Rabbi Tzvi Konikov, one of nine distinguished guests invited to address NASA’s memorial ceremony Friday morning, brought tears to the faces of many in his words of solace, remembrance and courage.

Rabbi Konikov shared the podium with Florida’s Governor Jeb Bush, NASA administrator Sean O’Keefe, and other dignitaries, cajoling the community, in the words of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, to “turn pain into action, and tragedy into growth.” The following is the text of Rabbi Konikov’s remarks:

Governor Jeb Bush, Honorable Senators, Congressmen Dave Weldon, Honorable Sean O’Keefe, members of the clergy, distinguished NASA professionals, my fellow Americans:

Today, is a day of mourning and remembering. We are all pained to the core by the tragedy of Shuttle Columbia.
Today, we mourn the loss of seven special people, seven heroic human beings, Rick Husband, William McCool, Michael Andersen, David Brown, Kaplana Chawla, Laura Clark and, my friend, Ilan Ramon. We pledge in the presence of almighty God that we will never forget you!

Today, we mourn as one family, just as these seven outstanding individuals who came from diverse backgrounds formed a team, united as one.

Last week I was honored to have been a friend of Ilan Ramon.

Today I am humbled to be part of his legacy.

As I think of my friend, Ilan, I recall the words of King David (in the book of Samuel), when told of the loss of his dear friend Jonathan, “I am pained and distressed over you my brother Ilan. You were so pleasant to me!”

At Chabad-Lubavitch, we daily live the motto of our Sages, “turn pain into action and tragedy into growth.” Every challenge, every obstacle, every set back, no matter how painful and difficult, must be channeled into greater activity, making the world a more G-dly and kinder place.

For while Columbia is gone, our holy mission continues…
Columbia is gone; yet the astronauts’ souls are with G-d, praying for the well being of their families and for all of us!

Columbia is gone; yet the astronauts’ legacy lives on. They wished to serve and they did. Now it is our turn to serve!

Columbia is gone; yet we anticipate that NASA will redouble its space exploration with all the benefits for mankind. For your work furthers medical research and the development of defensive weapons, thus healing and protecting all G-d’s children.

The Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneersohn, would continuously remind us that our country, The United States of America, is a nation of deep faith and great kindness.

I would like to thank NASA for accepting with open arms an Israeli scientist, a child of Holocaust survivors.

I would like to thank NASA for accommodating, even encouraging, Ilan’s religious beliefs.

I would like to thank NASA for allowing Ilan to carry a Torah scroll, which miraculously survived the concentration camps!

In particular, I would like to thank NASA for allowing Ilan to make the Kiddush and keep his Shabbat.

Last year Ilan Ramon turned to me with a question:
How does one mark the Sabbath in Space – with every 90 minutes another sunset, every 10 Å“ hours is Sabbath and every 20 days is Rosh Hashana –
Jerusalem, we have a problem!

So I had my homework to do.

But Ilan taught us a powerful message:

No matter how fast we’re going, no matter how important our work, we must pause and think about why we’re here on this earth.

Today, let every one of us do one extra act of kindness in memory of Ilan, Rick, William, Michael, David, Kaplana and Laura. This will serve as a powerful expression of our unity and resolve.

This torch of unity will light up the darkness and usher in a new era, the long awaited era of which the bible speaks of, the era of redemption. An era of G-dliness and goodness, an era of peace/Shalom.

May G-d bless America.

In the wake of the shuttle Columbia’s tragic end, so many persistent, painful questions—the whys and wherefores surrounding events of February 1st—will remain unanswered long after NASA establishes the technical cause of the disaster. “This was not supposed to happen,” says Rabbi Tzvi Konikov, echoing the sentiments of everyone connected in one way or another to the mission. Rabbi Konikov is the Chabad-Lubavitch representative to the Space Coast, and will speak at NASA’s official memorial service Friday morning, on the runway of the Kennedy Space Center landing facility.

Faced with the unenviable task of fielding a deluge of calls from friends, Space Coast community members and journalists who covered the launch closely and suffer a stabbing sadness that begs relief, Konikov, who maintains contact with Ilan Ramon’s family in Texas, feels there is genuine solace to be found in that “Ilan accomplished his mission in life.” Speaking at a memorial program on Monday night, Rabbi Konikov pointed to the astronaut’s unabashed Jewish pride. “He achieved so much for so many with the mitzvot he proudly took with him into space.”

Ilan Ramon was raised in a secular Israeli environment and yet he insisted on identifying Jewishly in his public role as an astronaut. “He saw it as a tremendous privilege and responsibility, and he wanted to live up to that and do his people and his heritage proud,” explained Rabbi Konikov in an interview with Lubavitch.com. Months before the launch, Ramon requested that NASA provide him with a kosher diet while on his mission, and then he consulted with Rabbi Konikov about observing Shabbat in outer space. Later the precious Torah scroll he took to space would make news, and three weeks before the launch, Ramon requested that Konikov arrange for him to take a dollar bill from the Lubavitcher Rebbe on his mission.

“So many journalists have called me to ask why Ramon took this dollar bill with him,” says Konikov. “It seems to me that Ramon wanted to hold on to the Rebbe’s idea of a mitzvah—in this case the mitzvah of tzedaka—as a source of light that would dispel the darkness of our world. Ilan made the point that no matter where one is, even in outer space, traveling faster than the speed of sound, one must pause to consider their purpose and mission in life. Ramon did this in a very literal way, and in doing so he served as a truly illuminating example to millions, especially to Jewish children who see him as a Jewish hero.”

Indeed, Ramon’s final acts of Jewish assertion leave a legacy that is fast generating a very concrete expression of Jewish unity. Almost immediately after the disaster, friends of the Konikov family and Chabad of the Space Coast decided to pool their resources to donate a new Torah scroll in memory of Ramon. Konikov informed Rona Ramon, the astronaut’s wife, of the gift which will be “presented to the Ramon family in time for Tal Ramon’s bar-mitzvah, in April,” says Konikov.

“The new Torah will ensure that Ramon will live forever in our lives,” said Rabbi Konikov.

At the invitation of Roy Bridges, director of the Kennedy Space Center, Rabbi Konikov will speak of hope, support and strength to a community of 600,000 that is vitally connected to the Space Center. “This community’s entire economy is based around the Space Center,” says Konikov, “so we need to find a way to mourn and grieve, while pushing ahead at the same time.”

For the families of the astronauts and members of the space program, the demoralizing blow of Columbia’s shocking end, after a presumably glorious launch and 16 days of productive research, will take a long time in healing. Unified by a spectacular pride on the morning of the launch, the community now finds unity in a deeply shared sense of loss. Ultimately, says Konikov, the courageous example of the astronauts will serve as an inspiration and a source of strength for the community to move ahead.

In a message to the Ramon family, the people who initiated the Ilan Ramon Torah Fund wrote: “We were broken all the way through our hearts and souls. Ilan Ramon, husband, father, astronaut, Israeli hero and symbolic of each of us as Jews of our home, the land of Israel, died as the space shuttle Columbia disappeared . . .

”It couldn’t be hopeless or meaningless. Ilan Ramon chose to go to space as a Jew of the nation of Israel. He carried with him a Torah scroll, the life of the Jewish people. He meant life to all of us, and his memory will forever give us life. We want his family to know and feel that he has become a part us, our personal as well as the Jewish people’s history.

”We are writing a Torah in the memory of Ilan Ramon to be dedicated and given to the Ramon family in Israel so he will live forever in our lives. One day, with G-d’s help, someone will take that Torah scroll to space.”

When Jack Mezrahi was growing up in Barranquilla, Colombia, a small city one hour from the capital, most Jewish people he knew were on their way out. “Barranquilla is a small city, and little by little, families were leaving in search of better business opportunities or a larger community—in Bogota, or Miami.” From over 800 families, he says, only about 160 remain in the city today.

But Jewish families weren’t the only ones leaving. Alberto Manopla, a Barranquilla native, says that the city’s two synagogues—Ashkenazic and Sephardic—had Rabbis who would “come for a year or two and then leave,” to be replaced by other Rabbis serving equally limited terms. A thriving community since about 1948, when many survivors and immigrants from Egypt and Syria established themselves in Barranquilla, the city was slowly losing its Jewish presence. “There was no continuity here,” Manopla says, “the community was warm and close knit, but there didn’t seem to be much of a future.”

So thirteen years ago, a group of families in Barranquilla contacted Rabbi Yehoshua Rosenfeld in Bogota, who was directing Chabad activities there since 1981, for
assistance in recruiting a Chabad rabbi for Barranquilla. “There were Rabbis in both synagogues at the time. I think people were looking at Bogota and seeing the Jewish energy and influence that Chabad had brought to the city, and thinking that may do a lot for Barranquilla.”

As it turned out, a renewed Jewish energy wasn’t the only thing a Chabad presence would do for Barranquilla. Because thirteen years after their arrival in 1990, Rabbi Yossi and Chanie Liberow are still there, and the Jewish presence in Barranquilla has more or less stabilized, Jack Mezrahi says. “People are staying here now,” he observes. “There’s a sense of permanence to Jewish life here that we never had before.”

That, says Alberto Manopla, a long-time resident of Barranquilla, is Chabad’s greatest contribution to the city. “Aside for all the work they do with the youth and the elderly, Chabad has been the only entirely stable Jewish presence in Barranquilla. That on its own has done a tremendous amount for the city.”

This March, Chabad of Barranquilla completes a four-story building to accommodate their full range of community programs and services. The building will house a large social hall, library, youth center, classrooms, kitchens, offices, gift shop and 12 assisted living units for the city’s Jewish elderly.

Replacing a variety of rented facilities used over the years, Manopla says the center will do more than bring together communities of both synagogues under one roof for a celebration of Jewish life. “People look at this building, and it’s pretty clear that Jewish life is here to stay,” he says

The dedication festivities are planned for March 9th, but Alberto Manopla says the project itself is six or seven years in the making. “When Chabad arrived here, many people, though eager for a stronger Jewish presence in town, were wary of the idea of a new synagogue taking members away from the existing ones,” he says. “We wanted to make it clear to the community that Chabad is not a synagogue, and we’re not taking members from anyone. We’re only enhancing the Jewish infrastructure already in place in the community.” It took several years, but Manopla says the community is “100% united behind Chabad’s endeavors” by now, and eagerly looking forward to the completion of the building.

In thirteen years of work with the community, the Liberows have brought “hope, optimism, and a sense of purpose to Jewish life in Barranquilla,” says Rabbi Yehoshua Rosenfeld. “In building a home for the community, Chabad makes it abundantly clear that they are here to stay.”

Sylvia Rothblum came to New York from Munich last week “not knowing what to expect,” she admits. Vice President of Warner Brothers in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, Rothblum attends Torah classes with Mrs. Chanie Diskind, Chabad-Lubavitch representative in Munich, and convinced two of her friends to travel to New York with her to the Guest Program of the Annual International Shluchos Conference that concluded this week.

The Guest Program, which runs concurrently to the women’s convention but keeps to its own schedule entirely, was born of a desire to “give people the bigger picture,” says Molly Resnick, coordinator of the Guest program together with Mrs. Rivka Kotlarsky and a committee of local women. “Women involved with Chabad in their respective cities get a much clearer perspective on the work of Chabad after participating in a weekend like this,” she observes. Since the Chabad representative of their city is usually preoccupied with her own convention, the Guest Program was created to “show the guests the scope and depth of Chabad’s work worldwide.”

The Guest Program gives visitors a glimpse into the “inside story” behind the phenomenon of Chabad-Lubavitch women in leadership positions around the globe. “It also provides them with a fascinating introduction—or for returning visitors, an in-depth look—at Jewish and Chasidic thought,” she says. The weekend’s schedule is packed tight with lectures and workshops on a wide range of topics, from Feminism to Maimonides and everything in between, presented by accomplished lecturers in their respective disciplines.

“I think the combination of so many elements is what makes the program so special,” Sylvia Rothblum says. “You have brilliant speakers, a very well-run program, a really diverse and interesting group of women, all of which make for an incredibly inspiring weekend.”

Rachel Alfandari, Rothblum’s friend from Munich, says she was especially inspired by the power of the women she met over the weekend. “You come with your prejudices about Orthodox women being second class and all that,” she says, “and it’s just amazing to meet women who are accomplishing so much, who are so talented and productive. I have a whole new perspective.”

She also points to the sophistication of the program’s intellectual content. “That amazed me,” she says. “There was nothing superficial here.”

Rachel Chitrik, a Crown Heights resident, hosted one of the sessions in her home. “I think the women loved every minute,” she says. “There was such a broad and interesting range of people who attended, and the program was really tailored to their interests.”

The Guest Program joined the main conference for the Gala Banquet on Sunday night.
“There was so much joy in that room,” Alfandari says. “The energy of the Shluchos and their children is an incredible inspiration for us.”

Sylvia Rothblum sums it up: “When you live in Munich and meet just one Chabad family, you have an idea what Chabad is about but you don’t exactly know where it’s coming from. Seeing 1500 women on their home turf gives you a far wider perspective on all that’s being done across the world. It’s very moving and very inspiring,” she says.

The Shuttle Columbia launched successfully this morning January 16, to the lively singing, of “Oseh Shalom.” Hundreds of proud Israelis swelled with joy, having arrived from Israel to witness firsthand the launch of the Shuttle, which carries the first Israeli Astronaut, Col. Ilan Ramon.

On hand to serve the Israeli guests is Rabbi Tzvi Konikov, Chabad-Lubavitch representative to the Space Coast, who has arranged for the only simultaneous translation in Hebrew of the live countdown coverage of the Shuttle Columbia launch. Radio stations WMIE 91.5 FM and WFJP AM 1510 broadcast the direct feed from Mission Control, Johnson Space Center and was also made available to radio stations
throughout Israel. Coverage began 9 a.m. Thursday and lasted 45 minutes after the launch.

Col. Ramon, who consulted with Rabbi Konikov months ago (see lubavitch.com archives http://www.lubavitch.com/article.asp?ID=17)about how to mark Shabbat in space, had asked Rabbi Konikov for a dollar bill from the Lubavitcher Rebbe, which he carried with him on his mission. The dollar bill represents the mitzvah of tzedaka, charity-giving, which the Rebbe promoted by distributing dollars to all those who came to seek his blessing.

The dollar bill was meant to be given to charity, but most people cherish the particular bill that was held by the Rebbe, preferring to give another one or more, in its place to charity. The Rebbe campaigned fervently to promote the habit of daily charity giving. During his lifetime, the Rebbe stood for hours every Sunday, receiving people who came to seek his blessing and his counsel. His blessing always came with a dollar bill that be given to charity.

“Whenever someone told the Rebbe that they were traveling, the Rebbe blessed them with a safe, successful trip, and gave them a dollar to give to charity when they arrive at their destination,” observed Rabbi Konikov.

A mission to space fits the bill, and Rabbi Konikov is delighted that Col. Ramon, who appreciates his unique responsibility as a Jewish astronaut and the role model he serves for Jewish people, will be taking this mitzvah into space. “His mission is an inspiration,” he says. “He is in our hearts, and we pray for a smooth launch and successful mission.”

Back in the geosphere, Chabad has been arranging for kosher lunches for many of the Israeli guests, and will be hosting all those who want to celebrate Shabbat, at the Chabad Jewish Community Center in Satellite Beach.

“That’s what we are here for, ” said Rabbi Zvi Konikov. “Chabad has 3,000 centers worldwide. It’s like a home away from home for those traveling.”

Coming from San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Las Vegas and dozens of cities in between, 150 shluchim gathered last weekend for the 35th annual West Coast Chabad Shluchim convention at the Ontario Marriott. Appropriately themed Unity, the convention focused on the collective strength achieved through a unified, cohesive body of shluchim, working together towards the same goal of reaching every last Jew, and creating vibrant communities throughout the West Coast.

Greeting the convention by phone from Lubavitch World Headquarters in New York was Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky. The convention also featured prominent leaders and scholars who addressed a gamut of issues of interest to the Shluchim.

A much-anticipated event for Shluchim of the Wild West, as it gives them the opportunity to socialize, exchange ideas, and compare notes, the convention also introduced major plans on the horizon. Prominent on the agenda, said Rabbi B. Shlomo Cunin, director of West Coast Chabad since its founding in 1965, is CAFA, or Chabad Action For America, a program that will link Chabad programs in California and Nevada to the new White House faith-based initiatives. CAFA will identify Chabad’s social service and outreach programs that might be eligible for the funding provided by the initiative so that “programs that were previously overlooked because of their religious affiliations will now benefit from government funding, creating the possibility for further growth and establishing a paradigm for other Chabad centers across the nation,” says Rabbi Chaim Cunin, spokesperson for Chabad of the West Coast.

In a gesture of solidarity with their fellow Jews in Israel, Chabad announced that it will work with the Israeli Consulate and the Israeli Ministry of Tourism to send Chabad rabbis to Israel, to offer much-needed encouragement and support. The first group is scheduled to travel to Israel at the end of February. The initiative, Chabad is hopeful, will in turn encourage members of the rabbis’ respective communities to do likewise, generating goodwill and support for Israsel during these difficult times.

To date, there are 180 Chabad-Lubavitch couples serving communities along the West coast in more than 100 centers, 25 day schools, and 30 summer camps. Topping off the conference announcements, Rabbi Cunin publicized plans to dramatically expand Chabad’s services in California by establishing an additional 20 Chabad centers here during the upcoming year, bringing the total number of centers serving California and Nevada’s Jews to 200.

A flyer appears in a Russian city inviting the Jewish community to celebrate Shabbat. Illustrated with Jewish symbols, it offers dinner and inspiration at no charge and draws a sizeable crowd of local Jews. Smiling Kippah and tallit-clad men welcome them warmly and in conversation, quote Jewish scriptures, speak of Moshiach and aliya to Israel, and insert frequent references to their own Jewish backgrounds.
The organization, called “Shomer Israel” or “Emmanu-el” or the like, will invite the Jews back the next week, or for the next holiday, and after a few weeks, they will have built something of a community.

And then the Jewish rhetoric begins to change. Because, despite all the appearances, these organizations are not Jewish at all. In fact, they are the newest, most aggressive attempts in an age-old campaign: the battle for Jewish souls.

“Self described ‘Messianic Jews’ are essentially evangelical Christian missionaries in Jewish disguise,” explains Dr. Alexander Lakshin, director of the MAGEN League, the only counter-missionary organization in the Former Soviet Union. “Their aim, well camouflaged at first by a blitz of Jewish words, symbols, songs and traditions, is simple: to convert as many people as they can to Christianity.”

And this is not, he says, a small grassroots movement. In the Former Soviet Union alone, approximately 20 well-organized and generously funded Messianic groups operate well over 200 congregations in cities from Moscow to St. Petersburg. A 1998 survey conducted by K. Kjar-Hansen and B.F. Skjott indicates that over 40% of their membership is Jewish.

“Russian Jewry is Messianic Judaism’s number one target,” says Rabbi Berel Lazar, chief rabbi of the Russia and the force behind the founding of Magen. “Simply because they’re easy prey.” Often in desperate financial straits, Russian Jews often find the lure of financial assistance too tempting to overcome. “These groups have all the funds needed to lure people in,” he says. “All too often, a person will only realize the true nature of the organization after they are already financially dependent on them, and by then, it’s too late to simply break away.”

Deprived of a Jewish education over four generations of communism, a Jew accosted by missionaries has no grandparent able to explain the pitfalls in the logic of messianic Judaism, says Dr. Lakshin. In fact, the elderly are as easy to convince as anyone else. “Missionaries convince people by distorting the facts of Judaism, and all too many Russian Jews simply don’t know better,” he explains. And widespread interest in Judaism after the fall of communism gave missionaries the perfect opportunity to pitch their purely Christian message as Jewish, and deceive thousands.

By the year 2000, nearly ten years after the fall of communism, Messianic activity, operating freely despite a mission statement that clearly constitutes fraud, had reached outrageous proportions in the Former Soviet Union, Lazar says. “In Russia, over 50% of Jewish communities were reporting missionary activity. In Ukraine, the number was closer to 80%.” And in the Moldova region, a full 100% of Jewish communities were being targeted in carefully planned Messianic campaigns, he says.

Ideally, the antidote to missionary activity is simply Jewish education, observes Rabbi Lazar. But that’s only a preventative measure. “Missionary activity in the FSU had reached a level where Jewish education was just not enough to stop it. We needed a serious, well-coordinated counter-offensive.”

Alexander Lakshin and Rabbi Lazar had crossed paths some 15 years before Rabbi Lazar contacted him in the summer of 2000. On a visit to the Soviet Union with a group of Yeshiva students from New York, Rabbi Lazar recalls meeting Alexander Lakshin, then a well-known Soviet Jewish activist, in a clandestine Yeshiva in St. Petersburg, known at the time as Leningrad, where Lakshin was studying. Fifteen years later, Lakshin was living in Brooklyn with his family when he got a call from Berel Lazar, now Russia’s Chief Rabbi. Rabbi Lazar wanted to discuss the creation of a counter-missionary force to be known as MAGEN, and offered him the position of director.

Lakshin was no stranger to the work, having been involved in various counter-missionary objectives in the US, and, more importantly, says Lazar, “he was no stranger to the landscape and mentality of Russian Jewry,” making him the ideal man for the job.

Funded by a large initial grant from the Rohr Family Foundation and the umbrella of the Federation of Jewish Communities of the CIS, the MAGEN LEAGUE was incorporated in the early months of 2001, and Lakshin and his family moved back to Moscow to run it.

MAGEN’s agenda, according to its website, is to “monitor missionary activity targeting Jews, operate educational programs for professional and lay leadership of Jewish communities and organizations, and publish informational materials explaining the anti-Jewish nature of so-called “Messianic Judaism.” A one-man operation at the outset, MAGEN now has chapters in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kiev, and Kishinev, Lakshin says. Plans call for the opening of additional chapters in Kazakhstan, Latvia, and Belarus.

Essentially, says Lakshin, MAGEN is a resource center, and as the single counter force against mass missionary activity in the former Soviet Union, “gradual growth is not an option; Magen’s activity needs to be as rapid and widespread as the force we are fighting.”

Backed by the entire spectrum of the Jewish establishment in the former Soviet Union and the local governments in its fight against fraud, Rabbi Lazar claims that despite its scope, MAGEN’s focus is as much on the individual as the community. “Jews here are being taken for a ride,” he says. “If we can stop even one Jew from being deceived, MAGEN will have achieved its purpose.”

Mark Powers is the director of MAGEN’s recently opened US chapter. Involved in counter missionary activity in America for close to 25 years as director of a local chapter of Jews for Judaism, America’s primary anti-missionary organization, he claims emphatically that Messianic Judaism is “not a Russian problem.” “All forms of missionary activity, including Messianic Judaism, are alive and flourishing in America and Europe, indeed across the world,” he warns.

Though the cults of the sixties and seventies are thought to be long gone, Powers claims they have in fact proliferated in the last several decades, albeit quietly. “Missionary and cult activity has gotten smarter, more secretive, and far more dangerous,” he says. “To think that it is not a force at work in today’s society is to delude one’s self.”

Magen’s range of activities in the US will include public lectures for synagogues, schools, and youth groups, particularly on campus, and a large effort directed at counseling individuals and families involved in missionary activity.

Plans are in the works for a MAGEN office in Europe, as well. “In the battle for Jewish souls, we are dealing with a force too large, powerful and wealthy, to grow slowly,” Powers says. “We need to direct all our efforts at slowing them down and eventually eliminating them completely.”

It appears they have already begun making inroads. “Since 1990,” wrote Charisma, a magazine of the Russian Messianic movement, in a July 2001 issue, “Messianic activity went freely and unrestrained in Russia and Ukraine. Now it is facing a fierce and well-organized resistance.”

An upscale suburban peninsula situated on the North Shore of Long Island, Port Washington is home to a Jewish community that, by the early 90’s, was fast becoming a commanding presence in the area, totaling some 40% of the general population. With easy access to the amenities of Jewish living available in the neighboring observant communities and no shortage of Jewish friends, few people here were looking for more.

Now, shortly over a decade into its founding, Chabad of Port Washington is in the midst of a major building project. A recent dedication ceremony marked the completion of the second phase and the unveiling of its third and final phase. Directed at celebrating the generosity of some of its staunchest supporters, the event, themed “A Time for Thanks,” drew close to 200 supporters strong.

That’s not to say that things went smoothly from the start, or that the Chabad couple fit right in. Quite the contrary: when Rabbi Shalom and Sara Paltiel initially arrived here, Port Washington’s residents were cordial and friendly to their new neighbors, but somewhat confounded, and Rabbi Paltiel recalls being asked by a well-intentioned fellow if, perhaps, he was lost.

Like many of its kind, Port Washington’s Chabad was initially launched from the Paltiel family room, which played host to everything from services to holiday programs and youth activities. It wasn’t long before attendance swelled, compelling the center to be moved into it own rented facilities where, at Doctor Martin Bronstein’s initiative, the Chabad Preschool was born, with a class of six.

As activities expanded and word of the center spread, the school experienced phenomenal growth matched only by its staff’s dedication. By ’97 things were running in high gear, and the center seemed once again to be bursting at the seams. This time it was community member Henry Schwartz who came to the rescue, suggesting that the preschool expand into a full-fledged Hebrew Day School. With Rabbi Paltiel’s go-ahead Henry set out looking for new, roomier facilities and soon hit on a 22,000 square foot piece of property, right on the waterfront, setting an enormous building campaign in motion.

The first phase of the project, completed in ’98, included a 150-seat sanctuary, a large social hall, seven classrooms, an office suite and a teachers’ lounge. The Center began drawing a daily minyan—a first for Port Washington—and about 100 for Shabbat services, with holidays often attracting as many as 500 people at a time. As education gained priority in community life, a Hebrew School was founded and over one hundred children are currently enrolled. An exciting teen club and popular Gan Israel Day Camp were soon added to the array of youth programs available to the community children, directed by Rabbi Mendy Lewis.

With the second phase just completed, the Chabad center now houses an additional six classrooms, computer and science laboratories, a gym, indoor and outdoor basketball courts, and an outdoor swimming pool, making Chabad Academy a truly top-notch, state of the art school, with Rabbi Nato Glogauer as its principal.

But it’s more than the government accreditation and the inviting facilities that makes parents proud to have their children go to school here, says Jamie Fabbi, whose son Dillan attends the Hebrew Academy. “My son loves it,” she says. “The teachers are extremely dedicated and absolutely love the students, and the kids are just mesmerized by everything the school has to offer.” And as the school expands at a terrific pace from year to year, the third phase of the building project, scheduled to begin next year, will include facilities for a high school, with a full-size gym, a comprehensive school library, and additional classrooms.

“When I was introduced to Rabbi Paltiel fifteen years ago, I never imagined how things would unfold here,” says Mr. Bert Brodsky, an entrepreneur instrumental in purchasing the land and very much involved in the building project. Brodsky, who frequents the center, says coming here gives him the opportunity to “reconnect to my roots.”

With thirty-eight people currently employed at the Chabad center, and the building project nearing completion, the Paltiels are hoping to devote more of their time and resources to other aspects of community life. A Mikvah building is currently in progress at the center, and the community is looking forward to greater focus on adult education through weekly classes, Shabbatons, and evening lectures.

Notwithstanding all the dramatic, big developments on the communal level, the Paltiels have managed to retain a personal touch that keeps people coming back. As Sheryl Pinner, who avoided any traditional Jewish involvement until recently says, “the light was inside of me, but Rabbi Paltiel was the one to ignite it.” And if koshering her entire kitchen is any indication, Port Washington’s Jewish community has come a long way from the days when an orthodox rabbi was a peculiarity here.

“As a native of Budapest and a survivor of the Holocaust, the rejuvenation of the Hungarian Jewish community and other Jewish communities throughout Central Europe following the decimation the Jewish community suffered under Nazi Germany, is one of the most deeply gratifying developments I can imagine.”

These sentiments, expressed by Congressman Tom Lantos of California, were shared by many in the audience, eyewitnesses to the first Orthodox rabbinical ordination to take place in this central European country since the pre-war era, when Hungary was a thriving center of Jewish learning.

The event, laden with historic significance, drew the attention of major political figures in Hungary and the U.S. Sixty years after its near-annihilation, Hungarian Jewry is finally on the rebound, and the ordination this week, of Rabbi Shlomo Koves, a native of Budapest, gave evidence of an impressive revival here. Hundreds converged at the Shas Chevra Lubavitch Synagogue, the oldest synagogue in Budapest, where the former Israeli Chief Rabbi Mordechai Eilyahu led the ceremony in conjunction with Rabbi Yehuda Yeruslavsky, Director of Beis Din Rabonei Chabad in Israel and Budapest’s Chabad Rabbi Baruch Oberlander, as Hungarian President Dr. Ferenc Madl, and Budapest’s Mayor Gabor Demzky, looked on.

Rabbi Oberlander, himself the son of Hungarian Holocaust survivors, noted that the event marked a turning point for Hungary’s Jewish population of 100,000. “The tide is finally turning,” says Rabbi Oberlander, “and a new generation of Jews is expressing interest in traditional, authentic Judaism,” he says, referring to the newly ordained rabbi.

Born into a family that had been assimilated for generations, except for a long line of distinguished rabbis on his maternal grandmother’s side, Koves’s interest in Judaism was self-motivated, and led him to undergo a circumcision procedure in a local hospital at age 12. But without spiritual guidance, Koves didn’t know what the next step should be. After he met up with Chabad several months later, Shlomo became a regular at Chabad, and was soon affectionately dubbed “the Oberlander’s eldest son.” After studying at Chabad’s yeshiva here, Koves continued his studies in Pittsburgh, New York, Paris, and most recently Israel where he was ordained as a mohel and sofer (scribe).

Founded in 1989, Lubavitch of Hungary came onto the scene at a time when traditional Judaism was reserved for the elderly as their children and grandchildren, haunted by the shadow of the Holocaust and communism, shied away from Jewish association. In the years since, the Oberlanders have succeeded to draw the young generation’s interest in Jewish education and communal life. Today, some 60 children are enrolled in the local Or Avner schools; with growing interest in the Pesti Jesiva, a center for advanced Judaic studies, and an open Jewish University scheduled to commence this February, Jewish education is once again on the rise in Hungary. Chabad’s synagogue attracts a daily minyan and some 19,000 families receive a periodical and monthly journal, both published at the Lubavitch publishing house in Hungary.

A gala dinner following the ceremony at the Budapest Marriot Hotel, celebrated 13 years of Chabad in Hungary. Hungary’s Minister of Education, Dr. Balint Maygar, addressed the guests, and spoke with pride of this event, alluding to his own Jewish identity and of his mother as a holocaust survivor. But it was the President’s brevity at the ceremony that spoke to the magnitude of the event: “I feel that I cannot add anything to this special event. I would feel honored just being able to take part in it.” And so he did, for more than an hour and a half, a keen observer to the triumph of Judaism and the Jewish spirit.

Most of Rabbi Mendel Mintz’s congregants at Chabad of Aspen are in town now. Which is a nice thing, especially since it’s so unusual. In a town like Aspen, where 50% of the homes are unoccupied for most of the year, population can swell from 5,000 to 30,000 in the space of a week. Peak season—December and January in the winter and several months in the summer—draws residents (who typically own houses in a variety of locations around the world) to their Colorado homes. Approximately 20% of homeowners in the Aspen Valley—a breathtakingly beautiful 40 mile stretch flanked by Aspen and Vail with several towns between—are Jewish, making for an unusually high Jewish demographic in the area during busy seasons, and an otherwise small core community in Aspen. The Mintzs, who moved out here three years ago, plan major Chabad events to coincide with peak seasons, and are busy the rest of the year addressing the needs of a transient Jewish population.

The only rabbi in this part of the state, Rabbi Mintz generates a good deal of enthusiasm among Jewish homeowners and tourists for the Jewish programs and events Chabad offers. The Rabbi, his wife Liba, and their two children live in the town of Aspen, where they operate Chabad activities from their home and rent the nearby St. Regis Hotel for larger activities. Every event draws a significant percentage of Jewish tourists, probably somewhere around 30%, says Liba Mintz, but although they come in and out, homeowners in Aspen make up much of the community around Chabad events and have been a “source of enthusiastic support since our arrival,” she says.

“People here have invested in their homes and are happy to invest in their community too,” Rabbi Mintz explains. With synagogue services, a Hebrew school, holiday programs, and a wide range of lectures and classes that go on throughout the year, Jewish visitors and residents can enjoy the best of both worlds.

Archeological digs from ancient times through the middle ages, and recent discoveries of mikvehs hidden in cellars throughout the former communist bloc, offer abundant evidence that this is one of those mitzvahs that Jewish people kept to stubbornly, even in the worst of times.

But as was true of so many Jewish rituals, mikveh became a casualty of modern Jewish alienation. Many Jewish women have never even heard of mikveh; for many others, it is a tradition shrouded in misconception. But a determined effort in the past few decades to educate Jewish women has proven a remarkable willingness on their part to reclaim this mitzvah. And when a thoroughly modern, middle-class American community decides to support a mikveh, it’s fair to surmise that the tide has finally turned.

When Rabbi Mendy and Chanie Posner arrived in the upscale city of Plantation, Florida, nearly ten years ago, to what Chanie describes as a “spiritual desert,” a local mikveh did not even seem like a remote possibility. Home to 10,000 Jews—more than 20% of Plantation’s population—Jewish awareness in this city was at an all-time low. But that did not deter the Posners from generating Jewish interest and lively involvement through the small, storefront Chabad House.

It wouldn’t take long for services to attract a minyan twice daily at the center and draw 100 people on a typical Shabbat. A Hebrew School, holiday programs, and weekly classes established by the Posners meant that the local Jewish community could almost hold its own. But still missing in Plantation was a mikveh, essential to every Jewish community, and with Jewish involvement on the rise, Plantation’s growing number of observant women were forced to go elsewhere for this staple of Jewish family life. In the earlier years they would travel an hour away to Miami for a mikveh, and later the commute was shortened when a mikveh was opened in Fort Lauderdale. But some eight years into Posner’s arrival here, Plantation still remained without a mikveh of its own.

So when Fanit Panofsky told Rabbi Posner of her plans to relocate her spa from small, rented facilities to a huge plot of land and a custom-designed brand new building, he jumped at the idea and added to it. A mikveh, he insisted, would be the perfect complement to the spa facilities, combining physical pleasure with spiritual fulfillment, and making for an all-around oasis of complete bliss. Confident in the merit of this proposal, and reminded of her great-grandmother who operated a mikveh in Morocco, Fanit wasted no time coordinating architectural and interior design plans with the halakhic prescriptions for a kosher mikveh, and the project was completed 18 months later.

“For us it was a dream come true,” says Chanie Posner, who operates the mikveh. Described by one patron as “breathtaking,” a term not often associated with mikvehs—even modern-day ones—Mikveh Shulamit shares the Contour Day Spa’s tasteful décor, and Fanit attributes much of the spa’s incredible success to the Mikvah, which she makes a point of advertising in the spa’s brochure.

An opening event for the mikveh drew nearly seventy women as Chanie discussed the history, significance and tradition of the ritual in Jewish life, followed by a tour of the magnificent facility. “There’s a lot of misconception about mikveh,” says Chanie, but Mikveh Shulamit is changing that radically, as increasing numbers of women—locally and from nearby cities—who never entertained the idea, are beginning to commit to a new way of life, as they reclaim the mitzvah of mikveh.

On your average Shabbos, a minyan at Chabad of South Orlando is usually made up of several dozen men and women, about half of whom are only visiting, and conversation after prayers is exchanged in a lively variety of foreign languages. Stocked with prayerbooks translated into just about every conceivable language, the shul’s doors are open to Jewish visitors from across the spectrum and across the world.

This is Chabad on location, only several miles from Disney’s 49 square mile enormous entertainment complex, home to Disneyworld, Epcot Center, Universal Studios and various other attractions. Disneyworld and the surrounding theme parks draw several million visitors each year among them, and employ thousands in the Orlando area. Between the two, says Rabbi Konikov, who moved out here with his wife Chanie and their children two years ago, South Orlando is home to a sizeable Jewish population.

This time of year is peak tourist season in Orlando, and hundreds of Jewish tourists are among the throngs filling the city’s hotels and parks. “People come to Chabad with literally any sort of material or religious need, because it’s just reassuring to know you have that Jewish presence here,” says Rabbi Konikov, who has dealt with illnesses, mikvah visits, kaddish minyanim, and kosher food supply issues in his years here. “Many Jews call us up before they even get here.” To accommodate their needs, Chabad has kosher food supplies arranged, special rates at hotels near Chabad procured in advance, and the Konikovs are available at any time to deal with other requests.

For the local community, Chabad holds regular services, classes and programs for the several hundred Jewish families who live here full-time. Most of them are employed with Disney or its affiliates, making for some rather unusual congregants at Chabad in the last few years. One of these was Mickey Mouse, known as Jennie off-hours and, for a time, an active member of Chabad of South Orlando. Having discovered another kind of magic in Orlando, her Mickey Mouse days are behind her, as Jennie, now called Rachel, studies at a Yeshiva in Israel.

The ratings are in and they’ve never been better, says Michael Kigel, producer of Passages and Messages, two religiously themed shows that air weekly on Rogers Cable Channel 9 in thousands of Ontario homes. In fact, since introducing a fifteen minute segment titled “My Soul is Thirsty for You; The Ideas and Ideals of the Lubavitcher Rebbe” to the program, the show’s Nielsen ratings have risen dramatically—this year’s tally has 40,000 viewers tuning in and out and 10,000 watching the entire show—an increase of exactly double over last year’s ratings. Co-produced by Kigel and Rabbi Moshe Spalter of Lubavitch of Ontario, the segment features a short video clip of the Lubavitcher Rebbe speaking publicly or to an individual, followed by a discussion on the topic with several local Chabad Rabbis.

“The idea is to present the Rebbe, ultimately, as a teacher, and his words as powerful lessons for our lives,” says Kigel. The discussion segment of the show, expertly constructed from various taped interviews with the rabbis gives viewers the opportunity to understand the Rebbe’s words in the context of today’s reality, he says, pointing to the example of one show which featured an audience with Ariel Sharon, and the ensuing discussion, which analyzed the Rebbe’s message to Sharon in the context of today’s political reality. Given the generally unpopular hour of the show (10:45 pm on Sundays) and the typically poor appeal of a religiously themed show, the show’s broad popularity is an indication of an interest on the part of the general public for something “genuine and spiritual,” Kigel says. Spalter, a member of the Chabad team in Toronto for over 20 years, couldn’t agree more. From several short appearances on the show, he says he has strangers—Jewish and non-Jewish—stopping him on the street, curious to know more.

The show’s opener, a desert scene with footage of the Rebbe singing the well-known Chabad song “Tzoma Lecha Nafshi,” (My Soul Thirsts For You), from which the show takes its name, has proven an accurate reflection of the public’s reaction to the show, he says. “When we first approached Michael about showing some clips of the Rebbe produced by Jewish Educational Media on his show in honor of the Rebbe’s 100th birthday last April, none of us were sure how it would take off,” he recalls. But the positive response encouraged Kigel and Spalter to establish the 15 minute segment as a regular part of the show, seeing as “people are literally thirsty for this kind of genuine spirituality,” Spalter says.

Following the dramatic rise in ratings, the show’s 15 minutes may be expanded, and, say the producers, they are looking forward to more of the enthusiastic feedback.

For the Chabad emissaries in nearby cities who made the trip on December 15, and for the locals who came to participate, this bar mitzvah represented a collective milestone. Four hundred people came to celebrate Mendel Moscovitz’s bar mitzvah—a first for the children of Shluchim—which in every way marked the coming of age of Jewish revival in the former Soviet Union.

A phenomenon of historic proportions, the celebrants at the bar mitzvah were among the primary catalysts responsible for the stunning transformation of life in the former Soviet Union. The uninhibited joyful dancing in the magnificent central synagogue of Kharkov in celebration of Mendel’s maturity as a Torah observant Jew, made it hard to believe that not too long ago, this was a place of utter hostility to Jewish life.

Mendel is the first of all the sons of the hundreds of Chabad-Lubavitch Shluchim in the former Soviet Union, to turn 13. An infant when his parents—Rabbi Moshe and Miriam Moscovitz—set out for the uncertain terrain of a country trying to rebuild itself after the collapse of Communism, Mendel shared in their initial discomfort, living in a cramped hotel room with insufficient running water and electricity, and only canned food for breakfast, lunch and supper. Growing up surrounded by poverty, Mendel was made deeply aware of the needs of others and his own responsibility towards his fellow Jews; he learned early on to share, extending material, emotional, and spiritual support to his less fortunate friends. And amidst plans and a hubbub of activity surrounding his own bar mitzvah, Mendel resolved to make this momentous occasion more than just a lavish party thrown in his own honor. Instead, at the bar-mitzvah boy’s request, ten of his friends would mark their own entry into Jewish adulthood, each receiving his own first pair of tefillin, a stepping-stone towards further Jewish involvement.

Kharkov’s central synagogue, the largest in the CIS and second in Europe only to one other synagogue, was originally built in the early years of the twentieth century and soon afterwards transformed into a sports complex. Rebuilt with the support of the Rohr Family Foundation, the synagogue is once again a bustling center of Jewish activity. The shul houses parts of Chabad’s school, which began as a class of seven, with Mendel Moscovitz among them, and now includes a preschool, separate primary and high schools for boys and girls, as well as a post-secondary institution of higher learning in Judaic studies with some 500+ students combined.

The Moscovitz’s were not spared the starts and setbacks so endemic to the Shliach’s experience: Three thousand people attended Kharkov’s first Rosh Hashanah services in the newly opened synagogue, immediately following the Moscovitz’s arrival, and the future seemed bright. But it was curiosity that had drawn people, and to the Moscovitz’s disappointment, the curiosity would fast be displaced by apathy and a general disinterest filling the road ahead with challenges that at times seemed insurmountable. Reminiscing about her early days here, Miriam recalls how one person approached her husband on Yom Kippur about his paleness, and suggested that he eat something. Another expressed his dismay that he had no truck on which to build a Sukkah; he assumed that like the Moscovitz’s Sukkah mobile, meant to publicize the holiday of booths, his too must be built on wheels. “Those were the days,” Miriam chuckles, glad that they are behind her. This Chanukah eight hundred people braved dangerously low temperatures to participate at a Chanukah event that included fireworks, latkes, and the lighting of a 20-foot tall menorah.

Although Jewish life is gaining new currency amongst the country’s 50,000 Jews, poverty remains the norm for the vast majority here, and providing humanitarian aid is an important feature of the Moscovitz’s activities. The “Meals on Wheels” program, by now a well known feature in the streets of Kharkov, provides daily meals to 1,000 people, with ten drivers delivering the food packages to eight hundred people who cannot leave their homes, and the two hundred are served meals daily in the shul. A medicine program for the sick and ailing, sponsored by the Global Jewish Relief Network, enables them to visit a doctor at the shul and procure required medicines, all at no charge. Without the necessary government aid, orphaned children are often left unattended and when one young boy without a father was suddenly orphaned of his mother too, Chabad took the initiative and opened an orphanage that ten boys now call home. A girls orphanage is expected to open next September.

But mostly they are happy occasions that bring the Jews of Kharkov together, culminating this year with Mendel’s bar mitzvah. According to Alexander Kaganovsky, formerly a secular Ukranian Jew, now heavily involved with Jewish activity here, the Moscovitzes have “changed the face of the city, and brought about an enormous Jewish renaissance.”

“The commemorative medal for Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II’s Golden Jubilee was created to mark the 50th anniversary of the accession of Her Majesty to the Throne in February 1952,” reads the award presented to Rabbi Israel Landa, Chabad representative to the Israeli community of Thornhill, Ontario. “It is awarded,” it continues, “to those persons who, like you, have made a significant contribution to Canada, their community, or to their fellow Canadians.”

The medal’s effect, though aimed at recognizing Chabad’s activities, also granted validity to an entire sector of the Jewish community that had previously been unacknowledged. And it came as no surprise that this major step up for the immigrant community of roughly 30,000 people (one third of the area’s general Jewish population) came through Rabbi Landa, who, community members are quick to point out, provided the Hebrew-speaking people here with a true home away from home.

When he arrived here with his wife some thirteen years ago, the local community was having a rough time integrating the Israelis with their Canadian Jewish counterparts, says Rabbi Landa. Determined not to let a small but growing Israeli populace fall by the wayside, he got to work creating a close-knit Israeli community that included people from every stripe of Israeli life, secular, religious and everywhere in between.

“People here weren’t comfortable with the routines of Jewish life in North America,” says Rabbi Landa. “They weren’t used to what was being offered here.” So the Landas set about simulating an Israeli-style community in this Canadian city, while drawing attention to issues of concern that might go unnoticed in Israel. “Our aim is twofold,” says Rabbi Landa, “we have created a place for people to feel at home, like in Israel, and they do. But at the same time we use the opportunity to make them aware that being Israeli isn’t enough to build a Jewish home, not in Canada.”

Israeli traffic, notes Rabbi Landa, is enough to remind even the most secular Jew about Yom Kippur. And non-observance doesn’t keep Israeli children from knowing what Shabbat is, in a country where the legal off-day is Saturday. In Canada, as elsewhere in the Diaspora, the threat to one’s Jewish identity is greater than in Israel, and Landa makes a point of talking to the Israelis about the importance of nurturing this identity through increased involvement in religious and communal activities.

Services for the Israeli community are held daily, Israeli-style, and draw some one hundred people on a typical Shabbat. As many as 25 people attend weekly classes for discussions on the Parshah, Kabbalah, or Chasidut, all in Hebrew, and holiday events are also a main feature of the Landas’ activities here; some three hundred people participated at this year’s Chanukah event. Rabbi Landa’s weekly slot on an Israeli radio station in the area and his column in the local Israeli paper help spread word about Chabad’s activities here, drawing newcomers, as well as those who have lived here for years without any affiliation.

For Mr. Henry Silberman, a native of Israel, being Jewish meant preserving Israeli culture and the Hebrew language, and he sent his children to a local Hebrew School in the hopes of securing both. Instead his children came home asking to hear the sounding of the shofar, and Silberman took them to Chabad, on the advice of a friend. Here he realized that involvement in an active Jewish community was more crucial to Jewish continuity even than Hebrew fluency. In the ten years since, Henry and his wife Iris have become regulars at services and activities here, and staunch supporters of Rabbi Landa. “Israelis are tough clientele,” notes Henry, “but the Landas are matching that toughness with an openness that draws everyone in.” Having recently purchased land, plans are in the making for the building of a center that will serve as the home base for all Chabad’s activities for the local Israeli community, providing them with a home all their own.

The Queen’s medal was awarded as well to Rabbi Zalman Aharon Grossbaum, director of Chabad-Lubavitch activities in Ontario, in recognition of his many years of dedicated service to Ontario’s community.