Words cannot do justice for what Antarctica looks like. Even photographic images and film can only give an idea. The magnitude and magnificence of a world of, ice, rock, and snow, some of it can be captured in an image. But what of the wind that bites into you regardless of how many layers you may be wearing – as you stand on the deck late at night while the ship breaks through pack ice. You hear the ‘crunch, crunch, crunch,’ and deep down you know you are secretly thinking, what if?

Antarctica is not a place where humans belong. G-d did not intend for us to be there and it is virtually impossible to survive for any lengthy period of time without product and support form off the continent. Perhaps this is a good thing? Antarctica is an incredibly fragile place and it would not take long for man to destroy it. Thankfully, today as people visit, there are many protocols and practices in place to preserve Antarctica’s ecosystem.

I feel blessed to have had the opportunity to experience the grandeur of Antarctica with over hundred fascinating people. I was part of a group of mostly Australian Entrepreneurs who gathered together to converse in, ‘how to get to the future first.’ Together, we brain stormed ideas of what the future would look like and what we collectively, and individually, could, and would do about it.

For me, one of my concerns prior to the trip was how I would keep kosher on the boat. I was sure there would be plenty of good food, but how much of it would I be able to eat. I brought along some energy bars, instant soups, oatmeal, as well as a box of matzo, just in case.

I figured I’d be able to sort something out with the chef when I got on the cruise. Nowadays, anyone working with sophisticated western tourists are usually inundated with all the diets and eating disorders we have: vegetarian, vegan, ovo- lacto-pesco phsycotarian, gluten free, Raw, paleo, low carb, diabetic, and in my case kosher. The challenge I find though with using the term kosher, is that I have come across countless interpretations of its meaning. The most common being, ‘kosher food is food blessed by a rabbi.’ Now I wish it was this simple. I being a rabbi, would never have a problem with food anywhere in the world and could happily order anything on the menu and bless it myself. However, kosher is far more complicated than this.

I don’t want to get into a long discourse now about what is, and what is not Kosher, instead, I prefer to speak about how I kept kosher on a boat in Antarctica. For starters, it was a lot easier then I had thought it would be. When I got on the boat and spoke with the head waiter Narandra, he seemed already versed in many aspects of kosher. He began showing me the kosher certifying symbols on many of the food products. Turns out, the company gets almost all their food in a container shipped from Miami. Anyone familiar with American kosher food products will know that a large percentage of available product is certified kosher. Things like peanut butter, jams, bolted milk, cereals, biscuits, and so on, are often kosher. Thus it was easy for me to find things to eat. Even the ice cream which was served every night was kosher. And strange as it were, and as cold as I was for some reason I still enjoyed eating the ice cream.

Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis was appointed to the role of Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth following the retirement of Lord Jonathan Sacks in September 2013. We learn from a recent  ‘Australian Jewish News’ that Chief Rabbi Mirvis is currently making his first trip to Australia for 12 days, with visits to Perth, Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne. Then he travels to New Zealand to visit Auckland and Wellington.

In Perth he is speaking at Perth Hebrew Congregation on his vision for the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth.

In Sydney he is speaking at Central Synagogue, South Head Synagogue, the Jewish Learning Centre in North Bondi and at North Shore Synagogue and at various schools (Masada, Moriah, Mt Sinai and Kesser Torah Colleges), delivering an address for the 65^thanniversary of Bnei Akiva and another at a public meeting at National Council of Jewish Women of Australia’s Fanny Reading House.

In Canberra he will attend the inauguration of the ACT Jewish community’s new Rabbi Alon Meltzer.

In Melbourne he visits Caulfield Hebrew Congregation, St Kilda Synagogue, Blake Street Hebrew Congregation, Mizrachi and Central Shule, as well as speaking at Mount Scopus Memorial College, Leibler Yavneh College and Bnei Akiva.

After travelling to New Zealand he will visit Wellington and Auckland to attend Rabbi Netanel Friedler’s inauguration at Auckland Hebrew Congregation on 1^st December.

Adelaide Hebrew Congregation is older than ALL of the above-mentioned Australian and New Zealand congregations of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth included in the list above. We were formed in 1848 by settlers arriving from England in the earliest ships arriving in South Australia. The customs and rituals, many of them written in detail and adopted by our congregation were based on those of Duke’s Place Synagogue in London from which many of the settlers and merchants came. These traditions are Ashkenazi, from Poland, and include various London shul rituals AHC has maintained for over 166 years. Our parade rituals honouring Chatan Torah and Chatan Bereishit, our pledges to charity at an aliya to the Torah, the prayer for the Queen and many other rituals and customs of our synagogue continue, probably unchanged, intriguing visitors, to this day.

At the time we moved to our new location in Glenside, the congregation’s previous Adelaide synagogue building, which was used for over 140 years, was the oldest continuously used synagogue in the southern hemisphere.

Our first qualified minister (and a Shakespearean scholar), Reverend Abraham Tobias Boas, served 50 years and was finally ordained as a Rabbi at his retirement, during a previous tour by a Chief Rabbi of the Commonwealth; the Chief Rabbi noted that Rabbi Boas was the longest serving Jewish minister in the Commonwealth. Other past AHC Rabbis, including Rabbi Philip Heilbrunn and then Rabbi Baruch Davis (who now serves at Chigwell and Hainault synagogue in Essex) maintained our strong links with these traditions.

Although we are a tiny community, we are proud of our heritage and look forward to learning of the new vision of the Chief Rabbi of the Commonwealth for all the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth.

We remain, like a diamond in the sand, on some distant shore, waiting to be discovered again.

(This is a guest post by a member of the Adelaide Hebrew Congregation)

You can read about Chief Rabbi Mirvis here: http://www.chiefrabbi.org/

“Israel Needs Your Help”

Around the world anti-Semites are boycotting Israeli products. In Israel, rocket sirens disrupt work, negatively affecting businesses. Along the borders, soldiers continue to risk their life’s to fight terror and keep our land safe from those who wish to destroy us. Israel will survive this ordeal as it has with Gods help time and time again. Israel will be victorious. Israel will defeat her enemies. You ask, ‘what can you do?’ because you want to help. You can instantly make the path smother for those who fight and struggle.

Do you part to help.

THE CHALLENGE
1. Purchase a bottle of Israeli wine to use on Rosh Hashana.
2. Post a photo of the bottle, or you and the bottle together.
3. Nominate 3-5 people to take the challenge.

You have until September 24, 2014 to post a photo of the Israeli bottle of wine you are committing to drink on the Jewish New Year

Or else….

If you don’t buy a bottle of Israeli wine, you must give $18 to Tzedakah to one of the three following charities. We chose these charities because they are not as well known as some of the larger ones. The listed three charities are doing amazing work and every small contribution makes a noticeable difference.

LEKET Feed a Hungry Child

Serving as the country’s National Food Bank and largest food rescue network, Leket Israel works to alleviate the problem of nutritional insecurity amongst the growing numbers of Israel’s poor. In 2013, with the help of over 50,000 volunteers, Leket Israel rescued and distributed 25 million lbs of produce andperishable goods, 1 million prepared meals, and 1.1 million (8,000/school day) volunteer prepared sandwiches to underprivileged children. Food, that would have otherwise gone to waste, was redistributed to hundreds of nonprofit partners caring for the needy. Leket Israel offers nutrition education, capacity building, and food safety projects to further assist our partners.

ISRAEL FREE LOAN Assist an Israeli Business

Communities throughout the country have been under rocket attack. Most prevalent, this has hit home for small businesses in the south, which have been under constant fire, causing businesses to work only part-time or close for the time being. These small businesses serve as the sole source of livelihood for the families who own them. The donations we receive from you will enable us to respond quickly and help them. In addition, every donation to IFLA is leveraged, as it is recycled and results in a growing “helping value” over time.

YASHAR LACHAYAL Help a Soldier

Yashar LaChayal brings soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces what they need when they need it. Yashar LaChayal has developed relationships with IDF commanders around the country, and therefore they are quick to contact our representatives when their units or individual soldiers are in need of assistance. But we do not wait to hear from them! Yashar LaChayal representatives are on the move, visiting IDF bases throughout Israel, on the borders and in remote locations, to see what the actual needs of our soldiers are. Once we determine what is lacking, we set out to fill the gap.

CLICK HERE FOR FACEBOOK EVENT

Dear Friends,

Usually, I don’t get involved with writing about political situations but with everything going on I thought I should share a few thoughts…

One of the most frustrating things in life is trying to reason logic with someone who is emotionally attached to something, some person, or some idea. The more you try to convince the person, the more you both become angry. Like an individual involved in a cult, in an abusive relationship, or a failing business – you can talk yourself blue in the face and it will get you nowhere.

Israel Landscape

Anti-Semitism is not logical. The perpetrator may try to use some warped logic to justify their means but it still stems from an emotional hatred. During The Black Death between 1348 and 1350, there were many violent attacks on Jewish communities throughout Europe. As the plague swept across Europe, killing off more than half the population, the Jews were the scapegoats. They were accused of poisoning the wells which caused the disease. To give you one example, 900 Jews were burnt alive in Strasbourg on February 14, 1349. The plague had not yet affected the city, and killing off the Jews was seen as a pre-emptive move to prevent the plague from coming.

It seems a couple of hundred years later, people were still convinced that the Jews were at fault for the plague. The 16th century German religious reformer, Martin Luther wrote: “they are often accused of poisoning wells, stealing children and mutilating them.”  How many Jews have been killed in pogroms because of blood libels, which falsely accused Jews for using Christian blood in their passover Matzah, when the Christians themselves had killed a child and blamed the Jews.

Jews have been blamed for killing Jesus, starting both world wars and losing them, the rise and fall of communism, 9-11, America’s financial success and financial problems, and just about anything that happens in the Middle East.

There is a story of two old ladies sitting on a park bench having an argument. One points to a gray thing moving along the ground and says: “Look at the size of that pigeon.” The other lady counters, “that’s no pigeon, that’s a giant rat!” They argue for a while until the thing flies up into the air and at which point lady number two remarks: “Wow that is the first time I’ve ever seen a flying rat!”  -   If you want to believe something is a rat, then no matter what happens in life you will keep your belief. Anti-semites have their beliefs about Jews and if they want to hold on to them, then no matter what good Israel does, the negative beliefs will remain. For some, they are so steeped in blame and hatred that even when blatantly good stares them in the face they will see bad.

Praying at the Western Wall

What scares me, is how far some people can go in order to hold on to a corrupt belief. It seems even when Jews do a nice simple thing to help out in their community the world’s anti-Semites have a way of darkening it. Here is what Major Robert H. Williams, in ‘FECP and the Minority Machine’, page 10, has to say about Jews doing good:“B’nai B’rith, the secret Jewish fraternity, was organized in 1843, awakening world Jewish aspirations, or Zionism, and its name, meaning “Sons of the Covenant,” suggests that the 12 men who organized the fraternity aimed at bringing about the fulfillment of “the Covenant,” or the supposed Messianic promise of ruler-ship over all peoples. To rule all peoples, it is first necessary to bring them together in a world federation or world government – which is the avowed aim of both Communists and Zionists.” 

Here is what I know about B’nai B’rith’s inception: The twelve men who headed the organisation were appalled by the deplorable condition of immigrant Jews to the United States.  The newcomers to the country were often living in utmost poverty, and these twelve men wanted to help. They set up an organisation which initially was about ”Visiting and attending the sick” and “protecting and assisting the widow and the orphan.”

My grandfather was president at one point of B’nai B’rith Montreal Canada. Their biggest project at the time was sending thousands of food baskets to impoverished families. I was part of B’nai B’rith Youth movement and we never conspired to inject the world with communist views. We spent our free time packing food baskets, cheering up elderly people and creating a better community environment.

The Jewish people have undergone two thousand years of persecution and expulsion from almost every country they lived in. One website http://biblebelievers.org.au/expelled.htm  has a list of 109 locations, from which Jews have been expelled since AD250.

Throughout history there have been innumerable pogroms across Europe and the Middle East. Jewish communities were decimated, the people murdered, raped, and their homes and businesses ransacked. Those who survive often did so by fleeing with whatever they carried in their pockets.

Significant pogroms in the Russian Empire included the Odessa pogroms, Warsaw pogrom (1881), Kishinev pogrom (1903), Kiev Pogrom (1905), and Białystok pogrom (1906), and, after the 1917 Russian Revolution, the Lwów pogrom (1918) and Kiev Pogroms (1919). This does not include the countless smaller pogroms that took place on a regular basis.

The UN has passed resolutions condemning just about everything Israel has ever done. During the Gulf War while 39 Scud missiles landed on Israel threatening biological warfare, America asked Israel not to get involved. NOT GET INVOLVED? If your family was being threatened to be killed and someone asked you not to get involved I hope you would never listen to that someone again…yet we do.

Where was the world when 6 million of our brothers and sisters were murdered by the Nazis? An estimated 67% of the Jewish European population which included up to 90% in some countries. This is Genocide. The Palestinians and the world claim “genocide” while the Palestinian population has grown in leaps and bounds. Do you want to reason with a people who deny the holocaust having happened yet say they wished it did happen, and given the opportunity would make it happen? Does any of this seem logical?

So yes we Jews are stupid if we think the world cares; granted there are some Christians and individuals who love us, thank you. Most have demonstrated for the last 2,000 years that they don’t really give a hoot, and that their dislike for the Jewish people will remain regardless.

Thus said, I don’t believe the Islamic world particularly hate us. I believe they hate everyone who is not exactly like themselves – Christians, Buddhist, Hindus, and even Shiite, Sunni, western Culture, America, anything really. If Israel was gone tomorrow, they would have a civil war amongst themselves. All it takes is an artist to draw a cartoon, or an idiot, to make some pathetic movie depicting the Prophet, and the Islamic world will be up in arms, rioting, protesting and killing.

There will never be peace in the Middle East – Iraq and Iran in the Gulf war, the Egyptian political instability, The Syrian Civil War, the Taliban in Afghanistan, and Hamas, Fatah, PLO and Jihad all fighting each other. They like to fight, full stop. It is part of their culture.

We Jews on the other hand don’t like fighting. We want to live in peace and only fight to protect ourselves. If Israel laid down its weapons, tomorrow there would be no Israel. If Hamas on the other hand laid down their weapons there would be peace. But Hamas then would lose its identity which is something they are not prepared to do.

If you meet anyone who wants to talk logic, perhaps start with this. “Can I ask you a simple question; Do you think Israel has the capabilities to blow Gaza off the map. To kill everyone there, and turn it into a pile of rubble?” The answer is “yes.”

“Now do you think Hamas, Iran, Jihad and all the other crazy groups have the capability to blow Israel to pieces?” The answer is “no.”

Now let me ask you another question. “Do you think that, if Hamas or Iran could blow Israel off the map would they?” The answer is “yes,” as they have expressed the intent openly many times.

Thus, when Israel kills a Palestinian child, it is a mistake. There is no malicious intent. Israel gains nothing by killing an innocent civilian. If they wanted to, they could kill them all. Hamas on the other hand specifically targets civilians, with 1,500 killed in buses and cafes in the past Intifada, and constantly by lobbing rockets into civilian populations. They are happy to blow themselves up in martyrdom, so why would they care to take a few of their own with them?

But this is all silly logic for intelligent people to reason with… to negotiate with… ‘insanity is trying to do the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.’ So we are insane as well.

If we care about world opinion we are doomed…because there are two types of people in the world: those who like us unconditionally, and those who unconditionally condemn and hate us. So who are we trying to appease. The world has condemned everything Israel does. During the Sydney 2000 Olympics Countries build fences to protect their athletes from terrorists along with armed security just in case. But when Israel puts up a fence to protect its civilians from terrorists who say and demonstrate their intent on causing harm, the world screams. So let them scream.

I remember one of my first self-defence lectures I went to when I was 14 years old. The instructor said: “Better to be tried by 12 (a jury) than to be carried by 6 (in a coffin).”

Let the UN, pass more resolutions, let the Arabs in every city around the globe protest, let the media broadcast its lies, let the Arab world kill themselves while the world ignores it, let America and every other country in the world condemn, and let the Chamberlains of the world wave a pathetic piece of paper signed by Hitler…but don’t let a single other Israeli civilian die by a terrorist or allow a young Israeli soldier to be killed unnecessarily.

Yes we trade one soldier for a thousand terrorists because life to us is valuable. And it should be too valuable to waste on politics. Too valuable to fire rubber bullets in the face of live ammunition. Too valuable to risk ground force when air strikes would do.

The sooner we wake up to the fact that logic and the plight of the Jews do not mix, the better off we will be. As frustrating and infuriating as it may be, many in the world are emotionally attached to their beliefs and no amount of reasoning will ever work.

Israel exists on miracles. Thirty-nine scuds can land on it without injuring a single person and Israel can take out an Egyptian air force without the loss of a life.

When King David went to battle, half the army would pray while the other half fought. Both sides employed tactics to the best of their abilities. For those of us not actively fighting for the protection of Israel we must pray with all our hearts to our Father in heaven that He protect them and us. And for those who are fighting, they must fight using everything available to them by air, land, and water. We receive miracles but we are not allowed to rely on them, yet at the same time we must recognise that our survival and victory balances on miracles.

May we see the coming of the final redemption as the prophet Isaiah says, ‘They will beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nations will not take up the sword against other nations, and they will no longer train for war.’

Am Happy to say that the first books have arrived from the Printer in Israel. Please G-d they will be in the shops soon.