by Debra | Aug 22, 2023 | Creativity, Israel, jewish news, News
By Debra Rich Gettleman
When someone says “fashionista,” your first thought probably isn’t “prostitute.” But thanks to an innovative Israeli NGO, Turning the Tables, a small cadre of Israeli prostitutes in Tel Aviv and Haifa, are finding a way out of the oldest profession in the world.
Turning the Tables has been running a fashion school, Yotsrot Atid (creating a future) since 2011. They enroll 100 women annually and the program, which focuses largely on building skills and self-esteem, is making a difference.
The most recent Israeli Welfare Ministry report from 2018 estimated that there were approximately 14,000 active prostitutes in the country. But that number barely scratches the surface according to the organization’s leadership. That same study cited the average lifespan of a prostitute at 46 years old.
TURNING THE TABLES founder Lilach Tzur Ben Moshe stands for a portrait in the Yotsrot Atid fashion studio in Tel Aviv, last month. (credit: ARIEL SHEINBERG)
Turning the Tables founder, Lilach Tzur Ben Moshe was inspired to start the organization after a troubling stint of living in Tel Aviv’s Central Bus Station. The area, considered a “meat market,” is rampant with drug abuse, sleazy Johns, and a whole bunch of people eager to take advantage of women in prostitution. Many of these unfortunate women find themselves descending further into debt, thus making their industry exit nearly impossible.
Leemor Segal, the organization’s resource development manager, says that over the years they have seen about 3000 women in prostitution come through the fashion program. She explains in a recent Jerusalem Post article by Ariel Sheinberg, that these women “Have gotten into prostitution as a result of abuse that was not only not addressed and treated, but many times it was twisted.” When women feel out of choices and cornered, they often turn to the only way they think they can earn a living. But that life pretty much ensures a future of seeing oneself only as a victim.
Turning the Tables looks to rehabilitate the individual, downsizing the cycle one woman at a time.
In Sheinberg’s article, Segal talks about some of the intakes she’s been through where women seem completely lost. She often tells women “Listen to me: I see you. I hear you. You’re smart. You’re talented. You’re funny. You’re beautiful. You are going to be in a different place a year from now. I know it.”
With a program completion rate of about 70%, the majority of those women do in fact find themselves in a much more positive and hopeful place 12 months later. The women who commit fully to the program, which includes mental health care and social worker visits, establish financial and emotional stability that allows them to exit the profession and start anew..
by Debra | Aug 21, 2023 | Antisemitism, Holocaust, News, Seeking Justice
by Debra Rich Gettleman
…you’re a big time Israeli MMA fighter standing up to antisemitism.
If you haven’t been living under a rock, you’ve heard of Nick Fuentes, a white supremacist and Holocaust denier who hosts the online show “America First.” Fuentes, 24, boasts a cult following of Gen Z white nationalists who aren’t shy about making their racist views known publicly.
When Ultimate Fighting Championship fighter Natan Levy saw a Twitter feed last week that featured a photo of a shirtless Fuentes, he mocked the Neo Nazi by posting “”He’s built like a chopstick. Definitely not a threat.”
This fired up one of Fuentes followers, a guy calling himself “Ben.” Ben posted back to Levy, “I’ll drive to Vegas any day of the week to spar you on behalf of Nicholas J. Fuentes and America First.” And then, just for hubris, he added, “With no formal MMA training, [it] should be easy, right?”
Levy, not the kind of guy to back down, told him “Sure, I’ll gladly KO [knock out] your punk ass. Come see me bro…I’ll Venmo you the gas money.”
Ben, a formal martial arts trained young man, didn’t appreciate Levy’s critical views of his much admired America First leader, and took Levy up on the match. According to Ben, America First is “a political movement based on furthering Christian values in the US.”
Prior to stepping into the octagon cage, Levy asked Ben why he was dissing Jews on Twitter. Ben replied that he was defending Fuentes, “Because I think what he says is right.” He also clarified that Fuentes is not a Holocaust denier. He is, rather, a “revisionist.” A distinction that doesn’t quite fit in this case since Fuentes is not a historian with an alternate view on Holocaust facts, but is instead an outright denier.
When Levy asked Ben how many Jews died in the Holocaust, Ben replied, “I wouldn’t know that off the top of my head… they say six million.” Levy then spoke directly to the camera acknowledging that Ben was probably just an ill-informed kid. He added, “I’m not gonna hurt him too bad. But a lesson has to be taught here about trolling. Education is painful sometimes.”
After two swift take downs and a bunch of hard-felt blows, Levy pinned Ben down and Ben acknowledged defeat.
“I’m sorry,” Ben admitted. “Six million Jews were killed in the Holocaust.”
“Murdered,” Levy corrected.
“Murdered in the Holocaust” affirmed Ben. “I need to be more well-researched.”
Levy’s final words to the contrite contender, “This time it wasn’t that painful. The next one will be more painful.”
by Debra | Aug 19, 2023 | Health & Wellness, Holocaust, Loss, Medical News
by Debra Rich Gettleman
If you haven’t broken out of your pandemic isolation mode, you might want to rethink your penchant for privacy.
A recent study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), looked at 30,000 Jewish prisoners of Auschwitz-Birkenau who were transported from the Theresienstadt ghetto (now a part of the Czech Republic) and discovered that loners were actually the first to die in Nazi Concentration Camps.
While we are all aware of anecdotal evidence suggesting that social ties are beneficial. This recent study painstakingly examined records of all 30,000 prisoners. The lead author of the study, Stepan Jurajda, an economics professor at Prague’s Charles University, was quoted in the Wall Street Journal saying the researchers, “looked up information on every single one of these prisoners, including names, ages and addresses, and who traveled from the Theresienstadt ghetto to Auschwitz-Birkenau. And they found out whether these people survived the war.”
Research showed that 10% of The Theresienstadt ghetto prisoners landed in Auschwitz knowing another prisoner. The connections could have been neighbors, co-workers, or just someone traveling on the same transport. It didn’t matter how deep or long-standing the connections were. Any social ties increased inmates’ chances of surviving by a third.
Women especially did well by maintaining social bonds. Even inmates who shared the same weekly magazine had a greater chance of making it out alive. In the same Wall Street Journal article, Jurajda shared, “The more people in the crowd you knew, the greater your chances of survival.
So go back into the world and build your social network. Whether it’s the woman next to you at Zumba, your favorite barista at Starbucks, or the Uber driver who gets you to the airport, according to this study, your best chance of survival depends on developing and maintaining even the weakest social bond.
by Debra | Aug 17, 2023 | Antisemitism, News
by Debra Rich Gettleman
The 1970s brought us Watergate, “Happy Days,” and bell-bottoms. They also brought us a slew of bomb threats that defined the decade. If you felt like you were living in a time warp this week, you are not alone. There were over 26 targeted bomb threats on synagogues and 2 on ADL offices across the county.
The idea of bomb threats is to strike fear into the hearts of the public. They scare everyone and create disruption to everyday life. The reality is that few of these threats result in detonation. But that doesn’t mean law enforcement can take those threats lightly.
The recent incidents are part of a string of 26 “swatting” calls aimed at synagogues in 12 states across the country. And the police response is known as “swatting” because it refers to the police SWAT teams that are summoned in such cases.
Whether it’s a 911 call insisting that there’s a backpack bomb hidden in a classroom cubby or a social media post warning that an explosion is imminent within the next 15 minutes, police take every threat seriously and arrive at the scene with bomb-sniffing dogs in tow.
The recent hoax calls are occurring against a backdrop of dangerously increasing incidents of antisemitism in the US. In fact, according to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), antisemitism incidents last year alone reached the highest level since 1979, when the ADL started keeping track.
The hoax calls go to police departments and suicide hotlines around the country. The gist of them is that some suicidal guy is about to off himself and has set up a bomb in a building to accomplish the deed.
When asked for the location of the bomb, the caller leaves the address of a synagogue that is livestreaming its services. Then, callers watch in real time as police interrupt frightened worshipers. They later post clips of the incidents online.
By combining technology and terror, hoax perpetrators can create massive fear in communities worldwide.
Oren Segal, ADL’s Center on Extremism director said in a recent New York Times article that the swatting calls pose a different type of threat than more typical antisemitic acts, such as graffiti or slurs.
“It’s the thousands of people that are anonymous, that are watching, that are getting excited by what they’re seeing and that may be animated to take it to the next level,” Mr. Segal said. “This is so dangerous because we don’t know who else is watching and what they might do based on what they’re seeing.”
by Debra | Aug 16, 2023 | Arts, Celebrity, film, News, Newsflash
Bradley Cooper as Leonard Bernstein in the film “Maestro.”
by Debra Rich Gettleman
Don’t you just hate when you spend millions of dollars to write, direct, produce, and act in a major motion picture only to be doused by social media criticism the minute the trailer is dropped? I know I do.
So yesterday, with the trailer release of Bradley Cooper’s up-coming biographical romance about Leonard Bernstein, Cooper felt the slings and arrows of a cadre of antisemitic organizations and individuals who found his prosthetic nose to be more than a little insulting.
While some of the backlash was aimed at the portrayal of Bernstein, the Jewish composer of West Side Story and a slew of other iconic musicals, by a non-Jew, the bulk of criticism centered around Cooper’s “Jewface” which pushed an ugly (both physically and metaphorically) convention of Jews as having large hooked noses, a deeply antisemitic cultural stereotype.
“Hollywood cast Bradley Cooper — a non-Jew — to play Jewish legend Leonard Bernstein and stuck a disgusting exaggerated ‘Jew nose’ on him,’” posted StopAntisemitism, an organization aimed at countering antisemitism.
Another poster lashed out about having seen Cooper play the elephant man on Broadway without the use of any prosthetics. “But then he plays a Jew and decides he needs a huge nose?
And one comment pointed out, “He’s the director too so don’t blame anyone else.”
Bradley Cooper
According to The Media Diversity Institute (MDI) website, portraying Jews with large hooked noses had its roots in Nazi propaganda from the 1930s. “It is a technique used to stir up a sense of disgust and repulsion towards Jews, either collectively or individually, and is often found alongside other antisemitic motifs involving money, power, conspiracy and blood.”
MDI goes on to explain that it is virtually impossible to find a single piece of propaganda from the time that does not depict Jews with an exaggeratedly large, grotesque, hooked nose. “It is easy to see how these strikingly evil and sub-human looking images stayed with those who saw them—subtly entrenching the association between Jews and large noses, using this ‘defining characteristic’ to encourage people to identify, and discriminate against Jews.”
There’s an old saying that no press is bad press. But I beg to differ on this one.
Leonard Bernstein
“Maestro” will have its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival in September and is expected to have a limited theatrical release on Nov. 22. The question now is how limited this release will be.
Recent Comments