Why did Kansas City-based Hallmark Cards recall a Chanukkah gift wrap from the shelves last week?

A. The blue ink used on the gift wrap was made from products derived from copepods, which are microscopic shrimp; therefore it was determined by the Chief Rabbi of Kansas City that the gift wrap was not kosher.

B. On the gift wrap, the words Happy Chanukkah in English and Hebrew were printed against a background picture of Passover matzah.

C. The product design was a pattern of blue and silver angular lines that included swastika shapes. Said a Hallmark spokesperson, “It was an oversight on our part to not notice the intersecting lines that could be seen as a swastika pattern.”

D. They did so under pressure from the faculty at the University of Missouri who are pushing Hallmark to join the BDS movement and discontinue selling any holiday cards, gift wrap or other Jewish-themed products until Israel withdraws from the West Bank.

E. When they printed the Hebrew greeting Chanukkah Sameach (Happy Chanukkah), they inadvertently omitted the Chet which is the first letter in Chanukkah, yielding Nacheh Sameach, which means Happy Cripple.

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Israel faces new elections in March. Currently, thirteen political parties are represented in the Knesset, the Israeli parliament. Which of the following is not a current or past Israeli political party?

A. Ale Yarok, or Green Leaf, whose primary platform is the decriminalizing of marijuana, this party also supports legalized prostitution and gambling. At one point, Ale Yarok partnered with another Israeli political party, forming the Holocaust Survivors & Grown-Up Green Leaf Party, which ran an ad featuring a Holocaust survivor stating, “About one million Israelis use cannabis for their enjoyment. These people contribute to society. For us, the Holocaust survivors, our moral obligation is to legalize [marijuana].”

B. HaPanterim HaShchorim, The Black Panthers, who advocated for social justice for immigrants. The party was named by Israeli politician Saadia Marciano after he met Angela Davis, founder of the American Black Panthers organization, when she visited Israel. According to Kochavi Shemesh, another party leader, “The idea was to frighten Golda. She said that this name wouldn't let her sleep. That was what we wanted.”

C. Flatto-Sharon, founded by Shmuel Flatto-Sharon with hopes that being elected to the Knesset would bring him parliamentary immunity and prevent him from being extradicted to France where he was accused of embezzling $60 million. He was elected to the Knesset and was not sent to France to face charges; however, he did serve time in Israeli prison for vote buying.

D. Lev, meaning Heart, a party founded by Knesset Members Roni Milo and Yechiel Lasry. Milo and Lasry were members of the Centre Party who broke away from that party on November 6, 2002, formed the Lev party, and then minutes later ended the Lev Party’s existence by merging into the Likud party.

E. Miflega Zchuyot HaGever BeMishpacha, the Man’s Rights in the Family Party, which supported men’s rights. Party leader Yaakov Schlusser advocated for custody rights for fathers, stating “Children have a right to see their fathers. Otherwise they will lose their sexual identity. The child that sees a woman in control, in contradiction to nature, may turn homosexual.” The party’s other primary focus was the establishment of a commission to investigate who really killed Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

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Israel faces new elections in March. Currently, thirteen political parties are represented in the Knesset, the Israeli parliament. Which of the following is not a current or past Israeli political party?

A. Ale Yarok, or Green Leaf, whose primary platform is the decriminalizing of marijuana, this party also supports legalized prostitution and gambling. At one point, Ale Yarok partnered with another Israeli political party, forming the Holocaust Survivors & Grown-Up Green Leaf Party, which ran an ad featuring a Holocaust survivor stating, “About one million Israelis use cannabis for their enjoyment. These people contribute to society. For us, the Holocaust survivors, our moral obligation is to legalize [marijuana].”

B. HaPanterim HaShchorim, The Black Panthers, who advocated for social justice for immigrants. The party was named by Israeli politician Saadia Marciano after he met Angela Davis, founder of the American Black Panthers organization, when she visited Israel. According to Kochavi Shemesh, another party leader, “The idea was to frighten Golda. She said that this name wouldn't let her sleep. That was what we wanted.”

C. Flatto-Sharon, founded by Shmuel Flatto-Sharon with hopes that being elected to the Knesset would bring him parliamentary immunity and prevent him from being extradicted to France where he was accused of embezzling $60 million. He was elected to the Knesset and was not sent to France to face charges; however, he did serve time in Israeli prison for vote buying.

D. Lev, meaning Heart, a party founded by Knesset Members Roni Milo and Yechiel Lasry. Milo and Lasry were members of the Centre Party who broke away from that party on November 6, 2002, formed the Lev party, and then minutes later ended the Lev Party’s existence by merging into the Likud party.

E. Miflega Zchuyot HaGever BeMishpacha, the Man’s Rights in the Family Party, which supported men’s rights. Party leader Yaakov Schlusser advocated for custody rights for fathers, stating “Children have a right to see their fathers. Otherwise they will lose their sexual identity. The child that sees a woman in control, in contradiction to nature, may turn homosexual.” The party’s other primary focus was the establishment of a commission to investigate who really killed Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

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Israel is considering a change to their Basic Laws (similar to a Constitution) to specify that Israel is the “nation-state of the Jewish people” rather than “a Jewish and democratic” state. Another of Israel's Basic Laws is called the Freedom of Occupation law. What does this law guarantee?

A. It guarantees the right of Israel to occupy any land which historically was part of Biblical Israel.

B. It guarantees the right of Israelis to engage in any occupation of his or her choosing.

C. Based upon the Occupy Wall Street movement, this law ensures the right of all Israelis to peacefully protest in public places.

D. It guarantees the right of Israel to occupy and destroy any house inhabited by a person found to have committed a terrorist act.

E. It allows El Al Airlines to provide unisex bathrooms on their airplanes, despite the efforts by the religious community to require men and women to occupy separate bathrooms.

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Israel is considering a change to their Basic Laws (similar to a Constitution) to specify that Israel is the “nation-state of the Jewish people” rather than “a Jewish and democratic” state. Another of Israel's Basic Laws is called the Freedom of Occupation law. What does this law guarantee?

A. It guarantees the right of Israel to occupy any land which historically was part of Biblical Israel.

B. It guarantees the right of Israelis to engage in any occupation of his or her choosing.

C. Based upon the Occupy Wall Street movement, this law ensures the right of all Israelis to peacefully protest in public places.

D. It guarantees the right of Israel to occupy and destroy any house inhabited by a person found to have committed a terrorist act.

E. It allows El Al Airlines to provide unisex bathrooms on their airplanes, despite the efforts by the religious community to require men and women to occupy separate bathrooms.

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Which famous person's ancestral path to America included Mexican and Jewish ancestry?

A. Actress/singer Lea Michele’s father, Mark Sarfati, is a Sephardic Jew whose family originally came from Spain, later immigrating to Turkey, and finally to Mexico, where Mark married Lea’s mother, Edith, a Roman Catholic. They moved to the Bronx, where Lea was born in 1986. Though primarily raised Catholic, Michele told Us Magazine, “I’ve always been proud of my body, my Jewish nose and all of that.”

B. Journalist/talk show host Geraldo Rivera is the son of Lillian Friedman, whose ancestry is Ashkenazic Russian, and Cruz Rivera, a Catholic from Mexico. They met while both were working at a restaurant in New York, and moved to Long Island after marrying. Geraldo was raised Jewish and had a bar mitzvah, which took place at the North Lindenhurst Fire Department Hall because there was no nearby synagogue.

C. Magician David Blaine was born in Brooklyn, the son of Patrice White and William Perez. Perez was half Mexican and half Italian, while White was of Russian Jewish descent. They met when White was working with the Peace Corps in the small village in Mexico where Perez lived. Blaine sports several tattoos, including the numbers that were branded on Primo Levi’s arm at Auschwitz.

D. Comedian/actor Louis C.K.’s grandfather, Geza Székely Schweiger, was a Hungarian Jewish surgeon who immigrated to Mexico, where he married a Catholic Mexican woman and raised his son Luis as Catholic. Luis married an Irish Catholic woman, Mary, and they raised their son Louie as Catholic. Luis later divorced Mary and married a Jewish woman, and then he converted to Orthodox Judaism. Louis is now an agnostic.

E. George W. Bush’s attorney general, Alberto Gonzales, famous for the memo that argued that waterboarding was not torture, was the grandson of Mel Blanc and Friz Frelang, both Jews who came from Vornerbradders in Poland. After they immigrated to Mexico, their daughter Ilana, known as “Looney,” married Arriba “Speedy” Gonzales, a Mexican Olympic runner, and their son Alberto was born in 1955.

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What distinction is held by journalist Maziar Bahari, whose story of captivity in an Iranian prison is told in the movie Rosewater, directed by Jon Stewart?

A. Though Bahari is a non-practicing Muslim, his great-grandfather was Jewish, and he is a relative of Yosef Hamadani Cohen, the Chief Rabbi of Iran from 1994 until his death last March.

B. He was the Sandek (godfather) at the bris of Jon Stewart's son Nathan in 2004.

C. Bahari, who is from Iran, is married to a Jewish Iranian woman whose family fled Iran after the overthrow of the Shah in 1979 and moved to Canada, where they met when he was a reporter for Newsweek magazine.

D. In Tehran in 1979, he played Tevye in a middle school production of Fiddler on the Roof, the last time this show was produced in Iran. After the overthrow of the Shah, Fiddler was banned as Zionist propaganda by the regime of Ayatollah Khomeini, a ban that remains in effect to this day.

E. In 1995, he directed the documentary film The Voyage of the St. Louis about the Jewish refugee ship that was turned away from American shores in 1939, the first Holocaust movie ever made by a Muslim.

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Lee Zeldin, who defeated incumbent Democratic Congressman Tim Bishop from the East End of Long Island, will be the only Jewish Republican in Congress next year. What did Zeldin say in recognition of that fact?

A. In an interview with the editor of the Jewish Press, he said, “I believe that the Jewish community is beginning to understand that the Democratic Party is no longer a place where they can feel comfortable. I intend to work with other Jewish Republicans in the 2016 election, with a goal of greatly increasing the conservative Jewish voice in Congress.”

B. In a phone call with leaders of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, he said,  "I will make it my highest priority to ensure that the Obama administration changes its tune in regard to Israel, our democratic ally in the Middle East.”

C. With a goal of becoming a bridge between Jews in the Republican and Democratic parties, he told the New York Times, “I’ve had the experience where I would go into a temple, and I may know the secret handshake, I may have been bar mitzvahed down the street, but there would be people who didn’t care about a single word coming out of my mouth because I was a registered Republican.”

D. On a congratulatory phone call that he received from Eric Cantor, the former Congressman who previously was the only Jewish Republican in Congress, he said, “I am proud to share this distinction with you, and together, I am sure that we can ensure that in 2016, no one will be able to make that claim again.”

E. To a reporter for Newsday on election night he said, “Really? There are no other Jews? Does that mean I get to be president of the Republican Jewish Caucus?”

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What problem arose in Israel this year in regard to Daylight Savings Time?

A. Because the ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) community does not support the concept of Daylight Savings Time, which impacts the start and end times of Shabbat and holidays, leaders of their community chose to totally ignore the time change. Among other issues, they blocked buses from entering their neighborhoods on Friday afternoon as their Shabbat beginning time was an hour earlier than the official time, and many Haredi Jews showed up late for work, as their scheduled time for morning minyan was later than that of the rest of the religious community.

B. Israel's Daylight Savings Time schedule aligns with the schedule of the European Union. This year, the change came on Yom Kippur, causing the holiday to last an additional hour. Hundreds of Israelis fainted from the lack of food over the extended fast, while others angered their rabbis by breaking the fast an hour early.

C. No problem arose, as Israel does not switch to Daylight Savings Time.

D. For the first time this year, Israel aligned the country's Daylight Savings Time schedule with that of Europe, meaning that the clocks would be turned back an hour on October 25, rather than on a date right after the Fall holidays as in previous years. Golan Telecom failed to implement that change in their system, so their customers’ cellphones all changed time a month ago, causing many people's cell phone alarms to go off an hour late, resulting in missed appointments, late arrival at work, and massive confusion throughout the country.

E. Many Israeli clocks have Hebrew letters rather than Arabic numerals, and these clocks rotate counter-clockwise (like reading Hebrew from right to left). Therefore, many people who were instructed to turn their clocks backward did not know if they should in fact move their clocks forward. Meanwhile, the ultra-Orthodox refused to participate in Daylight Savings Time, the Arab community moved their clocks backward two hours to align with Daylight Time in Egypt, and the Catholic community moved their clocks forward two hours to align with Vatican time, thus leading to total chaos as everyone in the country was on a different time.

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[Note: We will be on vacation Monday, October 27, and will return with our next weekly Jewish trivia quiz on Monday, November 3.]

31 years before Sandy Koufax skipped a World Series game because it conflicted with Yom Kippur, Detroit Tigers slugger Hank Greenberg made a similar decision when the Tigers played a crucial pennant race game against the New York Yankees on Yom Kippur. What was one way in which Greenberg's decision not to play on Yom Kippur was publicly noted?

A. The Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit erected a statue on the grounds of the Jewish Community Center of Metropolitan Detroit depicting Greenberg wearing a yarmulke and tallit, with a baseball bat lying on the ground beside him.

B. Poet Edgar Guest wrote a poem which read in part:
Came Yom Kippur - holy fast day wide world over to the Jew - 
And Hank Greenberg to his teaching and the old tradition true 
Spent the day among his people and he didn't come to play
Said Murphy to Mulrooney, 'We shall lose the game today!
We shall miss him in the infield and shall miss him at the bat,
But he's true to his religion - and I honor him for that!

C. Poet Dr. Seuss wrote a poem which read in part:
I am Hank.
Hank I am.
I do not eat green eggs and ham.
I’m a Jew,
A Jew for sure.
I will not play on Yom Kippur.

D. The Tigers lost the Yom Kippur game to the Yankees. Some very angry Tiger fans publicly expressed their feelings regarding Greenberg's decision by spray painting the walls of Navin Field (as Tiger Stadium was called at that time) with anti-Semitic graffiti.

E. Because of his professional success and his decision not to play on the holy day of Yom Kippur, Greenberg was the first athlete selected for induction into the National Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in Commack, New York.

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