Massive Police Movement Throughout Pesach

Crown Heightsers who went to Daven in 770 on any given day of Yom Tov would have noticed a large police presence in front of 770 and the Jewish Children’s Museum. 15 police cars form different precincts across New York City including Manhattan, Bronx and Queens were seen, leaving residents wondering what was really going on.

Police would never give a straight answer as to what they were doing, one thing that they were clear about is; they were ‘exercising’, driving across the 5 boroughs with a lot of vehicle movement to show people they are out there. Yesterday was the biggest show of police force, where more the 45 Police cars lined up Kingston that overflowed into Union Street and Eastern Parkway, they even had a full communications command post posted up along the Museum.

Rumors and speculations have it that the police were observing ‘Hasidic’ behavior in preparation for the passing of the Satmer Rebbe, and the riots that may ensue. Others were of the opinion that the Jewish Children’s Museum received terrorist threats and so the police added great protection. The bottom line is that we got the benefit of the added security and Police presence.

Murder in Crown Heights: Man Accused Of Fatally Shooting Uncle For Stealing Mail

A Brooklyn man is accused of fatally shooting his uncle six times because he was convinced his uncle was stealing his mail, police said.

David Husband, 69, worked as a superintendent in a Crown Heights building on President St. between Troy and Schenectady, where his 27-year-old nephew shared his apartment, police said.

Police said the nephew, Orangel S. Hill, called police at 12:41 a.m. Wednesday, saying he had just shot his uncle.

Click Here for a newscast of this event (RealMedia)

Pesach in Cuba: A tale of two synagogues

While the tale of the Jews’ exodus from Egypt symbolizes liberation for Jews all over the world, it is also symbolic for the resilient Jewish community of Cuba.

This tiny community of 1,200 Jews, of which 900 live in Havana, are but a fraction of one percent of the island’s 11 million people. Judaism is seen as an oddity of sorts, even in this peculiar country where Catholicism, Santeria, and Marxism converge.

“There is no anti-Semitism here, just ignorance,” according to Alberto Fernandez Barrocas, 59, vice president of the Adath Israel Synagogue of Old Havana. “People assume that Jews don’t believe in anything since they don’t believe in J. [Yoshke].”

162,210 Attend at FJC sponsored Seders across the FSU

MOSCOW, Russia – Hundreds of thousands of Jews across the Former Soviet Union celebrated Passover in great festive tradition thanks to a mass campaign carried out by the Federation of Jewish Communities of the CIS. A total of 437 FJC member communities across fifteen former Soviet republics marked this week-long holiday both at home and at over 500 mass public Seders.

The FJC’s Passover campaign, coordinated in conjunction with the Moscow and regional offices of the Ohr Avner Foundation, has delivered about 1.2 million pounds of Matzah and 150,000 bottles of wine to Jewish communities, large and small. This figure has been topped up by donations collected through the FJC’s website campaign and contributions made by local donors.

Students gather to celebrate holiday

Tucson, Arizona – A tradition thousands of years old was continued by Jewish students yesterday to mark the beginning of Passover.

More than 200 students feasted on unleavened matzo bread, potatoes and grape juice during the Seder dinner held at the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity house.

The celebration of Passover extends back to the time of Moses, when the Jews left Egypt after being enslaved by the pharaoh.

The ceremony was presided over by Rabbi Yossi Winner, a new face to the campus Jewish community.

“We never thought we’d get 200 students, but the RSVPs have been off the hook,” Winner said.

Winner, a Hasidic rabbi, moved to Tucson last year from New York City to establish a Chabad presence on campus.

Chabad-Lubavitch is one of the largest branches of Hasidic Judaism.

Winner’s home has become the center of operations for food preparation for Seder dinner.

“It’s to provide Jewish students on campus a home away from home,” Winner said.

A Hasidic Migration Renews Crown Heights Tensions

Until a few years ago, the Jews of the Lubavitch Hasidic sect living in Crown Heights told their children to not to venture south of Empire Boulevard into the African-American and Afro-Caribbean neighborhood of Flatbush. But crime has gone down ever since Rudy Giuliani’s anti-crime mayoral administration of the 1990s. Now the scene is different. A new Jewish-owned residential building is being erected on Lefferts Avenue in Flatbush. Nearby, developers are trying to put up luxury housing. A young Hasidic couple opened a stylish clothing store on the same street a few months ago.

“There is a big demand for Jews, more than ever before,” said Yossi Popack, a residential property owner in the area.

Property values are soaring in the heart of Hasidic Crown Heights. One could find a two bedroom apartment in the area of $1500, but most Hasidic families here have between eight and 12 children. A two family building has gone for over $700,000, something that might have sold for less than a quarter of a million dollars about a decade ago, according to one news report. And unless a Lubavitch family gets a job in another city, they stay in New York and want to remain within walking distance of their main synagogue on Eastern Parkway. Thus, Hasidic families are moving farther south and settling near and in Flatbush for cheaper living spaces in proximity to the synagogue. This is putting a strain on the African-American and Afro-Caribbean community and is adding to renewed tensions between these communities after more than a decade of calm since the infamous riots of 1991 that resulted in the murder of one foreign, Hasidic visitor.

Longmont welcomes first Jewish center

Longmont, Colorado – When Lisa Trank wants to attend synagogue, she drives roughly 15 miles to Boulder. She frequently travels there for other types of Jewish programs, too — including children’s events, adult classes or lectures — because Longmont has no Jewish community center, synagogue or rabbi.

Trank, 47, said she yearns for a nearby synagogue. Now, she won’t have to wait much longer.

In September, an ultra-orthodox rabbi from New York and his wife will begin setting up a Jewish center in town.

“I think it’s fabulous,” said Trank, the marketing director for Boulder’s Jewish Community Center and a member of Pardes Levavot, a Boulder Jewish Renewal congregation. “It reflects that the Jewish community is growing in Longmont, and it’s diverse enough that all aspects of Judaism can be reflected.”

Rabbi Yakov Borenstein, 24, and his wife, Shayna, 21, will move to Longmont from Brooklyn, N.Y., in early September to start a Chabad center, offering Longmont a synagogue, Jewish education classes and regular Jewish programming for the first time, Borenstein said. Chabad is an ultra-orthodox sect of Judaism.

“There is a Jewish awareness in Longmont,” Borenstein said. “There is a strong yearning for it. A lot of people are very, very interested.”

New Orthodox Jewish center hosts area’s first traditional Seder for Passover

Fort Collins – “Why is this night different from all other nights?”
The familiar question that Jewish children have been asking for more than 3,000 years during Passover took on added significance in Fort Collins this week.

Organizers of a community Passover Seder conducted Wednesday night say the ages-old traditional meal was brand-new for Northern Colorado.

The new Chabad Jewish Center of Northern Colorado sponsored the event, which Rabbi Yerachmiel Gorelik said was the first fully traditional community Seder in the area.

Revitalizing tradition

Worcester Academy may be the best-known boarding school in the city, but there is another local school that draws students from far away and which reopened its dorm this year: Bais Chana, a tiny Jewish school on Midland Street for girls in Grades 7-12.

The school is part of Yeshiva Academy, which accepts students from all strands of Judaism, but the girls at Bais Chana live by the Chabad-Lubavitch tradition: They keep their knees, elbows and collarbones covered, they don’t sing and dance in front of the opposite gender (a restriction specific to females), and many of them voluntarily surround themselves with Jewish culture, from the music in their iPods to the early-morning spiritual studies they organize themselves.

Seders in Moscow

On each of the seven floors of Marina Roscha, Moscow’s hulking, modern Jewish Community Center, Chabad-Lubavitch hosted a communal Seder, each catering to a specific segment of Russia’s Jewish community. Among the various Seders, including the senior Seder, the Passover program for young professionals, and the Israeli businessmen and families, some 3,000 guests were present.

Across the CIS, huge numbers–500 communal Seders, 1,000 children in Passover camps, a half million families served at the 437 soup kitchens–were the norm, but a closer look reveals the changing face of the CIS Jewish community there, and Chabad’s ability to keep pace with new realities.

Psalms book spares rabbi

Amid the aftermath of the Palestinian suicide attack today that killed nine comes news of a miracle as a rabbi’s life reportedly was spared when a book of Psalms held in a pocket next to his heart was ripped in two by a piece of shrapnel.

Chabad Rabbi Avishai Batshvilli and his wife were among the people at a crowded fast food stand near Tel Aviv’s old central bus station when a suicide bomber blew himself up as Israelis celebrated the fifth day of the Passover holiday. Along with the dead, more than 60 were wounded, at least 10 of them seriously. The same restaurant was hit by a suicide attack in January, wounding 20.