If I told you that my friend FaceTimes me when she’s bored and fills me in on her day, you might think she’s like any other phone-loving teenager. If I said she has super trendy glasses and bangs I wish I could pull off, you might wonder if she’s interested in fashion. If I explained that we see each other every week, and love hanging out, you might ask if we go to school together.

 Baruch Dayan HaEmes. In the days before the pandemic, Reb Mechel Schiffenbauer, a"h, gave the Daf Yomi shiur in the beis medrash at Agudath Israel of America's national headquarters in Manhattan at 42 Broadway. This photo depicts the widespread acceptance of the class. Of note, one of the shiur’s attendees on this particular day was Chaver Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah Rabbi Shmuel Kamenetsky, Rosh HaYeshiva of Talmudical Yeshiva of Philadelphia. Reb Mechel, a talmid chacham of great magnitude, gave the shiur at the Agudah for over twenty years, in addition to delivering two other Daf Yomi shiurim daily.

Y'hi zicro baruch.

Manashe Khaimov, MSW, Speaks with the Queens Jewish Link

Why are we called Bukharian if we are from Central Asia? Are we Sephardic or not? Are our traditions ours or were they adopted from the local communities? How did we end up in Central Asia?

In celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., hundreds of volunteers joined Met Council for its annual MLK Day of Service and signed up for shifts at Met Council's Greenpoint Fulfillment Center to help package emergency food deliveries for Holocaust survivors on the January 18 holiday. Four 90-minute socially distanced shifts were filled with immediate demand as New Yorkers proudly signed up to work the national holiday in service of their neighbors.

A new Democratic club wanting racial and economic justice, transparency, and inclusiveness, had its first meeting on Thursday, January 14. This QJL reporter was dropped from the Zoom meeting right before it began. Nonetheless, the QJL reporter has a recording of the complete meeting.