Skidding his pickup truck to a halt in a cloud of dust alongside his ostrich corrals, Jack Klass warns to stand clear as he grabs an ostrich by the neck with his bare hand in one swift movement. "This is how you have to hold them," he says. For decades, Jack managed what many say was the world's largest ostrich empire while serving as President of his synagogue in Oudtshoorn. Jack's close-cropped white hair, ruddy complexion, prominent nose and brow, stocky build and powerful hands do not so much suggest refined leadership as an Israeli general - just the sort of man to command hushed-tone respect from this much-diminished Jewish community of farmers and small-town businessmen.

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