Finally. After five years Gilad Shalit is finally in Israeli hands as part of a prisoner exchange deal that will see 1027 Palestinian detainees, many serving life sentences for their direct involvement in acts of terror, freed from Israeli prison. Shalit is heading to Tel Nof air force base where he will be reunited with his family and greeted by Prime Minister Netanyahu. Afterward he is expected to go home to Mitzpe Hila, which has been closed off to all visitors. The first images of a freed Shalit were broadcast by Egyptian television and show Shalit to be gaunt and pale, but otherwise healthy. Interviewed by Egyptian TV he said:

I’m very emotional. I haven’t seen people in a long time. I missed my family. I missed seeing people, and talking to them … Of course I miss my family very much. I also miss my friends … I hope this deal will lead to peace between Palestinians and Israelis and that it will support cooperation between both sides.

Welcome home Gilad.

Gilad talks to his parents for the first time in 5 years.

Arriving at Tel Nof Air Base, Gilad is given a new IDF uniform prior to greeting family

No offense to Hamas or anything, but dang that was an ugly shirt they gave Shalit. Next time just stick with a basic one-color dress shirt.

Gilad arrives and salutes Chief of Staff (off photo) and Prime Minister

Gilad, his Dad and Netanyahu

IDF Chief of Staff hugs Gilad Shalit

Statement from UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon regarding swap:

I am very encouraged by the prisoner exchange today after many many years of negotiation,” Ban said. “The United Nations has been calling for (an end to) the unacceptable detention of Gilad Schalit and also the release of all palestinians whose human rights have been abused all the time.

I wonder if Gilad managed to get a BA while in captivity…

Shalit was in captivity for 1,935 days. 1 + 9 + 3 + 5 = 18 which in Hebrew is Chai – the word for “life” or literally, “alive.” Hat tip: Tanya Gutsol. Note the deal was announced on day 1935. He was freed on day 1941.

UPDATE: Shalit just arrived at his parents’ home in Mitspe Hila, greeted by wildly cheering crowds.

I just got an email from a participant at the last Jewlicious Festival in Long Beach and I thought I’d share it with you:

Dear Jewlicious,
I was at the last Jewlicious Fest and I wanted to take a moment to thank you for all the hard work you guys put in to organize the Festival. It’s a bit funny but I almost didn’t go. If my friend didn’t basically force me to go I would have just stayed at home and done nothing special. Instead I went to Jewlicious and had an amazing time from start to finish. The Friday night meal was incredible, full of spirit and great food, I can’t believe you fit everyone into one giant table! The speakers afterward were interesting and then I stayed up late hanging out with old and new friends. We played backgammon and Texas Holdem using peanuts for betting! No need to refer to casinotoplists, we had No Limit Texas Dreidel! Saturday night’s Havdala service was very moving, the comedians were great, the bands were lots of fun and again, the food just would not stop. Throughout this whole event I met all kinds of interesting people, from all walks of life and levels of observance. What they all had in common was a passion for Judaism that I found to be both compelling and infectious. I am writing now from a Sukka Party that I helped organize on campus. Had you told me last year that I’d be organizing a Sukka party, I’d laugh at you. Had I not gone to Jewlicious, I would not be here now. Also I would not be dating my current girlfriend who I met as a result of my getting more involved in my community. Let’s say my Mom adores her and that’s ok with me! Thank you again for literally changing the course of my life. I can’t wait till the next Festival, but this time, I’ll be the one pushing people to come.

What did YOU do last weekend?

I have no clue about you, but I do know how about 150 college students and young adults spent the weekend at the 2nd Annual Camp Jewlicious at the Brandeis Bardin Institute in Simi Valley, CA. They swam, rode mountain bikes, climbed walls, rappelled, rode horses, tie dyed t-shirts, enjoyed Shabbat, had some great conversations, enjoyed some excellent speakers, made candles, baked challah, enjoyed some great music and generally partied like rock stars. Well, I mean if rock stars partied on lush 3000 acre properties amongst pheasants, squirrels, lizards and coyotes.

Camp Jewlicious was fun, meaningful and a great experience all around. Big ups go out to our entertainers: Rav Shmuel, Natan Winkler, Mikey Pauker, Josh Kramon, Hyim and DJ Shachar; Big ups also to our staff and volunteers as well as the staff at Brandeis Bardin. But mostly, a big thanks to our participants. OK, I know that’s kind of odd. I mean we worked hard and they reaped the benefits by simply showing up and enjoying the program, so why thank them? I guess it’s because we work hard for them, and when they show up and enjoy themselves, it’s like instant validation, a direct shot of dopamine to our collective cerebral cortex.

But yeah, don’t take my word for it. Check out all the photos on Flickr below. People seem to be having a good time, right? Right!

www.flickr.com Jewlicious’ Camp Jewlicious 2011 photoset

Special thanks to our sponsors without whom none of this would be possible. These are The Jewish Community Foundation Los Angeles and the Valley Alliance Of The Jewish Federation Of Great Los Angeles, Stanley and Joyce Black, Adam and Gila Milstein, The Israel Leadership Council. Further support came from JConnectLA, MASA Israel, Birthright NEXT LA, Birthrigh Israel, Jews For Judaism, San Diego Jewish Federation, Nefesh B’ Nefesh, and Jimena.

That’s a question I get asked a lot – even by people who read the Jewlicious.com blog or have attended the Jewlicious Festival. So yeah, there’s a bunch of different things we do, which is why sometimes we are difficult to define. Some of our friends got together and produced the following 40 second video clip which goes a long way towards enunciating what we’re all about:

Ready to repair the world one block at a time on Sunday?
Even if you cannot be there the whole day – you can be part of the very first TIKKUNFEST.

You can volunteer BEFORE or AFTER or just support Tikkunfest by coming to the Party from 5-8pm. All proceeds of the concert go to the support our community service project! Earn free concert with 3 hours + volunteering even on Saturday night!

We have a few PRE-FEST Jobs that need help!

SAT NIGHT – we are having a painting party with pizza and beer from 8-12pm painting planters. Dress to get painted.
1134 S. Crest . Dr. 90035

SUNDAY AM
We need a few volunteers who can come earlier on Sunday. You can work for three hours AND earn your free after party entrance. You can still volunteer afterwards too if you want!

- We need 5 more people who can help shovel dirt from starting at 9am

BLOCK CAPTAINS
We need 6 more Block/Zone captains who can come at 11:30 on Sunday and get trained in how to fix your block!
Send me a DM or email ecojew@gmail.com if you want to be a Captain (all captains are guaranteed tikkufnest shirts)

Thank you everyone!

Remember to collect clothing and food for the needy and bring it to TIKKUNFEST on Sunday with your e-waste.

Dress to get messy, bring money for dinner and swag.

Pre-register at tikkunfest.eventbrite.com!
Thank you to the many partners and sponsors!
You can be a sponsor to! We have some trees and planters that still need sponsors – and it is totally tax-deductible.

SHABBAT SHALOM

— Rabbi Yonah

Join us February 25-27, 2011, at the Alpert JCC in Long Beach for our record-setting, seventh annual, gathering of  Jewish students and young adults from around the country.

Jewlicious Festivals are grassroots, people-powered, green-thinking, fun-loving, culture-countering, stereotype-shattering, bridge-building, is-it-possible-to-have-this-much-fun event unlike any weekend in Jewish history.

This past February, 1,000 people made it to Jewlicious, from over 50 colleges and universities, 20 states and 5 countries. We had over 120 programs over 56 hours of a non-stop weekend.

Tickets will be on sale in tiers according to when you purchase your tickets and how old you are. The sooner you buy your tickets the lower your price is. Tickets are expected to go on sale in November!

You will be able submit your program suggestions too starting November 1, 2010.

We are all about Open Source

Learn all about TIKKUNFEST it’s goals and how it works. From collecting clothing and food for the needy, to fixing up the street, TIKKUNFEST is going to repair the world, one block at at tim

The Reuben is a Jewish deli classic. But unlike the Jewlicious Burger, the Reuben sandwich, well, let’s just say it has problems… wait, is this really a video about a sandwich?

The subtext of any pop culture piece on Jewlicious is always the age old question “Is it good for the Jews?” I watched season 2 episode 2 of Glee recently and the answer is… well, not so clear. Glee, the Fox show about Glee Club at William McKinley High School in Lima, Ohio, does not lack for Jews, both overt and covert. First there’s Brad Falchuk, one of the show’s Executive Producers and writers. His Mom Nancy Falchuk has been the NationalPresident of Hadassah since 2007. That’s pretty Jewy, even by Hollywood standards where almost everyone in the biz is a yid. Hadassah… that’s some serious yichus! But who gives a shit about the behind the scenes people, right? There’s plenty of Jewyness on the show itself.

We have the mohawked Puck, aka Noah Puckerman whose family celebratedSimchat Torah by watching Schindler’s List. Do I need to tell you how fucked up that is? I hope not… Puck it seems is also a bit of a prophet. Who can forget his description of one divine exhortation: “When I woke up, I knew it was a message from God. Rachel was a hot Jew and the Good Lord wanted me to get into her pants.” The Rachel in question is Rachel Berry, the other overtly Jewish character in Glee club. With her two gay dads she brings new complexity to the “who is a Jew” debate. She does have a Streisandesque air about her, she is very ambitious and driven (Jew!) and like many of her fellow secular American coreligionists, she is dating a non-Jew (Finn Hudson, the school’s quarterback and a member of the Glee club).

Next we have the crypto Jews… Is Artie Abrams, the nerdy paraplegic a Jew? What about his love-interest, Tina Cohen-Chang? Does that mean her Mom is Jewish? Finally we have Quinn Fabray, head cheerleader and Finn’s former ex. As a hot, blond sexy cheerleader, former head of the school’s Christianabstinence club until she got knocked up by Puck, she has tremendous Sh*ksappeal (I can’t really use that term anymore, can I?), she is actually played by Member of the Tribe, Dianna Agron. Go figure.All of this however, is merely a prelude to the Jew issues raised by the most recent episode of Glee.

Featuring a guest appearance by Britney Spears, the episode was so popular that half an hour after the episode aired, 7 of the 10 trending topics on twitter were Glee-related. One of the trending topics was the term “JewishCloud.” See, after getting a shot of Nitrous Oxide at the dentist, Glee club member and cheerleader Brittany caressed Jacob Ben Israel’s Jewfro and said that it looked like “…a Jewish cloud.” She was tripping, get it?

Jacob, played by Josh Sussman, was an important part of this episode. The Glee club’s use of a Britney Spears number at a school assembly seemed to have hypersexualized everyone, and nowhere is that hypersexuality more on display than it was with Jacob. Jacob offered to kill his parents and give Finn his house if he let him have Rachel after she showed up to school in a Britney Spears inspired schoolgirl outfit. Afterward, Jacob was caught in the Library, butt naked and apparently pleasuring himself. But that was restrained compared to Jacob’s behavior at the homecoming assembly when the Glee Club performed “Toxic.” At least at the Library, he was (mostly) alone whereas at the assembly he appeared to be pleasuring himself while moaning and screaming out loud.

This episode had massive ratings. Massive. It drew 13.5 million viewers, even more than the season debut the week before and broke all kinds of records. Glee’s depiction of Jews tries to mirror, at least in some respects, the complexity of modern Jewish America. But Jacob Ben Israel’s cringing, self-loathing, hypersexual character seems to be a Jewish cliche based on a combination of Portnoy’s Complaint and Der Stürmer.

I’m not Abe Foxman and Jewlicious is not the ADL and I am not at all suggesting that Glee’s writers are anti-Semitic. However, Jacob’s over the top behavior is weak, juvenile and ultimately uninteresting. My suggestion? Since Jacob is both Jewish and a blogger, why not model his character more on Nick Denton, the founder of the Gawker media empire? A young Nick Denton(MOT) transplanted from London into Ohio, struggling with his sexuality and whatever… it’s got to be more interesting than the current Jacob Ben Israel tomfoolery.

Returning to the original question of this post: Glee. Good for the Jews? I have to make a small confession. The truth is, I don’t really care. Please don’t hate me.

Less than a week left to vote!

This year’s Jewish Community Hero contest is winding down and I trust you’ve all been voting for your favorite candidates. Last year, the Jewlicious community rallied massively behind our own Rabbi Yonah Bookstein, delivering the most votes of any nominee. This year, we have no horse in the race, per se, so we spared you all the incessant calls to vote. And thank goodness for that! Looking over the nominees, it seems like our Jewish community does not lack for some impressive heroes. We’d hate to have to compete against them!

Thus, I’d like to urge you to go and vote NOW and all week for whoever floats your boat. I know Eli Valley thinks our biggest Jewish hero is Helen Thomas’s head (it’s funny! Read the comic!), but as that part of her anatomy has not been nominated, let’s look at a few of the nominees, almost at random, followed by who I’ve been voting for.

First there’s Rabbi Yisroel Bernath from my hometown of Montreal. Rabbi Bernath runs the Chabad House in NDG. You can read all about his accomplishments but suffice it to say, my friend Stephen is convinced that Rabbi Bernath will find him a shidduch if he makes it to the finals.

On the opposite end of the religious spectrum, we have Jewlicious Festival alum Patrick Aleph, founder of PunkTorah.org and OneShul.org. Patrick is helping redefine Jewish identity, culture, community and spirituality for unaffiliated Jews. Rock on!

How about a Jewish tough guy in the form of Orthodox Jewish boxer Dmitriy Salita? I’m pretty sure our first post on Jewlicious was about him. Furthermore, he’s doing all kinds of outreach regarding fostering positive Jewish identity and who can argue with that?

I could go on and on… David Weinberg has done great work, particularly in these trying economic times. There’s also Sarri Singer who survived a terror bus bombing in Israel and now helps victims of terror around the world. There’s also Idit Klein who works on making the Jewish Community a friendlier place for its LGBT members and also runs Keshet an organization for special needs children (!!).

Like I said, I could do this all week! There really are SO many impressive people nominated this year that I already know who the winner is – the Jewish community that has so many impressive people working on its behalf.