Reading an item about Rami Levy in last week’s “Grapevine,” Ruby Karzen, former longtime activist and AACI board member, was reminded of her grandson’s National Service stint. He had needed some warm socks and decided to buy them at a Rami Levy store.
Wearing his army uniform, he encountered the man himself – Rami Levy – at the entrance greeting customers as he often did in those days. Seeing the young soldier, Levy escorted him inside and loaded him with warm socks, underwear, and other items, refusing to charge him. Just another sign of patriotism and the esteem in which the IDF is held.
Originally from Chicago, Karzen and her husband, Rabbi Jay Karzen, last year celebrated the 40th anniversary of their arrival in Jerusalem; this year, they are celebrating their 70th wedding anniversary. They are thrilled that all their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren live in Israel.
■ FOR THE first time in 17 years, Renee Becker won’t be organizing the annual Emunah Jerusalem Harmony Concert at the Jerusalem Theatre’s Henry Crown Auditorium. Becker has retired and has left Jerusalem to join her immediate family elsewhere in the country.
But she will be the guest of honor at this year’s concert on February 23, when relatives, friends, and Emunah members show their appreciation for her many years of dedicated service, and will also celebrate her 80th birthday. Musical arrangements for the concert have been made by Raymond Goldstein. Perennial performers cantors Simon Cohen and Shai Abramson will be joined by singer Chaim Zippel and talented young violinist Ma’ayan Cavenor. They will be accompanied by the Halelu Choir conducted by Shalom Kinnory.
Event proceeds are earmarked for Emunah’s Pre-Academic Preparatory School, which enables girls to acquire the basic education to complete their matriculation exams after having dropped out of other educational frameworks.
■ FOR SOME years now, Philippine ambassadors have been commemorating International Holocaust Remembrance Day with a screening of the film Quezon’s Game, which tells the story of the Philippines’ courageous president Manuel Quezon, who on the eve of World War II, offered shelter to German Jews – under the eyes of Nazis stationed in Manila. Some 1,300 Jews took advantage of the offer.
This year, Aileen Mendiola, the ambassador of the Philippines, screened the film at the Friends of Zion Museum last Thursday night. Some of the audience had seen it before but chose to see it again.
■ A THANKSGIVING, memorial, and celebration were held, all in one, on the ground-floor community hall of an upscale apartment complex on Ahad Ha’am Street in the Talbiyeh neighborhood on Sunday, where the amazingly energetic, indefatigable Chana Canterman – who, with her husband, directs Chabad of Talbiyeh-Mamilla – was boosting the spirit of the occasion.
The multifaceted event included a memorial for Chaya Mushka Schneerson, the daughter of the sixth Lubavitcher rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, and wife of the seventh Lubavitcher rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson. An inspiring woman who died on February 10, 1988 – Shvat 22, 5748 – she had no children of her own, but in almost every Chabad family with girls there is a daughter named Chaya Mushka. She is also memorialized through a charity established by her husband after her death – Keren HaChomesh, an acronym of her name – a special fund for religious, social, and educational programs for women.
Speakers at the event included two mothers of former hostages – heroines in their own right. The two were Idit Ohel, mother of Alon, a talented pianist kidnapped from the Supernova festival on Oct. 7; and Efrat Mor, mother of Eitan, a security guard at the festival who spent two years in Gaza, where he learned to speak fluent Gazan Arabic. The mothers noted that they kept fighting here and abroad for their sons to be freed, never giving up hope that they would return. They were also extremely appreciative of the public’s support, stressing togetherness and unity.
Both women met people they otherwise would never have encountered, much less befriended. These meetings heightened their curiosity and knowledge, plus the realization that life is a journey with many challenges, including keeping a family together in times of crisis.
There was a Tu Bishvat celebration, along with a lot of singing and dancing. There are very few Chabad events without song. Ricka Van Leeuwen, who used to perform with her famous brothers, Aharon Razel and Yonatan Razel, when they were all less religious, now performs only in front of female audiences.
Approximately 200 women attended. Most were American students studying in religious educational frameworks in Jerusalem.
■ HEBREW UNIVERSITY researchers and faculty have brought great honor to one of Israel’s oldest academic institutions by winning prizes, grants, and awards from global organizations and foundations.
Prof. Benjamin Weiss of the university’s Einstein Institute of Mathematics will, on Independence Day, be an Israel Prize recipients in mathematics, computer science, and computer engineering research. Weiss is one of Israel’s most distinguished mathematicians, with an extraordinary academic career spanning more than six decades. He has published over 200 scientific papers on a wide range of subjects, such as ergodic theory and topological dynamics, orbital equivalence, probability, information theory, game theory, and descriptive group theory.
The Israel Prize committee praised Weiss’s profound impact on the mathematical world: “Prof. Weiss is one of the greatest researchers in the field of dynamics, a pillar of the mathematical community, and has shaped generations of researchers in Israel and around the world. His in-depth research, spanning over 60 years of activity and over 200 papers, has redefined the mathematical understanding of the phenomenon of randomness in deterministic systems.”
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