Rabbi Yossi Blesofsky delivers benediction
Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz held a touching Veterans Day Ceremony Friday, November 8, at Elmhurst Park’s Queens Vietnam Veterans Memorial at 79th Street and Grand Avenue. The annual event is her opportunity to express our borough’s deep gratitude, debt, and appreciation for the heroic men and women who have served in the United States Armed Services, sacrificing for our freedoms.
“I stand especially proud of the veterans who continue to answer the call of public service in their current roles as prosecutors and support staff in my office,” noted Katz, who remains committed to paying tribute to military personnel through commemorative observations, as well as by offering veterans who have made mistakes an opportunity to receive services and treatment rather than incarceration.

“Sol Soskin was a young man who landed at Anzio, was awarded two Purple Hearts, and has a street name for him in Bayside,” opened Queens’ lead Chabad shliach Rabbi Yossi Blesofsky of Bayside’s Chabad of Northeast Queens in his thought-provoking benediction. In 2008, Soskin, father to one of Rabbi Blesofsky’s members, passed away at 90, leaving a life of accomplishments, highlighted by his service as the President of the 111th Precinct Community Council with 20 consecutive terms beginning in 1954. For 15 years, Soskin helped countless small businesses obtain affordable loans and trained them to prepare proposals to obtain all levels of government contracts as Director of the Procurement Technical Assistance Program (PTAP) for the Long Island Development Corporation (LIDC). In May 1941, the activist was drafted into the US Army, discharged in November 1945, and later spent 15 years in Bethpage with the Navy at Grumman Aerospace.

“My spiritual mentor, the great Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, once explained that we all do our service – all of us, whether we’re doctors, lawyers, teachers, janitors, bus drivers, we all do our service, but the ultimate service goes to those who put their lives on the line. In Hebrew, the word is m’siras nefesh, the willingness to risk your very life, your very existence to protect your country and your nation. As Winston Churchill said, ‘We make a living by what we get; we make a life by what we give.’ And no one gives more than the veterans of all the branches of the military. As President Kennedy once said, ‘The highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.’”
The program included a tribute to fallen service members, remarks from Congress Member Grace Meng and New York City Council Member Robert Holden, and honored three remarkable men: Specialist 4th Class Leonard Williams, United States Army, Vietnam War Veteran; MS4 William McDonald, United States Navy (1976 to 1984); and Sergeant Michael Coston, United States Army (1978 to 1987).

“Veterans Day behooves us to not just offer nice platitudes, but to actually live meaningful lives of goodness and kindness – to make the sacrifices of our veterans worthwhile,” expressed Rabbi Blesofsky, adding a prayer: “Our Father in heaven, spread upon the honored veterans Your canopy of peace.” The rabbi concluded with the immortal words of the great Psalmist and warrior King David: “There are those who trust in chariots and horses, but we intone the name of the King, the Lord our G-d, we fight in the name of goodness and light,” adding a final blessing: “Almighty G-d, bless and preserve our veterans and their families, bless the world with what we have been waiting and praying for all these years – usher in an era of utopia and peace for all, and let us all say, ‘Amein.’”
By Shabsie Saphirstein