RUN EAGLES RUN
DECEMBER 9, 2021 / 5 TEVET 5782
POIGNANT LETTERS
The illuminating letters of Holocaust survivors
are turned into a book.

PAGE 18
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM — WHAT IT MEANS TO BE JEWISH IN PHILADELPHIA —
$1.00 OF NOTE
NATIONAL Theresienstadt
Sapling Planted at
NY Museum
Tree was grown on a
Bucks County farm.

Page 4
LOCAL Cemetery Policies
Draw Complaints
Two cemeteries are
open most days by
appointment only.

Page 5
LOCAL Ground Broken for
New Federation
Housing Facility
Annabel Gardens to
debut 54 apartments
in Willow Grove.

Page 7
Volume 134
Number 35
Published Weekly Since 1887
Jewish Leaders
Monitor Omicron
JARRAD SAFFREN | JE STAFF
LOCAL JEWISH LEADERS don’t know
much about the omicron variant just yet.

But they say they are ready for it.

Almost two years of dealing with the
pandemic has equipped them to handle its
ongoing cycle. From COVID in the spring
of 2020 to the winter surge last year to the
delta variant this past summer, they’ve
gotten pretty good at this.

“I’m not panicking,” said Rabbi Ira
Budow, head of school at the Abrams
Hebrew Academy in Yardley. “We’re still
masked in school and carrying on as
normal.” In Abrams, a pre-K-8 school, “the kids
are happy,” Budow said. Th e community
even had a Chanukah concert on Dec. 2.

Th e rabbi said 95% of his staff is vacci-
nated. Th ose who aren’t have agreed to
regular testing.

Other than masks, the school is
operating like normal. And even masks
have become routine over the past year.

So, as omicron hits U.S. shores, Budow has
no immediate plan to change anything.

See Omicron, Page 12
Shoe designer Stuart Weitzman speaks at WNMAJH in 2013.

Photo by Matthew Christopher
Stuart Weitzman Gift Gives
NMAJH Second Wind
SASHA ROGELBERG | JE STAFF
TWENTY MONTHS AFTER the
National Museum of American Jewish
History fi led for Chapter 11 bankruptcy,
the museum’s spell of bad fortune has
seemingly ended.

The newly-renamed
Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish
History received a new moniker and
eight-fi gure gift from Philadelphia shoe
designer Stuart Weitzman, announced by
the museum on Dec. 6 at its Miracle on
the Mall event celebrating its benefactors.

Weitzman, a longtime friend of the
museum, donated an undisclosed amount
to WNMAJH, allowing it to buy its loaned
building at Fift h and Market streets, as
See NMAJH, Page 13