CANDLE LIGHTING - MIAMI BEACH CANDLE LIGHTING - MIAMI BEACH September 11 / כ“ט אלול AUG 9השנה / תמוז ערבי”גראש/ פרשת בלק
ISRAEL AT WAR DAY 308
CANDLECANDLE LIGHTING: 7:09 7:54 PM PM LIGHTING: SHABBOS ENDS: 8:04 PM
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46 © The South Florida Community Voice Magazine. All rights reserved. Reproduction in printed or digital form in whole or in part in any form without prior written permission is prohibited. The publisher reserves all right to edit all articles for clarity, space and editorial sensitivities. Submissions cannot be returned to sender. The South Florida Weekly Magazine is not responsible for the cash flow of any advertised product or service that appears in these pages. The South Florida Community Voice Magazine assumes no responsibility for the content of articles or advertisements in this publication, nor for the content of books that are referred to or excerpted herein. Community Voice magazine is not responsible for the Kashrut or services provided by the advertisements. It is up to the consumer to verify the information.
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Beyond the Headlines
A weekly glimpse into the Israel you won’t read about in the news By Sivan Rahav Meir
‘But I Already Heard the Shofar at Selichot’ After a talk I gave recently ahead of Rosh Hashanah, a teenage girl came up to me and asked, “What is the most important thing my family and I should actually do on Rosh Hashanah?” “Hear the shofar,” I told her. “That’s the central mitzvah of Rosh Hashanah.” “Oh, then we’re fine,” she said. “We already heard the shofar during Selichot at the Kotel.” That was when I realized I had gotten something wrong. I had just given an entire talk filled with ideas for Rosh Hashanah—about the media, social networks, selfimprovement—and somehow I had failed to explain the most basic thing of all. I told her that hearing the shofar during Selichot is a meaningful custom, but hearing it on Rosh Hashanah is different: it is a Torah commandment. A special brachah is recited before the shofar is sounded, and while it is being blown, we remain silent and simply listen. This year, since the first day of Rosh Hashanah will be on Shabbat when we do not blow the shofar, we will only hear it on Sunday, the second day of Rosh Hashanah. The shofar is usually blown between the morning and early afternoon, in shuls throughout the Jewish world. Many communities publish the times in advance, so it is worth checking. Or you can simply come
important lesson last night.
to shul for the service. The girl thanked me and said she would tell her parents. Then she added that until now, she had thought apples and honey were the main thing about Rosh Hashanah. We are living at a time when there is such a deep desire to connect, to learn, to do more. But at the same time, many people are missing even the most basic practical Jewish knowledge. So with all due respect to the short ideas and inspiring messages I post every morning, sometimes, before explaining that the word shofar is connected to shipur, “improvement,” we need to start with something much more basic: What are we supposed to do? Where do we do it? When? And how? Don’t be embarrassed to ask. And don’t hesitate to explain it to someone else. Thank you to the teenage girl from Or Akiva, who taught me an
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No Matter How Far You Stray If I had not heard this story with the names of actual people, I would never have believed it. But Franny Weissman shared with me the following tale which, in fact, began more than 100 years ago: “I came on aliyah from the United States and got married to Evyatar, a native Israeli whose grandmother’s parents, along with two of her siblings, were murdered in Auschwitz. Ten of her siblings survived and nine of them decided to make aliyah together, but one sister settled in the United States, never revealing to anyone that she was Jewish. She announced that after the Holocaust she would not bring children into the world, and eventually she married a non-Jew. She did not reveal her identity even to him. “When her family tried to connect with her, she ignored them. Over and over again I heard the story of Aunt Adelle. There are more than 350 family members now in Israel, four generations, but she has always been the one piece missing from the puzzle. “Two years ago, I was asked to travel to the United States to recruit girls for an educational program in Israel. My husband encouraged me to agree to the mission and said, ‘Even if you bring just one soul to Israel, it will be a great success.’ They scheduled a lecture tour for me across the United States, and one of the lectures was
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in Florida. As it turned out, I was just five minutes from the home of Aunt Adelle. I couldn’t believe it. I knocked on the door, and asked for Adelle Schwartz. The housekeeper said that there was no one there by that name, but I realized that she had changed her name. I entered and saw someone who looked a lot like her siblings. I connected them through a video chat and they began to converse in Hungarian. Soon they were crying and sobbing. Even the housekeeper cried. “Before we parted, I took her hand and said, ‘Adelle, Hitler is gone. The war is over. You have a large family now. You are not alone. No matter how far away you may be, you can always come back. Don’t let Hitler win. At the very least, come to Israel to be buried.’ “We parted with great emotion and stayed in touch. Recently, we received word from an American attorney that Adelle had passed away at the age of 102. We then learned that she had changed her mind: instead of being cremated, she wanted a Jewish funeral. “We did everything we could to
bring her to Israel — the country she had kept at a distance for most of her life. Her funeral was held at Moshav Nir Etzion, and she was buried in the family plot. We were all there, and it was one of the most moving experiences of my life. “We saw with our own eyes the meaning of the verse: ‘Even if your exiles are at the end of the heavens, the Lord, your God, will gather you
from there, and He will take you from there’ (Devarim 30:4). “As my husband had told me, ‘If you bring even one soul to Israel, it will have been a great success.’” Translated by Yehoshua Siskin and Janine Muller Sherr Want to read more by Sivan Rahav Meir? Google The Daily Thought or visit sivanrahavmeir.com
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Ninety Seconds Eli Beer built the largest volunteer emergency service in the world out of two police scanners and a refusal to take no for an answer. The founder of United Hatzalah sat down with the Community Voice in Hollywood. The man was bleeding out on a Jerusalem sidewalk, and the sixteen-year-old kneeling over him had no bandage and no kit. So he took the yarmulke off his own head, stuck it into the wound in the man’s neck and put pressure on it until an ambulance came twenty minutes later. Two days later the phone rang. “Are you Eli Beer? My father woke up in Hadassah hospital this morning. He was treated by you, and you saved his life.” Beer went to visit him. The man was about seventy. He pulled Beer into a hug, and that was when Beer saw the number on his arm. “And that changed my life. That moment.” He had spent his childhood at Yad Vashem — he was thrown out of cheder in sixth grade and out of the next school a year later, and that is where he went when he ran out of school. “One person was able to influence so many people to kill Jews. Maybe somebody could influence people to save people. Do the opposite.” At nine or ten he decided that when he grew up he would save six million Jews. The broken system At almost fifteen he volunteered on a Magen David Adom ambulance and started writing
down when each call came in and when they arrived. The average was seventeen minutes. Jerusalem had nine or ten ambulances for the whole city, five overnight. He is careful to say this was normal everywhere, not an Israeli failure. “If the ambulance is stuck in traffic, they don’t have wings.” Then a seven-year-old choked on a hot dog. Beer’s crew was the only ambulance available and reached him twenty-one minutes
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after his mother called. “By the time we arrived, this kid was completely blue and cold.” They did CPR for forty-five minutes. The doctor who ran in to help turned out to live across the street. “That whole time when we were fighting traffic, he could have run across the street and saved him.” “And I said to myself, the system is broken. Ambulances are good for transport, but not good for saving people.” An ambulance is a pre-hospital service. Nobody had built a pre-ambulance service. The ambulance monopoly refused to share calls. “So I said, I’ll manage on my own. Israel is built on one very important thing — chutzpah. We don’t ask. We do.” He bought two scanners from Radio Shack and fifteen pagers, listened in on the ambulance and fire radios, and got there first. “Undercover. Everything was undercover.” The target was ninety seconds, chosen because brain damage cannot be reversed. Instead of a central station, trained volunteers Photos: United Hatzalah of Israel
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COMMUNITY NEWS everywhere, each with a pager, the closest ones alerted automatically — on motorcycles so traffic couldn’t stop them. He called them ambucycles, the first in Israel. He was sixteen and a half. Opening the doors For nearly two decades Hatzalah grew only inside frum communities, with Rav Moshe Halberstam of the Eidah HaChareidis as its rav. Then, twenty years ago, missiles fell on Haifa in the Second Lebanon War. “I said, let’s build Hatzalah for everyone. For the whole klal Yisrael.” Men and women, religious and secular, Jewish and non-Jewish, Arab communities. “We can’t say we’re 90 seconds only in this neighborhood.” “A lot of people were fighting against me.” What carried it was the backing of Rav Elyashiv, Rav Ovadia Yosef, Rav Kanievsky and Rav Shteinman. The organization took a new name: United Hatzalah. “It was actually the hardest thing I ever did, but the best thing I ever did.” Today it has ten thousand volunteers and has responded to more than eight million emergencies, with its own emergency number at 1221 and a command center Beer calls “like a NASA control and command room.” Its first real donor, Mark Gerson, gave $18,000 twenty-five years ago and was made chairman on the grounds that he was the only person on the board. He still chairs it. Asked what South Florida families can do beyond writing checks, Beer points to a program started by a local family, the Leights — Leight Legacy Heroes now has three thousand children world-
wide, from age six up, who fundraise and take EMT courses as kids. His book 90 Seconds is published by ArtScroll; a third is on the way. “Hatzalah is the greatest Jewish innovation. What do they have in Lebanon? Hezbollah. We have Hatzalah saving people, no matter who it is.” October 7th Beer got up at 6:45 on Simchas Torah to word that a volunteer had been shot in Ofakim, then missiles started toward Yerushalayim. At the command center, five hundred calls were waiting.
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United Hatzalah can open a caller’s phone camera within two seconds — a capability it was first in the world to use. That is how they learned what was happening at Nova. “People thought it was car accidents.” The cameras showed cars crashing one after another; callers assumed oil on the road. It was shooting at the drivers. The gunfire in the background was hollower than an M16. Old Kalashnikovs. Then the counting. Thirty dead, another thirty, another twenty. Past a hundred they assumed they were double-counting. “They said, no, these are different areas.
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COMMUNITY NEWS Ofakim, Netivot, Sderot, Kfar Aza. We realized this was an invasion. We knew before everyone that we were dealing with a war.” Volunteers came from shul in their taluses to answer phones. Asked whether the government was informing him: “They were getting updates from us. The army fell apart.” Volunteers were told to hold back and refused. Over a thousand went in under fire; three are the subject of an episode of the HBO series One Day in October. The army had closed the airspace and United Hatzalah’s two helicopters flew anyway. When the Ministry of Health called to scream, Beer phoned the prime minister’s office: “He said, do whatever you need to do to save lives.” His wife Giti was among those
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who went south. At noon a jeep brought in a severely wounded soldier. “Looking at him, it was hard to imagine that we’d be able to save him.” She noticed the wedding band on his finger. “All I could think of was that this is a married man. He has children waiting for him at home.” They intubated him under fire and got him to a helicopter. He was in a coma for months. When he walked for the first time he went to visit his son at kindergarten, and his wife sent Giti the video. At Kfar Aza that evening, soldiers found ten-month-old twins alive in their cribs, their parents killed that morning — left as bait, Beer says, crying all day so more Jews would come and could be killed too. Volunteers worked outside the gate all day. “There was
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COMMUNITY NEWS no more dangerous place in the world. 300 terrorists there.” The twins are alive. Two other volunteers reached a general bleeding to death, got him into an ambulance under tourniquets, and when the hospital was too packed to take him, pulled the rank off his shoulders and ran in shouting that there was a general outside. “That general is now the head of Mossad. Roman Gofman.” “We saved hundreds of people who otherwise would have been added to the number. We’re talking about a day when 1,250 people were killed.” Had he built United Hatzalah over thirty-five years for that day alone, he says, dayenu.
What he’s fighting for now What worries Beer now is not Hamas. “We have a big machlokes in Israel. Very big hatred between religious and secular” — worse, he says, than before October 7th or during the judicial reform fight. He uses the words civil war. His answer is to let chareidi men serve through United Hatzalah: “We want to take 10,000 chareidi people.” He is otherwise almost aggressively optimistic. “There was never a better time for Jews in America than now, in the history of the Jewish people.” There is antisemitism, but there was antisemitism in Florida forty years ago; what is new is social media. “We have to be thankful to Hashem that we’re
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living in the best times the Jews ever lived in.” He was once elected head of the va’ad bayit in his building. Eleven tenants. He decided to change the light bulbs and a war broke out over yellow versus white. “So I resigned after one month, and I said, enough with politics.” Netanyahu has raised the Knesset with him twice. He is not going to run. He named his real job decades ago, as a kid at Yad Vashem doing the arithmetic on six million. “The name of the organization is Hatzalah, but we added United. And I think we need to fight for uniting the Jewish people more than ever.”
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From Hives to High Holidays Hopes: The Story Behind Your Rosh Hashanah Honey For 40 years, the Ophir family has produced honey, grapes, and wine in the Galilee. With help from an organization better known for tree planting, their products are reaching supporters around the world. Tania Shalom Michaelian When Tzvike and Hadas Ophir planted their vineyard in 1986, on the day their eldest daughter Adva was born, they had no plans to make wine. They wanted to grow something alongside their hives. The couple was among the first residents of Alon HaGalil, a town in Israel’s North about an hour and a half’s drive from Tel Aviv. Tzvike grew up in Emek Hefer and Hadas in Kfar Yehoshua, both in farming families. Tzvike was also a second-generation beekeeper. “The bees fly, but vines are planted in the ground,” said Adva Ophir. “The vineyard was a way of putting down roots in the Galilee.” At first, the family grew table grapes. The work was intensive and required too much water, and after three difficult years they switched to wine grapes. They sold their harvest to Israeli wineries, including several boutique wineries that opened during the 1990s. The feedback was good enough to persuade Tzvike to try making wine himself. Meshek Ophir sold its first bottle in 2001. “It was never my father’s dream to make wine,” Adva said. “We weren’t even a family that drank wine. The idea literally came out of
the earth.” Today, Meshek Ophir produces wine and honey and continues to sell grapes to other wineries. It remains a family business, run by people whose working lives are tied to the weather, the seasons and the condition of their bees. What it takes to fill a jar The farm has around 1,000 mobile beehives. Tzvike, who is nearly 70, and Adva’s brother Noam move them from place to place according to the flowering season. Some are positioned near sunflower fields, avocado orchards and other crops, where the bees pollinate the plants. Rainfall, the number of blossoms, and the length of the flowering period all affect the amount of honey produced. The bees must first make enough to feed themselves. Only then is there honey for
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the family to harvest and sell. Meshek Ophir’s honey contains no additives and is not heated before it is placed in jars. Getting it there requires long days of physical work. Tzvike and Noam transport the hives, monitor the queens and worker bees, and protect the colonies from disease and other threats. “We make our living from the honey, but our more important job is protecting the bees and helping them survive,” Adva said. “Without beekeepers, many of them would not survive in the wild. The pollination they provide also allows other Israeli farmers to grow their crops.” After October 7, reaching some of the hives became dangerous. The family’s bees are spread across the Galilee, including near Shlomi and other areas that came under
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COMMUNITY NEWS rocket and missile fire. At times, entering those areas was prohibited. Tzvike continued to check on the hives. “My father is a farmer. He doesn’t care about war. He cares about his bees,” Adva said. “He went into areas under fire because if he didn’t look after them, he could lose them. This is what he knows how to do, and it is his livelihood.” The work was made harder by the absence of Noam and other family members, who continue to serve in reserve duty for months at a time. Noam normally drives the truck that transports the hives because Tzvike no longer has a truck license. During his reserve service, much of the responsibility fell back on his father. For Adva, the reason the family kept going is not difficult to explain. “We have been working together on this farm for 40 years,” she said. “It is our livelihood, but for the next generation, it is also about working as a family, being connected to the land, and passing those values on to our children. It is what keeps us here.” Help When It Was Needed Most Meshek Ophir was one of the founding members of Western Galilee Now, a Jewish National Fund-USA-driven nonprofit that promotes small businesses and tourism in the region. During the recent conflict, that relationship became particularly important to the family. “They called to ask how we were doing and how the business was managing,” Adva said. “They asked what they could do to help sell
our products and promote them abroad. Knowing that someone has your back during such a difficult period is very important. Western Galilee Now has opened doors for us.” For years, Jewish National FundUSA was known for two things – the iconic Blue Box (pushke) and tree planting in Israel. Today, the organization’s focus is on securing Israel’s North and South by attracting 800,000 new residents to these underpopulated areas. It does so through a strategy it calls “circles of impact,” in which its philanthropic investments in initiatives such as Western Galilee Now create economic development, job creation, and ultimately population growth. With funding from Jewish National Fund-USA partners (donors), Adva was also able to combine her work as a filmmaker with the family vineyard. She created “Between the Vineyards,” a film festival at the farm that includes a screening of the documentary she spent 15 years making about her family’s work. The festival gives people another reason to visit the farm and draws tourists to the area. “They were telling us that they believed in our farm and in the people working here,” she said. “Without their help, we would not have had the means to start the festival.” This year, Meshek Ophir’s honey will also be sold through Jewish National Fund-USA’s Online Mitzvah Marketplace (jnf.org/store), operated in partnership with Western Galilee Now to help small Israeli businesses reach customers overseas.
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For the Ophirs, the marketplace offers access to customers they would struggle to reach on their own. It also comes ahead of Rosh Hashanah, when honey sales are at their highest. “We need people to enjoy the honey and come back for more, but we also want them to understand how much work goes into every jar,” Adva said. “We are not a factory or a high-tech company. When people buy our honey, they help us maintain our 1,000 hives, provide pollination services to farmers and continue doing what we know how to do.” The past few years have been difficult for small businesses, especially in northern Israel, and the family needs a strong holiday season. Adva hopes the farm will continue to grow and that her parents will eventually be able to slow down, although she doubts her father will ever stop working altogether. “I want my parents to enjoy what they have built,” she said. “I want us to be able to breathe a little and enjoy the results of all this work.” She also wants people who have supported businesses in the Galilee to understand how much of a difference that help has made. “Small businesses are the heart of this country,” she said. “To the people supporting us, please continue. You are giving us a voice in the world and helping us remain on this land we love.” To support Jewish National FundUSA’s support for Israel’s North and South, visit jnf.org/donate or call 800. JNF.0099.
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Operation Inspiration: Golden Opportunities By Rabbi Jonathan Gewirtz
One morning, I found a quarter on my dresser at home. I slipped it into my pocket and went to shul. When it came time to give tzedaka, I pulled the quarter out and put it in the pushka. That would have been the end of the story if not for what happened next. A day or two later, I was davening, and someone came around with the tzedaka box. I reached my hand into my pocket and found… a quarter. Now, this may not seem like a big deal, except that nowadays, since most of the time I pay for things with a credit card, I don’t tend to use cash or get change. I was surprised to find the quarter in my pocket. But again, I fished it out and put it in the pushka. I’m sure I must have gotten it as change without remembering, or perhaps I found another one in the house or car and forgot, or maybe I’d had the second quarter all along but simply missed it. That doesn’t matter, but what did, was the thought I had because of it. Imagine if every day, another quarter just materialized in my pocket? That would be cool, wouldn’t it? I did some quick math, and realized it would not add up to much, maybe $80 a year. (Actually, it would be $91.25 but I was doing it quickly for an estimate and didn’t need to be so precise.) That’s not really a big amount. Not an amount that would be life-changing, though it would be consistent. My mind drifted towards the old
parable of the goose that laid the golden eggs. If you’re not familiar with it, a farmer had a goose that one day laid an egg that looked different than the others. It was small, perfectly formed, but made out of pure gold! He took it to town where the goldsmith tested it, melted it down, and gave the man a nice amount of money. It was enough for him to buy several items at the general store, even
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some treats he had not been able to afford before. The next day, the same thing happened. He found another small, golden egg. This time, he knew what it was, and wasted no time in going back to trade it for cash. Again, he had a small windfall, and for the first time in a while, he had a few dollars in his pocket. Eagerly, he awaited the next day when the goose would lay the egg, and sure enough - gold. While he appreciated these small amounts, the farmer knew he would not get rich this way. Finally, he decided to cut open the goose to get all the golden eggs at once. But, of course, when he did, the goose was not full of gold as he had expected. Instead, he now had no more golden eggs, and no more goose. When I thought about the quarter appearing each day, I knew I would not get rich from it. When people dream of winning the lot-
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COMMUNITY NEWS tery, they don’t think about winning $500 a month for life. They imagine winning millions of dollars right now. THAT would be life-changing and worth my while. I initially thought the same thing about the quarter. But then I reconsidered. What if every day I had that quarter, and an opportunity to give it to tzedaka? Wouldn’t that be something? Every day I would have another chance to do something that would last for eternity and be precious. Not only that, but where did the quarter come from? It was a gift from Hashem. I didn’t do anything for it; it just appeared. That’s also something to consider. It’s a sign that Hashem loves me
and cares enough to send me a reminder. When we daven to Hashem, we’re usually asking for that mega-jackpot win. We’re not asking for the small, quiet kindnesses, but rather the giant windfall. But we should not underestimate those small, valuable gifts from Hashem. This morning I opened two of them. They were my eyes. When we say Modeh Ani upon waking, do we stop to think about the fact that there are people out there who don’t wake up in the morning? It may not seem like much, but being able to awaken, see, hear, breathe, and so much more, are fabulous gifts which we often don’t appreciate until it’s too
late and they’re gone or impaired. Each day we have a golden opportunity to feel Hashem’s love; to feel a little bit richer than the day before, and to use those gifts to build a better life for ourselves and our loved ones. More than that, we can use them to build a better world, and to prepare a nest egg for eternity, like that quarter to tzedaka. A little bit at a time adds up pretty quickly and before you know it, you’ll actually be wealthier than you ever realized. 2026 – All Rights Reserved Did you enjoy this column? Feedback is welcome and appreciated. E-mail info@ JewishSpeechWriter.com to share your thoughts. I doubt anyone actually reads this. Prove me wrong.
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The Rabbi Who Came to Florida With Nothing — and Became “Moshe Iguana Hunter” How a former shochet from New York turned a rifle, a Shabbos guest, and a lot of emunah into South Florida’s most talked-about business There are no iguanas in New York. So when Rabbi Moshe moved his family to Hollywood, Florida a few months ago with no job lined up and no idea what came next, the last thing he expected was to become the most recognized iguana removal man in South Florida — known to half the community simply as “Moshe Iguana.” He didn’t plan it that way. Rabbi Moshe spent years in New York as a shochet, moving through thousands of chickens a week, and later worked as a realtor. When the family decided to come down to Florida, he didn’t have a business plan waiting for him. He had a decision to make Florida work, and a father asking him what exactly he intended to do about it. “I said, you’re asking the wrong guy,” Rabbi Moshe recalled. “You’re asking me? God is coming along with me. I’m sure He’s also in Florida. And this is exactly what happened.” He settled in Hollywood — “the middle of everywhere,” as he puts it — without knowing a single person in town. What he did know, almost immediately, was that his backyard had a serious iguana problem. He borrowed his nextdoor neighbor’s rifle, took care of a few, enjoyed it more than he expected to, and eventually bought a rifle of his own. The business itself came from a
Shabbos table. A young boy who eats by Rabbi Moshe every week — a boy who lost his father at nine years old — listened to him talk about shooting iguanas in the yard and asked a simple question: why don’t you make it a business? Rabbi Moshe told him to wait until after Shabbos. By Saturday night, he’d put out his first ad. “The rest is history,” he said. It’s a phrase that comes up again and again when he talks about the past year — not as a throwaway line, but because he genuinely means it that way. Every turn in the story, in his telling, traces back to Hashem opening a door he didn’t ask for. The ad itself became something of a local phenomenon — a photo of Rabbi Moshe holding an iguana in one hand and a gun in the other, running in the pages of
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this magazine’s Shavuos edition. People started talking about it before they ever called him for a job. Within months, he had built a client list that stretched from private homes to major buildings across Miami Beach, including Tower 41, where a resident named Rebecca flagged the iguana problem around the pool to building management — and Rabbi Moshe became their regular vendor almost overnight. He’s since worked with rabbanim across the community, including one who had stopped being able to comfortably use his own front door because of how many iguanas had taken over the property, and another visiting from a large Canadian Jewish community who called after seeing the ad and hearing, as his wife put it, something in Rab-
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COMMUNITY NEWS bi Moshe’s voice that told her he was the right guy for the job. He’s cleared out spiny tail iguanas — the more aggressive, ground-burrowing cousin of the green iguana — from underneath a local shul, where they’d been eating through the air-conditioning ducting. He did that job for free. Ask him the difference between the two kinds of iguanas he deals with, and he’ll explain it without hesitation: the green ones climb roofs and eat plants and grass; the gray spiny tails burrow under foundations and chew through ducts and wiring, doing damage most homeowners don’t discover until it’s serious. Either way, for a lot of people, the fear is real. Rabbi Moshe says he’s fielded calls from residents who won’t set foot in their own backyard, and from at least one family who checked into a hotel rather than deal with an infestation at home. To the people who push back on what he does — and he says there are some — Rabbi Moshe has one consistent answer: most of them have never actually stood in a yard with an iguana problem. “Those people that are really against it,” he said, “they never saw iguanas.” What strikes him more than the business itself is what’s happened around it. He’s opened his home to family and to people who need a place to stay. He makes kugel for a couple every Shabbos. He charges a widow far less than his usual rate for iguana service — sometimes nothing at all. In his telling, none of that is separate from the business succeeding. It’s the reason it succeeded. “It’s connected to chesed,” he said of the whole undertaking — a business built with a $1,000
investment that, within three months, brought in $20,000. “It’s something you have to permit — a miracle above and beyond a miracle. When you give, it’s the only way you get.” With the article running ahead of Rosh Hashanah, that idea lands with extra weight. Rabbi Moshe points out that the amount a person will earn in the coming year is already decided on the Yamim Noraim — which, to him, only reinforces that the real work isn’t about the money at all. “It’s not about making the money,” he said. “It’s about helping people.” Ask him how he’d describe him-
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self, and he doesn’t reach for his job title. “I have passion for life, and passion for people,” he said. “This is who I am.” He used to be a shochet, after all — someone whose work required precision and a certain amount of resolve. These days it’s iguanas instead of chickens, a rifle instead of a knife, and a magazine ad instead of a network. But the passion, he’ll tell you, was always the point. What Clients Are Saying “I highly recommend Moshe for wildlife removal. We had iguanas living under our house, and they were causing significant damage, including breaking the concrete. Moshe responded quickly, assessed the situation, and successfully removed the iguanas. During the process, he also found raccoons under the house and took care of them as well. He explained everything clearly and made sure the problem was properly taken care of.” “He came out right away, explained what was going on and what needed to be done, and somehow took something that felt really scary and turned it into something we understood and felt empowered to handle. He also takes videos and shows you what he finds, what is being done, and the before and after — there was never any question about what was being done or why.” “Moshe doesn’t just finish the job, collect payment and disappear. He checks in frequently, follows up regularly to make sure everything is okay, and has even made himself available during off hours. There has never been any pressure or upselling — he genuinely cares about solving the problem.”
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Eye Doc’s View By Dr. Bruce Fleischer, Pearle Vision
I have been an eye doctor for over 30 years. Recently, I had a patient who came in for a routine eye exam and ended up having a brain tumor, which I was able to diagnose by examining her optic nerves. I immediately sent her to a neurologist, and a neurosurgeon performed brain surgery that night to save her life. She made a full recovery and was obviously very thankful, as the doctor said that if she had waited another day or two, it would have been too late. When I perform an eye exam, I thoroughly check the health of the eyes in addition to providing an individualized, customized prescription for eyeglasses and/or contact lenses. In order to achieve the best vision and the best outcomes with eyeglasses and contact lenses, you need to see a real eye doctor rather than rely on virtual online exams and glasses. I recently had another patient who came in for a routine eye exam and ended up having a bleeding retinal disease that needed to be treated immediately, or he could have suffered permanent vision loss or gone blind in that eye. I immediately sent him to a retinal eye doctor that same day, who performed emergency laser treatment to stop the bleeding. Obviously, he was very grateful.
Years ago, a patient came to me for a general eye exam. She was fine, but I noticed that her son could not see well. The mother told me that he was blind. However, I noticed from the way the child moved and behaved that he could see; his vision was not good. I offered my services, and the mother agreed. I discovered that the child was approximately a -30 Diopter Myope, meaning that he could not see at a distance at all, and even his near vision was very blurry. I told the mother that I was going to put contact lenses on the child so that he could see. The mother was a bit apprehensive, but she allowed me to do it. The child’s eyes lit up, and he walked around the optical looking at everything clearly for the first time. His mother was overcome with joy and could not believe it. Now, the child attends a regular school. At Pearle Vision in Hollywood, I perform an extensive eye exam that allows me to make sure your eyes are healthy. I diagnose many eye diseases and conditions, such as glaucoma, cataracts, macular degeneration, diabetes, and high blood pressure in the eyes. I see all age groups, from 0 to 120 years old. I am also specifically trained to handle some of the most difficult cases, including children and adults with autism, Down syndrome, and other learning disabilities. Even if the child or adult does not say a single word, I know what their eye prescription is. As they say, “the eyes are the
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windows to the soul.” By looking at the eyes, I can sometimes discover whether something is wrong with the brain, such as a brain tumor or multiple sclerosis, or whether something is wrong elsewhere in the body, such as hypertension, diabetes, heart disease, and other conditions. Seeing a real eye doctor could therefore save your vision and your life. As I am writing this article, a young woman came in with floaters and flashes of light in her eye. It turned out to be a full-blown retinal detachment, and she was immediately sent for retinal repair. Another patient came in with loss of peripheral vision, which turned out to be caused by a pituitary tumor. And, of course, at Pearle Vision Hollywood, we offer same-day glasses and contact lenses, as well as same-day eye exams, all using the latest technology. We also have a 4.8 Google rating with fabulous comments and reviews. We also offer special lenses for children to help slow the progression of myopia, or nearsightedness. All children should get their first eye exam by the age of 3, to detect “lazy eye”. We accept many insurance plans and offer self-pay discounts. I am more than happy to see you and your family at Pearle Vision, where we provide you with the best experience. We are here Monday through Friday 10 am to 6 pm and Sundays 10am to 4 pm. Pearle Vision Hollywood, Dr Bruce Fleischer 2914 Oakwood Blvd, Hollywood Fl, 33020 (954) 921-5330
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Inside the White House: Rebbes Meet Trump in Historic Oval Office Gathering A delegation of Chassidishe leaders, brokered by months of quiet diplomacy, produces a rare Satmar reunion alongside talks on chesed, clemency, and community needs Two brothers who hadn’t spoken face-to-face in decades stood together in the Oval Office on Thursday, September 3rd, and shook hands. The moment came almost as a footnote to what was already a historic gathering. President Trump welcomed a delegation of leading Chassidishe rebbes and roshei yeshiva to the White House for the first meeting of its kind since 1979, a roughly half-hour audience that mixed policy, personal blessings, and, for a few minutes, a family reconciliation that few in the room expected to see. The delegation included the Bobover Rebbe, Rabbi Benzion Halberstam; the Vizhnitzer Rebbe of Monsey, Rabbi Yisroel Hager; Rabbi Malkiel Kotler, rosh yeshiva of Beth Medrash Govoha in Lakewood; and Rabbi Aharon Mendel Twersky, representing his father, the Skverer Rebbe. Both Satmar rebbes attended as well — Rabbi Aharon Teitelbaum of Kiryas Joel and Rabbi Zalman Leib Teitelbaum of Williamsburg, brothers who have led rival factions of the same chassidus since a bitter succession dispute followed their father’s passing in 2006. The group first gathered in the Roosevelt Room with Vice President JD Vance, White House
(Official White House Photo by Molly Riley)
Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian
Jewish liaison Martin Marks, and Staff Secretary Will Scharf, before moving to the Oval Office, where Jared Kushner joined the president. Getting there wasn’t entirely smooth — a delayed flight nearly kept part of the delegation from reaching Washington on schedule, until an askan reached Congressman Pat Ryan, who contacted the Transportation Secretary to help the group make it in time. Once inside, the conversation
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turned to the everyday concerns of frum communities: religious education, the needs of Jewish prisoners, and issues connected to the IDF draft. The rabbonim thanked the president for his support of the First Step Act and for expanding access to IVF treatment. Rabbi Malkiel Kotler used the moment to press a personal request as well, presenting Trump with a clemency letter on behalf of a Jew facing serious legal difficulties — a letter every rebbe in the delegation had signed in advance. There were lighter moments too. When Vance asked why the rebbes’ bekishes came in different colors, one attendee answered that it depends “on the balance in the bank account,” drawing laughter around the room. Rabbi Aharon Teitelbaum offered the president the traditional blessing
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Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian
The meeting will be remembered in Kiryas Joel, Williamsburg, Boro Park, Monsey, and Lakewood alike — not only for
what was discussed, but for the sight of two brothers, after twenty years apart, standing side by side in the same room.
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A YEAR LIKE NO OTHER: 5786 IN REVIEW
From Tehran to Tallahassee, from Gaza to Gumbo Limbo — a look back at the year that was, as we step into 5787 Rosh Hashanah has a way of sneaking up on you. One minute you’re deep in the swing of regular life, and the next you’re standing in shul listening to the shofar, wondering where the year went. So before we turn the page to 5787, let’s take a breath and look back at 5786 — a year that gave us war and peace, sometimes in the same week, and reminded us, again and again, how much South Florida is woven into the bigger story of the Jewish people. If 2025 taught the world anything, it’s that the
can shift overnight. President Trump’s reAROUND ground turn to the White House brought sweeping change day one — hundreds of executive orders, a THE WORLD from new posture on trade, and an April “Liberation
Day” tariff package that upended decades of assumptions about how countries do business with each other. Markets lurched, allies grumbled, and the global order that felt fixed for a generation suddenly looked negotiable. And then there was the war nobody saw coming with quite this scale. On February 28, the United States and Israel carried out joint strikes across Iran, killing Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei along with dozens of senior Iranian officials in a single coordinated operation. It triggered a full-blown war that — despite a string of ceasefires signed, broken, and re-signed throughout the spring and summer — was still simmering as this issue went to print, with strikes and counterstrikes continuing into September. Hezbollah, ever loyal to Tehran, opened a second front from Lebanon in March; that fight has been under an uneasy ceasefire since April. Halfway around the world, the war in Ukraine ground into its fourth year with no shortage of proposed peace plans — 28 points, then 19, then endless rounds of talks in Geneva and Abu Dhabi — but no signed deal as of this writing. Vladimir Putin keeps finding reasons to wait; Volodymyr Zelenskyy keeps refusing to give up the Donbas. It’s the kind of stalemate that makes you appreciate, by contrast, how remarkable it was when an actual deal did get signed elsewhere in the world this year — more on that below.
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AROUND THE US
Washington spent much of 5786 in a standoff with itself. A budget dispute over healthcare subsidies triggered the longest government shutdown in American history — 43 days — before it finally ended in November with a deal that included back pay for furloughed workers and a Senate vote on the Affordable Care Act tax credits. Not long after, a second shutdown hit the Department of Homeland Security for 76 days over funding for immigration enforcement, forcing Republicans to fund it separately through budget reconciliation. By the time you read this, Congress will have just passed another short-term funding bill — this one designed specifically to avoid a third shutdown crashing into the November midterms. Tariffs and rising costs were the story Americans felt in their wallets all year, even as the administration insisted the economy was strong. And in a small but oddly poignant footnote to the year, the U.S. Mint struck its very last penny in November — 233 years after the coin was first produced, retired because it now costs more to make than it’s worth. With midterm elections just weeks away as this issue goes to print, both parties are bracing for a fight that could reshape Washington for the second half of the Trump administration.
photo: theguardian
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AROUND ISRAEL No year in recent memory
Closer to home, Tallahassee spent the year chasing one big idea: eliminating property taxes for homeowners. Governor DeSantis called special legislative sessions to push the plan, and by summer the legislature had greenlit a measure headed to Florida voters this November — a potential game-changer for anyone who owns a home in this state. Mother Nature, for once, went easy on us. The 2025 hurricane season passed without a single storm making landfall in Florida, and forecasters called for another below-normal season in 2026. The flip side of a quiet, dry winter showed up in the spring, when drought conditions helped fuel one of the worst wildfire seasons in decades, with more than 130 fires burning across the state in a single week in April. For our own community, the numbers told a story of both resilience and vigilance. The ADL’s 2025 audit found that antisemitic incidents in Florida dropped nearly 10 percent from the year before — encouraging news, and Florida was named among the states leading the fight against antisemitism through its policies and legislation. But the report also noted that assaults on Jewish people nationwide reached some of the most violent levels since tracking began in 1979, a sober reminder that a lower number of incidents doesn’t mean the vigilance can let up. Boca Raton’s Orthodox community, meanwhile, marked a full century of Jewish life in the city with a celebration at Florida Atlantic University this year — a hundred years since the first Jewish families put down roots in what has become one of the largest and fastest-growing Orthodox communities in the country, with new families continuing to arrive from up north, from Latin America, and increasingly from Canada.
AROUND FLORIDA
has swung as wildly between despair and joy as this one did in Israel. It began with two years of an agonizing wait finally coming to an end. On October 9, after marathon negotiations brokered by President Trump, Israel and Hamas signed a deal in Sharm el-Sheikh to bring the Gaza war to what Trump called a “comprehensive end.” Within days, the last twenty living hostages — held captive for over two years since the Simchas Torah massacre of October 7, 2023 — were finally reunited with their families. Israel released nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners in exchange. Trump traveled to Jerusalem and received a standing ovation in the Knesset before flying to Egypt to sign the agreement alongside world leaders. For a community that had spent two years praying, marching, and taping yellow ribbons to lampposts, watching
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those hostages walk free was a moment that will define the year no matter what else happened in it. What else happened, though, was enormous. On February 28, in a stunning escalation few analysts predicted, the U.S. and Israel struck the heart of the Iranian regime together, killing Khamenei himself along with dozens of his top commanders and advisors. It set off a war that has run, on and off, for more than six months, with Hezbollah joining from Lebanon and Iran’s proxies lashing out across the region even as ceasefire after ceasefire was announced and then collapsed. As of this writing, low-level strikes between the U.S. and Iran continue, even as diplomats talk about a longer-term framework for peace. Through it all, Gaza’s reconstruction has moved forward in fits and starts, with the administration’s postwar framework — including a plan for Hamas’s disarmament — still working through political resistance on all sides. It’s not the clean ending anyone hoped for. But for a country that spent this Jewish year at war on more fronts than most of us can name, simply having its hostages home is a nes that shouldn’t be taken for granted.
HEADING INTO 5787
Every Rosh Hashanah asks the same question a year like this one makes impossible to ignore: what do we actually control? Not the tariffs, not the ceasefires, not the vote in Tallahassee or the vote in Washington. What we control is how we show up for each other — around the Yom Tov table, in the classrooms of our yeshivos, in the quiet acts of chesed that never make headlines but hold a community together. 5786 gave us plenty to fear and plenty to be grateful for, often in the same breath. As the shofar sounds again this year, that might be the most Jewish lesson of all: you daven for peace, you prepare for whatever comes, and you never stop believing next year will be better than this one. L’shanah tovah tikatevu.
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In the Heart of Gush Etzion: Palestinian Authority Construction Blocks Access to New Israeli Community as Government Fails to Act Regavim petitions Jerusalem District Court demanding demolition of two illegal structures built on state land that obstruct the planned access road to Bar Kochva: “The absurdity speaks for itself. The government plans a strategic community with one hand while allowing the Palestinian Authority to undermine it with the other.” September 2, 2026 — The Regavim Movement has filed an administrative petition with the Jerusalem District Court demanding immediate enforcement action against two permanent illegal structures built on declared state land in Area C, adjacent to the newly established community of Bar Kochva in the Gush Etzion Regional Council. The petition was filed against Defense Minister Israel Katz, Minister in the Defense Ministry Bezalel Smotrich, the Commander of the IDF Central Command and the Deputy Head of the civil administration. According to Regavim, the structures constitute a blatant illegal encroachment in the heart of land designated for the community’s development. They effectively block the route of Bar Kochva’s planned access road and create a significant security threat for motorists and for the surrounding area. At the center of the petition is a glaring contradiction in Israeli government policy. In 2024, the government of Israel approved
Photo: Regavim
the establishment of Bar Kochva as a community of national, security and strategic importance. The community is intended to strengthen territorial continuity between Gush Etzion and Jerusalem and prevent Palestinian encroachment on strategically important ridgelines. Yet while the government advances the community on the planning level, enforcement authorities have failed to act against illegal Palestinian construction developing directly in its path. According to data presented by Regavim, the construction is part of a broader, systematic Palestinian Authority strategy of expanding development from Areas A and B into Area C, creating facts on the ground and restricting Israel’s future ability to develop and maintain control of
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strategically important territory. Regavim turned to the courts only after a full year of efforts to resolve the issue through the relevant authorities. During that period, the organization submitted three warnings and urgent requests to Israel’s defense establishment and civil administration seeking enforcement action, but received no effective response. The petition argues that this failure to enforce the law constitutes a serious breakdown in the implementation of priorities established by the state itself, particularly regarding illegal construction and encroachment on state land. Bar Kochva was established in the Nahal Heletz area, which has also become a focal point in the Palestinian Authority’s campaign over control and recognition of
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COMMUNITY NEWS the territory. The PA has sought recognition of the area as a “Palestinian heritage site” through UNESCO and has promoted international campaigns, with the assistance of foreign organizations, supporting Palestinians who have encroached on land in the area, including land owned by the Jewish National Fund. Roey Drucker, Regavim’s Judea and Samaria Coordinator, said: “The reality in which Palestinian building offenders can freely construct on state land, block a vital access route and obstruct a nationally approved development plan represents a leadership and security failure. The State of Israel cannot designate Bar Kochva as a strategic anchor while allowing the Palestinian Authority to
Photo: Regavim
determine the boundaries on the ground and choke off the community’s development. We cannot continue hiding behind excuses about ‘enforcement priorities’ while control of the land slips
away. We are demanding decisive enforcement, the immediate demolition of the illegal structures and the restoration of Israeli governance and sovereignty throughout the Gush Etzion area.”
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Rosh HaShana 5787: A Time for Positivity, Hope and Resilience By Dr. Chaim Y. Botwinick
As we celebrate the beautiful chag of Rosh HaShana, we look back at this past year with tremendous sadness, frustration, gratitude and resilience. From the existential war between Israel and Iran and Hezbollah to the explosive rise and proliferation of global anti-Semitism and Jew-hatred, this past year was indeed a year of mixed emotions. These extreme feelings and emotions embodied a year which we will never ever forget; and one which reshapes the trajectory Jewish history. This year (5787) we will be commemorating the third anniversary of the October 7th massacre – an inconceivable and an unimaginable tragedy which changed our Jewish world for generations. To be sure, who would have thought or imagined that on the very day of Rosh HaShana, HaShem decreed that acheinu bnai yisrael would experience a tragedy of such magnitude on Shemini Aseret/Simchat Torah of that year. It is so hard to fathom or comprehend that this tragedy unfolded in Israel almost three years ago. The pain, anguished and despair which we experienced on that day still lingers strong in our hearts, minds and souls. The loss of life, shattered dreams and hopes and what then appeared to be a hopeless future for our Jew-
ish nation gave birth to a new reality for acheinu. But, my friends, as painful and as incomprehensible as this event was, Chazal teach us that throughout our history, although we have been confronted with tremendous pain, adversity and hopelessness, we eventually emerge as an achienu bnai yisrael with strength, resolve, resilience and promise. This unwavering resilience is only possible b’yad HaShem – through the powerful hand of GD. And, it is embedded and deeply anchored in our DNA as an Ish Echad B’lev Echad – As One People (One Nation) with One Heart. As a people, we have survived tragedies for millennia. Whether they were expulsion, anti-Semitic persecution, displacement or un-
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fortunate death, we grew, evolved and even thrived as a people and as a nation – always bolstered and supported by our bitachon, emunah and achdut. This resilience and strength which we have experienced throughout our history is deeply embedded in our DNA. Relevance to Rosh HaShana Today Friends, Rosh HaShana is one of the most important and meaningful chagim in our Jewish calendar. More than simply a celebration of new beginnings, Rosh HaShana is a time for reflection, spiritual renewal, tefilla and a time to reflect upon how one can live a more meaningful and responsible life during the year ahead. At the heart or core of Rosh HaShana is the idea of teshuvah, often translated as repentance or return. It encourages us to look
COMMUNITY NEWS honestly at the past year; to recognize our mistakes, take responsibility for harmful actions, seek forgiveness and consider how we can do better in the year ahead. This process is not limited to our relationship with HaShem. Jewish tradition also emphasizes repairing relationships with people. Before Rosh HaShana we are encouraged to ask for forgiveness from those that we may have wronged and to make sincere efforts to reconcile. I can vividly recall as a child how Rosh HaShana and Yom Kippur were one of the most difficult and challenging periods of time in my life. As the son of a pulpit Rav, I grew up in a household which viewed Yomim Noraim as the
most time consuming, and stressful times of the year. My father z”l was preoccupied by putting the finishing touches on his drashot (sermons), ensuring that all congregants had a proper seat in shul, and accompanying congregants and their families to cemeteries in order to visit the graves of loved ones. My mother spent her time preparing for Yom Tov and ensuring that anyone in the community in need, had a place to eat during Yom Tov and was ensured a gracious invitation for all Rosh HaShana meals All of this frenetic activity was happening through bright beautiful smiles on their faces and with the most eloquent and positive demeanor one can ever imagine. The one attribute (one of many)
my parents possessed which I will always remember, was their amazing positivity. Always minimizing sadness and tragedy and emphasizing the positive aspects of life. In fact, they always encourage me and my brothers to think about the positive aspects of our lives, irrespective of circumstance. These attributes were also evident through the words and language they used and the continued emphasis on speaking softly and kindly. Never raising their voices and always speaking in a welcoming and positive tone and at times even in a whisper - a middah which I always respected and tried desperately to emulate. As I grew older, I began to more fully appreciate my parent’s inspiring approaches to
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COMMUNITY NEWS life. It also added meaning to a beautiful quote attributed to the Lubavitcher Rebbe – If you Think Positive, It Will Be Positive. Friends, in light of the daunting realities we are currently confronting – including increased global anti-Semitism, the aftermath of the October 7th tragedy, the Iranian nuclear threat is it truly possible on this sacred day of Rosh HaShana to view life through positive lenses. Is “Positivity” Truly Possible? Is it truly possible to be optimistic on this Rosh HaShana when we experience the untold losses of precious human life on October 7th, the loss of IDF chayalim and chayalot in their heroic and tireless defense of our country and the ongoing Iranian nuclear threat. As I have written in numerous articles and posts and spoken on many occasions, there are those who feel that these events are way too difficult to bare and that optimism is physically, psychologically and emotionally impossible. And then, there are those who sincerely believe that positivity and optimism are achievable. How many of our beautiful Holocaust survivors returned from the war with a positive demeanor for hope, promise and an outlook for a brighter futures. Was it easy? Absolutely not. But these precious souls had a level of bitachon and emunah in HaShem that they as well as countless generations that followed will have a more positive future. As we hear the powerful sounding of the shofar on Rosh HaSha-
na, we are reminded that irrespective of the tremendous trials and tribulations we as a people have experienced, we still remain a resilient people. To be sure, the sound of the shofar ushers in a feeling of hope, resilience, promise and positivity. The great Kotzker Rebbe is quoted as saying that optimism and positivity are the result of a mindset rooted in bitachon and emunah in HaShem. Feelings of anger, frustration, and sadness are counterproductive and not sustainable. In fact, they may even exacerbate our negative feelings, making it all the more difficult to attain a positive mindset. Acheinu Bnai Yisrael have experienced way too many tragedies throughout history only to result in positive outcomes. Here too, on this Rosh HaShana we must create conditions for positive thinking; and we must be thankful to HaShem for all the goodness he offers. This disposition also includes our ability and capacity to support and celebrate the concept of ben adam l’chavero – the manner in which we treat fellow Jews, whether they are religious or secular. Here too, we are positioned to view our roles and dispositions as positive as opposed to negative or critical of others. The great Chofetz Chaim is quoted as saying that even the manner in which we speak or address our neighbors has a profound impact not only on that neighbor but also on our character, mood and demeanor. On Rosh HaShana we are looking to HaShem to grant us rach-
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manut (mercy) and good favor in judgment. This judgement is based in part on our ability to transcend our everyday habits and inclinations and to conduct ourselves b’zelem elokim, in the true image of GD and to serve as a mamlechet kohanim and as an ohr laGoyim. On this Rosh HaShana, let us all remember the words of the Navi Yeshayahu: Mah Tovu Ohalecha Yaakov, Mishknotecha Yisrael. – How lovely are your tents (people of) Yaakov; your sanctuaries (people of) Israel. May HaShem bless us and our families on this Rosh HaShana with the continued ability, will, strength and fortitude to view this world through positivity, hope and promise; and, may we all have a healthy, safe and positive Shana Tova. Wishing all a Shana Tova U’metukah
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Dr. Chaim Botwinick is a senior executive coach and an organizational consultant . He served as president and CEO of the central agency for Jewish education in Baltimore and in Miami; in addition to head of school and principal for several Jewish day schools and yeshivot. As an Influencer, he has published and lectured extensively on topics relating to education, resource development, strategic planning and leadership development. Dr. Botwinick is Author of “Think Excellence: Harnessing Your Power to Succeed Beyond Greatness”, Brown Books, 2011
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“A Legacy That Lives On: Remembering Ike Heller.” As our community recently marked the yahrzeit of Ike Heller on 26 Elul, Tuesday September 8th, we remember a man whose greatest accomplishments were measured not by recognition, but by the lives he quietly transformed. Earlier this year, the Landow Jewish Academy community gathered to dedicate the Ike Heller Educational Building, a moving celebration of a man whose values continue to shape the lives of hundreds of Jewish children every day. The atmosphere that morning was filled with warmth and gratitude. Hundreds gathered, filling the room with an energy rooted in love and respect for Ike Heller. Community members, past Federation leaders, philanthropists, and longtime friends came together, all sharing a common bond, a love for who Ike was. Rabbi Chaim Albert and Rabbi Anton, stood with the Heller family, presenting a plaque dedicating the building in Ike’s memory. It was a simple gesture, yet profoundly meaningful. As the plaque was unveiled, you could feel how deeply Ike’s legacy continues to resonate, not only in the physical space, but in the community, he helped shape. It was a dedication of a vision. For those who knew Ike best, there could not have been a more fitting tribute. Ike’s life’s mission and the mission of Landow Jewish Academy are remarkably intertwined. He believed that every Jewish child deserved the opportunity to discover their potential, embrace their heritage, love the Jewish people, and
develop the character necessary to make the world a better place. Those same ideals are lived every day within the walls of the building that now bears his name. To his family, Ike was simply a “beautiful man.” His guiding philosophy was simple: “Say little and do much.” He never sought recognition. Instead, he quietly invested in people, believing that helping others become successful was life’s greatest reward. Years after his passing, stories continue to emerge from individuals whose lives were forever changed because Ike believed in them before they believed in themselves. His children, remember a father whose home and heart were always open. “My father had a big heart. He collected people. There were always strangers in our home who quickly became
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family” recalls his son Seth Heller. That extraordinary ability to make people feel valued left an impression on everyone he met. Community leader Bonnie Schwartzbaum simply described Ike as “one of the finest human beings I have ever known.” Longtime friend Cindy Lewin remembered him with one word: “Mensch.” She continued, “He was always upbeat, always smiling. You would never know what he might have been carrying inside. He was simply a lovely person.” Those who worked alongside him witnessed that same spirit every day. “Ike was a mensch of a mensch,” recalled Mel Mann. “He treated the poor exactly the way he treated the rich. He was a tzaddik. He always found the good in people and never looked for honor.” That humility defined every aspect of his life. During the Vietnam era, Ike served honorably in the United States Military and the Coast Guard. His patriotism reflected his profound gratitude for the freedoms America afforded the Jewish people. At the same time, he was an unwavering Zionist who dedicated himself to strengthening Jewish identity and fostering a lifelong connection to Israel. As Director of the South Dade Jewish Federation, he inspired thousands of people to deepen their connection to Jewish life and to the State of Israel. Whether supporting Holocaust survivors, volunteering with the Jewish War Veterans, helping at the Kosher Food Bank, or mentoring young professionals, his life was devoted
YOU’RE NOT ALONE. COMMUNITY NEWS
to serving others. As Dr. Robert Carl reflected, “He was upbeat, friendly, and deeply concerned about the Jewish people.” Perhaps no one summarized Ike’s lasting impact better than Sydney Portnoy, who reflected on the influence Ike had on generations of communal leaders. “Ike is responsible for much of the leadership we have in South Florida today. He mentored so many people.” His passion for education was equally remarkable. Despite struggling with dyslexia as a child, Ike became an avid student of Torah, Gemara, Chassidus, and Jewish thought. He often joked that he might have become a rabbi, yet to many, he already was one. He taught not only through words, but through example. That legacy continues today inside the halls of Landow Jewish Academy. Every classroom, every teacher, every student, and every act of kindness reflect the values Ike spent his lifetime nurturing: faith expressed through action, humility over recognition, and an unwavering commitment to helping others reach their fullest potential. The dedication of the Ike Heller Educational Building was never simply about placing a name on a building. It was about ensuring that future generations understand the kind of person Ike Heller was and aspire to become. As we marked his yahrzeit this past Tuesday September 8th (26 Elul), we remembered not only a remarkable leader, mentor, patriot, Zionist, and educator, but a man whose greatest legacy lives not in bricks and mortar, but in people. Today, more than 650 students walk through the doors of the Ike Heller Educational Building. They study Torah alongside academic excellence, develop a deep love for Israel, perform acts of chessed, and learn that true leadership begins with humility, kindness, and responsibility to others. In doing so, they continue the work that defined Ike Heller’s life: building stronger Jews, stronger leaders, and a stronger future for the Jewish people. May his memory forever remain a blessing, and may his legacy continue to inspire generations to come. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Landow Jewish Academy is located in Ft. Lauderdale on a 5-acre campus with state-of-the-art facilities. For a tour of the school, please contact aanton@ljaonline.com or call 786-6833537.
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K IDS Z ONE KIDS ZONE . .. T A H T W O N K U O DID Y
10 ROSH HASHANAH FUN FACTS
1. In the Torah, Rosh Hashanah is called Yom Teruah — the “Day of Sounding” the shofar.
5. Some families eat a fish or ram’s head on Rosh Hashanah, asking to be “a head and not a tail” this year.
2. There are actually four Jewish new years on the calendar — Rosh Hashanah is just one of them!
6. On the second night, it’s customary to eat a brand-new fruit you haven’t tasted all year.
3. Rosh Hashanah is celebrated for two full days everywhere in the world, even in Israel — unlike most other holidays.
7. Special prayers called Malchuyot, Zichronot, and Shofarot are added only on Rosh Hashanah.
4. The shofar makes three different sounds: tekiah, shevarim, and teruah.
8. Round challah is used instead of braided, to represent the cycle of the year. 9. Rosh Hashanah marks the day the world itself was created. 10. Pomegranates are eaten because they’re said to have 613 seeds, just like the 613 mitzvot.
K IDS Z ONE KIDS ZONE Rosh Hashanah Trivia Quiz (Test Your Knowledge!) 1. WHAT IS ROSH HASHANAH CALLED IN THE TORAH? A) YOM KIPPUR
B) YOM TERUAH
C) YOM TOV
D) YOM SHABBAT
2. HOW MANY JEWISH “NEW YEARS” ARE THERE ON THE CALENDAR? A) ONE
B) TWO
C) THREE
D) FOUR
3. WHAT’S A “TEKIAH GEDOLAH”? A) A VERY SHORT, QUIET SOUND OF HONEY CAKE
B) A LONG FINAL SHOFAR BLAST
C) A TYPE
D) A SILENT PAUSE DURING DAVENING
4. WHAT DO MANY FAMILIES EAT ON THE SECOND NIGHT THAT THEY HAVEN’T EATEN ALL YEAR? A) OLD CHALLAH
B) A NEW FRUIT
C) LEFTOVER SOUP
D) MATZAH
5. WHY DO SOME PEOPLE EAT POMEGRANATES ON ROSH HASHANAH? A) THEY’RE RED LIKE AN APPLE MITZVOT
B) THEY’RE SAID TO HAVE 613 SEEDS, LIKE THE 613
C) THEY ONLY GROW IN ISRAEL
D) THERE’S NO REAL REASON ANSWER KEY: 1-B, 2-D, 3-B, 4-B, 5-B
UNSCRAMBLE THE FOLLOWING WORDS RELATED TO
ROSH HASHANAH 1. FOSHRA
5. RAPYER
2. NOYEH
6. E W T E S
3. PALEP
7. N O W R C
4. HALLACH
5. PRAYER 6. SWEET 7. CROWN
ANSWERS: 1. SHOFAR 2. HONEY 3. APPLE 4. CHALLAH
FOOD
Pomegranate, Apple and Date Salad By Amy Kritzer on jamiegeller.com
• 15 MIN DURATION • 15 MIN PREP TIME • 4 SERVINGS • Besides being easy, this salad is chock-full of symbolism. In addition to apples and honey, the pomegranate is another popular symbol especially around Rosh Hashanah. Since it is the New Year, we eat a new fruit that is recently in season. Also, the seeds of a pomegranate are compared to the numerous commandments in the Torah. Ingredients • 1 garlic clove minced • 1 lemon juiced • 1½ tablespoons honey • 3 tablespoons red wine vinegar • 1½ teaspoons salt • ½ teaspoons black pepper • ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil • 6-8 cups arugula • ½ red onion sliced thin • 1 apple cut into slices (Red Delicious or Fuji work great) • 4 dates diced • 8- ounces Gorgonzola cheese optional • 1 pomegranate seeds removed • ¼ cup walnuts (some omit on Rosh Hashanah)
Preparation
Dressing: 1. In a small bowl, whisk up minced garlic, lemon juice, honey, red wine vinegar, salt and pepper. 2. Slowly drizzle olive oil into mixture while whisking. Salad: 1. Put red onions with arugula in a bowl and pour in about ¾
of dressing. Toss with tongs. Reserve the rest of dressing for drizzling. 2. Put a pile of arugula on 4 plates. 3. Top each with apple slices. 4. Sprinkle on dates, Gorgonzola cheese, pomegranate seeds and walnuts. 5. Drizzle with more dressing, and serve!
Jamie Geller is the Chief Media and Marketing Officer at Aish. She is also a bestselling cookbook author, celebrity chef, television producer, and businesswoman. She’s the author of eight cookbooks and the founder of Kosher Media Network. P.68 / T S F C O M M U N I T YVO I C E .C O M | +1 ( 9 5 4 ) 6 6 2 - 5 0 5 4 | I n f o @ t s f c o m m u n i t y v o i c e . c o m
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REAL ESTATE & FINANCE
The Return on Failure By Shmuel Shayowitz
I was recently thinking about how differently we react to success and failure. When something works, we celebrate it, repeat it, and give ourselves credit for the decision. When something fails, we do the opposite. We hide it, regret it, and often interpret it to mean something negative about who we are. We tell ourselves we are not good at business, not disciplined with money, not cut out for investing, or not capable of what we hoped. That is where failure becomes more dangerous than the mistake itself. One of the most interesting ideas I heard recently is that the brain learns through prediction error. We expect one thing to happen, reality gives us something else, and our brain is forced to update. In simple terms, getting something wrong gives us information, and our brains adapt to it. But it only works if we are willing to receive the data. If we avoid it because we are afraid to fail or if we think we can’t, then we never get that update. We stay safe, but we also stay where we are. I see this in business and finance all the time. Someone tries an investment and loses money, so they swear off investing altogether. Someone starts a business idea that does not work, so they decide they are not entrepreneurial. Someone makes a poor hiring decision and becomes afraid to delegate. Someone gets into debt and spends years feeling ashamed and overwhelmed instead of un-
derstanding the behaviors that got them there. The original mistake may have been costly, but what makes it truly expensive is refusing to learn from it. Failure should pay tuition. If you lose money, time, energy, or confidence, you should at least walk away with better wisdom. Otherwise, it was not tuition. It was just an expense. I was thinking, perhaps that is also one of the deeper ideas behind ‘Teshuvah’. It is not about pretending the past did not happen. It is about refusing to let the past remain meaningless. We look at what we did, where we went wrong, what pattern needs to change, and who we want to become the next time we face the same decision. The mistake itself does not become good. But what we build from it can. That matters far beyond spirituality. Maybe the financial setback taught you to track your spending. Maybe the failed deal taught you to ask better questions. Maybe the rejection prepared you for the next opportunity. Maybe the business loss forced you to build systems you should have had from day one. Maybe the mistake you are still embarrassed about is precisely the experience that will make you more sensitive and resourceful to someone else years from now. The goal, then, is not to chase failure or celebrate bad decisions. It is to optimize them when they happen.
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As we enter a season that naturally makes people reflect, I think there is a better question than, “What did I do wrong this past year?” Perhaps we should ask instead, “What am I going to do differently because of what went wrong?” That changes the entire framework. It moves us from regret to responsibility, from shame to growth, and from looking backward to building forward. Now is the time to change one behavior. Make one better decision. Have one difficult conversation. Fix one financial habit. Revisit one opportunity you were too afraid to pursue. You cannot control every outcome in life, business, money, or relationships. But you can decide whether the experience will leave you smaller or make you stronger. Do not simply ask for a better year - become better because of the year you already had.
Shmuel Shayowitz is a highly regarded Real Estate & Finance Executive, Writer, Speaker, Coach, and Advisor. He is President and Chief Lending Officer of Approved Funding, a privately held national mortgage banker and direct lender that has facilitated over $4 billion in funding. Shmuel has over twenty-five years of industry experience and holds numerous licenses and accreditations, including certified mortgage underwriter, licensed real estate agent, residential review appraiser, and accredited investor, to name a few. Shmuel has successfully navigated through many changing markets and business landscapes, making his market insights and experience well-coveted within the banking and real estate industries. He can be reached at www.coachshmuel.com.
THIS NEW YEAR...
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DON’T BLOW DON’T BLOW IT! IT! PSA: This year, the First Day of Rosh Hashanah is Shabbos, so there will be no Shofar. Also, if you have been waiting on the sidelines to take action to improve your finances, don’t waste another year. Take advantage now! I can help!
!שנה טובה ומתוקה Shmuel Shayowitz
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