North Star with Ellin Bessner

For years, Fraidy Hecht of Kelowna, B.C., had to go to great lengths each month to fulfil the ancient requirement for religious Jewish women to immerse themselves in a ritual bath known as a mikvah. In the summers, Hecht could use the nearby lake, in a pinch; but in winter, it meant a five-hour road trip to Vancouver to find a mikvah—not just time-consuming, but occasionally treacherous when the weather is bad. For the past 14 months, Chabad synagogues in several small Jewish communities across North America—including Kelowna, and also Saskatoon and Regina—have been fundraising in a joint campaign called “Bring Mikvah Home.” Kelowna’s is the first one ready. Last week, the Hechts officially inaugurated the new ritual bath with a ceremony and dinner for donors and members on Feb. 21. On The CJN Daily, we’re joined today by Rabbi Shmuly Hecht, Fraidy’s husband, who explains why their mikvah is open to all the estimated 500 Jews in the Okanagan Valley area—not just Chabad members. What we talked about: Why so many people converted to Judaism in Kelowna in 2021, on The CJN Daily Learn more about the Kelowna mikvah project on the_ _Chabad Jewish Okanagan website What life is like for Jews in Kelowna, B.C., on_ Yehupetzville_ _ _Credits: The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here. This podcast is powered by Pinecast.

Travel agent Jay Mandelker of Toronto never imagined his Florida winter holiday would place him at the centre of a rare but horrifying alligator attack that killed his 85-year-old neighbour last Monday. Mandelker is the head of the homeowner’s association in the Spanish Lakes Fairways 55+ retirement community in Fort Pierce, where the victim, Gloria Serge, was pulled into the pond by the 10-foot-long alligator. Video of the attack shows the gator initially rushing out of the water to eat the victim’s small Shih Tzu dog—who survived. After coming ashore, the 500-pound reptile sunk its teeth into the startled senior’s foot and began dragging her into the water, while a neighbour tried unsuccessfully to rescue her and wound up calling 9-1-1. The story, and Mandelker, have been all over the news. He’s since been liaising with local police and Florida wildlife officials, and even held a memorial at a meeting for hundreds of traumatized snowbirds, including several Canadians. He now joins _The CJN Daily _to explain why golfers and walkers need to be more careful in Florida and what his community has learned from the tragedy. What we talked about:. Watch the TV news coverage of the alligator attack from WPTV Jay Mandelker, a travel agent and longtime snowbird in Florida, gives advice on travel after the Canada/U.S. border reopened in January 2022, on The CJN Daily. Learn more about Jay Mandelker at YYZ Travel Credits: The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.

Canadian philanthropist Charles Bronfman is one of 15 signatories to an open letter to Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, which sounds the alarm over the new government’s push to reform the judiciary. Bronfman, who created the Birthright program that sends young Jews to visit Israel, says he didn’t write the letter himself. But his name tops the list of uber-wealthy North American Jews, which includes Daniel Lubetzky, the founder of the KIND energy bar company; Lester Crown, who owns the Chicago Bulls and Maytag; and Marcia Riklis, heir to the late Faberge and Carnival Cruise fortune of her late father, corporate raider Meshulam Riklis. Bronfman has never been a Netanyahu supporter, and feels the Israeli leader wouldn’t talk to him on the phone anyway about his concerns that “the Zionist enterprise is in danger”. Bronfman joins _The CJN Daily _from his Florida home to talk about the threats he believes are affecting Israel’s founding democratic principles. What we talked about:. Read more about Charles Bronfman’s public disputes with Benjamin Netanyahu’s government in The CJN. Charles Bronfman at 90: On Birthright, saving the Jewish State, antisemitism and the Montreal Expos, on The CJN Daily Charles Bronfman memoir is released, in The CJN. Credits: The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.

Nearly 12 years ago, Toronto business executive Stephen Kaplan took a solo motorcycle trip to Alaska. He promised his worried wife, Danielle, it would be his last. But somewhere on a remote road in the Yukon, Kaplan hit a pothole and flew off his powerful bike. When he landed, he’d broken his spine and damaged his heart. The lifelong adventurer couldn’t move, trapped alone on the side of a road in grizzly bear territory. It sounds like a movie, but this was real. If it wasn’t for a few miracles including a passing trucker, a working GPS device, free hospital care in B.C., and his wife’s steely determination to help him recover, it’s unlikely he would have survived. Now Danielle Kaplan, a former health care worker, has written about the couple’s remarkable story, including the toll it took on her family and their marriage. Her new book is called_ I Married a Thrill Seeker: A Cautious Wife’s Memoir of Her Husband’s Risk-Taking and Their Long Road to Recovery._ Danielle and Stephen Kaplan join The CJN Daily to unpack how they survived and the lessons her book can teach couples. What we talked about: Find out more about the SPOT GPS device that saved Stephen Kaplan’s life Read more about the book, and Danielle and Stephen Kaplans’ experiences on their website Credits: The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.

More than 60 years ago, in 1961, Saul Fenster and his older brother, Henry—two Jewish siblings from Poland who had survived the Holocaust—bought a swampy plot of land an hour north of Montreal with the dream of opening a ski resort for families. And so, the Belle Neige ski hill in Montreal’s Laurentien mountains was born. Saul had learned to ski after the war in Switzerland, where he had been sent to try to cure his tuberculosis after the brothers survived a half-dozen death camps—including Auschwitz and Buchenwald. Belle Neige is honouring its founders this weekend with the opening of a new $4-million quadruple chairlift that has been named in the Fensters’ honour. Although both patriarchs have passed away, their families will be on hand for the inauguration ceremony in Val Morin, Que., on Feb. 25—which also happens to be the one-year anniversary of Saul’s death. Two of Saul’s sons, Mark and Elie Fenster, join The CJN Daily along with Nicolas Vallieres, the Belle Neige general manager, to describe how their family created its snowy field of dreams. What we talked about:. Read more about the Fenster’s founding of Belle Neige Read the obituary of Saul Fenster in the Montreal Gazette Credits:   The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.

In a relatively short time, Dan Illouz went from being a McGill University law student to sitting in Israel’s Knesset as a member of the ruling Likud government. The son of Moroccan immigrants to Montreal, Illouz moved to Israel 13 years ago. Since then, he has held political jobs and also served as a Jerusalem city councillor before taking his seat in the Knesset after Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud won the most recent election. Among his stances, Illouz supports the government’s current efforts to reform the power of the Israeli courts—which have prompted mass street protests in Israeli cities, evoked concern among many Jewish groups in the Diaspora and even brought stern warnings from political allies, including Canada. The rookie MK—who turns 37 on Tuesday, Feb. 21—views the protests more as a “disagreement” among friends, and condemns those who say the reforms will make Israel less democratic. Illouz joins The CJN Daily from his office in Jerusalem to explain. What we talked about: Read more about Dan Illouz on the Knesset website Why Illouz campaigned for former Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper in 2015 How Dan Illouz was deeply touched by a 2008 terrorist attack on a yeshiva in Israel The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.

Sketches on a restaurant napkin, a notebook draft of “Hallelujah”, black and white Polaroid snapshots of his naked chest: the late Canadian singer and poet Leonard Cohen kept it all for posterity. Now, a curator with the Art Gallery of Ontario has convinced the Cohen estate to dig into the icon’s personal treasures and stage a never-before-seen exhibit of the very personal collection. Cohen’s two children did not cooperate—in fact, they are embroiled in legal proceedings with Cohen’s former manager over control of their late father’s $48-million (USD) estate and holdings. The exhibit’s curator, Julian Cox, took The CJN Daily on a private tour of the exhibit, titled “Everybody Knows”, where host Ellin Bessner became surprisingly moved while seeing the intimate ephemera of the internationally renowned composer and troubadour. What we talked about:. **   **Learn more about the Leonard Cohen exhibit on the AGO website. Read The CJN’s review of the 2017 Montreal “A Crack in Everything” exhibit, still on until 2024, virtually. Why Michael Posner wrote three books about Cohen, on The CJN Daily. Credits   The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.

It’s been seven months since the federal government was made aware that it had awarded a lucrative training contract to a known racist and antisemite, Laith Marouf. The story broke in July 2022, after several media watchers went public about offensive tweets which Marouf had posted about Jews, Blacks, Indigenous people and French Canadians. While his contract was eventually cancelled and his training workshops for journalists halted, serious questions have been asked ever since about what government officials knew, when they knew, why it took so long for them to take action, and how Marouf could have slipped through the vetting process so easily. On Monday, a high-ranking civil servant from the Department of Canadian Heritage appeared before a House of Commons committee hearing into the affair. What followed was a 90-minute grilling by the committee’s MPs, who remained unimpressed and even disappointed with the answers. On today’s The CJN Daily, we’ll take you to the hearings, and also get analysis from Michael Geist, a law professor at the University of Ottawa who has been critical of the government’s handling of the scandal. What we talked about: Watch the full Standing Committee hearings on Canadian Heritage’s handling of the Laith Marouf scandal Meet the internet expert Mark Goldberg who outed Laith Marouf, on The CJN Daily Read why Twitter suspended Laith Marouf’s personal accounts, on The CJN.ca Credits The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.

Philip Kuntz considers himself the first-ever customer of Aroma Espresso Bar’s first-ever Canadian coffee outlet. When the Aroma location opened in 2007 at 500 Bloor Street West in Toronto’s Annex neighbourhood, Kuntz drank the very first cuppa. For a dozen years, the Ontario musician and artist made that Aroma outlet part of his daily routine–– holding court for hours at the now-closed store. (It was shuttered suddenly in October, 2019.) Kuntz has been watching the Aroma brand’s venture in Canada unfold, including _The CJN’_s recent coverage of the outstanding $10 million dollar legal dispute between the original Canadian franchisor and head office in Israel. He joins The CJN Daily to offer his thoughts about what’s gone wrong, and he even recites a limerick he composed in Aroma’s honour. What we talked about: Hear Part 1 of The CJN’s investigation into the Aroma Espresso Bar multi-million- dollar lawsuit with the Canadian branch on The CJN Daily Credits   The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.    tktk tktk Credits T

More than five years have passed since the still-unsolved murders of philanthropists Barry and Honey Sherman in their Toronto home. Despite a $35-million reward for clues to solve their killing, the case remains a mystery. Conspiracy theories abound over who did it and why, with fingers being pointed at the Clintons, Big Pharma, the Sherman children, a cousin or even the Mossad. Police haven’t released any clues in more than a year. But interest is about to heat up again as two major Canadian news outlets give the story the true-crime treatment, each releasing podcasts about the Shermans—this same month. The two shows take very different approaches. One is hosted by Kevin Donovan, the Toronto Star reporter who broke most of the Sherman case and wrote a book about it; the other, produced by the CBC, is hosted by Jewish journalist Kathleen Goldhar. She has produced previous hit shows about a romance scammer and the cult that ensnared two Bronfman sisters. Today, both podcasters join The CJN Daily to explain why they have been pursuing the case for years and whether either of their competing shows actually provide closure to the unsolved mystery. What we talked about: Hear Kevin Donovan on The CJN Daily talk about his book “The Billionaire Murders” which the new podcast is based on Read about the philanthropic legacy of the Shermans in The CJN Learn why the Toronto police released this video of a person of interest in The CJN.ca Credits The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.