Memphis Jewish Federation has announced its fourteenth annual Holocaust Art and Essay Competition for Mid-South and Tennessee students in grades 6-12.
This year’s contest theme is Courage and Hope: The Holocaust Through the Eyes of a Child. Middle school students in grades 6-8 are invited to submit artwork, and high school students in grades 9-12 are invited to submit essays. Cash prizes for the top winners are made possible by the Kaethe Mela Family Memorial Fund of the Jewish Foundation of Memphis.
Students are invited to consider how children use courage and hope during the horror? How did children survive in hiding and in camps? How were children affected by their loss of education and childhood? How did children resist? Could a child’s imagination take them to a beautiful place and away from the harsh reality of living through the Holocaust?
“This annual competition serves to raise awareness of the Holocaust in both the Jewish and broader communities,” said Bluma Zuckerbrot-Finkelstein, Executive Vice President of Memphis Jewish Federation. “In our current era of rising antisemitism and rampant unfamiliarity with the Holocaust in the general community, this contest is sorely needed.”
As in previous years, all artwork entered into the competition will be displayed in the lobby of the Memphis Jewish Community Center.
Contest winners will be recognized at the 61st Annual Yom HaShoah Community Commemoration on Monday, April 17, 2023, featuring Tova Friedman. Tova is one of the youngest survivors of Auschwitz, author of The Daughter of Auschwitz, and featured in many Tik Toks known as Tova Toks telling her story.
The first-place winning essay will be published in the program booklet and the first-place winning artwork will adorn the cover of the program booklet. The winning essay will also be published in The Hebrew Watchman and this blog, and shared on social media.
Students should email their essays to HolocaustEssayMJF@gmail.com. Artwork should be dropped off at the Memphis Jewish Federation following the published guidelines including photo of artwork and attachment emailed to HolocaustArtContest@gmail.com. All entries are due by the close of business on Monday, March 6, 2023. Please include entrants’ name, grade, school, and contact information.
Launched in late 2017 under the leadership of Memphis Jewish
Federation (MJF)’s Senior Services Collaborative (SSC), the Senior Services
Directory quickly become a reliable resource for seniors and their caregivers
in the Memphis Jewish Community. Packed with information about services,
activities, and programming provided to area seniors and the important people
in their lives, the initial run of the 8-panel brochure was instantly popular.
Fast forward about two years and the SSC’s supply of 3,000 copies
of the brochure had been been depleted. Partner agencies distributing the
brochure reached out to MJF requesting more copies of this invaluable central
source of information about the robust senior programming available throughout
the Memphis Jewish community. To continue meeting this need, Memphis Jewish
Federation has recently updated and reprinted the brochure, which now more
accurately reflects the landscape of senior services and program offerings at
senior-serving agencies and local congregations.
A
large-print, glossy quad-fold brochure with a comprehensive listing of senior
services provided by the Memphis Jewish community, the Senior Services
Directory is broken down into categories such as Vital Needs, Companionship,
Transportation, and Wellness. The SSC also made this information available in
digital form at www.memphisjewishseniors.org,
which is updated as needed. Many local seniors and their caregivers have likely
received brochures mailed directly to homes, but copies are also available at
local congregations and agencies serving Jewish seniors, and at senior
independent living and assisted living facilities, geriatric medical offices,
and hospitals.
The update and reprint was funded in part by a B’nai Tzedek teen philanthropy grant and by two donors giving anonymously through Jewish Foundation of Memphis’s Needs List, a popular resource for donors looking to make a meaningful impact on philanthropic causes important to them. The office of Jewish Community Partners, the agency that operates both Memphis Jewish Federation and the Jewish Foundation of Memphis, also has copies of the brochure for distribution. Visit JCP at 6560 Poplar Avenue, inside the Memphis Jewish Community Center. We can also mail one to you. Send an email with your name and address and we’ll send a copy your way.
The Senior Services Directory is a model case-study of a
successful collaboration. Our agencies and congregations submitted information
about their respective senior services and SSC members made valuable editorial
suggestions and recommendations,” said Bluma Zuckerbrot-Finkelstein, JCP’s
Chief Strategy Officer. “It is these kinds of collaborations that move the needle
in a community.”
The SSC was formed in November 2015 in the
wake of Memphis Jewish Federation’s 2014-2015 Community Needs Assessment Study,
which identified the challenge of delivering accessible and meaningful
programming to seniors. The committee is comprised of representatives from all
agencies interfacing with Jewish seniors, congregations, retired Jewish senior
professionals, and community volunteers passionate about senior services. Since
its inception, the SSC has made significant progress not only in expanding the
menu of programs and services available to seniors, but also in ensuring that
seniors in the Memphis Jewish community are aware of the programming that
exists.
Lives Restarted, a compelling documentary, shares the stories, faces and voices of Holocaust survivors reflecting on their journeys from liberation to freedom in America. The 38-minute documentary is now available in the United States for viewing and digital download through Amazon Prime Video.
Unlike previous Holocaust films, Lives Restarted focuses on what happened to survivors after World War II. Most lost families, homes, and financial resources. Many were sick or malnourished. Lives Restarted traces their stories of immigrating to the U.S. It documents how they survived and how they overcame racism, language, financial, educational and other barriers to become productive and successful Americans.
The national release via Amazon Prime follows internationally recognized Holocaust Remembrance Day earlier this month, which marked the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. It comes amid contentious debates in the U.S. and many countries around the world about how best to address immigration and refugees seeking sanctuary and opportunity.
Lives Restarted resulted from an odd-couple collaboration in Memphis, Tennessee. The director is Waheed AlQawasmi, 32. The executive producer is Jerry Ehrlich, 68. One was born in Amman, Jordan; the other in Atlanta, Georgia. One grew up never learning about the Holocaust. The other’s mother, who survived nine concentration camps, was Anne Frank’s neighbor.
Their film, which was initially commissioned by Jewish Community Partners of Memphis, tracks the lives of Holocaust survivors based on interviews of five living survivors and six children of survivors. “I had a dream. And the dream was in English,” said survivor Ted Winestone, proudly. “And that’s when I knew I was American.”
“I was born and raised in Amman, Jordan until I was thirteen years old. In school, we were taught about many aspects of World War II, except for the Holocaust,” said AlQawasmi.
“Imagine my surprise when I immigrated to the U.S. in 2000, enrolled in high school, and one of our first chapters in world history was about the Holocaust.”
“As they discussed their experiences, many survivors said, ‘never forget.’ Unfortunately, hate still exists in this world,” he said. “So now, more than ever, we truly need to ‘never forget.’”
This year’s second prize-winning entry in Memphis Jewish Federation’s 10th Annual Holocaust Essay contest was written by Christian Brothers High School 12th Grader Sloan McHugh. The first prize winner will read their eassy at this year’s Yom HaShoah, which will be held Thursday, May 2, 6:30 PM at the MJCC. The text will be published here after the program.
The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising was a
powerful symbol of Jewish resistance during and after World War Two. The Warsaw
Ghetto was a Jewish “housing” district in the Polish city of Warsaw where up to
400,000 Jews were kept by the Nazis. The armed resistance was led by Mordecai
Anielewicz and the equally important written resistance was lead by Emanuel Ringelblum. Their actions and words showed the
world that Jewish culture will persevere against hate, violence and tyranny.
Life in the crowded ghetto was
next to impossible for the Jewish citizens imprisoned there, often confined to
cramped rooms with eight to ten other people. Jews shipped into Warsaw were at
a severe disadvantage as they were only allowed to bring the bare minimum with
them, usually just bedsheets and a single change of clothes. Food and supplies
were deliberately limited by the Nazis which lead to twenty percent of the
population dying in the first year. The Jews remained sequestered, unable to
leave or gather supplies from outside of their country. With no aid, and little
means to help themselves, tensions grew and kindled the flames of resistance.
The armed resistance is often the main focus of the
narrative surrounding the ghetto. While less of a spectacle when compared to
the physical uprising, the written work of Emanuel Ringelblum was equally
significant. Ringelblum, a history teacher in Jewish schools, was deeply
involved in the Jewish community inside the ghetto and was responsible for the
creation of the Oneg Shabbat Archive. In 1930 he became an employee of the
Joint Distribution Committee and he was sent to Zbaszyn, his first experience
of the German attack on Jews and Poles.
This lead him to create a network
of soup kitchens that served tens of thousands of Jews that were being held
captive in Warsaw. In addition to these philanthropic activities, Ringelblum
created an ungrounded system to document the way Jews in Warsaw were being
treated and how they lived before, during, and after the uprising. This group
of documents, and his personal diary, was called the Oneg Shabbat Archive which
translates in Hebrew to “Sabbath delight”. All items used in everyday Jewish
life were collected and saved, including German pamphlets and propaganda. Every
single piece that went into the archive crossed Ringelblum’s desk. Daily,
weekly, and monthly summaries were included. Luckily for Ringelblum, Germans
took little interest in activities of the Jews
The Jewish citizens risked their
lives to keep their story alive and resist Nazi occupation and oppression. Although
Jews in Germany and surrounding areas had been stripped of everything they
owned in a previous life, the Nazis were not able to strip them of their honor
and their pride. The uprising sent a powerful message to the entire world: the
Jewish community had not given up hope. They remained strongly rooted in their
own beliefs and did not falter in the face of oppression And for that, the Jews
and their way of life survived.
95-year-old Warren Kramer, pictured above in his youth with his parents and grandparents, spends the colder half of each year in Memphis with his daughter, Adina Samberg, and her family, living in New York City with his other daughter Evelyn Moskowitz for the spring and summer months.
Jewish Community
Partners recently had the privilege to sit with Warren and his friends in the
Senior Lunch Bunch, who gather on weekdays at the Memphis Jewish Community
Center for the Memphis Jewish Federation-funded Scheidt-Hohenberg Hot Meal
Program.
With Federation’s Yom HaShoah Commemoration coming up on May 2, we wanted to talk with Warren before he left Memphis for New York, to hear first-hand his story that begins with escaping the Holocaust by way of the Kindertransport. Here is his story in his words.
I was born in Nuremberg, Germany June 9, 1924. Luckily, I
got out on the Kindertransport, to England five weeks before the war. When I
got to England, I didn’t know where to go. I had two years of high school English
and I had a pocket dictionary. Any word I didn’t know I would look up.
There was a refugee committee representative at the railroad
station who called a cab from a cabstand, put a tag on me, and told the driver
“take this boy to this address. The lady there will pay his fare.”
I didn’t know the people, a Jewish family. I was 15. This
was five weeks before the war and two days before Germany invaded Poland. Soon,
all the schools were evacuated from London. They expected bombing. So all the
schools closed, and I was evacuated again.
It was English kids too, not just refugees. So, we went to
the countryside, didn’t know where we were going, on a train. They took about a
million and a half children that day. All the cities, big cities, a big
operation. The train station was full of parents and kids, like summer camp.
We ended up in a place called Ealy, fifteen miles from Cambridge.
They took us around the little town of 10,000. No Jews living there. When I got
to the house, I remember it was a Friday, I said right away to the lady of the
house: “I want you to know I’m Jewish.” I knew nobody was Jewish living there.
She said: “As long as you believe in God, I have no problem.” Wonderful people.
They were very poor. They were very kind. So, they were my
family. After the war we stayed in touch. My wife and I visited their children,
because the parents passed away. But they took care of me. One of their
daughters wrote my parents a letter. She said she considered me like their
brother. I was accepted in the family. I stayed in England 8 years, without my
parents.
I learned printing at the school there, and when I learned
that I liked that, it became my occupation. I got a job in Cambridge, for two
years I worked in the printing press. First I commuted by train, a twenty
minute train ride. Then I wanted to take some night classes in Cambridge so I
moved there, staying with a man and wife. That was okay, but my English family
was still back in Ealy. So, sometimes weekends I would go and spend with them.
That was my family.
Then after working two years I joined the British Army, in
1943. I was 19 years old. As I was still a German citizen, the British Army did
not make us citizens. They did not send me out of England, because I was a
danger, I was still a German citizen.
I was in the English Army four years. For two years, I
worked in vehicle maintenance. When they came from the factory they were stored
in a big park, 2,000 vehicles, all kinds of makes. They would requisition
fifteen of these trucks, they needed this or that. Before they went out, my job
was to change the oil, check the tires.
In October, we had to go around and drain the water from the
radiators, so they wouldn’t freeze. Some of the taps had rusted and water
wouldn’t come out, so we had to poke a wire. And then in the spring, we had to
fill them up again. I did that for two years.
Then for two years I worked in the office and did the
payroll. Three hundred men I had to pay every week in cash. It felt good to
contribute to the war effort. That’s all I wanted to do.
The war ended in 1945 but we weren’t discharged at the same
time. They went according to two criteria; age and service. The older ones got
out first, and the ones who served the longest got out. I had to stay two more
years. In the meantime the war ended, my parents were released and they wanted
to come to America.
My parents had been sent to Theresienstadt, in
Czechoslovakia (now Czech Republic) which wasn’t an extermination camp. It was
like a work camp. My grandmother went with them and she was too old to work and
was sent to Auschwitz. My father worked in the office, my mother in the
kitchen.
When they were released, there were 37 survivors from
Nuremberg in that camp. A friend of mine that was there got himself to
Nuremberg where we used to live and he arranged for a Jewish nursing home there
to be made into apartments for those survivors. My parents lived there for
about a year. They had their own apartment, their home. It was not bad, but it
wasn’t great.
My father had an interesting job in the American Zone for an
organization that was called Denazification. Any German that wanted to work for
the Americans, they investigated their background to see how bad they were and
if they were bad they were rejected because the Americans didn’t want them.
Meanwhile, somebody from headquarters came to inspect my
books and said I was doing a good job and asked if I would consider staying in
the army. I applied for British citizenship, but never heard anything and forgot
about it. All of a sudden they said: “We want you in London about your
citizenship.” I didn’t want it anymore.
I got there, and met five or six guys, all officers sitting
and dressed properly, very official. And I wanted to tell them before they
started that I don’t want it anymore, I want to go to America. So I said: “May
I say something?”
“You speak when we tell you to speak!” That’s the army. Okay, whatever. So they went through the whole thing and they said: “Do you promise to stay in the country with all your possessions for at least six months” and I said no. “We worked so hard. We invested in your background for months,” and everything. They really got mad.
A stock photo of typical British Army officers of the era.
I was in touch with my parents who had come to America
already, and when I was discharged from the army in 1947, I went to America. New
York.
The British government had a policy. Any non-citizen who
serves in the military, they arrange free transportation to any country they
want to go to. Not only was it free, it was arranged. I got a letter I have to
report to a boat near London in uniform. Upstairs was first class, downstairs
we slept in hammocks. There were a lot of Canadians, going back home. This boat
went to Halifax, Nova Scotia. It took five days. A British Army officer came on
board and handed me a railroad ticket to New York. Arranged, paid for, and
everything.
I reunited with my family in New York, and as my parents
were talking to me they thought I was still 15, because of the years that had
passed. As we’re talking, I say “I’m not 15 anymore.”
So, we live there for seven years and then at age 30 I get married and my wife and I live in New York. I got a job in printing in New York. Incidentally, because of working in Cambridge for two years, I get a pension from them. A government pension. I still get it, with a cost of living increase. Not that much.
Warren married Elsbeth seven years after arriving in New York.
I live in Memphis only six months out of the year. Eight or
nine years ago I started coming to Memphis for six months. I like the JCC very
much here. The lunches, the people. In New York, completely different. No JCC I
go to. But, I like in New York getting around by public transportation. Visit my
friends. I don’t have that in Memphis. Here, they don’t walk. They walk to the
car here.
During the chaos of the Second World War, a Japanese diplomat working in Lithuania concocted a desperate plan to save as many Jews as he could, ultimately securing the safety of some 6,000 Jewish refugees. A powerful film depicting this important but lesser-known story will have its Tennessee premiere at an upcoming event at Malco’s Paradiso Cinema, co-sponsored by Temple Israel, Jewish Community Partners, Japan-America Society of Tennessee, Inc., and the City of Memphis. The screening is part of Japan-Tennessee Week celebrations in Memphis.
Persona Non Grata: The Story of Chiune Sugihara will be screened Thursday, September 27, at 6:30 P.M., at Malco’s Paradiso Cinema, after a brief program featuring Temple Israel Rabbi Micah Greenstein and Japanese Consul-General Kobayashi.
Risking not only his prestigious job but also his family’s very lives, Vice Counsel Chiune Sugihara ignored restrictions enacted by his government and issued visas to an estimated 6,000 Jews, allowing them to flee the Nazi occupation of Eastern Europe to Japanese territory, and on to freedom.
Vice Counsel Chiune Sugihara poses in his Lithuanian office in the late 1930s or early 40s.
“While serving in Lithuania in 1939-1940, a Japanese diplomat, Chiune “Senpo” Sugihara made a vitally important decision, even at the risk of losing his job, to save the lives of more than 6,000 Jewish people,” marveled Japanese Counsel-General Kobayashi, who will offer thoughts in a short appearance before the screening of the film. “As a fellow Japanese diplomat, and even more so as a human being, I myself am deeply moved, inspired, and encouraged by his humanitarian beliefs and actions. I am looking forward to viewing this film together with new friends in Memphis.”
Sugihara hand-wrote visas, spending 18–20 hours a day on them and producing a month’s worth of visas each day, until he was forced to leave his post before the consulate was shuttered in 1940. By then he had granted thousands of visas to Jews, many of whom were heads of households and legally permitted to take their families with them. According to witnesses, he was still writing visas as he traveled from his hotel and after boarding the train, throwing visas into the crowd of desperate refugees from the train’s window as it pulled away.
In 1985, the State of Israel honored Sugihara as one of the Righteous Among the Nations for his actions. He is the only Japanese national be so honored.
“In an age of bad stories and even fewer role models, the unbelievable story of Sugihara is both inspiring and reassuring,” said Rabbi Greenstein. “This Japanese diplomat saved thousands of Jewish strangers from death even when his country was an ally of the Nazis. He exceeded Oskar Schindler’s daring deeds but unlike Schindler, went unnoticed until now. Temple is honored to co-host the movie premier of Sugihara’s life as the kickoff to Japan-Tennessee week in Memphis. Just as we welcome guests into the Sukkah for our fall festival, so do we warmly welcome dignitaries, the Japanese-American community, and the entire community to Temple for this historic evening.”
Laura Linder, President and CEO of Jewish Community Partners, sees the event as a wonderful example of community collaboration, not only within the Memphis Jewish community, but across cultures.
“This event was brought to our attention by long-time supporter Arnold Perl,” said Linder. “Through his deep and meaningful connections to the nation, government, and people of Japan, as well as his decades-long relationships with both Temple Israel and JCP, he was able to connect these disparate groups and create a deeply meaningful event for Memphis, and Jewish and Japanese/Japanese-American Memphians in particular.”
Roger Brooks, President and CEO, Facing History and Ourselves
By Gila Golder
Laura Linder, President and CEO of Jewish Community Partners (JCP), announced this week that the Memphis Jewish community is invited to attend Memphis Jewish Federation’s 56th annual Yom HaShoah observance, featuring Roger Brooks, President and CEO of Facing History and Ourselves. The program will take place on Thursday, April 12 at 6:30 pm at the Memphis Jewish Community Center (MJCC). Doors will open at 6:00 pm.
The event will honor Holocaust survivors living among us, remember those we have lost, and celebrate their legacy. The program will include the traditional candle lighting ceremony in memory of the six million Jews who perished in the Shoah, as well as special prayers, readings and songs. The presentation of colors will be made by the Harry Washer Post no. 121 of the Jewish War Veterans of the USA. Teens from BBYO will make a brief presentation at the beginning of the ceremony.
Musical elements will be highlighted in this year’s program. Rabbi Cantor David Julian of Or Chadash Conservative Synagogue will lead the singing of the national anthem. Rabbi Cantor John Kaplan, Cantor Emeritus of Temple Israel and current spiritual leader of Congregation B’nai Israel in Jackson, TN, will join Cantor Ricky Kampf of Baron Hirsch Congregation in the singing of a musical selection. Cantor Aryeh Samberg of Anshei Sphard-Beth El Emeth Congregation will chant the El Maleh Rachamim. Cantorial Soloist Abbie Strauss of Temple Israel will lead the singing of Hatikvah, Israel’s national anthem. Pianist Claire Julian and violinist Diane Zelickman Cohen will play a musical interlude from Schindler’s List.
Rabbi Binyamin Lehrfield of Baron Hirsch Congregation will offer a closing benediction.
This year’s keynote program is a presentation by Roger Brooks on a collection of photographs of the Lodz Ghetto taken in secret by Polish Jewish photographer Henryk Ross. Charged by the Nazis to take propaganda photos in the ghetto, Ross risked his life to capture the miseries of ghetto life as it really was. Dr. Brooks will show a selection of these photos and examine what they tell us about the Lodz Ghetto specifically and the Holocaust in general.
Dr. Brooks joined Facing History and Ourselves in 2014. Prior to that, he served as the Elie Wiesel Professor in the department of Religious Studies at Connecticut College. He has a longstanding partnership with the Holocaust Education Foundation at Northwestern University, and received its Distinguished Achievement Award in 2014. An expert in Holocaust studies and early rabbinic culture, he is author or editor of six books and numerous articles.
This year’s commemoration is chaired by Elaine Stegman, a second generation survivor, longtime member of Memphis Jewish Federation’s Holocaust Memorial Committee, and a previous chair of the committee. She will serve as emcee for the program.
As in previous years, the first place winner of Memphis Jewish Federation’s annual Holocaust art contest will have his artwork featured prominently on the cover of the program booklet. The first place winner of the essay contest will read her essay aloud during the program.
Open to all students in Tennessee and the Mid-South, this year’s art and essay contest elicited over 100 submissions from middle school and high school students, including some from Fayetteville and Chattanooga. Entries came in from a diverse group of students from public schools, Jewish day schools, and private schools not affiliated with the Jewish community. The theme of this year’s contest was “Remembering the Jews of Lodz: Jewish Life and the Struggle to Survive.”
The first-place essay was written by Batya Bosin, a 12th grade student at Goldie Margolin School for Girls. Second place went to Rakhel Finkelstein, a 9th grade student at Goldie Margolin School for Girls. Alexandra Nabity, an 11th grade student at Collierville High School, and Rina Soffer, an 11th grade student at Goldie Margolin School for Girls, each received honorable mention awards.
Noah Broadway, an 8th grade student at Snowden School, was the first place winner of the art contest. Second place was declared a tie between 7th grade student Kathy Lam and 8th grade student Anisa Shank, both of Colonial Middle School. Third place was awarded to Noah Sandler, an 8th grade student at Bornblum Jewish Community School. Briana Ashmore, 8th grade student at Colonial Middle School, received an honorable mention award. All artwork submissions will be on display in the MJCC lobby during the week before the Yom HaShoah observance, in an exhibit curated by local artist Guyla Wanderman.
Memphis Jewish Federation will honor Jennifer Shiberou, art teacher at Colonial Middle School, for her annual participation in the art contest for middle school students. Ms. Shiberou designs lesson plans every year according to the theme of the Holocaust art contest and challenges her students to delve into a complex exploration of the theme in their artwork submissions.
Winners of the art and essay contest will be awarded cash prizes in a separate ceremony immediately following the Yom HaShoah observance.
This year’s art and essay contest is sponsored by the Memphis Commissioners of the Tennessee Holocaust Commission and their spouses: Jack and Marilyn Belz, Allen and Eileen Exelbierd, Jan and Andy Groveman, Josh and Joanna Lipman, and Leonid and Friderica Saharovici.
Amidst photos from the Living On exhibit of Memphis-area survivors, both living and deceased, Holocaust survivors Diana Bondar, Miriam Cherny, Ruth Diamond, Jeannine Paul, Friderica Saharovici, and Freida Weinreich will participate in the candle lighting ceremony in memory of the six million Jews who perished in the Shoah. Shoshana Cenker, a third generation survivor and member of MJF’s Holocaust Memorial Committee, will read biographies of each survivor as the flames are lit.
Holocaust survivor Sam Weinreich will sing the Ghetto Song, and Ted Winestone will chant the Tehillim (Psalms) and lead the audience in recitation of the Kaddish. In keeping with this year’s focus on Lodz, Mr. Weinreich, a survivor of the Lodz Ghetto, spoke at a special program in March hosted by JCP.
The annual Yom HaShoah observance is sponsored by Memphis Jewish Federation and coordinated and hosted by its Holocaust Memorial Committee. It is co-sponsored by the Memphis Jewish Community Center and supported by Anshei-Sphard-Beth El Emeth Congregation, Baron Hirsch Congregation, Beth Sholom Synagogue, Chabad Lubavitch of TN, Facing History & Ourselves, Or Chadash Conservative Synagogue, Temple Israel, and Young Israel of Memphis.
For more information about the program, please contact Bluma Zuckerbrot-Finkelstein at the Federation office, 767-7100, or at bzuckerbrot-finkelstein@jcpmemphis.org.
Washington – The Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA) today hailed Congress for bolstering nonprofit security funding from $25 million to $60 million, and for doubling assistance for Holocaust survivors from $2.5 million to $5 million in the pending spending package for fiscal year 2018.
Last night, Congress released the text of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018 (“the Omnibus Bill”). Its passage, widely expected by Friday night, will keep the government operating for the remainder of the fiscal year. Included in the bill are increased allocations for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Nonprofit Security Grant Program (NSGP) and the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) Administration for Community Living’s Holocaust Survivor Assistance Program, which bolster the social services work and security efforts of Jewish Federations.
Additionally, JFNA applauds the decision to provide $120 million for the Emergency Food and Shelter Program; to provide the U.S. State Department’s Office of the Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism with at least $1 million for programs to combat anti-Semitism abroad; to provide funding for the U.S. State Department’s Special Envoy for Holocaust Issues; and to preserve the critical Johnson Amendment, which prohibits charities from participating in political campaigns for public office.
According to assessments by the nation’s leading counterterrorism experts, including the FBI, DHS, and the National Counterterrorism Center, nonprofits generally, and Jewish communal institutions specifically, have been the victims of a growing number of violent attacks. For nearly a decade, JFNA has led the effort to secure funding for NSGP and to assist Jewish agencies in applying for NSGP grants. The funding will continue to help nonprofits acquire and install physical security enhancements and access training intended to deter, detect, and mitigate the consequences of terrorists and extremist threats.
“At a time when anti-Semitism is at an alarming high, this $60 million in new funding will provide critical resources to enhance the physical security of the nonprofit sector that helps to supplement the work of local and federal law enforcement to keep our communities safe,” said William Daroff, senior vice president for public policy and director of the Washington office of JFNA. “We applaud leaders of the key Homeland Security and Appropriations Committees for recognizing the merits of the program and increasing the program’s funding level this year, and for continually championing these all-important security grants. We also thank our communal partners at the Orthodox Union, Agudath Israel, and Jewish Community Relations Councils and Federations across the nation.”
JFNA also commends Congress for doubling funding for Holocaust survivor care to $5 million. The Holocaust Survivor Assistance Program is a public-private partnership between the DHHS Administration for Community Living, JFNA’s Center for Advancing Holocaust Survivor Care, and community-based health and supportive services providers to better address the unique needs of the country’s aging Holocaust survivor population.
The new funds will allow providers to serve twice as many survivors and family caregivers as well as train twice as many staff; conduct greater research in and develop person-centered, trauma-informed (PCTI) care materials, tools, and resources; provide more robust technical assistance, curriculum, and opportunities to train the Aging Services Network in PCTI care; and establish private sector partnerships to help address food insecurity and the emergency financial assistance needs of low-income Holocaust survivors. To learn more, visit https://jewishfederations.org/holocaust-survivor-care.
“There are approximately 100,000 Holocaust survivors living in the United States today, with an estimated 30,000 living in poverty,” said Daroff. “By doubling funding levels to $5 million, the program now will be able to provide immediate support to ensure that Holocaust survivors are able to live in dignity and comfort for the remainder of their lives.”
While Memphis Celebrates Israel at 70 this spring, Memphis Jewish Federation is offering programs that honor an earlier, darker chapter of Jewish history- the Holocaust.
Last year’s winning art entry, but Colonial Middle School student Celeste Rodriguez.
2018 Holocaust Art & Essay Contest
Memphis middle and high school students have submitted their entries for this year’s Holocaust Art & Essay Contest, competing to create written and visual works that best reflect the theme Remembering the Jews of Lodz: Jewish Life & the Struggle to Survive.
Students were asked to explore the vibrant Jewish life that existed in Lodz before the war or examine the struggle to survive in the Lodz Ghetto.
We offered a few guiding questions to help lead the students to breakthroughs of their own understanding of European Jewish life before, during, and immediately after the Shoah. What was Jewish life in Lodz like before the war? In what ways was Lodz a vibrant center of Jewish culture? How did the Lodz Ghetto differ from other Nazi ghettos? Given the harsh realities of life in the ghetto, how did the starving, desperate Jewish prisoners cope? What strategies did they employ in attempting to survive, physically and spiritually? How did Jewish culture express itself in the Lodz Ghetto?
Community Conversation with Memphis Lodz Ghetto Survivor Sam Weinreich
Mr. Sam Weinreich shares his story Sunday, March 18, 10:00 A.M., at Anshei Sphard-Beth El Emeth Congregation. A founding member of Memphis Jewish Federation’s Holocaust Memorial Committee and veteran participant in our annual Yom HaShoah observance, Mr. Weinreich suffered under Nazi occupation for six years, including detention in the Lodz Ghetto and transport to Auschwitz. He is the sole survivor of his family.
56th Annual Yom HaShoah Observance
Roger Brooks, President & CEO of Facing History & Ourselves, will give the keynote presentation at this year’s event, examining clandestine photographs of the Lodz Ghetto taken by Polish Jewish photographer Henryk Ross. Hired to take propaganda photos of the Lodz Ghetto, Mr. Ross secretly captured the horrific and very human daily lives of the Jews sealed into the ghetto.
Mr. Brooks is a renowned educator, scholar, and leader, and an expert on the Henryk Ross collection.
The community observance will be held this year on Thursday, April 12, 6:30 P.M. at the Memphis Jewish Community Center.
Below: One of thousands of images captured by Henryk Ross in the Lodz Ghetto.
While Memphis Celebrates Israel at 70 this spring, Memphis Jewish Federation is offering programs that honor an earlier, darker chapter of Jewish history- the Holocaust.
Last year’s winning art entry, but Colonial Middle School student Celeste Rodriguez.
2018 Holocaust Art & Essay Contest
Memphis middle and high school students have submitted their entries for this year’s Holocaust Art & Essay Contest, competing to create written and visual works that best reflect the theme Remembering the Jews of Lodz: Jewish Life & the Struggle to Survive.
Students were asked to explore the vibrant Jewish life that existed in Lodz before the war or examine the struggle to survive in the Lodz Ghetto.
We offered a few guiding questions to help lead the students to breakthroughs of their own understanding of European Jewish life before, during, and immediately after the Shoah. What was Jewish life in Lodz like before the war? In what ways was Lodz a vibrant center of Jewish culture? How did the Lodz Ghetto differ from other Nazi ghettos? Given the harsh realities of life in the ghetto, how did the starving, desperate Jewish prisoners cope? What strategies did they employ in attempting to survive, physically and spiritually? How did Jewish culture express itself in the Lodz Ghetto?
Community Conversation with Memphis Lodz Ghetto Survivor Sam Weinreich
Mr. Sam Weinreich shares his story Sunday, March 18, 10:00 A.M., at Anshei Sphard-Beth El Emeth Congregation. A founding member of Memphis Jewish Federation’s Holocaust Memorial Committee and veteran participant in our annual Yom HaShoah observance, Mr. Weinreich suffered under Nazi occupation for six years, including detention in the Lodz Ghetto and transport to Auschwitz. He is the sole survivor of his family.
56th Annual Yom HaShoah Observance
Roger Brooks, President & CEO of Facing History & Ourselves, will give the keynote presentation at this year’s event, examining clandestine photographs of the Lodz Ghetto taken by Polish Jewish photographer Henryk Ross. Hired to take propaganda photos of the Lodz Ghetto, Mr. Ross secretly captured the horrific and very human daily lives of the Jews sealed into the ghetto.
Mr. Brooks is a renowned educator, scholar, and leader, and an expert on the Henryk Ross collection.
The community observance will be held this year on Thursday, April 12, 6:30 P.M. at the Memphis Jewish Community Center.
Below: One of thousands of images captured by Henryk Ross in the Lodz Ghetto.
emcee for the program.
victims of a growing number of violent attacks. For nearly a decade, JFNA has led the effort to secure funding for NSGP and to assist Jewish agencies in applying for NSGP grants. The funding will continue to help nonprofits acquire and install physical security enhancements and access training intended to deter, detect, and mitigate the consequences of terrorists and extremist threats.
Community Conversation with Memphis Lodz Ghetto Survivor Sam Weinreich