FOUR NORMS TO DEAL WITH CELL PHONES ADDICTION

I offer these ideas for reforms, all of which aim to reverse the two big mistakes we’ve made: overprotecting children in the real world (where they need to learn from vast amounts of direct experience) and under protecting them online (where they are particularly vulnerable during puberty).

Young people and their parents are stuck in at least four collective-action traps. Each is hard to escape for an individual family, but escape becomes much easier if families, schools, and communities coordinate and act together. Here are four norms that would roll back the phone-based childhood. I believe that any community that adopts all four will see substantial improvements in youth mental health within two years.

No smartphones before high school

Each child thinks they need a smartphone because “everyone else” has one, and many parents give in because they don’t want their child to feel excluded. But if no one else had a smartphone—or even if only half of the child’s sixth-grade class had one—parents would feel more comfortable providing a basic flip phone or no phone at all.

No social media before 16

Each adolescent feels a strong need to open accounts on TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, and other platforms primarily because that’s where most of their peers are posting and gossiping. But if the majority of adolescents were not on these accounts until they were 16, families and adolescents could more easily resist the pressure to sign up. The delay would not mean that kids younger than 16 could never watch videos on TikTok or YouTube—only that they could not open accounts, give away their data, post their own content, and let algorithms get to know them and their preferences.

Phone-free schools

Most schools claim that they ban phones, but this usually just means that students aren’t supposed to take their phones out of their pockets during class. Research shows that most students do use their phones during class time. They also use them during lunchtime, free periods, and breaks between classes—times when students could and should be interacting with their classmates face-to-face. The only way to get students’ minds off their phones during the school day is to require all students to put their phones (and other devices that can send or receive texts) into a phone locker or locked pouch at the start of the day. Schools that have gone phone-free always seem to report that it has improved the culture, making students more attentive in class and more interactive with one another. Published studies back them up.

More independence, unsupervised free play and more responsibilities 

Many parents are afraid to give their children the level of independence and responsibility they themselves enjoyed when they were young, even though rates of homicide, drunk driving, and other physical threats to children are way down in recent decades. Part of the fear comes from the fact that parents look at each other to determine what is normal and therefore safe, and they see few examples of families acting as if a 9-year-old can be trusted to walk to a store without a chaperone. But if many parents started sending their children out to play or run errands, then the norms of what is safe and accepted would change quickly. So would ideas about what constitutes “good parenting.” And if more parents trusted their children with more responsibility—by asking their kids to do more to help out or to care for others—then the pervasive sense of uselessness now found in surveys of high-school students might begin to dissipate. It would be a mistake to overlook this fourth norm. If parents don’t replace screen time with real-world experiences involving friends and independent activity, then banning devices will feel like deprivation, not the opening up of a world of opportunities.

The Terrible Costs of a Phone-Based Childhood – The Atlantic



Social media copies gambling methods to create psychological cravings

by Daniel Kruger,  UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN

May 8, 2018

Social media platforms are using the same techniques as gambling firms to create psychological dependencies and ingrain their products in the lives of their users, experts warn.

These methods are so effective they can activate similar mechanisms as cocaine in the brain, create psychological cravings and even invoke “phantom calls and notifications” where users sense the buzz of a smartphone, even when it isn’t really there.

“Facebook, Twitter and other companies use methods similar to the gambling industry to keep users on their sites,” said Natasha Schüll, the author of Addiction by Design, which reported how slot machines and other systems are designed to lock users into a cycle of addiction. “In the online economy, revenue is a function of continuous consumer attention – which is measured in clicks and time spent.”

Whether it’s Snapchat streaks, Facebook photo-scrolling, or playing CandyCrush, Schüll explained, you get drawn into “ludic loops” or repeated cycles of uncertainty, anticipation and feedback — and the rewards are just enough to keep you going.

“If you disengage, you get peppered with little messages or bonus offers to get your attention and pull you back in,” said Schüll. “We have to start recognizing the costs of time spent on social media. It’s not just a game – it affects us financially, physically and emotionally.”

Recreating the slot machine The pull-to-refresh and infinite scrolling mechanism on our news feeds are unnervingly similar to a slot machine, said Tristan Harris, a former design ethicist for Google who has been described as the closest thing Silicon Valley has to a conscience.

“You pull a lever and immediately receive either an enticing reward (a match, a prize!) or nothing,” Harris wrote.

We cannot know when we will be rewarded, and more often than not we don’t find anything interesting or gratifying, much like gambling. But that’s precisely what keeps us coming back.

“The rewards are what psychologists refer to as variable reinforcement schedules and is the key to social media users repeatedly checking their screens,” said Dr Mark Griffiths, a professor of behavioural addiction and director of Nottingham Trent University’s International Gaming Research Unit.

“Social media sites are chock-a-block with unpredictable rewards. They are trying to grab users’ attentions … to make social media users create a routine and habitually check their screens.”

Like gambling, which physically alters the brain’s structure and makes people more susceptible to depression and anxiety, social media use has been linked to depression and its potential to have an adverse psychological impact on users cannot be overlooked or underestimated.

For instance, phone dependency, driven by high social-media usage, can lead us to think our phone is vibrating, or that we have received a message, even when we haven’t.

“Phantom calls and notifications are linked to our psychological craving for such signals,” said IHPI member Professor Daniel Kruger, an expert in human behavior, from the University of Michigan. “These social media messages can activate the same brain mechanisms as cocaine [does] and this is just one of the ways to identify those mechanisms because our minds are a physiological product of our brain.”

“There are whole departments trying to design their systems to be as addictive as possible. They want you to be permanently online and by bombarding you with messages and stimuli try to redirect your attention back to their app or webpage.”

ARTICLE

https://ihpi.umich.edu/news/social-media-copies-gambling-methods-create-psychological-cravings

THE SOCIAL DILEMMA , Netflix 2020 

Tristan Harris, former Google design ethicist and co-founder of the Center for Humane Technology, explains in the documentary that there are three main goals of tech companies:

  1. The Engagement Goal: To increase usage and ensure users continue scrolling.
  2. The Growth Goal: To ensure users are coming back and inviting friends, who in turn invite even more friends.
  3. The Advertisement Goal: To make sure that while the above two goals are happening, the companies are also making as much money as possible from advertisements.

Harris summed this up with the warning: “If you’re not paying for the product, you are the product.”



The Importance Of The Name “Jacobo”

בשביל שלושה דברים נגאלו ישראל ממצרים: שלא שינו את שמם, ואת לשונם, ואת לבושם

TETOUAN

To speak of my father, about whom I never dared writing until now; I must begin with my great-grandfather, and make a special emphasis on his name: Ya’akob Bitton z ”l. My great-grandfather (it is his picture you see photographed here) lived in Tetouan- a small city in the North of Morocco with a significant Jewish population. An official 1861 census reports that out of 11,000 inhabitants in Tetouan, 5,000 or 6,000 were Jewish. (https://avotaynuonline.com/2016/08/jews-tetuan-morocco-genealogy-iconography/). Tetouan’ Jews were direct descendants of those expelled from Spain in 1492.  Spanish was the most common language in Tetouan but Jews had also their own Judeo-Spanish dialect: Haketia.

This is what I know about my great-grandfather. He lived in Calle del Tesoro # 2. He had a spices shop next to the market. And whenever someone needed paper to wrap the fish, they would get it from him. He was called “Brother Yaakob Bitton, the good one” (Hermano Yaakob Bitton, el Bueno) an honorific title in the Jewish quarter of Tetouan. Why? Because he was always reciting Tehilim and never spoke unnecessarily. This is all I know of my great-grandfather. Including one more detail: indirectly, he saved my father from assimilation.

SAN MIGUEL DEL MONTE

My grandfather Leon z ”l (Yehuda) was the eldest son of Yaakob Bitton. Born in 1895 he had to go out to work since a young age because poverty in Tetouan had turned into starvation. So terrible was the situation that at the age of 13 or 14  my grandfather had to travel alone to Argentina to send some money to his family. I don’t know how many times he traveled back to Tetouan. But I have the document of his wedding, civil and religious, that took place in Tetouan, in 1916. I believe after that, he never returned to Morocco. My grandfather Leon became a very prosperous businessman. He opened a network of clothing stores in various provinces of the country. And he settled with my grandmother in the city of San Miguel del Monte, a small town more than 100 kilometers away from Buenos Aires.

In that little town, to this day, there is absolutely nothing Jewish. There is no community, no synagogue, no school, no Kashrut. I think my grandfather was the only Jew in the entire town.

My father grew up there, and in his childhood, he never saw a mezuza in his house, he never ate Kosher, never learned Hebrew, never even heard a Kiddush. My grandfather’s legacy to my father were his Berit Mila and his name.   

In the 1940s my grandfather became very wealthy and was the only person in his small town to own a car and a driver. My grandparents my father and his siblings lived and dressed  like millionaires and were the celebrities of San Miguel del Monte.

LANGUAGE, ECONOMY, AND ASSIMILATION

My grandfather represented those thousands of Jews who, for mainly economic reasons, decided to live their lives on their own, with no Jewish community life. I am reminded of the differences between my paternal grandfather and my maternal grandfather, Abraham Faur, z ”l, who arrived from Damascus, Syria, around the same time, 1915. The most notable “advantage” my paternal grandfather had was that he spoke Spanish. And that advantage gave him access to business opportunities anywhere in the then rich country.  But this “advantage” also precipitated his assimilation. My maternal grandfather, on the other hand,  did NOT speak Spanish, only Arabic. And like 99% of the Syrian Jews who arrived in Buenos Aires, he settled in Barracas,  near the port. He went through hardship and financial difficulties but always lived with the community, with other Jews like him, supporting each other. 

What saved my grandfather from assimilation?

I believe that what saved my grandfather’s family from total assimilation was that his employees cheated on him and took all his businesses. My grandfather was literally left with nothing but debts. And he had to go to Buenos Aires in search of business opportunities and start from scratch. He never recovered his wealth but, providentially, my grandfather’s  financial ruin brought my father closer to the Jewish community.

WHAT’S IN A JEWISH NAME? 

What saved my father from assimilation? 

The most important factor that kept my father’s Jewish identity alive was his name, “Jacobo”. In Argentina, only a Jew could be named “Jacobo”. My father told me that throughout his childhood and adolescence, all he wanted was to be like everyone else but his name gave his religion away. Because of his Jewish name he suffered mocking, bullying and hatred. He tried to change his name and begged his friends to call him “Juan Carlos”, but he did not succeed. At school or at work everyone kept calling him, “Jacobo”, laughing, reminding him that he was a Jew.  When he arrived in Buenos Aires, he had no choice but to connect socially with the only people who were not going to bully him because of his name: his Jewish “brothers”.  And one night, at a community party in Barracas he met my mom.  And the rest is history.  

The Sages explained that what kept the Jews from assimilating into Egyptian society, particularly in times of prosperity, was that the Israelites consciously preserved their language, their clothes, and their names, a lesson I will never forget. 

In memory of my father, יעקב בר יהודה, in the day of his anniversary



How to pray?

 

In the Talmudic tractate of Ta’anit page 23, the Gemara tells us about Abba Hilqiya, an extremely honest man, who worked hard to make a living, and lived a life of poverty. His daily meal consisted of a piece of bread, which he shared with his wife, his two children, and any poor and needy who came to his house to ask for a morsel of that piece of bread. Abba Hilqiya was also known for possessing a very special “gift”: his prayers (like those of his grandfather Honi haMe’aggel) were reputed to be answered.

The Gemara tells us that, during a particular year of a severe drought, the Sages of Israel sent a delegation of two Rabbis to see Abba Hilqiya to ask him to pray for rain. Before even talking to the sages, Abba Hilqiya had already called his wife and, very discreetly, without saying anything to the Sages, went up with her to the rooftop, and began to pray, together: each at a different corner. Incidentally, this beautiful imagery, that of a husband and a wife praying together in different corners, appears as a theme also in other places: this is the way a Jewish couple prays together for the same thing.  Separated but united.  In this week’s Perasha, Toledot, the Tora (and the Midrash) describes very similarly how Yitzhaq and his wife Ribqa prayed for a child (לנוכח אשתו).

Returning to Abba Hilqiya, soon after his wife and he started to pray, a cloud appeared in the sky bringing the desired rain. The Gemara notes that this cloud did not come from the side of the rooftop where Abba Hilqiya was praying. The cloud arrived from the side where his wife prayed, hinting that the rain had come mainly because of her merit.

Abba Hilqiya came down from the roof, without being seen by the Sages, and claimed: “Well, I presume you came to ask me to pray for rain. If so, you can go home now, because, as you see, it already started raining on its own.”  This beautiful story continues describing the dialogue that took place between the Rabbis — who knew that Abba Hilqiya had actually prayed– and Abba Hilqiya (the full story can be seen here).

Several important lessons are learned from this episode of Abba Hilqiya that can teach us how we should pray.

Let’s start with the most obvious.

1. As the Gemara itself cares to show, personal virtues that a person has are correlated with such person’s prayers being answered: honesty, integrity and assisting people in need, seem to be at the top of this list.

2. There is another element that, although less explicit, also is clear. The modesty of Abba Hilqiya, who did all what he could in order not to take credit for the rain. 

3. The point I want to stress most is one that is more subtle: If Abba Hilqiya was so poor, and he knew that his prayers were heard by God, why did he not simply pray for his own material well-being?  Honestly, I don’t know the answer (please, email me if you have read any commentary about this point). But I can think of two possibilities. a) That Abba Hilqiya cared so little about materialism that one piece of bread a day was enough for him, and he did not consider it necessary to pray for more than what he needed to live. And perhaps, this extreme simplicity was yet another merit that made him and his wife deserving of God’s attention. b) That HaShem listens to our prayer especially when we pray for others. That is, when we pray for the welfare or good health of another person, or for the success of Am Israel in general, as Abba Hilqiya did at the time all Israel was suffering for the lack of rain.
 
On a more personal note, our family had the merit of knowing a woman whose behavior was very similar to that of Abba Hilqiya and his wife: that was ORO BAT ESTER z ”l, my wife’s mother.
 
√ During the numberless derashot that took place these days in her honor in Ashdod, Israel, it was heard, for example, that she always asked her daughters to bring with them some nice perfumes when returning from traveling abroad. But she never used any perfume. They eventually came to find out that, when she learned of any bride without financial means, she would very discreetly hand her an envelope with money along with a perfume with a nice bow that she had made herself. She was always doing good things for others, and in total discretion. 
 
√ One of her grandchildren said that he once got up in the middle of the night and found “Abuela Nori” z “l in a corner of her humble apartment doing Tefila and crying. When he asked her what was wrong, she replied that she was crying because the Chayalim, the young soldiers of the Israeli army, were exposed to too much danger those days, and she was begging HaShem with all her heart to protect them.
 
√ In our family, we all used to share with her all our challenges and problems, big and small, because we knew that she would pray for us. She was the one in our family with all the merits to be heard by Bore Olam!  And it was a very poorly-kept secret that, if HaShem listened to our Tefilot, and our problem was somehow solved, we all knew that “the cloud of rain” must have had arrived from Abuela Nori’s side of the rooftop.


How to live?

Every so often I wonder: as a Jew, to what kind of life should I aspire to live? How can I improve my connection with God? And once and again I reach the same conclusion: the secret lies in a verse from the book of Tehillim (Psalm 16): שויתי ה ‘לנגדי תמיד. With this verse, King David claimed: “I have set God in front of me, always”, with emphasis on the word “always”.

FEARING GOD

Having God in front of us means having God in mind. It means to visualize (without visualizing God, ח”ו) that He is seeing me.    Think for a moment of an employee that works at an important company. He handles money, solves conflicts and deals with customers. If the employee knows that his boss, the company’s owner, is constantly watching his every movement through the security cameras, this employee will hardly fall into the temptation to behave dishonestly with money that does not belong to him; or fighting with another employee; or disrespecting a customer. With time, the good behavior of this employee, which began as a reaction to being watched by the security cameras, would become his habitual behavior. As the saying goes in Hebrew: what begins as a habit becomes a second nature (הרגל נעשה טבע). 

Now we can better understand what King David said in Tehillim: if I am convinced that God sees what I do, hears what I say and knows what I think, I will be naturally inclined to do only what is right in the eyes of God. And as long as I don’t stop noticing that I am “being observed by God” I am surely immune from acting in ways I know are not proper. 

DOING HIS WILL

Knowing that God observes me not only protects me from being tempted to do what is wrong in His eyes, even when I am alone and nobody else sees me.  When I become aware that God is following me closely, I must assume that God is not indifferent to my life and to what I do with it. And this in itself is a very empowering idea: If He is noticing me, it is because I matter to Him. And since He knows my full potential, He also knows the great things I can achieve.  If I reach the level of feeling that God is watching me, and I don’t lose sight of this feeling, then I also have the greatest motivation to try and reach for what I can potentially become. And when, beyond believing in God’s existence, I become aware of His constant presence, then I will surely decide to make my will be His will: to spontaneously wishing to do whatever it is that He wishes me to do.

LOVING GOD

Finally, if God watches me, it is because I am a person of interest to Him. His interest in me cannot be a function of God’s benefit or any other earthly thing like that…  what could I possible give Him or benefitting Him? Thus, His interest in me is totally disinterested. And we, as humans, call this disinterested interest “love.” God cares about me because he loves me. As the Tora says, God loves us as a father loves his children. Is any feeling more powerful than knowing that you are loved? And God’s love, when one genuinely feels it, engenders a natural reciprocity. Those who, like King David, are able to feel that God loves them, in good times and in bad times, end up loving God back. And this begins a self-propagating cycle of being loved, and loving. Realizing even more tangibly how much one is loved, and then loving even more, etc. Just like a bride and groom, who cannot stop thinking about each other. In that state, when I realize that God watching me translates into His love for me, and for which I love Him back, my mind gets fixated on Him, the object of my love, and all material distractions vanish from the brain. This is how and when we reach King David’s spiritual level: שויתי ה ‘לנגדי תמיד

THE WORST ENEMY OF THE TRUE FAITH

What we just described is David HaMelekh’s formula for our spiritual growth, or, dare I say, a brief summary of the purpose of the life of a Jewish individual. Living under God’s eyes.  An knowing it. Fearing disobeying him for fearing to disappoint Him. Naturally wishing to act as He wills. Feeling loved by Him and loving Him to the point of not being able to stop thinking about Him…

There is only one problem. All what I wrote is relatively easy to explain with words. But it is very difficult to do. More precisely, it is incredibly difficult to act in this way with any sort of consistency. It is doable to “live under God’s eyes” for a few moments: while praying, while studying Tora (and sometimes even in those moments is difficult to focus). The greater challenge is the “always” Kind David was telling us about. Living aware of His presence “constantly”… How many people, apart from King David, can reach this level of a permanent awareness of God, without succumbing to the enemy number one of Emuna: being distracted from God’s Presence?

THE EXCEPTION

To be inspired to write this, I had only  to think of my dear mother-in-law, ORO BAT ESTER z”l.  She embodied King David’s motto: שויתי ה‘ לנגדי תמיד.  Without studying Gemara or Jewish philosophy, she articulated this facet of EMUNA, beyond words, with her permanent devotion to HaShem. Aware of God’s will that the needy be helped, she volunteered to be that vehicle for God’s will and assisted those who were truly needy people, those whom no one knows are poor, because they feel too embarrassed to ask.  
She understood God tends to those who need help, and so that is what she did: taking care of the sick, comforting the mourners, helping the widows, protecting the orphans or helping the brides to be.

I will never forget the immense gratitude and joy that she always showed for all that God gave her, which–for that uncommon humility that only those who are very close to HaShem feel–she never felt she deserved.

Knowing that God was watching her, and over her, she always acted with total and explicit acceptance of many and great difficulties she suffered, for which she never complained.

My dear mother-in-law lived permanently in the presence of God. And what is more (and uncommon): her behavior and her actions made others too notice His presence.…

Her life was dedicated to respect and love HaShem and His people; to love and care for her beloved husband Ribbi David Carciente z”l , and for their expansive and beloved family.

Today marks the seventh day following her departure from this earth.

May she be the inspiration for my children and grandchildren and for all those who wonder how to live in God’s presence.



THE BEST RESPONSE TO THE TERROR KITES



Who is behind Trump, Putin, Cyrus?

ובשנת אחת לכורש מלך פרס לכלות דבר ה’ בפי ירמיה העיר ה’ את רוח כורש
VICTORY DAY
May 9, 1945 Nazi Germany capitulates and signs its surrender to the Allied forces, ending officially the Second World War. For the Soviet Union this day was so special that declares May 9 as Victory Day. It is no wonder that Russia celebrates so enthusiastically May 9th since of all the countries that participated in this horrible war, Russia is the one that suffered the most material and human losses. It is estimated that there were more than 20,000,000 soviet victims. Timothy C. Dowling estimates that in the 1,417 days of war, the Soviet Union lost 800 lives per minute. The greatest losses were at the beginning of the German attacks in 1941 and in the heroic defense of Leningrad, where more than a million soldiers and a million civilians were killed defending the city.
MAY 8th and 9th , 2018
Today, May 9, in the morning, Moscow celebrated the 73rd anniversary of the victory of the Allies over the Nazis. It was celebrated with a military parade, where Rusia presented its new and powerful weapons and aircraft, as it does every year. But this year there was something special in Moscow: the presence of the Prime Minister of the State of Israel, Binyamin Netanyahu. If I am not mistaken, this is the first time that a prime minister of Israel is invited to this ceremony. The symbolism is very powerful: Jews and Soviets suffered the evilness of the same monster. Although of course, in the case of our dead, all were civilians (see correction below*). And they did not die defending their land or on the battlefield: they were systematically assassinated in the worst ethnic deliberate genocide known to mankind.
In this very symbolic ceremony you could see the moment in which Putin, together with Netanyahu and Serbian president Alexander Vujcic, honor the memory of unknown soldiers, millions of young fighters who sacrificed their lives for stop the bloodthirsty Nazi machinery. The most emotional part of the ceremony, for me, was listening to the music of HATIKVA, Israel’s anthem in the Red Square (minute 1.43).
Russia: Putin, Netanyahu and Vucic pay tribute at Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
All this happens within 24 hours that President Donald Trump declared the nullity of the pact of the USA with Iran. This has been seen in Israel as an unprecedented act of friendship and loyalty on the part of the U.S. towards its ally: Israel. Trumps courageous decision to sop the Iran deal means for Israel, I believe, even more than his extraordinary decision to move the American embassy to Jerusalem. And although it is well known that “whatever is good for Israel is also good for America”, I feel that we should be very grateful to president Trump for his remarkable continuos support for Israel.
PRAYING TO ASK OR PRAYING TO THANK?
Although it is extraordinary that also Russia, Iran’s main ally, is seemingly in such good terms with Israel, I know that we cannot be overly optimistic. Today, the mood in Israel is tense. Very tense. No one knows how or when Iran will react. The citizens of northern Israel were called to prepare their miqlatim, the shelters, and the army reserves were called. At this moment, instinctively, the first thing that comes to our mind is to pray to HaShem and ask Him to protect us and help us in our struggle against those who seek our destruction. But there is something we must not forget: This morning, when in the Amidah (individual prayer that is said standing and silent) I read the text of Shomea’ Tefilá, where we introduce our “special requests to God” I could not help but think that we should also, or first, thank HaShem for inspiring the hearts of the leaders of the world, and opening their eyes. We Jews believe this is one of the ways that HaShem performs His miracles to us, like Shelomo haMelekh said: לב מלך ביד ה’ על כל אשר יחפץ יטנו (The heart of the Kings is in the hands of HaShem, and He moves their heart at His will). This happened with King Cyrus (Koresh) of Persia 2,500 years ago. The prophet Yirmiyahu had assured that HaShem would make us return to Israel after the destruction of the Bet haMiqdash. And HaShem did it, by inspiring the spirit of King Cyrus. As the last words of the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) say, indicating one of the greatest (and best documented) miracles of our incredible story:
“In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah, the Lord moved the heart of Cyrus king of Persia to make a proclamation throughout his realm and also to put it in writing: This is what Cyrus king of Persia says: ‘The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and he has appointed me to build a House for Him at Jerusalem in Judah. Any of his people among you may go up, and may the Lord their God be with them.’ ”
May HaShem inspire the hearts of men and women of good faith
and open their eyes to see the just cause of our people
*CORRECTION: Not all Jews who perished in WWII were civilians. About 1.5 million Jews fought in Allied armies, including 500,000 in the Red Army, 550,000 in the American army, 100,000 in the Polish army and 30,000 in the British army, according to Israel’s Holocaust museum Yad Vashem.  
Approximately 500,000 Jews fought in the Red Army against the Germans and many were killed and wounded.  The State of Israel recognized these Russian Jewish heros and a museum about them is planned in the near future.  (thanks to Jordan B. Cherrick from St. Louis, MO for helping me to correct my involuntary mistake).  


Stephen Hawking and the Enemies of Israel

אתם עדי, נאום השם
Last Wednesday, Stephen Hawking, one of the most famous scientists in the world, passed away. His contributions to science have greatly impacted the world which we live in now, and his courage with which he faced his disease became an inspiration to so many. I truly admire his perseverance!
Hawking, on the other hand, had an ambivalent relationship with the State of Israel. He visited Israel many times, he participated with the Israeli scientific community and had a cordial relationship with the Hebrew State. But in the last 10-15 years years, this has changed. Hawking was no longer a great friend of Israel, but rather a participant in the BDS movement, an “anti-Semitic” organization that promotes not only the boycott of the State of Israel but also, albeit surreptitiously, its disappearance.
In 2013, for example, Hawking decided to boycott a conference held in Jerusalem in honor of the 90th anniversary of Shimon Peres, the former Israeli president. This attitude of Hawking provoked indignation in Israel and much of the Jewish world. The organizers of the conference wrote, “The academic boycott is, in our opinion, scandalous and improper, certainly for someone [like Hawking] for whom the spirit of freedom is based on his human and academic mission. Israel is a democracy in which all individuals are free to express their opinions, whatever they may be.The imposition of a boycott is incompatible with an open and democratic dialogue “.
And although many musicians and artists have previously refused to visit Israel, Hawking was the first scientist of his stature to openly support the boycott movement towards Israel. Many accused him of absolute anti-Semitism and others of cynicism, since the computer system through which Hawking could communicate worked on a chip designed by the Israeli team of Intel.
Why did Hawking become such an enemy of Israel?
Some newspapers write that this new negative attitude towards the Jewish state was due to the influence of Noam Chomsky, a very important scientist, founder of modern linguistics. Chomsky is a Jew, but an atheist activist, and infamous for his visceral antagonism and opposition to Israel.
This might be a valid reason…
In the next lines, however, I would like to contribute a personal idea about another possible reason for Hawking’s new anti-Israelism.
I had the opportunity to read many of Hawking’s works when I wrote my book “Awesome Creation”, where I deal with the biblical narrative of Creation vs. the Big Bang and other cosmological theories. In the first chapter, in a footnote I quote one of Hawking’s most famous expressions, in his “Brief History of Time” (1988) where he says that when modern scientists would be able to formulate the unified theory of physics, then we would be able to ” know the mind of God.” With that note I point out the arrogance of this statement and I compare it to what Bil’am (Balaam) declared. Balaam was the only man in the Bible who attributed himself to knowing the Divine Mind (although the Tora shows that Bil’am was not even able to understand the mind of his donkey …).
Now, although what Hawking said about God was arrogant, it was clear that Hawking DID believe in God (or at least he was an agnostic). But his belief changed over the years, perhaps due to his personal tragic disease. Hawking became a very influential voice for atheism when he published his book “The Great Design” (2010), which states that it is not necessary to invoke God to justify the existence of the universe. “There is no God”, he said, since “the laws of gravity may have created the universe without God’s intervention.” Now, explaining the origin of the laws of physics, is obviously as difficult as explaining the origin of the universe. Hawking’s statement, which Rabbi Jonathan Sacks categorized as an intellectual “fallacy”, would sound childish and almost silly, since it assumes that physical laws, gravity etc., pre-existed the appearance of the universe, and were not created , designed, calibrated, etc. But because Stephen Hawking was saying so, these superficial ideas that denied God’s intervention in the act of Creation gained some credibility…
Anyways, what I would like to analyze is another point. The relationship between “not believing in God” and the “opposition to the existence of the State of Israel,” particularly in modern Western society.
The Tora and especially King David in his Psalms, identified the enemies of Israel with the enemy of God. The existence of Israel, our miraculous departure from Egypt, the incredible journey of three million people through the desert, the providential conquest of the promised land, and especially the inexplicable survival of Israel in a hyper-hostile diaspora for almost two thousand years, can only be explained as a miracle or a series of miracles. If Israel exists, it is because God exists. But if Israel disappears, one could doubt His existence (ח”ו) .This concept was beautifully formulated by the prophet Yesha’ayahu who said (43:10): אתם עדי, “You – the Jewish people – are the witnesses, the living testimony of My existence. “
And what was true for 1900 years, became infinitely more true since 1948, when miraculously the same people who were systematically “exterminated” only three years before, were now establishing their own state in their original homeland. Something absolutely unprecedented !! Their children returned from all the countries of the world, fulfilling literally the oldest prophecies of the Bible. Israel fought against countless enemies, ALL her neighbors, in a ratio of 0.5 against 100 ! The countries that are antagonistic to the existence of Israel are rich, have the largest oil reserves in the world, and enjoy the support of 99% of the countries of the world. Israel is currently the only country on the planet whose existence is explicitly threatened, the only country permanently condemned and demonized by the United Nations…and despite all this, far from being a country in a state of emergency, corruption or desperation, Israel is a military, cultural, economic and technological “superpower”. Far from being a country where its inhabitants live in a permanent state of fear, tension and depression due to the dangers that they face, Israel is according to the new 208 statistics the 11th happiest country in the world! (USA ranked 18th)
THERE IS NO WAY to explain or justify the existence, survival, prosperity and happiness of Israel in a non supernatural manner, intelligent and informed people know it. And I think that this is why many people who do not believe in God, who are intelligent and well informed, resort to the last line of psychological defense that helps them sustain their atheism; demonizing Israel and directly or even indirectly, seeking its destruction.
When Hawking, Chomsky, Soros and many other atheist activists become the “irrational” enemies of Israel, they confirm once more the words of Yesha’ayahu: that our existence is a miracle. And that the people and the state of Israel, are the irrefutable testimony of the existence of God.


Don Isaac Abarbanel and Barcelona’s terror attack

Why Spain? Why specifically Barcelona? Why “La Rambla”? Why attack with a van? These questions abound. But, why do these Islamic terrorists attack and kill whoever is in their way? What is the ultimate goal of the Islamic State? There is not much written on this topic. Or it is rationalized. I read an article that says that the Muslims attacked Barcelona because they want to reconquer Spain, which was Muslim territory in the Middle Ages. May be. But this does not explain the attacks in London, Paris, Brussels or Turku, Finland (as I am reading now, as I’m writing these lines).
These weeks we are reading in the Haftara, the text of the prophets that we read each Shabbat after reading the Tora, a passage from the book of Yesha’ayahu, chapter 54. These Haftarot contain a message of comfort for the Jewish people. And today I would like to share with you the commentary of Rabbi Don Isaac Abarbanel (1437-1508) on verse 17 of this Haftarah. This pasuq says that the Creator will intervene, so that the enemies of Israel will not prosper. Isaiah speaks of those who “condemn” Israel with words of premeditated evil (a subject we might address a another day) and those who attack Israel with their weapons.
    כל-כלי יוצר עליך לא יצלח וכל-לשון תקום-אתך למשפט תרשיעי
“No weapon that is made against you shall prosper; and every tongue that rises up against you, you will show its vileness. “
Don Isaac Abarbanel had a very hectic life. He was persecuted in Portugal, after having served loyally King Juan for many years. He was also forced to flee Spain after having served the Catholic Monarchs. At the end of 1491 Queen Isabel announced her intention to expel all the Jews from her kingdom, and that he could remain in Castile and maintain his fortune if he converted to Catholicism. Don Isaac Abarbanel rejected the offer and in 1492, in total poverty, he exiled himself in Venezia. Rabbi Abarbanel knew Christianity very closely, and since he was a man of government, he also knew Islam. In te past, he helped the crown of Spain in the battles against the Muslims, both in the reconquest of Andalusia and in the wars against the Ottoman empire in North Africa.
Commenting on this verse Rabbi Abarbanel describes the Muslims of his day: “The prophet [Yeshayhu] says that no weapon formed against you will prosper and every tongue that is raised against you, you must condemn. Today [1490?] There are religions that do not preach or debate, trying to promote their religion to others with words. These religion’s strategy [to proselytize] is to kill all those who do not profess their faith. The Ishmaelites [euphemism for muslims] belong to this category. “
These words were written more than 500 years ago, but they sound as if they were written yesterday. The ultimate goal of the extreme version of Islam, the Islamist utopia, is to “Islamize the rest of the world.” But unlike other religions, which do their proselytizing with words, Islamists do it with the sword. Their strategy to achieve this end is: to kill all the infidels that you can.
This sounds insane. And because of this, very few people can conceive, identify, recognize and articulate this idea. That is why you will not find in the main media many articles that are explicit about this. On the other hand, the perpetrators, are not ashamed to confess their intentions. In fact, a text was found last night, that reminds us of what Don Isaac Abarbanel explained. In that text Moussa Oukabir, the alleged main perpetrator of the attack, says: “I would kill all the infidels, and only leave practicing Muslims alive.”
As we all know, Israel also suffered and suffers attacks like that perpetrated yesterday in Barcelona. The perpetrators are the same: “Islamist suicides who want to kill infidels.” The excuses are different: the occupied territories, etc. But the real Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as I have written. Ore than once, has to do with religion, not with “territories.” Hamas, and the militant groups fighting against Israel (Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, etc.) are as sincere as Oukabir, and openly declare that there is no place for dialogue and negotiations with Israel. For them, the destruction of Israel is neither negotiable nor conditional to the cession of territories.
Unfortunately many journalists and government officials , especially from European countries, etc. do not see, or do not want to see this reality. They refuse to acknowledge that Israel is the victim, and that it suffers from the same problem, only that much more serious, that Europe suffers. They declare that it is possible to reach a “two states” solution or something like that. Additionally, they do the most cynical and intolerable: they pressure Israel to make suicidal territorial concessions! They forget that even “moderate” Palestinian groups share these principles of intolerance for Israel. The evidence? While 60% or 70% of Israelis are willing to accept the idea of ​​two states, the Fattah or the Palestinian Authority, does nothing to promote the idea of ​​living in peace with Israel. They do not even express their willingness to recognize a Jewish state, even in exchange for territories. Everyone knows, but very few denounce, that the future map of the geography of the Middle East that the Palestinians teach their children, does not include Israel.
There is a psychological barrier which prevents us from conceiving seriously the insanity of extremism. This barrier, our own sanity, is very dangerous. When we do not take the delirium of the fanatics seriously, we try to look for “alternative theories”, more rational, but wrong, to explain these attacks. And we dangerously seek false solutions to prevent them in the future.
In these painful times, we cry for the victims of terror in Barcelona, ​​and we pray to HaShem to protect us, and save humanity from hatred and irrationality.


Was Christopher Columbus Jewish?

The last name Colón, or Columbus, was typically a Jewish last name, originating from the Hebrew name Yona (“colomba,” which is Italian for “dove”). There was a famous Spanish Rabbi named “Rabbenu Yona” (d. 1264), as well as one of the most celebrated rabbis of that time and the most essential Italian jurist Rabbi (poseq) of all times, Rabbi Yosef Colón (Mahariq, 1420-1480). In Spain, in one of the earliest “autos de fe” (1461), Thomas Colón, along with his wife and son, were burned alive for committing the crime of “Judaizing” (performing Jewish practices, such as lighting candles or changing clothes on Friday afternoon, or standing silently while facing a wall [reciting the ‘Amida], etc.).

Of course, if Columbus was Jewish, he would have been expected to hide his identity, especially if his intention was to obtain the political support of the crown of Spain or Portugal for his expedition. At the time of the Catholic monarchs Ferdinand and Isabel (י”ש), being Jewish was not a title that granted many privileges in the Spanish court. Many Jews, probably more than 200,000, lived a double life. They, or their parents, had been forcibly converted since the start of the “pogroms” and riots in 1391. They lived outwardly as Catholics, but at home, among relatives and family (often risking their lives), they tried to live as Jews. These secret Jews were called by many different names: “marranos,” in the vernacular, converts, new Christians, or “chuetas” in southern Spain.

There is much evidence indicating the Jewishness of Columbus, such as his signature, etc. Less known facts are:

  1. In his will, Colón left 10% of his profits to the poor and the maidens who needed to be married. These gestures are two important precepts in Judaism, ma’aser kesafim, donating 10% of your income to charity, and within the Mitsva of Tsedaqa, as the Shulchan Aruch says, the most meritorious act and the noblest charity is to support young girls who need to get married and do not have sufficient means to do so (hakhnasat kala, Yore De’a 249: 15).
  2. Columbus had to leave the Port of Palos on August 2nd, 1492. That year, August 2nd was the day of Tisha BeAv, the day of national mourning for the Jewish people. Columbus, for reasons that could not be explained otherwise (in climatic terms, etc.), had his 90 men embark on August 2nd, but he left the port the next day, Friday, August 3rd, half an hour before the start of Shabbat. “Coincidentally,” August 3rd was also the last day the infamous Edict of Expulsion established for Jews to choose between converting or leaving Spain.
  3. All supporters of Columbus were Jewish or Jewish converts. Funding for the expedition of Columbus did not come, as the legend says, from the “money obtained by Queen Isabel” when she sold her personal jewelry. Columbus needed the political and legal support of the Queen to legally conquer new lands, and for this, he convinced the Queen that in the new lands (presumably, India), Spain could further spread Christianity. Among the Jews who supported Columbus were, for example, the famous Rabbi Don Isaac Abarbanel, one of the wealthiest men in Spain, and Rabbi Abraham Zacuto, Spain’s most famous astronomer at the time, who gave Columbus his astrolabe and its Perpetual Calendar, both new and essential tools for navigation. Columbus’s major donors were Jewish converts, among others, Luis de Santangel and Gabriel Sanchez. When Columbus returned from his first expedition, he wrote two letters thanking for the support he received: one letter to Sanchez and the other one to Santangel. He did not write to the Kings. But why would Spanish Jews and converts support Columbus’s enterprise enthusiastically? If Columbus’s intention was to promote the Christian faith, why would these persecuted Jews, who were forcibly converted to Christianity, and their relatives and friends were tortured and murdered in “autos de fe” for “resisting” practicing the Christian faith, support Columbus’s project?
  4. In his “Diary of the First Trip” of 1492, Columbus revealed his incredible master plan. There, Columbus writes that with the profits from the conquest of new lands, he wants to “free Jerusalem and build la casa sancta (the ‘holy house’).” Columbus says this repeatedly in his diaries. What moved Columbus to acquire gold and riches, in his own words, was his desire to finance a large army of over 100,000 soldiers, to liberate Jerusalem from the hands of the Moors and “build the holy house there.” For Christians, the conquest of Jerusalem was justified in order to liberate the “holy sepulcher,” the most sacred place in the world for Christians. In Christian terms, the expression “building a holy house in Jerusalem” has no sense. Obviously, as we Jews know, the building of the “Holy House in Jerusalem” can be nothing else but the Bet haMiqdash. The intention of Columbus, and the Jews who so enthusiastically supported him was that with the proceeds from a new world, Jerusalem could be conquered, and the Jews, including the 500,000-800,000 Jews who left Spain on the same day Columbus sailed from Palos, could finally return to their home, Israel, and see their “Casa Sancta” rebuilt (בבי”א), which was and still is, the highest aspiration of the Jewish people.
    All this information, as far as I know, is not very well known and, I believe, is not usually taught even at Jewish schools. 
     For what is probably the best article on this matter, where you can find all the information you need to prove the Jewish identity of Columbus, see here, Rabbi Yosef Faur: “Columbus and the discovery of America, a Jewish Perspective” .  
    In recent years (2013) a non-Jewish Hispanic businessman from Miami,  Charles Patrick Garcia, speaking to CNN, made Columbus Jewish identity better known.  Read this.  For those who want to practice their Spanish, there is also an interview to Garcia on this subject by “CNN en Español”.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHgjthCU7v