Community Corner

This year’s Queens Hatzolah Premier Men’s Event promised to be its biggest fundraiser yet, with a new venue, world renowned talent, and generous food servings. The recently opened TWA Hotel includes the original terminal, the hotel building behind it, and a restored Lockheed Constellation “Connie” plane transformed into a bar. Within the terminal are mannequins and antique cars from 1962, accompanied by Frank Sinatra songs of that period. “I flew TWA when I was in business. It was my primary airline,” said Shiu Reichmann, the Hatzolah coordinator who emceed the event. “We stood in front of the display board and watched for the flight numbers and cities. You had to be on time.”

Israel never leaves its fighters behind, but when there are no signs that a service member is alive or dead, what is the halachah? For the past four summers, Rabbi Dr. Aaron Rakeffet-Rothkoff stays in Kew Gardens Hills for a month with his wife Malka, speaking around the metropolitan area, meeting his former students, and fundraising for Shvut Ami, the kiruv organization in Israel serving Russian-speaking Jews.

On Monday evening, August 12, following the Tish’ah B’Av fast, more than a thousand men are expected to sit in traffic on the Van Wyck Expressway, heading towards Kennedy Airport. They will pass by sign after sign listing one airline after another. Theirs has been defunct since 2001, but the internationally renowned TWA Terminal reopened last year as an event venue with a hotel, rooftop pool, and an airplane from 1958 serving as a cocktail lounge. This is where Queens Hatzolah will be holding this year’s Premier Men’s Event, headlined by superstar singer Avraham Fried and the Zemiros Choir.

On his visit to Congregation Machane Chodosh last week, venture fund manager Daniel Frankenstein noticed the memorial plaques on the synagogue’s wall, with names such as Walter, Siegfried, and Irmgard. “These are German names; my grandfather was Hans and my grandmother was Hildegard. We are Yekkes,” he said. He was hosted by one of a handful of its older German-born members, longtime shul president Herbert Jaffe.

On Monday night, Queens Borough President Melinda Katz celebrated with her supporters in Forest Hills following the Board of Elections’ statement that after an exhaustive recount, she had a 60-vote lead in the Democratic Primary for Queens District Attorney. “The parties that were the subject of the litigation that’s coming up…were given full, fair, open, and transparent access to every step of these proceedings,” said Board of Elections Executive Director Michael Ryan. “At the conclusion, the faith of the public will rest easy.”

The closely watched race for Queens District Attorney still does not have a winner, with Board of Elections staffers conducting a manual recount of all the votes this week to determine the results. On the evening of Tuesday, June 25, leftist Tiffany Cabán claimed victory in the Primary Election over mainstream candidate Melinda Katz, with over 1,000 votes in the unofficial results that were announced before midnight on that day.