15 Feb Speak Your Vues
SPEAK YOUR VUES WITH THE VUES MASTER
Please note that the author of Speak Your Vues is in no way affiliated with the publisher of this paper. The author of this column is an independent third party contributor. The views and opinions expressed by this author may not reflect the views and opinions of the publishers. If one has any issues with any of the views, please write a letter to the Vues Master.
WOW
Dear Vues Master:
I write this letter to the Jewish Vues to tell
the Jewish world, in an effort to express my
Hakaras HaTov to the special individuals
who helped a “brother” out this past week,
as well as to share the bracha of being part
of such a special nation. This past week,
on a cold and rainy Monday morning, I was
involved in an early morning hit-and-run
accident near the Belt Parkway headed toward
Brooklyn. Baruch Hashem, I was not
injured, and pulled over to the side of the
road to wait for the police. For 3.5 hours,
I sat at the side of the road in my car alone
waiting for the police to arrive. When they
came, I stood outside in the rain while they
took my information. Within two minutes
of exiting my car, another car pulled over
and I heard someone calling, asking if I
needed help. When I looked to see who it
was, I found I did not know them, but it
was a Jew- who saw another Jew in need.
The driver jumped out, asked me what happened,
made sure I was okay, and started
talking to the police and tow truck company
for me. At the same time, a woman jumped
out of the backseat, came over to me, put
her arm around me, and once again asked
if I needed help. After spending a few
minutes helping me out, and asking if they
could give me a ride, I assured them I would
be okay, and thanked them, although I was
unable to think straight to ask their names.
But for Am Yisrael, that was not enough- I
continued standing waiting for the police
to finish, and I noticed that the car had not
pulled away. I have no doubt in my mind
that this family had somewhere to be, but
they stopped for me anyway. A moment later,
the woman ran over to me again, handed
me a small bag, and said “at least take some
water”. With that, she gave me a warm hug,
and went back to her car. The bag was full
of snacks and water, and the warmth of the
hug was what I needed at that moment. To
the “malachim” who stopped for me on a
rainy Monday morning- THANK YOU.
Hashem should repay your kindness with
brachos ad bli dai! MiKiAmecha Yisrael!
What other nation would stop what they are
doing, to extend such care to a brother in
need. With appreciation,
ND
Vues Master’s Note: Love this. This is why
we are the chosen people. Send some more
inspiring stories!
KIDDUSH HASHEM
Dear Vues Master:
I’m once again trying to eat my breakfast in
a luncheonette, when this Jewish person is
giving the non Jewish worker a hard time.
This worker is there from morning to night
six days a week and sometimes on Motzei
Shabbos as well. This person is complaining
about everything. She wanted Mezonos
rolls instead of Hamotzie. Same thing according
to Rav Belsky ztl. You have to wash
& bentch on mezonos bread! She wants the
light potatoes not dark. Who cares? It still
turns into sugar and it’s fattening light or
dark! What is she thinking that it’s Coffee
dark or light? Just Wait! You’ll see, She’ll
have a problem with that also. I just hope it
wasn’t Decaf- oy vey ez Mir’ Why can’t we
instead make a Kiddush Hashem and wait
patiently and say thank you? I make sure to
try to tip the workers as I saw Rav Yaakov
Kaminetzky ztl tip the elevator doorman
$1. By the way, was the baguette you gave
me for breakfast, whole-wheat?
R M L Halevy SHLITA!
Vues Master’s Note: Try to be dan l’kaf
zchus. Maybe this is the one time a year
she can afford to go out and it is so special
that it sneeds to be perfect. Remember these
workers should be trained that the customer
is always right!
SAYING HELLO ON
VACATION
Dear Vues Master:
Last week, I went to Eretz Yisrael with my family for Yeshiva break. My son is learning in a yeshiva this year & my family went to visit him. I found it very interesting how on this trip wherever I went people from Flatbush would stop me & say hello. The same people would never say hello to me in Brooklyn. I find it very interesting that it really doesn’t make a difference whether it’s a child or adult when you go away on a vacation & you see someone from your hometown they are always that much more friendly. Those same people for whatever reason would never say anything to me when I’m back in Brooklyn. I just find that very interesting.
YFM
Vues Master’s Note:Very true! It happens all the time.
MARRIAGE
Dear Vues Master:
A lion in Africa was getting married and invited all the animals in the jungle to celebrate with him. Among those who came was a little mouse. The mouse approached the lion and congratulated him, saying “Mazel Tov my brother, Mazel Tov!” The lion said “Thank you for the congratulations, but how can you call me your brother? You’re a mouse and I’m a lion, King of the jungle.” “Yes,” the mouse answered, “Before I was married, I was also a lion.”
MB
Vues Master’s Note: Don’t make fun of marriage, they say it is an institution!
DIVERSITY IN THE JV
Dear Vues Master:
I just want to tell you how much my family appreciates the Jewish Vues. This past Shabbos morning, I sat with my mother before shul having a cup of coffee & reading The Jewish Vues. We both commented that the Jewish Vues is the only heimish paper that would put both Jonathan Pollard & Rabbi Ezrachi on the front cover. No other paper would do that. We appreciate very much how you go out of your way to include all different types of people throughout Klal Yisrael. Kol Hakavod. Please keep up the good work!
JK
Vues Master’s Note: We try to be the newspaper of Klal Yisrael! We also love compliments. Thank You!
TUSKEGEE
Dear Vues Master:
The passing of Charles E. McGee last week has occasioned an outpouring of tributes to the Tuskegee Airmen, the all-Black units of American military aviators, of whom McGee was one of the last surviving members. What is not widely known is that the history of the Tuskegee pilots is connected to the controversy over the Roosevelt administration’s refusal to bomb Auschwitz. Defying racist War Department officials who regarded them as racially inferior and did not want them to fly, the Tuskegee Airmen scored extraordinary achievements in battle. Tuskegee squadrons shot down more than 100 German planes and repeatedly won Distinguished Unit Citations and other medals for performance in their missions over Europe. They were so admired by their fellow pilots that other bomber groups often specifically requested the segregated Tuskegee units as escorts for their bombing raids. Several of those raids took place in the skies over Auschwitz. On the morning of August 20, 1944, a group 127 American B-17 bombers, called Flying Fortresses, approached the sprawling Auschwitz complex. The site included the mass-murder section known as Birkenau as well as an industrial zone where Jewish slave laborers worked in factories that produced synthetic oil for the German war effort. The bombers that day were escorted by one hundred P-51 Mustang fighter planes. Most of the Mustangs were piloted by Charles McGee and other members of the Tuskegee Airmen’s 332nd Fighter Group. Throughout the previous two and a half months, Jewish organizations had been asking the Roosevelt administration to bomb the gas chambers and crematoria in Auschwitz, as well as the railways and bridges leading to the camp. Some of the requests named specific bridges and railway junctions that should be hit, in order to disrupt the trains that were deporting hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz. For example, the president of Agudath Israel, Rabbi Jacob Rosenheim, pleaded with the administration to undertake “an aerial bombardment of the most important railway junctions of Kaschau and Presov, through which the deportation-trains pass.” The U.S. Labor Zionists submitted a similar appeal, at the request of Golda Meir (then known as Goldie Myerson), one of the leaders of the Jewish community in British Mandatory Palestine. U.S. officials responded that such air strikes were “impracticable” because they would require “diversion of considerable air support essential to the success of our forces now engaged in decisive operations.” But that excuse was false. The planes would not have had to be “diverted” from elsewhere in Europe—as proven by the fact that U.S. pilots, including Charles McGhee and other Tuskegee Airmen, repeatedly flew directly over, or very close to, Auschwitz. In the August 20 raid, the attacking force dropped more than 1,000 five hundred-pound bombs on German oil factories less than five miles from the gas chambers. Despite German anti-aircraft fire and a squadron of German fighter planes, none of the Mustangs was hit and only one of the American planes was shot down. All of the units reported successfully hitting their targets. On the ground below, Jewish slave laborers, including 15 year-old Elie Wiesel, cheered the bombing. In his best-selling memoir, Night, Wiesel described their reaction: “We were not afraid. And yet, if a bomb had fallen on the blocks [the prisoners’ barracks], it alone would have claimed hundreds of victims on the spot. But we were no longer afraid of death; at any rate, not of that death. Every bomb that exploded filled us with joy and gave us new confidence in life. The raid lasted over an hour. If it could only have lasted ten times ten hours!” But it did not. The gas chambers and crematoria were never targeted, even though there were additional U.S. bombing raids on Nazi industrial sites in the Auschwitz region in the weeks and months to follow—including attacks on August 27 and September 13 in which the Tuskegee Airmen participated. Similarly, McGhee and his fellow-pilots repeatedly were sent to take part in attacks on railways and bridges in Hungary—but never the ones named in the Jewish organizations’ requests. For example, on August 28, the 332rd Fighter Group of the Tuskegee Airmen escorted bombers hitting the Miskolc Min train marshalling yards north of Budapest. On September 17, the 332rd participated in an attack on the Rakos train marshalling yards, located in Budapest. The next day, the Tuskegee Airmen took part in the 304th Bombardment Wing’s attack on railroad bridges in Budapest. And on September 21, they escorted B-17 bombers striking the Debreczen marshalling yards, east of the Hungarian capital. The Roosevelt administration knew about the mass murder going on in Auschwitz, and even possessed diagrams of the camp that had been supplied by two escapees. But it never gave the order to strike the mass-murder machinery or the transportation routes leading to it. President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s policy was to refrain from using even minimal military resources in connection with humanitarian goals, such as interrupting the mass murder of the Jews. U.S. officials did not want to deal with what they called the “curse” and “burden” of caring for large numbers of refugees. The president and his administration failed to confront one of history’s most compelling moral challenges. The refusal to bomb Auschwitz remains the most powerful symbol of the U.S. government’s failure to do what should have been done. And the Tuskegee Airmen were eyewitnesses to the fact that it could have been done.
RM
Vues Master’s Note:Thanks for the History lesson. We need more people reminding us about the Holocaust.
MINYANIM IN FLIGHT
Dear Vues Master:
I’m not sure how to react to the announcement that El Al made yesterday. El Al Israel Airlines cabin staff have received a letter informing them that the airline has decided to trial organized in-flight minyanim on its long-haul flights between Tel Aviv and North America, Globes reports. The minyanim will be held in the galley at the back of the aircraft, after the meals have been served. The times of the minyanim will be announced prior to the flight. The formally organized minyanim, which will be announced on the passenger’s screens and over the aircraft’s public information speaker system, “at times regulated by the cabin crew,” are designed to replace the current ad-hoc prayers, in which aisles are sometimes blocked at awkward times causing inconvenience and discomfort to some passengers. Estimates are that Shacharis should take 30-40 minutes and will take place if possible exactly at sunrise. The letter to El Al’s cabin staff stresses the importance of the timing and that matters in the kitchen should be arranged so that minyanim can take place at precise times. However, passengers will be required to return to their seats during prayer times, which will be halted if weather conditions dictate. I’m very happy that they are trying this out but I’m worried that this has the potential to be a big Chilul Hashem. People will get up & make a lot of noise & wake people up that are sleeping. What do you think?
LB
Vues Master’s Note: Why can’t it be a Kiddush Hashem? Jews davening in the air. Why think negative? Be thankful El Al has a frum owner.
NAZI
Dear Vues Master:
Nazi works should not be removed from Amazon, as they are necessary for the study of Holocaust history. If we want to ensure that it never happens again, we must understand how it happened.
AM
Vues Master’s Note:The problem is that the Neo Nazis use it to revive their anti-semitism!
PSA
Dear Vues Master:
Senator Simcha Felder (D-Brooklyn) is encouraging New York homeowners who are struggling financially due to the pandemic to apply for the New York State Homeowner Assistance Fund (NYS HAF). NYS HAF is a $539 million federally funded program to help low- to moderate-income homeowners who are at risk of default, foreclosure, or displacement because of a financial hardship caused by the pandemic. Homeowners can apply by visiting www.nyhomeownerfund.org or calling 1-844-77-NYHAF (1-844-776-9423). “Homeowners have struggled throughout the pandemic with little or no government help. They have begged for assistance with their mortgages, taxes and bills and I am pleased that this program is finally available to those in need,” said Senator Felder. Applicants may receive up to $50,000 in financial assistance to catch up on missed mortgage payments, property taxes and water/sewer bills. They can also get help reducing mortgage debt to make monthly mortgage payments more affordable; and for homeowners who are unemployed, they can receive assistance with up to six months of future housing payments. The program is also open to owners of cooperative or condo units who are behind on maintenance fees. Senator Felder is also warning homeowners to be careful of scams. Applying for HAF is free and homeowners should be on guard against anyone charging a fee to apply for HAF or promising that they can make sure you will be awarded HAF money. “The program is expecting to receive more applications than it can fund, so I am strongly urging New York homeowners to apply as soon as possible!” concluded Senator Felder.
ST
Vues Master’s Note: Again advice is cheap! How about going from home to home and helping these people get this help. When it comes to collecting votes they come to peoples houses!
KIDDUSH HASHEM II
Dear Vues Master:
I was just in the bank in Boro Park, when I heard and noticed a “frum” yid with a beard, payos, and wearing tzitzis out carrying on loudly by calling the African American woman bank teller a liar! I was so embarrassed for our religion that I called out to the man that you’re making a Chillel Hashem! He was threatening that he would go around with a petition to get signatures to fire the poor unfortunate bank teller. She was telling him the bank policy that they don’t accept double endorsed signatures on checks, and he was calling her a liar. Why can’t he go to the bank manager privately and handle the issue like a “mentch”? I apologized to the bank teller and told her that I would go around with a petition to keep her job. I wonder if Rav Pam ztl or Rav Dovid Feinstein ztl was in the bank would he carry on the same way? No way!
RMS
Vues Master’s Note: Good point! I suggest you start giving classes on how to conduct yourself in public!
SHIVA
Dear Vues Master:
The father of a wealthy and hugely successful businessman died. The businessman, who did not have a particularly close relationship with his father, was in the midst of completing a major deal and didn’t want to take a week off to sit Shiva. So, he hired a minyan of Jews to sit for him. In the middle of the shiva, his conscience was troubling him, so he called the Rav and asked: “Do I need to pay a shiva call on the men who are sitting instead of me?”
NK
Vues Master’s Note:I would have told him that he should send a text instead!
YUM
Dear Vues Master:
As he lay dying, an old Jewish man turned to his son and said “I smell the coffee cake mom is baking in the kitchen. It really smells great. Please get me a piece.” The son went to the kitchen and returned empty handed. “Where is the cake?” his father asked. “Sorry, dad” the son responded, “mom said its for the shivah.”
DS
Vues Master’s Note: It is a good thing he was not stepping on the oxygen tube!
RELATIONSHIP
Dear Vues Master:
One aspect of the Israel-Diaspora relationship that I’ve come to appreciate since moving to Israel is how much American Zionists care about Israel. American Zionists identify with their connection to Israel. Whether it was through their discussions at home, day school education, summer camps, or youth groups, American Zionists have ingrained in their children a love of Israel and Zionism. American Zionists believe they are stakeholders in Israel. American Zionists believe the State of Israel is a country for the Jewish people and for them individually. They express their love for Israel by their support for Israel. They don’t feel abandoning Israel is any more of an option than abandoning a member of their family. American Zionists also struggle with Israel, and that struggle is also part of their support for Israel. Since Israel is such an integral part of their identity, American Zionists take the time to struggle and question, and wrestle with Israel. When American Zionists see steps that Israel is taking that are at odds with what they believe are Jewish values, they believe it is important to not stay silent, but to respectfully question. That is their way of loving and supporting Israel. American Zionists have a right to speak up for Israel because America is a democracy, Americans can speak up and try to influence US policy on Israel. As Americans who cares so deeply for Israel it is imperative that American Zionists lobby for US policies that are supportive of Israel.
RUP
Vues Master’s Note: What about davening and learning for their zchuss?
MIRACLE
Dear Vues Master:
I just saw a great video on YWN and I wanted to share the story. A non-Jew who works for the Reb Shayale Hachnasas Orchim guest house in Krestiner, Hungary posted a video about the yeshuah he experienced after he davened by Reb Shayele’s kever. In the video obtained by B’Chadrei Chareidim, Christian, who is a non-Jew, relates in perfect Yiddish: “My wife was diagnosed with cancer two years ago and the doctors said she needed surgery.” “I went to work by HaRav Friedlander in the Hachnasas Orchim and I told him I won’t be coming to work the next day because I had to go with my wife to the hospital.” “He asked me what happened and I told him that my wife has cancer and needs surgery. He told me to go to the kever and pray. I told him: ‘But I’m not Jewish,’ but he told me that it doesn’t matter, Reb Shayele helps everyone.” “I went to the kever. I wrote a kvittel, I lit candles and I prayed and I asked for a full recovery for my wife.” “The next day, my wife went back to the hospital to be tested prior to the surgery. The doctor said: ‘I can’t understand what I’m seeing here. The tumor is shrinking.’ He delayed the surgery and we went home. We went back a while later and the cancer had disappeared.” Christian added: “Six months ago, we had a baby and I named him Natan as thanks to Hashem Who gave me a child. Baruch Hashem, he’s healthy, everyone’s healthy in the zechus of Reb Shayele ben Reb Moshe.”
SBM
Vues Master’s Note: I thought the passuk says Li segulah that we are the only nation looking for segulos!
FREEDOM?
Dear Vues Master:
When GoFundMe shut down funding last week for the truckers’ Freedom Convoy, it didn’t just clobber Canadian rig drivers. It dealt a blow to the rights of Americans. Silicon Valley executives are trying to limit the causes Americans support, favoring leftist ones and canceling conservatives. How dangerous do you think this is to our society?
DR
Vues Master’s Note:Almost as dangerous as the government firing hospital doctors who refuse to take vaccines. It is Political Science. A doctor told me that they were short staffed and that they had doctors come in while they were Covid positive as long as the covid negative doctors who are not vaxxed don’t come in!
SUGAR FREE
Dear Vues Master:
An update for the food manufacturers: 70% of Americans are now trying to reduce their sugar intake. Therefore, we need more variety in sugar-free products. Please take the sugar out of your pizza sauce recipe. Make sugar-free ice cream and other sweets in flavors other than vanilla. Just because we are health conscious or have health conditions doesn’t mean we are boring!
SG
Vues Master’s Note: Is that what it means? I always thought they throw
in the sugar for free at no charge!
KADDISH
Dear Vues Master:
A Rav who went to pray in the Shul of a town he was visiting was surprised to see that all of the congregants were saying kaddish. He went over to the shamash and asked what happened, was there a mageifa in town? “No,” the shamash answered. “Unfortunately, in this town people only come to the shul when they have to say kaddish.” The Rav sighed and said: Kol Haeida kulam kedoshim.
NM
Vues Master’s Note:Ah! Now I see the joke!
SUPER BOWL RIOTS IN L.A.
Dear Vues Master:
What is this world coming to? The LAPD declared an unlawful assembly this past Sunday night after “violent and destructive” Los Angeles Rams fans wreaked havoc on downtown streets following the team’s Super Bowl victory over the Cincinnati Bengals. A station helicopter, over one of the large crowds of people on streets, spotted people setting off fireworks in the middle of traffic. Roman candles were also in the mix. City buses were vandalized. Some looting was reported, and at least one person was shot. I think the world is getting crazier every day!
EB
Vues Master’s Note: Yes. It’s a crazy world! Only getting crazier!