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Friday October 31, 2003

shorts

bay area

Fund established

for ailing S.F. rabbi

A fund has been set up to help Rabbi Aaron Rosenbleeth and his family, because of his recent lung cancer diagnosis.

Rosenbleeth, the Judaic principal at San Francisco’s Hebrew Academy, is on indefinite leave and will undergo extensive treatment.

This week, Rabbi Pinchas Lipner sent out an e-mail, asking community members to pray for Rosenbleeth, whose Hebrew name is Avraham Yaakov ben Sarah.

Rosenbleeth, the father of four children, ages 3 to 15, has been at Hebrew Academy for 17 years.

Checks should be made out to the Young Israel Rosenbleeth Fund and mailed to Jerry Katzovitz, Treasurer, Young Israel Rosenbleeth Fund, 1806A Noriega St., S.F., CA 94122.

SFSU to host

Mideast film festival

Six Israeli- and Palestinian-oriented films will be screened as part of a San Francisco State University film festival Nov. 4 to 6.

“By bracketing each Israeli/Jewish film with a Palestinian/Arab film, we hope that our students and those arrayed on both sides of the issue can better understand the suffering that the war brings to everyone,” said Professor Jerald Combs, a history instructor.

A double feature will be shown on each of the three days, from 3:45 to 7 p.m. in room 133 of the campus’ Humanities building. Films include “Gaza Strip,” “Jenin Jenin,” “Jenin Diary: The Insider Story,” “Living in Conflict,” “Palestine is Still the Issue,” and “As If Nothing Happened.”

A panel discussion will be held after each screening and moderated by Seth Brysk, the director of San Francisco Hillel. For information, call (415) 338-7563.

Assembly leader calls on Holocaust claims chair to resign

Wilma Chan, the state Assembly’s majority leader, has added her name to the list of Californians calling for the resignation of Lawrence Eagleburger, chairman of the International Commission on Holocaust Era Insurance Claims.

A lawsuit, filed Sept. 24 by aging Los Angeles-area survivors Manny Steinberg, Jack Brauns and Si Frumkin under the state’s unfair business practices statute, claims ICHEIC has “aided, assisted and conspired” with Italian insurance giant Generali to reduce the company’s liability from $1 billion to $100 million, of which it has paid out only a pittance.

At a press conference last month, Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi accused the commission of exerting more effort to protect European insurance companies “than in providing quick and appropriate payments to survivors.” He also called for Eagleburger, the secretary of state under President George H.W. Bush, to resign.

Chan (D-Oakland) wrote a letter dated Sept. 30 to Eagelburger echoing Garamendi’s call.

“The raison d’être of the ICHEIC is to provide a means to resolve claims in a more timely manner than can be achieved through litigation,” wrote Chan.

“After more than five years, the ICHEIC has failed in the execution of its mission; and you as its Chairman, must be held accountable for that failure.”

Gift to Hadassah spurs another

Earlier this year, Dora Aspan Sorell, received a restitution payment for her internment in a Nazi slave labor camp. The native of Romania received more than $5,000.

And following the lead of Fred Oplatka, a Viennese native who donated his entire reparations check to Hadassah last year, Sorell decided to do the same.

Sorell, who lives in Berkeley, had read about Oplatka’s actions in the Jewish Bulletin last year, and as a physician herself, she strongly believes in Hadassah’s mission to heal.

Her gift will qualify for a matching grant, and Sorell will be honored at the Berkeley Hadassah chapter’s Nov. 11 meeting.

Jewish Home names new administrator

San Francisco’s Jewish Home senior-living facility this week named Sandra C. Simon-Murphy to replace administrator Sandra Epstein, who will retire later this year after holding the position since 1984.

Simon-Murphy will oversee all non-medical aspects of operating the 430-resident facility. She has worked in senior-living facilities for the past dozen years, most recently serving as the administrator at the Sunnyvale-based ManorCare Health Services.

A San Franciscan, Simon-Murphy will oversee management, training, financial analysis and strategic planning in the San Francisco facility, as well as serve on the management team for the Jewish Home’s proposed 170-unit senior living project at the Jewish campus in Palo Alto.

No summer sessions

at Camp Swig in 2004

Camp Swig, one of two Union of American Hebrew Congregations summer camps in Northern California, will not be in session next summer.

The Saratoga-based Reform camp has been undergoing major renovations that will take longer than originally anticipated.

“We have to put our full energy on rebuilding, and we can’t do that with campers there,” said Ruben Arquilevich, senior director of camps Swig and Newman.

Approximately 325 teenagers and 100 staff and faculty participate in sessions at Swig each summer.

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