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“My hands were shaking uncontrollably, and every inch of my body was trembling. I was engrossed in complete fear. An accident was bound to happen, and I had to pull the car off to the side of the highway. Here I was in a car and not knowing what to do or what is wrong with me. I was screaming to Hashem for help.” This was Michael’s first major encounter with a severe episode of a panic attack after suffering months of insomnia, anxiety, and depression. Michael was one of the speakers at the “Mental Health Awareness: Stop the Stigma” event on June 16 at Ohel Joseph & Brukho Toxsur Rego Park Center. The purpose of the event was to start the dialogue and acknowledge the fact that many individuals in our community who are faced with mental health issues often avoid or delay seeking help due to stigma.

The nearly 100-year-old rosh yeshivah from Jerusalem, Rav Baruch Mordechai Ezrachi, made a special visit to the Chazaq Headquarters in Queens on Thursday, July 1, and met with Rabbi Yaniv Meirov.

It’s the beginning of a new era at Emet Outreach. Thanks to an outpouring of support during their recent Charidy campaign, Emet is officially launching Emet 2.0. What is Emet 2.0? It’s an expansion of Emet’s programming to have a greater impact on the Jewish future of the Queens community and beyond. Emet 2.0 means that Emet will continue to connect one-on-one with students with their signature warmth and long-lasting relationships, but they will now also be able to reach more college students, young professionals, and married couples with the beauty of Torah and mitzvos.

On Friday, the leadership of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America (the Orthodox Union), the nation’s largest Orthodox Jewish umbrella organization, expressed its horror over the brutal attack of a Chabad rabbi on a street outside of a synagogue in Boston, Massachusetts, on Thursday. The Orthodox Union condemned the attack, an apparent act of anti-Semitism, and called for greater action by elected officials and society at large to aggressively combat the ongoing and alarming rise of anti-Semitism in the United States.

This past Tuesday morning, at the Queens headquarters of the Board of Elections on Queens Boulevard, Republican Mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa and Republican Gubernatorial Candidate Andrew Giuliani called for immediate New York State election integrity reforms

Rav Shimshon Pincus z”l used to teach that the biggest miracle that there is in this world is a person’s ability to change – to break his negative habits and character traits and return to Hashem and his true self. This miracle is greater than the Splitting of the Sea, greater than the manna that our forefathers ate in the desert, and greater than all the other miracles that have been and will be. The strength, determination, and clarity that a person needs to break his evil inclination has a Divine Source, as it says, “The [evil] inclination of a person gathers strength every day, and desires to kill him…and if not for the fact that G-d helps him, he would not be able to overcome it.”