Hadassah
Letters to the Editor
Letters to the Editor: Food as Heritage and Chagrin and Anger
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Chagrin and Anger
I have not read an article that articulated my own chagrin and anger about the American response to October 7 as brilliantly as Abby Horowitz’s graphic essay “Welcome Home” in the September/October 2024 issue. My chagrin is at the screaming American students who are not directing their outrage at Hamas murderers and kidnappers, but rather at Israeli victims. My anger is at the unbelievably one-sided American news reporting, blaming the Israel Defense Forces for killing the people who invaded their country and stole their children. Thank you, Abby, for reminding me that there is a real Israel—a place that lives and fights in the real world, not the upside-down moral universe of American college campuses and news media.
Judy Stephenson
Memphis, Tenn.
Poland Recommendations
I traveled to Poland in 1982, 1984, 1986, 1991 and 2015, including visits to Auschwitz during my first and last trips. In addition to the sights mentioned by Jennifer Wolf Kam in her September/October article, “Encountering Ghosts in Poland,” I highly recommend a day trip to Oswiecim (from Krakow), which we arranged via the Auschwitz Jewish Center at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City. The day included a private tour guide for Auschwitz and Birkenau. We received a private tour of the synagogue at the Auschwitz Jewish Center and a visit to the small Jewish cemetery. We ate a delicious lunch at nearby Cafe Bergson, which was formerly the house of the last remaining Jewish resident of Oswiecim.
I also recommend visiting the New Jewish Cemetery in Krakow. It was a very poignant experience to wander through a cemetery, which was in a state of disrepair at the time, although apparently Krakow had plans to restore it.
Susan J. Levinson
New York, N.Y.
Food as Heritage
As a longtime vegetarian with more and more vegan leanings as time goes by, I particularly enjoyed Julie Wilcox’s “Stress and Your Diet” and Adeena Sussman’s “Vegetables Take Center Stage” in the September/October issue. Food has been, is and will be a large part of Jewish heritage, identity and culture. If it’s plant-based and Jewish, delicious and sustainable to boot, it can only be good for you.
Paula Zevin
Somerset, N.J.
Survival and History
Thank you, Hadassah National President Carol Ann Schwartz, for the column “Navigating Grief and Strength” (September/October issue), which made for an upbeat start to the new year. As a chapter president—again, after 55 years—facing the stresses of leadership amid a divisive social and political moment, your column summarized both the history of the Jewish people’s survival and the proud history of Hadassah. Together we will heal. Am Israel Chai!
Nancy Golin Wiadro
Naples, Fla.
Supporting Israeli Teens
In “A Kibbutz in Exile” in the July/August 2024 issue, Uriel Heilman highlights the experiences of senior evacuees. Displaced children serve as a backdrop to illustrate the hardships and chaos faced by the communities in temporary hotel housing, but the story of these youth is also worth telling.
For the last year, ELEM/Youth in Distress in Israel, a leading nonprofit that works with at-risk youth, is in these same hotels supporting teens. Building on our existing model of trauma-informed, informal therapy spaces, ELEM’s social workers and volunteers set up safe places in hotel lobbies for youth to talk, play, eat and have a rare moment to just be kids.
Liora Attias-Hadar
CEO ELEM/Youth in Distress in Israel
New York, N.Y.
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