Published Articles

Original Article Published on The Jerusalem Post

Israel got Fed Cup Europe/Africa Zone Group I action in Eilat off to a losing start on Wednesday, falling 2-1 to Turkey.

Shahar Pe’er and Julia Glushko lost their singles matches to open the day before teaming up to win the doubles encounter.

Israel will be back in action on Thursday when it faces Estonia before coming up against Croatia in its final Pool C tie on Friday.

The group winner will play-off against the winner of Pool C for a place in the World Group II playoffs in Eilat on Saturday, while the bottom-placed nation will play-off to determine relegation to Europe/ Africa Zone Group II in 2017.

The stars seemed aligned and the script already written by the time Pe’er, ranked 189th in the world, took Center Court on a sunny, warm, slightly breezy Wednesday for her evening session match against Turkey’s Ipek Soylu.

Despite Soylu’s slightly better ranking of 161, Pe’er is nine years older, has Fed Cup experience, and reached a career high of 11th in the world.

Pe’er also had the crowd on her side, with school children from Eilat filling the stands and cheering, “Let’s go Shahar, let’s go.”

Soylu got off to a quick 3-0 lead until Pe’er hit her groove, regained composure and won the first set in 50 minutes, 7-5. However, Soylu went on to win the second set 6-3 and the decisive set 6-2 to claim the match.

Israel’s No. 1 Glushko (No. 126) took the court under the lights versus Caglia Buyukackcay (142). Shouts of “El, el Yisrael” and “Let’s go Julia, let’s go!” helped Glushko get off to a 3-2 lead, but she could not sustain the rhythm in falling 7-5, 6-3.

The evening ended with the Pool C doubles match between Turkey and Israel, with Pe’er and Glushko partnering to take on Buyukakcay and Basak Eraydin.

After trading back-and-forth 7-5 sets, Israel clinched the win with 6-4 in the decisive set.

The Arkia Airlines gate and flight attendants at Ben Gurion Airport hardly realized there was a major international tennis tournament taking place in Eilat this week.

Yet, professional women tennis players from 14 countries, as well as coaches, umpires, members of the media and International Tennis Federation staff members have all congregated at the Municipal Tennis Center in Eilat, home of the Fed Cup 2016 Europe/ Africa Zone Group I tournament.

Tzipi Obziler, the Israeli captain, is a former Fed Cup player, representing Israel from 1994 to 2009. Israel’s team is coached by Sandra Wasserman, a former member of the Belgium Fed Cup team who reached a high of 48 in the WTA rankings as a player.

Obziler acknowledged that “it’s been a while, but to be a part of the Fed Cup team for the 17th year and first time as a captain means a lot to me. To hear again the national anthem, to wear again the Israeli flag on the back are very emotional things for me and I can only think about doing the best we can on and off court at any time.”

The tournament features two daily sessions through Saturday.

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by Aaron Herman

How do you you create a meaningful Israel experience for young adults with special needs? Video blogger Aaron Herman spoke with Covenant Award winner Howard Blass, Director of the Tikvah Program at Camp Ramah in New England, Tali Cohen, Director of Tikvah Vocational Services and participants about their unique Israel experience.

The Tikvah Program at Camp Ramah in New England is an eight-week overnight camping program for 60 campers with special needs that is integrated within a summer camp for 800 typically developing children. As Director, Howard manages four separate special needs programs, including a full-time overnight camp, a Vocational Training Program, a Camp Employment Program, and an Inclusion Program.

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Original Article in Jewish Ledger:

Every year, I approach Kosherfest with a healthy dose of both excitement and skepticism. How can there possibly be anything new in the world of kosher, I wonder? But there always is. And this year’s Kosherfest did not disappoint.

Kosherfest 2015 – held in the Meadowlands Exposition Center in Secaucus, New Jersey in mid-November — marked its 27th year with an event featuring 400 booths and 300 new products. The more than 6,000 who passed through the doors of the two-day represented just about every area of the kosher food industry — chefs, cookbook authors, restauranteurs, grocery and specialty store owners, buyers, distributors, caterers, representatives of summer camps, nursing homes, kosher supervision agencies. and manufacturers of products from organic chicken to mock shrimp, knishes to falafel balls, chocolates to wine and liqueurs.

Simply put — kosher is big business. According to a 2015 report by Lubicom Marketing Consulting, there are 12,350,000 kosher consumers in the United States (not all of whom are Jewish), and 205,000 kosher certified products manufactured by 11,400 kosher companies and plants. Also, Lubicom reports, 3,400 products received kosher certification in 2015 alone.

Here are some of the new products featured at Kosherfest 2015:

MAKE ROOM FOR HUMMUS
Two new brands of hummus surfaced at Kosherfest 2015. Mediterranean Chef representative, Eyal Schmerling, was giving out samples of its matbucha, pesto sauce, roasted pepper strips, cooked beets, and various hummus flavors. Schmerling boasted that his products have “fewer preservatives and a 65-day shelf life.”   Meditteranean Chef, which according to Schmerling has been a fixture in Israel for 35 years, is now based in Lincoln Park, N.J. Also new to the hummus market is Fountain of Health. Founded in 1990, Fountain of Health is just now hitting the U.S. market. With unique hummus flavors such as sesame ginger, roasted beets, caramelized onions and chipotle.

HEALTHY EATING
RC Fine foods showed off the company’s various gluten-free soup bases; and Glutzero of Helsinki, Finland featured fresh gluten-free fetuccine and other pastas. Healthy snack products on display included Amrita’s five flavors of energy bars — all raw, peanut and tree nut-free and grain and wheat free. A man sampling both a cranberry raisin and chocolate maca bar was overheard telling the Amrita rep, Alex Alam El-Din, “This is the best product I tasted in the show.” He was delighted to learn that the product is currently sold at Whole Foods. Another delicious, healthy snack product on display was Matt’s Munchies, the premium fruit snack. Based in Santa Ana, California, Matt’s Munchies comes in eight flavors.

Nancy Kalish, the gregarious owner of Pure Genius blondies and brownies – a vegan delight that is both gluten- and nut-free, said, “We launched just five weeks ago and received our OU kosher certification practically on the way to the show!” adding, “I have an unbelievably terrible sweet tooth. When I had kids, I had to find a healthy treat that tastes good.”

SPEAKING OF SWEETS
Other sweet new products include gourmet soft caramels in five flavors from Shay’s Chocolate (my personal favorite: sea salt and espresso) and chocolates by CocoArt Artisan Milk Chocolates. According to the CocoArt CEO Yoseph Schwartz, the company boasts 26 chocolate products. He thinks they’re all winners – but the one that garnered the best feedback thus far, he admits, is orange creamsicle.

L’CHAIM!
There was no shortage of wines and liquors at the show, with the countries of Argentina, Italy and Israel each manning large pavilions. Odem Mountain Winery of Golan Heights was on hand offering samples of Alfasi Cabernet Sauvignon-Merlot. Michel Murciano, owner of Hevron Heights Winery, was offering samples of various wines from his vineyards. When the Ledger asked how he planned to handle the European Union’s new policy requiring special labeling on products “made in the territories,” Murciano said, “I called the printer to make 1000 labels which say, ‘Achtung Juden” (Caution, Jews). For me, this is the same thing the Nazis did [to the Jews].”

BRINGING IN THE NEW
In addition to a slew of new products introduced by new manufacturers, many of the veteran kosher companies — like Gold’s, Gabila’s Knishes, Mansichewitz and Empire Kosher – proved that they’re still on the grow by introducing a long line of new products. Empire, for example, unveiled a brand new line of organic chickens and soups.

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Original Article in The Times Of Israel:

NEW YORK – By age four, Jason Fuchs was a TV addict. But unlike most kids, he didn’t want to just sit in front of the boob tube, he wanted to be on it.

“My parents would call out to me while I was watching, and I didn’t respond to anything. I remember pointing to the TV and saying, “I want to be in the box–the thing I was staring at,” Fuchs told The Times of Israel last week.

Back then he was too shy to talk with his father’s agent friend; he’d been taught not to speak with strangers. But a follow-up meeting three years later put Fuchs ‘in the box’ – and on the big screen.

Over the past 20 years, the former child actor has appeared in plays (“Abe Lincoln in Illinois”; “A Christmas Carol”), TV shows (“Law and Order: Criminal Intent”; “Law and Order: Special Victims Unit”; “All My Children”; “The Sopranos”) and movies (“Flipper”; “The Hebrew Hammer”; “Mafia!”). The Columbia University graduate has also written scripts, including “Ice Age 4” and “Rags.”

And it his screenwriter chops that has Fuchs, now 29, poised to become a hero for other little television-obsessed boys, with the October 8 debut of his family blockbuster, “Pan.”

Growing up, what were some of your childhood interests outside of TV, movies and acting?

My parents insisted I attend a regular school [as opposed to a performing arts school] until high school. And I never got too successful! It is harder when you are Macaulay Culkin – always working on a regular basis.

My two great loves are basketball and foreign affairs. I have always been a diehard New York Knicks basketball fan. I remember watching the Gulf War on CNN. I knew who Dick Cheney was even when I was a little kid and I had a Gulf War trading card collection.

When 9/11 took place, my father worked across the street from the Twin Towers. He saw them fall and came to get me at school that day, covered in soot. I sort of dove in to learn about the Middle East after 9/11. I wanted to understand everything.

Has this interest in the Middle East continued?

When I was 17 years old, I had an internship at GIS-Global Information System, an independent government intelligence service which gives second opinions to governments. During freshman year of college, I was their UN correspondent.

GIS is run by a brilliant Australian Gregory Copley and Israeli Yossef Bodansky, author of “Bin Laden, The Man Who Declared War on America,” which is ironically the first book I read after 9/11. Bodansky is a rock star to me – he is brilliant and kind. I still have an obsession with current affairs and the Middle East and keep up as closely as I did when I worked there.

Did this interest in Middle East Studies continue at Columbia University?

I took some Middle East courses. I studied with Rashid Khalidi [the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University]. He is a nice guy, but he didn’t like me. We did not share all the same perspectives. It is not so much a Professor Khalidi issue as a Columbia issue – there is some intolerance for a diversity of opinions and they don’t foster an atmosphere of healthy dissent.

What does Israel mean to you?

I have never been to Israel. It is very important to me, I feel a very strong connection and affinity, and I NEED very much to go at some point – sooner than later. I went to Hebrew school, and had a strong sense of yiddishkeit and appreciation for Jewish history.

I am the grandson of two Holocaust survivors (my grandfather is still alive). I am also cognizant of the threats the Jews have faced historically and am aware of how significant it is to have a national homeland like Israel whose founding ethos is “Never Again.”

So knowing that your grandparents were in the Holocaust and didn’t have an Israel to run to, it is a very powerful thing to know that such a place exists.

I also feel a strong connection with it as a lover of democracy. I like living in a democracy, I vote, I do jury duty, I think it is a good way to govern. Jewishness aside, I also feel a kinship to Israel in the same way I feel a kinship to democracies all around the world.

You sound pretty ‘connected’ Jewishly. Do you have a favorite holiday or story?

The holiday that on an emotional level I registered with has always been Passover. For me, the story of Passover is the best story in the Old Testament. It is kind of the template for every movie that I enjoy. The savior motif, the idea that there is someone destined for something special, to lead his people – that is Moses, that is the Exodus story.

You see echoes of that in Luke Skywalker, Harry Potter and in this version of the Peter Pan story. Peter is, in this telling of the story, the Chosen One. He is a messiah-like figure who is fated to do something extraordinary. He rises up from essentially, bondage – he is an orphan in a horrible orphanage – he nuns mistreat him and the other boys – and he rises up to be The Pan, the savior of Neverland.

And that’s not an original idea at all. It is a very traditional idea, one that resonates for me in some of the stories that mean the most to me, and hopefully resonates for so many people.

How did the Pan story make it to to the big screen?

When I was 9 years old, I got stuck on a Peter Pan ride with my dad, and was stuck for 20 minutes in a pirate ship. I was always a curious kid with an insane number of questions for my dad: Why is Peter Pan, Peter Pan? Why can he fly? Why do he and Hook hate each other so much? What is Neverland? Why is he there?

By the way, that’s not an un-Talmudic way to approach things for a nine year old.

What kept me motivated is when no one bought the script. I didn’t write it on spec. I was too passionate. I thought I’d pitch it and maybe someone would bite but no one did. Finally, I met with Warner Brother’s exec Sarah Schechter and she told me to do it. It is a fairy tale story within itself!

What was it like working with Hugh Jackman?

Hugh Jackman is amazing. With a movie star of that kind of measure, you don’t know what to expect. Hugh is the most normal, kind, decent human being you’d ever hope to work with. When your most famous actor is as big of a mensch as Hugh Jackman is, everyone has to be a mensch. It sets the tone for the entire crew.

What does it mean to you personally to have Pan coming out in Israel?

I love the fact it is opening in Israel. It is very meaningful that something that meant so much to me, the story I told my agent, my parents and my girlfriend – is out there for people in Israel who have no clue who I am to go and see.

You’re rumored to be writing the “Wonder Woman” script starring Gal Gadot.

Anything related to DC Comics is like working with the CIA – there is a code of silence. I have read what you have online about what my involvement with that project might be. I can only speak as a fan – I always loved comics as a kid. I am as hardcore a DC Comic fan as there is. But in terms of my involvement, I cannot comment. I think Warner Brothers has set the film “Wonder Woman” to come out in June 2017.

What do you have in the pipeline? What are you currently working on?

I recently wrote a movie script for “Break My Heart One Thousand Times,” a supernatural thriller where ghosts are part of everyday life and a TV pilot for TNT, “Black Box,” a conspiracy thrillerish TV show.

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