Kingston

Kingston congregants back rabbi's appointment

Jay Grenby — Mon, 20 May 2013 10:12:14 +0100

Kingston Synagogue members have overwhelmingly supported the board of management’s choice of Rabbi Samuel Landau and his wife Shana as the congregation’s new rabbinic couple.

Shul chair Dr Martin Wolfson said that 90 per cent of those at the meeting had approved the selection. He added that “Rabbi Landau has already visited us a couple of times and the more we have met him, the happier we are that he is joining us. He comes with incredible enthusiasm and a host of ideas and we are very excited about the future of the community under his guidance.”

Currently the youth rabbinic team at Northwood Synagogue, the Landaus will start at Kingston on August 1, immediately after the departure of Rabbi Michael Rosenfeld, whose contract has not been renewed.

Rabbi Landau, 25, has studied in the UK and Israel and is completing a psychology degree.
His wife hails from Sydney and has worked in the construction and property sectors in London. She is also a Mensa member.

Drifting Kingston goes for 'dynamic' Landau

Jay Grenby — Mon, 06 May 2013 10:53:46 +0100

Kingston Synagogue will not be renewing the contract of minister Rabbi Michael Rosenfeld and is recommending Northwood Synagogue youth minister Rabbi Samuel Landau as his successor. Members will be asked to support the appointment at an EGM on Wednesday.

In a letter to members, Kingston chair Dr Martin Wolfson described Rabbi Landau and his wife Shana as “a very special couple whom we hope and expect will help Kingston Synagogue become as exciting and dynamic as it has been in the past”.

The normal selection procedure had been circumvented partly because of the prolonged negotiations over Rabbi Rosenfeld’s departure and also because of the “unsolicited but not unwelcome” emergence through informal contacts of a candidate who “ticked all the most important boxes”.

Although the board had considered seeking someone older, the feeling was that “we needed a young dynamic minister for the community to have the chance of a future. We have drifted recently.”
Rabbi Rosenfeld, who has been with the congregation for five years, will take up a chaplaincy role with the Oxford and Oxford Brookes universities on August 1.

Kingston honours four community champions

Jay Grenby — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 11:10:37 +0100

Long-time members of the two Kingston synagogues have been honoured as community champions by the local mayor in an annual award scheme.
Former Kingston Liberal Synagogue president Judy Thwaites received her award for “the impact of her initiative to set up the Kingston Holocaust Memorial Day Trust”. Together with fellow KLS member Fleur Standring, another 2013 award recipient, she established the trust in 2007 to educate local pupils about the Holocaust.
What started as a one-day event has expanded to five-and-a-half days of workshops, this year attended by more than 1,100 students and involving more than 40 volunteers from the Kingston Liberal and United synagogues.
Ms Standring was honoured for her “tireless work” for the Kingston Interfaith Forum and the Kingston Race and Equalities Council. Her forum colleague and Kingston Synagogue member Sydney Assor received an award for his “dedicated and selfless work in building bridges and relations between different faiths”. Moroccan-born Mr Assor was nominated by the local Muslim community, which has accorded him the honorary title of “sheikh”.
The award to Dr Alan Lyons recognises his 45 years of service to Kingston Synagogue and the local community.
After receiving her accolade from the mayor, Councillor Mary Heathcote, Ms Standring said: “I saw the award primarily as a further way of raising the profile of our HMD workshops — and, hopefully, of promoting a perception of us as a minority group contributing something to the wider community.”

Shul partners educating the young generation

Zoe Winograd — Mon, 04 Feb 2013 10:01:47 +0000

A joint initiative by the Kingston Orthodox and Liberal synagogues to provide a Holocaust Memorial Day education programme for local students is now attracting over 1,000 participants.

On the launch day of the scheme’s seventh year, French-born survivor Marcel Ladenheim discussed his experiences with year-10 students from Coombe Boys’ School at Kingston Synagogue.

Now Surbiton-based, Mr Ladenheim recalled that much of his childhood had been spent in hiding under the care of two non-Jewish women — his mother was mentally ill.

He also recounted the trauma of leaving France after the war when his aunt took him to Manchester. “The reason I speak to you today is because I’d like to remember the children who were murdered,” he explained. “And for my mother, who never recovered from her experiences, and the two ladies who didn’t have to take in a Jewish boy, but did.”

Sean Dickson, 14, said Mr Ladenheim’s talk had moved him greatly. “From listening to his story, it is quite upsetting to know how many people were actually affected. How many rooms full of people died? It’s hard to imagine.”

Coombe Boys’ head of humanities Grant Robertson pointed out: “As much as we can do in the classroom, we can’t create the first-hand experience for them. It is not just what they get from the survivor, but the whole environment of being in a synagogue.

“The boys were so enthused about spreading the message further. They have really come away with a sense of how brave the survivors were, and the people who saved them.”

Forty volunteers from both synagogues organised the half-day workshops, each featuring a talk by one of seven survivors involved in the project and the showing of a film made by the Holocaust Educational Trust.

Programme volunteer Robert Lewis said: “We hope that the children leave with the knowledge of what it was really like. Just hearing somebody talk about their experiences will hopefully breathe into them a feeling of tolerance.”

Czech mates meet again in London

Jay Grenby — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 14:27:38 +0100

Czech Ambassador Michael Žantovský hosted the annual reunion of Holocaust survivors and their families originating from Ostrava, organised by Kingston Synagogue's Ostrava Scroll Group.

Seventy "Ostrawaks" attended, some travelling from the Czech Republic, Austria, Belgium and Germany.

They were welcomed at the embassy by Kingston Ostrava group chair David Lawson, who reported on its latest research into the lives of some of the city's one-time 10,000 Jewish population.

The group was established five years ago after Kingston was offered a Sefer Torah formerly used in the city on permanent loan by the Czech Memorial Scrolls Trust.

Since then, the team has uncovered remarkable stories of survival of former community members now living as far afield as Australia and Canada.

Among the reunion guests was George Tyrell, who survived Theresienstadt.

Thanking the organisers for a "wonderful afternoon", he added: "One felt so very much at home and among one's own."

School for south London?

Simon Rocker — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 14:32:18 +0000

Promoters of a plan to set up a Jewish primary in south London have been encouraged by the initial response to a survey to gauge demand.

Kingston Liberal Synagogue's Ben Baginsky, who is co-chairman of the school group, said that most of the 100 responses received to date were positive. But a bigger sample was needed to assess the viability of the idea.

"We will work for the next six-to-12 months to determine the demand," he said. "If at that stage we feel it is a goer, then we'll push ahead strongly.

"It's a really exciting possibility for south-west London Jewry. If we can get it off the ground, it could attract people to the area." An encouraging sign is that the independent nursery at Wimbledon Reform has a waiting list.

The school group comprises representatives from Liberal, Reform and Orthodox synagogues in the area. But the ethos and the location have not been decided. "It is not affiliated to any particular stream," Mr Baginsky said.

Also under consideration is the free school option, introduced by the government to allow new state-aided schools independent of local authorities.

Odessa files

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 14:13:16 +0000

There was a large turnout at a Kenton, Kingsbury and Wembley adult education programme meeting for an illustrated account of a visit by Kenton Synagogue members to the Tikva children's home in Odessa.

Following contributions from Madeleine Whiteson and Robert Brody, Sharon Arad spoke about some of the children she had met and Michael Topper recalled the appalling living conditions of many of the children's families. David Harris gave some case studies and Jenny Lamski appealed to members to form a fundraising committee.

Fighting Israel's corner

Jay Grenby — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 14:59:47 +0000

Kingston United and Liberal communities have joined forces to produce a response to the controversial Methodist Church report, Justice for Palestine and Israel.

A working party under the leadership of Peter Brady and Jack Green has issued a 60-page document, dealing "with various inaccuracies and bias contained in the report".

It covers topics such as Israel's history and geography, the peace process, defamation and delegitimisation, maritime law, blockades and boycotts. Also addressed is the Methodists' call for a boycott of goods from "illegal" Israeli West Bank settlements.

A number of "constructive" meetings with local Methodists have taken place, among them a forum at New Malden Methodist Church attended by three dozen members of the local Methodist and Jewish communities. Rev Bonni-Belle Pickard and Ronald Ison welcomed participants and following group discussions, a question-and-answer session was moderated by Rev Stan Brown and Colin Green.

North and south join forces for mass educational programme

Jay Grenby — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 10:57:49 +0000

United and Liberal communities north and south of the river have once again combined to organise major HMD educational activities for almost 3,000 secondary school students.

Two-thirds of that number were at the Northwood United/Northwood and Pinner Liberal event, now in its 10th year.

Pupils from 33 schools in Harrow, Hertfordshire and Hillingdon took part in 18 sessions at the shuls. There were also satellite sessions at the Bushey and Borehamwood United synagogues.

Monday's opening ceremony featured an address by Helen Hyde, headteacher of Watford Girls' Grammar School, who is the child of survivors.

As in Northwood, the south London programme in Kingston joins the local United and Liberal shuls. Having launched five years ago as a one-day event, its workshops now stretch over four days to meet demand. More than 40 volunteers from the two shuls have been working together on the project, which has received a neighbourhood grant from the Royal Borough of Kingston and donations from members of both congregations.

A feature of the half-day sessions in both programmes is the contribution of survivors, discussing their experiences of Nazi persecution and how today's young generation can combat prejudice.

In Kingston, for example, early arrivals included year eight students from Tolworth Girls' School in Kingston, who are studying the Holocaust and the Kindertransport as part of a humanities course. After hearing from Bronia Snow, 13-year-old Abbie O'Donnell remarked: "It was moving to hear Bronia talking about how she survived. People who had done nothing wrong suffered because of one man."

Lottie Premm-Jones, 12, was impressed by "how strong she was to cope with the loss of her parents and brother. I don't know if I could be that strong."

At Northwood, year 10 girls from St Margaret's School, Bushey, said hearing Mala Tribich's story in person evoked emotions "you could never get when just reading about the Holocaust in books". One girl told her: "Listening to you has made me wonder how people can be so cruel. Thank you for sharing your experience, and I will share it with others."

Kingston professionals hit right note

Thu, 07 Oct 2010 16:48:07 +0100

Kingston Synagogue's decision to bring in professional chazanim over the High Holy Days has been rewarded with significantly increased attendances.

Three hundred people were at a midnight selichot service with renowned American cantor Moshe Schulhof. To avoid impacting on shul funds, the event was sponsored by anonymous donors.

The community then enlisted Jerusalem-born, London-based cantor Zvi Lider to lead the Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur services. A shul representative said some members were moved to tears by "the experience of hearing the services tunefully and meaningfully intoned by a 'zogger chazan' [interpretative cantor] – a rare treat for a congregation in south-west London in 2010." His sentiments were echoed by congregants' post-festival entries on Facebook.

Kingston has now established a fund to support regular invitations to talented cantors.