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Where to order Yom Kippur break-fast meals in NYC in 2023

(New York Jewish Week) — Thousands of pounds of smoked salmon are consumed in New York City at the conclusion of the fast on Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, which this year begins on Sunday night and ends the following evening.

For lox lovers, there’s no shortage of spots to cater a traditional Ashkenazi meal (which often consists of bagels, smoked fish, plus schmears and all the fixings). 

But there’s no reason to draw the line there. In this vast and diverse city of ours, there are a host of other delicious ways to break the fast — without breaking a sweat over the stove. Whether you want a platter of Yemenite flatbreads delivered or a variety of vegetarian Ethiopian stews to go, keep reading for 12 places across the city that are preparing Yom Kippur break-fast meals this year. 

1. Breads Bakery

Multiple locations in Manhattan 

For Yom Kippur break-fast, Breads Bakery is offering an assortment of cakes, breads, smoked salmon and schmears. If you’re feeding a crowd, the 12-serving Jerusalem Bagels and Atlantic Smoked Salmon Platter ($125) includes Jerusalem bagels (oblong, sesame seed-coated bagels), smoked salmon, scallion cream cheese and capers. For $65, there’s a platter of six Jerusalem bagels with a choice of four spreads, including hummus, egg salad, tuna salad, labneh, tzatziki and tahini. As a bonus, the Israeli-style bakery also has a new dessert on this year’s menu: milk-and-honey rugelach. Kosher-style, but not certified kosher. 

2. Edith’s

Williamsburg, Brooklyn

Edith’s, the Williamsburg eatery that celebrates Jewish cuisine from around the world, has a selection of items that can be picked up or delivered for your Yom Kippur break-fast. An $85 Bagels & Spreads Platter includes assorted cream cheeses served with sliced cucumber, tomatoes and pickled onions. Or, for the same price, there’s a Malawach and Spreads platter that includes the Yemenite flatbread paired with butter, housemade jam, grated tomato, zhug (a fiery green hot sauce) and labneh. A la carte items are also available. Not kosher. 

3. Gertie

Williamsburg, Brooklyn

Williamsburg’s Jewish diner, Gertie, has a break-fast menu available for pickup or delivery. For $150, there’s the Gertie x Jake Cohen Deluxe Bagel Spread, which includes six bagels with smoked fish and schmears, plus three slices of cake from Cohen, a cookbook author/influencer, as well as a signed copy of his latest book, “I Could Nosh.” A la carte items also available. Not kosher. 

4. Mansoura Pastries

Gravesend, Brooklyn

Family-owned Mansoura Pastries has been producing Middle Eastern sweets and treats for five generations, selling break-fast-appropriate items such as baklava (15 pieces for $30) and mamoul, a flower-shaped cookie dusted with sugar and filled with pistachio (12 pieces for $24). The bakery also sells a variety of candied nuts and nougats as well as chocolate-dipped fruits and nuts. Drop by the Kings Highway bakery or order online for delivery via UPS. Kosher. 

5. Merlyne’s Cuisine

Gravesend, Brooklyn

Beat it, bagels! Merlyne’s Cuisine is a caterer specializing in Syrian specialties like cheese sambusak —  a fluted buttery pastry filled with cheese ($18/dozen) —  or calsonnes, a cheese-filled ravioli-type pasta ($18 per dozen); tomato or spinach mini tarts ($20 per dozen), or a 9-inch spinach tart for $42. Pick up in Brooklyn or local deliveries available in the borough. Yom Kippur orders are due Monday, Sept. 18; order form here. Kosher. 

6. Modern Bread & Bagel

Two locations in Manhattan (plus Los Angeles)

Gluten-free bakery Modern Bread & Bagel has a variety of platters perfect for a Yom Kippur break-fast meal. Their Bagels, Cream Cheese, Smoked Fish and The Works Platter ($179) serves 10 and includes a dozen bagels and 24 ounces of smoked fish, plus assorted schmears and fixings. Other platters and a la carte items available, too. Yom Kippur pre-orders will be available for pickup and local delivery on Sunday. The cut off to order is Thursday at noon. Kosher. 

7. Moss Cafe

Riverdale, Bronx

This lively kosher cafe — where produce is procured from small local farms — has a variety of Yom Kippur break-fast options, including a dairy-free Herbed Egg Salad Platter ($140, serves 10) that includes egg salad made with local, cage-free eggs and housemade mayonnaise served with bread, microgreens and lacto-fermented pickles. Other items are also available. Items will be available to pick up on Sunday between 1 p.m. and 4 p.m.; delivery to the Upper West Side, Westchester County and Teaneck, New Jersey, is also available. Order deadline is Tuesday at 9 p.m. Kosher. 

8. Second Ave. Deli

Two locations in Manhattan

Second Ave. Deli offers far more than pastrami: For the break-fast meal, you can order smoked fish and bagels, too. The Nova Scotia Salmon platter runs $19.95 a person and includes lox, bagels, non-dairy cream cheese, tomatoes, onions and capers. Salads, tuna, rugelach and babka are available, too. $125 minimum on all deliveries; $100 minimum on orders you pick up. Kosher. 

9. Seudah Glatt Kosher Caterers

Gravesend, Brooklyn 

Get your choice of dairy, meat or pareve prepared foods from Seudah. Look online under “Local Takeout – Pickup” for dairy choices running from cheese balls (6 pieces for $4.50) and cheese bourekas (6 pieces for $7.50). Meat options range from mini beef kibbeh ($1/piece) and apricot chicken ($10 for a half chicken). Salads and pareve sides are also available; items must be picked-up at Seudah’s store on Kings Highway in Brooklyn. Kosher. 

10. Shelsky’s

Cobble Hill, Brooklyn 

This popular Brooklyn spot has a variety of break-fast platters available for pickup on Sunday or Monday, Sept. 25. One option is the Smoked Goodness Platter ($40/person, eight-person minimum) with “hand-sliced Eastern Gaspé Nova, whole-filleted smoked whitefish, wild-Alaskan sable, and kippered salmon beautifully arranged on a platter with thinly-sliced red onions and capers”; the order also comes with bagels and plain and scallion cream cheese. For the non-fish eaters, Shelsky’s is preparing deli, crudite and fruit platters, too, plus a variety of sweets. Pre-order deadline is Monday, Sept. 18. Not kosher. 

11. Tsion Cafe

Harlem

For Yom Kippur, Ethiopian Israeli Tsion Cafe has a vegan Ethiopian Veggie Combo that owner Beejhy Barhany considers the best way to break the fast. The combo is served with injera, a flatbread made with teff flour, accompanied by an assortment of veggie stews (red lentils, yellow split peas, cabbage with potatoes and carrots, ground chickpeas,and collard greens). Each stew is packaged individually and easy to warm up for consumption at any time. $21 per serving. Orders for pickup only on Friday and Saturday from 7-10 p.m. Not kosher. 

12. Zucker’s Bagels

Multiple locations in Manhattan

Local chain Zucker’s Bagels and Smoked Fish has an expansive High Holiday menu consisting of a variety of offerings for Yom Kippur gatherings both large and small. The High Holidays Essentials Kit ($115, serves six) includes a choice of bagels, three cream cheeses (plain, veggie and scallion), Eastern Nova Scotia salmon, babka, mini black-and-white cookies, plus a jar of toasted everything seeds tucked inside a Zucker’s thermal bag. Customers can also order a la carte by phone or email from their extensive menu. Orders must be placed 48 hours in advance; stores are open on Yom Kippur until 3 p.m. with deliveries being made until 5 p.m. Not kosher. 


The post Where to order Yom Kippur break-fast meals in NYC in 2023 appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

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‘Transparently Antisemitic’: Google Founder Sergey Brin Blasts UN in Internal Company Forum

Sergey Brin of Google (Source: ReutersConnect)

Sergey Brin of Google
(Source: ReutersConnect)

Google cofounder Sergey Brin criticized the United Nations in a company forum, calling it “transparently antisemitic” after the release of a report that accused Google and other tech firms of enabling Israeli military operations in Gaza.

Brin was responding to a UN report that claimed companies including Alphabet, Google’s parent company, profited from what it called “the genocide carried out by Israel” by providing cloud computing and artificial intelligence services to the Israeli government and military.

“Throwing around the term genocide in relation to Gaza is deeply offensive to many Jewish people who have suffered actual genocides,” Brin wrote in a discussion thread on a Google DeepMind employee forum. “I would also be careful citing transparently antisemitic organizations like the U.N.”

The report was the brainchild of Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories. The Trump administration has accused her of antisemitism and has called for her removal, saying she has demonstrated consistent antisemitic biases in her work and has unfairly singled out Israel. 

On Wednesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the US was imposing sanctions on Albanese  under a February executive order targeting those who “prompt International Criminal Court (ICC) action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives.”

In a post on X, Rubio accused Albanese of waging “political and economic warfare” against both nations and asserted that “such efforts will no longer be tolerated.”

Albanese, an Italian lawyer and academic, has held the position of UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories since 2022. The position authorizes her to monitor and report on “human rights violations” that Israel allegedly commits against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. 

Albanese has an extensive history of using her role at the UN to denigrate Israel and rationalize Hamas attacks on the Jewish state. In the months following the Palestinian terrorist group’s Oct. 7 atrocities across southern Israel, Albanese accused the Jewish state of perpetrating a “genocide” against the Palestinian people in revenge for the attacks and circulated a widely derided and heavily disputed report alleging that 186,000 people had been killed in the Gaza war as a result of Israeli actions. 

Google has faced internal uproar over the company’s $1.2 billion Project Nimbus deal with Israel. The deal has faced sustained criticism from human rights activists and some Google employees, who argue the technology could be used to enhance Israeli military operations and surveillance of Palestinians. According to a recent UN report, the agreement provided Israel with key cloud and AI infrastructure after Hamas launched its deadly October 7, 2023 attack against the Jewsih state, killing approximately 1,200 people and prompting a large-scale Israeli military response in Gaza.

Google has previously punished employees who protested the company’s relationship with Israel. After a wave of internal demonstrations in 2024, CEO Sundar Pichai issued a companywide memo urging staff not to use the workplace to debate political issues.

In the months following Oct. 7, Israeli defensive military operations in Gaza have led to the deaths of more than 57,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The ministry does not differentiate between civilians and combatants. Hamas, the terrorist group that runs the Gaza Health Ministry, has repeatedly fabricated casualty statistics in the past. 

The UN report accused US tech firms of exploiting a lucrative opportunity created by the conflict and Israel’s need for digital tools. It singled out Google and Amazon as being complicit in Israel’s so called “genocide” in Gaza. 

The post ‘Transparently Antisemitic’: Google Founder Sergey Brin Blasts UN in Internal Company Forum first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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US Clamps Sanctions on Israel-bashing UN Rights Monitor Albanese

Francesca Albanese, UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, attends a side event during the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, March 26, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Denis Balibouse

The Trump administration has imposed sweeping sanctions against Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, citing the UN official’s lengthy record of singling out Israel for condemnation.

In a post on X, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the sanctions under a February executive order targeting those who “prompt International Criminal Court (ICC) action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives.” He accused Albanese of waging “political and economic warfare” against both nations and asserted that “such efforts will no longer be tolerated.”

“Today I am imposing sanctions on UN Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese for her illegitimate and shameful efforts to prompt [International Criminal Court] action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives,” Rubio announced on X/Twitter.

“Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated,” declared the Trump administration’s top foreign affairs official. “We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defense.”  

Rubio concluded: “The United States will continue to take whatever actions we deem necessary to respond to lawfare and protect our sovereignty and that of our allies.”

The decision to impose sanctions on Albanese marks an escalation in the ongoing feud between the White House and the United Nations over Israel. The Trump administration has repeatedly accused the UN and Albanese of unfairly targeting Israel and mischaracterizing the Jewish state’s conduct in Gaza. 

Albanese, an Italian lawyer and academic, has held the position of UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories since 2022. The position authorizes her to monitor and report on alleged “human rights violations” by Israel against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. 

Last week, Albanese issued a scathing report accusing companies of helping Israel maintain a so-called “genocide economy.” She called on the companies to cut off economic ties with Israel and warned that they might be guilty of “complicity” in the so-called “genocide” in Gaza. 

Critics of Albanese have long accused her of exhibiting an excessive anti-Israel bias, calling into question her fairness and neutrality.

Albanese has an extensive history of using her role at the UN to denigrate Israel and seemingly rationalize Hamas’ attacks on the Jewish state.

In the months following the Palestinian terrorist group’s atrocities across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Albanese accused the Jewish state of perpetrating a “genocide” against the Palestinian people in revenge for the attacks and circulated a widely derided and heavily disputed report alleging that 186,000 people had been killed in the Gaza war as a result of Israeli actions. 

The action comes as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits Washington, where he has received a warm reception from the Trump administration. Netanyahu has been meeting with US officials to discuss next steps in the ongoing Gaza military operation. 

Gideon Sa’ar, Minister of Foreign Affairs for Israel, commended the Rubio announcement with his own post on X/Twitter, exclaiming: A clear message. Time for the UN to pay attention!” 

The post US Clamps Sanctions on Israel-bashing UN Rights Monitor Albanese first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Hardball: Trump Administration Reports Harvard to Accreditor Over Antisemitism Allegations

US President Donald Trump speaks during a Cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. Photo: Kevin Lamarque via Reuters Connect.

The Trump administration escalated its showdown against Harvard University on Wednesday, reporting the institution to its accreditor for alleged civil rights violations resulting from its weak response to reports of antisemitic bullying, discrimination, and harassment following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 massacre across southern Israel.

The US Department of Education (DOE) announced the action on Wednesday. Citing Harvard’s admitted failure to treat antisemitism as seriously as it treated others forms of hatred in the past, the DOE called on the New England Commission of Higher Education to review and, potentially, revoke its accreditation — a designation which qualifies Harvard for federal funding and attests to the quality of the educational services its provides.

“Accrediting bodies play a significant role in preserving academic integrity and a campus culture conducive to truth seeking and learning,” said Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. “Part of that is ensuring students are safe on campus and abiding by federal laws that guarantee educational opportunities to all students. By allowing anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination to persist unchecked on its campus, Harvard University has failed in its obligation to students, educators, and American taxpayers.”

The DOE, McMahon added, “expects the New England Commission of Higher Education to enforce its policies and practices, and to keep the Department fully informed of its efforts to ensure that Harvard is in compliance with federal law and accreditor standards.”

As previously reported by The Algemeiner, Harvard’s Presidential Task Force on Combating Antisemitism has acknowledged that the university administration’s handling of campus antisemitism fell well below its obligations under both Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and its own nondiscrimination policies.

In a 300-plus-page report, the task force compiled a comprehensive record of antisemitic incidents on Harvard’s campus in recent years — from the Harvard Palestine Solidarity Committee’s endorsement of the Oct. 7 terrorist atrocities to an anti-Zionist faculty group’s sharing an antisemitic cartoon depicting Jews as murderers of people of color. The report identified Harvard’s past refusal to afford Jews the same protections against discrimination enjoyed by other minority groups as a key source of its problem.

Coming several weeks after President Donald Trump ordered the freeze of $2.26 billion in federal research grants and contracts for Harvard, the task force report found it was “clear” that antisemitism and anti-Israel bias have been fomented, practiced, and tolerated not only at Harvard but also within academia more widely.”

The university is now suing the federal government over the funding halt.

President Trump has spoken scathingly of Harvard, calling it, for example, an “Anti-Semitic, Far Left Institute … with students being accepted from all over the world that want to rip our Country apart” in an April post to his Truth Social platform.

In recent weeks, however, both Trump and McMahon had commended Harvard’s constructive response in negotiations over reforms the administration has asked it to implement as a precondition for restoring federal funds. The requested reforms include hiring more conservative faculty, shuttering diversity, equity, and inclusion [DEI] programs, and slashing the size of administrative offices tangential to the university’s central educational mission.

The administration has since changed its tone in the wake of a report by The Harvard Crimson that interim Harvard President Alan Garber has said “behind closed doors” that he has no intention of doing anything that would make Harvard more palatable to conservatives.

Earlier this month, the Trump administration’s Joint Task Force to Combat Antisemitism issued Harvard a formal “notice of violation” of civil rights law. Charging that Harvard willfully exposed Jewish students to a flood of racist and antisemitic abuse both in and outside of the classroom, it threatened to strip whatever remains of Harvard’s federal funding.

“Failure to institute adequate changes immediately will result in the loss of all federal financial resources and continue to affect Harvard’s relationship with the federal government,” wrote the federal officials comprising the multiagency Task Force. “Harvard may of course continue to operate free of federal privileges, and perhaps such an opportunity will spur a commitment to excellence that will help Harvard thrive once again.”

In Wednesday’s announcement, US Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Harvard’s conduct “forfeits the legitimacy that accreditation is designed to uphold.”

“HHS and Department of Education will actively hold Harvard accountable through sustained oversight until it restores public trust and ensures a campus free of discrimination,” he said.

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

The post Hardball: Trump Administration Reports Harvard to Accreditor Over Antisemitism Allegations first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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