Wonderful messages continue to come in from our Christian friends in the wake of the incident last week involving a swastika and other anti-Jewish graffiti being painted outside the Vestavia Hills home of a Jewish family.

The below came in Monday from Update reader Jim Hart (pictured here). Jim is managing partner of Dent, Baker & Company, a local certified public accounting firm, and a donor to our Birmingham Jewish Federation Annual Campaign:

I had two very different bookends to this past weekend that made me think of The BJF.

First, while sitting in my Vestavia Hills home this past Friday evening, the 10 PM news reported an account of a horrible incident of vandalism and anti-Semitism directed at a Jewish family in my home city of Vestavia Hills. I thought we were past that stuff; I was obviously wrong.

The news showed disgusting photos of a Nazi symbol painted on the driveway alongside a Jewish sacred symbol. That sight and the account made me physically ill; it kept me awake for hours. While I suspect the timing just before Christmas, as students left school for the holidays, was no accident, I sure hope that I am dead wrong on that. It would be doubly disgusting if my suspicion is correct.

I have no earthly idea how anyone could possibly justify those actions, and I hope for some swift and strong justice for the hate crime. They should be happy I am neither the city judge nor their parent.

While the news account made one think it was the result of a long brewing high school anti-Semitic flap with the daughter of that Jewish family, the fact that it may have been perpetrated by stupid high school students in no way lessens the evil of the act. Indeed the fact that even one of our Vestavia Hills youngsters is acting like the Ku Klux Klan criminals of yesteryear, is a real cause for concern and disgust. I do hope that the system and the parents will make the wrongdoers pay.

Although I am not acquainted with the family that was victimized by the criminal hoodlums, that does not matter. They should have everyone's support, and certainly they have mine. The news account on Friday made me think about The BJF's education efforts to combat anti-Semitism in all forms. And while I DID think we in greater Birmingham had moved past that, I was wrong. The BJF's effort in education to combat anti-Semitism is just one of the many ways your organization is a blessing to our community.

Then I at least got to end the weekend before Christmas on a more positive note, when I read Elisa Held Nelson's article in the Sunday Birmingham News about your organization and its mission. (See below link.) There is not a single part of it that I do not support.

Our community is stronger for all you do in so many ways, and while I may have discounted the value of education against anti-Semitism, I don't any longer. I just assumed others thought as I do. That was a big mistake. But the events of Friday made the Sunday article all the more meaningful. Keep up the good work.

Pictured are Auburn Jewish Student Organization members Rebecca Chazanoff, of Los Angeles, and Moises Rivera, of Miami, FL, with AJSO faculty advisor Rob Kulick in front of the menorah on Auburn's campus.

Happy War Eagle Chanukah!

Chanukah came early to the plains of Auburn as the local synagogue, Congregation Beth Shalom, and the Auburn Jewish Student Organization (AJSO) teamed up to bring the Jewish Festival of Lights to Auburn. About 50 students, faculty and community members celebrated together as they recited the blessings and lit a large Chanukah menorah in front of Foy Hall. The celebration ended with the singing of traditional holiday songs.

According to Rob Kulick, faculty advisor for the AJSO, this "momentous and somewhat historic event" came through the efforts of AJSO president Moises Rivera and member Rebecca Chazanoff. "The placement of a menorah at Auburn has been long sought after as a way of both marking the Festival of Lights and celebrating a Jewish presence on campus," said Rob. This marked only the second time a Chanukah menorah lighting has taken place, the first being in 2005.

Chanukah began Tuesday night at sunset and continues until sundown on Weds., Dec. 28. The holiday commemorates the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem after its destruction and the re-establishment of religious freedom for the Jewish people.

Congregation Beth Shalom and Jewish students used the menorah as an opportunity to teach about Chanukah and share their holiday practices with the broader student body. According to the Anti-Defamation League, which provides advice regarding church-state issues, the placement of a menorah by a student organization in an open forum, such as a college campus, is constitutionally permissible.

BJF A RESOURCE

The Birmingham Jewish Federation serves as a resource for the AJSO. Funds from The BJF Annual Campaign help support Jewish life at Auburn and other college campuses in our state. Jewish student life on the Auburn campus is on the rise; the AJSO counts about 90 active participants this year (out of an approximate enrollment of 24,500 undergraduate and graduate students).

In addition, Auburn graduate and Washington, DC area resident Martin Freeman opened a fund in The Birmingham Jewish Foundation to support Jewish activities at Auburn. Anyone may make a donation to this fund. (Contact Foundation executive director Sally Friedman at sallyf@bjf.org or 205.803.1519 for information.)

BJF Director of Community Relations Joyce Spielberger works with students at Auburn and University of Alabama; Caren Seligman, BJF Director of Outreach, works with students at UAB and Birmingham-Southern College. For more information about Jewish life on our state campuses, contact Joyce at joyces@bjf.org or Caren at carens@bjf.org or call 205.879.0416.

As part of "Our Next 100 Years," a historic Jewish community initiative, The BJF has helped strengthen Jewish life and pro-Israel activities on our state's college campuses, to make attending school in Alabama an attractive choice for both in-state and out-of-state students.