Daily Archives: August 27, 2005

Jewish Boy dies after falling from tree in camp

A 13-year-old Brooklyn boy tumbled 50 feet to his death at a Highland summer camp after the tree limb he had climbed broke, state police said yesterday.

Shalom Rabinowitz was climbing a pine tree behind his bunkhouse with a friend about 4 p.m. Monday when the branch he was on broke. Rabinowitz dropped 50 feet, striking several branches as he fell, police said.
Site of the camp.

Jewish values mesh with Scout ideals

When Boy Scout troop 711 from Alaska lost four of its leaders in a freak electrical accident on the first day of the recent National Scout Jamboree here, the one Jewish Scout in the Alaska contingent was left in a quandary.
On the Sunday morning of the gathering, when jamboree activities were suspended for a few hours, all of Noah Magen’s troop mates were headed to religious services for their respective faiths. But what does a Jewish Scout do on Sunday?

Beard Ban Deters Chabad Rabbis From Becoming Chaplains in Army

By most measures, Yisroel Newman, 25, and other young Chabad-Lubavitch rabbis like him are the obvious solution to the army’s severe shortage of Jewish chaplains.

These young rabbis are trained by a movement dedicated to reaching Jews wherever they may be, no matter how remote. The peripatetic military lifestyle would not be much more difficult than the postings that some recently ordained young Chabad rabbis have received in Siberia, with no more than a few thousand dollars to start a Jewish community.

Chabad Honors Champion in Quest for Sacred Texts

These are more than just words on documents,” said U.S. Senator Norm Coleman of Minnesota. “There is a very powerful and special meaning that they have. That’s why I’m so devoted to the cause of returning the Schneerson documents from Russia.”

The Senator was speaking at an event honoring his leadership in the ongoing effort to regain the sacred Schneerson Collection. Senator Coleman addressed a group of 150 Chabad rabbis and students who had gathered in S. Paul’s Adath Israel Synagogue last week.

Putting On Tefillin High Up in the Sky

“The sky is the limit”, said the shliach Rabbi Anshelle Perl of Mineola, New York, as he ascended the air balloon with a couple of Chabad associates. Rabbi Perl pointed out the significance of ‘staying above’ and close to G-d and his guest, Mr. Myron Katz, agreed to put on tefillin ‘high in the sky’.

Anne Frank home inspires Sept. 11 museum

Days before the fourth anniversary of the 2001 attacks, a photographer is offering intimate images of death and love inside ground zero at a new museum that brings you nose-to-nose with the smoldering pit.

“If people want to come past the security gates and see what our world was like down in the hole, this is as close as they can come to it,” said Gary Marlon Suson, the official ground zero photographer for the Uniformed Firefighters Association, the city firefighters’ main union.

Suson spent eight months at the site with recovery workers searching for the remains of the 2,749 people who died on a sunny September morning, including 343 firefighters. His time in “The Pit” comes alive at the Ground Zero Museum Workshop of photographs, videos and artifacts, opening Sept. 8.

Construction of synagogue halted as leaders cite lack of funds

STAMFORD — Chabad Lubavitch of Greater Stamford has stopped construction on a $7 million synagogue because the congregation ran out of money last year to fully build, landscape and furnish it, according to leaders in the group.

The Jewish congregation had expected to finish the building, which is shaped like an open book, this month. Backers of the project say they still hope to finish the religious center at 752-760 High Ridge Road by next year.

Neighbors, however, are frustrated, saying the site is unkempt and the entire project is poorly planned.

Leaning back in his office chair during an interview, Rabbi Yisrael Deren sighed and explained “the situation was one where we had the option of either borrowing more money to go ahead and complete it or slowing the construction down considerably and raising the money.”

Jewish Values, Halacha and Secular Law are Combined in Jewish Mediation (Beis Din) Service

Rabbi Yitzchok Adlerstein, a prominent figure in Jewish advocacy and the Chair of Jewish Law and Ethics at Loyola Law School, has joined with Michael Lapin, a well-known attorney, civic leader and member of the Jewish community in Orange County, to bring to the field of alternative dispute resolution a different approach — that of underscoring mediation with the perspectives of Jewish law and values. They have formed Jewish Mediation Service to serve the southern California community.