$1.00 WWW.5TJT.COM VOL. 9 NO. 17 5 SHEVAT 5769 tc ,arp JANUARY 30, 2009 INSIDE FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK A MOST IMPORTANT MISSION Listen Up BY LARRY GORDON Hannah Reich Berman 27 MindBiz Political Observations Esther Mann, LMSW 28 The afterglow of an intense being an elected official is Long-Term Investment political season—dominated supposed to be about. Steven Genack 33 by the presidential elections One true indication of this here—has not yet faded far is that Maureen Dowd of the Letters To The Editor enough into what could even New York Times called Mr. Our Readers 36 be considered recent history. Paterson a “goofball” for the Taking into account all that way he handled the appoint- ‘We Need To Talk’ has happened politically these ment of Congresswoman Ari Sher 47 last few weeks, it seems that Kirsten Gillibrand to Hillary Governor David Paterson Clinton’s seat in the U.S. might be the one politician Senate. Not appointing On the 10th annual Hebrew Academy of Long Beach trip to Israel, DRS with the most prudent Caroline Kennedy to fill the High School graduates (L–R) Josh Weinstock, Yonatan Sklar, and Sammy approach to what best serves Solomon, accompanied by Rabbi Aryeh Cohen (at right), delivering gifts to the people, which is what Continued on Page 8 Israeli soldiers at an army base outside Be’er Sheva. Netanyahu: HEARD IN THE BAGEL STORE Obama Will Try To Business Strategies Toldos Avrohom Yitzchok Internationalize BY LARRY GORDON ment, are the yeshivos, institu- Rebbe at Katz b’ris. tions, and organizations that See Page 67 Jerusalem Sites Someone out there is mak- depend almost exclusively on ing money, but no one seems the largesse of individual B Y HANA LEVI to know who. What is known donors. JULIAN is that the country is going One thing that has been through the worst economic made clear by the recent eco- Binyamin Netanyahu, the downturn since the Depres- nomic events is that the Likud Party chairman and sion, and no one seems to experts did not possess too Knesset opposition leader, cians would try to interna- know how to get a handle on much expertise; with the top warned at the Jerusalem tionalize holy sites in it. From this vantage point, economists insisting that they Conference on Wednesday Jerusalem—and he vowed to those suffering most, aside were blindsided and never saw that the Obama administra- from individual families sud- tion and leftist Israeli politi- Continued on Page 20 denly faced with unemploy- Continued on Page 14 Mourning the loss of MK Avraham Ravitz. Lending A Helping Hand One Drop ROAD TRIP See Page 64 At A Time Another Mother’s Musings B Y PHYLLIS J. BY LAURA BEN- L UBIN DAVID 6:00 a.m.—certainly not an Who says good people are auspicious time to be on call hard to come by? In the “me- for an airport run. Being in oriented” society we live in, close proximity to JFK, we we almost expect people to have often been called upon look out for numero uno. And to make drop-offs and pick- sometimes they do. But not ups. My husband and I both Reception for always. have concluded that the drop- Yeshivat Torat Shraga. My friend sent me an off is certainly simpler than See Page 54 e-mail about a bone-marrow the pick-up. The pick-up (if donation drive for Amit you are not interested in park- CANDLE LIGHTING Kadosh, a little girl in Israel ing at the airport) entails a Jan. 30 – 4:52 PM with cancer. Touched by her two-person team. One person Feb. 6 – 5:01 PM Jonathan Kaplowitz, a.k.a. Chaverim member Q36, with NYC Councilman Jim Gennaro after giving his car a boost. See Story, Page 69 Continued on Page 16 Continued on Page 18 2 January 30, 2009 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES January 30, 2009 3 4 January 30, 2009 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES January 30, 2009 5 6 January 30, 2009 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES January 30, 2009 7 FROM THE EDITOR New York Democrats boy- professional sports, the big total team payroll below the Palestinians. The Mitchell Continued from Front Cover cotted the news conference at names and huge salaries on salary of one Yankee ballplayer appointment sadly looks like which her appointment was the Mets and Yankees couldn’t (Alex Rodriguez). Mr. nothing more than a chapter vacancy took some courage, announced, while former even get the teams into the Rodriguez is paid $25 million from a book that could be considering that Ms. Kennedy Republican Senator from playoffs last year. The Jets per season; the entire Tampa entitled Been There, Done had endorsed Barack Obama New York Alphonse D’Amato signed a big-name, $20-mil- Bay Rays payroll last season That. Mitchell’s ideas to bring for president over Hillary. The was at Ms. Gillibrand’s side, lion-a-season quarterback, was $22 million. That says a peace to the Arabs and Israelis word is that former president beaming. To Democrats, that Brett Favre, and that got them lot about what hungry and call for nothing but more Bill Clinton applied intense was seriously indicative that just as far as the baseball ambitious people can accom- Israeli concessions to the pressure on Paterson not to something was awry. teams—nowhere. That’s what plish. That’s how I categorize Palestinians and, disappoint- appoint Kennedy, because of But the Gillibrand appoint- the Kennedy appointment to Ms. Gillibrand, a good choice ingly, equating Israel’s build- her betrayal of Mrs. Clinton. ment was clearly the way to the Senate would have who will do well for her con- ing of playgrounds and homes It’s all in a day’s work. go. She’s new, ambitious, and amounted to. It would make stituents in New York. in Judea and Samaria with Leftist liberals don’t like hard-working, as well as prob- great headlines for a few days, Talking about tired, old, Hamas missile strikes into Gillibrand, despite the fact ably anxious to make a name after which Ms. Kennedy worn down, and mistaken Israel as being the catalysts that she is a Democrat; being for herself. This business of would have begun to be appointments forces me to for suicide bombings. from upstate New York has New York’s desiring or per- pulled apart by the same shift over to President This false start and disin- pushed her politics too much haps needing to be identified media that initially built her Obama’s selection of former genuous peace effort is fur- to the center for the taste of with big names to go with the up so high. senator George Mitchell as ther illustrated by Mitchell’s the downstate political city bright lights on Broadway has To stay with the sports special Middle East envoy— appearance in Israel ten days slickers. One sure sign of her probably peaked and already analogy, you probably know the latest diplomat chosen to before Israelis go to the polls independence and free think- demonstrated its uselessness. which baseball team made it bring peace between Israel to select a new leader. The ing is that many of the usual To borrow an analogy from into the World Series with a and the violence-bent odd thing is that these peace brokers or negotiators usually spend a disproportionate amount of their time trying to pressure Israel to withdraw from territory, reassure them of the need for national secu- rity, or encourage them to extricate people from the homes they’ve lived in for decades. These misplaced efforts usually end in failure, because the focus is misdi- rected. Both Israel and the U.S. are in fundamental agreement that the way to go is a two-state solution—Israel and Palestine living side-by- side in peace. Unfortunately or fortunate- ly—depending on how you view these things—the Arabs involved in the process reject the idea of a two-state solu- tion and prefer, instead, a one-state solution. That is, without Israel being one of those states. So what is it that is new and refreshing or that can be a breakthrough for peace that George Mitchell can bring with him on his new/old mission? Where is the fresh spirit that our new president was supposed to bring into the Oval Office? With Mitchell doing the steering, the two sides in the Arab-Israel conflict will con- tinue to travel along parallel lines, probably never meeting at any point. If Mr. Mitchell wants to advance the process, he needs to get real and stop fantasizing about Israel’s with- drawing to pre-1967 borders, uprooting 350,000 Jews from Judea and Samaria, and hand- ing over East Jerusalem so that the new Palestine can establish a capital there. As long as this is the objec- tive, there will be meetings, conferences, and even sum- mits, but no advancement toward lasting peace. Both sides have become word- smiths and manipulators of parlance. They say words and issue statements that seem to Continued on Page 10 8 January 30, 2009 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES January 30, 2009 9 FROM THE EDITOR ously entertain the notion of full with- FEATURES Continued from Front Cover drawal to pre-1967 borders and the division of Jerusalem. Around The Five Towns 44 mean one thing, but closer legal and Yes, Israel talks about a Palestinian P.O.