Councilwoman Wins Primary for House Seat

A black city councilwoman won the racially charged primary for a Congressional seat in central Brooklyn yesterday, beating back a challenge from a white councilman to win a seat created nearly four decades ago to increase minority representation in Congress.

The councilwoman, Yvette D. Clarke, 41, narrowly beat three opponents to capture the seat, which has been held by blacks since the 1968 victory of Shirley Chisholm, the first black woman elected to Congress.

Chabad Synagogue Celebrates Completion of Safer Torah

Praise for heroes, respect for victims

In public events and private thoughts, Centre County residents paid homage Monday to the victims of the attacks on the United States five years ago.

They recalled the Sept. 11, 2001, moment when they first heard that America was under siege, and they were urged to remember the victims without reliving the fear wrought by terrorists.

“They want to rule us by fear,” U.S. Rep. John Peterson, R-Pleasantville, told a small gathering in front of the Old Main administrative building on the Penn State campus. “Islamic radicals want to destroy the freedom of religion that America was founded on.”

The congressman paid tribute to National Guardsmen from Pennsylvania, saying 16,000 of the 19,000 Guardsmen have been deployed abroad and 34 have been killed in Iraq.

Cause for celebration

Nova Scotia, Canada – Old men and young boys danced and sang on Spring Garden Road in Halifax as they celebrated the dedication of a new Torah on Sunday.

The arrival of the scroll containing the Jewish holy book had the atmosphere of a wedding.

The newly completed Torah, which was to join two existing Torahs used by the Chabad Lubavitch community of the Maritimes, was wrapped in velvet and crowned with silver and carried to its new home under a wedding canopy led by bagpipers.

The dedication is a rare and special event, said Mark Ludman, who carried the new Torah during part of the procession.

“They’re painstaking to make,” he said. “Each one is handwritten and there can be no errors in it.”

A Booming Sect Sends Jewish Emissaries Abroad

David Eliezrie is a rabbi — the head of a Yorba Linda synagogue. One of his sons is a rabbi, and two of Eliezrie’s daughters married rabbis.

The three children are schluchim, or members of rabbi-and-wife emissary teams sent around the world under the Chabad-Lubavitch banner, a small, growing and controversial Hasidic branch of Judaism.

In an era where some denominations — Roman Catholicism, for example — have left pulpits empty because of clergy shortages, the offspring of Chabad rabbis are following in their parents’ footsteps in such numbers that a surplus of about 200 new rabbis and their wives are now staged in Brooklyn, awaiting assignments around the world, Lubavitch officials said.

To become an emissary is “like getting into Harvard, only better,” said Naomi Blesofsky, 24, one of David Eliezrie’s daughters. “To live this life gives you purpose and is an honor in our community.”

Congressional Candidates in Dead-Heat Race Look for a Last-Minute Edge in Brooklyn

With the high-profile race to replace Rep. Major Owens in Brooklyn’s 11th congressional district shaping up as too close to call, the four candidates were scrambling to energize their supporters and to raise last-minute funds in the final full day of campaigning.

The Democratic primary is tomorrow, and unlike the campaigns for Senate, governor, and attorney general, there is no clear front-runner in the 11th, an election that has generated widespread attention for its racial dynamic. A City Council member, David Yassky, has run circles around his opponents in fundraising, but he is the lone white candidate in a district that is nearly 60% black. He has faced relentless charges that he moved into the district with the idea of dividing the vote among the three African-American candidates.

Jewish student center to honor 9/11 victims

Iowa City, IA — The Chabad-Lubavitch Jewish Student and Community Center will commemorate victims of terror on Monday at The Pentacrest with a Good Deed Mitzvah Marathon Fair, in remembrance of the fifth anniversary of 9/11.

The fair will run from 11 a.m. – 3 p.m. and is designed to present members of the campus community with opportunities to do a good deed in memory and in honor of the victims of 9/11.

Tables will be set up on The Pentacrest, at which participants will be able to choose from many opportunities to do a good deed such as to make sandwiches for the homeless, buy a letter in a Torah Scroll, say a prayer, don Tefillin, or give charity to benefit the rebuilding efforts in Israel’s Northern region and the victims of genocide in Darfur. Rain location is in the basement of IMU.

Today! Hachnosas Safer Torah to the Frankel Shul!

A Sefer Torah dedication is being held tonight in Crown Heights, in memory of Reuven Brenenson and Yehudah Efraim Lipkind. The procession is setting out from 1703 President Street between Utica and Rochester and will head to the Frankel shul with singing and dancing, which will be concluded with a Seudas Mitzvah.

If you would like to sponsor a letter or Posuk in the Torah please call Tova at (347) 420-1700.

Cat Burglar Breaks Into Two Homes and attempts another

Wednesday morning a Jewish family on Montgomery St. between Kingston and Albany woke up to find their home not exactly as they had left it the night before when they went to bed. Sometime during the night a thief had broken into their home from the side door and helped himself to a large sum of cash, jewelry, food from the freezer and more they had yet to discover.

The first thing they noticed was that things on the table wasn’t the way they had left it, and while trying to put things away they noticed money missing from where they usually kept some loose dollars. After noticing this they went to look for the jewelry and items were missing from there.

Police were called and determined the magnitude of what had taken place. A burglar let himself into their home by breaking the lock on the side door of the home and while the family was asleep he silently moved about and helped himself to the various goods in the home. To describe the brazenness of this burglar, he helped himself to money and jewelry yet that wasn’t enough, he emptied the freezer which contained a few packages of frozen hotdogs and other frozen goods, into shopping bags and left it at the door so he can come back later and take it.

Bais Rivkah Tuition Committee Resigns!

This letter comes after a large number of students at the Bais Rivkah Schools were turned away from classes this year.

Dear Parents,

We, the undersigned, were volunteer members of the Tuition Committee of Bais Rivkah. Pursuant to the letter that was sent out on 6 Elul, regretfully we wish to publicly disassociate ourselves from the last-minute decision made by the School Advisory Board: Rabbis Abraham Shemtov, Yossi Kazanovski (Monsey, NY), Mendy Gansburg, Meyer Eichler, Shalom Duchman and Faitel Levin, to require parents with outstanding tuition balances to apply for a Gemach before issuing admission cards.

The decision to renege on the signed agreements we had made with parents was decided by the Advisory Board without our knowledge or approval. In light of the above development, we feel we had no alternative but to resign from the committee.

Respectfully yours,
Zalman Chein as Chairman of the Tuition Committee

What Nerve – Hatzalah Cable Cut

Late Wednesday night, some time between eleven o’clock at night and three o’clock in the morning, the electric cable that charges the hatzalah ambulances in front of 770 was cut by vandals.

Note: this is not the first time the Hatzalah Ambulances have been the target of vandalism. There have been two other incidents we reported one where the tires of the ambulances were slashed and two when CH-3 had both its mirrors broken off.

Pictures of the repair crew repairing the damage in the Extended Article

Motsai Shabbos: The International Siyum Harambam

The ‘International Siyum HaRambam’ will be taking place tonight, Motsai Shabbos in the Oholei Torah Ballroom, in the presence of Rabbis, Rosh Yeshivas, activists and public figures. Event organizer, Rabbi Shmuel Menachem Mendel Butman told COL that the Siyum Harambam was particularly slated for a date following the end of all summer camps and when yeshivas and schools have reopened their learning seasons.

Entertainment will be provided by the 40-voice choir ‘Shir Chodosh’ choir conducted by R. Eli Lipskier. Separate places will be available for women and girls and there will be a special program for children.

109 Years to the Foundation of Tomchei Temimim

The yeshiva was founded by the Rebbe Rashab in 5657. Bochurim gathered in the ‘Small Zal’ upstairs 770 to Farbreng with R. Dovid Raskin, Menahel HaYeshiva, R. Shlome Zarchi and R. Yoel Kahan, Mashpim in the Yeshiva.

More pictures in the Extended Article.

Solon Chabad to dedicate Torah scroll

Solon, OH – Rabbi Zushe Greenberg and his wife Miriam, of the Chabad Jewish Center of Solon, are very excited about a new arrival.

It’s not another son or daughter (the Greenbergs have eight children), but in many ways it will be one of their family’s most exciting additions; it’s a brand new Torah scroll.

The Solon center is inviting the entire community to welcome this new Torah scroll, especially commissioned for them, on Sun., Sept. 10. The scroll will reside in their Aron Hakodesh (Holy Ark) next to three other Torah scrolls previously donated to the center by synagogues and individuals during the center’s 15 years of existence in Solon.

Funds for Chabad’s new Torah scroll were publicly raised. Those making a substantial donation could sponsor one of the 54 individual parshas (portions of the Torah). An individual scroll letter cost $18. Because the goal has yet to be reached, fundraising efforts for the new Torah are continuing. Although the exact figure was not disclosed, prices for new Torah scrolls are typically in the $40,000 range.

Butcher Is Accused of Passing Off Chicken as Kosher

Click Here for a newscast of this event (FOX5)

Monsey, NY – Since sundown on Saturday, when the Jewish Sabbath ended, men, women and children have been scrubbing kitchen counters and stoves, and dipping pots and utensils in scalding water.

New Shluchim To Long Island

Rabbi & Mrs. Yitzchok Gurary of Crown Heights will IY”H be moving on Shlichus to Melville, NY where they will direct adult education and youth programs @ Chabad of Huntington.

The new Shluchim were appointed by Rabbi Asher Vaisfiche of Chabad of Huntington.

HATZLOCHA RABBA!

New Chabad House opens in Burbank

Burbank, CA – Members of a Judaic movement that has a history of more than 250-years reached a milestone in Burbank on Sunday with the opening Soussana Family Jewish Chabad Center.

The ribbon cutting brought more than 200 people to the Chabad Center throughout the day, including Burbank City Councilman Dave Gordon and Jack and Elka Soussana, the Chabad Center’s major donors.

“Because of them and their generous donations we are able to get into this building,” Janice Kormandel, one of the center’s participants said of the Soussana’s and the many other contributing families.

Chabad of Burbank will offer programs including children’s education, prayer and social services and crisis control, making it Burbank’s own Jewish support center, Rabbi Shmuly Kornfeld said.