Federation Star - January 2017

12A Federation Star January 2017
COMMUNITY FOCUS
HOLOCAUST MUSEUM & ED CTR OF SWFL www.holocaustmuseumswfl.org / 239-263-9200
January exhibits and programs at the Museum
Amy Snyder
Executive
Director
We are pleased to announce the
opening this month of The
World Knew: Jan Karski’s
Mission for Humanity. It will be on
display from January 3 through May
14, 2017.
The new exhibit profiles the life
of the extraordinary Jan Karski, whose
personal experience in World War II
spanned the gamut from reserve officer
and junior diplomat to Polish Underground
courier to the Polish government
in exile in London. In 1942 and 1943,
he personally alerted Prime Minister
Churchill, President Roosevelt and U.S.
Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter
to the presence of Jewish Ghettos,
transit camps and the atrocities being
committed against Jews in Poland and
Eastern Europe. However, his reports
were met with disbelief and, as a result,
no help was provided by the Allies to
relieve the plight of the Jews.
Karski didn’t give up trying, however,
because he knew firsthand the
dangers Jews were in during the war.
He was an eyewitness to the cruelty of
the Nazis. In 1940, as a member of the
Polish Underground, he was betrayed.
Arrested and tortured by the Gestapo,
he tried to commit suicide to prevent
providing information on his group’s
activities. Miraculously, he was able
to escape with the help of the Polish
Resistance. In 1942, Karski personally
investigated conditions in the Warsaw
Ghetto, where he was smuggled in using
a disguise. He also went undercover
in a transit camp, where he saw Nazi
mistreatment and killing of Jews. His
courage, knowledge of four languages,
photographic memory and diplomatic
skills made him a key underground
operative.
In 1944, Karski wrote Courier
from Poland: Story of a Secret State,
documenting his work in the Polish Underground,
providing further evidence
to convince the Allied powers of the
need to act against the Nazi atrocities
that went far beyond the normal acts of
war. After the war, he settled in the U.S.,
becoming a citizen, and a professor at
Georgetown University for 40 years.
He married Pola Nirenska, a dancer
who was a Holocaust survivor. After the
war, he didn’t want to speak about his
experiences. Eventually though, he felt
Parkinson Association of Southwest Florida
presents
A Step Forward:
A Conversation with
Rasheda Ali
Please join us as we
welcome our keynote
speaker, Rasheda Ali,
to our Annual Luncheon.
Ali is an internationally
known author, speaker
and PD advocate. Her
book, I’ll Hold Your Hand
So You Won’t Fall, was
inspired by her children
and her late father,
Muhammad Ali.
Tuesday, January 24, 2017
Luncheon 11:00am
LaPlaya Beach And Golf Resort
9891 Gulf Shore Drive, Naples
$125 per person
Includes complimentary valet parking
Intimate VIP Reception 5:30–7:30pm
Olde Cypress Country Club
7165 Treeline Drive, Naples
$250 per person
Includes luncheon
To register call (239) 417-3465 or visit www.pasfi.org
compelled to, saying, “I have no other
proofs, no photographs.”
He was known as an incredibly
humble person. Despite all his courageous
acts and diplomatic efforts, he
once told colleagues during a talk that
he felt he “didn’t do enough” to help the
Jews and occupied Poland. He died in
2000, and was posthumously awarded
the Presidential Medal of Freedom in
2012. Yad Vashem also recognized
Karski in 1962 as “Righteous Among
The Nations.”
The tour of The World Knew: Jan
Karski’s Mission for Humanity traveling
exhibition is organized by the Jan Karski
Educational Foundation. The exhibit
was created by the Polish History Museum
with major support from the Polish
Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Additional
funding was provided by the National
Endowment for the Humanities. Any
views, findings, conclusions or recommendations
expressed in this exhibition
publication do not necessarily reflect
those of the National Endowment for
the Humanities.
Other January Museum-related
activities:
Wednesday, January 4 at 10:00
a.m. at the Museum: Shelley Lieb
will lead a discussion of the book
The Nazi Titanic by Robert P.
Watson. The event is free and open
to the public. Reservations are required.
Please call the Museum at
239.263.9200 to RSVP.
Monday, January 16 from 10:00
a.m. to noon at the Museum: third
of four Genealogy Workshops led
by David Nelson; the topic will be
“Jewish Genealogy Internet Resources.”
The workshop is free and
open to the public; reservations are
required. To RSVP, email David@
HolocaustMuseumSWFL.org or
call 239.263.9200.
Monday, January 23 from 1:00 to
3:30 p.m. at Beth Tikvah, 1459 Pine
Ridge Road, Naples: The Museum
is sponsoring a Collier County Jewish
Book Festival event with Josh
Aronson, author of Orchestra of
Exiles, and Robert P. Watson, author
of The Nazi Titanic. For more
information on tickets, visit www.
jewishbookfestival.org or call Renee’
at the Jewish Federation office
at 239.263.4205.
There will be a special commemoration
of International Holocaust Remembrance
Day at Temple Shalom on Friday,
January 27 at 7:30 p.m. The guest
speaker is Dr. Stephen M. Berk, the
Henry and Sally Schaffer Professor of
Holocaust and Jewish studies at Union
College in Schenectady, New York. The
event is free and open to the public.
Finally, the Museum will officially
open its new Memorial Garden Art Installation
on Sunday, January 22. This
unique artwork was designed by artist
Juan Diaz, who recently made his debut
at Art Basel Miami. The work was created
to honor those Holocaust survivors
and camp liberators who were part of
our Museum family and Education
programs. For more information, visit
www.HolocaustMuseumSWFL.org.
The Museum is located at 4760
Tamiami Trail North, Suite 7, in Naples.
It is open year-round Tuesday through
Sunday; closed Monday and major Jewish
and U.S. holidays.
Holocaust Musuem & Education Center of SWFL-sponsored event:
Monday, January 23, 1-3:30 p.m. at Beth Tikvah ~ Topic: Holocaust
Josh Aronson • Orchestra of Exiles
Robert P. Watson • The Nazi Titanic
www.JewishBookFestival.org • 239.263.4205
A champion of women’s
rights visits ZOA of SWFL
By Jerrold L. Sobel, President, ZOA Southwest Florida Chapter
As Americans we often take for issues related to media, diversity, gender
granted the right to protest and and immigration. Her outspoken stand
stand for or against positions on such issues as female genital mutilation,
forced marriages, male dominance,
unpopular to others. In other parts of the
world it could be downright dangerous. and other denials of equal rights for
Yet no matter the danger of ostracism, Muslim women has made her anathema
there are people willing to defy conventional
wisdom to fight for what they In January 2014, Raheel and eight
to advocates of Sharia law.
believe in. Such a woman will be honoring
our community with a presentation in a Clarion Project film, Honor Diaries.
other women’s rights activists partook
on Wednesday, January 25 at 7:30 p.m. The women discuss the aforementioned
at The Chabad Jewish Center of Naples. gender inequality, honor-based violence,
forced marriage and FGM. They
Raheel Raza is a Muslim woman
author and activist born in Pakistan and come with awareness and understanding
living in Toronto with her husband and of the complex cultural issues at play,
two daughters. Brought up in a culture and are therefore able to attack political
where women were supposed to “be correctness taboos that restrict dialogue
seen and not heard,” she has kicked up and prevent true acknowledgement of
quite a hornets’ nest.
the abuses perpetuated not only against
An outspoken advocate for gender Muslim women abroad but here in the
equality and an activist for women’s United States and Canada as well.
rights internationally, she has appeared For ticket information, visit http://
many times in print, radio and television zoaswfl.org.
media to reveal and debate Canadian
Read the current and previous
editions of the Federation Star
online at www.jewishnaples.org.
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