Congregation B’nai Avraham, celebrating its 27th year, honors 3 community leaders

Civil Rights Activist Sanford Rubenstein Pledges To Continue Standing Up for the Voiceless

March 3, 2016 By Francesca Norsen Tate Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Civil rights attorney and B’nai Avraham member Sanford Rubenstein (center) with Nicole Bell (at right) and Laura Harvey. Eagle photos by Francesca N. Tate

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The ability to maintain courage through adversity and working for justice was the central theme of Congregation B’nai Avraham’s 27th annual dinner this past Tuesday. In fact, the venue, which has hosted this beloved tradition for years — the Museum of Jewish Heritage in Battery Park — is itself a monument to survival and resiliency.

This year’s honorees, attorney Sanford Rubenstein, Roberta Weisbrod and Devorah Plotkin, are no strangers to tragedy and adversity.

Rubenstein, a Brooklyn native, has defended many high-profile cases of people whose civil rights were ignored or violated. Standing with him and presenting his award was Nicole Paultre-Bell, whose fiancé Sean Bell was killed by police hours before their wedding was to take place. The Bell family was later represented in their successful lawsuit by Rubenstein. During his acceptance remarks, Rubenstein, who was presented with the Baal Teshuvah Award, pledged to continue fighting for those whose voices were being ignored.

Rabbi Aaron Raskin praised Rubenstein’s generous spirit, saying that Rubenstein readily expressed thankfulness for being part of a prayerful community. A practical token of this gratitude was Rubenstein’s donation to the synagogue last fall of a Torah dedicated to his parents’ memory.

Weisbrod was also honored for her devotion and service to B’nai Avraham and for surviving tragedies of her own. Her husband, Federal Judge David Trager, died in 2011 after a battle with cancer. Trager was a federal prosecutor and the dean of Brooklyn Law School for a decade as well as a professor there.

Then, last November, Weisbrod lost her daughter Mara. Mara Emet Trager was a renaissance woman who readily picked up law as well as Russian, Spanish and two other languages. She worked in the U.S. Attorney’s Office and found time to manage her vocation and nurture a family. A video in Mara’s memory, with an obituary that Roberta composed, brought tears to the community. Her award, the Mara Emet Trager Chesed Award, is named for her daughter’s memory.

Plotkin was honored for her work as an educator, particularly for the past two decades at Kiddie Korner Jewish Pre-School, which her daughter Rebbetzin Shternie Raskin runs. But her doing so marks a miracle — Plotkin is a survivor of the Holocaust, first as a child refugee to Siberia who then lost her mother. She persevered and went on to marry Rabbi Shmuel Plotkin. Together, they built a vibrant Lubavitch community. She received the Kiddie Korner Award on Tuesday.