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The founder of Peru’s only Jewish bakery looks to educate non-Jews through food — and Instagram stories
LIMA, Peru (JTA) — The story of Lima’s only Jewish bakery begins on Christmas.
On the eve of the holiday in 2016, Deborah Trapunsky was baking challah for a non-Jewish friend who wanted a unique gift for her boyfriend. Her friends had always loved her challah, and she enjoyed sharing this aspect of her culture with them. But on that night, Trapunsky figured that she would see if anyone else would be interested in some challah to go with their Christmas dinner. So she posted on Facebook.
The response was overwhelming.
Trapunsky ended up receiving nearly 100 orders, and without a professional oven, she barely kept up with the demand. Using her parents’ small kitchen to complete the orders, Trapunsky said that she had to “colonize” her parents’ apartment — using every countertop to knead dough, laying out challahs throughout the rooms to cool down and then packaging them.
As she drove around Lima on Christmas day completing all the deliveries, as the majority of Peruvians were celebrating with their families, Trapunsky hatched a plan to turn the unexpected response into a business.
“I was really surprised when the orders started to grow and grow,” she said. “I had no idea about anything, no idea how much challah I could bake, no idea how to do the packaging…but that’s how it all started.”
She named her creation Oh-jalá — a bit of wordplay, as “ojala” means “I hope” and jalá is the Spanish word for challah, the braided Ashkenazi bread traditionally made on Shabbat and holidays.
Seven years after that Christmas Facebook post, the bakery has moved from a cramped 120-square-foot kitchen to a 1,200-foot brick and mortar space that opened in 2020 in a garage of an old colonial home in the posh neighborhood of San Isidro.
Trapunksy, who is 30, has gone from selling four flavors of challah to 12 — including vegan and nutella varieties — and has expanded from only selling challah to offering coffee, hamantaschen (for Purim), a variety of sweetbreads and even bagels. (She made sure to add the disclaimer that hers are not on par with New York bagels but that they suffice for the traveler in Peru who is craving the Jewish-American staple).
Over the years, Trapunsky’s clientele has also shifted from mostly Jewish customers — who found her after the initial Christmas rush — to mostly non-Jews. She therefore sees Oh-jalá as more than a job: it’s her attempt to combat stereotypes, encourage the integration of Jews into Peruvian society, and perhaps most importantly, it’s her attempt to forge a unique Jewish-Peruvian identity for herself.
The bakery is housed in a garage of an old colonial home in the posh neighborhood of San Isidro. (Courtesy of Deborah Trapunsky)
“Here in Peru people like ‘different’ [cultures and cuisines], and being Jewish in Peru is very different,” Trapunsky said. “And I really enjoy having a bakery that exists at the intersection between this minority community and the larger Peruvian world.”
Jewish Peruvians make up fewer than .01% of the country’s population of 34 million and are mostly concentrated in the capital Lima. Trapunsky and her family are currently close with other members of the community here, but they didn’t always fit in.
Like many South American Jews, her family mostly descends from Eastern Europe. Before 1998, they lived in Chile, but looking to leave financial struggles behind, the Trapunskys left for Peru. Siblings, parents, cousins, aunts and uncles all lived together in an old house in Lima. Trapunsky recalled these memories fondly, as she was only a child and enjoyed being with her cousins. But she also remembers the tension between her parents and uncles and aunts, as their economic hardships were compounded by feeling like outcasts among Lima’s Jews.
Oh-jalá includes bagels on the menu. (Courtesy of Deborah Trapunsky)
Lima’s Jewish community of around 2,000 is very wealthy, and the Trapunskys came to Peru with almost nothing. Starting from scratch, they had to fight for a place within a community that Deborah describes as “hermetic.” She spent much of her childhood feeling like she didn’t belong in the traditional but not Orthodox community that was supposed to embrace her. It made her bitter.
“The Jewish community here is very closed-minded. When [my family] arrived in Peru, we didn’t have any money…I was young but I remember feeling the struggle of my family trying to exist in an unwelcoming community,” Trapunsky said. “So although I’ve always felt grateful for being Jewish and for the Jewish community here, I also have always felt a little resentment.”
After graduating from Peru’s only Jewish high school, she went to university and immersed herself in the non-Jewish world. She quickly discovered that the majority of Peruvians know very little about Jewish people, and what they do know is often based in stereotypes and anachronisms. She often tried to educate her peers about Jewish holidays, traditions and food, and through that process felt more Jewish than she ever had.
“Sharing my culture with friends helped me discover what made me feel Jewish. When I was only spending time with other Jews, I lost the ability to identify myself by contrasting myself to others,” she said. “But being immersed in Peru’s secular world gave me the opportunity to connect to my Judaism in a very different way.”
She added that she thinks the insularity of Lima’s Jewish community leads non-Jewish Peruvians to view the community with suspicion and reinforces negative stereotypes about Jewish people. With Oh-jalá, Trapunsky is trying to change that — to foster interaction between local Jews and others, and to show Peruvians how Jews enrichen their society.
Trapunsky is shown with some of her employees inside Oh-jalá. (Courtesy of Deborah Trapunsky)
“Food is a safe and secular space,” she said. “It gives me the opportunity to share cultural information in a non-political manner.”
But Oh-jalá’s physical space is not the only tool that Trapunsky uses in her mission — she also uses the bakery’s Instagram account to educate Peruvians about Judaism. With more than 18,000 followers, she does educational Instagram stories on Sukkot, Pesach, and other Jewish holidays. She even did an Instagram live video on “Judaism 101.” In a series of highlighted stories on her page, she talked about topics ranging from the fasting on Yom Kippur to why Jews don’t celebrate Christmas to, of course, the origins of challah.
As a result, she has received hundreds of positive direct messages from Peruvians eager to learn more about the religion and compare Judaism to their own Catholicism. She said this was her exact goal.
“I want to overturn the hermetic reputation of the Jewish community and turn it into something accessible, open to the public, and even trendy,” she said. “I want everyone in Peru to be able to get to know us… and explore our culture.”
Starting Oh-jalá has also helped her let go of the resentment. She now not only feels more secure in her identity as both Peruvian and Jewish, but also more of a valued member in the Lima Jewish community.
As the financial success continues, Deborah is focused on the future. She wants to franchise her bakery and plans to open another one on the other side of the city.
Ever the entrepreneur, she also made sure to tell the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that she’s looking for investors — and for a Jewish boyfriend.
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High schoolers’ ‘human swastika’ on football field shakes San Jose Jewish community
(JTA) — The photo spread swiftly after a student posted it on social media: Eight California high schoolers were lying on their school’s football field, their bodies arrayed in the shape of a swastika.
Alongside the picture was a quote from Adolf Hitler, threatening the “annihilation of the Jewish race.”
The incident at Branham High School in San Jose began on Dec. 3 and has roiled the local Jewish community in the days since, as the wrenching saga has ignited suspensions, recriminations and alarm from around the world.
The photograph and the response to it were first reported by J. Jewish News of Northern California.
“We don’t want to see hatred,” Cormac Nolan, a Jewish Branham senior, told the local Jewish newspaper. “We don’t want to see the idolization of one of the most evil men to ever walk the face of the Earth. We don’t want someone who spews out hatred like this on our campus.”
The school’s student newspaper reported that the students involved had been suspended, and that dozens of other students walked out to protest the incident.
The San Jose Police Department told J. that it is investigating the incident, and the school’s principal, Beth Silbergeld, who is Jewish, said the school was working with the Anti-Defamation League and the Bay Area Jewish Coalition, a local antisemitism advocacy group, “to ensure that we receive appropriate support and guidance as we work to repair the harm that’s been done to our community.”
Silbergeld told J. that she felt pressure to learn from the incident.
“I’ve been in education for a long time and have seen, sadly, lots of incidences of oppression and hate toward many groups,” she said. “I think that we always have a responsibility as schools to do what’s right and to take action and learn from the experiences of other other schools and other incidents as a way to hopefully eliminate actions like what we’ve experienced.”
The incident is not the first time Branham High School has faced controversy over antisemitism on its campus. In April, the California Department of Education ruled that the school had discriminated against its Jewish students by presenting “biased” content about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a 12th-grade ethnic literature curriculum.
It is also not the first instance of a “human swastika” roiling a school community. In 2019, nine middle schoolers in Ojai, California, also arranged themselves in a “human swastika” and faced disciplinary measures from the school.
Exactly what possessed the Branham students to do what they did is not clear. But psychologists told the J. that the teen years are a peak moment for transgressive behaviors that may or may not reflect deep-seated biases.
“It’s a developmental time where you’re doing new things, you’re trying new things, you’re making mistakes, you’re trying to fit in, you’re trying to get laughs and likes,” Ellie Pelc, director of clinical services at the Bay Area’s Jewish Family and Children’s Services, told the newspaper. “And you often do so in some hurtful or harmful ways that you don’t always have the capacity to think through in advance.”
The photo was met by condemnation by California State Sens. Scott Wiener, who wrote that antisemitism was “pervasive & growing” in a post on Facebook, and Dave Cortese, who said he was “deeply disturbed” by the incident in a statement.
“What happened at Branham High School was not a joke, not a prank, and not self-expression — it was an act of hatred,” wrote San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan in a post on X. “The fact that this was planned and posted publicly makes it even more disturbing.”
By Tuesday, the uproar had sparked a response from district leaders. In a post on Facebook, Robert Bravo, the superintendent for the Campbell Union High School District, wrote that the district “will respond firmly, thoughtfully, and within the full scope allowed by Board Policy and California law.” (Displaying a Nazi swastika on the property of a school is illegal in California.)
He added that the school district considered the incident an instance of “hate violence” based on California state education code, which allows for suspension or expulsion in such cases.
“Our response cannot be limited to discipline alone,” continued Bravo. “We are committed to using this incident as an opportunity to deepen education around antisemitism, hate symbols and the historical atrocities associated with them.”
The antisemitic post comes two months after California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill creating a statewide office assigned to combatting antisemitism in California public schools. The office, which is the first of its kind in the country, was met with praise from local Jewish advocacy groups while some critics warned it could chill academic freedoms.
Marc Levine, the regional director of the Anti-Defamation League in the Central Pacific region, called the incident “repulsive and unacceptable” in a statement on X. The incident was also condemned by the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Bay Area, which wrote in a statement that it had been working with the school about “how to ensure an effective response.”
The Bay Area Jewish Coalition also issued a statement on Tuesday, writing that the antisemitic act had “shaken Jewish families across Northern California and beyond.”
“We hope that what happened at Branham serves as a wake-up call for California and for the rest of the country to take the antisemitism crisis seriously and reverse the trend through real, meaningful action and long-term change,” the statement continued.
The post High schoolers’ ‘human swastika’ on football field shakes San Jose Jewish community appeared first on The Forward.
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Nashville Jewish community center sues Goyim Defense League over alleged campaign of intimidation
(JTA) —
A Jewish community center in Nashville has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the neo-Nazi group Goyim Defense League and several of its leaders and affiliates, accusing them of orchestrating a campaign of antisemitic intimidation, harassment and trespass aimed at terrorizing the city’s Jewish community.
The lawsuit was filed Tuesday by the Southern Poverty Law Center on behalf of the Gordon Jewish Community Center, a 120-year-old nonprofit that serves as a major hub for Jewish life in Nashville. The complaint names the Goyim Defense League, its founder and leader Jon Minadeo II, extremist streamer Paul Miller, who is also known as GypsyCrusader, and several associates.
At the center of the case is a January 2025 incident in which Travis Garland, a Tennessee man affiliated with the Goyim Defense League, allegedly disguised himself as an Orthodox Jewish man and infiltrated the Jewish center’s secured campus. According to the lawsuit, Garland livestreamed the intrusion, mocked Jewish customs and the Holocaust, and refused repeated requests to leave before being forcibly escorted off the property by a security guard.
Garland was later arrested and pleaded guilty in state court to trespassing at the Jewish center, receiving a sentence of nearly a year in jail, according to Nashville television station WTVF.
The complaint alleges Garland acted as part of a coordinated effort, receiving guidance and encouragement from Miller and others who followed the incident in real time via video chat and later promoted it online as a “stunt.”
“Using fear and harassment to threaten and intimidate groups is a despicable act that cannot be tolerated in a multicultural society,” Scott McCoy, the Southern Poverty Law Center’s deputy legal director, said in a statement. “This is the second lawsuit the SPLC has brought against the Goyim Defense League for their actions targeting Nashville’s Black and Jewish communities.”
The lawsuit also ties the January incident to a broader campaign by the Goyim Defense League during a 10-day visit to Nashville in the summer of 2024, when members of the group allegedly harassed Jewish and Black residents, assaulted a Jewish man and a biracial man, and intimidated Black children downtown while waving swastika flags. The SPLC previously filed a separate lawsuit on behalf of a biracial man who was assaulted during that tour.
According to the lawsuit, the Jewish center has spent roughly $75,000 on additional security in the wake of the incidents and says staff and members have altered how they use the campus because of heightened fear.
The lawsuit comes as the Goyim Defense League has faced mounting pressure online and in court. Following a recent investigation by Nashville television station WTVF, websites operated by Minadeo were taken offline by their domain registrar, and several of his accounts were suspended from X. Other Goyim Defense League members have been convicted or indicted in connection with violent incidents during the group’s 2024 visit to Nashville, according to local reporting.
The suit invokes the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871 and other federal civil rights statutes and seeks court protection as well as financial compensation and punitive damages.
“This lawsuit demonstrates the Nashville Jewish community’s resolve to stand firm in the face of antisemitic intimidation and to hold accountable those who perpetrate it,” said Ben Raybin, an attorney for the Jewish center.
For a time, the Goyim Defense League was among the most prolific distributors of antisemitic propaganda in the United States, with members spreading flyers in Jewish neighborhoods and other public spaces. While the group’s online reach appears to have diminished more recently, Nashville has remained a focal point of its activity.
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Rabbi Eliezer Diamond, beloved Jewish Theological Seminary professor and author, dies at 73
(JTA) — Rabbi Eliezer Diamond, who taught at the Jewish Theological Seminary for over three decades and left an indelible mark on generations of rabbis and Jewish scholars, has died.
Diamond died Thursday at 73, following several years battling multiple forms of cancer.
Born in 1952, Diamond received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees and rabbinical ordination from the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary of Yeshiva University from 1968 to 1977.
But it was at JTS, the Conservative flagship in New York City, where Diamond earned his doctorate in Talmud and was the Rabbi Judah Nadich Professor of Talmud and Rabbinics, that his talents for mentorship and teaching flourished.
“My beloved teacher, a precious mentor and friend to countless Jewish leaders, Rabbi Eliezer Diamond z”l, has departed this world for the next,” wrote Rabbi Menachem Creditor, a scholar in residence and rabbi for the UJA-Federation of New York, in a post on Facebook. “His wisdom changed the course of my rabbinate many times over, something I know to be true for many others.”
Over his long career as a highly respected Talmud scholar, Diamond published a chapter on the rabbinic period in the “Schocken Guide to Jewish Books,” as well as entries in the “Reader’s Guide to Judaism” and “The Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception.” In 2003, he published his only book, “Holy Men and Hunger Artists: Fasting and Asceticism in Rabbinic Culture,” with the Oxford University Press.
Diamond retired from JTS after the fall 2024 semester. In March during the previous semester, his legacy at the school was celebrated in a program titled “Diamonds of Torah: Honoring Rabbi Eliezer Diamond’s Teaching.”
“Generations of students have been profoundly impacted by his teaching, while his writings on prayer, asceticism, and issues of environmental law and ethics have influenced so many in the wider Jewish world as well,” wrote Shuly Rubin Schwartz, the chancellor of JTS, in a statement announcing his retirement.
On Facebook, where Diamond frequently posted photos of his wife, Rabbi Shelley Kniaz, five children and numerous grandchildren, he also documented his health struggles, providing deeply personal and rabbinic testimonies of his experience.
After hearing a grim prognosis in August 2024, Diamond posted, “I am not a statistic; I am a distinct human being, Eliezer Ben-Zion, son of Yehuda Idel and Chaya Golde. No one can know what the Shekhina’s plan is for me. What I do know is that She does not want me to live in the shadow of death but rather to bask in the radiance of life.”
As news of his death spread on Friday, many of Diamond’s former students and friends eulogized him on social media, many of them calling attention to Diamond’s legendary kindness.
Rabbi Ben Goldberg, a former student of Diamond and the rabbi of Congregation KTI in Port Chester, New York, wrote on Facebook that Diamond had “passed on to the supernal yeshiva, where I imagine he will be as beloved as he was in all of the places he taught in this world.” He recalled his time in Diamond’s classes at JTS where, he wrote, it was clear to all that Diamond “cared deeply about his students.”
“More than anything about Talmud, I’ll remember him writing lengthy (and unnecessary) notes of apology for saying something in class that might have been hurtful (which of course, it wasn’t),” Goldberg wrote.
Michael Rosenberg, another former student of Diamond who now serves on the faculty of the Hadar Institute, recalled meeting with Diamond in 2023 where the pair had a conversation that remained with him.
“That conversation was filled with pearl after pearl — about parenting, teaching, being in relationship,” wrote Rosenberg in a post on Facebook. “I am a better parent and teacher because of that conversation, and I am so sad that I will not get to follow up with my teacher and rabbi.”
Beyond his teaching at JTS, Diamond also previously taught at Stern College, the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, the 92nd Street Y, several Ramah camps and the now-defunct Solomon Schechter High School.
Diamond was also a longtime resident of Teaneck, New Jersey, and congregant of Congregation Beth Sholom, where he regularly held a Torah study session on Shabbat afternoons.
“Rabbi Diamond’s wisdom (and hazzanus [singing]) were matched only by his wit,” wrote David Spielman, who was had Diamond as a high school teacher, in a post on Facebook. “A devout Brooklyn Dodgers fan, he once chastised someone for wearing a Yankees cap, saying it was inappropriate attire for Minyan. He would also say that Ebbets Field would be rebuilt ‘Bimharah b’yamainu.’ Rabbi Diamond will be remembered for that wit, wisdom, and perseverance now that his suffering is finally over.”
Beyond the numerous eulogies that have been written for him on social media, Diamond’s prolific reflections on life and faith endure.
“What draws me back to Hashem, if not to my life as a whole, is Psalm 23 גם כי אלך בגי צלמות לא אירא רע כי אתה עמדי. ‘Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I fear no evil for you are with me,’” wrote Diamond in his last post on Facebook. “Wherever I am, God is there too. I hope that I will return home soon.”
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