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A Minnesota synagogue built an ice rink — and is inaugurating it with a klezmer skate
(JTA) — A forecasted low of -16 degrees in the Twin Cities on Thursday has the stage set perfectly for two frozen Jewish firsts — a Klezmer on Ice festival and a synagogue-run skating rink.
Such is life in Minnesota, where bone-chilling temperatures are no match for Jewish festivities.
“It kind of shows us the Minnesota-style of thinking about the winter where just because it’s freezing cold outside, you don’t have to stop doing everything,” said Marcus Rubenstein, rabbi at Temple of Aaron in St. Paul.
“I used to be a rabbi in New York. They said you couldn’t schedule any big events in the winter because no one would come in case it snowed,” Rubenstein said. “But [here] sometimes it will snow 6, 7 inches and be -5, -10 degrees, and you’ll have everybody come out. I mean people in their 80s, 90s to little kids. And they just put on their coats and go out and have fun.”
Rabbi Marcus Rubenstein of Temple of Aaron test drives his synagogue’s new ice rink. (Courtesy of Marcus Rubenstein)
Temple of Aaron, a Conservative congregation of about 700 families, is inviting families to bundle up and have fun on what Rubenstein believes is the first-ever skating rink on a synagogue property. The rink, which can accommodate about 30 people at a time, was built and is being maintained by “Ice Captains” — synagogue members who clear it of snow and shovel off any extra ice that forms.
On Thursday, skaters at the rink heard the kickoff performance of the klezmer festival, featuring Jewbalaya, a hybrid klezmer and New Orleans jazz band in which Rubenstein plays the trumpet.
But the music will be piped in from inside the synagogue — a concession, Rubenstein and others associated with the festival said, to the cold.
Last week, musicians promoting Klezmer on Ice with a pre-festival performance alongside Lake Harriett, the (usually frozen-over) body of water at the heart of Minneapolis, ran into some technical challenges. Anticipating frigid temperatures, the musicians planned to play from a lakeside booth decorated like a boom box as part of a pop-art initiative called Art Shanty. But there was a wrinkle.
“We were supposed to have a sousaphone player who by the time they got their heavy big brass instrument into the box, the valves were frozen so they couldn’t play,” said Josh Rosard, an organizer of Klezmer on Ice. The performance went on without the sousaphone.
It’s not just brass instruments that are vulnerable to cold snaps. Strings and woodwinds can quickly go out of tune in the cold, as metal contracts and wood begins to warp. Clarinets and violins, staples of the Eastern European Jewish music genre, just can’t take it.
That’s why most of the Klezmer on Ice events will take place indoors — including but not only at Temple of Aaron. On the schedule for the weekend-long festival are local and national performers Sarina Partridge, Tzipporah Johnson, Izzy Buckner, the Klezmommies and the band Midwood. There will also be a cabaret variety show; klezmer-infused Shabbat services; and a luminary Havdalah ceremony.
Rosard said he saw the event as a breakout moment for the Twin Cities’ klezmer scene and, given the strong track record of longstanding klezmer festivals at spawning new acts, an opportunity.
“I’m really excited for what players in the community are going to take out of the workshops in particular and excited to see what may come out of it in the future,” said Rosard, who grew up casually playing the accordion but got more seriously involved in the klezmer world during the pandemic. He met his Klezmer on Ice co-organizer, Jewish musician and folklorist Sarah Larsson, with whom he attended KlezCanada and the Portland Klezmer Festival.
Still, he acknowledged, “It’s a little bit tongue in cheek to do something like this in the middle of February in Minnesota.”
Rubenstein said his congregants are up for it. Temple of Aaron’s new ice rink will be open not only during the klezmer festival’s opening night but for skating sessions most Saturdays after Shabbat morning services and Hebrew school classes finish.
The sun sets ahead of the Klezmer on Ice Festival’s opening night, which features a free skate session at Temple of Aaron’s ice rink. (Courtesy of Marcus Rubenstein)
If the activity isn’t exactly standard after-synagogue fare, it’s perfectly permitted under the Conservative movement’s interpretation of Jewish law. The movement, of which Temple of Aaron is a part, permits non-competitive ice skating on Shabbat, so long as no Shabbat rules are violated (such as driving to or from a rink or paying to rent skates), and the skating takes place within the boundaries of an eruv, or Jewish legal enclosure inside which certain objects can be carried on Shabbat.
Rubenstein said he was thinking about the activity in different terms — as it relates to making Temple of Aaron a centerpiece of a St. Paul Shabbat.
“The kids are ice skating anyway,” he added. “So why not ice skate at shul and come do it together with their Jewish friends, and build community that way?”
Temperatures are supposed to rise over the course of the weekend, but the high on Friday should be in the low single-digits. So for the klezmer performance that is supposed to take place at Lake Harriet, Rosard says, a plan is in place to avoid last weekend’s snafus.
“We’ll have the sousaphone player drive up as close as possible, then run-slash-briskly walk straight into the performance shelter,” he said. “We didn’t quite have the urgency last time.”
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She survived the Tree of Life massacre seven years ago today — and still shows up to pray
Audrey Glickman showed up for morning minyan today — as she has nearly every morning since Oct. 27, 2018, when she survived the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history.
Glickman, now 68, was leading services that fateful Shabbat morning in a small chapel inside Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life when she heard the unmistakable sound of gunfire. She grabbed congregant Joe Charny, then 90, and raced up the stairs and into a small room. Together, huddled and scared, they hid under their prayer shawls.
Seven years later, she still prays in Squirrel Hill. But what she thought would be a wake-up call ended up being a warning: She’s watching the rise of antisemitism, the political rhetoric that helped fuel the shooting, and the divisions that persist. “The hatred is increasing,” she told me Sunday by phone. “And it’s taking different shapes.”
Below is our conversation, edited for length and clarity ahead of tonight’s memorial gathering at the Jewish Community Center in Pittsburgh.
Does this anniversary feel different to you?
Everything feels different this year. There’s more talk about how the shooter was influenced — the idea that Jews were “bringing in immigrants.” It’s a reminder that words matter. Hatred starts small and travels fast.
The shooter is now on death row. Does that bring you a sense of closure?
Death isn’t a penalty. It ends punishment. Being on death row — cut off from society — that’s the punishment. And that’s fine with me.
What do you most want people to remember seven years later?
That the victims weren’t just those in the building. The whole city was wounded. The first responders who were working that day felt it. We have to give people space to understand their own grief — to inhabit their victimhood and come to terms with it.
Antisemitism has increased since the 2018 attack, especially after Oct. 7 2023.
Antisemitism from the right is a physical threat. Antisemitism from the left is an existential threat. They’re different. We can sometimes work with the left — at least talk — but it’s hard to work with the right when they’re against us.
What worries you most about antisemitism right now?
The hatred is increasing, and it’s taking new shapes. And we’re not battling it efficiently. People are discontented, and they need someone to blame — and leaders exploit that. They push people toward hate because it keeps them divided.
What do you want people to know about Jews?
Jewish people are just people. We don’t spend our whole lives “being Jews” and doing mysterious things that make people want to hate us. We serve in the army, we run libraries, we teach children. My father cleaned rugs. We’re ordinary people who want to live and work alongside everyone else. And as long as we can all work together for a better world, we’re going to be a lot better off.
The post She survived the Tree of Life massacre seven years ago today — and still shows up to pray appeared first on The Forward.
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Trump sets deadline for Hamas to release hostages’ bodies as Egyptian team enters Gaza to help
(JTA) — An Egyptian team has entered Gaza to join in the search for the remains of 13 hostages whose bodies have still not been released following the ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war.
The ceasefire’s first phase required the release of all hostages, living and dead. Hamas freed all 20 living hostages as required but has released the remains of only 15 of 28 hostages who were killed on Oct. 7, 2023, or subsequently in captivity.
On Saturday, U.S. President Donald Trump, who brokered the ceasefire and is applying pressure to maintain it, issued a stern warning to Hamas about freeing the remaining hostages.
“Hamas is going to have to start returning the bodies of the deceased hostages, including two Americans, quickly, or the other Countries involved in this GREAT PEACE will take action,” Trump posted on Truth Social. He did not offer details about which countries would step in or what actions they might take.
The Israelis reportedly believe that Hamas is aware of the locations of the majority of the hostages’ bodies but is slow-walking their release to delay a shift to the deal’s second phase, which would require it to disarm and cede control of Gaza.
Trump acknowledged both concerns in his post, in which he implied a deadline of Monday afternoon for swift action on Hamas’ part.
“Some of the bodies are hard to reach, but others they can return now and, for some reason, they are not. Perhaps it has to do with their disarming, but when I said, ‘Both sides would be treated fairly,’ that only applies if they comply with their obligations,” he wrote. “Let’s see what they do over the next 48 hours. I am watching this very closely.”
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, meanwhile, said on Monday that Israel and the United States should pause efforts to advance the peace plan until the hostages are returned.
“Hamas knows exactly where every one of the deceased hostages is held,” the group said in a statement, adding, “The families urge the Government of Israel, the United States administration, and the mediators not to advance to the next phase of the agreement until Hamas fulfills all of its obligations and returns every hostage to Israel.”
Israel has endorsed the entry of Egyptian forces to locate the hostages but has not accepted an offer from Turkey, which took Hamas’ side in the war, to help.
The 13 remaining hostages include two, Omer Neutra and Itay Chen, who were dual American citizens. They also include Thai and Tanzanian agricultural workers; several older men murdered on Oct. 7; a hostage killed in a failed rescue attempt; and a soldier, Hadar Goldin, whose body has been held by Hamas since 2014.
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Ireland elects left-wing politician with record of anti-Israel rhetoric as president
(JTA) — Ireland’s new president will be a left-wing politician who has sharply criticized Israel in parliament and faced backlash for comments defending Hamas.
The election of Catherine Connolly, a member of the Irish parliament since 2016, marks the elevation of a vocally anti-Israel voice at a time when Ireland has stood out internationally for its critical stance on Israel. Last year, Israel announced that it would shutter its embassy in Ireland, citing “antisemitic rhetoric of the Irish government.”
Connolly won by a landslide after securing 63% of the votes on Friday, the largest margin in Ireland’s history. She defeated Heather Humphreys, a member of the center-right Fine Gael party.
While Irish presidents represent the country for matters of diplomacy and play an important constitutional role, the position is largely symbolic and they do not have the power to enact laws or policies.
“My message is use your voice in every way you can, because a republic and a democracy needs constructive questioning, and together we can shape a new republic that values everybody,” wrote Connolly in a post on X following her victory.
Connolly drew criticism from Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin in September after she described Hamas as “part of the fabric of the Palestinian people,” and said British Prime Minister Keir Starmer should not have “any say about Hamas” leading a future Palestinian state.
After Martin criticized her remarks, saying she was “reluctant to unequivocally condemn 7 October,” Connolly later clarified on BBC Radio that Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack was “absolutely wrong,” but added the attacks did not constitute an attempted genocide and that the history of the conflict “did not start on 7 October.”
“I come from Ireland which has a history of colonization. I would be very wary of telling a sovereign people how to run their country,” Connolly told BBC Radio. “The Palestinians must decide, in a democratic way, who they want to lead their country.”
Ireland has historically supported Palestinians in their conflict with Israel, a stance often linked to the country’s own history of British imperial rule.
As a member of Ireland’s parliament, Connolly has also fiercely criticized Israel, referring to the country as a “terrorist state” and saying that it was not “democratic” — including in comments predating the war in Gaza.
In 2021, Connolly formally accused Israel of attempting to “accomplish Jewish supremacy,” swiftly drawing condemnation from Jewish leaders who said her remarks smacked of antisemitic rhetoric.
The members of the Irish rap duo Kneecap, which has protested Israel on stage and drawn a terrorism charge, now dropped, over the display of a Hezbollah flag, urged voters to cast their ballots for Connolly.
Ireland’s current president, Michael D. Higgins, who served his maximum two terms, also has a record of sharply criticizing Israel.
In January, Jewish attendees were forced to leave a Holocaust memorial ceremony in Dublin after they protested Higgins’ remarks during the event about the war in Gaza, which he called a “horrific loss of life and destruction which has taken place.”
Last month, after a United Nations Commission of Inquiry concluded that Israel was committing a genocide in Gaza, Higgins called the finding a “very, very important document” and suggested that Israel and countries who supply Israel with weapons should be excluded from the United Nations.
Connolly, a 68-year-old lawyer and psychologist, describes herself as a socialist and pacifist. She is also critical of the European Union and NATO and worked to legalize same-sex marriage and abortion in Ireland.
The post Ireland elects left-wing politician with record of anti-Israel rhetoric as president appeared first on The Forward.