The 5 Towns Jewish Times
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$1.00 WWW.5TJT.COM VOL. 7 NO. 9 10 KISLEV 5767 tmhu ,arp DECEMBER 1, 2006 INSIDE FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK A THANKSGIVING MISSION A Decade At Risk BY LARRY GORDON Rabbi Shaya Cohen 28 MindBiz A School Board Meeting Esther Mann, LMSW 36 Instead of just reporting residents voted into office Paradise Lost that the mostly public-school trustees committed to fiscal Hannah Reich Berman 37 constituency present at last responsibility and educational week’s District 15 school progress, fairness, and integri- Daf Yomi Insights meeting reached new lows in ty. The new board replaced a Rabbi Avrohom Sebrow 60 addressing the board and its board mostly concerned with members, I’d prefer to sift protecting the unions and Aliyah Chronicle through all the verbal muck salary and benefits packages Shmuel Katz 63 and try to figure out what is for district employees, with really going on. lots of rhetoric about plunging For those who do not live in performance and low test A contingent of members of Kehillas Bais Yehudah Tzvi of Cedarhurst (also the district or even our imme- scores for the dwindling num- known as The Red Shul), led by Rabbi Yakov Feitman, spent their diate area, please note that Thanksgiving weekend in Israel. Pictured above: Davening Minchah this about six months ago, district Continued on Page 5 past Sunday afternoon prior to the return trip to New York. SHABBAT ACROSS AMERICA HEARD IN THE BAGEL STORE BY RABBI YAIR himself out of the running for HOFFMAN President of the United States The Commute DEAN, TIFERET CHAYA–THE CAROL in 1995. He was the first TEPLER HIGH SCHOOL FOR GIRLS black person to ever serve as BY LARRY GORDON the West Side. On most days Yitzi Wolman Bar Mitzvah. the Chairman of the Joint it took about 90 minutes, See Page 47 Colin Powell, the former Chiefs of Staff. He had served There was a time, about a door-to-door. On some days Secretary of State; Harry S in Vietnam, and ultimately dozen years ago, when I used and nights, it could take up Truman, the former President; earned the rank of General. to drive into Manhattan to two and a half hours. It and Joseph Kennedy, former His views wielded enormous every day to go to work. I was largely unpredictable. President Kennedy’s father power and influence. lived in Brooklyn then, so it When I moved out here, I and former U.S. Ambassador Harry S Truman was once a was not necessary to negoti- immediately abandoned the to England. What do they all businessman who declared ate the round-the-clock traf- driving for the comforts and have in common? bankruptcy. He was President fic of the Van Wyck, the LIE, relative swiftness of the Colin Powell is a former or the Midtown Tunnel. Still, LIRR—Lawrence to Penn Secretary of State who took Continued on Page 18 it was a crawl most days, Station in 43 minutes. It was down the BQE, into the Battery Tunnel, and then up Continued on Page 12 J.J.’s Big Day Secrets Of The 15-Minute Chef SKA scholarship winners. A STICK WORTH See Page 53 The Refusal CARRYING Diet Diaries: Third And Final Entry An American Response To BY JAMIE GELLER The Gemayel Assassination BY STUART H. I refuse, I refuse, I refuse!! DITCHEK, MD, FAAP I will not get on that scale. Hubby says I lose our weight- Pierre Gemayel died on the loss contest by default, but I same day that Syria and Iraq don’t care; I’d rather lose than normalized relations and the see a number I don’t like. It’s same week that the United so psychological. My husband States government leaked Heshy and Esther Wein to be doesn’t get it; I think that reports that the Iraq study honored. See Page 44 men, in general, just don’t group under James Baker will On Sunday, November 12, several hundred people came to a understand. If I see a number recommend renewed talks CANDLE LIGHTING Young Israel of Woodmere breakfast to see J.J. Goldstein, a 10-year-old I don’t like, I will go into a with the Syrians very soon. Dec. 1 – 4:10 PM with special needs, receive the Rudy Rosen Community Service Award. tailspin and possibly never This coincidence of olive Dec. 8 – 4:09 PM Presenting the award are (L) Rabbi Herschel Billet and (R) Phil Fuchs. See Page 51 Continued on Page 14 Continued on Page 16 2 December 1, 2006 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES December 1, 2006 3 4 December 1, 2006 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES FROM THE EDITOR Continued from Front Cover ber of public-school students, but not much else. Newly elected to the board P.O. BOX 690 LAWRENCE, NY 11559 were four men who send or sent their 516-984-0079 [email protected] children to local yeshivas. As a result, [email protected] when there is a hard decision to be LARRY GORDON made, they are routinely accused of Publisher/Editor not caring about the public schools ESTA J. GORDON because they don’t use them—or Managing Editor worse, desiring to destroy the local YOSSI GORDON public-school system. Director of Sales Needless to say, not only are these CHANA ROCHEL ROSS suggestions scurrilous, they are Editorial Assistant trumped up and baseless, and they plant SIDI BARON, YAKOV SERLE, JERRY MARKOVITZ the seeds of a great deal of animosity. Sales Representatives No reasoning or citing of facts will SHMUEL GERBER assuage the way this particular opinion Chief Copy Editor has evolved. This way of thinking has MICHELE JUSTIC been and continues to be eloquently Copy Editor articulated by two board members, Pam CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Greenbaum and Stanley Kopilow. Their Howard M. Adelsberg, Esq. Irwin Benjamin, Hannah Reich Berman approach and thinking on numerous Jamie Geller, Rabbi Aryeh Z. Ginzberg issues affecting the district seem to have Yochanan Gordon, Michele Herenstein one criterion: that they be in contraven- Rabbi Yair Hoffman, Rabbi Mordechai Kamenetzky tion to whatever the position of the rest Esther Mann, Rochelle Miller, Naomi Ross, of the board happens to be. Rabbi Avrohom Sebrow, Eli Shapiro One glaring example of this was YOSEF BROWN MICHAL WEINSTEIN demonstrated at the meeting on Staff Graphic Artists Tuesday, November 21 when, because IVAN NORMAN, IRA THOMAS of death threats received in the mail by Staff Photographers some board members, security screen- FRANKEL & CO., CREATIVE DESIGN LLC ing for people entering the building Design & Production was dramatically tightened. In addition TALIYE CORLEY to two Nassau County police officers Art Director being present throughout the three- The Five Towns Jewish Times is an independent weekly news- and-a-half-hour meeting, those enter- paper. Opinions expressed by writers and columnists are not ing the meeting had to sign in and necessarily those of the editor or publisher. We are not responsible for the kashrus or hashgachah of any product or establishment advertised in the Five Towns Jewish Times. Continued on Page 9 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES December 1, 2006 5 6 December 1, 2006 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES December 1, 2006 7 8 December 1, 2006 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES FROM THE EDITOR the new photo-ID rules. community organizations, with some munity organizations can have greater Continued from Page 5 By the end of the meeting, and reasonable limitations. access to school facilities in the district. despite the heckling and very tough So why is it that there is so much ani- Listening to some of these com- present photo identification. public comments, the majority of the mosity and tension between these two ments last week, I was struck by a On several occasions as the new board had the courage to vote in favor factions, the public-school and private- recurring theme that demonstrates that security measures were discussed by of holding a voter referendum on two school parents? Listening to the banter, a great number of people in the district the board, both Greenbaum and issues. The first is pre-K busing for all the heckling, and sometimes very suc- have either a completely distorted Kopilow emphatically expressed oppo- understanding, or no understanding at sition to the heightened scrutiny of all, of why we send our children to those attending these meetings. yeshiva and not the public schools in Kopilow insisted that the threats were the first place. For as far back as I can not to be taken seriously (he was one A great number of people have either a recall, there has been a feeling that the of the recipients) and that the board’s motivation of parents who send their motivation to adapt the new measures completely distorted understanding, or no children to yeshiva is that we do not was to “chill free speech” that is a very want our children to be in the same prominent feature of these regular understanding at all, of why we send our classrooms or in the same location as conclaves. For her part, Ms. the children who make up the present Greenbaum was concerned how chil- public-school population. This is, of dren would have access to the build- children to yeshiva in the first place. course, not true. I’ve been aware that ing, as many do not have photo IDs. this sentiment exists and is hanging out Then someone mentioned that the there and occasionally surfaces in HAFTR basketball team conducted some of those unkind letters that make their practice sessions in the building, students in the district.