14th April, 2022 Shabbat Shalom, Chag Pesach Sameach a Blessed Easter and Ramadan Kareem How appropriate that we all celebrate our festivals together, the three monotheistic religions. If only we could all celebrate together irrespective of our different traditions, our different prayers because after all, we all reach out to the same God. Here in…

7th April 2022 Thursday night exactly one week before the Passover Seder! It is a time of festivals, religious festivals, from Ramadan to Easter and Pascha/Passover/Pesach. Spring cleaning by any other name is in the air and the shops have scrubbed down their shelves and replaced the “regular” foodstuffs with Kosher for Passover goods. Even…

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25th March 2022 Shabbat Shalom! Yes I’m back in Jerusalem after the most incredible week in London. Gathering and dispensing hugs and love was number one on my list of “do’s” and that was exactly what I did. Family and friends, Gideon, Stephanie, Sammy, Olivia and Zachary opened their home and hearts and I came…

11th February, 2022 Shabbat Shalom to one and all! Today I should write about all sorts of news items, many of them just about as gloomy as the skies outside our window, but apart from a quick half paragraph ( I promise to try) I am going to tell you about our week! Actually, one…

Kalman Thursday  the 29th of April 2004 (10 Iyar 5764)  at six o’clock in the morning, my wonderful, good, kind and gentle father-in-law, a true gentleman, Kalman Raviv (Ribak) died in his sleep. I want to give you his story as my gift to you from him. It reflects a small part of his achievements, but…

10th December 2021 6th Tevet 5782 Shabbat Shalom! Just 14 days, a fortnight, until Christmas Eve! Where has this year gone? I was looking at this week’s Torah reading and am convinced that every family should read it and interpret its message for our own family and friends. We all know about Joseph’s jealous brothers…

3rd December 2021 Gosh I can’t believe it’s already December tonight is the 6th Candle of Chanuka and it’s only 21 days to Christmas! Where has the time gone? This morning, thanks to a crossword clue that I couldn’t answer, I discovered that the word Omicron is a strange choice for the newest variant of…

26th November 2021 Shabbat Shalom everyone! How are you? I looked at today’s date and I couldn’t help but wonder where the year has gone! It strikes me that this time last year we had no concept that Covid would still be running our lives! 29th of November 1947 was one of the most important,…

23rd July 2021 Good Shabbat, a blessed Eid al Adha, have a safe and beautiful weekend I hate saying “I told you so” but sadly the raucous parties, pubs and huge crowds at the Euro 2020 football games, especially the final, have put Britain, or rather England, into the red. Thanks to the idiocy of…