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In long-isolated Australia, festivals bring out Jewish celebrants in Sydney and Melbourne
When things finally began returning to normal in Australia after nearly three years under one of the world’s strictest Covid protocols, Australian Jews didn’t hesitate to celebrate.
In November, Jews with the roots in the former Soviet Union who live in Australia heralded their heritage with a pair of long-awaited festivals in the country’s two biggest cities, Nov. 6 in Sydney and Nov. 13 in Melbourne. Each event attracted about 200 people. Limmud FSU Australia hosted both festivals in close partnership with the Zionist Federation of Australia or ZFA, marking the FSU Jewish community’s first in-person, large-scale events since 2018.
“For a while, we couldn’t travel more than 5 kilometers from our homes,” said Ukrainian-born Inna Polura, who worked logistics for Limmud FSU’s first Sydney festival back in 2015 and now volunteers at the Sydney Jewish Museum. “This last event was very successful, and at least 50 kids attended. We see a huge potential here.”
Moscow-born real estate agent Elena Sladkova, 25, added, “Finally we were able to do it, and this was one of the best festivals our community has seen in a very long time.”
About a quarter of Australia’s 120,000 Jews were born in the former Soviet Union or are children of immigrants from the former USSR. Limmud FSU organizes gatherings all over the world to strengthen Jewish identity and a sense of Jewish community among Jews with roots in the USSR.
At the Limmud festivals in Australia, which were held in both English and Russian, representatives of three nonprofit groups — the Blue Peony Foundation, the Svoboda Alliance and the Russian-Speaking Jewish Community Association — shared tips on how to assist Ukrainians suffering from the war that has devastated their country.
The Sydney event, held at New South Wales University, featured such presenters as Amir Maimon, Israel’s new ambassador to Australia; Leon Goltsman, Waverley Councillor for Bondi Ward, Sydney; Ron Weiser, former president of the ZFA; Diana Ulitsky of the social service agency JewishCare NSW; and Rabbi Yehoram Ulman of the Sydney Beth Din. The Melbourne event took place at the Crowne Promenade Conference Centre, with such prominent speakers as MP David Southwick, deputy Victorian Liberal Party leader; and Sebastian Inwentarz, ZFA Birthright’s Australia director.
Some of the festivals’ sessions focused on uniquely Australian themes, such as Professor Ludmila Stern’s history lecture on the World War II-era prosecution of two elderly Ukrainians and a German in the Australian city of Adelaide for atrocities against Jews. Jeremy Jones, director of international and community affairs at the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council, spoke of local efforts to secure the emigration of Soviet Jews to Australia in the 1970s and ’80s. In Melbourne, Simon Holloway, head of education at the Melbourne Holocaust Museum, spoke on the dramatic emergence of Holocaust research in the former Soviet Union.
There were plenty of lighter sessions among the three dozen or so at each festival. At the Melbourne event, Orthodox psychotherapist Miriam Dolnikov talked about myths and facts about Orthodox sex. Rabbi and chef David Trakhtman spoke about “spiritual gastronomy.”
Volunteers, like these ones in Melbourne, are an indispensable part of those who organize Limmud FSU conferences. (Yuri Peress, PY-PHOTO)
In between sessions, entertainment was provided by the Russian School Lider Dance Ensemble as well as students from the AMS Music Centre and VulgarGrad, a seven-piece, Melbourne-based band that plays unique funk and punk renditions of traditional folk songs from the former Soviet Union. A special performance was held in Sydney by Ukraine-born Israeli singer Vladi Balyberg, and both events featured a unique concert by a prominent Israeli actor and singer, Vladimir Friedman. There were also workshops on challah baking and martial arts for kids.
“The last three years have shown that everything in the world can change overnight. But the fact that Limmud FSU continues to work and be active is priceless,” said Marina Rozenberg Koritny, head of the World Zionist Organization’s Aliyah Promotion Department. “This organization does wonderful, significant work in Jewish education in the Diaspora, and continues to remind us all the time that we are all one people.”
This year alone, Limmud FSU has held festivals in New Jersey; Niagara Falls, Canada; Baku, Azerbaijan, and Boston. A Dec. 1-3 gathering in Tiberias, Israel, was the year’s biggest event, with some 1,100 participants.
“It has been a long time since we last gathered in Australia,” said Limmud FSU founder Chaim Chesler. “But the post-Covid Australian Jewish community, whose roots lie in the countries of the FSU, is just as vibrant and hungry for community and learning opportunities as before. We are delighted to return.”
Events for children were part of the Limmud FSU conference in Sydney, Austrlia, on Nov. 6, 2022. (Veda Kucko)
Among Limmud FSU Australia’s key supporters are the Conference on Jewish Material Claims against Germany, the ZFA, the World Zionist Organization, Genesis Philanthropy Group, the Jewish National Fund-Keren Kayemet LeIsrael and Wilf Family Foundations. Since Limmud FSU’s first conference in 2006, the group has hosted more than 80 events worldwide, drawing over 80,000 participants. The group’s co-founder is Sandra Cahn; Matthew Bronfman is its chairman; and Aaron Frenkel is president.
“I think the best way to expand your network is by volunteering and participating in the community, and that’s why I’m involved with Limmud,” said Russia-born Maria Gelvan, 38, who coordinated the activities of the 28 volunteers at the Melbourne festival. “It’s an absolutely amazing opportunity for unifying the Jewish community.”
Luiza Levenfus, 44, who immigrated to Israel from the former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan at age 12 before moving to Melbourne when she was about 20, says Jewish identity is at risk in Australia’s multicultural society.
“There is a big risk of losing our connection to Judaism,” Levenfus said. “I feel like my kids don’t understand the Jewish side of things, even though their mom is Jewish and their dad is half-Jewish and half-Russian — especially in the suburb where we live.”
That’s why taking the time to go to the Limmud FSU festival was so important, she said.
“People there get me. I don’t have to explain to them why I have tears when I hear Hebrew songs,” Levenfus said. “We’re all on the same page.”
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The post In long-isolated Australia, festivals bring out Jewish celebrants in Sydney and Melbourne appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Jewish Democrats back Michigan AG Dana Nessel’s decision to skip state party convention
(JTA) — Local and national Jewish Democrats say they are sympathetic after Michigan’s Jewish attorney general, Dana Nessel, said she would skip the state Democratic Party’s nominating convention over concerns about antisemitism and harassment.
“I don’t blame AG Nessel for not wanting to go and basically put herself in situations that feel untenable in this moment of time and don’t add any value politically, personally,” Jessica “Decky” Alexander, the Michigan Jewish Democratic caucus chair, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency on Friday.
Alexander’s comment came a day after Nessel announced during a televised antisemitism roundtable that she would be skipping the convention next month, where party leaders will finalize the state’s Democratic candidate for Senate following a divisive primary that has focused in part on Israel and antisemitism.
“I don’t feel safe going. I feel like my presence isn’t going to be welcome. I don’t want to get chased around. I don’t want to get harassed. I don’t want to get yelled and screamed at. I don’t want to get booed off the stage, irrespective of what I’m saying,” Nessel said during the roundtable. “And I believe that if I go, that is what will happen because it’s been happening to me.”
She said she had filed a formal complaint within the party about a party official who had called her a neo-Nazi because of her beliefs. “Why is this person more accepted in our party than me?” she asked without naming the official. Her office responded to a request for comment by referring to the recorded livestream of the antisemitism roundtable.
Nessel’s declaration comes in the final days of the primary between Rep. Haley Stevens, a pro-Israel stalwart, and Abdul El-Sayed, a democratic socialist who is deeply critical of Israel. El-Sayed is surging in polls despite a reported $30 million spent against him by AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobby, and its supporters, whom he has made a target of criticism from the campaign trail.
Nessel’s comments also follow turmoil at the Michigan Democratic Party’s endorsement convention in April, where Stevens was booed by attendees. A third primary candidate who later dropped out of the race, state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, said a convention attendee had targeted her Jewish husband with an antisemitic slur.
The incident has fueled alarm among Jewish Democrats, according to Halie Soifer, CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America.
“She’s not alone,” Soifer told JTA about Nessel on Friday. “We’ve heard from other Jewish Democrats who attended the Democratic Party convention earlier this year in Michigan, and there was a sense of discomfort amid what felt like a pro-Palestinian protest [that] may have even blurred the line for some into antisemitic sentiment — and it’s really concerning.”
Nessel has raised the alarm about antisemitism within the party for years, alleging in 2024 that Michigan Rep. Rashida Tlaib, a prominent pro-Palestinian voice, had been antisemitic when criticizing charges Nessel filed against pro-Palestinian protesters at the University of Michigan.
For her part, Alexander said she would be participating in the nominating convention and said she believed the chair of the state Democratic Party, Curtis Hertel, had been “very accessible and very open to making sure that we, including our Jewish elected officials, feel safe in that space.” But she said she understood why Nessel was staying away.
“It would never even occur to me, but I’m not an elected official,” Alexander said. “It’s a different stake for me than it is for Dana. I understand her completely.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Jewish Democrats back Michigan AG Dana Nessel’s decision to skip state party convention appeared first on The Forward.
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Maine rabbis call for peace, urge politicians to stop calling Gaza war a ‘genocide’
(JTA) — Every congregational rabbi in Maine has signed onto a statement calling for peace and urging the state’s political leaders to stop using the term “genocide” to describe Israel’s war in Gaza, following a Democratic primary in which several candidates used the label for the first time.
But the rabbis also indicated that they, too, were unsatisfied with conditions in the Middle East and called on Israeli and Palestinian leaders to work toward a peaceful future.
“We call upon Maine’s leaders, and particularly its political leaders, to reject the irresponsible usage of the term in describing the Israel-Hamas War,” said the statement released on Friday. “We also call upon Israeli and Palestinian leaders to end the cycle of violence and to create a better world for both Palestinian and Israeli children.”
The statement, titled “A Call for Peace and Responsible Rhetoric,” argues that using the term as a “political slogan does not advance peace in the Middle East.” The term “erases essential moral and legal distinctions, diminishes the meaning of genocide, and inflames hatred for the local Jewish community,” the rabbis say.
“Compassion for Palestinians does not require the adoption of hateful and misleading language,” they continue. “Advocating for peace does not require participation in a ‘Holocaust inversion’ against the Jewish community. And political leadership does not require demonizing one community in the service of another.”
The statement comes days after Troy Jackson, a former logger and state Senate president, secured the Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nomination Saturday at the party’s nominating convention to replace Graham Platner, a staunch Israel critic who dropped out of the race earlier this month. Platner faced a sexual assault allegation, which he denies. Jackson now faces Republican incumbent Sen. Susan Collins in November’s general election.
Platner’s romp to the primary victory featured routine use of “genocide” to describe Israel’s actions. And ahead of the convention to replace him, Jackson and several other Democratic hopefuls who later exited the race began using the term “genocide” to describe Israel’s war in Gaza for the first time, a shift that drew scrutiny from some Jewish leaders and voters in the state.
The use of the term has become a “currency for acquiring power and position in Maine’s Democratic party,” Rabbi Rachel Isaacs, the leader of Beth Israel Congregation in Waterville, who also signed the statement, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
“Too many Maine Democrats are cynically willing to trade in that currency at the expense of our safety and dignity,” she said in an emailed statement. “We decided we needed to say something collectively, both about the specious and dangerous nature of the claim, and about how much damage has been done to our families and congregants.”
The statement Friday was spearheaded by the Jewish Community Alliance of Southern Maine and signed by every congregational rabbi in the state, including Rabbi Bill Siemers of the Conservative Congregation Beth Israel in Bangor and Rabbi Erica Asch of the Reform Temple Beth El in Augusta. (Rabbis affiliated with the Chabad movement in Maine did not appear on the signatory list.)
Zach Schwartz, the director of the Jewish Community Relations Council at the Jewish Community Alliance of Southern Maine, said the federation hoped the “unity displayed here in Maine can inspire Jewish communities across the US to also unite against the extremist rhetoric harming our community and our children.”
Rabbi Josh Stanton, the associate vice president of interfaith and intergroup initiatives for Jewish Federations of North America, also hailed the joint statement.
“Maine’s Jewish clergy are setting an important example with their call to put aside inflammatory rhetoric and look to the common good,” Stanton said in an emailed statement. “At a time of rising polarization and declining civil discourse, the Jewish Community Alliance of Southern Maine’s efforts to unify the community around this important message are a mark of true leadership.”
Isaacs told JTA that she hoped Jackson would “support, understand, and advocate for all of Maine’s citizens, including the totality of Maine’s diverse Jewish community.”
“Work with us to figure out how to express outrage and legitimate critique of Israel’s government without succumbing to language that you might not know is an ancient antisemitic trope, or dismissing the security needs of Israel’s citizens,” Isaacs said of her message to Jackson. “Please have the courage to forge your own path, and not follow in the footsteps of Graham Platner, a man who should have never been normalized, endorsed, or empowered.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Maine rabbis call for peace, urge politicians to stop calling Gaza war a ‘genocide’ appeared first on The Forward.
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Boy George cedes role of King Herod in ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ production after releasing pro-Israel song
(JTA) — Boy George has withdrawn from his run as King Herod in London’s West End revival of “Jesus Christ Superstar,” days before he was due to take the stage and 24 hours after releasing “We Will Dance Again,” dedicated to the victims of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on the Nova music festival in Israel.
The 80’s pop star was scheduled to appear at London’s Palladium starting Monday as part of the production’s rotating cast playing King Herod, the Judean king who is best known by Jews for his expansion of the Second Temple and to Christians for his efforts to stave off the arrival of a challenger — the story of which is reflected in the rock opera by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice.
Boy George will be replaced by actor Richard Armitage in the London production.
In announcing the cast change, Paul Kelmsley, the singer’s manager, did not directly mention the blowback the former Culture Club frontman was receiving for releasing a pro-Israel song but alluded to it.
“George has never been afraid to stand by his personal convictions, and I have always respected him for that,” he said. ”In this instance, I felt it was right to step aside, allowing the production to remain the focus, while ensuring everyone involved can move forward with mutual respect and goodwill.”
Boy George is defending his decision to release the song, saying he believes artists should be free to express their views even when they are unpopular. In “We Will Dance Again,” the singer rejects claims of genocide against Israel and proclaims, “If you’re ever confused, I stand with the Jews.”
Earlier Friday, Boy George lashed back at the vitriol he was getting online. “What is most shocking is the amount of gay folk attacking me, ” he posted on X. “If you support terrorism you can in the words of Divine ‘Take your toolkit and go f—_ a garage,’” he said, referring to a quote attributed to the taboo-breaking transgender artist.
“When I say ‘they want to kill every last one of us’ I am also talking about us queers, not just the Jewish community,” Boy George said. “When will you wake up?”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Boy George cedes role of King Herod in ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ production after releasing pro-Israel song appeared first on The Forward.
