the short trip over the Hudson themselves, Prevor said.
“We are getting their hamantaschen for Purim this year,” said Joelle Obsatz, owner of Butterfield Market. “They have faces on it. I have never seen anything like it — I think it will be a hit. We will only be selling our house-made hamantaschen and Babka Bailout’s.”
As for Prevor’s previously down-on-her-luck friend, she now assists Prevor in the kitchen. These days, Prevor donates portions of Babka Bailout’s proceeds to numerous organizations, including Welcome Home Jersey City, an organization that supports refugees arriving in the area. “Whenever there is an opportunity to help, I do, either by baking or donating money,” she said. “Whenever an organization asks, my rule of thumb is to help.”
While Prevor may have never intended to become a professional baker, it’s clear she’s established a perfect niche for herself and her community. “In our little shop, people that pick up our baked goods come from all over — the Arab world, the Philippines, Latin America. Once they try them, they are hooked,” she said. “That kind of ties into all my flavors. I love diversity. I love learning from other people and taking flavors from other countries and making everybody feel welcome.”
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A comedian went viral for saying he supports Israel onstage — he wasn’t even there
Menachem Silverstein’s High Holidays were interrupted by what he calls a beautifully ironic “monkey paw situation.”
“Like any good Jewish comedian, I’m in Rosh Hashanah services praying to God for a little bit of a boost in my career, for something to go viral, for something to hit,” Silverstein, a 30-year-old comic in Los Angeles, told me. “I turn my phone after hag. I have about 40-plus messages from people being like, ‘What the hell’s happening? Is this you?’”
Friends were sending him links to a video of a crowd leaving a theater in the middle of a standup set. The caption overlaid on the clip said, in English and Arabic, “audience walks out after comedian backs Israel.” On an X post with more than 2 million views, an account named “Truthseeker” identified the comic as Silverstein.
Silverstein knew immediately the video was of the Laugh Factory in Chicago, a venue he last played this summer. He had no memory of the crowd walking out — a traumatic experience for any standup. In fact, as he took a closer look at the video, he realized it wasn’t even him onstage.
“My most viral thing was not showing up to a comedy club, which is hilarious in itself,” said Silverstein, who estimates across platforms the clip has been seen more than 10 million times. “If I would have known, I would have missed more shows.”
By the time Silverstein was clued into his virality, it was too late to contain the disinformation.
Alex Jones picked the clip up, commenting, “It’s got one guy in a yarmulke. He literally says, ‘If you don’t support what Israel is doing in this war, leave.’”
No such statement is made in the clip. There’s no guy in a yarmulke, only a man in a dark t-shirt who appears to be blindfolded. This didn’t stop news outlets like Palestine Chronicle and the 1.1 million follower Global Reports Instagram account from running with the story.
Someone captioned the original clip — now deleted — indicating the comedian stated their support for Israel, leading to a mass exodus. From there, Truthseeker identified Silverstein as the comic, based, Silverstein believes, on a joke he retired about three years ago.
“Basically, the joke was, ‘Hi, my name is Menachem. I stand with Israel. It’s not political; they’re just the only people that can pronounce my name.’”
Grok and other AI models reinforced the claim that Silverstein was the person in the clip. But the real reason for everyone leaving their seats was something much less loaded: a prank.
David Fuhrer, president of the Laugh Factory said, based on an account confirmed by the Chicago Laugh Factory’s head of operations, that the video was from a Sept. 10 performance of a regular show called “What Could Go Wrong?,” in which practical jokes are played on comics.
“In this particular case, we had a comedian named Kieron Harrell and we blindfolded him and put headphones on him,” Fuhrer said. “They walked the entire audience out into the lobby as a joke so he had an empty room he was performing to.”
Fuhrer said it had “nothing to do with antisemitism or people walking out on Menachem.” He doesn’t know who repurposed the video, only that it had gone viral.
“It’s a shame because he’s a wonderful person and a great performer and a part of our family here.”
If you go to the “What Could Go Wrong?” Instagram, you’ll see a better image of the real comic, Harrell, who looks nothing like Silverstein.
Daniel Cassilagio, who produces “What Could Go Wrong,” captioned the images of the performer, saying the show was “so good that it was used as a geo political [sic] disinformation campaign.”
Cassilagio wrote on Instagram that the clip was recorded, uploaded without the producers’ knowledge and “then virally shared by what are most likely bots from China.”
People who don’t check their sources have “been harassing both the comic that was on stage, and a comic from LA who I’ve never even heard about or met,” Cassilagio wrote on a post that, judging by its 166 likes, has far less visibility than the fake account. “He wasn’t even in Chicago at the time.”
Silverstein told me that, while he added around 200 followers, he’s been inundated with hateful comments and his reach has dropped as people have been reporting his account. If you search his name now, the top hits are for his nonexistent scandal. When he’s looking to play clubs, he’s concerned that bookers will see he “walked a crowd” and deny him a slot.
Beyond the made-up controversy, there’s not much about geopolitics in Silverstein’s act. His material includes jokes on fatherhood, being 5’9” (“a Jewish 6’2”) and some well-deserved ribbing of Kanye West. In videos, he can be seen circumcising a baby carrot.
In an age when performers like Macklemore and Jerry Seinfeld have been canceled for their views on Israel and Palestinians, Silverstein sees a new frontier in his experience.
“It used to be you watch a podcast or watch a stand-up clip, clip someone out of context, post it, and get them canceled,” he said. “Now they’re getting away with just posting a random thing, putting your name on it, and then people believe it.”
The post A comedian went viral for saying he supports Israel onstage — he wasn’t even there appeared first on The Forward.
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‘Run, hide, fight’: Synagogues make threat preparedness part of High Holiday services
Rabbi Yosef Kanefsky plans to open his Yom Kippur sermon this year in an unusual way: with an emergency evacuation plan.
It’s how he opened his Rosh Hashanah sermon, too.
“I mentioned [that] people should understand where the exits are,” Kanefsky said. “I mentioned what our plan is, God forbid, if we need to evacuate the children in the youth program — that we have volunteers for that.”
Kanefsky, senior rabbi at B’nai David-Judea Congregation in Los Angeles, acknowledged that the reminder to prepare for the worst could be “potentially a little bit jarring” on the holiest days of the year. But with synagogues on heightened alert, he said, it felt unfortunately necessary.
“It’s just part of our lives right now,” he said. “That extra measure of vigilance.”
Extra security measures at synagogues are nothing new. Since the 2018 shooting that killed 11 worshippers at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue, Jewish institutions have invested heavily in infrastructure, personnel and training to counter the threat of violence. But this High Holiday season, several synagogues are taking the unusual step of integrating emergency preparedness into the services themselves, whether through verbal instructions like Kanefsky’s or written plans handed out alongside prayer books.
A flyer distributed at Beth Tzedec Congregation in Toronto outlines a three-point plan in the event of an attack: Run, hide or — as a last resort — “Be prepared to defend yourself.”
“Remember: Your actions before police arrive may save your life,” it reads in all-caps.
In August, the Jewish nonprofit Secure Community Network released a safety card that synagogues can customize with their own evacuation maps then place in their pews. While a range of scenarios could prompt a building evacuation, like a fire or earthquake, the card focuses on reacting to an attack.
It includes instructions for how to make a tourniquet to stop bleeding and tips for fleeing or fighting “the shooter.”
And at Congregation Emanu-El in San Francisco, a flyer advising congregants to run, hide, or fight in the event of an attack was placed on every other seatback during Rosh Hashanah.
“It brought home the potential dangers in a way I hadn’t seen before,” Frances Dinkelspiel, a member of Congregation Emanu-El, told the Forward. “You’re going in for services. You’re opening your heart. There’s a sense of community. You’re embracing one another. And then there’s this piece of paper that’s reminding you: Don’t relax too much.”
Kanefsky said he felt a responsibility to his congregation to provide safety instructions, noting that the High Holidays may attract out-of-town visitors unfamiliar with the building.
But he also acknowledged that such warnings “can take away from the spiritual mood that we’re working so hard on building,” he said.
Kanefsky said he tried to make the announcement as unobtrusive as possible — giving the instructions in what he called “a spiritual and emotional envelope” by thanking the synagogue’s security team and framing preparedness as “part of the devotion to one another and our devotion to God.”
Michael Masters, Secure Community Network’s CEO, said the High Holidays present an elevated security risk at synagogues compared with other times of year. Even basic preparedness measures, like knowing where the exits are, can make a meaningful difference in a threat situation, he said.
He cited the ramming attack on Temple Israel in West Bloomfield, Michigan, in March as a prominent recent example. Seconds after the assailant drove a truck filled with explosives through a building entrance, a security guard opened fire on the vehicle; after the vehicle caught fire, the campus was safely evacuated.
“The guard was there, and he was well trained, and he did an amazing job, as did law enforcement,” Masters said. “But the faculty and the staff and the students were all trained as well.”
Dinkelspiel emphasized that she feels safe at her synagogue, which has a modern security system and bollards around the sidewalk to prevent cars from driving onto the property. But that sense of safety, she said, was part of what made the flyer so unnerving.
“After all these security measures the congregation has,” Dinkelspiel said, “there was still this reminder on this flimsy piece of paper that Jews can be attacked at any time.”
The post ‘Run, hide, fight’: Synagogues make threat preparedness part of High Holiday services appeared first on The Forward.
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Mamdani once vowed to arrest Netanyahu. Now he won’t join protests against him.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said Wednesday that he will not join protests against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he arrives in the city to address the United Nations annual gathering next week and pushed back on the suggestion that he ever encouraged New Yorkers to protest the Israeli leader.
“I do not have any plans to attend any protest at the U.N. General Assembly,” Mamdani told reporters. “To New Yorkers, I have never encouraged them to protest. What I have always told them is that they have the right to do so in the city.”
But two months ago, when Mamdani was asked what New Yorkers frustrated with Netanyahu should do when the Israeli leader came to the city for the annual fall U.N. event, the mayor repeatedly pointed to protest as an option. “I think one of the bedrocks of our city is protest,” Mamdani said at a July 22 press conference. “It is something that has been a part of what makes our city so special: that New Yorkers can express themselves, whether they are in support or in opposition, no matter the topic.”
Mamdani’s July remarks came after a legal review the mayor ordered concluded that he lacks the power to order the arrest of Netanyahu, a pledge he made during his mayoral election campaign.
In July, when a reporter followed up directly, “Are you urging them to protest?” Mamdani stopped short of saying yes. But he again pointed to protests as a way for New Yorkers who oppose Netanyahu to make their voices heard. “I’m simply saying that this is a city where — if anyone feels a level of frustration or opposition, protest is something that we will always respect,” Mamdani said. “I leave it to New Yorkers themselves to make that decision,” he added.
From arrest pledge to protest rights
Mamdani had campaigned on ordering Netanyahu’s arrest based on a warrant issued by the International Criminal Court in November 2024, which accused the Israeli prime minister, former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Hamas military commander Mohammed Deif of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Netanyahu has rejected the charges. The United States is not a member of the International Criminal Court and the Trump administration imposed sanctions on the ICC months after it issued the warrants.
After taking office, Mamdani ordered a legal review and acknowledged in July that New York City does not have the authority to execute the ICC warrant.
He made that announcement in an unusual video address describing Netanyahu as “a war criminal, the architect of a horrific genocide against the Palestinian people” and declared that the Israeli leader would not be welcome in New York, home to the largest concentration of Jews in the United States.
The address drew criticism from Jewish leaders who questioned why the mayor was devoting so much attention to an arrest he acknowledged he could not legally carry out. The criticism came amid growing tension between Mamdani and parts of New York’s Jewish community over his rhetoric about Israel. Jewish organizations have also raised concerns about it contributing to a hostile climate for Jews across the city.
It was against that backdrop that Mamdani was pressed at the July press conference about what he would tell Palestinian supporters who had welcomed his promise to arrest Netanyahu, and were disappointed that he could not fulfill it. That is when he turned to protest as a remaining option. “I want to make it very clear that that welcome ends with me,” Mamdani said. “ I will not be welcoming Benjamin Netanyahu or any other war criminals when they come to this city.”
Netanyahu is expected to arrive in New York City next Wednesday under heavy security measures and address the U.N. General Assembly on Thursday before returning to Israel. One Israeli media outlet reported that the official plane carrying the Israeli leader, known as “Wings of Zion,” will land at Newark International Airport in New Jersey instead of John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York due to concerns that Mamdani could try to prevent the aircraft from remaining parked at JFK during Netanyahu’s visit.
Protests against Netanyahu are planned outside his hotel and near the United Nations during his address. Jewish groups are also planning a mass rally against antisemitism on Wednesday.
At Wednesday’s press conference, Mamdani drew a sharper distinction between encouraging protests and defending the right to hold them. “We respect that right,” he said. “And this is a city that is proud of the Constitution, proud of the First Amendment; we’ll continue to do so.”
Mamdani cited the same First Amendment right when asked about students from Ramaz and SAR, two prominent Modern Orthodox schools, who are planning a prayer vigil outside the mayor’s residence on Friday morning in support of Israel. “They can have a vigil, or I’ve heard some describe it even as a ‘protest,’” he said. “Whatever it is intended to be, they have the room and space to do so outside of Gracie Mansion. Though, he added, he would “probably be somewhere else across the city” when they gather.
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