Is Everything Jewish Sad?

Die Presse, November 28, 2022

German original: https://www.diepresse.com/6221211/ist-alles-juedische-traurig

Is everything Jewish sad? The Jewish Museum Vienna is clearing up 100 misconceptions with an exhibition.

He was not yet 20 years old, but already an international pop star, when Justin Bieber visited the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam in 2013. Like many others, he signed the guest book. His entry, however, led to an outcry of indignation in the media at the time: "It was really inspiring to be able to be here. Anne was a great girl. Hopefully she would have been a Belieber ( note "Bieber fan")." The unanimous criticism of it: indecent, tasteless, tactless had been this entry.

In contrast, pop colleague Beyoncé's visit the following year was exemplary: she appeared in an inexpensive and understated pantsuit, wrote a respectful message in the guestbook and disappeared with her family without much media hype. She posted only one photo of her and her outfit at the Anne Frank House on Instagram. 45 minutes later, the suit from Topshop was sold out. So she had done everything right, showing the public how to behave as a celebrity in a memorial.

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"It's not only prejudices that make it difficult for majority and minority societies - in this case, non-Jews and Jews - to live together, it's also kitsch, romanticizations and misunderstandings that stand in the way of our togetherness," says Hannes Sulzenbacher, chief curator of the Jewish Museum of the City of Vienna, describing the starting point of the exhibition "100 Misconceptions About and Among Jews." One of these collective misconceptions is that "remembrance of the Holocaust must be discreet." This misconception is reified in the context of the exhibition by means of a work by the English artist Simon Fujiwara, "What Beyoncé wore to the Anne Frank House," for which he made a replica of the infamous pantsuit.

"The reception of these celebrity visits was no longer about Anne Frank or memorial culture, it was about perfect self-dramatization. About what I must wear and what is proper when I visit a memorial," Sulzenbacher says. A drumbeat. The exhibition, which will be on view beginning in late November, will also set the new tone for the museum's programming. Barbara Staudinger took over as director of the museum in July, and Hannes Sulzenbacher also took up his position as chief curator with her. "We are starting with a loud, provocative and cheeky exhibition that should also be noticed," says Sulzenbacher. The two came up with the concept and idea together, and the entire eight-person team at the museum curated it.

"Even clichés that are well-meaning make a conversation at eye level almost impossible. Many people don't even dare to refer to Jews as such any more, and they switch to 'Jewish people'. In the end, they remain only a projection surface, not a normal counterpart, always a "non-us, something foreign," according to Sulzenbacher. The Jewish Museum is now presenting an exhibition with a great deal of humor, irony and parodic elements, which is intended to challenge stereotypes. In a joint brainstorming session, the curating team collected a list of 100 misconceptions that Jewish people encounter in everyday life.

For example, "All Jews are smart thinkers or Nobel Prize winners," "As victims of discrimination and expulsion, Jews are better people," or "Everything Jewish is sad." Each thought is hung on a work of art, a historical object or simply "junk." The loans come from museums and private collections in Israel, the USA and Europe.

Ambiguous symbolism

One does not shy away from laughing at oneself. This can be seen particularly well in a cast-iron stove exhibited under the misconception that "the hexagram is an exclusively Jewish symbol". Historically, the Star of David was linked to the Jewish religion only very late, earlier it was also a symbol that was supposed to provide protection against demons; the South German brewers of the Middle Ages, in turn, used it as a guild sign.

The exhibited stove has the symbol engraved on its front and has been exhibited twice in the past in this museum as a Jewish object. Now, however, it turned out that although the stove comes from a prominent address in Leopoldstadt, the hexagram in this case was meant to represent a magical sign of protection against fire, not a religious symbol. "For me, this is an important point: we are part of this narrative.

Jews and Jewish museums in particular often contribute to perpetuating clichés and romanticization," says Sulzenbacher.

The exhibition is intended for all those who also want to have something to laugh about in a Jewish museum. By no means, however, should that mean that future exhibitions can't strike a more serious tone. "I see the mission of this museum as intervening in society with its themes and taking up political issues of the present day; at least that is my professional motivation," says Sulzenbacher. So the program preview can be awaited with excitement.

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"100 Misconceptions About and Among Jews." The exhibition opens on November 30 at the Jewish Museum Vienna.

Deutsch Holds Mandates in the IKG Vienna

Tiroler Tageszeitung, November 26, 2022
German original: https://www.tt.com/artikel/30838726/deutsch-haelt-mandate-in-der-ikg-wien

The Jewish Community (IKG) Vienna elected its new board on Sunday. The ATID list of incumbent president Oskar Deutsch was able to retain its eight mandates in the 24-member body. In second place is the grouping Sefardim-Bucharic Jews (VBJ), which now holds seven seats with an increase of one mandate.

There are around 5,500 Jews eligible to vote in the IKG Vienna, and 3,308 votes were ultimately cast. The elections took place on three days in November, the main election day was Sunday. The religious group Kehille also gained one mandate, while the List Chaj - Jewish Life of ÖVP National Council member Martin Engelberg and the Orthodox List Khal Israel each lost one mandate.

Board elections are held every five years at the IKG Vienna, most recently on Nov. 19, 2017, when ATID received eight mandates; at the constituent meeting of the board, Deutsch, who formed a coalition with four other lists, came in with 22 votes.

Number of anti-Semitic Incidents Down Significantly

APA, Wiener Zeitung, November 3, 2022

German original: https://www.wienerzeitung.at/nachrichten/chronik/oesterreich/2166712-Zahl-antisemitischer-Vorfaelle-deutlich-gesunken.html

From January 1, 2022 to June 30, 2022, a total of 381 anti-Semitic incidents were reported to the Anti-Semitism Reporting Office of the Jewish Community Vienna (IKG). Compared to the same period of the previous year (562), this is a decrease of 32 percent. This decrease is mainly due to the decrease in anti-Semitic incidents related to Corona, according to a report published on Thursday. A higher number of unreported cases can be assumed.

At 219 reports, the majority of incidents involved "hurtful behavior," followed by 82 mass letters, 61 reports of property damage, 12 threats and seven attacks. Most incidents were reported in January (91), after which the number dropped to between 50 and 60 reports per month. The number flared up again in May (72) which the report said was due to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Of the 381 reported incidents, 66 were related to the Covid 19 pandemic. Ninety-six involved Shoah relativization, 123 times Israel-related anti-Semitism, and 56 times anti-Semitic conspiracy myths prompted a report to the ICG.

More right-wing than left-wing incidents

316 cases could be clearly assigned ideologically, according to the report. More than half (201) of the incidents had come from the political right, 81 from the "left," and 34 were "Muslim." Muslim-motivated perpetrators predominated, especially in the case of attacks and threats, while discrimination from the right prevailed in the case of damage to property and hurtful behavior.

"The decrease in the total number of reported incidents is encouraging. However, a closer look reveals particular problems, as the number of threats and physical assaults remains at the high level of the previous year. However, we now see that the center of society is taking the threat of anti-Semitism seriously and is providing important impetus to reverse the trend. Therefore, we will continue to work with all partners in civil society, authorities and politics to further push back anti-Semitism in Austria," commented IKG President Oskar Deutsch on the report.

Benjamin Nägele, Head of the Reporting Office and Secretary General of the IKG Vienna, assesses the lower number of reported attacks as a result of political measures. However, the overrepresentation of verbal and physical assaults against - as Jewish recognizable - children and young people is still conspicuous and disturbing. (apa)

Memorial March "Light of Hope": Lights against Forgetting

ORF (online), November 7, 2022

With "Lights of Hope" the November pogroms will be commemorated on Wednesday evening in the center of Vienna. The "Light of Hope" commemorative march has been organized since 2012 by the Youth Commission of the Jewish Community (IKG) Vienna.

The Lights of Hope are the centerpiece of the commemorative march, to which the Jewish youth, invites all interested people - Jewish or not, young or old - to remember the victims of National Socialism. The words "never forget" are at the heart of the event.

The young generation wants to show how important it is to maintain the chain of generations, according to the statement on the website of the IKG Vienna. The commemoration of the Nazi era and its victims is not only part of Jewish culture, but a task and responsibility of the entire civil society.

With the destruction of Jewish synagogues and houses organized by the Nazi regime throughout the German Reich, as well as the mistreatment of countless Jewish fellow human beings, those atrocities began in 1938 that ultimately led to the murder and extermination of the Jews in Europe.

Public Event to Set an Example

"Light of Hope" began as an internal event of the Jewish community of Vienna and has grown in recent years, according to the IKG Vienna. In 2016, it was decided to open the commemorative march and subsequent rally to the public for the first time, it said.

The reason for this was NS-glorifying and anti-Semitic postings by functionaries of the ÖVP-affiliated (ÖVP – Austrian People’s Party) action group at the Vienna Juridicum. In the course of the ÖH (ÖH - Austrian Students’ Association) election campaign in 2017, it became known that such postings were shared in Whatsapp and Facebook groups. As a result, the Dean of the Juridicum, Paul Oberhammer, and the Rector of the University of Vienna, Heinz Engl, took part in the "Light of Hope" rally to send a signal against anti-Semitism at the Juridicum.

Growing Interest

Since participation in the memorial march has been open to all, the IKG Vienna has recorded growing participation and greater media interest. In the commemorative year 2018, the march counted about 2,500 participants.

In 2020 and 2021, the Light of Hope march had to take place virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This year, the commemorative march will be celebrated in-person as usual. It will start at 19:00 at Heldenplatz, at the entrance to the "House of History". The final rally of the memorial march will be held at Judenplatz.

Kaddish in Salzburg

In Salzburg, commemorative ceremonies will be held on Wednesday at 6 p.m. at the Alter Markt and at 7 p.m. at the Kollegienkirche. Jewish and Christian believers will gather there for a Kaddish (a prayer of remembrance). Pupils, students, artists, and teaching staff are also expected to join in an interfaith fellowship to give a face to the memory of the living and the dead, according to a release from the Catholic University Community of Salzburg.

How Jewish is Graz?

November 11, 2022

Wiener Zeitung (online), October 27, 2022

German original: https://www.wienerzeitung.at/nachrichten/kultur/kunst/2166279-Wie-juedisch-ist-Graz.html

An exhibition at the Graz Museum focuses on the diversity of Jewish life.

There is no kosher store and no kosher restaurant in Graz. In contrast to Vienna, where there are shopping facilities, a vital Jewish life and practiced Jewish culture, National Socialism permanently decimated the Jewish community in Graz to such an extent that it is only noticeable if you are interested in it.

A separate exhibition at the Graz Museum, which focuses on Jewish life from the Middle Ages to the present, aims to change that. The exhibition "Jewish Life in Graz" was created at the request of the Jewish Community and in exchange with Jewish people living in Graz or connected to the city. It is an exhibition to be touched, emphasize those responsible, whose wish to bring all Graz schoolchildren in the seventh and eighth grades to the show by summer 2023 can be described as commendably ambitious.

The Dreidel

One of the things you can touch is a dreidel, which can be used to guide you through the first room. The dreidel is a kind of spinning top that comes to rest on one of four sides. Each of these four sides represents a possible answer to questions posed in one of the exhibition rooms. Thus the answer to the question: "How does the kippah stay on the head?" is: "With the fixing band" - or also "by itself". As an instrument of a deliberately dialogical exhibition, the Dreidel also invites visitors to ask their own questions and make their own comments. Joyful knowledge gain is inevitable.

It is important to the exhibition designers, above all curator Martina Zerovnik, not to present Jews passively, but as active agents. Nevertheless, the horror that National Socialism brought upon Jewry cannot be left out. A room with the names of Aryanized businesses written all over its walls is a reminder of the massive injustice committed. However, Jewish history should not be presented as a story of suffering. The Shoah is not the end of Jewish history, according to Gerald Lamprecht of the Center for Jewish Studies, who is responsible for the scientific support of the exhibit. Even though only a few Jews returned to Graz after World War II and restitutions of their property were made difficult or impossible, today there is a diverse, small community of about 100 people.

Exemplary for the relationship between them and the majority society is the Jewish cemetery in the district of Wetzelsdorf, which was recently completely renovated. It is only accessible by appointment. The fear of anti-Semitic vandalism is too great. Jews living in Graz today report on this and other aspects on video screens: "She didn't want to raise her son Jewish, because another Hitler could come," one interviewee says about his mother. Antony Scholz, former vice president of the Styrian religious community, is even more direct: "No Jew in Graz today would walk across Griesplatz wearing a kippa." This reverberates and makes one concerned.

Salvaging Brick

A symbol of confidence and community, on the other hand, is the story of how the new Graz synagogue came to be, which was completed in 2000. After the original building was destroyed in 1938, the bricks were later piled up in a garage. In a wonderful project by Kulturvermittlung Steiermark, after this garage was demolished, over 9,000 bricks were salvaged, cleaned and recycled for the new building together with schoolchildren. This also reverberates, but in a more hopeful manner.

Claudia Beiser, a Graz resident and descendant of the Zerkowitz family of master builders, to whom Graz owes the Margaretenbad, among other things, praises the pleasant collaboration with the curators. Her family is one of those affected by Aryanization and murder and is portrayed in the exhibition. Does she perceive Jewish life in Graz? "Not really." It would be nice if the exhibition at the Graz Museum would help change that permanently.

Color, Landscape, Atmosphere

wina: Das Jüdische Stadtmagazin (online), July 2022
German original: https://www.wina-magazin.at/farbe-landschaft-atmosphaere/

Kunsthalle Krems is exhibiting paintings and drawings by Helen Frankenthaler, one of the most important representatives of American abstract expressionism.

They are fine webs on paper and powerful paintings. Concrete objects, places, and people are not often found in the works of Helen Frankenthaler. But her abstract color compositions always suggest landscapes, give the feeling of sun, heat and flickering air, and lead viewers of her paintings into other worlds, usually with a positive mood. Hardly ever does it become gloomy or crude.

Florian Steininger, artistic director of the Kunsthalle Krems and curator of the exhibition, began preparing the Frankenthal show three years ago. He himself had already been intensively involved with the American abstract expressionists during his studies, and one can see his joy at having succeeded in bringing more than 70 of Frankenthaler's works to Krems.

"Her work has very rarely been shown comprehensively in German-speaking countries," the Austrian art historian tells us. It is also hardly represented in European museums and collections. Only one large painting can be found in Vienna's Museum of Modern Art - and now forms the finale of the exhibition in Krems. In addition, there is a small work from the private collection of an Austrian collector. The main lender and cooperation partner of the exhibition is the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation in New York, says Steiniger, who curated the show - a cooperation with the Museum Folkwang in Essen, which will show an almost identical selection of works under the same title starting at the end of the year.

Who was Helen Frankenthaler?

She was born in New York in 1928 into a liberal Jewish upper-middle-class family. Her father, Alfred Frankenthaler, served as a judge on the New York State Supreme Court; her mother, a Löwenstein by birth, had come to the United States from Germany with her family as a young child. The family lived on the elegant Upper East Side, and Helen was able to study, as were her two sisters.

She first graduated from a so-called prep school for wealthy children in New York, the Dalton School, and then attended Bennington College in Vermont, where she studied painting. She continued painting after graduation with private lessons, including from Hans Hofmann. In Krems, one can see a very early work by the young artist, obviously in the tradition of Pablo Picasso and George Braque.

But then she turned to other models and currents. It was above all Jackson Pollock who influenced her with his large-format abstract drip paintings; she visited him repeatedly in his studio. And she was already represented in the spring of 1951 at a major exhibition, the 9th St. Exhibition of Paintings and Sculpture, which is considered the founding exhibition of New York abstract expressionism and which consisted of 61 male artists and only eleven female artists. For the 23-year-old, it was a significant step to be able to be there, alongside Lee Krasner, the wife of Jackson Pollock, for example.

At the time, she was also finding her style. Curator Steininger explains: "In 1952, Frankenthaler created her revolutionary, large-format soak stain paintings. For these, she spreads untreated canvases on the floor and then applies diluted oil paint with a variety of tools: poured directly from paint cans, with brushes, sponges, mops or other means." In doing so, she also moves directly into the painting, thus already coming close to action painting.

Oil painting with charcoal strokes. One of her most famous works dates from 1952: the oil painting with charcoal strokes Mountains and Sea in pastel colors. It shows neither concrete mountains nor the sea and fascinates thanks to its powerful dynamics. In 1955, the first work by Frankenthaler was purchased by the Museum of Modern Art.

Privately, she was involved with the well-known art critic Clement Greenberg during those years; he was considered a specialist among the abstract expressionists. After their separation, she married the painter Robert Motherwell; the couple divorced in the early 1970s.

Frankenthaler, who died in 2011, remained true to her basic painting style, but repeatedly changed her perspectives and emphases. For example, one finds a phase of strictly horizontally structured abstract paintings that nevertheless recall landscapes. "She has said that she also plays with chance, she experiments on paper, and then later translates that into large paintings," Steininger explains.

To his regret, he never met her in person, "but you know she was a strong personality, very self-confident." The emotionally presented works by Helen Frankenthaler are complemented by a black-and-white photo series by the Vienna-born Magnum photographer Ernst Haas, who was allowed to accompany her while she was at work in her studio in 1969. The height of tension, then thoughtfulness, and finally physical commitment when bending over large canvases-all this is freshly transported through decades into today and brought back to artistic life [by the exhibition].

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Memorial plaque for victims of the Shoa from Sommerein

Niederösterreiche Nachrichten (NÖN), August 3, 2022
German original: https://www.noen.at/bruck/erinnerungskultur-gedenktafel-fuer-opfer-der-shoa-aus-sommerein-sommerein-shoa-gedenktafel-ava-pelnoecker-steve-reindler-rosa-reindler-wolf-reindler-print-331179151

The descendants of a Sommereinian [Sommerein, a town in Lower Austria] refugee were visiting.

The hobby historian Ava Pelnöcker expected special guests in Sommerein last Wednesday: Steve Reindler (69) had come from New Zealand with his wife Lynn for the first time to visit the village from which his great-aunt Rosa and her brother Heinrich had been expelled in 1938.

In the presence of Christine Besser, the chairwoman of the local village renewal and beautification association, which supported the project financially, Steve Reindler unveiled a memorial plaque, which now commemorates the two victims of the Shoa in front of the Sommerein church. Visibly moved, Steve Reindler thanked Ava Pelnöcker, who had reconstructed the fate of his family members, which had been forgotten here [in Sommerein], on the basis of documents and contemporary witnesses, including their elementary school teacher Johanna Frast (95). "I am very happy that we can pay a bit of tribute to the Reindler family, which they deserved," said Pelnöcker.

About the history of the Reindler family: Wolf Reindler, a Jewish businessman from Vienna, purchased the house at No. 41 (today Markt 23) in 1860, where daughter Rosa (born in 1877) and son Heinrich (born in 1896) continued the family general store after the death of their father.

Following the Anschluss [annexation by Hitlerite Germany] of Austria in 1938, the situation for Austria’s Jewish citizens came to a head. That same year, the GESTAPO ordered the immediate closure of the grocery store. While the nephews Wilhelm and Ludwig Reindler succeeded in emigrating to New Zealand in 1939 despite adversities, the sale of the Sommereiner house was delayed in the course of the annexation of the village to a military training area.

Rosa was not allowed to use the proceeds from the sale for emigration and was deported to the Riga ghetto in February 1942 and murdered the following year, presumably in the Kaiserwald concentration camp.

The proceeds from the sale of the house were confiscated by the Nazi administration. Heinrich was imprisoned for his love affair with the Sommereiner Helene Kopper on the basis of the "Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor" and sentenced to one year in prison. Heinrich Reindler was deported to the Litzmannstadt ghetto (Łódź, Poland) on October 23, 1941, and died in the winter of 1941/42 - presumably from cold and malnutrition.

After the end of the Second World War, Heinrich's nephews Wilhelm and Ludwig tried in vain for decades to obtain financial reparations. It was not until 2013 that their five children, including Steve Reindler, were awarded a small amount by a compensation fund for a part of the property that was in the public domain, and thus at least a little justice was done - late, but still.

Jewish Museum: New Director Feels “No Headwind”

ORF (online), July 20, 2022
German original: https://religion.orf.at/stories/3214183/

Barbara Staudinger has been director of Vienna's Jewish Museum since the beginning of July. She is therefore often asked about her religion. For her work, however, it "plays no role" that she is not Jewish. She is unperturbed by the appeal of some prominent individuals last year to refrain from changing museum directors: "I don't feel any headwind."

The fact that Danielle Spera's contract as director of the Jewish Museum might not be renewed had put several prominent figures on notice in 2021. In an open letter during the “hearing phase,” they spoke out in favor of Spera and against a new appointment. Among them were ex-Chancellor Brigitte Bierlein, then ORF Director General Alexander Wrabetz, then Festival President Helga Rabl-Stadler and artist Andre Heller.

"I am not a person who looks backwards, but looks forwards. I was warmly received by all the people who came to me," Staudinger said in an interview with the Ö1 religion magazine "Praxis" on Wednesday. She felt great joy, "a great desire for change.

"Spera has done many things very well"

Staudinger: "That doesn't mean that my predecessor did anything badly. On the contrary, she did many things very well. But culture thrives on change." And this joy of change, she says, was imparted to her by many people. "It gave me a lot of strength."

Of course, there are people who say to themselves, "Never change a winning team," but one can often experience in the city "that projects that may have met with rejection at first are then loved all the more afterwards," says the new director of the Jewish Museum.

"What if I were Jewish?"

A historian, theater scholar and Judaist by training, she is "often asked" if she is Jewish, which she then denies, she says. "I then sometimes answer with a counter-question: 'What would it add to my work if I were religious? If I were Jewish? What would be different then? What would I do differently then?'" says Staudinger in an interview with Ö1.

"It's not like I'm exhibiting myself. I think I've shown, through my studies, through my research, that I know what I'm talking about. It's not like I come to a museum, preside over it, and have no idea what is inside it." Staudinger, for example, was a curator at the Jewish Museum Munich and, among other things, part of the team redesigning the Austrian exhibition at the Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum. As of 2018, she directed the Jewish Museum Augsburg.

Reaching “Other Minorities”

Staudinger has made it her mission to reach new target groups - "Vienna's urban society in all its diversity," says the director of the Jewish Museum. "I think I showed in Augsburg how you can have an effect with performances, with actions, with interventions in other museums, with many, many collaborations out in the urban space. And very importantly, how you can also have an impact in those districts where people live who may not be part of the Jewish Museum's core audience."

Staudinger stresses the importance of also "addressing other minorities in the city through issues raised by the Jewish Museum." After all, she says, these are issues that affect minorities other than Jewish minorities. "I want to focus specifically on these groups, on younger groups of visitors who have not gone to the Jewish Museum until now. That's where I think the Jewish Museum has some catching up to do."

Recipes against the crisis of museums

According to Staudinger, museums are slipping into a crisis or are already in one because people are increasingly asking themselves, "What does this have to do with me?" It's important to address current issues, she said, "issues and problems that we all face." That is the task of every museum, she said, and the Jewish Museum's task is to address and discuss these current issues from a Jewish perspective.

In the museum, Staudinger also wants to rely heavily on digital formats. A digital collection that is also accessible online and not only serves as a research tool or archive is "now a real core element of every museum.” Exciting online exhibitions are also to be developed "that don't depict what's on display in the building, but convey their own stories in very unique formats. That's very important to me."

52 Listening Stations with Stories of Escape

ORF (online), July 11, 2022

German original: https://vorarlberg.orf.at/stories/3163621/

Along the international border between Vorarlberg and Switzerland, 52 border stones have been set up on the bike route from Lake Constance to the Silvretta [Alps], marked with the names of refugees and escape helpers from the time of the Second World War. These border stones are also listening stations where the escape stories are told in many variations.

Thousands of refugees tried to reach the safety of Switzerland via Vorarlberg between March 1938 and May 1945: as early as the summer of 1938 Switzerland began sealing off the border. Escape helpers on both sides of the border could still assist some in escaping, but by that time there were only illegal routes to freedom.

Along bike route number one, from Bregenz to Partenen, and at selected locations in Switzerland and Liechtenstein, symbolic border stones mark 52 listening stations about these refugees' fates and invite passersby to engage with the history of the respective place via QR code, and to pause and take note of the surroundings.

The audio path project "Over the Border" by the Jewish Museum in Hohenems tells of odysseys across Europe and of local smugglers who become escape helpers, of lovers who break out of prison, of prisoners of war who get lost, of protesting schoolgirls and interrogations by the Gestapo, of adventures on birthdays, of dangerous routes across the Rhine and of the mountains-of human courage, persecution, arbitrary authority, and resistance.

The experiences of the refugees are reflected in personal letters, documents from the German and Swiss authorities, memories of contemporary witnesses and photographs of the scenes. From them, a picture of the contemporary events emerges from many perspectives that can now be heard, read, and seen. [This history can be experienced] along the route by bike between lake and mountains, on both sides of the Rhine, on both sides of a border that still today divides and connects simultaneously.

Everything Kosher in Vienna?

Der Standard (online), October 3, 2022

German original: https://www.derstandard.at/story/2000139637448/alles-koscher-in-wien

For many Jews, observing religious dietary laws is part of everyday life. An Introduction to the Jewish Holiday Yom Kippur

Whenever Veganista [a vegan Austrian ice cream chain] produces a new batch of Ice Cream Sandwiches - two ice cream-filled cookies - the rabbi comes by early at 5 a.m. Why? He turns on the oven - making sure the cookies are kosher.

"As a vegan, I was always an outsider," says Cecilia Havmöller, who founded Veganista with her sister. "We wanted to make ice cream for everyone. Ice cream that doesn't discriminate against anyone." Not even against the 8,000 or so Jews living in Vienna. Which is why all their ice cream parlors are kosher certified.

The dietary laws, called Kashrut, are a cornerstone of the Jewish faith. They describe which foods are "permitted, fit" – that’s what kosher is. The rules derive from the Torah and, roughly speaking, cover three aspects: Only meat from ruminant cloven-hoofed animals and marine animals with scales are kosher. A second point concerns the origin and production of the food: animals must be kept in a manner appropriate to the species and ritually slaughtered. Finally, in preparation, the main issue is the strict separation of dairy and meat. Mixing is prohibited.

Years to Kosher Certification

Plant-based foods such as fruits and vegetables are considered neutral. Those who eat a vegan diet have an inherently easier time living kosher - also because there must be a three- to six-hour break between the consumption of meat and milk, depending on tradition. This makes Veganista's vegan ice cream attractive: it is also suitable as a quick dessert after a meaty midday meal.

Although Veganista only processes neutral, plant-based foods, the kosher certification process is complex and sometimes long. It took them just under two years. Every ingredient had to be checked, producers contacted: Is the oat milk, the agave syrup kosher? Another requirement: No non-kosher product is allowed in the production rooms, and even the snacks the employees bring with them must comply with the dietary laws.

"That sounds strict," Havmöller says. "But for us it has become normal." The customers' delight, she says, is worth it. Just in time for the opening of the location in the Karmeliterviertel - center of the Jewish community - the longed-for certificate arrived. "We opened at noon, and at twelve sharp the rabbi came." Her eyes sparkle. "The kids were so happy!" Havmöller, who has been vegan since early adolescence, knows the feeling of being ostracized because of eating habits.

They are in close exchange with the rabbi. Sometimes the latter gets tips from the Jewish community, Havmöller says. "We often post new varieties on Instagram." So, it sometimes happens that the rabbi sends a text message at midnight asking whether the new creation is really kosher.

A Question of Milk and Egg

The inspection is the responsibility of the certifying rabbis, says Schlomo Hofmeister. He is the community rabbi of Vienna - and the man who cycles to Veganista early in the morning to turn on the oven. Besides him, there are four others in Vienna who perform certifications. Each is liable with his name, which is written - for all to see - on the certificate next to the entrance door.

"Kosher doesn't just mean looking: What's inside? But also, where was there possible cross-contamination in the processing?" If non-kosher substances are processed on a machine or surface, the surfaces must be extensively cleaned, according to Jewish law. "Certain plastics and porcelain cannot be made kosher at all," Hofmeister explains.

Jewish dietary rules are about hygiene, but also about ethics, about respect for creation. "You shall not cook the kid in its mother's milk," says Exodus 23:19. Not everything has an explanation. And some things are controversial even among Jewish scholars. Is it even permissible to consume milk and eggs today - the keyword being factory farming? "Since you can't examine everything, the rule is: more than 50 percent nullifies the rest." Meaning: I assume that the majority of animals are "healthy," that is, "kosher." It's debatable, Hofmeister says, whether these time-honored assumptions are still valid in light of today's commercial factory farming.

He estimates that at least half of the Jews living in Vienna eat kosher. The spontaneous snack during the lunch break, the sweet break at the bakery – it’s not so easy in this case. There are not too many Jewish restaurants. How many are there? Hofmeister reaches for a blue booklet: "Eight restaurants. Nine bakeries, pastry shops and coffee houses. Twelve ice cream parlors, eleven of them Veganistas. Three butchers, half a dozen caterers, and a few kosher kitchens in social institutions and schools."

Trust is Good, Verification is Better

To guarantee compliance with the guidelines, the certificates must be renewed regularly. And: the responsible rabbis drop by for unannounced visits. "Trust is good, inspection is good," Izhak Faiziev says and laughs. He runs the kosher restaurant Mea Shearim in the second district. The specialty on the menu: sushi and Asian food. "For the Jewish community, this didn't exist before." Their cuisine looks like any other, except that all the products used are guaranteed kosher. Some are marked with a “K.” For many processed products, however, kosher status is not obvious at first glance, which is why the rabbis in charge compile lists.

Dairy products are also forbidden in the kitchen of Mea Shearim, where steak and salmon are prepared. Since the two must be strictly separated, most restaurants specialize in either dairy or meat. Few establishments can afford two kitchens, two sets of cutlery and dishes, separate trays and napkins.

Unlike production facilities, which include Veganista, restaurants need a permanent supervisor to monitor compliance with dining laws. This Mashgiach oversees the cleaning of lettuce, vegetables and herbs, which must be washed several times to ensure that no animal ends up on the plate, inspects eggs for traces of blood and ensures that no fish ends up in the meat fryer.

The Mashgiach must be a religious Jew. Also, independent - meaning it must not be the owner - and, most importantly, trustworthy. "Why do the guests come? Because they know me personally as the owner, or the Mashgiach they trust," Faiziev says. The overseer not only inspects the procedures, he must also take over an "absolutely necessary step" in the cooking and baking process. The reason: after heating, it's hard to tell which source ingredients were used. So, the Mashgiach at Mea Shearim drops the schnitzel into the deep fryer, turns on the stove, puts the pot on the hot plate.

At Veganista, the permanent presence is not necessary. Only when cookies are baked does Schlomo Hofmeister have to come by. "The rabbi could also put the cookies in the oven," he says, grinning. "But turning the oven on is easier, which is why it's now standard worldwide."

Young Jewish Generation: "No one Should Remain Silent".

Kurier, January 27, 2023

German original: https://kurier.at/politik/ausland/junge-juedische-generation-niemand-soll-still-bleiben/400738344

Remembrance culture: How does the young Jewish generation deal with coming to terms with and commemorating the Holocaust?

by Sandra Lumetsberger

They are getting older, frailer and fewer: the survivors of the Holocaust. On Monday, 200 of them came to the commemoration ceremony at the concentration camp in Auschwitz-Birkenau, which Soviet soldiers liberated on January 27, 1945. The images, speeches of politicians are omnipresent on such days, usually accompanied by documentaries.

For Greta Zelener, all this triggers an oppressive feeling, her head starts to rattle: If she had lived back then, she would have been affected. What would she have done then? And why were others capable of such acts? Questions that occupy her on such days, until she manages to bring herself back to the present.

In it, the 30-year-old sits in a café in Berlin-Charlottenburg and talks about a slight surge of fear that she doesn't actually have to have. But the Holocaust still has an effect - to what extent depends very much on the respective family history - whether one belongs to those who were able to help liberate the camps as part of the Soviet army, for example, or whether one was interned in one. These perspectives shape one's self-image and are passed on. She knows from conversations that in many families there was silence, the trauma was too great. It was often only the grandchildren to whom the elders opened up.

Commitment to the culture of remembrance

Greta Zelener belongs to a young Jewish generation that speaks up, asks specific questions, and is committed to a culture of remembrance - in private or through research in films and books, but also wants to tell what being Jewish means today beyond that.

Discovering Jewishness

Yet she first had to learn this for herself. Her great-grandmother, who had once emigrated from Berlin to Ukraine, fled with her children to Uzbekistan, where she hid on a farm. She and two other siblings out of a total of eight survived. The other siblings or relatives, also living in Ukraine, stayed there and assumed that the Germans would not harm them - "they saw themselves as Germans, were culturally shaped there," Zelener says.

After World War II, her great-grandmother went back, but discarded anything religious she passed on: Yiddish songs or food. "Other than that, my parents hardly knew anything about Judaism." When they came to Berlin from Odessa in 1996, they sent their daughter to a Jewish school and left it open to her whether she wanted to live religiously or not. "I would often come home and tell them what we learned, such as about the holidays and what to do on Bat Mitzvah when their daughter is religiously of age at 12. I brought Judaism back to them that way. For my parents, it was like a gift, bringing back a piece of their identity," she says, laughing, adding that religion plays no role for her today.

"Meet a Jew"

She is currently writing her doctoral thesis on Jewish adult education, is involved in inter-religious dialogue, and visits schools ("Meet a Jew"). There, she tries to work out what she has in common with other religions, the diversity of Judaism, but has already had to do some basic educational work: she reports on students who were quite surprised to learn that she does not have a Jewish passport, but a German one.

When it comes to the culture of remembrance, there are also contentious debates in her generation. There are representatives who reject the attributions and impositions they experience as Jews - such as questions about the Holocaust, anti-Semitism or the Middle East conflict.

"But, then something like what happened in Halle happens".

Igor Matviyets, who studies political science and Russian studies in Halle, is familiar with such questions as "Where were your grandparents during World War II” or, “what, you don't celebrate Christmas?" He gets to hear them at university, when meeting new people, or at government offices. There, he says, for some he is the first Jew they have met so far. "As long as there's interest and curiosity behind it, it's not meant to be derogatory, I don't have a problem with it. Maybe people learn that they can ask some things differently. That's not how I celebrate Christmas, yet it's a holiday for me, too."

As much as these conversations annoy some people, which he can understand, it is clear to him that one often cannot avoid taking a stand. For example, after the far-right attack on a synagogue in Halle on October 9, 2019. The 28-year-old is not religious himself, but he felt the attack was one against himself and he wore a yarmulke the next day. "From history it shows that for the enemies of the Jews it is irrelevant whether you eat pork, are a policeman, a civil servant or in the armed forces, you remain, if it is comprehensible, a Jew."

What does Remembrance Day on January 27 mean to him? He says it is important that it exists, but at the same time he has the feeling that a ritualization is setting in: It's mostly speeches of the same kind, accompanied by a dedicated ensemble playing music - "all well and good," he says - but, "then something like what happened in Halle happens, and I wonder what the reminding and remembering actually does?"

More diversity instead of stereotypes

Moreover, stereotypes still circulate, which are also transported by the media. Most recently, he was annoyed by a history magazine published by Der Spiegel. On the cover: two Jews in traditional clothing from the 1920s with the title: "Jewish Life in Germany. The Unknown World Next Door." Matviyets: "Apart from serving clichés, it's just one of many variations on Jewish life," he says. "Enlightened Judaism has always been part of Germany." And just as then, there are many secular Jews today who live among non-Jewish people, work with them - after all, you can't tell by looking at people that they are Jewish. In Halle, he says, hardly anyone goes around with a kippah or a gown. Some might wear them under their hats. "That has nothing to do with a lack of feeling safe, it's just the way it is. Just like someone who wears a cross under his T-shirt or shirt rather than on the outside of his jacket," he says.

More education in schools

What Greta Zelener is particularly concerned about is that in a recent poll by the opinion research institute infratest dimap, 37 percent agreed with the statement that Germany should "draw a line" under dealing with the Nazi past. In 2018, the share of these respondents was 26 percent; in 2019, it was 33 percent. People with lower levels of education in particular were in favor.

Looking at this, she sees that there is still a lot of need in schools. There needs to be contact with Jews and visits to museums, which should be made more interactive. She is also convinced that everyone can do something. "No one should remain silent. It's up to all of us, no matter where, to address discrimination and anti-Semitism and intervene in extreme cases." She observes that some things are quickly shifted to politics. Of course, where it is needed, it must react with appropriate legislation. Anti-Semitic crimes must be punished in such a way that they act as a deterrent and make it clear that there are consequences.