An Update on the Status of Jerusalem Pizza and China Lee

When Jerusalem Pizza and China Lee burned down, we didn’t just lose a couple of restaurants, but a community center. After months of waiting, we finally have some news about rebuilding.

Mazel Tov to our members Shalom and Yardena Cohen. May you rebuild stronger and better than before.

Support the Highland Park/Edison/New Brunswick Eruv

Image what life would be without the Edison/Highland Park Eruv. Here’s an article from the December 17, 1978 New York Times describing what life was like:

When Mrs. Irwin Asher moved to nearby Edison a little more than a year ago, she found it difficult to make friends.

The primary time for socializing was Saturday, and for the last seven years Mrs. Asher had spent her Saturdays at home with her children. It wasn't just that Mrs. Asher was a doting mother; she simply was observing the restrictions of the Jewish Sabbath.

There could be no wheeling baby carriages, no carrying sefarim or talits, no visiting the sick in hospitals, no bringing food over for Shabbat. We are use to the eruv, and the fact that it has never been down in over seven years. This includes Friday, July 5, 2019 when we spotted a message on a Facebook group that somone noticed the eruv was down. The eruv was back up by noon that very day and once again up by the time Shabbat came.

However, maintaining the eruv does cost money, and every year, the Eruv Committee raises money from the members of the various Orthodox congregations who benefit from it. Now it’s Etz Ahaim’s turn to fund raise.

We are asking everyone who benefits from our eruv to contribute $36 to help maintain it. This works out to a mere 70¢ every Shabbat. These funds help with repairs, expansion, insurance, etc. This also includes are webpage, and a whole technology behind it to keep everyone informed about the eruv’s status. Not one penny goes to the various volunteers who check the ten miles of eruv every week, and whose vigilance helps keep it up.

Please click on the button below (or go to https://etzahaim.org/news/eruv-2024) and contribute $36 or.whatever you can afford to help keep the eruv up and running.

Support the Eruv

P.S. For those who do not know, we have multiple ways of informing you of the status of the eruv. You can get our Mastodon updates pushed to your phone. You can get Facebook updates from our Facebook page, or you can subscribe to our email list and get emails every Friday once we’ve determined the Eruv’s status. Go to our webpage at https://hperuv.org for more information where we display the latest status. And if you’re old fashion, you can also call the Eruv Hotline at tel:732-487-ERUV for the latest updates.

Do you know that most people who are looking to move to Highland Park first search to see whether Highland Park has an eruv? Because of this, we keep a lot of information about the Raritan Valley community on our webpage. Come take a look!

Vaad Recommendations for Purchasing Chametz After Pesach

Vaad HaRabbonim of Raritan Valley Guidelines for Purchasing Chometz After Pesach 2024

One may not eat or derive benefit from overt chometz that was owned by a Jew during Pesach. Overt chometz includes cereal, cookies, crackers, pretzels, grains, and flour. Products that contain vinegar, such as mayonnaise, ketchup, and mustard, may be purchased since it is probable that the vinegar is not chometz. The following is a partial list of local stores and their status regarding the purchase of chometz.

  1. Vaad-supervised stores are acceptable for the purchase of chometz. The Vaad encourages the community to patronize local kosher establishments whenever possible.

  2. Dunkin Donuts on Raritan Ave. which is under Vaad supervision, is acceptable for the purchase of chometz.  Nonetheless, baked items should not be purchased before  9:45 PM, Sunday, April 30th (so as not to benefit from melacha performed on Yom Tov).  In general, throughout the year, one should wait one hour after Shabbos or Yom Tov before purchasing baked products from Dunkin Donuts.

  3. The following supermarkets and their suppliers are non-Jewish owned. These are the preferred locations for the purchase of chometz: Aldi, BJ’s, Costco, CVS, Duane Read, H Mart, Rite Aid, Sam’s Club, Target non-frozen chometz items, Trader Joe’s, Walgreen’s, Walmart (in-store purchases, while online purchases are discussed in 5), Wegman’s and Whole Foods.

  4. The following supermarkets and/or their suppliers have some level of Jewish ownership. Nonetheless, because of various considerations, there are halachic justifications for purchasing chometz in some of these establishments. The stores are  listed in order of preference and the  explanations for the basis of  leniency are found in the footnotes: 

    1. Acme has a small percentage of Jewish ownership. Nonetheless,  there is halachic justification to purchase chometz in Acme after Pesach.

    2. ShopRite stores in these locations are owned by non-Jews: Aberdeen, Bound Brook, Chatham, East Brunswick, East Windsor, Edison, Elizabeth, Lawrenceville, Livingston, Marlboro, Millburn, Morristown, Neptune, Somerset, Springfield, Union, West Orange. (This is a partial list.) Although Shoprite is supplied by a coop known as  Wakefurn which has partial Jewish ownership, there is justification to purchase chometz in these stores after Pesach .

    3. Stop & Shop: The Vaad recommends not purchasing chometz in Stop & Shop until Lag B’Omer, Sunday, May 26.

    4. Some Shoprite stores are Jewish-owned. (See above part “c” above for a list of non-Jewish stores. Other stores may not be presumed to be non-Jewish without further research.) Chometz should not be purchased in these stores until Lag B’Omer, Sunday, May 26.

  5. Online companies such as Amazon.com and Walmart.com sell products from their inventory or from suppliers. Chometz from their inventory is acceptable, but chometz from a supplier may come from a Jewish-owned company. Therefore, the customer must make a reasonable effort to determine whether the supplier is Jewish.

  6. Non-chometz items may be purchased from any Jewish or non-Jewish-owned store (e.g., fruit, vegetables, eggs, cooking oil, etc.)

  7. Alcoholic beverages (except for wine) may not be purchased until after Shavuos from a Jewish-owned store if the chometz was not sold. The beverage may be chometz, and the depletion of inventory in liquor stores is slower than in supermarkets. Locally, one may purchase alcoholic beverages from RiteAid in (Highland Park), which is a non-Jewish owned corporation.

Counting the Omer Cheat Sheets

As we do every year, We are once again making available for download a chart to help you remember to count Sefirat HaOmer. If you would like to print it out to keep in your siddur or on your fridge. You can download it from https://shalmon.com/sefira (pick your nusach). If you go to this page you will also see the current day’s count, with the beracha.

You can also get a Sefirat HaOmer app from Rusty Brick for your smartphone.: