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NYC public schools don’t have the final two days of Passover off next year. A petition is trying to change that.
(New York Jewish Week) – New York City educators and parents are protesting after the city announced that public schools would be open for part of Passover next year, breaking from a longstanding tradition.
The eight-day holiday has overlapped virtually every year with the city’s spring break since 1973, when Jewish teachers successfully lobbied to guarantee the alignment.
But next year, Easter and Passover are separated by three weeks, making it impossible for the city’s weeklong school recess to overlap with both of them. The school-year calendar released last Friday revealed that the NYC Department of Education had scheduled the final two days of the holiday, April 29 and 30, as school days.
Because those days are Jewish holidays, when certain activities are prohibited according to Jewish law, observant educators and students would not be able to attend. The departure from tradition has put those people in a difficult situation, in part because educators have limited flexibility to take days off under their union contract.
“I’m religious and I am required by my religion to take those days off, regardless of whether we have school or not,” Yocheved Diskind, an occupational therapist at a public school in West Harlem, told the New York Jewish Week. “So now I have to take two extra days off and I don’t get paid at all for them.”
Diskind is one of around 1,500 people to have signed a petition calling on the city to extend the spring recess to include the Passover holidays.
“At a time when the values of inclusion are under attack, respecting the full observance of the Passover holiday should not be dependent on its proximity to Easter on the calendar,” says the petition, whose first signatories are from the occupational and physical therapists’ chapter of the United Federation of Teachers.
The pushback comes at a moment when the structure of the school year is being contested on several fronts. In a bid for inclusion, the education department has recently added holidays from multiple traditions to the school calendar — including the Muslim holidays of Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha; the Chinese Lunar New Year; Juneteenth and, potentially in the future, the Hindu festival of Diwali. Depending on how each holiday falls, the new days off can put pressure on the city to meet a 180-day minimum set by state law.
At the same time, the city education department and its teachers union negotiate annually over when teachers must work, and the city’s goal is to maximize the time that teachers are required to be in the classroom. Next year’s school calendar includes 185 required workdays for educators, including 182 instructional days, leaving some in the union concerned that members are being exploited.
“They used to build in an extra two or three days: In case they had to cancel for snow days, they would still reach 180 days. But since the pandemic, snow days are all remote days,” Diskind said. “So there’s no reason to build in even an extra two days into the calendar without extra compensation.”
The city, meanwhile, says it negotiated the new calendar with the union and that the holidays that are required contractually to be days off are. About the end of Passover, Nathaniel Steyer, the DOE press secretary, told the New York Jewish Week that the union “never ever brought this up” in negotiations about the calendar.
The UFT did not respond to repeated requests for comment by press time.
“There is no precedent for giving all days of Passover with a split,” Styer said in a statement. “There has been a split three times in recent memory — with the last night falling on the weekend. It is in our labor agreements that only the first two days of Passover and Good Friday are covered. Spring Recess is not in our labor contracts, but we generally attempt to cover most of Passover & Easter, when they are aligned on the calendar.”
New York City is among the rare school districts where Jewish holidays have been baked into the school-year calendar. For decades, the city had so many Jewish teachers and students that having classes on major Jewish holidays was a fool’s errand. The 1973 agreement around Passover came as the number of Jewish students and teachers was dwindling.
Now, the district has relatively few observant Jewish students; Orthodox schoolchildren in the city almost all attend private schools. But there are significant numbers of Orthodox education department employees, including in support services such as speech and occupational therapy. (The petition notes that students who attend school on Passover might have to do so without the support of these providers.) And the expectation not to have school on major Jewish holidays has largely survived, at times resulting in quirky calendars, such as a five-day gap between the first and second days of school in 2010.
The school calendar departed from the 1973 Passover agreement only once, in 1986, according to the petition. That year, Passover and Easter were not close in time, and adding two additional days off would have taken the district below the state requirement. Teachers then were given blanket approval to take the days as personal days, the petition says.
Diskind, the occupational therapist in West Harlem, explained that teachers could take the two days of Passover as personal days next year but would be left with only one discretionary day for the rest of the school year. They could also take time off without pay, an option that some Jewish educators exercise when other Jewish holidays fall on school days, but doing so has financial repercussions. (During the next school year, the fall Jewish holidays all land on weekends except for Yom Kippur, when schools are closed. Shavuot, the two-day spring festival, falls midweek in June.)
“Most people choose to take an unpaid day off because you generally need to use personal days for other reasons that would not be excused throughout the year,” Diskind said. “In the long term, unpaid days also require you to stay longer in order to reach your pension.”
Districts around the country have contended with how to accommodate religious observances — and not everyone believes the solution is ever to close schools at all.
David Bloomfield, an education professor who was a parent leader in New York City when his own children attended its public schools, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in 2020 that he thought districts should ramp up their protections for students and teachers who miss school for religious reasons instead of trying to adjust the calendar to please everyone.
“With the growth and sensitivity toward diversity, it’s one thing for a hermetic community to observe its traditions,” Bloomfield said. “But as we become more diverse, we have a harder time accommodating all of those important ceremonial obligations.”
“New York City is home to a diverse population, including 1.6 million Jews. People who celebrate Passover are a part of the rich fabric of our city,” says the petition. “The Passover holiday should not be an arena for givebacks and increased instructional days without compensation.”
“The proposed DOE calendar is especially disturbing in light of the increase in anti-Semitic rhetoric and attacks in recent years, particularly in New York City,” it also noted.
The number of anti-Jewish hate crimes in the first five months of the year was 100, according to data released this week by the New York Police Department, showing a 25% decline from 135 during the same period last year. Jews accounted for the victims of half of all hate crimes in the city last year and remain the most-targeted group, according to the police data; two men recently pleaded guilty to hate crimes related to a high-profile 2021 attack on a Jewish man who was beaten while walking to a pro-Israel rally.
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Les Wexner testifies that he was ‘conned’ by Jeffrey Epstein and did not know of his crimes
(JTA) — Leslie Wexner, the Ohio retail billionaire whose association with Jeffrey Epstein has shadowed his philanthropic legacy, spent six hours Wednesday answering questions in a closed-door congressional deposition that Democrats later derided as implausible and evasive.
Wexner, 88, appeared before staff of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform at his home in New Albany, Ohio, where he sought to rebut years of scrutiny tied to Epstein, the disgraced financier and convicted sex offender who once managed Wexner’s personal finances.
In a prepared opening statement submitted to the committee, Wexner cast himself as a victim of deception.
“I was naive, foolish, and gullible to put any trust in Jeffrey Epstein,” Wexner said. “He was a con man. And while I was conned, I have done nothing wrong and have nothing to hide.” He added: “I completely and irrevocably cut ties with Epstein nearly twenty years ago when I learned that he was an abuser, a crook, and a liar.”
Wexner’s testimony comes amid renewed attention to his relationship with Epstein following the release of previously redacted federal investigative records. Wexner, long celebrated across the Jewish communal world for his business achievements and billion-dollar philanthropy, has never been charged with a crime connected to Epstein’s sex-trafficking operation and has consistently denied knowledge of Epstein’s misconduct.
In his statement, Wexner presented that denial in unequivocal terms. “Let me be crystal clear: I never witnessed nor had any knowledge of Epstein’s criminal activity,” he said. “I was never a participant nor co-conspirator in any of Epstein’s illegal activities.” He continued, “At no time did I ever witness the side of Epstein’s life for which he is now infamous.”
Wexner also addressed the emotional toll of the scandal and expressed sympathy for survivors. “Before going any further, though, I want to acknowledge the survivors of Epstein’s terrible crimes and the devastation that each of them has endured,” he said. “The pain he inflicted upon them is unfathomable to me. My heart goes out to each of them.”
Throughout the document, Wexner portrayed Epstein as a master manipulator who carefully curated an image of elite credibility. “Epstein lived a double life. He was clever, diabolical, and a master manipulator,” Wexner said, describing how Epstein “revealed to me only glimpses into the life in which he was a sophisticated financial guru.”
Wexner reiterated longstanding claims about the unraveling of their relationship, saying that after Epstein’s legal troubles surfaced, his wife Abigail Wexner reviewed financial records and concluded Epstein had misappropriated “vast sums” from the family. “Once I learned of his abusive conduct and theft from my family, I never spoke with Epstein again. Never,” he said.
But Democrats who participated in the deposition emerged sharply skeptical.
“He’s claiming there was no friendship with Jeffrey Epstein,” Rep. Robert Garcia of California, the committee’s top Democrat, told reporters during a press conference outside Wexner’s residence, calling the claim “bogus.”
Garcia went further, arguing that Epstein’s wealth and influence were inseparable from Wexner’s patronage. “There would be no Epstein island, there’d be no Epstein plane, there would be no money to traffic women and girls … without the support of Les Wexner,” he said.
Rep. Stephen Lynch of Massachusetts struck an even harsher tone. “There’s no question in my mind, given the evidence so far, that Les Wexner knew about this and failed to stop it,” Lynch said.
Other Democrats questioned the credibility of Wexner’s repeated assertions that he had neither seen nor suspected misconduct. Rep. Yassamin Ansari of Arizona said his claims of not recalling key details about Epstein strained belief. Rep. Dave Min of California summarized the testimony as a case of “see no evil, hear no evil,” calling it “really just not credible.”
Committee Republicans did not attend the deposition, citing a medical procedure for Chairman James Comer. A committee spokeswoman said Wexner “answered every question asked of him” and pledged that video and transcripts would be released.
For Wexner, the proceeding marked another chapter in a saga that has complicated his public image and tarnished his name in the Jewish world, where countless rabbis and other professionals have received fellowships bearing his name. In his statement, he framed the deposition as an opportunity for to help the Epstein’s victims.
“I hope you are successful in uncovering the truth and bringing closure to all survivors,” Wexner said. “If I am able to assist you in that effort by answering your questions, I am grateful for the opportunity to do so.”
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Quietly sold by Jewish library, letter by famed 18th-century rabbi surfaces at auction, fetching $400,000
(JTA) — A decade ago, amid a financial crisis, the Jewish Theological Seminary turned to its assets, selling real estate as well as rare books from its world-renowned library. The book sales were private, and the institution has never detailed what was sold or for how much.
Now, a lost treasure from the library has once again emerged at auction: this time, a letter written and autographed by the 18th-century Jewish luminary Moshe Chaim Luzzatto, also known as the Ramchal.
When it was housed at the library, the letter belonged to a Ramchal collection numbering hundreds of pages. Removed from the collection and marketed to the auction house’s Orthodox clientele as a profound text by “a great and holy Kabbalist,” the letter sold on Sunday for nearly $400,000. The identities of the seller and buyer are not publicly known.
The price reflects the massive appeal of heritage items in a newly affluent Orthodox market, where rare texts and autograph material are increasingly treated as both status symbols and investment vehicles. It is a market the auction house, Genazym, has helped supercharge by selling not just books, but proximity to revered rabbinic figures.
Born in 1707, Luzzatto was an Italian Jewish thinker, mystic and writer whose influence far exceeded his brief life. His best-known work, “Mesillat Yesharim,” became a cornerstone of Jewish ethical literature and remains widely studied today. Though his mystical teachings stirred suspicion among some contemporaries, later generations regarded him as a major figure of Jewish thought.
In a famous 1928 essay titled “The Boy from Padua,” the Hebrew poet Hayim Nahman Bialik offered one of the most enduring modern interpretations of Luzzatto’s legacy. Bialik described Luzzatto as a forerunner of three great streams of modern Jewish history: the Lithuanian rabbinic tradition, Hasidism and the Enlightenment.
The auctioned letter, spanning two handwritten pages and addressed to his mentor, captures Luzzatto engaged in a detailed discussion of mystical concepts. He uses the space to explain his reasoning and mentions additional writings then in progress.
For scholars like David Sclar, the quiet removal of Luzzatto’s writings from the JTS library and their transfer to private hands suggests a cultural decline.
“It’s a scandal within the world of scholarship and American Jewish institutions,” Sclar, a librarian at a Modern Orthodox high school in New Jersey, said in an interview. Sclar wrote his dissertation on Luzzatto using primary sources such as the auctioned letter.
He is also a former employee of the special collections division at JTS who left the institution years before the crisis that precipitated the sell-off. He sees the outcome of the auction as evidence of not only wrongdoing but incompetence.
“This is one of the items that they sold through the back door, which means they sold it for probably virtually nothing,” Sclar said. “And the tragedy in all of this, besides JTS sort of destroying cultural heritage, is that it’s also stupid, because if they had decided that they were desperate for money then just do an auction. Don’t do it through the back door.”
The librarian at JTS, David Kraemer, declined a request for an interview, directing questions to the institution’s spokesperson, who offered a brief emailed statement.
“Decisions were made at the time with careful consideration of what was in the best interest of the institution,” the spokesperson wrote.
In 2021, amid earlier revelations of the library’s sell-off, Kraemer told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that he had been ordered to sell items of his choosing to raise a specified amount of money, which he did not disclose.
In their defense of the sales, Kraemer and other JTS officials said at the time that the deaccessioned materials had been digitized and were deemed to have limited research value, allowing scholars to access their contents even after the originals left the collection. Seminary leaders described the decisions as financially prudent and of minimal impact on the library’s core mission.
Critics, however, argue that digitization does not replace the scholarly and cultural value of original manuscripts.
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International social workers group rejects measure to expel Israeli union amid pressure from Jewish groups
(JTA) — An international federation of social workers has voted not to expel the Israeli Union of Social Workers following weeks of debate and opposition from Jewish groups over their potential ban.
“After careful deliberation, IFSW members voted against this motion,” the National Association of Social Workers, the U.S. affiliate of the International Federation of Social Workers, said in a statement.
The vote to suspend or expel the Israeli union on Wednesday would have required 75% of the union’s 67 voting member nations to vote for the measures.
The vote stemmed from a complaint issued by the Irish, Spanish and Greek affiliates of the federation, who accused the Israeli union of failing to seek an exemption from mandatory military service for its members.
Wednesday’s decision marked the end of weeks of internal debate within the federation, during which the proposed expulsion drew mounting scrutiny from the Israeli union and Jewish groups who warned that the measure would single out Israeli, and Jewish, professionals for discriminatory treatment.
On Tuesday, 12 prominent Jewish organizations, including Hadassah, the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation League and the Jewish Federations of North America, sent a letter to the American and Canadian members of the international federation calling on them to voice their opposition to the vote.
“Hadassah is alarmed by this blatantly antisemitic maneuver to isolate and exclude Jewish and Israeli professionals solely based on their ethnic and religious identity,” said Carol Ann Schwartz, the national president of Hadassah, in a statement. “We call on the National Association of Social Workers and the Canadian Association of Social Workers to reject this outrageous and grossly discriminatory proposal.”
The same day, the U.S.-based National Association of Social Workers voiced their opposition to the vote for the first time, calling on the other voting members to “uphold the profession’s core values of unity, dialogue, and compassion.”
The motion to expel the Israeli union “directly contradicts IFSW’s mission of promoting international cooperation, unity, and constructive engagement,” wrote the American union in a statement. “Rather than fostering hope and harmony, expulsion would sow division and disharmony, eroding the trust and solidarity that are essential to our global community.”
The Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington, which also signed onto Tuesday’s letter, hailed the vote Wednesday as a “victory for inclusion over discrimination.”
“While it is disappointing that the IFSW even considered such exclusionary motions, we are hopeful that this closes the door on any effort to isolate Israeli social workers initiated by international bodies that should be supporting and lifting them up,” said Guila Franklin Siegel, the chief operating officer of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington, in a statement.
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