Social Issues

Fifty years have passed since the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the birth control pill for sale with a doctor’s prescription. Now ninety-eight percent of all women will use contraception during their lifetimes, and one-third of those will use birth control pills.

In the basement of her Oceanside, L.I., home, next to a window and a hand-lettered “Patience” poster, Irene Hizme sits at a drawing board, creating works of intricate calligraphy and flower-filled branches.

A Czechoslovakia-born Holocaust survivor in her “early 70s” and retired biochemist/computer programmer, she spends much of her free time these days making thank-you notes and birthday cards. She does many of her works as a volunteer for The Blue Card, an organization that offers financial assistance to aging Holocaust survivors.

WASHINGTON (JTA) -- Leaders of both parties in the U.S. Senate are urging President Obama to consider placing the Turkish charity involved in the Gaza flotilla incident on the terrorism list.

Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.), the Senate majority leader, and Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), its minority leader, circulated a letter last Friday among their colleagues that would press Obama to investigate the Turkish Humanitarian Relief Foundation.

(JTA) — Kosher meatpacking executive Sholom Rubashkin was acquitted in an Iowa state court of child labor violations.

Rubashkin was found not guilty on all 67 counts of child labor violations, relating to 26 teenagers from South America who worked at the Agriprocessors kosher meatpacking plant in Postville, Iowa.

Several then-underage workers at the Agriprocessors plant were flown in from Guatemala by the court to testify against Rubashkin.

Breaking bread together, literally, helped launch conversations between some of the county’s Muslims and Jews.

In mid-April, several women from the local American Women’s Muslim Association along with several women from Westchester’s Jewish community, gathered at Hartsdale’s Chef Central to share such dishes as biryani, baba ghanoush, kasha varnishkes and noodle kugel.

Q: How much eccentric behavior should a synagogue community tolerate?

I am the president of a small synagogue in the metropolitan area. Our staff consists of a part-time rabbi, a weekly bookkeeper and a maintenance person. Volunteers keep the synagogue going, and we pride ourselves on our welcoming environment. People of different ages and socioeconomic situations come to our services and programs.

The dispute now raging over how American Jewry should fund overseas Jewish needs will have at least one important outcome: it will put a serious discussion about Jewish identity on the front burner of the organized American Jewish community (“Jewish Agency, JDC, Stake Claims In Funding Fight,” May 7). Such a discussion is long overdue.

When it comes to projects focused on empowering Jewish women and girls, it’s a good bet that Barbara Dobkin’s name is listed among the supporters. And if it isn’t, you have good reason to ask why not.