Tag Archives: Entebbe

Jew of the Week: Anne Neuberger

The Hasidic Woman That Runs America’s Cybersecurity

Chani Anne Neuberger (b. 1976) was born in Brooklyn to a Hasidic Jewish family with roots in Hungary. She grew up speaking Yiddish and went to school at Bais Yaakov of Boro Park. She studied at Touro College, then earned an MBA from Columbia University. A professor suggested that she apply for the prestigious White House Fellowship, and she did a couple of years later. She was selected and – to her surprise – instead of going to the Treasury Department she was posted to the Department of Defense. From there, she got a job working for the Secretary of the Navy, and eventually became the US Navy’s deputy chief management officer. In 2009, Neuberger was posted to the new Cyber Command team of the NSA (National Security Agency). Her work was impressive, and after the Snowden leaks of 2013, she was appointed the NSA’s first chief risk officer. Neuberger also served as assistant deputy director of operations, and most recently oversaw security during the 2018 US Midterm elections. Earlier this week, Neuberger was named the NSA’s new head of the Cybersecurity Directorate. She sits on the NSA’s board of directors, and is one of its highest-ranking women. Neuberger finds inspiration for her work in her own family history: Seven of her eight great-grandparents were killed in the Holocaust, her grandparents were survivors, and in 1976 her parents were hostages on the Air France plane that was hijacked by terrorists and diverted to Entebbe. Outside of government, Neuberger runs a charity called Sister to Sister which helps single mothers in Orthodox Jewish communities across the US and Canada. The organization has over 1000 members and volunteers. Neuberger remains devoutly religious, and has said that sometimes her coworkers remind her that sunset is approaching so that she can make it home for Shabbat. Her advice to religious Jews: “learn to navigate the secular world as a frum [religious] Jew without apologizing, without abandoning your principles, but also with a sense of how and when to be flexible.”

Jews and the Founding of America

The Jewish View on Extraterrestrial Life

Words of the Week

I didn’t really have any role models of working women. I heard a lot of “a frum woman can’t do this; a frum woman doesn’t do that.” But I strongly feel that a woman should use the talents Hashem gave her, and that being frum is not a barrier to professional success.
– Anne Neuberger

Jew of the Week: Shimon Peres

A young Shimon Peres with his wife Sonia

Szymon Perski (1923-2016) was born in the shtetl of Vishnyeva (then part of Poland, now in Belarus) to a wealthy Russian-Jewish family. He was the great-great-grandson of the famed Rabbi Chaim Volozhin, and was greatly influenced by his own grandfather, Rabbi Zvi Meltzer. At the young age of 11, Perski’s family moved to Tel Aviv and Hebraized their last name to Peres. (Their entire extended family back in Vishnyeva would later perish in the Holocaust). After finishing his schooling, young Shimon went to live on a kibbutz working as a dairy farmer and shepherd before co-founding his own kibbutz. He was soon elected secretary of a Labor Zionist youth organization. From there, he joined the Mapai party, whose leader David Ben-Gurion took a personal interest in him. At 21, Peres was imprisoned for two weeks by the British for leading an “illegal” expedition into the Negev to scout a new place for Jewish settlement. In 1947, now married, Peres was appointed to the Haganah and put in charge of recruitment and weapons purchases. The following year, he took charge of Israel’s nascent navy. In the 50’s, while part of Israel’s delegation to the US, he studied at NYU and Harvard. At 29, he became the head of Israel’s Ministry of Defence – the youngest person to ever hold the position. He was praised for building strong military alliances with other countries (particularly France, who awarded him their highest distinction, the Legion of Honor), and securing large amounts of modern weapons that propelled Israel into a regional powerhouse. He also helped establish the crucial Dimona nuclear reactor. In 1959, Peres was elected to the Knesset. At one time or another, he served as Minister of Immigrant Absorption, Minister of Transportation, Minister of Defence, Foreign Minister, Minister of Finance, and Information Minister. In 1984, Peres was elected Israel’s prime minister, and in 2007, Israel’s president. Among his other major achievements are the 1976 Entebbe rescue operation (which he pushed through the Cabinet), the 1994 peace treaty with Jordan, and his Peres Center for Peace, which has trained over 250 Arab doctors and brought life-saving treatment to thousands of Arab children. Peres was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 for his work with the Oslo Accords, was knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 2008, presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012 by Barack Obama, and with the US Congressional Gold Medal in 2014. He was also the author of 11 books. Sadly, following a debilitating stroke, the last of Israel’s founding fathers passed away in his sleep early Wednesday. Dignitaries from around the world are flying in to pay their respects, including past and present heads of state of Germany, France, Canada, Australia, Mexico, and the US – many of whom Peres had guided and advised. President Obama has ordered flags in America to fly at half mast. Despite his age, Peres worked tirelessly until the very last days of his life. He had once said, “Optimists and pessimists die the same way. They just live differently. I prefer to live as an optimist.”

Words of the Week

It’s better to be controversial for the right reasons than to be popular for the wrong reasons.
– Shimon Peres

Jew of the Week: Avigdor Ben-Gal

The Man Who Saved Israel

Avigdor Ben-Gal

Janusz Ludwig (1936-2016) was born in Lodz, Poland. At the outbreak of World War II, his family managed to escape to the Soviet Union. Unfortunately, they were soon mired in Siberia, where Ludwig’s parents disappeared. Thankfully, Ludwig and his sister made it to Israel, together with a group of other Polish children (many of whom were orphans) by way of Iran. They settled in Tel-Aviv, and were raised by their cousin. In Israel, Ludwig adopted a new name: Avigdor Ben-Gal. Though he initially aspired to be a physician, Ben-Gal enjoyed his military service with the IDF, and decided to be a career military man. He saw his first action in Egypt during the 1956 Suez Crisis. Just over a decade later, he was an operations chief during the Six-Day Way. By 1973, Ben-Gal was commander of the 7th Armored Brigade. He sensed that a war would soon break out, but was ridiculed by most others within the political and military sphere. Nonetheless, he began preparing his own brigade for war. When the Yom Kippur War did indeed break out, Ben-Gal’s brigade was the only one ready for combat. They were able to miraculously defeat the Syrians in the Golan Heights despite being heavily outnumbered (700 Syrian tanks vs. 175 Israeli tanks). Ben-Gal’s skill and heroics turned back the Syrian invasion after just 3 days of combat. He then led a brave counter-offensive that brought the IDF within 20 miles of Damascus just 4 days later. At the war’s conclusion, Ben-Gal was credited with having “saved the State of Israel” by defense minister Moshe Dayan. In 1976, Ben-Gal helped to plan the rescue operation of Israeli hostages in Entebbe. A year later, he was put in charge of Israel’s Northern Command. After retiring from the military, Ben-Gal served on the board of Israel Aerospace Industries, the state-owned aviation manufacturer (and one of Israel’s largest employers). He was also on the board of Tahal – an engineering and infrastructure company that is an important defense contractor – as well as the NSO Group, an Israeli tech start-up focusing on surveillance and security. Sadly, Ben-Gal passed away last Saturday.

Words of the Week

I will always stand with Israel. I can’t tolerate people who criticize Israel without walking in their shoes. I hate the lies they spread and their lack of knowledge. I’m proud to stand up for the Israelis.

– Adam Sandler