Shabbat Jan 3-4, 2025

Perhaps it’s because I grew up in Montreal and was inundated with advertising of the majority religion, or perhaps I just watched too much Captain Kangaroo (10 points for anyone not embarrassed to message me that they watched the good Captain too!), but I always thought Christmas had Twelve Days (like the song), which seemed perfectly logical because after all, Chanukah has 8. But as the years have gone by, it seems quite clear that despite weeks of preparation, Christmas celebrations are really one day. But Chanukah is definitely 8! And we have the blow-by-blow account of those days from our perspective coming to you live right now!

We left off two Shabbatot ago, with last Friday not really having a free second to compose, so there is a lot to catch up on! We left off in Efrat, a few days before Chanukah, at Elan and Nomi’s house, where we were just starting to emerge from jet lag. We arrived on Thursday, joined Nadav for his school’s annual Grandparent’s Day, and then Friday and Shabbat was just a lot of good time with the family, meals, synagogue, games and fun with the kids. Saturday evening, we visited with Carol and David Novosellor; David had returned from the US following his father, Rabbi Moshe Novosellor’s passing. We shared some amazing stories about his father, a community Rabbi in Philadelphia for over 50 years (if I am not mistaken). I won’t regale you with all of them, but by a stroke of luck on his El Al flight home David randomly clicked on a movie with a Jewish religious theme, and it was a movie interviewing his father! 

Efrat is literally 15 minutes outside of Jerusalem (umm, when there is no traffic) so we stayed in the area for a couple more days. Sunday we were able to get together with Debbie Kamioner and Zev Kessler, who have officially become Israeli citizens. Congratulations! Then we took Shlomo shopping in Jerusalem for his birthday and picked up Shoshana who goes to school there. We left for Petach Tikvah mid-day Monday to pick up Ora and Adi from School and hung out there for awhile before returning to Netanya to prepare for Chanukah!

The first night of Chanukah was Wednesday Dec 24, making the first day of Chanukah and Christmas overlap this year. As you may know, the Jewish Holidays are on a lunar calendar of 354 days per year and not the 365-day Solar Calender. However, our biblical holidays like Passover and New Year/Yom Kippur are fixed to be in the Spring for Passover, and Fall for Rosh Hashana/Yom Kippur/Sukkot. This is accomplished by adding “leap months” 7 times in 19 years to make sure that the holidays, as well as the others including Chanukah, always stay in same season (and same day in the lunar calendar) but not the same solar calendar date.  

We started off the holiday by joining Ariel, Gila, Elisha, Ora and Adi for the lighting of the first candle and a fun dinner prepared by Bruce and Ariel with Elisha as sous-chef! As you may know, Chanukah is the celebration of light, a celebration of the victory of the Maccabees against the Hellenistic Seleucid Empire. The holiday also celebrated the miracle of the oil:  a small jar of oil, enough for one day, burned brightly in the recaptured Temple in Jerusalem for 8 full days, 2200 years ago. 

Thus, the meal was topped off by Sufganiot, deep fried jelly donuts that are a big deal in Israel. Potato Pancakes (Latkes fried in oil) are ubiquitous in communities with a lot of Eastern European Jews, but not as big a thing in Israel. In Israel there are sufganiot, which are decorated to be absolute works of art, and are about a million calories each, or there are jelly donuts and plain donuts, which was the discussion in Ariel’s house. You see, Elisha likes jelly, the girls like plain! So, all need to be accommodated!

The whirlwind continued the next few days. On Thursday we were invited to Nomi’s brother Eli’s wedding. Eli married Aly, who is originally from Mexico, which meant a very lively multi-lingual wedding! Mazel Tov to Nomi’s parents, Karen and Robert Goldberger, whose children are now all happily married. The next day, Friday was spent preparing for Shabbat as Ariel, Gila and kids as well as Jenna came to Netanya. Friday was the first of a series of 4 very rainy days, which meant that we were inside quite a bit, but we are equipped with lots of games and things to do to keep from going too stir crazy. 

Saturday night, Gila and the kids slept over and we took off Sunday morning for Neot Kedumim, a nature reserve about an hour east of us that is filled with plants that represent those in Biblical times. We met Elan, Nomi, Shoshana, Shlomo, Nadav, Aryeh and Eitan there, and so the cousins were all together which made the activity even more special.  Using ancient stones and presses, we ground wheat into something resembling flour, we ground olives into something not even remotely resembling olive oil and learned about Israel in the times of the Maccabees. There were camels and donkeys and great art projects using clay. 

After a very busy day we brought the Petach Tikvah gang back home and stole off with Elan’s three eldest kids, Shoshana, Shlomo and Nadav, for a couple of days of TLC in Netanya. This is a fun dynamic with two teenagers and an almost 11-year-old. Meaning? Well, more sleeping in for one! Monday’s breakfast started about 10:30 with everyone pitching in, so we ended up with eggs, toasted pita’s, large fruit platters and yogurt parfaits. Then off to the Ir Yamim Mall for a couple of rounds of bowling (where we met Eliana and Daniel Berman and their kids; Eliana is daughter of Eta and Bobby Shaul).  Dinner was at our favorite Netanya burger emporium, Red Burger (try the double entrecote burger!) and then off the Cinema City for the CGI enhanced animal world of Mufasa! The graphics were awesome, and though we could guess the key parts of the story of the Lion Kings’ father, the music and characters made it really fun. Parental guidance note: lots of scary scenes that look very realistic if you bring little kids!

We returned the teens and preteen to Efrat on Tuesday afternoon and took Aryeh (who was disappointed not to come to Netanya) for some ice cream and to play at a Ninja Gym. B y now we were at the 7th candle, which we lit in Efrat. We were treated to a massive BBQ dinner thanks to Nomi and Elan, at which they hosted a family from Toronto spending time in Israel. Then back across the country again, this time to sleep over in Petach Tikvah as we were on duty to baby sit the next two days (are you tired yet?). 

Let’s talk about a real Montreal highlight! The State of Israel has for decades run International Bible Contests for both school age children and for adults. The children’s competition is well known and is run in schools all over the world, with the winners of each country participating in the finals on Israel Independence Day. Less knows is the adult contest, which is done more as a self-study program with web-based tests to get from one level to the next.  On New Years Day, the last night of Chanukah, the finals for the Adult contest were held in the beautiful Jerusalem Theater with 10 finalists from Israel, the US, Argentina and France….and representing Canada was our own Haim Fruchter! The event is one of pageantry and songs, but as was fitting, also several important reminders that the times are not normal, with tributes to fallen soldiers (including the son of one of the judges). In fact, the participants were really the winners of the 2023 contest, but the event was postponed for a year due to the war. With over 20 fans in the audience, including Bilha Fruchter and her family, Haim’s brother and sister-in law, and our friends the Gehrs, and Homas, Barbara and Bruce and Haim’s best buddy, our grandson Elisha, we all cheered Haim on! With very stiff competition, he finished 7th, but considering that he made it that far, we are all super proud of this accomplishment! Kol Hakavod (All honor to you) Haim!!

We left Jerusalem to return to Petach Tikvah (with a pizza stop on the way) and the next morning we packed up Elisha, Ora and Adi to go to the Biblical Museum of Natural History in Beit Shemesh. This is a very cool place, the brainchild of a Rabbi named Natan Slifkin, who has for many years researched and wrote about animals in Ancient Israel from Biblical and Talmudic times. The museum explained which animals were native to this Mediterranean area, which were imported, which are extinct and how names of animals in Hebrew were likely mistranslated in English Bibles (and others, of course). The museum is small; a tour takes about 75-90 minutes and includes a small animal petting zoo with rabbits and lots of indigenous lizards, turtles and even a serpentarium where the kids can get up close and personal with various snakes including a baby Burmese python (mamma python is 4 meters long and weights about 40kg, so we don’t play with her). Definitely can be on your to do list for kids of all ages.  Another advantage of the museum is it’s 5 minutes away from Ikea in Beit Shemesh which is a great way to feed hungry Grandchildren with tons of food and not break the bank! Following that outing, we returned the kids to Petach Tikvah and then returned to Netanya with no visitors or sleep over guests!

So what is the feeling these days here in Israel. Overall, the mood is more positive than when we left here in May. The malls are busy and the streets have a vibe again. However, there are still few tourists due to the lack of international flights coming into Israel; there are only so many people that can fly on El Al and Emirates! In truth, the middle east has changed drastically since October 7, 2023. The horrible attacks from Hamas caused the barbaric deaths and atrocities and led to Hezbollah bombing indiscriminately for 15 months. They also led, despite a slow start and negative world opinion, to the demolition of Hamas and undoing of their leadership, considerable weaking of Hezbollah and the complete destruction of their leadership, and Israel showing Iran they can enter their airspace and attack targets at will. These specific events directly led to the overthrowing of the Assad regime in Syria. There are still many ripples that will happen due to these events and many unknowns. Yet, despite these positives, the wars are not over. War is never pretty, and in spite of massive destruction in Gaza, Hamas obviously feels it has nothing more to lose and is in it for the long game, holding live and dead hostages and continuing to shoot projectiles. The Houthis in Yemen are also an issue, perhaps not as lethal or dangerous as Hezbollah due to their distance from Israel, but they are cynically lobbing ballistic missiles towards central Israel in the middle of the night to send as many citizens as possible into their shelters (including last night). Iran is wounded, and it’s unclear what their next move will be. So, despite lots of steps forward, there is no obvious end in sight. We pray that there will be a resolution in the near future. 

So, this is the first blog of 2025, which means we have been communicating like this for 17 years! Our best wishes for a 2025 which brings us peace, trust and more understanding between people!

Shabbat Shalom

Barbara and Bruce

Happy Birthday to Sheila!

Happy Birthday Uncle Peter!

Happy Birthday to Shlomo!

Happy Birthday to Gail!

Happy Birthday to Debbie Feldman!

Happy Birthday to Alvan!

Happy Birthday to Damien!

Condolences to David Novosellor on the passing of his father

Condolences to the Sarna family on the untimely passing of their son Dee

Condolences to Ziggy Levkovich and family on the passing of his father Josef. Many of us knew Reb Yosef and appreciated his wit and tenacity. He was a holocaust survivor who spent the post war years as a Nazi Hunter and finder of lost children, then built an amazing family. In his final decade he educated hundred’s if not thousands who went on Trips to Poland with Jroots and touched many others with his educational videos and books. We had the honor to travel with him in Poland in summer 2023 and have lot’s of video and audio footage of his story. As we spoke to Ziggy this week, we agreed that he was a small man in stature who made a very large impact. He will be greatly missed.