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An amended Conservative Jewish Passover policy taps into the booming gluten-free market
(JTA) — Ahead of Passover 2020 — as life worldwide ground to an abrupt halt in the face of a rapidly spreading pandemic and people faced the specter of empty grocery shelves, or staying confined at home — a range of rabbis tried to make it a little easier to observe the holiday.
Long lists of foods and newly lenient guidelines from Jewish organizations circulated among people who keep kosher for Passover, explaining which foods they could purchase and eat on the holiday, given the year’s extraordinary circumstances. The message — sometimes explicit, sometimes implied — was that these special permissions applied only temporarily.
Now, one rule instituted as a COVID provision by the Conservative movement is becoming permanent: Before Passover begins, Jews may buy certified kosher products that have kosher-for-Passover ingredients and are certified gluten-free and oat-free — even if they aren’t explicitly certified kosher for Passover.
When it first appeared in 2020, that rule was written in a way that suggested it was an emergency measure, using the words “when the situation demands.” This year, that four-word phrase has been removed from the Rabbinical Assembly’s Passover guide, and the guidance has moved from a separate section into the main list of allowable products.
The edit reflects how some shifts in Jewish practice that first appeared at the outset of the pandemic, as stopgap measures, have since been normalized. It also allows — for at least a narrow set of Jews who observe Jewish ritual in accordance with the Conservative movement’s dictates — more robust and potentially less expensive options for keeping kosher during Passover.
Rabbi Aaron Alexander, chair of the Kashrut Subcommittee on the Conservative movement’s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards, which issues the movement’s Jewish legal rulings, said the change does not reflect a shift in the movement’s approach to Jewish law, known as halacha. Instead, he said, it reflects confidence that the Food and Drug Administration’s strict rules about how products can be labeled can be trusted when it comes to Passover observance.
“It’s not a significant change in how we understand halacha in general and how we understand the general Passover laws,” Alexander said. “It’s always been the case that there are products you can buy without a KP [symbol] before Passover, when you can be pretty sure that there’s no chametz and that any accidental admixture would be minimal.”
The requirement for foods to be certified gluten-free and oat-free, Alexander said, is “an extra line of defense” for people buying products before Passover that are not explicitly labeled kosher for Passover.
The policy shift opens new doors to kosher-keeping Jews: Rather than seeking out specialty items with Passover kosher certification, often carried only in kosher supermarkets and in major markets, they can observe Passover by taking advantage of the increasing number of products that are labeled kosher, gluten-free and oat-free, as long as the ingredients accord with Passover laws.
The gluten-free marketplace is estimated at $6 billion a year in the United States and is growing by an estimated 10% each year, according to industry trend reports. The marketplace serves people with celiac disease — whose incidence is rising — as well as people who seek to reduce or eliminate their gluten intake for perceived health reasons.
Some people with celiac disease say they look forward to Passover because more products will hit shelves that they can count on to be free of gluten. Now, Jews who follow the Conservative movement’s guidance can benefit from some of the wide array of gluten-free foods that are already available.
On Passover, five types of grain are prohibited (except for when they are used to make matzah): wheat, spelt, barley, oat and rye. By purchasing products that are certified gluten-free and oat-free, consumers can avoid buying food that contain those five ingredients.
“In an effort to definitively alert consumers to the presence of wheat gluten in packaged foods, the FDA mandates that any product including the words ‘gluten-free,’ ‘no gluten,’ ‘free of gluten,’ or ‘without gluten’ must contain less than 20 parts per million of glutinous wheat, spelt, barley, or rye,” a footnote to the guide states. “This eliminates the possibility of a gluten-free packaged food containing 4 of the 5 hametz-derived grains in any quantity that would be viable according to Jewish law.”
Alexander emphasized that the gluten-free and oat-free guidance should be seen as “a good way to figure out whether or not the products you’re getting before Passover could be problematic.” He cautioned that looking at the rest of the ingredients is crucial: Some certified gluten-free products, for example, could still be prohibited for Passover because they contain yeast.
Sarah Chandler, an ordained Hebrew priestess and Jewish educator who used to run a pickle business, already bought food with gluten-free labels during her pre-Passover shopping.
“It’s very practical, and it’s also consistent with other levels of kashrut,” Chandler told JTA regarding her pre-Passover shopping. “The fact that you and I can go to a grocery store and buy eggs — you don’t need a kosher symbol on it. We just know that it’s eggs. We’re not worried that the egg is from a bird of prey and not kosher. We can just assume that [if] it says ‘chicken eggs,’ they’re chicken eggs.”
She added, using a Hebrew term for kosher certification, “We don’t need a hechsher on it. The hechscher just means a certain level of supervision.”
Chandler is a vegetarian and eats a variety of nut butters, which are often expensive. Recently, she bought a jar of gluten-free cashew butter that was on sale for $6 instead of its regular price $12. (A jar of almond butter by a kosher brand marketed for Passover can run around $18.) Because it’s still unopened and the ingredients are kosher for Passover, she plans to eat it during the holiday.
Kosher-keeping Jews with gluten intolerance and celiac disease have especially found a lifeline in the growing marketplace of gluten-free food.
Lisa Goldman, also known as the “Gluten Free Jewish Momma,” is an Orlando-based advocate for the gluten intolerant on behalf of her now-grown daughter, who was diagnosed with celiac disease in 2012.
“My daughter was crying over not being able to have matzah balls because matzah [is] very high in wheat,” Goldman recalled. “So it was so exciting when all of the Jewish brands started to come out with a gluten-free version of many of their products.”
By the Way Bakery, a kosher, gluten-free and dairy-free bakery in New York City founded in 2011 by Helene Godin, may be a destination where Jewish shoppers who abide by the Conservative ruling could get food for the holiday. It is offering multiple Passover items this year, though the menu isn’t certified kosher for Passover.
By the Way Bakery is certified kosher, and its individual products that are sold in Whole Foods are in the process of being certified gluten-free.
“I’m really careful with the word ‘certified,’” Godin told JTA. “We are not certified with respect to Passover. I can tell you what is in [our products]. We’re very transparent. If you go to our website and you go to the FAQ section, there’s a link to our ingredient summary. And we list everything that’s in every product.”
Some of the items on this year’s Passover menu include an orange almond cake that Godin calls “the little black dress of desserts” because it goes with everything, and a chocolate truffle torte. By the Way Bakery’s cakes and cookies are made with wheat flour alternatives, many of which fall into the category of kitniyot, or foods such as legumes, corn, and rice that some Jews, including many Ashkenazim, avoid eating on Passover. Sephardic Jews traditionally eat kitniyot on the holiday and the Conservative Movement began permitting the consumption of kitniyot during Passover in 2016.
“There are people who say, ‘You’re not kosher enough,’” Godin said. “And there are people who say, ‘Oh, I’ll eat that.’”
Another popular gluten-free kosher bakery, Modern Bread and Bagel, is offering non-kitniyot foods for Passover. Like By the Way Bakery, Modern Bread and Bagel is not certified kosher for Passover, but all of its kitchen’s ingredients are kosher for Passover.
Godin says her company gains new customers every Passover, but this year has been an especially busy time. The number of orders for the orange almond cake, which has not been on the menu in several years, was three or four times larger than what she expected.
“Our projections were that we would be up 20% over last year. And we’ve well exceeded that,” she said. “Post-COVID, people just want to celebrate and get together.”
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A watch party without Netanyahu? Supporters tried to project cheer
(JTA) — JERUSALEM — Forty-five minutes after Israeli channels released their first exit polls, a silence had washed over the Likud election watch party held at the International Convention Center in Jerusalem.
Supporters had waited in anticipation for the exit polls to appear on the screen. When Channel 14 — which had a broadcast desk stationed in the corner of the room — first showed its poll, a cheer circulated through those in attendance. But as everyone looked down at their phones to track the results from the other channels, the mood became increasingly subdued.
Supporters hoping for a strong Netanyahu victory were disappointed by polls showing that his Likud party did not have enough support to form a governing coalition.
They had hoped to celebrate the moment with Netanyahu, who, in the end, did not show up.
The initial exit polls, released at 10 p.m. as polling stations closed, showed Likud as the largest party. However, neither it nor its committed coalition partners had gained enough seats for a parliamentary majority that would allow it to form the next government. Channel 12 had Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s bloc, which at its height had 68 seats in the outgoing Knesset, dropping to 50, with the opposition parties at 53 across the network projections.
The Central Elections Committee hopes to finish counting the votes by Thursday. By law, the official results have to be published by Nov. 4.
The historic turnout in the election, billed by many as the most consequential in Israel’s history, stood in stark contrast to the empty convention center hall. It appeared that only the most dedicated of Bibi fans had decided to make the trip to the watch party. Three hardcore supporters held up a blue and white Likud flag while chanting “Malach Bibi,” meaning “King Bibi,” with a crowd of journalists pushing past each other to get footage.
Every two minutes, the Likud jingle echoed through the hall on a loop, and a string of AI-generated Likud election videos played on the screen. The lectern sat empty, and Netanyahu had not issued a statement in the wake of the first results. Netanyahu, along with Likud MKs, had been expected to address supporters in the hall had there been a clearer mandate; instead, journalists gathered, snacking on refreshments while waiting for more Likud supporters to show up.
Yossi Levi, 71, a pensioner from Eilat, made the long drive to Jerusalem to show his support. He said that for his entire tenure as prime minister, Netanyahu has had to fight the 120 members of the Knesset for his survival, and that he “thankfully” had so far always come out on top.
Levi recalled his time working on the Likud security team when Netanyahu first began his career and paused the interview to shake hands with Netanyahu’s head of security before returning to his story. Whether or not Netanyahu was able to form a coalition, he said, his support would remain unwavering.
That appeared to describe the crowd on Tuesday night: those who had stood by Netanyahu as he ascended to the heights of Israeli electoral power, and who were standing by him now, as his bloc appeared to shed 18 seats in the Knesset.
Boaz, who lives in the city center of Jerusalem, described the mood as not exactly disappointment “but something in the middle,” as the results did not yet indicate a clear winner or loser and adding that it was now time for coalition politics to begin.
Holding a blue-and-white Likud flag and milling about the lobby alone, he did not project confidence but insisted that he would stay at the event in case any of the party’s parliamentary members decided to show up.
With few audience members in attendance, the event center gave the appearance of something of a crashed party. By 11 p.m. Jerusalem time, the hall had begun to empty, with both supporters and those there to cover the event deciding to leave the scene.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
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Jewish treasures stolen by Nazis 88 years ago come home, thanks to an Arizona synagogue
(JTA) — What could one purchase with boxes of Crisco, bags of coffee and cartons of cigarettes in chaotic postwar Germany?
For Moishe Saksenhaus, a young Holocaust survivor from Belarus, the answer was: two Jewish ritual textiles, hundreds of years old.
The seller said he’d stolen them himself from a burning Berlin synagogue on Nov. 9, 1938 — the November Pogrom, commonly called Kristallnacht.
Moishe brought those two items — a Torah wimple, or sash, and a parochet, or Torah ark curtain — with him to America, taking them out of their suitcase only on special occasions. After Moishe’s death in 1993, his family donated them to his synagogue, Temple Chai in Phoenix, Arizona. They remained on display there until the building was deconsecrated in 2026. The congregation moved to a new location in nearby Scottsdale this spring.
Last week, nearly 88 years after Kristallnacht the two items made their way back to Berlin.
In a ceremony at the site of the New Synagogue Berlin Foundation-Centrum Judaicum museum and archive, on Oranienburger Strasse, Associate Rabbi Bonnie Koppell of Temple Chai handed them over to Berlin Jewish Community president Gideon Joffe.
“There were people who felt individually attached to the items” in Phoenix, Koppell told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in a phone interview before her trip. “But ultimately, I think everyone realized that they belonged in their home. If the people from whom they were stolen wanted them back, that was where they belong.”
The handover took place Oct. 22 in the presence of Joffe, Rabbi Gesa Ederberg, historian Rabbi Andreas Nachama, members of the Berlin community and 29 visitors from Arizona.
“It’s been a very moving and touching journey, for both our guests from the United States and for these historical items,” said Nickolai Todorov, a Berlin Jew who accompanied the U.S. visitors as a tour guide. “It was just a special thing to be an eyewitness to.”
Rabbi Bonnie Koppell, left, and Sandy Koppell examine the Torah curtain (parochet) and Torah wimple during the handover ceremony at the New Synagogue Berlin–Centrum Judaicum, Oct. 22, 2026. (Nicolai Froundjian)
The large parochet is embroidered with the text of the Kiddush, the Jewish blessing over wine, in versions for the Sabbath and holidays. Along the lower edge of the text is what might be the signature of the artist, in Hebrew: “This handiwork of mine is not to bring me honor, rather to bring merit for the multitudes in accord [with the biblical verse] ‘And Yitzchak went out to pray at the field’ — Yitzchak Itzik ben C’harad Yehuda Leib z“l [of blessed memory] from Rivnitz,” a town in Moldova whose small Jewish community dated back to at least 1800.
The highly decorated wimple, which would have been used to bind a Torah scroll, bears a blessing for a child named Yitzchak “Itzik” ben Kavod Ha-rav Gistori, likely embroidered in honor of his brit milah, or ritual circumcision.
A spokesperson for the Berlin Jewish community, an umbrella for several congregations of various denominations, told JTA in an email that its experts had been unable to confirm which pre-World War II synagogue the Torah curtain came from, but that it would be added to the Centrum Judaicum collection. There are plans to display the wimple at the community center on the site of the former Fasanenstrasse synagogue.
Sol Saksenhaus, 72, a retired special-ed teacher, is one of those Arizona congregants who felt sad to let the objects go. It was his father who had bought them, protected and carried them across the ocean to his new home in America. Sol and his brother had grown up with these objects, which had taken on an aura of sacredness.
But they are “being given back as a sign of love from our community, to light them up again,” he told JTA in a telephone interview from Phoenix. “I can live with that, and I know my parents in heaven can live with that, too.”
Sol’s parents, Moishe and Rosa Saksenhaus, had escaped the Warsaw Ghetto through the sewers, and joined with partisans to commit acts of sabotage against the Germans. The Soviets eventually deported them to Siberia, where their first child died. After the war, Moishe and Rosa made their way back west, following American army lines and ending up in a Displaced Persons camp in the town of Feldafing, Germany.
Moishe, street-smart and multilingual, got a job translating for the U.S. military in Traunstein, Sol related. His father told him he became involved with black market activities, such as collecting British Army bicycles and having them sent to Palestine.
“My dad may have had a little bit of a reputation as one of the go-to guys, that if you wanted something, my dad knew how to get it,” Sol said.
Which may be why this particular German man approached him one day.
“He said he was a medical doctor. He kept approaching my dad with pictures” of the Jewish objects, Sol recounted. His father recalled the man’s name as “Ahgar.” He’d complained about conditions under American occupation: “’We don’t get anything; we’re on limited rations,’” the man told Sol’s father. “My dad said he was arrogant, and that he wanted the stuff he used to have from before.”
“He threatened my dad: He says, ‘I was part of the patrol that went into the temple’” on Fasanenstrasse in Berlin. He claimed to have taken the two items during the raid, and threatened to destroy them if Moishe did not procure Crisco, coffee, flour, cigarettes and cigars.
“My dad pretty much told him to ‘get the f–k away. I can’t look at you.’ But the guy was persistent. And the trade happened.”
Moishe Saksenhaus brought the objects to the U.S. when he and Rosa emigrated. “He cherished them, but he didn’t know what he was going to do with them,” said Sol. On rare occasions his father would show them to the family. “When that thing came out, it was like opening the holy ark… I kind of like froze, and just watched the emotions” on the family’s faces.
Sol’s father died in late 1993. There was a rise in Holocaust denial at the same time, Sol recalled; Deborah Lipstadt’s book, “Denying the Holocaust: The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory,” was published that June. It was also the year that Steven Spielberg’s Oscar-winning film “Schindler’s List” came out, sparking new interest in the Holocaust and its legacy. His mother and aunt decided to donate the tapestry and wimple to Temple Chai, to help with Holocaust education. Before handing the tapestry over to Rabbi William Berk, then the temple’s spiritual leader, Rosa Saksenhaus tore the swastika off an old tag on the tapestry. “This is not going into a temple like this,” she told her son.
The centuries-old Jewish ritual textiles, stolen during Kristallnacht in 1938 and traded after the war to a survivor for coffee and tobacco, are returned to the Berlin Jewish community during a ceremony at the New Synagogue Berlin–Centrum Judaicum, Oct. 22, 2026. (Nicolai Freundjian)
Sol recalled that Berk sent the items to an expert at the University of California in Los Angeles, who determined they were from the 16th century. Berk, who moved to Israel with his family in 2007 after more than two decades with the congregation, could not be reached for comment.
And so the tapestry remained hanging on the synagogue’s north wall. Rosa died in 1999. In 2006, Bonnie Koppell was installed as associate rabbi. In 2022, Rabbi Emily Segal took on the role of senior rabbi.
Two years ago, Sol brought a friend to see the wimple and the tapestry.
“I had seen these objects in our sanctuary for 30 years, knowing only that they had been ‘rescued’ during Kristallnacht,” recalled Joan Neer, assistant to Koppell, who heard Sol’s story for the first time that day. “In reality they were brutally taken,” she said.
The encounter “ignited my curiosity and set me on a journey to uncover their story,” Neer told JTA in an email. The more she learned, the more she became convinced: “It would be great if we could return them to the Jewish community in Berlin,” she wrote to Koppell and synagogue president Debbie Berkowitz.
“What began as a simple conversation in my office has become a journey of discovery, connection, and restoration,” she said.
Once the Berlin community said yes, the task of packing and transporting the objects began. The large tapestry was wrapped in artisanal paper and shipped.
“We had an AirTag on it, so we watched it sitting in the Cologne airport,” said Koppell. “And then it got moved to the customs building.”
“Then we got word that they wanted €5,000 [$5,567] in [customs] tax. And that if we didn’t pay it, they were sending it back in five days.”
The German Jewish community stepped in and used its tax-exempt status to get the package released, she said, adding that she carried the wimple in her hand luggage.
“We have come to remember, to learn and to return something that has traveled a very long road,” she told the Berlin Jewish community on Oct. 22. “This time, they are going home.”
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Israel revokes travel permissions for Brad Lander, American rabbis
(JTA) — Israel revoked travel authorizations for several American rabbis, activists and Jewish New York politician Brad Lander following their work last week with Palestinians harvesting olives in the West Bank.
Emails from Israel’s immigration authority, shared with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, told the recipients that their electronic travel authorizations had been “revoked” following “a change in circumstances in your case.” No further reason was given.
A spokesperson for Lander, a Democratic congressional candidate whose detention by Israel last week sparked an international uproar, confirmed to JTA that his ETA was revoked following his detention.
The spokesperson added that Lander “intends to try to get it back” in order to join a planned congressional delegation with the liberal Zionist lobby J Street in February 2027. Lander is widely expected to win his race next week given that his district is heavily Democratic.
In a longer comment to the left-wing magazine Jewish Currents on Tuesday, Lander said Israel’s actions were “petty” and “one small step in this much larger infrastructure of occupation and ethnic cleansing.”
The travelers had been working at a Palestinian olive farm near an Israeli settlement when they were detained by Israeli authorities. T’ruah, a rabbinic human rights group, and the other participating Jewish groups said they were there to help Palestinian farmers harvest olives that the farmers had been unable to access for three years.
Rabbi Jill Jacobs, CEO of T’ruah, told JTA that she estimated “more than half” of the approximately 60 Jews detained last week have had their ETAs revoked over a span of several days. Some received notice while still in Israel, though they were allowed to leave without incident.
“It feels pretty random,” she said.
Jacobs said that number includes Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist rabbis, as well as progressive Jewish activists. Also joining the olive harvest group were Israelis who had grown up in settlements and others who had lost family in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks, according to a fellow participant.
Foreign visitors are required to hold ETAs to enter Israel. They are typically acquired by tourists, volunteers and business travelers for short-term stays. The process to apply for one is usually quick, involving the payment of a small fee online, and applicants tend to be approved within hours.
It is highly unusual for Israel, which allows almost anyone who can demonstrate Jewish heritage to become a citizen, to take steps to restrict the travel of diaspora Jews. The government has been cracking down more in the last year on ETAs for visitors who protest in the West Bank, Jacobs said. Israel over the weekend denied entry to Rabbi Alissa Wise, an American who leads the left-wing group Rabbis For Ceasefire, Wise told the Religion News Service.
Jacobs said Israel’s actions toward the American Jewish clergy in the group were especially troublesome to her in light of right-wing targeting of liberal Jewish movements in the country.
“They’re saying, ‘Actually we only want Jews who have certain political positions. This is not going to be a safe place for all Jews,’” Jacobs said. “They’re saying, ‘We actually don’t care about the mainstream of American Jewry.’”
Representatives for Israel’s Population and Immigration Authority, which processes ETAs, did not return a JTA request for comment. The country is holding elections Tuesday.
Rabbi Marisa James of Congregation Beit Simchat Torah in New York was among the clergy to have their ETAs revoked following their detention. James told JTA that she received the notification while at the airport on Sunday preparing to leave Israel.
“It’s just so sad to me,” James said. Her ETA had been valid through March 2027. For Jews traveling to Israel in the past, she said, “there’s never really been a political litmus test.”
James lived in Jerusalem for five years, working for part of that time with Encounter, a progressive group that arranges tours of the West Bank for American Jews. In her many times crossing into the territory, she said, she had never before encountered resistance from the Israeli military, until last week’s harvest.
She said the military had shown up at the harvest site to turn the activists away. They held James and her fellow international activists for several hours, though Lander was released quickly.
A statement earlier this week from the government office said Israel had deported 11 visa holders, including Americans, from the country following clashes with the Israel Defense Forces during a different protest in Hebron.
The Jews who had their ETAs revoked are allowed to reapply for new authorizations but are unsure of what would happen if they did. Jacobs said she was “hopeful” that a new Israeli government would grant authorizations to the group if they were to reapply.
“I hope there will be a government that actually cares about its relationship with diaspora Jews,” she said.
Just prior to her ETA being revoked, James had been cheering on Israelis arriving at the airport to cast election ballots. Israel does not have absentee voting, and many Israelis assume that the tens of thousands of citizens who have arrived there in recent days are motivated by opposition to the current government.
James, too, is hopeful that a new Israeli government would be friendlier to progressive Jewish visitors whom she says are trying to fight for a better future for the country.
“We feel deeply connected to the place and deeply invested in its future,” she said. “I always grew up thinking, well, that’s what they want, right?”
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