Short Takes

Citing several grievances against the Israeli government and police, between 10,000 and 15,000 Satmar chasidim protested Tuesday outside the Israeli Consulate on Second Avenue.
“The issue was protesting the oppression of religious Jews and the religious way of life in Israel,” said Rabbi David Niederman, director of the United Jewish Council in Williamsburg and a member of the Satmars’ Central Rabbinical Congress, which sponsored the rally.

Over the past few weeks, Danny Ross’ life has revolved around two events.
First came this week’s congressional hearings probing the Environmental Protection Agency’s response to 9-11.
Then, there’s his appearance Saturday night at the Bitter End in the West Village, where he’ll premiere his debut album, “Introducing Danny Ross!”

It’s hard enough to offer counseling to Israelis traumatized by rocket blasts in Sderot. But what happens when the counselor is also traumatized?
“We have a duty, so we do it; only afterward do you think about yourself,” says Aharon Polat, a social worker on call to respond to near-daily attacks by Palestinians on the southern Israeli town. He’s witnessed the Kassam blasts from as close as 150 feet, and like his patients, has his routine when sirens sound: “I go down to the floor and hide very good. I don’t want to die.”

(JTA) – More than 700 synagogues will take part in Shabbat Across America on Friday. Created by the National Jewish Outreach Program, the evening involves a beginner’s service and traditional Shabbat meal, with all the rituals explained. It has attracted more than a half-million people in the past decade.

A state judge has thrown out the claim by a group of plaintiffs that the Mapleton Park Jewish Center in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, was sold to a mosque without the knowledge of members.
“The documents submitted in support of the sale indicate that the sale was duly authorized,” wrote Judge Mark Partnow in granting a motion to dismiss the case against the Ahmadiya Movement in Islam and several other defendants.

The CEOs are out; the respiratory therapist is in.On the heels of a series of male moguls, the president of Hadassah, June Walker, has been nominated to chair the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. She’ll be the second woman to chair the umbrella group, and the first leader of a women’s organization, adding another crack in what has been considered a glass ceiling for women in Jewish organizational life.

A vandal painted a two-foot high, black swastika on the outside of Shaare Tzedek, a Conservative congregation on the Upper West Side last weekend.
The police department’s Bias Crime Unit was investigating the incident, according to the shul and the Anti-Defamation League.
The vandalism was noticed around 12:30 p.m. Sunday, and took place sometime after the building closed at around 5:30 p.m. Saturday night.
“People are always shocked when this kind of thing happens, and kind of scared,” said Lolita Pogrebitskaya, the shul’s office manager.

Vandals painted anti-Semitic graffiti on the side of a yeshiva and a Hatzolah ambulance in Belle Harbor, Queens, last weekend. The words “Heil Hitler” were discovered Saturday morning on the side of the Merkaz Hatorah yeshiva on Beach 129th Street, and a swastika and “death to the Jews” was discovered on the ambulance later that day.
“The irony and ugliness of such graffiti on a volunteer ambulance is stunning,” said Joel Levy, New York regional director of the Anti-Defamation League.

The selection of Mayor Michael Bloomberg to lead the U.S. delegation to the Yad Vashem dedication Tuesday in Jerusalem was a helpful election-year gift from President George W. Bush, and apparently a thrill for Bloomberg, too.

Looks like Mayor Michael Bloomberg can use all the help he can get to win approval for a stadium on the West Side. While hosting a group of organizers of Tuesday’s Siyum HaShas celebration, Bloomberg noted that the event was an “amazing celebration of having a great love of study,” then asked the crowd to put in a good word for him with the Almighty.