Category: Announcements

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Secrets and Lies: The Shocking Truth of Recent Australian Aboriginal History

Book Cover

Introducing a new book by our friend Barbara Miller. Barbara is a famous Australian author, human rights activist, historian, and pastor.

Barbara Russell, a young woman from a white working-class family. A ruthless Premier Bjelke-Petersen enforcing legal discrimination. What secrets lie hidden? What lies are being told?

Barbara couldn’t stand by and watch the feud of the people with governments and miners strip Australian Aboriginal communities of all they held dear. Not if she could help.

Would her passion make a way for her? Was she strong enough to make a difference for the people, resist the temptation of love, and stand up to her family too?

In this story of secrets, lies, ideological conflict and racial discrimination laws, Barbara teams up with Mick, an Aboriginal schoolteacher. They organise remote Australian Aboriginal people to fight Bjelke and the mining companies that encroach on their land. But Bjelke has a few tricks up his sleeve and will use all in his powers in this police state to stop them. If the Aboriginal people fail, more of them will die in poverty and desperation.

Can the church take on the state and win in this epic battle as the church stands with the Aboriginals to challenge racism? This historical memoir is another sizzling story in the First Nations True Stories series.

With the current debate in Australia of Voice Treaty Truth and the worldwide issue of Black Lives Matter, this book gives many key Aboriginal people a voice and reveals the shocking truth of the hidden history of 1975 to 2021 in a near-novel like manner. Every important historical event is covered. This is one of the social justice books that you will want on your shelf. The political activism examples are not those of keyboard warriors but those of a people who took to the trenches.

If you like fast-paced action, real-life heroes, and the window opened on another culture, this book is for you. If you like books with political intrigue that bring to life an interesting historical period, you’ll love Secrets and Lies.

The eBook will be 99c till 6 July 2021, and then go up to $3.99.

START READING NOW!!!

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Crazy Travel Photography and Story-Telling

Irene Shaland and Alex Shaland in Africa

Come to a Free In-Person Presentation “Crazy Travel Photography and Story-Telling”

Date and Time: June 24, 2021 at 7-8 PM EST

Presenters: Irene and Alex Shaland

Organized by: Cleveland Photo Fest

Where: 2731 Prospect Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio 44115, in the Bostwick Design Art Initiative Building

About the presentation:

Meet Irene and Alex Shaland, world travelers, book authors, travel writers, and camera swingers.  Alex swings the camera, Irene simply looks glamorous. Hear their stories of globe-trotting adventures-on-steroids researching, photographing, and writing about the countries and places they visit, people they meet, and nature and wildlife they deeply care about.

Why was this program titled “Crazy Travel Photography and Story-Telling”? As an example, who else but crazy Shalands would have crisscrossed the entire Indian subcontinent in 12 days pushing the shutter button and scribbling notes as fast as they could. After returning home, they produced two magazine articles, a chapter for Irene’s book, and several lectures. And they have been performing this stunt (research-travel-meet people and become friends-photograph and take notes-write, publish, present–repeat) for over 30 years. Almost 80 countries and counting.

Knowing Shalands’ “mode of operation” event sponsors asked Irene and Alex to share some unusual or “crazy” moments and images from some of their trips. This program will take you from the jaw-dropping architectural marvels of Singapore to insanely-creative street art of Melbourne, Australia; from African safaris in South Africa, Zimbabwe, Kenya, and Tanzania to the pyramids of Egypt; and from the streets and fields of Nepal to national parks in the USA.

About the presenters:

Irene Shaland’s art and travel articles, accompanied by Alex’s photographs, have appeared in over 20 publications and online sources including Holiday Magazine (France/U.K.), The Boston Forward, Tikkun, ZEEK, Diarna Digital Heritage Mapping, Hackwriters (U.K.), IMAGE Magazine, ROMAR Travel, and other journals printed in the U.S., Canada, U.K., Korea, and Kenya. Irene’s third book “The Dao of Being Jewish and Other Stories” narrates little-known tales of Jewish communities in 10 countries over two millennia.

“Suburbanites on Safari” is Alex’s first work devoted exclusively to Africa and African wildlife that, in addition to being informative and entertaining, aspires to support the effort to preserve and protect the animals with whom we humans share this planet.

Learn more about Alex Shaland.

Learn more about Irene Shaland.

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Free Virtual Lecture: Travels in Jewish History – Asia

angkor watt Cambodia

Adath Shalom Synagogue Presents
Irene Shaland’s Free Virtual Lecture:

Travels in Jewish History

Date: Thursday, May 6th, 2021   Time: 7:30 PM EST

Join this event on Zoom: 

https://zoom.us/j/3393948412?pwd=QjJiVW0yUUtuV01mS0NvUzlyOU9SUT09

Meeting ID: 339 394 8412

Passcode: Israel

For more information follow this link to the announcement on the Adath Shalom website: https://www.adathshalom.net/event/travels-in-jewish-history-india-china-myanmar-cambodia-and-more.html

     Travel with Irene Shaland to the continent of Asia in search of little-known Jewish histories. In China, learn the two-fold narrative: the Jews IN China and the Jews OF China while discovering the 2,000-year history of Jewish life there. What are the Jewish secrets of the Gobi Desert and the Silk Road? What do the most anti-Semitic of Russian Tsars and a Russian-Yiddish cultural enclave in the north of China have in common?

     In India, discover the most refined beauty and the deepest spirituality of this country while learning the little-known history of the oldest continuously living Jewish community in the world, its myths of origin, and the sense of identity. Hear fascinating stories about the synagogue near the tomb of a Persian emperor, Jewish atheist’s shrine in a mosque, India’s role in the Holocaust, and Muslim youths defending the synagogue of Mumbai.

     In Burma/Myanmar, you will be transported to the ancient land of rice fields and countless golden Buddhas and pagodas to discover the little-known narrative of the once-thriving Jewish community there, which was all but decimated during World War II. Understand why this small group of immigrants throughout their history in Asia became so successful commercially and powerful politically only to disappear to almost oblivion after the 1940s and 1960s. 

     In Cambodia, you will visit a small synagogue near the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh and discover what the Rabbi’s usual day looks like in the country of Angkor Wat.

Irene Shaland is the author of a multitude of magazine articles published in the US, Canada, South Africa, Kenya, the UK, and Israel. She regularly presents at conferences, museums, universities, special-interest group events, and other venues.

Irene’s last book “The Dao of Being Jewish and Other Stories” is available on Amazon.

Join this event on Zoom: 

https://zoom.us/j/3393948412?pwd=QjJiVW0yUUtuV01mS0NvUzlyOU9SUT09

Meeting ID: 339 394 8412

Passcode: Israel

For more information follow this link to the announcement on the Adath Shalom website: https://www.adathshalom.net/event/travels-in-jewish-history-india-china-myanmar-cambodia-and-more.html

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Introducing Rabbi Barbara and Her Book: The Cat That Ate the Cannoli

Book cover of Rabbi Barbara's book The Cat That Ate the Cannoli

All quoted text and Images used with permission from the author, Rabbi Barbara Aiello.

“Discovering Rabbi Barbara and her book … turned a light on so many parts of my own family’s traditions, and opened my eyes to the anusim stories in my own grandparents from Calabria. I read it with tears the first time, and reread it with more tears, finding more details that I missed the first time. Thank you Rabbi Barbara! – Corbin”

Continue reading “Introducing Rabbi Barbara and Her Book: The Cat That Ate the Cannoli”
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Join us for a Free Virtual Lecture: Jews and Aborigines

Australian aboriginal man

Jews and Aborigines: Little-Known Stories from Australia

Presenter: Irene Shaland. Date: Tuesday, January 26th , 2021, 1:00 PM

This program is hosted by The Women of Fairmount Temple.    The event is FREE but a Registration is required.  To register: email Janice Hirshon at  [email protected]

Follow Irene Shaland on an exciting virtual trip to Australia to explore this country’s history, its land, and its people. Meet an Aboriginal man, William Cooper, a hero of his people’s human rights struggle and a brave defender of the Jews during World War II.

Continue reading “Join us for a Free Virtual Lecture: Jews and Aborigines”
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Celebrating Chanukah in Story and Song

Rabbi Barbara Aiello

“Thank you so much for the wonderful, beautiful, meaningful, uplifting, intimate commemoration (service) event. Everything you do is filled with deep meaning and addressed to all of us – our dedicated friends and …to the world at large.” A. and I. S., USA

CHANUKAH IN SICILY with Rabbi Barbara
Monday, December 14, 2020 – 6:00 pm Italy time
A ZOOM Event – Sponsored by Chavurah Ner Tamid Palermo, Sicily’s Pluralistic Jewish Congregation Porta “Chanukiyot”, candele e fiammiferi per accendere cinque le candele! Bring your Chanukah menorah, candles and matches! to light the FIFTH CANDLE

Continue reading “Celebrating Chanukah in Story and Song”
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