New York City

Houston — In a schoolroom of Congregation Emanu-El, a Reform rabbi is leading a seminar on patrilineal descent. Down the hall, a discussion on Jewish mysticism is taking place under the direction of a Conservative rabbi. A few doors away, an Orthodox rabbi is talking about Ahavat Yisrael, love of one’s fellow Jew.

A friend of Charles Coates at the University of Illinois had some interesting news in early 1935.
"Chuck, they're having a track meet in Palestine," Coates' buddy said.
Coates, a sprinter since his elementary school and high school days in New York City, hadn't heard of the second Maccabiah Games. But an all-expenses-paid trip overseas sounded exciting.

Near the end of the 2007-08 academic year, some unusual news about one class at the Solomon Schechter School of Manhattan came home to Miriam Akabas and her daughter Ariel and other families of then-fifth-grade students:  there would be no boys in the school’s sixth-grade class the following year.

For various unconnected reasons, several families of end-of-year fifth-graders were moving from New York City; seven of the departing students were boys, all the males in the class.

On his first visit to New York City after the Sept. 11 attacks a year ago, Rabbi Boruch Shlomo Cunin, from Los Angeles, was talking with some fellow Lubavitchers about a Jewish response to terrorism.
"What would the rebbe do?" one of the chasidim asked, referring to the late Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, leader of the Chabad movement.
"The rebbe would give New York City a gift," was the answer.

For most of the nearly six decades since the end of World War II, an SS training base 20 miles east-southeast of Lublin was, for the general public, a relatively minor footnote in the history of the Holocaust.
In recent years, however, Trawniki has assumed a higher profile.

The nation's Jewish communities are on high alert this week after the Bush administration upgraded the country to "orange alert" (the second-highest warning) in response to potential terrorist attacks by al Qaeda in the United States.
In New York, the Jewish Community Relations Council warned several thousand area synagogues, Jewish schools, community centers and hospitals to upgrade security for their buildings' ventilation, heating and air conditioning systems in case of a chemical or biological attack by the Islamic terrorists.

A week after unknown assailants spray-painted swastikas on 26 cars in Marine Park under cover of night, a high-visibility community forum sponsored by the Brooklyn neighborhood's political officials (including both New York U.S. senators, Rep. Anthony Weiner, state and city representatives and the borough president's office) is taking a stand against bias.
The Town Hall meeting that was to be held Thursday at the Kings Bay Y was being seen as more than a reaction to the anti-Semitic scrawlings in a neighborhood with a small Jewish population.

Near the end of the 2007-08 academic year, some unusual news about one class at the Solomon Schechter School of Manhattan came home to Miriam Akabas and her daughter Ariel and other families of then-fifth-grade students:  there would be no boys in the school’s sixth-grade class the following year.

For various unconnected reasons, several families of end-of-year fifth-graders were moving from New York City; seven of the departing students were boys, all the males in the class.

A lawsuit that may provide a legal weapon in the United States for agunot (Jewish women whose husbands are withholding a Jewish divorce) resumed this week in Canada.
Stephanie Brenda Bruker, a former resident of Montreal who moved to New York City 10 years ago, is suing her ex-husband, Jason Benjamin Marcovitz, for $1.35 million in damages in Quebec Superior Court.
Her claim: emotional distress and breach of contract.

Ron Rubin, a professor of political science by vocation and a few-times-a-week jogger by avocation, never gave serious thought to running 26 miles, 385 yards in a single stretch until he turned his television to the New York City Marathon one Sunday morning about 15 years ago.
He saw thousands of runners (world-class athletes and weekend schleppers) traversing the five boroughs and millions of fans cheering them on. He heard marching bands inspiring the runners. He signed up.