USC's very own Trojan Men do a very cute job on Hanuka songs!

Hat Tip: Nili Shneidman!

A weekend devoted to combating Islamaphobia and Anti-Semitism

"I have this feeling that Tel Aviv is the kind of Los Angeles of the '70s. Everybody's looking for spirituality here," said Zerbib. "They say as a joke that Tel Aviv is the most religious town in Israel because [most of the people there] are searching, which is true actually. In Jerusalem people are closed in their books. [They categorize] 'You are like this, you are like that. That's it,'" said Zerbib.

Jpost

Firstly The Seventy Faces is joining with Be-True to bring an event on Jewish Meditation:

One of our sponsors--Be True--will be coming to campus this Tuesday
(Nov 4th), 2-245pm in VKC 208. The speaker, Rabbi Zalman Kravitz, will
address key concepts of Jewish Meditation including what distinguishes
it from Eastern cultures. Lunch will be served.

On Monday 3rd November there is another lecture:

Islam and Judaism: Misconceptions and Truths

6:00 - 7:30 p.m.
Fishbowl Interfaith Chapel at USC

Discussion led by Imam Jihad Turk and Rabbi Reuven Firestone

Presented by the USC Muslim Student Union and USC Hillel Jewish Center

Co-Sponsored by the USC Interfaith Council, the Center for Muslim-Jewish Engagement, and the USC Office of Religious Life

Join Imam Turk and Rabbi Firestone as they discuss and address the truths and misconceptions of Anti-Semitism in Islam and delve into the sources of conflict between these two faiths as well as the ideal relationship that should exist between Islam and Judaism.

Finally Hebrew Union College is organizing Sephardic conference scheduled for Sunday-Tuesday, November 16-18, at HUC and at other locations throughout the city.

Details are here http://www.huc.edu/sephardic/conference/.

Tuesday Oct 14th, USC's Annenberg school is hosting a listening lunch called  with professor Josh Kun on his research of rare Jewish American LPs. Kun will also talk about his upcoming book And You Shall Know Us By The Trail Of Our Vinyl: The Jewish Past As Told By The Records We've Loved and Lost.

This sounds like a lot of fun, highly recommended. More info and to RSVP.

What's the connection between a wailing hungry Jew at the eve of Kol Nidre and an anxious American voter? According to Haim Watzman writing for Huffington Post, it's all the same.

"Penitents are like voters. They face critical choices, ones that will set the course of their lives, and must make them in a situation of uncertainty. Committed voters try to grope through the fog of rhetoric in order to understand the true wills and predilections of the candidates they must choose from; penitents seek to dispel the mystery and ambiguity that cloaks the divine in order to understand what God wants of their lives.

But when I look around me this year, three days before Yom Kippur and a month before the American elections, I have a feeling that a lot of Jewish penitents and American voters are not using an essential tool that they need to make their choices. I mean irony."

Are we looking towards a low period for Jewish innovation? And just when things were getting so good out there.  Regardless, I'm sure  the people that care will continue to put their effort to making great things happen, even if they have to down-scale.

But what does this mean for our Birth-right generation? The Heebster generation?

From The Wisconian Jewish Chronicle:

"The past decade has seen a groundswell of innovative Jewish nonprofits — from the birth of a Jewish pop culture magazine, Heeb, to the creation of a slew of trailblazing Jewish social service organizations, to an array of projects that allow Jews to express their Judaism through ways other than the prayer book.

But as these initiatives reach adolescence and eye expansion, the spiraling economy and financial crisis threatens to stunt their growth and thwart the next generation of startups from even getting off the ground."

JTA's Fundermentalist TV also Investigates!

From The Daily Trojan:

"Legendary digital communications pioneer and namesake of USC's Viterbi School of Engineering Andrew J. Viterbi was one of eight people awarded the 2007 National Medal of Science, the nation's highest honor for science and technology, at a gala Sept. 29.

Viterbi won the award for his development of the maximum-likelihood algorithm for convolutional coding, known as the "Viterbi algorithm," which is a method for solving complex mathematical problems."

Provost C. L. Max Nikias has approved the deletion of part of a Muslim student group website that hosted religious documents urging Muslims to kill Jewish people. The material was removed from a collection of scriptures known as hadiths, historical sayings of the Prophet Muhammad not included in the Quran. The hadith in question, along with thousands of others, are hosted in their entirety on a USC server as part of the now defunct Muslim Student Association's website.

Nikias first heard of the hadiths' phrasing when Rabbi Aron Hier of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Jewish human-rights organization, approached USC trustee Alan Casden with his concerns. Hier was troubled by five hadiths advocating Muslim violence against Jews to hasten the coming of the "final hour."

Nikias reviewed the site, and responded that "the passage cited is truly despicable. … We did some investigations and have ordered the passage to be removed."

read more...

Personally I don't see why the Wiesenthal center had to make the fuss. This is religous texts, not an opinion piece or propaganda. And like one of the commentators mentioned you can't just take it out of context. In that case why don't they censor the Torah for saying that you should stone the man who lies with another man. That's incitement to homosexuals in just the same way. Except for the fact that one must understand the history and religious commentaries, and the oral law etc.

As Charlotte Korchak said, "is this really going to help?" In my opinion it only creates more tension and unnecessarily villainizes the Muslim groups.

It's interesting anyhow, the whole story. USC makes every organization sign a statement which includes not inciting violence, and that also goes for a student website. So USC needs to decide whether religion can be analyzed seperately or not. In this case they deemed Islam as inciting violence, the small decision has huge implcations for Muslim students at USC in how they now represent themselves.

But then again...two Jews three opinions right?

Next Sunday, September 14th a milestone confernce will take place at the Beverly Hilton with over 1,200 leaders of the Iranian-American Jewish community present.

Organized by 30 years after

Panels include:

• I. IRAN: Thirty Years After The Revolution
  
• What is the current plight of women and minorities in the Islamic Republic?
  
• What are the prospects for democracy, regional stability and nuclear compromise?
  
• What does the future hold for Jews in Iran and what role can Iranian-American Jews play as their advocates?
  
  II. UNITED STATES: Thirty Years In A New Home
  
• In what ways has the Iranian-Jewish identity evolved in the United States and how can that identity survive America's melting pot?
  
• What are the next steps and strategies to promote greater engagement of Iranian Jews in American political affairs?
  
• What can the Iranian-Jewish community learn from the political experiences of other immigrant communities?
  
  III. ISRAEL: The Next Thirty Years Of Pro-Israel Advocacy
  
• What are the prospects for peace and security for Israel with her Palestinian and Arab neighbors?
  
• Given recent criticism of the "Israel Lobby," historic charges of dual-loyalty, and the increasing organization and influence of the anti-Israel community, what new and unique challenges do Israel and American Zionists face in the next thirty years?
  
• What steps can the Iranian-Jewish community take to extend its Zionism beyond philanthropy and strengthen the U.S.-Israel alliance?

Sept 9th @ the El Ray

All ages welcome

$20 ticket

Think, the gypsy circus stealing instruments, singers, dancers, styles and tunes from all four corners...and they're coming to your town.

It's gonna be insane!

Look out for the 70 faces team out there!

The Jewish Month of Elul just began last Monady (sept 1st).

Listen to Rabbi Brovender here on why this month is significant.

starts 1st Sept

WebYeshiva is offering a special free subscition to its elul zman (the month of high holidays) of learning.

This really is a great opportunity if you want to learn. The courses include the structure of high holidays teffilah, Rav Kook on charachter and virtue, Jewish Buisness ethics and even hebrew ulpan!

sign up here for free!

So I accidentaly did some good reporting work today. I got in contact with an SC chef, who happens to be a Jew, to see where the Kosher food at.

As you can tell, the campus is upside down with everything being moved and re-built so here are the updated locations of Kosher food on campus!

Popovitch

Literate

Cafe 84

The Lot

Law school cafeteria

The make is high noon Kosher meals, and the guy promises more variation and better quality this semester.

An article on American Jewish life

It's the economy Tipesh

Whilst the American Jewish community is boasting high-income, occupational status and educational levels there is also:

A decrease in outstanding Jewish students

“it is of significance that Jews in American colleges and universities are decreasingly attracted to science and technology and are a decreasing percentage of outstanding students. In part, this is due to the rapid increase of Asian students who have high rates of excellence.”

Significant poverty rates in parts of the community

“But the high socioeconomic status of Jews as a group masks their high income gaps. While their incomes are the second highest in the country, with 75% having incomes of more than $50,000 per year, they also have significant poverty rates. According to a study by the United Jewish Communities, 15%-20% are poor. In New York, the figure is even higher, with more than 25% living near or below the poverty line. The Jewish poor are comprised primarily of the elderly, some of whom are Holocaust survivors; immigrants from the former Soviet Union; ultra-Orthodox; and those earning minimum wage or less.”

Cost of Jewish living too high to bear

“THE COST of Jewish living has become increasingly intolerable. At least 12 years of Jewish day school education is today the norm in the Orthodox community, a cost borne by parents. Tuitions and other required fees in Modern Orthodox high schools in the New York-New Jersey metropolitan area average about $20,000 of non-tax-deductible dollars per child. At Manhattan's Ramaz High School tuition is now more than $30,000 annually. When we add the cost of synagogue membership and summer camp fees to the many other costs involved in living Jewishly, the economic realities of the Jewish-committed are far less rosy that the broader data suggest.

Nor is this an issue solely for the Orthodox. Tuition at Manhattan's Abraham Joshua Heschel School, a pluralistic Jewish day school, is very close to that of Ramaz. Especially amid the current economic situation, many parents are finding it increasingly difficult to make their financial ends meet, and those who are not fully-committed to living Jewishly are discouraged from sending their children to day schools because of the high cost. Indeed, a number of Conservative Solomon Schechter day schools have closed in recent years, and it is estimated that another six or so will likely close in the foreseeable future.”

Immigration to Israel less viable

“However, the current economic recession and the housing crisis may actually have just the opposite effect. As a start, both younger and older potential olim may be prevented from making aliya because of an inability to sell their houses at the price they intended when they planned their aliya. Not only that: The strong Israeli real estate market and the across-the-board recent price rises here mean less purchasing power on both the US and Israeli sides. Fewer of the younger olim will consider commuting to jobs in the US as a viable option because of the increasing weakness of the dollar, and seniors living on US pensions and Social Security will find aliya and living in Israel a much less viable option.”

And finally youth movements and Israel programs may too be affected

“In addition, the combined declining dollar and increasing shekel has had serious adverse impact on some of the programs which bring youth to Israel, such as the NFTY-EIE High School in Israel, the Ramah Jerusalem High School TRY program, and the many yeshivot and seminaries which comprise the post-high school Year-in-Israel program.”

Never know the dirty car artist might just pop around!!

Duh!

Acclaimed Israeli writer AB Yehoshua has an article in the British Guardian discussing everything wrong about Israel today from the nostalgic point of veiw of an old good-timer.

It's depressing but nevertheless relevant.

"Old Israelis like myself are stupefied by the scope and scale of today's corruption and the multiplying investigations. Is corruption something that has always existed here but was somehow hidden until now? Are we learning of it because our prosecutor and police are bolder and better equipped nowadays?

I do not believe that corruption is coming to light just because law enforcement is somehow better, or because citizens, like the presidential staff who accused President Katsav of sexual crimes and harassment, are more courageous. What is coming to light is a much deeper evil, a loss of values within Israeli society and its government, such as never existed before."

Read More

Coming to the Carmichael gallery of contemporary art in West Hollywood is Israeli street artist Adam Yekutieli, featured in The Forward.

The exhibition will be showing from Augaust 16th to September 14th.

I recently discovered a publication by the Steindhart Foundation: Contact.

Each Issue of the Magazine explores issues affecting the Jewish Community in a compelling way you rarely get to see.

The New issue printed this Spring, Jewish Peoplehood; What does it mean? is worth taking a look at.

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Movin' at LightSpeed!

Nearly all the articles are up from Issues 1 and 2

We also have the shemspeed radio which you can find on the side panel, or here.

AND we also have the Breaking News from the Jerusalem Post in the side panel.

Phew...