Dear Rabbi Michalowitcz,
Link Yad Chesed would like to thank you and your community for all the effort and contributions made for this past Purim’s Matanot L’enyonim Tzedaka Drive. Ten thousand dollars was distributed on Purim to over 30 needy families in Thornhill and surrounding areas. Westmount contributions again amounted to over 60% of the total collected. Sixty Michloah Manot which were kindly donated by the Westmount Community were also delivered to poor families.

The smiles of appreciation and heartfelt gratification of all these recipients was an incredible uplifting for all the volunteers involved. We had all of you in mind in each and every delivery.

May Hashem bless you all for doing such a wonderful mitzvah and great effort.

Thank you,
All the volunteers of Link Yad Chesed


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I want to thank you, on behalf of the soldiers and the officers of Regiment xxxx Brigade # xxx for your generous contribution to our efforts to protect Am Yisrael and Eretz Yisrael.

The combat equipment vests that you so graciously, and so quickly, provided us with have gone a very long way to increasing our effectiveness in the field and in giving us an invaluable boost in morale. Your donation has provided vests for an entire Company in our Regiments, as well as its field command staff.

I want to tell you a little about the importance of the equipment you provided us with.

An equipment vest is the basic means through which a soldier takes with him almost all of the things he needs to do his job. If the vest is not in good condition, if it is not designed to fit the body correctly and if it lacks proper equipment pouches, the soldier cannot function properly; the lack of a proper vest can even put him, and his comrades, in jeopardy. A good vest tremendously improves his flexibility and effectiveness. It can make the difference between a successful operation and problematical one; it can make the difference between life and death.

As you know, the vests you supplied to us are of the very highest quality and of the latest IDF design; and your thoughtfulness in providing special function vests, like those for medical and other special equipment operators, together with the latest design standard - us combat vests, have provided us with a very important added level of quality equipment, helping to bring it up to the necessary standard for the job we have to do.

We also want you to know that, together with the equipment itself, the very fact that you, our brothers and sisters living overseas, thought of us and responded so quickly when you learned of our needs in this very difficult time, has given us something as valuable as the equipment itself. It brought with the equipment a sense of being loved and supported by people whose names we don’t even know, and with the knowledge that they are together with us in our struggle to protect our families, our people and our land.

Again, on behalf of all of us in the Regiment, our most sincere and heartfelt thanks.

Sincerely,

Lieutenant Colonel (res.) Yuval
Regiment Commander

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Dear Westmount members,

You guys are amazing.  I have always said that being the head of the Chessed Committee at Westmount is the easiest job in the world.  All I have to do is get the word out there when someone has a baby or G-d forbid, is not well or is sitting shiva, and I get inundated with offers.  The biggest problem I have had is when I get complaints from members that I don’t call on them often enough.  You make my job so easy.

However, when I got a request this morning for last minute seder arrangements for a family of 6, I was skeptical.  After all, less than a week away from the first Seder, most people have their arrangements made.  Women are getting into that “I’ll never be ready for Pesach” mode, and any extra work seems insurmountable.  I told the person that we would try, but it was a bit late.  

But I underestimated you.  Only hours after I sent an email out, I got 6 invitations!  What a kehilla!  Mi k’amcha Yisroel?  Who is  like Your Jewish Nation? I feel privileged to be friends with all of you.

Chag Kasher V’Sameach,

Jeanette

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March 17, 2006

To: The Westmount Community Shul

Dear Rabbi Michalowicz,

Link Yad Chesed would like to thank you and your community for all the effort and contributions made for this past Purim's Matanot L'enyonim Tzedaka Drive. Ten thousand dollars was distributed on Purim to over 25 needy families in Thornhill and surrounding areas. Westmount collection contributed to about 70% of the total contributions. Thirty-five Michloah Manot were also delivered to poor families.

The smiles of appreciation and heartfelt gratification of all these recipients was an incredible uplifting for all the volunteers involved. We had all of you in mind in each and every delivery.

May Hashem bless you all for doing such a wonderful mitzvah and great effort. 

Thank you,

February, 2006

The Jewish Perspectives Newspaper


Light Shines from the Westmount Shul

In the words of Chazal there is a concept called "Ba lelamed v'nmtza lomeid," literally: something comes to teach something but instead derives something from the very context it intended to teach about. This refers ostensibly to how the Torah sometimes will compare themes, but the idea of Chazal has application elsewhere. Just before Chanukah I was invited to be a guest speaker at a Shabbaton for a kehillah in Thornhill, known as the Westmount Shul. I gave an early Shabbos morning shiur and delivered a number of addresses over the course of the Shabbos. I was invited to teach, but I ended up myself deriving a charge from that very context. "Ba lelamed v'nimtza lomeid."

For those who are in danger of growing a bit complacent in their Yiddishkeit, a visit to Westmount serves as a exhilarating awakening. What I found there was well over a hundred people who daven with tremendous hislahavus (enthusiasm), who sing Shabbos niggunim with zest, who have profound respect for decorum in a bais medrash, who have the thirst and intellect necessary for Torah learning, who have a warmth of demeanor needed to make a stranger feel at home ... and who, despite their swelling ranks, have been able to maintain an infectious atmosphere of a large family.

One has to take a second and a third look before discovering that which 'West- mounters' profess to be their modus operandi, namely to be a kiruv congregation. One does not see this readily. Although some present may not have been observant that long, the shul has been able to collectively promote an overall ambiance of kedusha and comfortableness within the observance of Torah. That is a rare achievement: a so-called "heimishe" feeling within an outreach shul.

Throughout the week there are well-attended shiurm at Westmount's parent organization, the Routes Torah Learning Centre on Centre Street, with nearly thirty people in attendance in the early morning and many more at night. The Shabbos experience is definitely a tool for deepening people's connection with Torah rather than the sole objective in its own right. For the members of Westrnount, the link to the shul is pervasive.

This, and much else that goes on in Westmount is the achievement, with siyata diShmaya, of the well-loved Rav, Rabbi Yossi Michalowitz, founder, spiritual leader and overall paterfamilias of Westrnount.

My own Shabbos experience at Westrnount, from the tefillos to the oneg Shabbos to the Shabbos morning Kiddush (single malt only, thank you!) to the elaborate and highly charged Shaleshudos was a rich one. It triggered my need to continue my "own spiritual climb, to referbish my link to other Yiden and my desire to perhaps be more deeply involved in kiruv.

In retrospect, I reckon that if the members of Routes-Westmount were able to learn from my meager talks that Shabbos even half as much as what I absorbed from being in their midst, then the experience would have been worthwhile from points of view besides my own.

~SYK (Rabbi Shmuel Yaakov Klein)

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Girlz Can Make a Difference Too!

By: Laura Greenfield, age 14

     On November 27th, 2005, I attended a Girlz program at Routes. You may be wondering what “Girlz” is. Allow me to explain: Girlz is a post-Bat Mitzvah program for girls aged 12 to high school age. The girls get together about once a month to do chesed projects.
     At the program I attended, we made colourful ponchos and scarves for girls who were disengaged from Gush Katif. We added a bracelet and a card showing that the gifts were from Routes. If we wanted to, we could write our addresses so the girls could write to us. About two months later, I received a letter from one of the girls, thanking me! Her name is Rina-Mirriam and she is ten years old. She now lives in Yad-Binyamin. We have begun a correspondence back and forth.

February 7, 2006


WESTMOUNT BULLETIN'S
CONCERT REVIEWS  
Critics Agree!!

IT'S UNANIMOUS!  Everyone agrees that the Reflections evening was a smashing success!

Women from all backgrounds enjoyed the entertaining vocals and schmoozing style of Liora Oppenheimer, as well as the sweet voices of Zehava Sabijan with her moving performance of Reflection and Karmela Wener, with her outstanding rendition of Come What May (Nicole Kidman who???)

Here are just some of the comments from the Audience:

GREAT!  AMAZING!!  SO DIVERSE!!  
BROUGHT ME TO TEARS!

Here are some recorded raves by the delighted concert attendees:

Matti Sherman, mother and singer affecionado:

“…last night's Malave Malka -- she just was so amazing I didn’t know she was so talented!  She was so entertaining …and has the most beautiful voice and writes her own music. 
She could’ve been the next American Idol, but B’H’” she’s Frum and she’s NOT the American Idol.
And she performed for all of us …and we really really truly enjoyed her…a Yasher Koach to a lovely entertaining evening.”

Gail (Rebbetzin and Humble Producer):
“It was incredible!!”

Sharona Watemburg (Hostess Extraordinaire):
“It was just…awe, gasp, gulp!!)”

Estair Kaufman, world renowned Judaic painter and NIA instructor:  

"I’m still inspired by this motzi shabbat…. It was so wonderful and so refreshing to hear your inspiring, beautiful voice and mastery of word…I like your straightforwardness, humour and sensibilities…I can’t wait for more."

ONCE AGAIN, Westmount Women have shown the community that there IS a need for women's voices to be heard, and that we can make a difference, and do it with style.

We also raised over $800.00 for Rav Tal, the Rosh Yeshivah of Gush Katif for his new Yeshiva and Educational  Institutions in Yad Binyamin