February 1 In Jewish History
682: Visigoth King Erwig pressed for the "utter extirpation of the pest of the Jews," and made it illegal to practice any Jewish rites in an area that corresponds to much of modern day Spain. This put further pressure on the Jews to convert or emigrate
1605: Birthdate of Aboab de Fonseca, the Portuguese born Dutch Rabbi and Mystic. In 1642, when Brazil was under Dutch control the 600 Jews of Recife established a synagogue where they could worship in public. They recruited de Fonseca, who was living in Amsterdam, to come to Brazil and serve as their Hocham or spiritual leader. This means that Aboab de Fonseca was the first congregational rabbi in the New World.
1682(5442): Asser Levy, the "founding father" of North American Jewry passed away.. He was survived by his wife Miriam (aka Maria). Though Levy and the "Levy" family of New York are thought of as Sephardic with roots in Holland and even further roots in Spain, he might have been the son of Benjamin Levy, an Ashkenazi shochet from Recife, Brazil.
1733: King Augustus II of Poland passed away. Born in 1670, Augustus II was the Elector of Saxony (Germany) before gaining Augustus gained the Polish throne. His rise to power was facilitated by his “court Jew” and financier Issachar Berend Lehmann. August II was a contemporary of the Besht who was making his public personna known at about the same time as the Polish King passed away.
1796: The capital of Upper Canada is moved from Newark to York. Jews did not settle in Canada until the British defeated the French in 1760, at which time the French ban on Jewish settlement in the area became null and void. By the time of this move, the Jews had already built their first synagogue, The Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue of Montreal also known as Shearith Israel which was established in 1768.
1799: The French army under Napoleon left for Palestine to forestall a Turco-British invasion through the Palestinian land-bridge.
1810(27 Shevat 5570): Rabbi Mechel Scheuer passed away. He was born in Frankfurt am Main in 1739. His father was Rabbi David Tebele Scheuer and he led his father's Yeshiva in Mainz as its Rosh Yeshiva during the years 1776 and 1777. In 1778 he became rabbi of Worms and in 1782 was appointed rabbi of Manheim. At the time of his death, he was the rabbi of Coblence.
1827: Birthdate of Alphonse de Rothschild, French banker, philanthropist and member of the French branch of the fabled Rothschild family.
1856: Auburn University is chartered as the East Alabama Male College. Today Auburn has 60 Jewish students out of an undergraduate population of 19,000 students. Auburn does not offer Jewish studies classes but does have a Hillel Chapter.
1860: Rabbi Morris Raphall becomes the first Jewish clergyman to open a session of the House of Representatives. Raphall’s son-in-law would serve in the Union Army and after he had committed some unspecified infraction, Lincoln pardoned him. Raphall’s letter thanking Lincoln is still in existence today.
1861: Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise published an article in The Israelite entitled “No Political Preaching” in which he explained why he had refrained from preaching a sermon on January 4, 1861. President James Buchanan had designated that date “ ‘as a day of feasting and prayer, that God might have mercy upon us and save this Union.’” [This was just about the only action that Buchanan took to preserve the Union!]
1862(1st of Adar I, 5622): Rosh Chodesh Adar I
1862: The will of Samuel Samuels was admitted to probate today. According to the terms of the will, Samuels left $100 to the Jewish congregation, "Bnai Jeshurun," on Greene-street, and $100 for the benefit of the Orphan Asylum under the charge of the Hebrew Benevolent Society.
1868(8th of Sh'vat, 5628): Isaac Leeser passed away. Born in 1806, he “was an American Jewish minister of religion, author, translator, editor, and publisher; pioneer of the Jewish pulpit in the United States, and founder of the Jewish press of America. He produced the first Jewish translation of the Bible into English to be published in the United States. He is considered one of the most important American Jewish personalities of the nineteenth century America.”
1880: In St. Louis, the Young Men's Hebrew Association was organized.
1887: Birthdate of Harry Scherman, American economist, author and co-founder of the Book of the Month Club.
1901: A Memorial Service for Queen Victoria was held at the Hurva synagogue in Jerusalem. Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Samuel Salant officiated at the service which was so well attended that local police were called to control the crowd.
1904: Birthdate of Sidney Joseph Perelman. Better known as S. J. Perelman, he was a humorist, author, and screenwriter. He is primarily known for his humorous short pieces written over many years for The New Yorker magazine. His most famous cinematic venture was writing the script for the Academy Award-winning screenplay Around the World in Eighty Days starring David Niven.
1905: Birthdate of Emilio Segre. The Italian born physicist worked on the Manhattan Project and won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1959.
1915: A dispatch from the London Daily News datelined Cairo, based, in part on reports from “Vladimir Jabotinsky, a well-known Moscow journalist” describes the deteriorating conditions faced by the Jews living under Ottoman rule in Eretz Israel. Mr. Jabotinksy “entertains the graves fears for the safety of the 15,000 colonists in Galilee, Judea and Samaria should the Turkish army in Syria” suffer a defeat since the Turkish government will blame it on the Jews. The government “is doing its utmost to stir up feelings against the Zionists. The Turks have declared Zionism to a be a revolutionary, anti-Turkish movement “which must be stamped out.” The Anglo-Palestine bank has been liquidated which will lead to ruin for many of the Jewish settlers. A large number of Jewish refugees have fled to Alexandria among them “1,000 young men who have have declared their eagerness to join the British army.” The report closes with expression of concern for the 5,000 Jews and 12,000 Christians living in Jerusalem who are trying to survive on American relief supplies described as “insufficient to maintain life.”
1918: Russia adopted the Gregorian Calendar. Russia’s comparatively late adoption of the calendar used by most of the western world makes precise dating of certain events all the more difficult.
1919: The First Congress of Muslim-Christian Assocations began its deliberations in Jersualem.
1923: Birthdate of Canadian businessman Benjamin Weider who “was the co-founder of the International Federation of BodyBuilding & Fitness (IFBB).”
1925: Today, Sophie Udin and six other women who had been active in the labor Zionist organization Poale Zion, created the Pioneer Women’s Organization of America The organization was renamed Pioneer Women in 1947 and Na'amat (a Hebrew acronym for "Movement of Working Women and Volunteers") USA in 1981. Udin and her colleagues had previously attempted to raise money from American women in support of the creation of agricultural schools in Palestine. The male leaders of Poale Zion argued that their organization offered women full equality and that there was no need for a separate women’s organization. The creators of Pioneer Women, however, pointed to Poale Zion’s small number of female members and its domination by male leaders. Moreover, the middle-class orientation of the rapidly expanding Hadassah, founded in 1912, made that organization seem less than welcoming to many immigrant, working-class, and Yiddish-speaking women Zionists. The creators of Pioneer Women believed that a women’s labor Zionist organization would engage immigrant and working women who might otherwise be unable to find a home for their Zionist energies. Post 1948, the organization focused on helping female pioneers and working women in Israel, largely by raising money for necessities ranging from laundry equipment to wells for irrigating fruit trees. Feminism and class consciousness were also crucial components of the Pioneer Women philosophy. Its leaders stressed the importance of women's contributions to the Zionist enterprise and encouraged each member to become a "coworker in the establishment of a better and more just society in America and throughout the world." Today, Na'amat works on a wide range of issues relevant to women in Israel, the U.S.A., and internationally, from seeking an end to domestic violence to improving workplace conditions, and from child well-being to peace in the Middle East.
1928: Birthdate of Representative Tom Lantos. This California Democrat took his seat in Congress in 1981. He is the only survivor of the Holocaust serving in Congress.
1930: Birthdate of Ping Pong or Table Tennis Champion, Marty Reisman.
1935: At the annual convention of the Palestine Jewish Farmers Federation, Moshe Smilansky, veteran farmer economist, poet, writer and journalist, shocked the assembled gathering when in his opening address as president he announced that in the present circumstances in Palestine Jewish farmers and colonists should employ Jewish labor only
1941: Prime Minister Churchill instructed his Foreign Minister, Anthony Eden, to send a warning to Romanian dictator Ion Antonescu telling him “that we will hold him and immediate circle personally responsible in life and limb” if the Iron Cross did not stop their murderous attacks on the Jews.
1943: Most of the 1,500 Jews remaining in Buczacz who had not been sent to Belzac were murdered. One survivor, Netka Goldberg, lost three sisters, two brothers and her mother. Her father would be killed seven months later.
1946: Norwegian statesman Trygve Lie was chosen to be the first secretary-general of the United Nations. Lie was head of the U.N. when Israel was created and was supportive of creating the Jewish state.
1947: Birthdate of American television journalist Jessica Savitch.
1948: The Arabs bombed the Palestine Post (a.k.a. Jerusalem Post) building in Jerusalem
1950(14th of Sh'vat, 5710): French sociologist. Marcel Mauss passed away.
1952: SN (Samuel Nathaniel) Behrman's "Jane" premiered in New York City. Behrman, was a popular and prolific dramatist who tackled a number of topics in his works including what it was like to grow up Jewish in a small town as the 19th gave way to the 20th century.
1955: Lord Rothschild wrote to Churchill “thanking him for the fact that in Jerusalem in 1921 ‘you laid the foundation of the Jewish State by separating Abdullah’s Kingdom from the rest of Palestine. Without this much-opposed prophetic foresight there would not have been an Israel today.’”
1958: Egypt and Syria announced plans to merge into United Arab Republic. This was one of those failed attempts at pan-Arabism that was really a military alliance designed to destroy Israel. The U.A.R. was neither united or a real republic. The Syrians pulled out in 1961, but the name lingered on for many years after.
1959(23rd of Sh'vat, 5719): Rabbi Jonah Bondi Wise passed away. He “was an American Rabbi and leader of the Reform Judaism movement, who served for over thirty years as rabbi of the Central Synagogue in Manhattan and was a founder of the United Jewish Appeal, serving as its chairman from its creation in 1939 until 1958.”
1968: Birthdate of comedic actor Pauly Shore best known for his role in “Encino Man.”
1969: Birthdate of jazz saxophonist Joshua Redman son of a legendary jazz musician and Jewish dancer from Russia.
1967: As part of their confrontation with the unionized bagel bakers, owners shut the doors to their bakeries claiming “that they did not have enough work.”
1970: The New York Times includes a review of Mr. Sammler’s Planet by Saul Bellow.
1976: "Rich Man, Poor Man" mini-series based on the work of Irwin Shaw, premieres on ABC TV.
1978: Director Roman Polanski skipped bail and fled to France after pleading guilty to charges of engaging in sex with a 13-year-old girl. The father of the Polish born director was Jewish. His mother died in a concentration camp. Polanski avoided being trapped in the ghetto and spent the war wandering the woods of Poland.
1979: Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returns to Iran after 15 years in exile. This marked a major turning point in the Islamic world as religious fundamentalists began coming to power. There are those who would say that there is a direct line between the success of Khomeini and the victory of Hamas in the Palestinian elections in 2006. After 28 years, Iran boasts a leader who denies the Holocaust happened and calls for the destruction of the state of Israel.
1984: Daniel Stern became NBA commissioner. Jews seem to gravitate to the position since at one point the commissioners of most major sports were Jewish: Commissioner of Major League Baseball: Bud Selig, Commissioner of the National Basketball Association: David Stern and Commissioner of the National Hockey League: Gary Bettman. According to one Urban Legend, there was a move to get Commissioner of the National Football League: Paul Tagliabue to convert to Judaism so that it would be four for four!
1985: Morton I. Abramowitz began serving as President Reagan’s Director of the Bureau of Intelligence and Research.
1988: Two Palestinians were shot dead today near Anabta in a fracas on the Nablus road north of Jerusalem that involved demonstrators and settlers. Military authorities said settlers were trapped at roadblocks by stone throwers and drew their guns and opened fire. Soldiers also shot at the demonstrators. Another account said a convoy of 75 settlers returned when the trouble subsided and vandalized a score of Arab cars.
1989(26th of Shevat,5749): Marie Syrkin, an author, editor and teacher who was active in the Zionist cause for many decades, died of cancer today at St. John's Hospital in Santa Monica, Calif. She was 89 years old and lived in Santa Monica. Miss Syrkin was born in Bern, Switzerland, the daughter of Dr. Nachman Syrkin, a prominent Socialist Zionist theoretician. She came with her family to the United States in 1908 and earned bachelor's and master's degrees from Cornell University, then taught high school in New York City. Her first book, ''Your School, Your Children,'' published in 1944, was an impassioned plea for schools to propagandize democratic values instead of remaining neutral in the war of ideas. In 1950 Miss Syrkin was named associate professor of English at Brandeis University, where she taught until her retirement in 1966 as professor of the humanities. Her involvement with Zionism dated to the early 1930's, when she was a translator of Yiddish poetry and a commentator on Jewish life in the United States. She was a founder of the Labor Zionist journal Jewish Frontier in 1934 and for a quarter century beginning in 1948 was its editor in chief. Her most recent article for the magazine appears in its current issue. Golda Meir Biography In the 1940's Miss Syrkin made the first of many trips to Palestine - later Israel - to interview survivors of the Holocaust and to gather material for her 1947 book, ''Blessed Is the Match: The Story of Jewish Resistance,'' which chronicled the uprising in the Warsaw ghetto and other revolts against the Nazis. A longtime friend and associate of Golda Meir, who was also a schoolteacher, Miss Syrkin published ''Golda Meir: Woman With a Cause'' - a three-volume biography of the Israeli Prime Minister - in 1964. She was a prolific writer for such periodicals as Midstream, Commentary, The Saturday Review, The New York Times Magazine and The New Republic. Her final volume was a collection of essays from those and other magazines entitled ''The State of the Jews,'' published in 1980. From 1965 to 1969 Miss Syrkin was on the executive body of the World Zionist Movement and during that period was honorary president of the Labor Zionist Movement in the United States. Miss Syrkin was married to the poet Charles Reznikoff, who died in 1976. She is survived by a son, David Bodansky of Seattle; a sister, Zivia Wurtele of Santa Monica; two grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.
1992(27th of Shevat, 5752): U.S. District Court Judge Irving R Kaufman, who presided at the Rosenberg Spy Case, passed away at the age of 81.
1993: Gary Bettman becomes the NHL's first commissioner
1998: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including On the Possibility of Jewish Mysticism in Our Time by Gershom Scholem and Selected Poems by Harvey Shapiro
2003(25th of Tevet, 5771): The Space Shuttle Columbia burned up on re-entry into the earth’s atmosphere killing the crew of six including Israel’s first man in space, Ilan Ramon. Ilan Ramon was born in 1954. He was a combat pilot in the Israeli Air Force. He was a graduate of Tel Aviv University and held the rank of Colonel at the time of his death. Ramon was a veteran of the Yom Kippur War, one of the first Israeli pilots to fly the then new F-16 jet and was part of the group that destroyed the Iraqi nueclar reactor before it could go on line.
2004: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including The Liberated Bride by A.B. Yehoshua; translated by Hillel Halkin and The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of Paul O'Neill by Ron Suskind.
2005: One of the highlights of the completion of the most recent Talmud cyle of study was the Siyum HaShas celebration at Madison Square Garden. At Madison Square Garden this evening, “a handful of the 25,000 people there taking part in the 11th Siyum HaShas Daf Yomi celebration recalled some of the more unusual settings in which they have demonstrated their commitment to the daily study of Talmud, which was completed — and renewed for a new seven-and-a-half-year cycle — this week. Daf Yomi, or daily page, was introduced in 1923 at the First International Congress of Agudath Israel in Vienna by a young Polish rabbi, Meir Shapiro, as a way to bring uniformity to the worldwide study of Shas, an acronym for the names of the six orders of the Mishna, on which the Talmudic sages recorded their commentaries around 200 C.E. Agudah said 120,000 North American Jews were taking part in the celebration this year.”
2006: Despite violent protests, Israel successfully completed the evacuation of the West Bank outpost of Amona. This is in line with the policy of the Sharon government provide security for the state of Israel and ensuring that Israel remains both a democratic nation and a Jewish homeland. The withdrawal policy has the support of the majority of Israelis.
2007: The first exhibition of female architects in the history of Israeli architecture entitled "The feminine presence in Israeli architecture," opened at the gallery of the Union of Architects in Jaffa. Twenty-two female architects participated and displayed works they have planned in the past few years and which have since been built.
2007: As part of a kosher cooking contest, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg issued a proclamation naming this date as Simply Manischewitz Cook-off Day. Candace McMenamin, a non-Jew from Lexington, S.C. won with her sweet potato encrusted chicken. Only in America
2008: Six gunmen opened fire on the Israeli Embassy in Mauritania early this morning, trading fire with guards before fleeing screaming "Allah Akbar," witnesses said. The six men arrived by car and regrouped in front of a discotheque that is just beside the embassy, said Hamza Ould Bilal, a taxi driver who was parked outside the club, called the VIP. He saw them pull out their automatic weapons and scream "God is Great!" in Arabic, before assailing the embassy, he said.
2008: “Praying With Lior,” a new documentary about a Philadelphia boy with Down syndrome preparing for his bar mitzvah opens at the Cinema Village in New York.
2009: At Yale University, CAMERA, Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America presents “Palestinian Issues in Israeli Journalism: A conversation with Khalid Abu Toameh, a journalist who writes for the Jerusalem Post”
2009: The New York Times and the Washington Post each featured a review of Innocent Abroad: An Intimate Account of American Peace Diplomacy in the Middle East by Martin Indyk, the assistant secretary of state for near east affairs during the Clinton Administration and the first Jewish American to serve as U.S. Ambassador to Israel.
2010: The Center for Jewish History and the Auschwitz Institute for Peace and Reconciliation is scheduled to present “Diplomacy and Genocide: Challenges for the Future” during which a distinguished panel of policy makers, diplomats, and scholars discuss the issues and opportunities in diplomatic approaches to the prevention of genocide in the contemporary international community.
2010: Two barrels of explosives were discovered on Israeli beaches today, which were dispatched into the sea as part of a large-scale Palestinian terror attack against Israeli navy ships. The Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) was investigating the discovery of the explosive devices, described as barrels of explosives, with a particular emphasis on the detonator and type of explosives.On Friday, a number of explosions were heard off the coast of the Gaza Strip, likely caused by additional devices that were thrown out to sea. Three Palestinian terror groups – Islamic Jihad, Popular Resistance Committees and the Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades - claimed responsibility.Today, an explosive device washed ashore in Ashkelon and in the evening a second one was discovered in Ashdod. Both were destroyed by police sappers. Defense officials said that Palestinian terror groups have been trying for years to strike at Israeli Navy ships that patrol along the Gaza coast. “The terror groups have difficulty carrying out attacks due to the blockade on Gaza,” one official explained. “This is their way of trying to bypass the blockade and carry out an attack.”
2010: Seven American and European scientists were named winners of Israel's prestigious $100,000 Wolf Prize today. The Wolf Foundation said its prize in medicine went to Axel Ullrich of Germany for groundbreaking cancer research that has led to development of new drugs. Sir David Baulcombe of Cambridge University was awarded Wolf Prize for agriculture research in defending plants against viruses. The physics prize was shared by US professor John F. Clauser, Alain Aspect of France and Anton Zeilinger of Austria for their work in quantum physics. The mathematics prize was shared by two US-based professors: Shing-Tung Yau for geometric analysis, and Dennis Sullivan for contributions to algebraic topology and conformal dynamics.
Each category carries a $100,000 prize, which is then divided if there is more than one recipient. The Wolf Foundation said that 38 past winners have gone on to win Nobel prizes. The winners will receive the awards in a ceremony on May 13. The Wolf Foundation was founded by the late German-born Dr. Ricardo Wolf, an inventor, philanthropist and former Cuban ambassador to Israel. The private nonprofit foundation's council is chaired by Education Minister Gideon Sa'ar.
2010(17th of Shevat): Selma G. Hirsh, a humanitarian and an author who was associated with the American Jewish Committee for many years, passed away today at her home in Stamford, Conn. She was 92. From 1972 until her retirement in 1982, Ms. Hirsh was the associate executive director of the A.J.C., an international advocacy organization based in New York. She was also the founder of its Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights. Ms. Hirsh was the author of “The Fears Men Live By” (Harper, 1955), about the roots of prejudice. She also wrote, with Frederick Elliott Robin, “The Pursuit of Equality: A Half Century With the American Jewish Committee” (Crown, 1957), a history of the group. Selma Goldstone was born in Manhattan on June 9, 1917. She earned a bachelor’s degree from Hunter College and a master’s in geology from Oberlin. Afterward she wrote radio scripts on earth-science subjects for the Smithsonian Institution. During World War II, Ms. Hirsh worked as executive director of the Writers’ War Board, a group of prominent writers and other artists involved in the war effort. She joined the staff of the A.J.C. in 1945. Ms. Hirsh’s marriage to Joseph Hirsh, whom she wed in 1938, ended in divorce. Besides her daughter Lisa, she is survived by another daughter, Donna Hirsh; a sister, Louise Meier; two grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.
2011: Virginia Jewish Advocacy Day is scheduled to take placed in Richmond, VA.
2011: The Leo Baeck Institute and American Council on Germany are scheduled to present a lecture by Joschka Fischer and Norbert Frei entitled "The German Foreign Office and the Nazi Past"
2011: At Tulane University, Dean Carole Haber announced that Prof. Ronna Burger, Chair of the Department of Philosophy, has been appointed at the Catherine and Henry J. Gaisman Chair in Judeo-Christian Studies. This chair was endowed through of generous gift of Catherine and Henry J. Gaisman. Prof. Burger’s intellectual path has taken her from an early interest in the Bible and its interpretation to Greek philosophy and most recently to the question of the relation between them. This path is reflected in her scholarly pursuits and her teaching at Tulane, where she has found an intellectual home for over three decades. After receiving her PhD in philosophy from the New School for Social Research in 1975, a Mellon Fellowship in New York, followed by a Humboldt Fellowship in Tübingen allowed Burger to turn her dissertation into her first book, on Plato’s Phaedrus (Alabama 1980), and go on to her second book, on Plato’s Phaedo (Yale, 1984; St. Augustine’s Press, 1999). Over many years of study and teaching, Burger became increasingly struck by the deep Platonic roots of Aristotle’s thought, and a fellowship at the Siemens Foundation in Munich offered the opportunity to bring that understanding to fruition in Aristotle’s Dialogue with Socrates: on the Nicomachean Ethics (Chicago, 2008). Plato and Aristotle provided a foundation for Burger to explore the thought of Maimonides and his response to the confrontation between Greek philosophy and the Bible, which she has addressed on several occasions, including two papers presented at the American Philosophical Association. Burger’s philosophic background has enabled her at the same time to open up new lines of interpretation of the Bible, from a Platonic reading of the story of Adam and Eve to reflections on the biblical account of Moses as legislator and founder, which she has presented at numerous college campuses. Her interests converged in a recent lecture Burger gave in Munich on the problem of the holy in Plato’s Euthyphro, soon to be published in English with a German translation. Burger was the recipient of Tulane’s SLA Faculty Research Award in May 2010.
2011: Six Senate Democrats rejected a deficit-driven proposal by a new Republican senator to cut United States aid to Israel. In a letter sent today to the top House Republicans on the Appropriations and Budget committees, the Democrats said aid to Israel, the only democratic nation in the Middle East, is imperative. They backed the $3 billion in foreign military assistance that the U.S. provides annually to Israel. Republican Sen. Rand Paul said last week that the nation faces a fiscal crisis and argued that the U.S. cannot give money away, even to allies, as the debt grows. In an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer last week Paul said that “Reuters did a poll, and 71 percent of American people agree with me that when we're short of money, where we can't do the things we need to do in our country, we certainly shouldn't be shipping the money overseas.” When asked by Blitzer if he wanted to halt an annual $3 billion that go to Israel, Paul replied affirmatively, explaining that Egypt receives almost the same amount. "You have to ask yourself, are we funding an arms race on both sides? I have a lot of sympathy and respect for Israel as a democratic nation, as, you know, a fountain of peace and a fountain of democracy within the Middle East. But at the same time, I don't think funding both sides of the arm race, particularly when we have to borrow the money from China to send it to someone else. We just can't do it anymore. The debt is all- consuming and it threatens our well-being as a country,” Paul said. Many pro-Israel Jewish groups condemned Paul's remarks, including the pro-Israel lobby J Street and the National Jewish Democratic Council. Congresswoman Nita Lowey, ranking member of the Appropriations Subcommittee on State and Foreign Operations, called the initiative “shocking”. “Israel is the only democratic nation in the Middle East and one of our most stalwart allies”, Lowey said. “A stable and secure Israel is in our national security interest and has been a staple of our foreign policy for more than sixty years. Using our budget deficit as a reason to abandon Israel is inexcusable. It is unclear to me whether Rand Paul speaks for the Tea Party, the Republican Party, or simply himself”.
2011: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak informed Maj. Gen. Yoav Galant today that they have cancelled his upcoming appointment to the post of Israel Defense Forces chief. The announcement comes after months of scandal surrounding his appointment due to allegations that he had seized public lands near his home in Moshav Amikam in northern Israel. Galant was designated to succeed current IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi this month
Created, Compiled and Edited by Mitchell A. Levin Cedar Rapids, IA melech3@mchsi.com
Copyright; February, 2011; Mitchell A. Levin
Monday, January 31, 2011
Saturday, January 29, 2011
This Day, January 31, In Jewish History
January 31 In Jewish History
439: Promulgation of the Code of Theodosius II in the Byzantine Empire. This was the first imperial compilation of anti- Jewish laws since Constantine. Jews were prohibited from holding important positions involving money including judicial and executive offices and the ban against building new synagogues was reinstated. Theodosius was the Roman emperor of the East (408–450) The Code was readily accepted as well by Western Roman Emperor Valentinian III (425-455).
1253: Henry III of England ordered that Jewish worship in Synagogues must be held quietly so that Christians should not have to hear it when passing by. In addition Jews were not to employ Christian nurses or maids, nor was any Jew allowed to prevent another Jew from converting to Christianity.
1419: Pope Martin V issued a Bull that abolished the oppressive laws promulgated by antipope Benedict XIII and granted the Jews those privileges which had been accorded them under previous popes.
1493: Jews fleeing Spain were no longer allowed to enter to enter Genoa. During the previous year Jews fleeing Spain were allowed to land in Genoa for three days. As of this date the special consideration was cancelled due to the “fear” that the Jews may introduce the Plague.
1813: Birthdate of Dutch physician, pharmacist and philanthropist, Samuel Sarphati. “One of the great Amsterdammers of the 19th century,” Sarphati, was a promoter of public housing, an organizer of municipal services such as garbage collecting, and the builder of a bread factory that provided better and cheaper bread for the city. He also built the Amstel hotel. Sarphati is seen by Dutch history as a great philanthropist. Nobody ever knew he was Jewish—until the Germans authorities changed the name Sarphati Street into “Muiderschans”.
1846: After the Milwaukee Bridge War, Juneautown and Kilbourntown were incorporated to form the modern city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Four years prior to this, the families of Solomon Adler, Isaac Neustadt, and Moses Weil settled in the city. As proof of the vibrancy of the young community, during the 1840’s the first Rosh Hashanah services were held at the home of Henry Newhouse and the first Yom Kippur Services were held in a building containing Pereles grocery store. For more about the history of the Jews of Milwaukee consider a visit to the Jewish Museum of Milwaukee or reading "One People, Many Paths: A History of Jewish Milwaukee," by John Gurda.
1848: Birthdate of Nathan Straus who the wealthy American businessman and philanthropist who owned R.H. Macy & Company and Abraham and Straus. Born in Otterberg, Germany, Strauss moved to the United States with his family in 1854 where they first settled in Georgia before moving to New York City after the Civil War where young Nathan worked in his father’s firms L Straus & Sons. In the 1880’s he began a life of philanthropy and public service that included leading the fight against tuberculosis and a major effort to improve the public libraries. His philanthropy extended to developing a Jewish homeland in Eretz Israel following his first visit to the area in 1912. His support is memorialized by the fact that a street in the Jerusalem is called “Rehov Straus” and that the city of The modern Israeli city of Netanya, founded in 1927, was named in his honor
1851(28th of Shevat, 5611): David Spangler Kaufman passed away. Born in 1813, Kaufman was the first Jewish United States Congressman from Texas. No other Jewish Texan served in Congress until Martin Frost in 1979. He was born in Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania. After graduating with high honors from Princeton College in 1830, he studied law under John A. Quitman in Natchez, Mississippi, and was admitted to the bar. He began his legal career in Natchitoches, Louisiana, five years later. In 1837 Kaufman settled in Nacogdoches, Texas, where he practiced law and participated in military campaigns against the Cherokee Indians. He was wounded in a encounter in 1839. Between 1838 and 1845 he was a member of the Republic of Texas's congress. He served in the Republic's House of Representatives from 1838 to 1842, and was Speaker of the House in the last two years. He was a member of the Texas Senate from 1843 to 1845, when president of Texas Anson Jones named him chargé d'affaires to the United States in February 1845. After the Texas Annexation, Kaufman represented the Eastern District (District 1 of Texas in the United States House of Representatives from 1845 to 1851. While in Congress, Kaufman argued unsuccessfully that Texas owned lands that are now parts of New Mexico, Colorado, Kansas, Wyoming, and Oklahoma. He encouraged Governor of Texas Peter Hansborough Bell to have Texas troops seize Santa Fe, New Mexico, which never occurred. He also played a role in the Compromise of 1850, as one result of which the national government assumed the debts of the former republic. Kaufman was a Freemason and a charter member of the Philosophical Society of Texas. He died in Washington, D.C. while attending the Congress, and was originally buried in the Congressional Cemetery there. In 1932 his remains were moved to the State Cemetery in Austin, Texas. Kaufman County, Texas and the city of Kaufman, Texas are named for him.
1856: F.W. Evans delivered a lecture tonight entitled "Shakerism" during which he described numerous similarities in the beliefs and/or practices of the Shakers and those of the Jews. This positive view Jews may be one of the reasons that systemic European style anti-Semitism never took firm root in the United States
1886: Birthdate of Lev Shestov. Lev Isaakovich Shestov, born Yehuda Leyb Schwarzmann was a Russian - Jewish existentialist philosopher. The Kiev native fled to France in 1921 seeking to escape the society created by the Bolsheviks after the Russian Revolution. He lived in Paris until his death in 1938.
1892: Birthdate of entertainer Eddie Cantor.
1906: Birthdate of composer Benjamin Frankel.
1916: While developments today with respect to the nomination of Louis D. Brandeis to be an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court did not change the rather general opinion among Senators that the nomination would be confirmed, it became more apparent that confirmation would not be accomplished without a struggle.
1917: Germany announces its U-boats will engage in unrestricted submarine warfare. This was one of the final steps that would lead to the United States entering the World War on the side of the Allies. While America's entrance into the war proved to be the key to defeating the Kaiser, it made providing aid to Jews trapped in central and eastern Europe much more difficult. At the same, time the thousands of German Jews serving in the Kaiser's army, like many of their country men, probably saw this is as a necessary step to insure victory
1918(18th of Shevat, 5678): Dr. Jechiel Tchlenow, the Moscow physician who was a major leader of the Zionist movement passed away. In 1917, Tchlenow had come to London “where he took an active part in the diplomatic negotiations that have resulted in official declarations by Great Britain” favoring the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine.
1919: Birthdate of Jackie Robinson, the man who broke the color barrier in major league baseball when he played with the Brooklyn Dodgers. . Robinson was befriended by Hank Greenberg, the Jewish slugger who had had to deal with bigotry during his career. According to Jonathan Eig, the only friends that Robinson had in Brooklyn during his first year “were Jewish people.” “The Jewish community clearly recognized a kindred spirit here, someone who had to prove himself. The war had just ended, [and] anti-Semitism was running high. Blacks and Jews both, after the war, felt they had some work to do to establish more respect."
1921: The Supreme Court overturned the conviction of Victor Berger. Berger had been convicted of violating the Espionage Act and sentenced to 20 years in federal prison. In overturning the conviction the Supreme Court found that the presiding Judge, Kennesaw Landis (the future Baseball Commissioner) had improperly presided over the case after the filing of an affidavit of prejudice.
1923: Birthdate of author Norman Mailer. Born in Long Branch, NJ, The future Pulitzer Prize winner’s family soon moved to Brooklyn “later described by Mailer as ‘the most secure Jewish environment in America.’”
1928: Nathan Straus, prominent philanthropist, celebrated the eightieth anniversary of his birthday today at his home, 580 West End Avenue. He will spend the day quietly with members of his immediate family. Among those sending congratulatory communications are President Calvin Coolidge and New York City Mayor Jimmy Walker. While Straus has gained great honor for his humanitarian efforts, he was proud of his business acumen and some of his unique accomplishments which, according to him, included the introduction of rest rooms and medical care employees. His philanthropic contributions in Palestine were made with the understanding that they would be available to all regardless of race, religion, creed or nationality. Everybody knows about his support of Jewish settlers, but how many people are aware of the fact that he gave funds that were to be used by Arabs so that they buy modern agricultural equipment? How many people known that when Palestine was struck by an earthquake, and Arabs were the chief victims, he sent a substantial sum earmarked for their use?
1928: Mrs. Hertha Fuerth Lasker, a Viennese artist who was married last August to Edward Lasker, one of the leading chess players in the United States and a cousin of Albert Lasker, former Chairman of the United States Shipping Board, was a passenger on the Hamburg-American liner which arrived in New York tonight.
1929: Stalin expelled Leon Trotsky Russia. Trotsky took refuge in Turkey.
1930: The Golden Ring, a romantic operetta, set in Tel Aviv, premiered at the National Theatre on Second Avenue in New York City.
1930: The trial of Simcha Hinkas, the Jewish policeman charged with leading a Jewish crowd which killed a family of Arabs in Jaffa on Aug. 25, 1929 continued today in Jaffa with the prosecution presenting what it consider to be its strongest witnesses.
1932: The New York Times reported that Miss Freda Berson of Warsaw who is one of the best discus throwers in Poland and Miss Heda Bienenfeld of the Vienna Hokah, an outstanding Austrian swimmer will be competing in the upcoming Maccabiah.
1934: Birthdate of “Alfred Appel Jr., a scholarly expert on Vladimir Nabokov, whose lecture course he attended at Cornell and the author of wide-ranging interpretive books on modern art and jazz.”
1934(15th of Sh'vat, 5694): Tu B'Shvat
1935 (27th of Sh'vat, 5695); David Trietsch, an expert on the agriculture and economy of Palestine, as well as “one of the founders of the Zionist movement” passed away today. The 65 year old native of Germany died of heart failure at Rmat Ayim, near Tel Aviv. Trietsch believed that a Jewish homeland would be created through “practical colonization” as opposed to political negotiations. When the Ottomans sought to halt Jewish settlement in Palestine, Trietsch supported the settlement of Jews in Cyprus so that they would be poised to move to Palestine quickly as soon as there was a change in the political climate.
1937: Birthdate of American born composer Philip Glass.
1937: Ben-Zion Mossinson of Tel Aviv delivered an address at New York’s Rodeph Sholom entitled “Is There A Solution for the Jewish Problem?”
1938: Muriel Rukeyser established herself as a poet of enduring impact with the publication of U.S. 1, her second book of poems.
1938: The Palestine Post reported that three large Arab bands abducted nine Arab supernumerary policemen from their police post near Acre, and shot their corporal dead in cold blood. The Arab policemen were disarmed and beaten, warned to leave the force and released. At another police post in the South arms and ammunition were stolen.
1938: The Palestine Post reported that Romania officially denounced the Minorities Treaty intowhich it had entered upon gaining independence at the Peace Conference at Versailles, and claimed that the Jewish question was now "a purely internal matter" over which the League of Nations had no more jurisdiction. This meant that Romania now felt free to implement still more severe anti-Semitic discriminatory measures.
1938: The Palestine Post reported on the rise of anti-Jewish feelings and vandalism in Yugoslavia including the fact that "local Nazis" had smashed the windows out of the Sephardic synagogue of Belgrade.
1940: Birthdate of Alan G. Hevesi “a Democratic politician who served as a New York State Assemblyman from 1971 to 1993, as Comptroller of the City of New York from 1994 to 2001, and as State Comptroller for the State of New York from 2003 to 2006”
1941: Three thousand Jews were taken from their villages and moved into the Warsaw Ghetto. Another 70,000 Jews would be uprooted and moved into the Warsaw Ghetto by the end of March.
1942 (13th of Shevat, 5702): Rebbetzin Shterna Sarah passed away in New York. Wife of the fifth Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Sholom DovBer Schneerson, and mother of the sixth Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak, Rebbetzin Shterna Sarah lived through the upheavals of the first half of the 20th century. She fled the advancing front of World War I from Lubavitch to Rostov, where her husband passed away in 1920 at age 59. In 1927, she witnessed the arrest of her son by Stalin's henchmen the night he was taken away and sentenced to death, G-d forbid, for his efforts to keep Judaism alive throughout the Soviet empire. After Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak's release, the family resettled in Latvia and later, Poland; in 1940, they survived the bombing of Warsaw, were rescued from Nazi-occupied city, and immigrated to the United States.
1942: Einsatzgruppe A commanding officer, Franz W. Stahlecker, sent a detailed report about activities in the Baltic and White Russian countries. It stated that between July 23 and October 15, 1941, 135,567 Jews were killed. Eichmann sent out a letter making official the conclusions of the Wannsee Conference, "The evacuation of the Jews . . . is the beginning of the final solution of the Jewish problem."
1945 (17th of Shevat, 5705): Fritz Freund, husband of Mathilde Freund, died at Buchenwald just three months before the camp was liberated. In the first decade of the 21st century Mathilde Freund would sue France’s government owned railroad, Societe National des Chemins de Fer Francais over its role in the deportation of her husband and thousands of other French Jews to the death camps.
1947: In the House of Commons, during a debate about Britain marinating the Mandate in Palestine, Churchill, leading the Opposition, calls for the Government to end the Mandate. Two weeks later, the Labor Government will adopt this as policy.
1948: Birthdate of poet Albert Goldbarth.
1948: J D Salinger's "A Perfect Day for Banana Fish" appears in New York City.
1949: After hearing Churchill’s speech in Parliament denouncing the logic of the Labor Government’s policy towards Israel and calling for recognition of the new Jewish state, Sir Simon Marks, a leading Jewish businessman and philanthropist, wrote to the former PM assuring him that Chaim Weizmann would find great comfort in his words.
1950: President Truman revealed that he had ordered the Atomic Energy Commission to develop the hydrogen bomb. This decision might have been called Dueling Jewish Physicists. On one side was Dr. Oppenheimer father of the A-Bomb who opposed building the hydrogen bomb. On the other side was Dr. Teller who had worked on the A-Bomb and favored building the H-Bomb. Teller won out. Oppenheimer’s opposition was one of the causes of him losing his security clearance during the 1950’s. This was an injustice that Teller did not support and that President Kennedy would rectify.
1955: Egyptian authorities hanged two Jews in Cairo – Dr. Moshe Marzouk and Samuel (Shmeul) Azar – who had been found guilty of spying for Israel. Eight other Jews had been given long prison sentences for the same reason.
1960: World Sephardi Federation meets in Madrid, Spain. Some members complain they did not want Spain to be the site of the meeting, as they did not want to return to Spain for any reason.
1960: Songwriter Adolph Green marries actress/singer Phyllis Newman in New York City.
1961: David Ben-Gurion resigned as premier of Israel.
1974 (8th of Shevat, 5734): Samuel Goldwyn, a major force in the creation of the motion picture industry, passed away at the age of 91. The evolution of Goldwyn’s name is microcosm of the experience of European Jews who came to America. Born Schmuel Gelbfisz, he changed his name to Samuel Goldfish when he moved to Great Britain because that sounded more English. After he moved to America he went into partnership with two Broadway producers whose names were Selwyn. In naming their partnership they combined their two last names to create Goldwyn. Sam liked the American sound of it so much that he changed his name for the third and last time. What is amazing is the role that this Jewish immigrant from Poland played in creating modern American culture. Among other things, he discovered that quintessential American hero, Gary Cooper and won the Oscar for best picture with his production “The Best Years of Our Lives.” Goldwyn may have been. When Louis B Mayer a former partner turned commented on Goldwyn’s death he said, “The reason so many people turned up at his funeral is that they wanted to make sure he was dead." However Goldwyn’s last production marked him as a man of moral fiber. In his final film made in 1959, Samuel Goldwyn brought together African-American actors Sidney Poitier Dorothy Dandridge, Sammy Davis, Jr. and singer Pearl Bailey in a film rendition of the George Gershwin Opera, Porgy and Bess. The film won three Oscars. Samuel Goldwyn's lack of English language skills led to many of his malapropisms being frequently quoted such as:
• "A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on."
• "Include me out."
• "What we need now is some new, fresh clichés."
• "Anyone who would go to a psychiatrist ought to have his head examined!"
• "Every director bites the hand that lays the golden egg."
• "Flashbacks are a thing of the past."
• "A wide screen just makes a bad film twice as bad."
1978: Israel turned 3 military outposts in the West Bank into civilian settlements
1978: The Jerusalem Post reported that Defense Minister Ezer Weizmann left for Cairo for the second round of the interrupted military discussions. One of his specific aims was reported to be to influence the Egyptians so that they would modify their position of "not giving up even one inch of Sinai."
1987: As more information came out about what would be known as The Iran-Contra Affair, Yaacov Nimrodi, said today that Israel's Defense Ministry had approved the sale of $50 million worth of Israeli-made weapons to Iran almost two months before the first reported American request for Israel's help in approaching Teheran.
1988: A Jewish settler was severely burned today when his car was firebombed in an area near the Ofra settlement north of Jerusalem.
1990: Yuval Ne'eman resigned from the Knesset today and was replaced by Gershon Shafat.
1992: Tonight’ performance of the Gershwin musical "Crazy for You" at the Shubert Theater is a benefit designed to raised funds for the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.
1996 (10th of Shevat, 5756): Mathematician Gustave Solomon passed away at the age of 65.
1999: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or topics of special interest to Jewish readers including Playing For Keeps: Michael Jordan and the World He Made by David Halbestram and The Burden of Responsibility: Blum, Camus, Aron and the French Twentieth Century by Tony Judt.
2004: “Talmud: in the Art of Ben-Zion and Marc Chagall,” an exhibit at the Center Art Gallery at Calvin College that brings together the Biblical work of two of the most important Jewish artists of the 20th Century that features 18 intaglio prints by Ben-Zion and 25 color lithographs by Marc Chagall comes to an end.
2007: The Times of London reported that Lord Levy (Michael Levy) the Prime Minister's personal friend and fundraiser, is the second person close to No 10 Downing Street to be questioned by police under suspicion of perverting the course of justice in the ongoing cash-for-honors investigation. After amassing a fortune in the recording industry, Levy became a major fundraiser for the Labor Party and Tony Blair as well as various Jewish and Israeli charities.
2007: The Jerusalem Post reported that the recently launched Yad Vashem Farsi site has been well received by the target audience. Since the Persian site went on-line last week, some 11,000 hits have been recorded, including 2,242 visits from Iran. That figure is just 1,000 hits short of the total number of visits the Yad Vashem Web site received from Iranians in the whole of 2006. Yad Vashem spokeswoman Estee Yaari said that none of the Farsi-language posts translated so far had been negative”
2008: In Manhattan, the 92nd St Y presents “Praise, Grumble, Schmooze, Lament: The Voices of 21st Century Jewish Poetry.” The program features readings by established and emerging Jewish poets, including Alicia Ostriker, Rodger Kamenetz, Robin Becker, Jacqueline Osherow, Dan Bellm, Patty Seyburn, Philip Terman, Scott Cairns, Jay Michaelson and Richard Chess.
2008: The Washington Post featured a review of Sacha Baron Cohen the Unauthorized Biography: from Cambridge to Kazakhstan by Kathleen Tracy
2008: It was announced that Neil Diamond will appear at the upcoming Glastonbury Festival in the UK.
2009: The 92nd St Y presents a musical evening featuring the Tokyo String Quartet and Jerusalem born pianist Benjamin Hochman.
2009: The Jewish Federation of Howard County (MD) presents Yom Hadash Community Concert.
2010: Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz (Likud) said today that Israel would allow the ultra-Orthodox community to continue to run their private bus lines segregated by gender, but could not officially recognize the practice on public bus lines.
2010: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Blood and Faith: The Purging of Muslim Spain by Matthew Carr and 36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction by Rebecca Newberger Goldstein
2010: The Tenth Herzliya Conference is scheduled to open this afternoon on the Campus of the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) Herzliya in Israel.
2010: The Israel Center of the Milwaukee Jewish Federation, the Harry & Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center and the Jewish Museum Milwaukee invite the Jewish community to attend “Dead Sea Scrolls and the Bible: A Jewish Night at the Museum” which will include a tour of the “Dead Sea Scrolls and the Bible” exhibit at the Milwaukee Public Museum and recitation by Museum President and CEO Daniel Finley of the real story of how the exhibit came to the Museum.
2010: Opening session of The Tenth Herzliya Conference, “Israel‘s primary global policy annual gathering, drawing together Israeli and international participants from the highest levels of government, business, and academia to address pressing national, regional and world strategic issues.”
2010: An exhibition at the Krasdale Gallery in White Plains, NY, entitled “Pages de Guerre” featuring the works of Avigdor Arikha comes to an end.
2010(16th of Sh'vat, 5770): David V. Becker, a pioneer in using radioactive materials to diagnose and treat thyroid disease and an expert on the thyroid damage caused by the Chernobyl nuclear reactor accident in 1986, passed away at his home in Manhattan. He was 86 and had continued his research work until last year. At his death, Dr. Becker was a professor of radiology and medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College in Manhattan and an attending radiologist and physician at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center.2011: Dr. Ron Taffel is scheduled to present a program entitled “Childhood Unbound: Confident Parenting in a World of Change” at the 92nd Street Y in NYC.
2011: Rami Feinstein is scheduled to presents a concert featuring songs from his two albums—a combination of rock, folk, and funk- in Jerusalem.
2011: New York City based Israeli choreographers Deganit Shemy and Netta Yerushalmy, are scheduled to perform this evening in an event intended to raise funds for the 1st Contemporary Israeli Dance Festival in New York, coming in June 2011.
2011: Last day for submitting recipes for the 2011 Man-O-Manischewitz Cook-Off.
Created, Compiled and Edited by Mitchell A. Levin Cedar Rapids, IA melech3@mchsi.com
Copyright; January, 2011; Mitchell A. Levin
439: Promulgation of the Code of Theodosius II in the Byzantine Empire. This was the first imperial compilation of anti- Jewish laws since Constantine. Jews were prohibited from holding important positions involving money including judicial and executive offices and the ban against building new synagogues was reinstated. Theodosius was the Roman emperor of the East (408–450) The Code was readily accepted as well by Western Roman Emperor Valentinian III (425-455).
1253: Henry III of England ordered that Jewish worship in Synagogues must be held quietly so that Christians should not have to hear it when passing by. In addition Jews were not to employ Christian nurses or maids, nor was any Jew allowed to prevent another Jew from converting to Christianity.
1419: Pope Martin V issued a Bull that abolished the oppressive laws promulgated by antipope Benedict XIII and granted the Jews those privileges which had been accorded them under previous popes.
1493: Jews fleeing Spain were no longer allowed to enter to enter Genoa. During the previous year Jews fleeing Spain were allowed to land in Genoa for three days. As of this date the special consideration was cancelled due to the “fear” that the Jews may introduce the Plague.
1813: Birthdate of Dutch physician, pharmacist and philanthropist, Samuel Sarphati. “One of the great Amsterdammers of the 19th century,” Sarphati, was a promoter of public housing, an organizer of municipal services such as garbage collecting, and the builder of a bread factory that provided better and cheaper bread for the city. He also built the Amstel hotel. Sarphati is seen by Dutch history as a great philanthropist. Nobody ever knew he was Jewish—until the Germans authorities changed the name Sarphati Street into “Muiderschans”.
1846: After the Milwaukee Bridge War, Juneautown and Kilbourntown were incorporated to form the modern city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Four years prior to this, the families of Solomon Adler, Isaac Neustadt, and Moses Weil settled in the city. As proof of the vibrancy of the young community, during the 1840’s the first Rosh Hashanah services were held at the home of Henry Newhouse and the first Yom Kippur Services were held in a building containing Pereles grocery store. For more about the history of the Jews of Milwaukee consider a visit to the Jewish Museum of Milwaukee or reading "One People, Many Paths: A History of Jewish Milwaukee," by John Gurda.
1848: Birthdate of Nathan Straus who the wealthy American businessman and philanthropist who owned R.H. Macy & Company and Abraham and Straus. Born in Otterberg, Germany, Strauss moved to the United States with his family in 1854 where they first settled in Georgia before moving to New York City after the Civil War where young Nathan worked in his father’s firms L Straus & Sons. In the 1880’s he began a life of philanthropy and public service that included leading the fight against tuberculosis and a major effort to improve the public libraries. His philanthropy extended to developing a Jewish homeland in Eretz Israel following his first visit to the area in 1912. His support is memorialized by the fact that a street in the Jerusalem is called “Rehov Straus” and that the city of The modern Israeli city of Netanya, founded in 1927, was named in his honor
1851(28th of Shevat, 5611): David Spangler Kaufman passed away. Born in 1813, Kaufman was the first Jewish United States Congressman from Texas. No other Jewish Texan served in Congress until Martin Frost in 1979. He was born in Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania. After graduating with high honors from Princeton College in 1830, he studied law under John A. Quitman in Natchez, Mississippi, and was admitted to the bar. He began his legal career in Natchitoches, Louisiana, five years later. In 1837 Kaufman settled in Nacogdoches, Texas, where he practiced law and participated in military campaigns against the Cherokee Indians. He was wounded in a encounter in 1839. Between 1838 and 1845 he was a member of the Republic of Texas's congress. He served in the Republic's House of Representatives from 1838 to 1842, and was Speaker of the House in the last two years. He was a member of the Texas Senate from 1843 to 1845, when president of Texas Anson Jones named him chargé d'affaires to the United States in February 1845. After the Texas Annexation, Kaufman represented the Eastern District (District 1 of Texas in the United States House of Representatives from 1845 to 1851. While in Congress, Kaufman argued unsuccessfully that Texas owned lands that are now parts of New Mexico, Colorado, Kansas, Wyoming, and Oklahoma. He encouraged Governor of Texas Peter Hansborough Bell to have Texas troops seize Santa Fe, New Mexico, which never occurred. He also played a role in the Compromise of 1850, as one result of which the national government assumed the debts of the former republic. Kaufman was a Freemason and a charter member of the Philosophical Society of Texas. He died in Washington, D.C. while attending the Congress, and was originally buried in the Congressional Cemetery there. In 1932 his remains were moved to the State Cemetery in Austin, Texas. Kaufman County, Texas and the city of Kaufman, Texas are named for him.
1856: F.W. Evans delivered a lecture tonight entitled "Shakerism" during which he described numerous similarities in the beliefs and/or practices of the Shakers and those of the Jews. This positive view Jews may be one of the reasons that systemic European style anti-Semitism never took firm root in the United States
1886: Birthdate of Lev Shestov. Lev Isaakovich Shestov, born Yehuda Leyb Schwarzmann was a Russian - Jewish existentialist philosopher. The Kiev native fled to France in 1921 seeking to escape the society created by the Bolsheviks after the Russian Revolution. He lived in Paris until his death in 1938.
1892: Birthdate of entertainer Eddie Cantor.
1906: Birthdate of composer Benjamin Frankel.
1916: While developments today with respect to the nomination of Louis D. Brandeis to be an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court did not change the rather general opinion among Senators that the nomination would be confirmed, it became more apparent that confirmation would not be accomplished without a struggle.
1917: Germany announces its U-boats will engage in unrestricted submarine warfare. This was one of the final steps that would lead to the United States entering the World War on the side of the Allies. While America's entrance into the war proved to be the key to defeating the Kaiser, it made providing aid to Jews trapped in central and eastern Europe much more difficult. At the same, time the thousands of German Jews serving in the Kaiser's army, like many of their country men, probably saw this is as a necessary step to insure victory
1918(18th of Shevat, 5678): Dr. Jechiel Tchlenow, the Moscow physician who was a major leader of the Zionist movement passed away. In 1917, Tchlenow had come to London “where he took an active part in the diplomatic negotiations that have resulted in official declarations by Great Britain” favoring the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine.
1919: Birthdate of Jackie Robinson, the man who broke the color barrier in major league baseball when he played with the Brooklyn Dodgers. . Robinson was befriended by Hank Greenberg, the Jewish slugger who had had to deal with bigotry during his career. According to Jonathan Eig, the only friends that Robinson had in Brooklyn during his first year “were Jewish people.” “The Jewish community clearly recognized a kindred spirit here, someone who had to prove himself. The war had just ended, [and] anti-Semitism was running high. Blacks and Jews both, after the war, felt they had some work to do to establish more respect."
1921: The Supreme Court overturned the conviction of Victor Berger. Berger had been convicted of violating the Espionage Act and sentenced to 20 years in federal prison. In overturning the conviction the Supreme Court found that the presiding Judge, Kennesaw Landis (the future Baseball Commissioner) had improperly presided over the case after the filing of an affidavit of prejudice.
1923: Birthdate of author Norman Mailer. Born in Long Branch, NJ, The future Pulitzer Prize winner’s family soon moved to Brooklyn “later described by Mailer as ‘the most secure Jewish environment in America.’”
1928: Nathan Straus, prominent philanthropist, celebrated the eightieth anniversary of his birthday today at his home, 580 West End Avenue. He will spend the day quietly with members of his immediate family. Among those sending congratulatory communications are President Calvin Coolidge and New York City Mayor Jimmy Walker. While Straus has gained great honor for his humanitarian efforts, he was proud of his business acumen and some of his unique accomplishments which, according to him, included the introduction of rest rooms and medical care employees. His philanthropic contributions in Palestine were made with the understanding that they would be available to all regardless of race, religion, creed or nationality. Everybody knows about his support of Jewish settlers, but how many people are aware of the fact that he gave funds that were to be used by Arabs so that they buy modern agricultural equipment? How many people known that when Palestine was struck by an earthquake, and Arabs were the chief victims, he sent a substantial sum earmarked for their use?
1928: Mrs. Hertha Fuerth Lasker, a Viennese artist who was married last August to Edward Lasker, one of the leading chess players in the United States and a cousin of Albert Lasker, former Chairman of the United States Shipping Board, was a passenger on the Hamburg-American liner which arrived in New York tonight.
1929: Stalin expelled Leon Trotsky Russia. Trotsky took refuge in Turkey.
1930: The Golden Ring, a romantic operetta, set in Tel Aviv, premiered at the National Theatre on Second Avenue in New York City.
1930: The trial of Simcha Hinkas, the Jewish policeman charged with leading a Jewish crowd which killed a family of Arabs in Jaffa on Aug. 25, 1929 continued today in Jaffa with the prosecution presenting what it consider to be its strongest witnesses.
1932: The New York Times reported that Miss Freda Berson of Warsaw who is one of the best discus throwers in Poland and Miss Heda Bienenfeld of the Vienna Hokah, an outstanding Austrian swimmer will be competing in the upcoming Maccabiah.
1934: Birthdate of “Alfred Appel Jr., a scholarly expert on Vladimir Nabokov, whose lecture course he attended at Cornell and the author of wide-ranging interpretive books on modern art and jazz.”
1934(15th of Sh'vat, 5694): Tu B'Shvat
1935 (27th of Sh'vat, 5695); David Trietsch, an expert on the agriculture and economy of Palestine, as well as “one of the founders of the Zionist movement” passed away today. The 65 year old native of Germany died of heart failure at Rmat Ayim, near Tel Aviv. Trietsch believed that a Jewish homeland would be created through “practical colonization” as opposed to political negotiations. When the Ottomans sought to halt Jewish settlement in Palestine, Trietsch supported the settlement of Jews in Cyprus so that they would be poised to move to Palestine quickly as soon as there was a change in the political climate.
1937: Birthdate of American born composer Philip Glass.
1937: Ben-Zion Mossinson of Tel Aviv delivered an address at New York’s Rodeph Sholom entitled “Is There A Solution for the Jewish Problem?”
1938: Muriel Rukeyser established herself as a poet of enduring impact with the publication of U.S. 1, her second book of poems.
1938: The Palestine Post reported that three large Arab bands abducted nine Arab supernumerary policemen from their police post near Acre, and shot their corporal dead in cold blood. The Arab policemen were disarmed and beaten, warned to leave the force and released. At another police post in the South arms and ammunition were stolen.
1938: The Palestine Post reported that Romania officially denounced the Minorities Treaty intowhich it had entered upon gaining independence at the Peace Conference at Versailles, and claimed that the Jewish question was now "a purely internal matter" over which the League of Nations had no more jurisdiction. This meant that Romania now felt free to implement still more severe anti-Semitic discriminatory measures.
1938: The Palestine Post reported on the rise of anti-Jewish feelings and vandalism in Yugoslavia including the fact that "local Nazis" had smashed the windows out of the Sephardic synagogue of Belgrade.
1940: Birthdate of Alan G. Hevesi “a Democratic politician who served as a New York State Assemblyman from 1971 to 1993, as Comptroller of the City of New York from 1994 to 2001, and as State Comptroller for the State of New York from 2003 to 2006”
1941: Three thousand Jews were taken from their villages and moved into the Warsaw Ghetto. Another 70,000 Jews would be uprooted and moved into the Warsaw Ghetto by the end of March.
1942 (13th of Shevat, 5702): Rebbetzin Shterna Sarah passed away in New York. Wife of the fifth Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Sholom DovBer Schneerson, and mother of the sixth Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak, Rebbetzin Shterna Sarah lived through the upheavals of the first half of the 20th century. She fled the advancing front of World War I from Lubavitch to Rostov, where her husband passed away in 1920 at age 59. In 1927, she witnessed the arrest of her son by Stalin's henchmen the night he was taken away and sentenced to death, G-d forbid, for his efforts to keep Judaism alive throughout the Soviet empire. After Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak's release, the family resettled in Latvia and later, Poland; in 1940, they survived the bombing of Warsaw, were rescued from Nazi-occupied city, and immigrated to the United States.
1942: Einsatzgruppe A commanding officer, Franz W. Stahlecker, sent a detailed report about activities in the Baltic and White Russian countries. It stated that between July 23 and October 15, 1941, 135,567 Jews were killed. Eichmann sent out a letter making official the conclusions of the Wannsee Conference, "The evacuation of the Jews . . . is the beginning of the final solution of the Jewish problem."
1945 (17th of Shevat, 5705): Fritz Freund, husband of Mathilde Freund, died at Buchenwald just three months before the camp was liberated. In the first decade of the 21st century Mathilde Freund would sue France’s government owned railroad, Societe National des Chemins de Fer Francais over its role in the deportation of her husband and thousands of other French Jews to the death camps.
1947: In the House of Commons, during a debate about Britain marinating the Mandate in Palestine, Churchill, leading the Opposition, calls for the Government to end the Mandate. Two weeks later, the Labor Government will adopt this as policy.
1948: Birthdate of poet Albert Goldbarth.
1948: J D Salinger's "A Perfect Day for Banana Fish" appears in New York City.
1949: After hearing Churchill’s speech in Parliament denouncing the logic of the Labor Government’s policy towards Israel and calling for recognition of the new Jewish state, Sir Simon Marks, a leading Jewish businessman and philanthropist, wrote to the former PM assuring him that Chaim Weizmann would find great comfort in his words.
1950: President Truman revealed that he had ordered the Atomic Energy Commission to develop the hydrogen bomb. This decision might have been called Dueling Jewish Physicists. On one side was Dr. Oppenheimer father of the A-Bomb who opposed building the hydrogen bomb. On the other side was Dr. Teller who had worked on the A-Bomb and favored building the H-Bomb. Teller won out. Oppenheimer’s opposition was one of the causes of him losing his security clearance during the 1950’s. This was an injustice that Teller did not support and that President Kennedy would rectify.
1955: Egyptian authorities hanged two Jews in Cairo – Dr. Moshe Marzouk and Samuel (Shmeul) Azar – who had been found guilty of spying for Israel. Eight other Jews had been given long prison sentences for the same reason.
1960: World Sephardi Federation meets in Madrid, Spain. Some members complain they did not want Spain to be the site of the meeting, as they did not want to return to Spain for any reason.
1960: Songwriter Adolph Green marries actress/singer Phyllis Newman in New York City.
1961: David Ben-Gurion resigned as premier of Israel.
1974 (8th of Shevat, 5734): Samuel Goldwyn, a major force in the creation of the motion picture industry, passed away at the age of 91. The evolution of Goldwyn’s name is microcosm of the experience of European Jews who came to America. Born Schmuel Gelbfisz, he changed his name to Samuel Goldfish when he moved to Great Britain because that sounded more English. After he moved to America he went into partnership with two Broadway producers whose names were Selwyn. In naming their partnership they combined their two last names to create Goldwyn. Sam liked the American sound of it so much that he changed his name for the third and last time. What is amazing is the role that this Jewish immigrant from Poland played in creating modern American culture. Among other things, he discovered that quintessential American hero, Gary Cooper and won the Oscar for best picture with his production “The Best Years of Our Lives.” Goldwyn may have been. When Louis B Mayer a former partner turned commented on Goldwyn’s death he said, “The reason so many people turned up at his funeral is that they wanted to make sure he was dead." However Goldwyn’s last production marked him as a man of moral fiber. In his final film made in 1959, Samuel Goldwyn brought together African-American actors Sidney Poitier Dorothy Dandridge, Sammy Davis, Jr. and singer Pearl Bailey in a film rendition of the George Gershwin Opera, Porgy and Bess. The film won three Oscars. Samuel Goldwyn's lack of English language skills led to many of his malapropisms being frequently quoted such as:
• "A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on."
• "Include me out."
• "What we need now is some new, fresh clichés."
• "Anyone who would go to a psychiatrist ought to have his head examined!"
• "Every director bites the hand that lays the golden egg."
• "Flashbacks are a thing of the past."
• "A wide screen just makes a bad film twice as bad."
1978: Israel turned 3 military outposts in the West Bank into civilian settlements
1978: The Jerusalem Post reported that Defense Minister Ezer Weizmann left for Cairo for the second round of the interrupted military discussions. One of his specific aims was reported to be to influence the Egyptians so that they would modify their position of "not giving up even one inch of Sinai."
1987: As more information came out about what would be known as The Iran-Contra Affair, Yaacov Nimrodi, said today that Israel's Defense Ministry had approved the sale of $50 million worth of Israeli-made weapons to Iran almost two months before the first reported American request for Israel's help in approaching Teheran.
1988: A Jewish settler was severely burned today when his car was firebombed in an area near the Ofra settlement north of Jerusalem.
1990: Yuval Ne'eman resigned from the Knesset today and was replaced by Gershon Shafat.
1992: Tonight’ performance of the Gershwin musical "Crazy for You" at the Shubert Theater is a benefit designed to raised funds for the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.
1996 (10th of Shevat, 5756): Mathematician Gustave Solomon passed away at the age of 65.
1999: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or topics of special interest to Jewish readers including Playing For Keeps: Michael Jordan and the World He Made by David Halbestram and The Burden of Responsibility: Blum, Camus, Aron and the French Twentieth Century by Tony Judt.
2004: “Talmud: in the Art of Ben-Zion and Marc Chagall,” an exhibit at the Center Art Gallery at Calvin College that brings together the Biblical work of two of the most important Jewish artists of the 20th Century that features 18 intaglio prints by Ben-Zion and 25 color lithographs by Marc Chagall comes to an end.
2007: The Times of London reported that Lord Levy (Michael Levy) the Prime Minister's personal friend and fundraiser, is the second person close to No 10 Downing Street to be questioned by police under suspicion of perverting the course of justice in the ongoing cash-for-honors investigation. After amassing a fortune in the recording industry, Levy became a major fundraiser for the Labor Party and Tony Blair as well as various Jewish and Israeli charities.
2007: The Jerusalem Post reported that the recently launched Yad Vashem Farsi site has been well received by the target audience. Since the Persian site went on-line last week, some 11,000 hits have been recorded, including 2,242 visits from Iran. That figure is just 1,000 hits short of the total number of visits the Yad Vashem Web site received from Iranians in the whole of 2006. Yad Vashem spokeswoman Estee Yaari said that none of the Farsi-language posts translated so far had been negative”
2008: In Manhattan, the 92nd St Y presents “Praise, Grumble, Schmooze, Lament: The Voices of 21st Century Jewish Poetry.” The program features readings by established and emerging Jewish poets, including Alicia Ostriker, Rodger Kamenetz, Robin Becker, Jacqueline Osherow, Dan Bellm, Patty Seyburn, Philip Terman, Scott Cairns, Jay Michaelson and Richard Chess.
2008: The Washington Post featured a review of Sacha Baron Cohen the Unauthorized Biography: from Cambridge to Kazakhstan by Kathleen Tracy
2008: It was announced that Neil Diamond will appear at the upcoming Glastonbury Festival in the UK.
2009: The 92nd St Y presents a musical evening featuring the Tokyo String Quartet and Jerusalem born pianist Benjamin Hochman.
2009: The Jewish Federation of Howard County (MD) presents Yom Hadash Community Concert.
2010: Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz (Likud) said today that Israel would allow the ultra-Orthodox community to continue to run their private bus lines segregated by gender, but could not officially recognize the practice on public bus lines.
2010: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Blood and Faith: The Purging of Muslim Spain by Matthew Carr and 36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction by Rebecca Newberger Goldstein
2010: The Tenth Herzliya Conference is scheduled to open this afternoon on the Campus of the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) Herzliya in Israel.
2010: The Israel Center of the Milwaukee Jewish Federation, the Harry & Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center and the Jewish Museum Milwaukee invite the Jewish community to attend “Dead Sea Scrolls and the Bible: A Jewish Night at the Museum” which will include a tour of the “Dead Sea Scrolls and the Bible” exhibit at the Milwaukee Public Museum and recitation by Museum President and CEO Daniel Finley of the real story of how the exhibit came to the Museum.
2010: Opening session of The Tenth Herzliya Conference, “Israel‘s primary global policy annual gathering, drawing together Israeli and international participants from the highest levels of government, business, and academia to address pressing national, regional and world strategic issues.”
2010: An exhibition at the Krasdale Gallery in White Plains, NY, entitled “Pages de Guerre” featuring the works of Avigdor Arikha comes to an end.
2010(16th of Sh'vat, 5770): David V. Becker, a pioneer in using radioactive materials to diagnose and treat thyroid disease and an expert on the thyroid damage caused by the Chernobyl nuclear reactor accident in 1986, passed away at his home in Manhattan. He was 86 and had continued his research work until last year. At his death, Dr. Becker was a professor of radiology and medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College in Manhattan and an attending radiologist and physician at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center.2011: Dr. Ron Taffel is scheduled to present a program entitled “Childhood Unbound: Confident Parenting in a World of Change” at the 92nd Street Y in NYC.
2011: Rami Feinstein is scheduled to presents a concert featuring songs from his two albums—a combination of rock, folk, and funk- in Jerusalem.
2011: New York City based Israeli choreographers Deganit Shemy and Netta Yerushalmy, are scheduled to perform this evening in an event intended to raise funds for the 1st Contemporary Israeli Dance Festival in New York, coming in June 2011.
2011: Last day for submitting recipes for the 2011 Man-O-Manischewitz Cook-Off.
Created, Compiled and Edited by Mitchell A. Levin Cedar Rapids, IA melech3@mchsi.com
Copyright; January, 2011; Mitchell A. Levin
This Day, January 30, In Jewish History
January 30 In Jewish History
1349: The Jews of Freilsburg Germany were massacred.
1648: Spain and the United Netherlands sign The Treaty of Münster and Osnabrück marking the end of the eighty year long Dutch revolt against Spanish rule. The treaty guarantees the independence of the Protestant Netherlands from the rule of Catholic Spain and the Holy Roman Empire. It means that the Jewish community in the Netherlands, which includes many Sephardic refugees and Marranos, will be able to grow and flourish.
1667: The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth ceded Kiev, Smolensk, and left-bank Ukraine to the Tsardom of Russia in the Treaty of Andrusovo. According “to the treaty...arranged with John the Jews, who then lived in the towns and districts that became Russian territory, were permitted to remain "on the side of the Russian czar," under Russian rule, if they did not choose to remain under Polish rule. Jewish wives of Greek Orthodox Russians were permitted to remain with their husbands without being forced to change their religion.
1807: Sir Robert Grant was “called to the bar” and began the practice of law. This was but one step on the ladder that led to Grant’s successful career as a member of the House of Commons. Grant was not Jewish. Robert Grant was a strenuous advocate for the removal of the disabilities of the Jews, and twice carried bills on the subject through the House of Commons. They were, however, rejected in the Upper House, which did not yield on the question until 1858, twenty years after Grant’s death.
1852: The horribly mutilated body of Jacob Lehman was found today in the Delaware River. Lehman was the son of Aaron Lehman, a German Jewish peddler living in Philadelphia. When last seen, Jacob had in his possession $200 worth of watches, jewelry and other items that constituted most of his father's inventory.
1852: A jury in Philadelphia rendered the following verdict: "That the lad Jacob Lehman came to his death at the hand or hands of some person or person to the Jury unknown." Lehman was the son of a German Jewish peddler whose gruesomely dismembered body had been found floating in the Delaware River
1854(1st of Sh'vat, 5614): Rosh Chodesh Sh'vat
1857: The will of Marcus Cone was offered for probate today. Included in the will were instructions for establishing Cone's German Human Benevolent Society of New York, Cone's German Human Benevolent Society of Syracuse and Cone's German Human Benevolent Society of Albersweiller, the Germany city in which he was born. Cone wanted to establish the two societies in the United States because neither of these cities had any organized way to provide aid for their indigent Jewish citizens.
1860: The New York Times reported that "In England, astonishment is expressed” that Emperor Napoleon has not appointed the Duc de Persigny to the Foreign Ministry. Unbeknown to the public M de Persigny will not join the cabinet because he refuses to serve with Achille Fould, the Minister of State. M Fould is a favorite of the Empress who “absolutely clings” to him “as the only man competent to” serve as “Minister of State and of the Household of the Emperor.” Furthermore, M Fould is Jewish, a millionaire and is connected to “other rich Jews” through his banking connections.(“Nearly all the millionaires of Paris at this moment are Jews.”) The Emperor is reportedly “afraid to offend so important” a component needed to ensure the stability of his government. “There are people malicious enough to suggest that the Empress' wish in the matter goes for very little, however, and that she is made to bear the blame because that is more convenient in these personal matters than a reason of State.”
1875: The London Punch published a cartoon of Disraeli shaking hands with Gladstone and saying: "Sorry to lose you. I began with books; you’re ending with them. Perhaps you're the wiser of the two."
1882: Birthdate of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the 32nd president of the United States. Roosevelt’s New Deal created a variety of career opportunities for a whole generation of newly college educated generation of Jewish professionals. For several generations of Jews, FDR was a near-saint. Starting in the 1970’s, questions were raised about Roosevelt’s failure to do more to rescue the Jews of Europe. The problem with criticizing Roosevelt is the need to come to grips with the level of anti-Semitism that existed before, during and after the war. This reality played a part in Roosevelt’s dealing with the furor of the Holocaust.
1893: Birthdate of Rabbi Yitzhak-Meir Levin a Haredi, politician, member of the Kensett and one of 37 people to sign the Israeli declaration of independence.
1900: Birthdate of Russian composer Isaak Iosifovich Dunayevsky.
1903: Leopold Greenberg, Herzl's representative in London, left for Cairo to carry on political negotiations.
1904: Herzl finished his visit to Italy.
1908: Caught up in the dispute between the Territorialists and the Jews who will only settle for a homeland in Palestine, Churchill drafted a letter at the behest of British Zionist, Rabbi Dr. Moses Gaster. Seeking not to offend either party, Churchill expressed his support for the Zionist dream of settling in Palestine while allowing that a temporary refuge may have to be found if such is the wish of the Jewish people. The Territoralists were those Jews were willing to accept the British offer of a homeland in Uganda or Kenya as an immediate solution to the suffering of the Jews in Russia. The Russian Jews were among those who were the strongest opponents of the solution.
1909: Birthdate of activist and author Saul David Alinsky
1912: In response to an appeal by Dr. J. L. Magnes the New York City Jewish community announces subscriptions amounting to over sixty thousand dollars annually for five years for Jewish education in New York City.
1912: In Brooklyn, N. Y, The Atlantic Union Conference of the Seventh Day Adventist convention adopts resolutions protesting against the recent massacres of Jews in Russia and outbreaks of anti-Jewish feeling in so-called Christian countries as un-Christian and affirming their belief that the Jew is entitled to religious and civil rights.
1912: Birthdate of Barbara Tuchman. Ms. Tuchman was a prolific popular historian who won a Pulitzer Prize for The Guns of August a book that President Kennedy urged people to read so that his generation might avoid the folly which led to World War I. Ms. Tuchman won a second Pulitzer for Stillwell and the American Experience in China, a very readable tome that uses the experiences of Stillwell's career in Asia to explain the events that would ultimately lead to the victory of the Communist Chinese. Although she was Jewish, Ms. Tuchman wrote only one book related to Jewish History - Bible and Sword (England and Palestine from the Bronze Age to Balfour). Ms. Tuchman passed away in 1989 at the age of 77.
1916(25th of Sh'vat, 5676): Joseph Jacobs passed away. Born in 1854, he “was an Australian literary and Jewish historian who was a writer for the Jewish Encyclopaedia and a notable folklorist, creating several noteworthy collections of fairy tales.
1918: Birthdate of actor David Opatoshu.
1919: The Versailles Conference decided that the Arab provinces should be wholly separated from the Ottoman Empire and the newly conceived mandate-system applied to them. This decision clashed with the expectation of Faisal's Arab delegation that his state would include Palestine, and the conditional understandings reached in the Faisal-Weizmann Agreement.
1922(1st of Sh'vat, 5682): Rosh Chodesh Sh'vat
1923: In Newark, NJ, Jacob Israel Gersten and Henrietta (Henig) Gersten gave birth to Bernard Gersten, the Executive Producer of Lincoln Center Theater.
1927: Birthdate of Zeev (Heinz) Raphael, a native of Germany who escaped to safety in Sweden three days before the German invasion of Poland.
1928: Birthdate of Harold “Hal” Prince, Tony Award winning theatrical producer and director.
1930: Simcha Hinkas, a Jewish policeman, went on trial in Tel Aviv. He is accused of leading a crowd of Jews who reportedly killed five adults and wounded two children in an Arab family on August 25, 1929 during the Arab Uprising. According to the government, while Hinkas was on duty at a crossroad on Herzl Street during the Arab riots he saw a truck filled with Jews fired on by Arabs who killed four and wounded five. Hinkas allegedly went back to his barracks, got his rifle and led a Jewish mob in an attack on an Arab house. A government witness identified the bullets in the dead Arabs as having come from a government issued rifle, but could not tie them to the gun belonging to Hinkas. Two Arabs later identified Hinkas from a group of 13 Constables, but other Arabs identified different Constables. Alfred Riggs, assistant superintendant of the police “declared that Hinkas was one of the mildest and best of the police” but, “for reasons of his own,” the British police official seemed certain that the Jewish policeman was guilty.
1931: Charlie Chaplin's "City Lights" premieres at Los Angeles Theater.
1933: Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany.
1933: Youth Aliyah opens its offices in Berlin. The previous year Recha Freier, a rabbi's wife decided it would be a good idea to send young people from Germany to Kibbutzim. She founded the Juedische Jugendhilfe organization to help facilitate the work. That same year it became a department of the World Zionist Organization under Henrietta Szold. Five thousand adolescents were rescued before the war and another 15,000 after the war.
1934: Mr. and Mrs. Nathan Chasan of the Bronx announce the engagement of their daughter Shulamith Chasan to Theodore S. Chazin, son of Cantor and Mrs. Hirsch L. Chazin. Mr. Chazin is a practicing attorney and the secretary of the Jersey City Zionist District.
1934: Moses Mendel Penn, the oldest patient ever cared for at Montefiore Hospital for Chronic Diseases, will observe his 109th birthday there today. He has partly recovered from a stroke that paralyzed one side of his body eight months ago. Mr. Penn entered the hospital on the application of the Bronx Young Men's Hebrew Association, of which he is the oldest living member.
1937: Rabbi Samuel Goldenson delivers a sermon entitled “The Ten Commandments and Social Problems” during Saturday morning services at New York’s Temple Emanu-El.
1938: The Palestine Post reported that a Jewish constable, Mordechai Schwartz, who was charged with the premeditated murder of Police Constable Mustapha Khoury, was sentenced to death. The court refused to accept evidence that the previous murder by Arabs of two Jews in Karkur had influenced Schwartz to an immediate act of reprisal. Schwartz continued to claim his innocence.
1939: Hitler, in his anniversary speech in Berlin, talked about the event of war, "The result will not be the Bolshevization of the earth, and thus the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe." Hitler also spoke in warm terms about its friendship with Poland.
1942: In a speech at the Sports Palace in Berlin, Hitler told of his confidence in victory and his hatred for the Jews. "The hour will come when the most evil universal enemy of all time will be finished, at least for a thousand years." By the spring, four labor camps would be converted to death camps for the purpose of extinguishing the Jews; joining Chelmno were Belzec, Treblinka, Sobibor, and Auschwitz.
1942: Birthdate of Marty Balin of the Jefferson Airplane.
1943 (24th of Shevat, 5703): In Letychiv, Ukraine, German Gestapo commences mass shootings of Jews from Letychiv Ghetto. 200 surviving Jews from Letychiv slave labor camp were ordered to undress and were shot with machine-gun into a ravine. Some 7,000 Jews were murdered in Letychiv. For those with a sense of irony, this was Shabbat and the Torah reading was Yitro.
1944: Seven hundred Jews are deported from Milan, Italy, to Auschwitz.
1945: Hitler gives his last ever public address; a radio address on the 12th anniversary of his coming to power.
1948: Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated by a Hindu extremist. While Gandhi was a figure revered by many, some Jews have their reservations about this proponent of civil disobedience and non-violence no matter what the threat. After Kristallnacht Gandhi wrote, "If the Jewish mind could be prepared for voluntary sacrifice, even the massacre I have imagined by Nazis could be turned into a day of thanksgiving that Jehovah had wrought deliverance of the race even at the hands of a tyrant...the German Jews will score a lasting victory over the German gentiles in the sense that they will have converted the latter to an appreciation of human dignity." Apparently Ghandi lacked any concept of the evil that was Hitler. But even after the war when the total horror was known, Gandhi said that the Holocaust was "the greatest crime of our time, but the Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher's knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from the cliffs....It would have aroused the world and the people of Germany."
1953: The Jerusalem Post reported from Bonn that the West German Chancellor, Konrad Adenauer, assured Israel that his country would pay the first installment of 47 million marks of the German-Israeli Reparation Agreement within the next two months.
1953: The Jerusalem Post reported that IDF patrols had beaten back two attacks by Jordanian marauders at two points along the armistice lines, inflicting heavy casualties. Jordan falsely claimed that a number of Israeli soldiers were killed in both encounters. Both sides complained to the UN Israeli-Jordanian Mixed Armistice Commission.
1953: The Jerusalem Post reported that traces of copper were found near Jenin.
1971: Carole King's “Tapestry” album is released. This recording by Brooklyn born Jewess Carol Klien would become the longest charting album by a female solo artist and sell 24 million copies worldwide.
1978: The Jerusalem Post reported that US President Jimmy Carter sent a sharp note to Prime Minister Menachem Begin, complaining over the plan to establish Shilo, a new West Bank settlement.
1978(22nd of Shevat, 5738): Mordechai Yehuel, 27, of Ramat Gan was stabbed and killed in Ramallah.
1979: The civilian government of Iran announced it had decided to allow Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to return from exile in France. The subsequent Islamist revolution would end the reign of the Shah, a regime which was much friendlier to Israel than the government that would follow. In retrospect, one can draw a straight line between the French decision and the Iranian nuclear threat that the West and Israel face in the 21st century.
1990: The Israeli Government said today that it had no official policy of settling Soviet Jewish immigrants in the West Bank or Gaza Strip, and Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir dismissed the debate over the issue as an ''artificial storm'' created by panicked Arab leaders.
1991(15th of Sh'vat, 5751): Tu B'Shvat
1991: The New York Times reviews The Smile of the Lamb by David Grossman; translated by Betsy Rosenberg.
1991: In Amman, around 3,000 Jordanians demonstrated in favor of Iraq, burned American and Israeli flags and urged Mr. Hussein to fire chemical weapons at Israel. The demonstration reflected Jordan's tilt toward Baghdad throughout the gulf crisis. "O Saddam, hit, hit Tel Aviv!" some chanted. "With chemical weapons, O Saddam!" others replied. Jordan's population is more than half Palestinian, and many have voiced support for the Iraqi leader as a champion who will lead them to statehood.
1991: The Young Professionals of the American Friends of Tel Aviv University is sponsoring a black-tie cocktail party and dance, at Stringfellows to benefit the Adopt-a-Student Endowment Fund at the Rubin Academy of Music at Tel Aviv University
1992: As Israel presses the United States for loan guarantees to cope with a projected huge influx of immigrants from the former Soviet Union, officials here said today that the immigrant flow this month had sunk to its lowest in almost two years and could dwindle even further. According to the agency's provisional figures, 5,800 immigrants from the former Soviet Union have arrived so far this month, with 600 more expected before the start of February, a lower figure than those recorded during the Persian Gulf war, when Iraqi Scud missiles fell on Tel Aviv and other places. The last time the figure fell below 7,000 was in February 1990. Since late 1989, when the wave of Jewish emigration from the Soviet Union began, some 350,000 immigrants have arrived in Israel. The wave peaked in December 1990, when, according to the Jewish Agency, more than 35,000 arrived, making 1990 a record year.
1998: Premier performance of Paul Simon's "The Capeman."
2000: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Einstein’s German World by Fritz Stern and The Greenspan Effect: Words That Move the World's Markets by David B. Sicilia and Jeffrey L. Cruikshank.
2001: Prime Minister Ehud Barak saw 20 immigrants' representatives inside his Jerusalem office and then presided tonight over a modest support rally at the city's convention center as he continued his campaign against Ariel Sharon. Despite Mr. Sharon’s “seemingly invincible lead,, Mr. Barak told foreign journalists today that he discounts the polls, remains confident of victory.
2003: In an article entitled “A Burst of Light Provides Privacy,” Elaine Louie discusses the work of Ayala Sefaty of Tel Aviv who designed her own underwater restaurant in Eilat.
2003: “The Israeli experiment aboard the space shuttle Columbia has accomplished its goals of studying the effects of dust storms on weather and recording electrical phenomena atop storm clouds, scientists said today. Researchers from Tel Aviv University said their Mediterranean Israeli Dust Experiment had gathered solid information on the plumes of dust and other aerosol particles blown from deserts by storms before being carried worldwide by high winds. The particles affect rain production in clouds, deposit minerals in the ocean and scatter sunlight that affects global warming, the scientists said. ''The experiment has worked without a hitch,'' Dr. Joachim Joseph, a principal investigator, told a briefing at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. ''We have very good data, very unique data.'' A twin-camera multispectral instrument in the payload bay of the shuttle has been scanning desert particles whipped into the atmosphere and, at night, making images of the tops of some of the thousands of thunderstorms that rumble through the atmosphere every hour. The shuttle, nearing the end of a 16-day mission, is to return to the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., on Saturday with its crew of seven, including the first Israeli astronaut, Col. Ilan Ramon, a combat pilot in the Israeli Air Force. The flight, which had been delayed almost two years, finally went into orbit at a time when storms in the Sahara that push dust into the Mediterranean Sea are infrequent. But researchers said luck was with them and they were able to obtain images of dust plumes. The first was made on Sunday, blowing from the western coast of Africa into the Atlantic. The big payoff was on Monday, on the last scheduled pass over the Mideast. ''On the last orbit over the Mediterranean,'' Dr. Joseph said, ''we got a nice dust storm over Israel. ''We just lucked out.'' Israeli scientists said they had clear images of cloud-to-space lightning, called sprites, and the first scientific pictures recorded from space that show an elf, a luminous doughnut-shape electrical glow above a thunderstorm that lasts less than a millisecond. Aside from the successful science, the mission is important to Dr. Joseph because Colonel Ramon is carrying a keepsake, a small Torah scroll used at Dr. Joseph's bar mitzvah almost 60 years ago while he was in a concentration camp in Germany. The elderly rabbi performing the ceremony, who died soon afterward in the camp, gave the Torah to the boy and told him to tell people what had occurred there. Dr. Joseph said Colonel Ramon saw the Torah when visiting his house and was so moved by the history that he asked to take it into space as a tribute. In an interview from space last week with Israeli officials, the astronaut displayed the Torah. ''This represents more than anything the ability of the Jewish people to survive despite everything from horrible periods, black days, to reach periods of hope and belief in the future,'' the colonel said. Because of the gesture from space, Dr. Joseph said, he feels he has finally fulfilled his promise to the rabbi.”
2005: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Lot’s Daughters: Sex, Redemption, and Women's Quest for Authority by Robert M. Polhemus and the newly released paperback editions of Growing Up Fast by Joanna Lipper and Oracle Night by Paul Auster
2005: In “The Observant Reader,” Wendy Shalit provides a prescient synopsis of the varying ways in which Orthodoxy is portrayed in contemporary literature.
Jonathan Rosen’s novel ''Joy Comes in the Morning'' features a beatific Upper East Side Reform rabbi named Deborah whose days are spent reassuring insecure converts, studying the Talmud and cuddling deformed newborns whose parents have rejected them. This paragon is, we are told, like a ''plant . . . nourishing herself directly from the source.'' But if Deborah is a plant, she's certainly not a clinging vine. When she propositions a man named Lev, it's with a sexy whisper: ''I'm a rabbi, not a nun.'' In contrast, Deborah's Orthodox ex, Reuben, is a Venus' flytrap. Although he wasn't supposed to touch her, he had no qualms about sleeping with Deborah, a slip she's sure was ''only one of the 613 commandments he had violated, but perhaps the one he most easily discounted.'' Curiously, Reuben showed ''more anxiety about the state of her kitchen'' than he did about spending the night -- next morning, he went through the dishes to make sure she had separate sets for milk and meat. You might think Reuben is just a guy with a problem, but the problem may also be the author's. In the course of the novel, Rosen dismisses modern Orthodox men as ''macho sissies'' and depicts ''pencil-necked'' Orthodox boys ''poring over giant books instead of looking out the window at the natural world.'' Rosen's yeshiva students ''give in to the simplicity of rules rather than the negotiated truce that Deborah seemed to have achieved.'' Even an elderly lady attracts his withering eye: ''Like many Orthodox women of a certain age, she had the look of an aging drag queen.'' Authors who have renounced Orthodox Judaism -- or those who were never really exposed to it to begin with -- have often portrayed deeply observant Jews in an unflattering or ridiculous light. Admittedly, some of this has produced first-rate literature or, at the least, great entertainment, but it has left many people thinking traditional Jews actually live like Tevye in the musical ''Fiddler on the Roof'' or, at the opposite extreme, like the violent, vicious rabbi in Henry Roth's novel ''Call It Sleep.'' Not long ago, I did too. At 21, I was on the outside looking in, on my first trip to Israel with a friend who was, like me, a Reform Jew. One day, we wandered into a religious neighborhood in Jerusalem, and suddenly there were black hats and side curls everywhere. My friend pointed out a group of men wearing odd fur hats. ''Those,'' he explained, ''are the really mean ones.'' I never questioned our snap judgment of these people until, a few years later, I returned to study at an all-girls seminary and was surprised to discover that my teachers, whom I adored, were men and women from this same community. The women were a particular revelation. Instead of the oppressed drudges I'd expected, they turned out to be strong and energetic, raising large families and passing on beloved Jewish traditions, quite often in addition to holding down outside jobs. Not all of them had been born into this world: some were newly religious women, former Broadway dancers or scholars with advanced degrees who had now dedicated themselves to performing good deeds. After spending more time in homes like theirs, in Israel and later in America, I came to have a very different view of the haredi, known to outsiders as the ultra-Orthodox. Some of my Jewish friends have intermarried with people of other faiths; others have gone back to their traditional roots. Because I did the latter, I'm fascinated by the ways different Jewish communities understand and misunderstand one another. As a writer, I'm especially fascinated by how this happens in print. And it seems I'm not the only one. Although some Jewish outsiders, like Allegra Goodman, have written sympathetically of the haredi, other writers have purported to explain the ultra-Orthodox from an insider's perspective. But are these authors really insiders? As I changed from outsider to insider, my perspective changed too. Consider, for example, Nathan Englander, a talented writer whose collection of stories, ''For the Relief of Unbearable Urges,'' brimmed with revelations of hypocrisy and self-inflicted misery: a fistfight that breaks out in synagogue over who will read from the Torah; a sect whose members fast three days instead of one and drink a dozen glasses of wine at the Passover Seders instead of four; a man whose rabbi sends him to a prostitute when his wife won't sleep with him. Of course, the Orthodox don't actually brawl over who reads the Torah, no rabbi is allowed to write a dispensation for a man to see a prostitute, and even extremely pious Jews can't invent their own traditions for fast days or Seders. Englander's sketches were fictional, but did most people realize this? Apparently not. The world at large took him to be a ''former yeshiva boy'' who had renounced his old life. Englander didn't help matters by referring to the ''anti-intellectual'' and ''fire-and-brimstone'' aspects of his ''shtetl mentality substandard education'' -- a strange way of describing the Long Island community where he grew up, which prides itself on its tolerance and dedication to learning, both secular and religious. Englander is about as much a product of the shtetl as John Kerry. He actually attended the coeducational Hebrew Academy of Nassau County and then the State University of New York, Binghamton. It was one of his supposedly substandard teachers who encouraged him to write in the first place. Englander is one of a number of outsider insiders. In 1978, Tova Reich's novel ''Mara'' depicted an Orthodox rabbi who doubles as a shady nursing-home owner, married to an overweight dietitian so obsessed with food that she gorges herself with five-course meals, even on the fast day of Yom Kippur. The Hasidic hero of her 1988 novel, ''Master of the Return'' (praised by Publishers Weekly for its ''devastating accuracy'') abandons his semi-paralyzed pregnant wife in her wheelchair in order to spit on immodestly clad female strangers; at home, he helps his 2-year-old son get ''high on the One Above'' by giving him marijuana. Reich's 1995 novel, ''The Jewish War,'' told of a band of zealots whose leader takes three wives and encourages his followers to kill themselves. Reich herself prefers not to comment on the level of observance she keeps today, while Englander for his part publicly boasts about eating pork. Ostensibly about ultra-Orthodox Jews, this kind of ''insider'' fiction actually reveals the authors' estrangement from the traditional Orthodox community, and sometimes from Judaism itself. Unlike Bernard Malamud, Saul Bellow and Philip Roth assimilated Jews who have written profoundly about the alienation that accompanies that way of life, the outsider insiders write about a community they may never have been part of. One of the most popular of these is Tova Mirvis. In her first novel, ''The Ladies Auxiliary,'' the Orthodox women of Memphis appear in an unsettlingly harsh light. One of Mirvis's favorite themes is the oddball ba'al teshuvah (literally, ''master of repentance''), a deeply observant Jew who did not grow up as one. Such a type can be seen in ''The Ladies Auxiliary'': Jocelyn, who after years of keeping kosher still regularly indulges in the shrimp salad she hides in her freezer. In Mirvis's more recent novel, ''The Outside World,'' we meet Shayna, a mother of five girls living in an ultra-Orthodox Brooklyn community. Shayna supposedly chose a more spiritual life as a young adult, yet now she spends most of her time reading bridal magazines. Another character, Bryan, is a 19-year-old who returns home from Israel as a deeply religious radical, renamed Baruch. Yet at his engagement party, he's suddenly starring in a Harlequin romance: out on the porch, Baruch embraces his fiancee and she leans ''in close, their bodies gently pressing against each other.'' It's bad enough that a yeshiva student would embrace a woman not related or married to him, but to do so in public is even worse. Yet Baruch's younger sister isn't surprised: ''They who pretended to be so holy in public were just like everyone else in private. It confirmed what she had suspected: that it was all pretense.'' It certainly seems that way. Shayna's supposedly observant husband, Herschel, ignores his job as a kosher supervisor for the Orthodox Coalition while collecting a salary, without experiencing a moment's guilt. Meanwhile, Shayna has a television in her bedroom, ''its presence an unacceptable connection to the outside world. It had long ago been smuggled into the house in an air-conditioner box to hide it from the neighbors, all of whom had done the same thing.'' There will always be people who fail to live up to their ideals, and it would be pointless to pretend the strictly observant don't have failings. But before there can be hypocrisy, there must be real idealism; in fiction that lacks idealistic characters, even the hypocrite's place can't be properly understood. Like other outsider insiders, Mirvis homes in on hypocrisy, but in the process she undermines the logic of her plot. The novel's jacket copy announces that ''The Outside World'' is meant to explain ''the retreat into traditionalism that has become a worldwide phenomenon among young people,'' but the uninformed reader might wonder why any young person would want to be part of such a contemptible community. On her Web site, Mirvis says she ''did very little research'' for her books because ''I grew up with all these rules and customs and rituals.'' People who grow up with some traditional customs may imagine themselves experts, but until they've logged real time among the haredi they may know as little as most secular writers. Come to think of it, they may know less, because a secular writer might do more on-the-spot research. What is the market for this fiction? Does it simply satisfy our desire, as one of Mirvis's reviewers put it, to indulge in ''eavesdropping on a closed world''? Or is there a deeper urge: do some readers want to believe the ultra-Orthodox are crooked and hypocritical, and thus lacking any competing claim to the truth? Perhaps, on the other hand, readers are genuinely interested in traditional Judaism but don't know where to look for more nuanced portraits of this world. Thankfully for this last group, another sort of fiction has recently appeared, written by some of the newly religious Jews that Mirvis, Englander and others describe but don't quite understand. In real life, thousands of people each year enter the religious fold, and the ones who are writers are bringing with them the literary training of the more secular life they left behind. This makes them ideally suited to act as interpreters between the two worlds. Consider, for example, Risa Miller, whose ''Welcome to Heavenly Heights'' is a sharply focused fictional portrait of a group of religious American Jews in a settlement on Israel's West Bank. Miller doesn't idealize her characters: they have the same worries and petty jealousies as the rest of us. But she also presents them as people who aspire to transcend their flaws. A ba'al teshuvah since her college days at Goucher, Miller may well have been the first woman to accept the PEN Discovery Award in a sheitel, the wig traditionally worn by observant married women. Ruchama King is another talented insiders' insider. King is also haredi, though she grew up less observant, and her novel, ''Seven Blessings,'' while ostensibly about matchmaking, is really about the revolution in women's learning among ultra-Orthodox Jews. Like Miller, King doesn't shy away from the problems that affect her world, but she also captures the subtlety and magic of its traditions. In particular, she convincingly describes the sublimated excitement that characterizes ultra-Orthodox dating as tiny gestures take on heightened meaning. The promising young poet Eve Grubin, who was raised on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and went to Smith College, has recently committed herself to Orthodox Judaism. Her first collection, ''What Happened,'' which explores her faith, will appear this fall. For now, harshly satirical views of the haredi may still be too common, and novels and stories by sympathetic outsiders like Allegra Goodman too rare. But the emergence of these newly religious novelists is a refreshing development. In their work, age-old customs are being presented in a way that reminds us of the deep satisfactions they can provide, even, or especially, in the face of the uncertainties of modern life. Who knows, they may even succeed in converting some of those outsider insiders
2005: In an article entitled “The Nation; One Clear Conscience, 60 Years After Auschwitz,” Roger Cohen tells the story of Miecyslaw Kasprzyk, an unsung hero of the Holocaust.
As the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz is marked with solemn exhortations never to allow the infamy of the Nazi death camps to return, I find myself thinking of a Pole with a bad leg and dirty fingernails who did not need such lessons in the nature of evil. His name is Miecyslaw Kasprzyk. He lives in a shack atop a hill outside the southern Polish town of Wielicka, near Krakow. Clucking chickens are his principal companions. Now 79, Mr. Kasprzyk stands ramrod straight. He squints at the world through thick spectacles and he likes his vodka, but he sees clearly enough, always has. His bad leg dates to 1936, when it was broken in an accident. Then, in 1941, the leg was injured again: He was shot while trying to smuggle a message to his father in the Polish underground. Without that leg, I might not have found him. I am pleased that I did, pleased that I witnessed his reunion with a Jewish woman, born Amalia Gelband, whose life he saved by hiding her from the Nazis during World War II. Over more than 50 years, a lot is forgotten, but Mr. Kasprzyk's limp stuck in Amalia's mind, an awkward mnemonic. She was 11, a child adrift in the Nazi-terrorized Europe of 1942, when Mr. Kasprzyk, risking his life, hid her in his family's farmhouse outside Wielicka. Her mother, Frimeta, was already dead, killed that year by the Germans. Her father was overseas, unreachable. Mr. Kasprzyk took her in, along with her older brother, Zygmunt. Encouraged by his mother, he hid them in the attic of their isolated home. The children were known to him through an uncle who knew their uncle Pinkus Sobel, a horse trader. ''How can you not help, if a child asks?'' Mr. Kasprzyk said to me. How indeed? How can simple humanity be drained from so many people? But it was. Millions of Germans, and those complicit with them in countries the Nazis overran, must have known that what they were doing, or allowing happening, was vile and unconscionable. It must have occurred to them to try to stop the mass murder. But almost every one of them, after whatever internal debate occurred, acting out of fear or opportunism or anger or for simple convenience, sided with complicity, active or passive. They knew and nodded, or they knew and looked away, or they told themselves they really did not know. Not Mr. Kasprzyk. Soon after the German invasion of Poland in 1939, he understood. Polish police officers ordered him to bring a small group of Jews to a local Jewish cemetery in his horse cart. The Jews were stripped and shot dead, their jewelry distributed to local officials. ''It was the first time I had seen a naked woman,'' said Mr. Kasprzyk, who was 14 at the time. The episode stuck in his throat. ''Someone who does not know the difference between good and evil is worth nothing,'' he said. ''In fact, such a person belongs in a mental institution.'' When the attic hiding-place seemed too vulnerable, Mr. Kasprzyk ushered Amalia to greater safety. Late in 1942, he helped her and her brother find work on two farms near Pleszow, on the outskirts of Krakow. Amalia assumed the name Helena Kowalska, went to church every Sunday, slept on the kitchen floor, peeled potatoes, and told anyone who asked that she was a Catholic whose father was a prisoner of war and whose stepmother had driven her out. The Gebala family, who put her to work, never knew her true identity. In 1945, when Poland was liberated, Amalia, alias Helena, left the farm and found refuge with her brother in a Jewish orphanage in Krakow. War's end brought no relief from penury for the modest Pole who protected them. People, he noted, talked for a while about the missing Jews, but soon the blur of discomfiting names was lost in silence. Hidden in the woods above Wielicka stands a monument to the town's murdered Jews. No road or path leads there. Weeds and nettles advance. An inscription records the slaughtered ''Polish Jews.'' Somebody has tried to scratch out the word Polish. Forgotten Jewish cemeteries, defaced headstones and crumbling little monuments to dead Jews dot Poland and Hungary. I saw a monument last year in Goncz, Hungary, that listed each of the town's Christian World War II dead by name; at the bottom it mentioned that 168 Jews also died. These Hungarian Jews were nameless, citizens of a different class. Mr. Kasprzyk, a righteous Pole, should have his name widely known. He did not do well after the war: The same nonconformism that led him to defy the Nazis with decency also led him to defy Communist authority. ''I was never a member of the party, and you had to be to get ahead,'' he said. ''I do not belong to anyone, not even Christ. I do not like anyone to give me orders.'' Instead of all the pious speeches surrounding this 60th anniversary, I wonder why Europe does not clean up some of those little monuments in towns like Wielicka and Goncz, and does not honor the likes of Mr. Kasprzyk. As Fritz Stern, the great historian of Germany, said recently: ''Even in the darkest period, there were individuals who showed active decency, who, defying intimidation and repression, opposed evil and tried to ease suffering. I wish these people would be given a proper European memorial not to appease our conscience, but to summon the courage of future generations.'' In this particular case, I confess to a personal interest in the memorializing of Mr. Kasprzyk. I see him limping toward Amalia as they met again after almost six decades. I see their embrace serenaded with clucking. I hear his tender words: ''Malvinka, Malvinka.'' The ''Malvinka'' he saved, now Amalia Baranek, a Brazilian citizen, is the mother of my wife.
2006(1st of Shevat, 5766): Playwright Wendy Wasserstein, author of the Heidi Chronicles and The Sisters Rosensweig passed away at the age of 55.
2007: The House of Love and Prayer, a new multi-lingual musical based on the life of Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach, had its final performance at the JCC in Manhattan
2007: In Derby, UK, as part of Holocaust Memorial Day observances a screening of 'Into the Arms of Strangers,” for students from the Millennium Centre, with a Q&A session to follow with Steven Mendelsson who traveled on the “Kindertransports.”
2008: In Manhattan, the 92nd St Y presents Christopher Hitchens and Rabbi Shmuley Boteach in debating “Does God Exist?” Two of today’s most provocative voices as debate the ultimate religious question: Is there a God? Best-selling authors Christopher Hitchens and Shmuley Boteach pull no punches as they discuss organized religion and its place in American life.
2009: Maira Kalman started a new illustrated blog in the New York Times called “And the Pursuit of Happiness” about American democracy today. The first entry chronicled her visit to Washington, D.C. for President Barack Obama's inauguration. Kalman's work is also featured on Rosenbach Museum and Library's 21st Century Abe project. Maira Kalman, born in 1949, is an American illustrator, author, artist, and designer. Born in Tel Aviv, Kalman came to New York City with her family at age 4. She attended the High School of Music and Art, now LaGuardia High School. Ms. Kalman has authored a series of children's books about Max Stravinsky, the poet-dog. She has done The New Yorker covers, including one she did with Rick Meyerowitz called New Yorkistan. She created the sets for the Mark Morris Dance Group production of Four Saints in Three Acts, an opera by Virgil Thompson and Gertrude Stein. Kalman is also known for her illustrations for the 2005 edition of the popular guide to writing style, The Elements of Style, by William Strunk and E.B. White. Maira Kalman was married to the designer Tibor Kalman until his death in 1999. Together, the two ran the design company M&Co. The company remains successful today. Ms. Kalman wrote the monthly illustrated blog The Principles of Uncertainty for The New York Times for one year, ending in April 2007. The blog was published in a book of the same title, which was released in 2007 to critical acclaim
2009: Lillian Hellman’s “Scoundrel Time” opens at the City Lite Theatre in Chicago.
2009: “Batsheva Dance Company, one of the most inspirational and sought-after companies in the dance world, presents its acclaimed production, ‘Three’ at the Performing Arts Center in Purchase, New York. Three, choreographed by Artistic Director Ohad Naharin,is a collection of three dances: "Bellus," "Humus" and "Seccus." Its eclectic mix of music includes Glenn Gould's recording of Bach's Goldberg Variations, a score by ambient maestro Brian Eno and a finale set to the Beach Boys. Since its founding in 1964 by dance luminaries Martha Graham and Baroness Batsheva De Rothschild, Batsheva has become one of the most influential cultural role models in Israel.”
2009: A swastika was discovered today at Congregation Shaarey Tphilohan Orthodox synagogue in Portland, Maine which claims to be Portland's oldest Jewish congregation.
2009 (5th of Shevat 5769: Milton Parker, who brought long lines and renown to the Carnegie Deli in Manhattan with towering pastrami sandwiches and a voluble partner who kibitzed with common folk and celebrities alike, passed away today at the age of 90. Mr. Parker was primarily the back-room planner who brought taam — a Yiddish word suggesting great flavor and quality — to the pastrami, corned beef, brisket and tongue; the cheesecake and matzo balls; the soups and the pickles that placed the Carnegie, at 55th Street and Seventh Avenue, at or near the top of deli maven lists. Theater district tourists have made it a regular stop. His partner Leo Steiner, who died in 1987, was the shtick-happy frontman who greeted customers and escorted celebrities like Henny Youngman, Jackie Mason, Woody Allen and the French actor Yves Montand to their favored tables. The five-inch-high sandwiches were largely Mr. Parker’s domain. Mr. Parker and Mr. Steiner, along with a less active partner who later sold his share, bought the Carnegie from three previous owners in 1976. Mr. Parker retired in 2002 and handed over control of the business to his son-in-law, Sanford Levine. According to savethedeli.com, a Web site that celebrates delicatessens nationwide, Mr. Parker’s business card read “Milton Parker, CPM (corned beef and pastrami maven).” Mr. Levine’s card reads “MBD (Married Boss’s Daughter).” Besides the quality and belly-bulging portions of the Carnegie Deli’s menu items, several other factors brought fame to the restaurant. Dozens of delis dot the streets of the theater district. For years, the Stage Delicatessen — near the Carnegie, on Seventh Avenue — had a superior reputation. But in 1979, Carnegie pastrami was judged better by The New York Times. That touched off what newspaper articles called the Pastrami War. Both establishments fared well, with customers lining up down the block. “Them?” Mr. Parker said at the time of his rival. “They’re living off our overflow.” It certainly did not hurt business, five years later, when Mr. Allen’s movie “Broadway Danny Rose” was released, with some scenes shot at the Carnegie. Born in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, on Jan. 10, 1919, Mr. Parker was one of three sons of Jacob and Jennie Picker Packowitz. His father was a clothing salesman. Besides his daughter, Mr. Parker is survived by his wife of 62 years, the former Mildred Levy; his brother Irving; a son, Jeffrey; and a granddaughter. Both of Mr. Parker’s parents died when he was young. As a teenager, he worked at luncheonettes and diners in Brooklyn. After Levittown, the cookie-cutter suburb, was built on Long Island in the late 1940s, Mr. Parker opened a coffee shop in a nearby mall. At 58, he sold the coffee shop. But after a year in retirement, he was bored. A business broker, who knew that the Carnegie Deli was up for sale, paired him with Mr. Steiner. The Carnegie had opened in 1938; knishes came half a century later. In 1988, Mr. Parker placed them on the menu — but only after staging a publicity-seeking knish-eating contest. The favorite was Jay Resnick, the 1985 Brighton Beach Baths knish-eating champion. The $250 prize went to Mark Litman, a soft-drink route salesman from Brooklyn who said he had never before eaten a knish. In 15 minutes, Mr. Litman downed four and half knishes. Each whole knish weighed in at one pound — an indicator of Carnegie deli portions. “In the history of delicatessens, Milton Parker’s Carnegie Deli caused more heartburn to the Jewish world than anything I’ve ever heard of,” Freddie Roman, the veteran borscht belt comedian, said this week on the savethedeli Web site. “His pastrami sandwich was incredibly much too large for human consumption.”
2010: The Museum of Modern Art is scheduled to present a musical event featuring Israeli pianist Menahem Pressler with the New York Chamber Soloists.
2010: The JCC on the Palisades in Tenafly, NJ, is scheduled to observe Tu B’Shevat with a program of stories and songs led by Miki Rahav, of Kibbutz Yagur entitled “Celebrating 100 years of Kibbutz Life with Stories and Songs.”
2010((15ht of Shevat, 5770): Aaron Ruben, who was a producer, writer and director for some of the most popular television comedies of the 1960s and ’70s, notably “The Andy Griffith Show,” “Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.” and “Sanford and Son,” passed away today at his home in Beverly Hills, at the age of 95. Mr. Ruben, who cut his teeth as a comedy writer on radio for George Burns and Gracie Allen, and Milton Berle and on television for Phil Silvers and Sid Caesar, tapped a rich vein of television gold when, in 1960, he shifted location to the mythical small town of Mayberry, N.C. As the producer and sometime writer and director of “The Andy Griffith Show” for its first five seasons, he helped create one of the most revered series in television history, a gentle family comedy whose troupe of genial actors included Andy Griffith, Don Knotts, Jim Nabors Frances Bavier and Ron Howard. Spotting the appeal of Mr. Nabors, whose guest appearance as the gas-station attendant Gomer Pyle had become a regular role, Mr. Ruben created the series “Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.,” with Mr. Nabors transposing his lovable but clueless character to the hostile environment of the Marine Corps. The series became an enormous hit, coming in second only to “Bonanza” in the 1965-66 season. It ran until 1969. Mr. Ruben was later hired by Norman Lear and Bud Yorkin to produce “Sanford and Son,” an American version of the British hit “Steptoe and Son,” with the comedian Redd Foxx in the lead role as an ill-tempered junk dealer. That series, a runaway success from the outset, ran from 1972 to 1977. Aaron J. Ruben — he told an interviewer that he never knew what his middle initial stood for — was born on March 1, 1914, in Chicago. He went to college at Lewis Institute there, but after dropping out to find work he was drafted into the Army in 1941 and stationed in Southern California. After being discharged from the Army in 1943, Mr. Ruben, who had done some acting and writing in the theater in Chicago, stayed in Los Angeles and began writing comedy sketches for Wally Brown, a comedian on Dinah Shore’s radio show. After nine weeks he was offered the chance to write for Burns and Allen, a breakthrough opportunity that led to jobs writing for Fred Allen, Henry Morgan and Milton Berle in New York. In the early 1950s he started writing for various television shows, including “Caesar’s Hour” and “The Phil Silvers Show,” where he was also the director for two years. In 1960 he was offered his choice of three pilot shows to produce. One, created by the prolific producer Sheldon Leonard, was “The Andy Griffith Show,” which Mr. Ruben chose without hesitation. “You’d have to be brain-dead to pick anything except the Griffith show,” he told an interviewer for the Archive of American Television in 1999. Its innocent, conflict-free version of small-town American life, he said, offered viewers “the grown-up’s Oz.” After “Sanford and Son,” which he left after three years, Mr. Ruben was a producer or executive producer of “The Headmaster,” “C.P.O. Sharkey,” “Teachers Only,” “Too Close for Comfort” and “The Stockard Channing Show.” With Carl Reiner, a regular on “Caesar’s Hour,” he wrote and produced the 1969 film “The Comic,” with Dick Van Dyke in the starring role. In his later years, Mr. Ruben was a court-appointed special advocate for abused and abandoned children.
2010: Joëlle Alexis won the World Cinema Documentary prize for Editing tonight at Sundance for her work on Yael Hersonski's “A Film Unfinished.” The movie examines an unfinished Nazi propaganda film about life in the Warsaw ghetto.
2011: Blood Relation, a documentary film by Noa Ben Hagai is scheduled to shown on the final day of the Seventh Annual Brooklyn Israel Film Festival.
2011: At the 92nd Street Y Drawing on a compendium of more than 600 New York Times articles on the Civil War, Harold Holzer and Craig L. Symonds are scheduled to discuss revelations about America’s great conflict that are still affecting Americans today
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2011: Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit is scheduled to sponsor Super Sunday, the community wide telethon to benefit the Federation's 2011 Campaign.
2011: “Return to Haifa” is scheduled to have its last performance at the Aaron & Cecile Goldman Theater, Washington DCJCC.
2011: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including The Neoconservative Persuasion: Selected Essays, 1942-2009 by Irving Kristol, Panorama by H.G. Adler and Zero-Sum Future: American Power in an Age of Anxiety by Gideon Rachman
Created, Compiled and Edited by Mitchell A. Levin Cedar Rapids, IA melech3@mchsi.com
Copyright; January, 2011; Mitchell A. Levin
1349: The Jews of Freilsburg Germany were massacred.
1648: Spain and the United Netherlands sign The Treaty of Münster and Osnabrück marking the end of the eighty year long Dutch revolt against Spanish rule. The treaty guarantees the independence of the Protestant Netherlands from the rule of Catholic Spain and the Holy Roman Empire. It means that the Jewish community in the Netherlands, which includes many Sephardic refugees and Marranos, will be able to grow and flourish.
1667: The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth ceded Kiev, Smolensk, and left-bank Ukraine to the Tsardom of Russia in the Treaty of Andrusovo. According “to the treaty...arranged with John the Jews, who then lived in the towns and districts that became Russian territory, were permitted to remain "on the side of the Russian czar," under Russian rule, if they did not choose to remain under Polish rule. Jewish wives of Greek Orthodox Russians were permitted to remain with their husbands without being forced to change their religion.
1807: Sir Robert Grant was “called to the bar” and began the practice of law. This was but one step on the ladder that led to Grant’s successful career as a member of the House of Commons. Grant was not Jewish. Robert Grant was a strenuous advocate for the removal of the disabilities of the Jews, and twice carried bills on the subject through the House of Commons. They were, however, rejected in the Upper House, which did not yield on the question until 1858, twenty years after Grant’s death.
1852: The horribly mutilated body of Jacob Lehman was found today in the Delaware River. Lehman was the son of Aaron Lehman, a German Jewish peddler living in Philadelphia. When last seen, Jacob had in his possession $200 worth of watches, jewelry and other items that constituted most of his father's inventory.
1852: A jury in Philadelphia rendered the following verdict: "That the lad Jacob Lehman came to his death at the hand or hands of some person or person to the Jury unknown." Lehman was the son of a German Jewish peddler whose gruesomely dismembered body had been found floating in the Delaware River
1854(1st of Sh'vat, 5614): Rosh Chodesh Sh'vat
1857: The will of Marcus Cone was offered for probate today. Included in the will were instructions for establishing Cone's German Human Benevolent Society of New York, Cone's German Human Benevolent Society of Syracuse and Cone's German Human Benevolent Society of Albersweiller, the Germany city in which he was born. Cone wanted to establish the two societies in the United States because neither of these cities had any organized way to provide aid for their indigent Jewish citizens.
1860: The New York Times reported that "In England, astonishment is expressed” that Emperor Napoleon has not appointed the Duc de Persigny to the Foreign Ministry. Unbeknown to the public M de Persigny will not join the cabinet because he refuses to serve with Achille Fould, the Minister of State. M Fould is a favorite of the Empress who “absolutely clings” to him “as the only man competent to” serve as “Minister of State and of the Household of the Emperor.” Furthermore, M Fould is Jewish, a millionaire and is connected to “other rich Jews” through his banking connections.(“Nearly all the millionaires of Paris at this moment are Jews.”) The Emperor is reportedly “afraid to offend so important” a component needed to ensure the stability of his government. “There are people malicious enough to suggest that the Empress' wish in the matter goes for very little, however, and that she is made to bear the blame because that is more convenient in these personal matters than a reason of State.”
1875: The London Punch published a cartoon of Disraeli shaking hands with Gladstone and saying: "Sorry to lose you. I began with books; you’re ending with them. Perhaps you're the wiser of the two."
1882: Birthdate of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the 32nd president of the United States. Roosevelt’s New Deal created a variety of career opportunities for a whole generation of newly college educated generation of Jewish professionals. For several generations of Jews, FDR was a near-saint. Starting in the 1970’s, questions were raised about Roosevelt’s failure to do more to rescue the Jews of Europe. The problem with criticizing Roosevelt is the need to come to grips with the level of anti-Semitism that existed before, during and after the war. This reality played a part in Roosevelt’s dealing with the furor of the Holocaust.
1893: Birthdate of Rabbi Yitzhak-Meir Levin a Haredi, politician, member of the Kensett and one of 37 people to sign the Israeli declaration of independence.
1900: Birthdate of Russian composer Isaak Iosifovich Dunayevsky.
1903: Leopold Greenberg, Herzl's representative in London, left for Cairo to carry on political negotiations.
1904: Herzl finished his visit to Italy.
1908: Caught up in the dispute between the Territorialists and the Jews who will only settle for a homeland in Palestine, Churchill drafted a letter at the behest of British Zionist, Rabbi Dr. Moses Gaster. Seeking not to offend either party, Churchill expressed his support for the Zionist dream of settling in Palestine while allowing that a temporary refuge may have to be found if such is the wish of the Jewish people. The Territoralists were those Jews were willing to accept the British offer of a homeland in Uganda or Kenya as an immediate solution to the suffering of the Jews in Russia. The Russian Jews were among those who were the strongest opponents of the solution.
1909: Birthdate of activist and author Saul David Alinsky
1912: In response to an appeal by Dr. J. L. Magnes the New York City Jewish community announces subscriptions amounting to over sixty thousand dollars annually for five years for Jewish education in New York City.
1912: In Brooklyn, N. Y, The Atlantic Union Conference of the Seventh Day Adventist convention adopts resolutions protesting against the recent massacres of Jews in Russia and outbreaks of anti-Jewish feeling in so-called Christian countries as un-Christian and affirming their belief that the Jew is entitled to religious and civil rights.
1912: Birthdate of Barbara Tuchman. Ms. Tuchman was a prolific popular historian who won a Pulitzer Prize for The Guns of August a book that President Kennedy urged people to read so that his generation might avoid the folly which led to World War I. Ms. Tuchman won a second Pulitzer for Stillwell and the American Experience in China, a very readable tome that uses the experiences of Stillwell's career in Asia to explain the events that would ultimately lead to the victory of the Communist Chinese. Although she was Jewish, Ms. Tuchman wrote only one book related to Jewish History - Bible and Sword (England and Palestine from the Bronze Age to Balfour). Ms. Tuchman passed away in 1989 at the age of 77.
1916(25th of Sh'vat, 5676): Joseph Jacobs passed away. Born in 1854, he “was an Australian literary and Jewish historian who was a writer for the Jewish Encyclopaedia and a notable folklorist, creating several noteworthy collections of fairy tales.
1918: Birthdate of actor David Opatoshu.
1919: The Versailles Conference decided that the Arab provinces should be wholly separated from the Ottoman Empire and the newly conceived mandate-system applied to them. This decision clashed with the expectation of Faisal's Arab delegation that his state would include Palestine, and the conditional understandings reached in the Faisal-Weizmann Agreement.
1922(1st of Sh'vat, 5682): Rosh Chodesh Sh'vat
1923: In Newark, NJ, Jacob Israel Gersten and Henrietta (Henig) Gersten gave birth to Bernard Gersten, the Executive Producer of Lincoln Center Theater.
1927: Birthdate of Zeev (Heinz) Raphael, a native of Germany who escaped to safety in Sweden three days before the German invasion of Poland.
1928: Birthdate of Harold “Hal” Prince, Tony Award winning theatrical producer and director.
1930: Simcha Hinkas, a Jewish policeman, went on trial in Tel Aviv. He is accused of leading a crowd of Jews who reportedly killed five adults and wounded two children in an Arab family on August 25, 1929 during the Arab Uprising. According to the government, while Hinkas was on duty at a crossroad on Herzl Street during the Arab riots he saw a truck filled with Jews fired on by Arabs who killed four and wounded five. Hinkas allegedly went back to his barracks, got his rifle and led a Jewish mob in an attack on an Arab house. A government witness identified the bullets in the dead Arabs as having come from a government issued rifle, but could not tie them to the gun belonging to Hinkas. Two Arabs later identified Hinkas from a group of 13 Constables, but other Arabs identified different Constables. Alfred Riggs, assistant superintendant of the police “declared that Hinkas was one of the mildest and best of the police” but, “for reasons of his own,” the British police official seemed certain that the Jewish policeman was guilty.
1931: Charlie Chaplin's "City Lights" premieres at Los Angeles Theater.
1933: Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany.
1933: Youth Aliyah opens its offices in Berlin. The previous year Recha Freier, a rabbi's wife decided it would be a good idea to send young people from Germany to Kibbutzim. She founded the Juedische Jugendhilfe organization to help facilitate the work. That same year it became a department of the World Zionist Organization under Henrietta Szold. Five thousand adolescents were rescued before the war and another 15,000 after the war.
1934: Mr. and Mrs. Nathan Chasan of the Bronx announce the engagement of their daughter Shulamith Chasan to Theodore S. Chazin, son of Cantor and Mrs. Hirsch L. Chazin. Mr. Chazin is a practicing attorney and the secretary of the Jersey City Zionist District.
1934: Moses Mendel Penn, the oldest patient ever cared for at Montefiore Hospital for Chronic Diseases, will observe his 109th birthday there today. He has partly recovered from a stroke that paralyzed one side of his body eight months ago. Mr. Penn entered the hospital on the application of the Bronx Young Men's Hebrew Association, of which he is the oldest living member.
1937: Rabbi Samuel Goldenson delivers a sermon entitled “The Ten Commandments and Social Problems” during Saturday morning services at New York’s Temple Emanu-El.
1938: The Palestine Post reported that a Jewish constable, Mordechai Schwartz, who was charged with the premeditated murder of Police Constable Mustapha Khoury, was sentenced to death. The court refused to accept evidence that the previous murder by Arabs of two Jews in Karkur had influenced Schwartz to an immediate act of reprisal. Schwartz continued to claim his innocence.
1939: Hitler, in his anniversary speech in Berlin, talked about the event of war, "The result will not be the Bolshevization of the earth, and thus the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe." Hitler also spoke in warm terms about its friendship with Poland.
1942: In a speech at the Sports Palace in Berlin, Hitler told of his confidence in victory and his hatred for the Jews. "The hour will come when the most evil universal enemy of all time will be finished, at least for a thousand years." By the spring, four labor camps would be converted to death camps for the purpose of extinguishing the Jews; joining Chelmno were Belzec, Treblinka, Sobibor, and Auschwitz.
1942: Birthdate of Marty Balin of the Jefferson Airplane.
1943 (24th of Shevat, 5703): In Letychiv, Ukraine, German Gestapo commences mass shootings of Jews from Letychiv Ghetto. 200 surviving Jews from Letychiv slave labor camp were ordered to undress and were shot with machine-gun into a ravine. Some 7,000 Jews were murdered in Letychiv. For those with a sense of irony, this was Shabbat and the Torah reading was Yitro.
1944: Seven hundred Jews are deported from Milan, Italy, to Auschwitz.
1945: Hitler gives his last ever public address; a radio address on the 12th anniversary of his coming to power.
1948: Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated by a Hindu extremist. While Gandhi was a figure revered by many, some Jews have their reservations about this proponent of civil disobedience and non-violence no matter what the threat. After Kristallnacht Gandhi wrote, "If the Jewish mind could be prepared for voluntary sacrifice, even the massacre I have imagined by Nazis could be turned into a day of thanksgiving that Jehovah had wrought deliverance of the race even at the hands of a tyrant...the German Jews will score a lasting victory over the German gentiles in the sense that they will have converted the latter to an appreciation of human dignity." Apparently Ghandi lacked any concept of the evil that was Hitler. But even after the war when the total horror was known, Gandhi said that the Holocaust was "the greatest crime of our time, but the Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher's knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from the cliffs....It would have aroused the world and the people of Germany."
1953: The Jerusalem Post reported from Bonn that the West German Chancellor, Konrad Adenauer, assured Israel that his country would pay the first installment of 47 million marks of the German-Israeli Reparation Agreement within the next two months.
1953: The Jerusalem Post reported that IDF patrols had beaten back two attacks by Jordanian marauders at two points along the armistice lines, inflicting heavy casualties. Jordan falsely claimed that a number of Israeli soldiers were killed in both encounters. Both sides complained to the UN Israeli-Jordanian Mixed Armistice Commission.
1953: The Jerusalem Post reported that traces of copper were found near Jenin.
1971: Carole King's “Tapestry” album is released. This recording by Brooklyn born Jewess Carol Klien would become the longest charting album by a female solo artist and sell 24 million copies worldwide.
1978: The Jerusalem Post reported that US President Jimmy Carter sent a sharp note to Prime Minister Menachem Begin, complaining over the plan to establish Shilo, a new West Bank settlement.
1978(22nd of Shevat, 5738): Mordechai Yehuel, 27, of Ramat Gan was stabbed and killed in Ramallah.
1979: The civilian government of Iran announced it had decided to allow Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to return from exile in France. The subsequent Islamist revolution would end the reign of the Shah, a regime which was much friendlier to Israel than the government that would follow. In retrospect, one can draw a straight line between the French decision and the Iranian nuclear threat that the West and Israel face in the 21st century.
1990: The Israeli Government said today that it had no official policy of settling Soviet Jewish immigrants in the West Bank or Gaza Strip, and Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir dismissed the debate over the issue as an ''artificial storm'' created by panicked Arab leaders.
1991(15th of Sh'vat, 5751): Tu B'Shvat
1991: The New York Times reviews The Smile of the Lamb by David Grossman; translated by Betsy Rosenberg.
1991: In Amman, around 3,000 Jordanians demonstrated in favor of Iraq, burned American and Israeli flags and urged Mr. Hussein to fire chemical weapons at Israel. The demonstration reflected Jordan's tilt toward Baghdad throughout the gulf crisis. "O Saddam, hit, hit Tel Aviv!" some chanted. "With chemical weapons, O Saddam!" others replied. Jordan's population is more than half Palestinian, and many have voiced support for the Iraqi leader as a champion who will lead them to statehood.
1991: The Young Professionals of the American Friends of Tel Aviv University is sponsoring a black-tie cocktail party and dance, at Stringfellows to benefit the Adopt-a-Student Endowment Fund at the Rubin Academy of Music at Tel Aviv University
1992: As Israel presses the United States for loan guarantees to cope with a projected huge influx of immigrants from the former Soviet Union, officials here said today that the immigrant flow this month had sunk to its lowest in almost two years and could dwindle even further. According to the agency's provisional figures, 5,800 immigrants from the former Soviet Union have arrived so far this month, with 600 more expected before the start of February, a lower figure than those recorded during the Persian Gulf war, when Iraqi Scud missiles fell on Tel Aviv and other places. The last time the figure fell below 7,000 was in February 1990. Since late 1989, when the wave of Jewish emigration from the Soviet Union began, some 350,000 immigrants have arrived in Israel. The wave peaked in December 1990, when, according to the Jewish Agency, more than 35,000 arrived, making 1990 a record year.
1998: Premier performance of Paul Simon's "The Capeman."
2000: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Einstein’s German World by Fritz Stern and The Greenspan Effect: Words That Move the World's Markets by David B. Sicilia and Jeffrey L. Cruikshank.
2001: Prime Minister Ehud Barak saw 20 immigrants' representatives inside his Jerusalem office and then presided tonight over a modest support rally at the city's convention center as he continued his campaign against Ariel Sharon. Despite Mr. Sharon’s “seemingly invincible lead,, Mr. Barak told foreign journalists today that he discounts the polls, remains confident of victory.
2003: In an article entitled “A Burst of Light Provides Privacy,” Elaine Louie discusses the work of Ayala Sefaty of Tel Aviv who designed her own underwater restaurant in Eilat.
2003: “The Israeli experiment aboard the space shuttle Columbia has accomplished its goals of studying the effects of dust storms on weather and recording electrical phenomena atop storm clouds, scientists said today. Researchers from Tel Aviv University said their Mediterranean Israeli Dust Experiment had gathered solid information on the plumes of dust and other aerosol particles blown from deserts by storms before being carried worldwide by high winds. The particles affect rain production in clouds, deposit minerals in the ocean and scatter sunlight that affects global warming, the scientists said. ''The experiment has worked without a hitch,'' Dr. Joachim Joseph, a principal investigator, told a briefing at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. ''We have very good data, very unique data.'' A twin-camera multispectral instrument in the payload bay of the shuttle has been scanning desert particles whipped into the atmosphere and, at night, making images of the tops of some of the thousands of thunderstorms that rumble through the atmosphere every hour. The shuttle, nearing the end of a 16-day mission, is to return to the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., on Saturday with its crew of seven, including the first Israeli astronaut, Col. Ilan Ramon, a combat pilot in the Israeli Air Force. The flight, which had been delayed almost two years, finally went into orbit at a time when storms in the Sahara that push dust into the Mediterranean Sea are infrequent. But researchers said luck was with them and they were able to obtain images of dust plumes. The first was made on Sunday, blowing from the western coast of Africa into the Atlantic. The big payoff was on Monday, on the last scheduled pass over the Mideast. ''On the last orbit over the Mediterranean,'' Dr. Joseph said, ''we got a nice dust storm over Israel. ''We just lucked out.'' Israeli scientists said they had clear images of cloud-to-space lightning, called sprites, and the first scientific pictures recorded from space that show an elf, a luminous doughnut-shape electrical glow above a thunderstorm that lasts less than a millisecond. Aside from the successful science, the mission is important to Dr. Joseph because Colonel Ramon is carrying a keepsake, a small Torah scroll used at Dr. Joseph's bar mitzvah almost 60 years ago while he was in a concentration camp in Germany. The elderly rabbi performing the ceremony, who died soon afterward in the camp, gave the Torah to the boy and told him to tell people what had occurred there. Dr. Joseph said Colonel Ramon saw the Torah when visiting his house and was so moved by the history that he asked to take it into space as a tribute. In an interview from space last week with Israeli officials, the astronaut displayed the Torah. ''This represents more than anything the ability of the Jewish people to survive despite everything from horrible periods, black days, to reach periods of hope and belief in the future,'' the colonel said. Because of the gesture from space, Dr. Joseph said, he feels he has finally fulfilled his promise to the rabbi.”
2005: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Lot’s Daughters: Sex, Redemption, and Women's Quest for Authority by Robert M. Polhemus and the newly released paperback editions of Growing Up Fast by Joanna Lipper and Oracle Night by Paul Auster
2005: In “The Observant Reader,” Wendy Shalit provides a prescient synopsis of the varying ways in which Orthodoxy is portrayed in contemporary literature.
Jonathan Rosen’s novel ''Joy Comes in the Morning'' features a beatific Upper East Side Reform rabbi named Deborah whose days are spent reassuring insecure converts, studying the Talmud and cuddling deformed newborns whose parents have rejected them. This paragon is, we are told, like a ''plant . . . nourishing herself directly from the source.'' But if Deborah is a plant, she's certainly not a clinging vine. When she propositions a man named Lev, it's with a sexy whisper: ''I'm a rabbi, not a nun.'' In contrast, Deborah's Orthodox ex, Reuben, is a Venus' flytrap. Although he wasn't supposed to touch her, he had no qualms about sleeping with Deborah, a slip she's sure was ''only one of the 613 commandments he had violated, but perhaps the one he most easily discounted.'' Curiously, Reuben showed ''more anxiety about the state of her kitchen'' than he did about spending the night -- next morning, he went through the dishes to make sure she had separate sets for milk and meat. You might think Reuben is just a guy with a problem, but the problem may also be the author's. In the course of the novel, Rosen dismisses modern Orthodox men as ''macho sissies'' and depicts ''pencil-necked'' Orthodox boys ''poring over giant books instead of looking out the window at the natural world.'' Rosen's yeshiva students ''give in to the simplicity of rules rather than the negotiated truce that Deborah seemed to have achieved.'' Even an elderly lady attracts his withering eye: ''Like many Orthodox women of a certain age, she had the look of an aging drag queen.'' Authors who have renounced Orthodox Judaism -- or those who were never really exposed to it to begin with -- have often portrayed deeply observant Jews in an unflattering or ridiculous light. Admittedly, some of this has produced first-rate literature or, at the least, great entertainment, but it has left many people thinking traditional Jews actually live like Tevye in the musical ''Fiddler on the Roof'' or, at the opposite extreme, like the violent, vicious rabbi in Henry Roth's novel ''Call It Sleep.'' Not long ago, I did too. At 21, I was on the outside looking in, on my first trip to Israel with a friend who was, like me, a Reform Jew. One day, we wandered into a religious neighborhood in Jerusalem, and suddenly there were black hats and side curls everywhere. My friend pointed out a group of men wearing odd fur hats. ''Those,'' he explained, ''are the really mean ones.'' I never questioned our snap judgment of these people until, a few years later, I returned to study at an all-girls seminary and was surprised to discover that my teachers, whom I adored, were men and women from this same community. The women were a particular revelation. Instead of the oppressed drudges I'd expected, they turned out to be strong and energetic, raising large families and passing on beloved Jewish traditions, quite often in addition to holding down outside jobs. Not all of them had been born into this world: some were newly religious women, former Broadway dancers or scholars with advanced degrees who had now dedicated themselves to performing good deeds. After spending more time in homes like theirs, in Israel and later in America, I came to have a very different view of the haredi, known to outsiders as the ultra-Orthodox. Some of my Jewish friends have intermarried with people of other faiths; others have gone back to their traditional roots. Because I did the latter, I'm fascinated by the ways different Jewish communities understand and misunderstand one another. As a writer, I'm especially fascinated by how this happens in print. And it seems I'm not the only one. Although some Jewish outsiders, like Allegra Goodman, have written sympathetically of the haredi, other writers have purported to explain the ultra-Orthodox from an insider's perspective. But are these authors really insiders? As I changed from outsider to insider, my perspective changed too. Consider, for example, Nathan Englander, a talented writer whose collection of stories, ''For the Relief of Unbearable Urges,'' brimmed with revelations of hypocrisy and self-inflicted misery: a fistfight that breaks out in synagogue over who will read from the Torah; a sect whose members fast three days instead of one and drink a dozen glasses of wine at the Passover Seders instead of four; a man whose rabbi sends him to a prostitute when his wife won't sleep with him. Of course, the Orthodox don't actually brawl over who reads the Torah, no rabbi is allowed to write a dispensation for a man to see a prostitute, and even extremely pious Jews can't invent their own traditions for fast days or Seders. Englander's sketches were fictional, but did most people realize this? Apparently not. The world at large took him to be a ''former yeshiva boy'' who had renounced his old life. Englander didn't help matters by referring to the ''anti-intellectual'' and ''fire-and-brimstone'' aspects of his ''shtetl mentality substandard education'' -- a strange way of describing the Long Island community where he grew up, which prides itself on its tolerance and dedication to learning, both secular and religious. Englander is about as much a product of the shtetl as John Kerry. He actually attended the coeducational Hebrew Academy of Nassau County and then the State University of New York, Binghamton. It was one of his supposedly substandard teachers who encouraged him to write in the first place. Englander is one of a number of outsider insiders. In 1978, Tova Reich's novel ''Mara'' depicted an Orthodox rabbi who doubles as a shady nursing-home owner, married to an overweight dietitian so obsessed with food that she gorges herself with five-course meals, even on the fast day of Yom Kippur. The Hasidic hero of her 1988 novel, ''Master of the Return'' (praised by Publishers Weekly for its ''devastating accuracy'') abandons his semi-paralyzed pregnant wife in her wheelchair in order to spit on immodestly clad female strangers; at home, he helps his 2-year-old son get ''high on the One Above'' by giving him marijuana. Reich's 1995 novel, ''The Jewish War,'' told of a band of zealots whose leader takes three wives and encourages his followers to kill themselves. Reich herself prefers not to comment on the level of observance she keeps today, while Englander for his part publicly boasts about eating pork. Ostensibly about ultra-Orthodox Jews, this kind of ''insider'' fiction actually reveals the authors' estrangement from the traditional Orthodox community, and sometimes from Judaism itself. Unlike Bernard Malamud, Saul Bellow and Philip Roth assimilated Jews who have written profoundly about the alienation that accompanies that way of life, the outsider insiders write about a community they may never have been part of. One of the most popular of these is Tova Mirvis. In her first novel, ''The Ladies Auxiliary,'' the Orthodox women of Memphis appear in an unsettlingly harsh light. One of Mirvis's favorite themes is the oddball ba'al teshuvah (literally, ''master of repentance''), a deeply observant Jew who did not grow up as one. Such a type can be seen in ''The Ladies Auxiliary'': Jocelyn, who after years of keeping kosher still regularly indulges in the shrimp salad she hides in her freezer. In Mirvis's more recent novel, ''The Outside World,'' we meet Shayna, a mother of five girls living in an ultra-Orthodox Brooklyn community. Shayna supposedly chose a more spiritual life as a young adult, yet now she spends most of her time reading bridal magazines. Another character, Bryan, is a 19-year-old who returns home from Israel as a deeply religious radical, renamed Baruch. Yet at his engagement party, he's suddenly starring in a Harlequin romance: out on the porch, Baruch embraces his fiancee and she leans ''in close, their bodies gently pressing against each other.'' It's bad enough that a yeshiva student would embrace a woman not related or married to him, but to do so in public is even worse. Yet Baruch's younger sister isn't surprised: ''They who pretended to be so holy in public were just like everyone else in private. It confirmed what she had suspected: that it was all pretense.'' It certainly seems that way. Shayna's supposedly observant husband, Herschel, ignores his job as a kosher supervisor for the Orthodox Coalition while collecting a salary, without experiencing a moment's guilt. Meanwhile, Shayna has a television in her bedroom, ''its presence an unacceptable connection to the outside world. It had long ago been smuggled into the house in an air-conditioner box to hide it from the neighbors, all of whom had done the same thing.'' There will always be people who fail to live up to their ideals, and it would be pointless to pretend the strictly observant don't have failings. But before there can be hypocrisy, there must be real idealism; in fiction that lacks idealistic characters, even the hypocrite's place can't be properly understood. Like other outsider insiders, Mirvis homes in on hypocrisy, but in the process she undermines the logic of her plot. The novel's jacket copy announces that ''The Outside World'' is meant to explain ''the retreat into traditionalism that has become a worldwide phenomenon among young people,'' but the uninformed reader might wonder why any young person would want to be part of such a contemptible community. On her Web site, Mirvis says she ''did very little research'' for her books because ''I grew up with all these rules and customs and rituals.'' People who grow up with some traditional customs may imagine themselves experts, but until they've logged real time among the haredi they may know as little as most secular writers. Come to think of it, they may know less, because a secular writer might do more on-the-spot research. What is the market for this fiction? Does it simply satisfy our desire, as one of Mirvis's reviewers put it, to indulge in ''eavesdropping on a closed world''? Or is there a deeper urge: do some readers want to believe the ultra-Orthodox are crooked and hypocritical, and thus lacking any competing claim to the truth? Perhaps, on the other hand, readers are genuinely interested in traditional Judaism but don't know where to look for more nuanced portraits of this world. Thankfully for this last group, another sort of fiction has recently appeared, written by some of the newly religious Jews that Mirvis, Englander and others describe but don't quite understand. In real life, thousands of people each year enter the religious fold, and the ones who are writers are bringing with them the literary training of the more secular life they left behind. This makes them ideally suited to act as interpreters between the two worlds. Consider, for example, Risa Miller, whose ''Welcome to Heavenly Heights'' is a sharply focused fictional portrait of a group of religious American Jews in a settlement on Israel's West Bank. Miller doesn't idealize her characters: they have the same worries and petty jealousies as the rest of us. But she also presents them as people who aspire to transcend their flaws. A ba'al teshuvah since her college days at Goucher, Miller may well have been the first woman to accept the PEN Discovery Award in a sheitel, the wig traditionally worn by observant married women. Ruchama King is another talented insiders' insider. King is also haredi, though she grew up less observant, and her novel, ''Seven Blessings,'' while ostensibly about matchmaking, is really about the revolution in women's learning among ultra-Orthodox Jews. Like Miller, King doesn't shy away from the problems that affect her world, but she also captures the subtlety and magic of its traditions. In particular, she convincingly describes the sublimated excitement that characterizes ultra-Orthodox dating as tiny gestures take on heightened meaning. The promising young poet Eve Grubin, who was raised on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and went to Smith College, has recently committed herself to Orthodox Judaism. Her first collection, ''What Happened,'' which explores her faith, will appear this fall. For now, harshly satirical views of the haredi may still be too common, and novels and stories by sympathetic outsiders like Allegra Goodman too rare. But the emergence of these newly religious novelists is a refreshing development. In their work, age-old customs are being presented in a way that reminds us of the deep satisfactions they can provide, even, or especially, in the face of the uncertainties of modern life. Who knows, they may even succeed in converting some of those outsider insiders
2005: In an article entitled “The Nation; One Clear Conscience, 60 Years After Auschwitz,” Roger Cohen tells the story of Miecyslaw Kasprzyk, an unsung hero of the Holocaust.
As the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz is marked with solemn exhortations never to allow the infamy of the Nazi death camps to return, I find myself thinking of a Pole with a bad leg and dirty fingernails who did not need such lessons in the nature of evil. His name is Miecyslaw Kasprzyk. He lives in a shack atop a hill outside the southern Polish town of Wielicka, near Krakow. Clucking chickens are his principal companions. Now 79, Mr. Kasprzyk stands ramrod straight. He squints at the world through thick spectacles and he likes his vodka, but he sees clearly enough, always has. His bad leg dates to 1936, when it was broken in an accident. Then, in 1941, the leg was injured again: He was shot while trying to smuggle a message to his father in the Polish underground. Without that leg, I might not have found him. I am pleased that I did, pleased that I witnessed his reunion with a Jewish woman, born Amalia Gelband, whose life he saved by hiding her from the Nazis during World War II. Over more than 50 years, a lot is forgotten, but Mr. Kasprzyk's limp stuck in Amalia's mind, an awkward mnemonic. She was 11, a child adrift in the Nazi-terrorized Europe of 1942, when Mr. Kasprzyk, risking his life, hid her in his family's farmhouse outside Wielicka. Her mother, Frimeta, was already dead, killed that year by the Germans. Her father was overseas, unreachable. Mr. Kasprzyk took her in, along with her older brother, Zygmunt. Encouraged by his mother, he hid them in the attic of their isolated home. The children were known to him through an uncle who knew their uncle Pinkus Sobel, a horse trader. ''How can you not help, if a child asks?'' Mr. Kasprzyk said to me. How indeed? How can simple humanity be drained from so many people? But it was. Millions of Germans, and those complicit with them in countries the Nazis overran, must have known that what they were doing, or allowing happening, was vile and unconscionable. It must have occurred to them to try to stop the mass murder. But almost every one of them, after whatever internal debate occurred, acting out of fear or opportunism or anger or for simple convenience, sided with complicity, active or passive. They knew and nodded, or they knew and looked away, or they told themselves they really did not know. Not Mr. Kasprzyk. Soon after the German invasion of Poland in 1939, he understood. Polish police officers ordered him to bring a small group of Jews to a local Jewish cemetery in his horse cart. The Jews were stripped and shot dead, their jewelry distributed to local officials. ''It was the first time I had seen a naked woman,'' said Mr. Kasprzyk, who was 14 at the time. The episode stuck in his throat. ''Someone who does not know the difference between good and evil is worth nothing,'' he said. ''In fact, such a person belongs in a mental institution.'' When the attic hiding-place seemed too vulnerable, Mr. Kasprzyk ushered Amalia to greater safety. Late in 1942, he helped her and her brother find work on two farms near Pleszow, on the outskirts of Krakow. Amalia assumed the name Helena Kowalska, went to church every Sunday, slept on the kitchen floor, peeled potatoes, and told anyone who asked that she was a Catholic whose father was a prisoner of war and whose stepmother had driven her out. The Gebala family, who put her to work, never knew her true identity. In 1945, when Poland was liberated, Amalia, alias Helena, left the farm and found refuge with her brother in a Jewish orphanage in Krakow. War's end brought no relief from penury for the modest Pole who protected them. People, he noted, talked for a while about the missing Jews, but soon the blur of discomfiting names was lost in silence. Hidden in the woods above Wielicka stands a monument to the town's murdered Jews. No road or path leads there. Weeds and nettles advance. An inscription records the slaughtered ''Polish Jews.'' Somebody has tried to scratch out the word Polish. Forgotten Jewish cemeteries, defaced headstones and crumbling little monuments to dead Jews dot Poland and Hungary. I saw a monument last year in Goncz, Hungary, that listed each of the town's Christian World War II dead by name; at the bottom it mentioned that 168 Jews also died. These Hungarian Jews were nameless, citizens of a different class. Mr. Kasprzyk, a righteous Pole, should have his name widely known. He did not do well after the war: The same nonconformism that led him to defy the Nazis with decency also led him to defy Communist authority. ''I was never a member of the party, and you had to be to get ahead,'' he said. ''I do not belong to anyone, not even Christ. I do not like anyone to give me orders.'' Instead of all the pious speeches surrounding this 60th anniversary, I wonder why Europe does not clean up some of those little monuments in towns like Wielicka and Goncz, and does not honor the likes of Mr. Kasprzyk. As Fritz Stern, the great historian of Germany, said recently: ''Even in the darkest period, there were individuals who showed active decency, who, defying intimidation and repression, opposed evil and tried to ease suffering. I wish these people would be given a proper European memorial not to appease our conscience, but to summon the courage of future generations.'' In this particular case, I confess to a personal interest in the memorializing of Mr. Kasprzyk. I see him limping toward Amalia as they met again after almost six decades. I see their embrace serenaded with clucking. I hear his tender words: ''Malvinka, Malvinka.'' The ''Malvinka'' he saved, now Amalia Baranek, a Brazilian citizen, is the mother of my wife.
2006(1st of Shevat, 5766): Playwright Wendy Wasserstein, author of the Heidi Chronicles and The Sisters Rosensweig passed away at the age of 55.
2007: The House of Love and Prayer, a new multi-lingual musical based on the life of Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach, had its final performance at the JCC in Manhattan
2007: In Derby, UK, as part of Holocaust Memorial Day observances a screening of 'Into the Arms of Strangers,” for students from the Millennium Centre, with a Q&A session to follow with Steven Mendelsson who traveled on the “Kindertransports.”
2008: In Manhattan, the 92nd St Y presents Christopher Hitchens and Rabbi Shmuley Boteach in debating “Does God Exist?” Two of today’s most provocative voices as debate the ultimate religious question: Is there a God? Best-selling authors Christopher Hitchens and Shmuley Boteach pull no punches as they discuss organized religion and its place in American life.
2009: Maira Kalman started a new illustrated blog in the New York Times called “And the Pursuit of Happiness” about American democracy today. The first entry chronicled her visit to Washington, D.C. for President Barack Obama's inauguration. Kalman's work is also featured on Rosenbach Museum and Library's 21st Century Abe project. Maira Kalman, born in 1949, is an American illustrator, author, artist, and designer. Born in Tel Aviv, Kalman came to New York City with her family at age 4. She attended the High School of Music and Art, now LaGuardia High School. Ms. Kalman has authored a series of children's books about Max Stravinsky, the poet-dog. She has done The New Yorker covers, including one she did with Rick Meyerowitz called New Yorkistan. She created the sets for the Mark Morris Dance Group production of Four Saints in Three Acts, an opera by Virgil Thompson and Gertrude Stein. Kalman is also known for her illustrations for the 2005 edition of the popular guide to writing style, The Elements of Style, by William Strunk and E.B. White. Maira Kalman was married to the designer Tibor Kalman until his death in 1999. Together, the two ran the design company M&Co. The company remains successful today. Ms. Kalman wrote the monthly illustrated blog The Principles of Uncertainty for The New York Times for one year, ending in April 2007. The blog was published in a book of the same title, which was released in 2007 to critical acclaim
2009: Lillian Hellman’s “Scoundrel Time” opens at the City Lite Theatre in Chicago.
2009: “Batsheva Dance Company, one of the most inspirational and sought-after companies in the dance world, presents its acclaimed production, ‘Three’ at the Performing Arts Center in Purchase, New York. Three, choreographed by Artistic Director Ohad Naharin,is a collection of three dances: "Bellus," "Humus" and "Seccus." Its eclectic mix of music includes Glenn Gould's recording of Bach's Goldberg Variations, a score by ambient maestro Brian Eno and a finale set to the Beach Boys. Since its founding in 1964 by dance luminaries Martha Graham and Baroness Batsheva De Rothschild, Batsheva has become one of the most influential cultural role models in Israel.”
2009: A swastika was discovered today at Congregation Shaarey Tphilohan Orthodox synagogue in Portland, Maine which claims to be Portland's oldest Jewish congregation.
2009 (5th of Shevat 5769: Milton Parker, who brought long lines and renown to the Carnegie Deli in Manhattan with towering pastrami sandwiches and a voluble partner who kibitzed with common folk and celebrities alike, passed away today at the age of 90. Mr. Parker was primarily the back-room planner who brought taam — a Yiddish word suggesting great flavor and quality — to the pastrami, corned beef, brisket and tongue; the cheesecake and matzo balls; the soups and the pickles that placed the Carnegie, at 55th Street and Seventh Avenue, at or near the top of deli maven lists. Theater district tourists have made it a regular stop. His partner Leo Steiner, who died in 1987, was the shtick-happy frontman who greeted customers and escorted celebrities like Henny Youngman, Jackie Mason, Woody Allen and the French actor Yves Montand to their favored tables. The five-inch-high sandwiches were largely Mr. Parker’s domain. Mr. Parker and Mr. Steiner, along with a less active partner who later sold his share, bought the Carnegie from three previous owners in 1976. Mr. Parker retired in 2002 and handed over control of the business to his son-in-law, Sanford Levine. According to savethedeli.com, a Web site that celebrates delicatessens nationwide, Mr. Parker’s business card read “Milton Parker, CPM (corned beef and pastrami maven).” Mr. Levine’s card reads “MBD (Married Boss’s Daughter).” Besides the quality and belly-bulging portions of the Carnegie Deli’s menu items, several other factors brought fame to the restaurant. Dozens of delis dot the streets of the theater district. For years, the Stage Delicatessen — near the Carnegie, on Seventh Avenue — had a superior reputation. But in 1979, Carnegie pastrami was judged better by The New York Times. That touched off what newspaper articles called the Pastrami War. Both establishments fared well, with customers lining up down the block. “Them?” Mr. Parker said at the time of his rival. “They’re living off our overflow.” It certainly did not hurt business, five years later, when Mr. Allen’s movie “Broadway Danny Rose” was released, with some scenes shot at the Carnegie. Born in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, on Jan. 10, 1919, Mr. Parker was one of three sons of Jacob and Jennie Picker Packowitz. His father was a clothing salesman. Besides his daughter, Mr. Parker is survived by his wife of 62 years, the former Mildred Levy; his brother Irving; a son, Jeffrey; and a granddaughter. Both of Mr. Parker’s parents died when he was young. As a teenager, he worked at luncheonettes and diners in Brooklyn. After Levittown, the cookie-cutter suburb, was built on Long Island in the late 1940s, Mr. Parker opened a coffee shop in a nearby mall. At 58, he sold the coffee shop. But after a year in retirement, he was bored. A business broker, who knew that the Carnegie Deli was up for sale, paired him with Mr. Steiner. The Carnegie had opened in 1938; knishes came half a century later. In 1988, Mr. Parker placed them on the menu — but only after staging a publicity-seeking knish-eating contest. The favorite was Jay Resnick, the 1985 Brighton Beach Baths knish-eating champion. The $250 prize went to Mark Litman, a soft-drink route salesman from Brooklyn who said he had never before eaten a knish. In 15 minutes, Mr. Litman downed four and half knishes. Each whole knish weighed in at one pound — an indicator of Carnegie deli portions. “In the history of delicatessens, Milton Parker’s Carnegie Deli caused more heartburn to the Jewish world than anything I’ve ever heard of,” Freddie Roman, the veteran borscht belt comedian, said this week on the savethedeli Web site. “His pastrami sandwich was incredibly much too large for human consumption.”
2010: The Museum of Modern Art is scheduled to present a musical event featuring Israeli pianist Menahem Pressler with the New York Chamber Soloists.
2010: The JCC on the Palisades in Tenafly, NJ, is scheduled to observe Tu B’Shevat with a program of stories and songs led by Miki Rahav, of Kibbutz Yagur entitled “Celebrating 100 years of Kibbutz Life with Stories and Songs.”
2010((15ht of Shevat, 5770): Aaron Ruben, who was a producer, writer and director for some of the most popular television comedies of the 1960s and ’70s, notably “The Andy Griffith Show,” “Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.” and “Sanford and Son,” passed away today at his home in Beverly Hills, at the age of 95. Mr. Ruben, who cut his teeth as a comedy writer on radio for George Burns and Gracie Allen, and Milton Berle and on television for Phil Silvers and Sid Caesar, tapped a rich vein of television gold when, in 1960, he shifted location to the mythical small town of Mayberry, N.C. As the producer and sometime writer and director of “The Andy Griffith Show” for its first five seasons, he helped create one of the most revered series in television history, a gentle family comedy whose troupe of genial actors included Andy Griffith, Don Knotts, Jim Nabors Frances Bavier and Ron Howard. Spotting the appeal of Mr. Nabors, whose guest appearance as the gas-station attendant Gomer Pyle had become a regular role, Mr. Ruben created the series “Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.,” with Mr. Nabors transposing his lovable but clueless character to the hostile environment of the Marine Corps. The series became an enormous hit, coming in second only to “Bonanza” in the 1965-66 season. It ran until 1969. Mr. Ruben was later hired by Norman Lear and Bud Yorkin to produce “Sanford and Son,” an American version of the British hit “Steptoe and Son,” with the comedian Redd Foxx in the lead role as an ill-tempered junk dealer. That series, a runaway success from the outset, ran from 1972 to 1977. Aaron J. Ruben — he told an interviewer that he never knew what his middle initial stood for — was born on March 1, 1914, in Chicago. He went to college at Lewis Institute there, but after dropping out to find work he was drafted into the Army in 1941 and stationed in Southern California. After being discharged from the Army in 1943, Mr. Ruben, who had done some acting and writing in the theater in Chicago, stayed in Los Angeles and began writing comedy sketches for Wally Brown, a comedian on Dinah Shore’s radio show. After nine weeks he was offered the chance to write for Burns and Allen, a breakthrough opportunity that led to jobs writing for Fred Allen, Henry Morgan and Milton Berle in New York. In the early 1950s he started writing for various television shows, including “Caesar’s Hour” and “The Phil Silvers Show,” where he was also the director for two years. In 1960 he was offered his choice of three pilot shows to produce. One, created by the prolific producer Sheldon Leonard, was “The Andy Griffith Show,” which Mr. Ruben chose without hesitation. “You’d have to be brain-dead to pick anything except the Griffith show,” he told an interviewer for the Archive of American Television in 1999. Its innocent, conflict-free version of small-town American life, he said, offered viewers “the grown-up’s Oz.” After “Sanford and Son,” which he left after three years, Mr. Ruben was a producer or executive producer of “The Headmaster,” “C.P.O. Sharkey,” “Teachers Only,” “Too Close for Comfort” and “The Stockard Channing Show.” With Carl Reiner, a regular on “Caesar’s Hour,” he wrote and produced the 1969 film “The Comic,” with Dick Van Dyke in the starring role. In his later years, Mr. Ruben was a court-appointed special advocate for abused and abandoned children.
2010: Joëlle Alexis won the World Cinema Documentary prize for Editing tonight at Sundance for her work on Yael Hersonski's “A Film Unfinished.” The movie examines an unfinished Nazi propaganda film about life in the Warsaw ghetto.
2011: Blood Relation, a documentary film by Noa Ben Hagai is scheduled to shown on the final day of the Seventh Annual Brooklyn Israel Film Festival.
2011: At the 92nd Street Y Drawing on a compendium of more than 600 New York Times articles on the Civil War, Harold Holzer and Craig L. Symonds are scheduled to discuss revelations about America’s great conflict that are still affecting Americans today
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2011: Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit is scheduled to sponsor Super Sunday, the community wide telethon to benefit the Federation's 2011 Campaign.
2011: “Return to Haifa” is scheduled to have its last performance at the Aaron & Cecile Goldman Theater, Washington DCJCC.
2011: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including The Neoconservative Persuasion: Selected Essays, 1942-2009 by Irving Kristol, Panorama by H.G. Adler and Zero-Sum Future: American Power in an Age of Anxiety by Gideon Rachman
Created, Compiled and Edited by Mitchell A. Levin Cedar Rapids, IA melech3@mchsi.com
Copyright; January, 2011; Mitchell A. Levin
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