Jewish Federation of NEPA Non-profit Organization 601 Jefferson Ave. U.S. POSTAGE PAID The Scranton, PA 18510 Permit # 184 Watertown, NY Change Service Requested Published by the Jewish Federation of Northeastern Pennsylvania VOLUME XI, NUMBER 20 OCTOBER 18, 2018 Nikki Haley resigns as U.S. ambassador to the U.N. BY JOSEFIN DOLSTEN AND been an unwavering champion of truth, sistently earning the loudest plaudits at RON KAMPEAS principled realism and integrity within the the annual American Israel Public Affairs NEW YORK (JTA) – Nikki Haley, the United Nations,” Ivanka Trump said on Committee policy conference. U.S. envoy to the United Nations and a Twitter. “Jared and I are grateful for her “Her departure was unanticipated “strong defender” of Israel in the world friendship – a true blessing in our lives!” and took the pro-Israel community by body, will leave her post by the end of Haley was considered a star in the surprise,” Matt Brooks, the Republican this year. center-right pro-Israel community, con- See “Haley” on page 8 President Donald Trump in an Oval Office appearance with Haley on October 9 praised the former South Carolina gov- ernor and said that about six months ago, The 2019 UJA Campaign she told him that she was ready to leave Nikki Haley (Photo by Drew Angerer/ Dear Friends, by the end of this year. “She’s a fantastic Getty Images) As this year’s 2019 UJA Campaign person, very importantly, but she’s also co-chairs, we are asking you to help our somebody that gets it,” Trump said. Trump earned international respect by people – wherever they may be in the Haley, a moderate on Trump’s foreign delivering on his warnings, including on world. It is not really a question of how policy team, had a “warm relationship” Iran and Israel. “They get it when the pres- much you contribute to the Campaign, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin ident says he means business,” she said. but your act of giving and your recog- Netanyahu, who frequently praised her for “If you look at the anti-Israel bias and the nition that you consider yourself to be criticizing what she saw as bias against strength and courage the president showed a part of our family. the Jewish state at the U.N. in moving the embassy” to Jerusalem. Your financial commitment will The most consequential actions she She especially praised Jared Kushner, enable us to write the next chapter in David and Rhonda Fallk took had to do with Israel: She pulled out Trump’s Jewish son-in-law. “Jared is a Jewish history – a history that has always of UNESCO, the United Nations cultural hidden genius that no one understands,” reflected itself in the caring of one Jew UJA Campaign in the memo section. affiliate, and pushed for the defunding she said. Haley recently joined Kushner in for another. Alternatively, if you wish to make of UNRWA, the agency that administers shaping his Middle East peace proposal, Please be part of this critical effort. your gift online, go to the Federation assistance to Palestinian refugees and which no one outside the small team has If you wish to make your 2019 UJA website at www.jewishnepa.org. their descendants. She threw a party for seen. “It is so unbelievably well done,” gift by mail, please direct it to the Fed- We hope each of you had a wonderful countries that did not vote to condemn the she said of the proposal. eration as follows: Jewish Federation of High Holy Day season this year. United States for recognizing Jerusalem Ivanka Trump, Kushner’s wife and Northeastern Pennsylvania, 601 Jefferson David and Rhonda Fallk, co-chairs as Israel’s capital. Trump’s daughter, returned the compliment Ave., Scranton, PA 18510. Indicate 2019 2019 UJA Campaign Haley at the Oval Office event said on Twitter. “She is a bold reformer and has Nazis’ aerial photography is helping map and preserve Jewish cemeteries BY CNAAN LIPHSHIZ Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal – Jews for LUBLIN, Poland (JTA) – When generations buried their dead atop a mound German air force pilots took aerial pho- that in 1941 stood on the town’s northern tographs of western Ukraine in 1941, margins. But after the murder of the area’s they did it to help Nazi Germany defeat 10,000 Jews during the Holocaust, the for- the Soviet Union in a war that saw the est adjacent to the cemetery was allowed genocide of six million Jews. But in a to swallow it up, leaving exposed only twist of fate, the German government has a few dozen headstones. Fragments of recently started funding an effort that uses others used to lie in piles on the shoulders the photographs to identify and preserve of the potholed asphalt road that snakes Jewish cemeteries. along Buchach’s Torgova Street. The effort, in which the Luftwaffe -ar The forest’s progression and the de- chives are only one of several ingenious struction caused to the headstones – locals tools, began in 2015 with the establishment throughout Eastern Europe steal them of an organization called the European to use as sharpening stones or building Jewish Cemeteries Initiative, or ESJF. material – complicated efforts to map the The largest-ever international project of its cemetery. The Luftwaffe aerials show its kind, ESJF has since fenced more than 100 See “Cemeteries” on page 12 Jewish cemeteries in seven countries on a modest annual budget of approximately $1 million. Federation And in Eastern Europe, fencing Jew- ish cemeteries is “not as straightforward as it may sound,” according to Philip Jewish communities in Eastern Europe are struggling to maintain crumbling on Facebook Carmel, a British former journalist, the heritage sites from the prewar era. (Photo by ESJF) The Jewish Federation of Northeast- organization’s CEO since its creation. ern Pennsylvania now has a page on Even determining the location of such That’s where the Luftwaffe aerial they were accurate enough to help us Facebook to let community members graveyards can be challenging in towns photographs enter the picture, Carmel identify some Jewish cemeteries right know about upcoming events and keep with entire Jewish populations that were said. “Obviously they were taken to before the destruction.” connected. murdered and cemeteries plundered for help the German war effort,” Carmel In the western Ukrainian town of Bu- construction material and then stolen said of the prints and negatives that he chach – the birthplace of Jewish Nobel for development. pulled from German state archives. “But Prize laureate Shmuel Yosef Agnon and Candle lighting October 19 ....................................5:57 pm INSIDE THIS ISSUE October 26 ...................................5:47 pm Tom Breslauer tribute At the movies News in brief... November 2................................. 5:38 pm Temple Israel of the Poconos In an Argentine film, a Holocuast Arson balloons hit Jerusalem and PLUS will present a movie tribute to survivor leaves his home to find Tel Aviv; Qatar sends fuel to Gaza Opinion .......................................................2 Holocaust survivor Tom Breslauer. the man who saved him. over Abbas’ protests; and more. D’var Torah ...............................................8 Story on page 3 Story on page 6 Stories on pages 11, 13, 15 Book Review ...........................................12 2 THE REPORTER ■ OCTOBER 18, 2018 A MATTER OF OPINION Visions from another generation On September 25, 1916, in the midst many of whose descendants continue a new generation. As such, the continuity been taken hostage by the PLO and flown of what was then referred to as “the to hold leadership positions in this of Jewish life here, in Israel and around to Entebbe, Uganda. When it was over, war to end all wars” – long before the community. These leaders and their the world now rests upon us. two passengers and the sayeret matkal slaughter of two-thirds of European contemporaries now rest peacefully in Remember what it was like for leader, Yoni Netanyahu were dead, but Jewry and the birth of the modern state Providence, Dalton and Dunmore ceme- Jews when there was no Jewish state, because of their sacrifice, hundreds of our of Israel – the first Annual Meeting of teries, but in their time, their vision and when even one Jew was considered too people survived. the Jewish Federation commitment built the institutions that many, when the nations of the world Now, fast forward 25 years to October of Scranton convened became the forerunners of Scranton’s closed their doors to our people. Now, 28, 2001 – barely a month after 9/11. Our under the chairman- more than ever, we have a 2001 Israel Mission participants visited ship of its president, responsibility to those who Mt. Herzl, Israel’s military cemetery. Samuel Samter. FROM THE DESK OF THE will follow in our footsteps After paying our respects at the grave of He began his ad- to ensure that Masada shall Theodore Herzl, we walked through rows dress with the fol- EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR never fall again. and rows of thousands of small white lowing words: “The MARK SILVERBERG As students of history, marble gravestones marking the final Talmud tells us that we know very well that we resting places of those who died so that he who saves one are the barometers of the Israel might live. life is considered as Jewish Community Center, Jewish societies in which we live. The Jewish We stopped in front of one nondescript if he had preserved the whole world. Family Service Agency and the Jewish people have been like a cultural surfboard grave in the middle of a long row of white As Jews, and most especially as Jew- Home of Eastern Pennsylvania. throughout history, riding the crest of marble stones.