This Day, January 11, In Jewish History

January 11 In Jewish History

347: Birthdate of Theodosius I the last emperor to rule both the western and eastern portion of the Roman Empire. As powerful as Theodosius may appeared to be, he was no match for the rising power of the Christian church leaders. When a bishop had incited a group of his followers to burn down a synagogue, Theodosius ordered the bishop to pay for re-building the Jewish house of worship. But Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan, overruled the Emperor contending, according to one source, that Christian money should not be used to pay for Jewish things.

1313: The Council of Zamora (Spain) made a ruling which was allegedly based on a ruling by Pope Clement V, in which he allowed the Christians to legally deny accruing any interest on loans from Jews.

1755: Birthdate of Alexander Hamilton, aide to General George Washington, ardent Federalist and the 1st United States Secretary of the Treasury. Hamilton was in Charleston, a city on Nevis, an island in the West Indies. He was the son of James A. Hamilton and Rachel Facucett Lavien. Although the facts are a little murky, it would appear that Hamilton’s mother was Jewish. She had left her husband, Johann Michael Lavien, a Jewish planter before she began her affair with Hamilton was a married man. Since Hamilton was born out of wedlock, he could not go to school at the school run by the Church of England. Instead he attended classes at a Jewish private school. If Hamilton’s mother was indeed Jewish and not just a woman married to a Jew, he would be Jewish according to Halachah. Hamilton never identified himself as a Jew and lived his life in New York as a Christian.

1775: Francis Salvador of South Carolina became the first Jew to be elected to a state legislature. An ardent patriot, Salvador lost his life and his hair while fighting the Cherokees who were allies of the British.

1787: William Herschel discovered the Uranian moons Titania and Oberon. Herschel’s ethnic origins are part of an oft told tale among Germans of this period. William Herschel was the son of German Jew named Isaac Herschel. Isaac married a Christian woman and the children, including William, were raised as Christians.

1799: A state of siege was declared in Jerusalem, as Napoleon approached Gaza and Jaffa.

1849: Birthdate of Dr. Oskar Lassar, famed German dermatologist. He also developed a public bath house system designed to give improve the hygiene of the less fortunate.

1859: Birthdate of Lord George Nathaniel Curzon. Curzon was one of two members of the British Cabinet who were opposed to the Balfour Declaration; the other was a Jew, Edwin Samuel Monatgue. In the end, Curzon did vote to accept the declaration. In the 1920’s Curzon served as Foreign Secretary. He negotiated the agreement that resulted in Egypt gaining her independence. He also oversaw the division of the British Mandate in Palestine which resulted in the creation of the Kingdom of Jordan on the land east of Jordan River. Some Jewish leaders decried this as an illegal act. When partition was later proposed for the land west of the Jordan, many opposed it saying that Curzon’s earlier partition had already given the Arabs their state. For a time, Winston Churchill was one of those who made that argument.

1860: Two factions clashed today at a contentious meeting of the shareholders of the Great Eastern that took place today at the London Tavern in the UK. One faction was led by the Chairman, a man named Campbell. The other was led by Simon Magnus, a English Jew who had made his fortune in the coal industry.

1873: An article published today entitled “The Persecuted Hebrews” described efforts by the government of the United States to ameliorate the suffering of the Jews of Romania. Among other things the U.S. Ambassador in Vienna has enlisted the help of the Austrian government in an attempt to pressure the Prince of Romania to improve the conditions of the Jews living in Moldavia and Wallachia.

1888(27th of Tevet, 5648): Prominent Jewish businessman Jacob Magnus passed away. He was buried in Balls Pond Jewish Cemetery, Islington, Middlesex, England.

1895: As part of the Dreyfus Affair, Major Ferdinand Esterhazy faces a court-martial where he is confronted by Colonel Georges Picquart who offers indisputable evidence of Esterhazy’s guilt and Dreyfus’ innocence. As had happened previously when Picquart had presented his evidence to the deputy chief of staff, the court attacks Picquart and disregards his testimony.

1905 (5th of Shevat): Chasdic Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter passed away in Góra Kalwaria, Poland. He was born in Warsaw in 1847. When he was young his father died, so that when it came time to lead the Ger Hasidic dynasty, he was under-age and he refused the mantle of leadership for many years. Eventually his followers succeeded in gaining his assent for him to become their leader as Rebbe. Thus he succeeded his grandfather, Rabbi Yitzchak Meir Alter, as the second Rebbe of the Ger dynasty of Chasidic Judaism. He was a prodigious scholar and his work the Sfas Emes (or Sfat Emet) deals with the legalistic Talmud, the ethics of Midrash, and mysticism of the Zohar. During the Russo-Japanese War many of his young followers were drafted into the Russian Army and sent to the battlefields in Manchuria. Alter was very worried over these devotees and would constantly write to them. It began to be detrimental to his health. He was only 57 when he passed away. He was succeeded by his son Rabbi Avraham Mordechai Alter. Following the Holocaust, the Ger dynasty became a large movement in Israel.

1907: Birthdate of Pierre Mendes France French political leader who was Prime Minister of France during the Fourth Republic

1908: Birthdate of Lionel Jay Stander, the gravely voiced actor who had a career in movies, radio, television and theatre who was a victim of the infamous Blacklist. Younger viewers best remember him as the butler on the television hit “Hart to Hart.”

1912: The Russian consul in New York City refuses to grant a visa to Jewish journalist Herman Bernstein.

1918: Birthdate of composer Albert Weisser.

1919: Romania’s Jewish population grew today when it annexed Transylvania. Romania promised that it would grant full emancipation to its Jewish population at the time of the annexation. The changes were met with opposition by the National Christian Defense League and riots by right-wing students.

1921: A month before assuming his responsibilities at the Colonial Office, Winston Churchill “was in Paris where he discussed” Middle East policy with French President Alexandre Millerand, “who criticized Britain’s support for a Jewish National Home.”

1921: Birthday of Judith Lieber, luxury handbag doyenne. She “was the first woman to become an apprentice and then master in the Hungarian handbag guild. She survived World War II in hiding and met her husband—an American soldier—on the streets of Budapest. A GI Bride, she moved to the United States and began working as a pattern maker and later foreman at a handbag company before launching her own company in 1963. Lieber's small firm quickly grew, and she soon opened a factory to produce her designs. Today, Lieber's handbags, still made in the United States by skilled artisans, are cherished by celebrities and collectors alike. In 1953, throngs of guests and reporters turned out to see the Judith Lieber bag carried by Maimie Eisenhower at her husband's inauguration; every first lady since Nancy Reagan has carried one. Although she retired from designing handbags in 1998, many of her most famous lines, including the classic beaded Chatelaine, are still in production. Her bags have been featured in numerous art exhibitions and are included in the collections of London's Victoria and Albert Museum, New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., among others.

1922: Insulin was first administered to a human patient with diabetes in Toronto, Canada. The study of the pancreas and the function of insulin took place over many decades and took the efforts of numerous scientists. As you would imagine some of these were Jewish. Two of these were Oscar Minkowski who played a key role in establishing the relationship between the pancreas and diabetes and Rosalyn Sussman Yalow who received the 1977 Nobel Prize in Medicine for the development of the radioimmunoassay for insulin.

1922: Birthdate of Lawrence Garfinkel, an epidemiologist with the American Cancer Society who helped design landmark studies that linked smoking to lung cancer. (As reported by Denise Grady)

1928: Birthdate of David Wolper “an award-winning movie and television producer best known for the groundbreaking mini-series Roots."

1929: Birthdate of Rafael "Raful" Eitan, the native of Afula who became Chief of Staff of the IDF, an MK and Deputy Prime Minister of Israel.

1931: Governor Franklin Roosevelt and Mayor Jimmy Walker were among the dignitaries who expressed their sense of loss when informed that Nathan Straus had passed away today.

1933: In Hamburg, Germany, the Altona Confession was issued by area pastors. In light of the confusing political situation and the developing Nazi influence on the State Church, it offered Scriptural guidelines for those seeking lead a Christian life.

1935: Hakibbutz Hadati, the religious kibbutz movement was founded. Actually, the movement was styled after the moshav, which allowed for ownership of private property. It was affiliated with the HaPoel Ha Mizrachi movement the religious Zionist Labor Organization. Its idea was to combine religious life and labor in a communal agricultural settlement the first being Tirat Tzvi

1942: The Nazis seized 1,500 Jews in Vienna and sent them by train to Riga.

1943: The Höfle Telegram was sent by SS-Sturmbannführer Hermann Höfle to SS-Obersturmbannführer Adolf Eichmann in Berlin listing 1,274,166 total arrivals to the four camps of Aktion Reinhard through the end of 1942, as well as the total arrivals by camp for the last two weeks of 1942.

1943: Birthdate of Steven Neil Posner, the Baltimore native “who with his father, Victor, was caught up in a major corporate raiding case that led to the convictions of Ivan F. Boesky and Michael R. Milken”

1944: “Rabbi Barnett R. Brickner said today that he had been particularly impressed by the good care taken of American soldiers in all the theatres he had visited, including India, the Persian Gulf and the Middle East…Rabbi Brickner is administrative chairman of the Committee examining religious activities on behalf of the military as well a member of the National Jewish Welfare Board.” Brickner shared with his religious counterparts “the task of making a survey of the morale” of America’s fighting men and women.

1944: The Nazis established the Crakow-Plaszow Concentration Camp.

1945: The deportations of Jews from Hungary to Austria have ended. In Budapest, 120,000 Jews await in protected housing for the arrival of the Red Army. Hungarian Fascist Nyilas thugs entered "protected" Jewish houses throughout Budapest, murdering dozens of residents. A gang of eight Nyilas enter one of the houses and kills 15 men, 26 women and one child. Another group surrounds the Jewish hospital, torturing and killing 95 patients.

1948: Maurice Fischer, the Jewish Agency Representative in Paris sent a telegram demanding that the negotiations with the French over allowing them to see secret British documents recently seized by the Haganah be held in Paris and not in Jerusalem.

1957:In Savannah, GA, an expanded structure designed to replace the original Mordecai Sheftall Memorial space was dedicated at Mickve Israel.

1965: Birthdate of Mark E. Halperin, American political analyst for Time magazine and Time.com. and the co-author of Game Change

1968(10th of Tevet, 5728): Assara B’Tevet

1968(10th of Tevet, 5728): Moshe Zvi Segal an eminent Israeli rabbi, linguist and Talmudic scholar passed away. Segal was born in Lithuania in 1876. In 1896, he moved with his family to Scotland and subsequently to London. He was ordained as a rabbi in 1902 and later obtained a degree from Oxford University. He emigrated to the then British Mandate of Palestine in 1926. In 1936 (jointly with Raphael Patai) and again in 1950, Segal was awarded the Bialik Prize for Jewish Thought. In 1954, he was awarded the Israel Prize, for Jewish studies.

1971: Israel's population reached 3,000,000.

1972: East Pakistan renames itself Bangladesh. East Pakistan had gained its independence from Pakistan as a result of war between India and Pakistan. “The major general who masterminded and spearheaded India’s offensive, and who accepted Pakistan’s surrender, was Jack Frederick Ralph Jacob, the scion of an old Jewish family from Calcutta.” There are no definite numbers available as to the size of the current Jewish population of Bangladesh due to a fear of persecution.

1977: Bollingen Prize is awarded to David Ignatow. David Ignatow was born in Brooklyn, and has lived most of his life in New York. He has published sixteen volumes of poetry and three prose collections. Included in these are Poems, The Gentle Weightlifter, Say Pardon, Figures of the Human, Earth Hard: Selected Poems, Rescue the Dead, Poems: 1934-1969, Facing the Tree, Selected Poems-1975, Tread the Dark, Leaving the Door Open, Shadowing the Ground, Despite the Plainness of the Day: Love Poems-1991, Against the Evidence, and I Have a Name. He has taught at Columbia, the New School for Social Research, the University of Kentucky, the University of Kansas, York College of the City University of New York, New York University, and Vassar College. At various times he has worked as an editor for the American Poetry Review and Beloit Poetry Journal. The National Institute of Arts and Letters has presented to Mr. Ignatow an award "for a lifetime of creative effort." His work has been recognized also with the Bollingen Prize, two Guggenheim fellowships, the Wallace Stevens fellowship from Yale University, the Rockefeller Foundation fellowship, the Poetry Society of America's Shelly Memorial Award, and an award from the National Endowment for the Arts. He is president emeritus of the Poetry Society of America and a member of the executive board of the Walt Whitman Birthplace Association. Ignatow passed away in 1997.

1977: France set off an international uproar by releasing Abu Daoud, a Palestinian suspected of involvement in the massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics

1982: The New York Times includes a review of The Dean’s December. It is Saul Bellow’s ninth novel and his first since he won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1976.

1984: Religious women of many backgrounds gathered for a Women of Faith conference sponsored by the American Jewish Committee. “The three-day conference was sponsored by the American Jewish Committee and brought together 100 Protestant, Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Jewish women. Those in attendance shared personal stories of bias and exclusion within their churches and synagogues and searched for new ways to empower women within communities of faith, linking the struggles of women for parity in religious settings to the broader feminist struggle for economic and political justice. The conference reflected two important and growing trends. On the one hand, many of the women found that their faith influenced their thinking as feminists and their commitment to broad social change. At the same time, they brought their critical feminist thought to both their understanding and practice of religion. As women began to look critically at religion through feminist lenses, they insisted—not always successfully—that communities of faith adopt a less hierarchical, more egalitarian approach and advocated for the views and needs of women to be addressed. According to conference organizer Inge Gabel, many women in fact became more involved in religion because of their feminist social activism. She explained, "It isn't just that women are dealing with emotions, but we have something just as important to say intellectually, theologically, politically, and morally."

1986: In an article published today famous chef Marian Buros described the delicatessen started by Arnold Reuben as “the quintessential New York restaurant" decorated with "Italian marble, gold-leaf ceiling, lots of walnut paneling and dark red leather seats.”

1987: The complexities of life in Israel will be the focus of a five-part film series starting today entitled ''A Lens on Israel: Society Through Its Cinema'' at the 92d Street Y. Sunday's film is ''Again, Forever'' and deals with political corruption during the 1977 elections. The guest speaker, who will lead a discussion after the who will lead a discussion after the 1984 film, is Yael Dayan, the daughter of Moshe Dayan and the author of ''My Father, His Daughter.'' Admission to Sunday's film, which will be shown at 7:30 P.M., is $7. A subscription to the entire series is $30. Other movies to be shown on successive Sundays include ''Dead End Street'' (1982), about a prostitute in Tel Aviv; ''Kazablan'' (1973), a musical that addresses the tensions among Ashkenazic and Sephardic Jews; ''Paratroopers'' (1976), which focuses on the values and attitudes of the Israeli army, and ''Smile of the Goat'' (1985), the story of a shattered friendship between an Israeli soldier and an Arab patriarch. The Y is at 92d Street and Lexington Avenue. To order tickets, the number is 996-1100.

1988: Israeli television reported tonight that a Palestinian was shot dead in the Khan Yunis refugee district in the Gaza Strip as he tried to grab a soldier's rifle. He was identified by the Palestine Press Service, an Arab-run news agency, as Mustafa Youssef Khadir, 20 years old.

1988(21st of Tevet, 5748): Isidor Isaac Rabi nuclear physicist passed away at the age of 89. He won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1944. According to Rabbi Fred Davidow, The Healer of Shattered Hearts: A Jewish View of God by David Wolpe contains the following story about Rabi. "The renowned physicist I. I. Rabi was once asked to name the most significant intellectual influence in his life. The interviewer expected to hear "Einstein" or perhaps "Newton." "My mother," Rabi replied instantly. For each day, he explained, when he would come home from cheder ..., his pious mother would say to him, 'So Isaac, did you ask any good questions today?' From her, said Rabi, he learned that the key to wisdom is to ask good questions."

1989: The High Court has overturned an Israeli military censor's ban for the first time, allowing the publication of criticism of the head of the Mossad intelligence agency. In its ruling today, the court said the Tel Aviv weekly Ha'ircould print an article questioning the competence of the Mossad chief, whose name is barred from publication. A Ha'ir journalist, Aluf Ben, 24 years old, said his article, which is to be published Friday, criticized Mossad's role in the Iran-contra arms scandal and the Pollard spy affair, in which an American naval analyst passed American secrets to Israel. The article, which has been banned since August, also blames the Mossad chief for the discovery of Israeli-faked British passports in West Germany and the expulsion of Mossad agents from Britain last year, Mr. Ben said. The evening newspaper Maariv printed more criticism of the agency's director, but some other newspapers said their reports had been censored. Mossad Chief to Retire The Mossad chief is to retire soon after six years at his post. Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir's office denied any link between the retirement and publication of the article.Mr. Ben said the Mossad director was appointed hastily in 1982 as a stopgap during Israel's invasion of Lebanon, when the proposed new chief was killed in an ambush there. Asked how the court verdict could change his decisions to bar news items, the military censor, Brig. Gen. Yitzhak Shani, said, ''The only thing I can say is that censorship will obey the court.''

1990: According to reporter Michael Wines, following the invasion of Panama, U.S. officials are still trying to understand the role Mike Harari, a 62-year-old retired agent of the Israeli intelligence service, Mossad, played under the role of General Noriega. “Mr. Harari is variously rumored to have been an Israeli spy, a gun-runner, or a military adviser to General Noriega. But Mr. Harari, who was rarely seen in public when General Noriega was in power has insisted that he is none of the above, but simply an ordinary businessman. Some Americans and Panamanians describe Mr. Harari as one of General Noriega's closest associates - a man who placed the general's daughters in an Israeli kibbutz one summer, who managed some of the general's business ventures and who used his Israeli Government contacts to entertain and protect his powerful friend. Mr. Harari was born in Tel Aviv. He joined the Haganah, the Jewish militia that preceded the Israeli Army, at the age of 18 in 1945, three years before Israel's independence. After a stint in Rome in which he helped to smuggle Jews into Palestine, he began a career as a counterintelligence specialist for Mossad, the Israeli spy agency. Mr. Harari is reported to have helped in the planning and execution of Israel's successful strike at Uganda's Entebbe airport in 1976, which freed 105 Israelis held hostage by Palestinian terrorists who had hijacked their plane. Prime Minister Golda Meir also assigned him to head a hit squad that located and assassinated the Palestinian terrorists who massacred 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics. That group completed its task, but not before the commandos misidentified a Moroccan waiter in a restaurant in Norway as one of the Black September killers and gunned him down before horrified diners. Six commandos were imprisoned in Norway; a 1988 report said that Mr. Harari was dispatched to Mossad's Mexico City station until the furor died down. While based in Mexico he visited Panama and became friends with Gen. Omar Torrijos Herrera, then Panama's leader, and his intelligence chief, Lieutenant Colonel Noriega. When General Noriega seized power and elevated his rank after General Torrijos died in a mysterious plane accident in 1981, the friendship between the two men blossomed. Mr. Harari has said he retired from Mossad in 1980 to enter private business. In recent years he has shuttled between Israel, Panama and other Central American nations, and he once arranged a trip by General Noriega to Israel, where the general bought at least one house. Mr. Harari also arranged for Panamanian counterterrorist commandos to receive training in Israel, Mr. Stone said. The commandos also served as an elite security detail for the general. In turn, Mr. Harari reaped some profits of his own. At Mr. Harari's apparent behest, Mr. Stone said, General Noriega shifted a contract to service Panamanian aircraft in the United States from a longtime supplier to a Miami business owned by an Israeli aviation company. He also negotiated a sale of Israeli-made radar and air-traffic control equipment to Panama's military, he said. According to one official, Mr. Harari was nicknamed ''Mr. Sixty Percent'' for the large commissions he made on the deals he brokered. General Noriega also made Mr. Harari his honorary consul and commercial attache in Israel.

1992: Paul Simon opens a tour in South Africa. This was his first appearance in South Africa after the boycott of the formerly white supremacist government had ended. Simon played a key role in bringing certain types of African music to Western audiences.

1993: Howard Stern's radio show begins transmitting to Buffalo NY (WKBW).

1997: On the third day of, the Red Sea International Music Festival, the festival returns to Eilat where the opera chorus performs an “a capella” concert at 11 A.M. At 9 P.M. attendees are treated to an orchestral concert entitled ''Romeo and Juliet in Music'' with the Berlioz symphony and the Prokofiev ballet suite.

1998: The New York Times featured a review of the paperback edition of Don’t Call It Night by Amos Oz; translated by Nicholas de Lange. “Not surprisingly, the author's latest novel is set in his native Israel, but it is not a landscape of political turmoil and terrorism that he surveys, but one of discordant domesticity between two middle-aged lovers.”

2001: As the attempt to control cell phone usage in such places as churches and restaurants heats up Gil Israeli, the chief executive of NetLine, located in Tel Aviv, is quoted as saying that a sign saying ''No Cell Phones'' does not go far enough. Mobile phones have become such a public nuisance, he said, that a technological fix is required. His solution is the C-Guard Cellular Firewall, a cell phone jammer developed by his company about two-and-a-half years ago.

2001: In the following letter-to the editor of the Wall Street Journal the leaders of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs take issue with a column by Ira Stoll that “attacks” Rabbi Yitz Greenberg and U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council.

On behalf of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA), which represents 13 national and 123 local Jewish community relations and public affairs organizations throughout the United States, we want to express our dismay over Ira Stoll’s op-ed in the December 29 edition attacking Rabbi Yitz Greenberg. Any reasonable person who has read the full text of Rabbi Greenberg’s speech given last November at the United Jewish Communities’ General Assembly in Chicago -- which provided the selective quotes that formed the basis for Mr. Stoll’s attack -- will conclude that the op-ed is a blatant distortion of reality. Rather than accusing Israeli soldiers and policemen of using excessive force in responding to the recent Palestinian violence, Rabbi Greenberg, Chairman of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, actually praises them for their restraint under extraordinarily difficult circumstances. He notes that in a small number of cases there may have been an overreaction and that Israeli officials are properly investigating them. Rabbi Greenberg, who has had a long and illustrious career supporting Israel and the Jewish people, was simply doing in this speech what he has been doing for decades -- providing our community with a thoughtful, loving analysis of the dilemmas Israel faces in exercising power in one of the world’s toughest neighborhoods. Mr. Stoll also unfairly attacks the Council that administers the Holocaust Museum. While no institution is beyond criticism, we believe that overall this important institution has done an outstanding job of educating Americans and its many visitors from abroad about the history of the Holocaust and current human rights concerns. We are confident that under Rabbi Greenberg’s inspired leadership the Museum will continue to serve this important function.
Sincerely,
Chairperson Leonard A. Cole,
Executive Vice Chairperson Hannah Rosenthal

2000: On his return from West Virginia, Prime Minister Ehud Barak tonight broke the silence that governed the closed-door negotiations with Syria to say that the peace talks had reached a ''decisive stage'' in which both sides would have to make difficult decisions. Speaking in a television interview, Mr. Barak said it was impossible to predict whether the round of talks that begins next week would be ''conclusive.'' He said that he had witnessed ''certain fissures in the Syrian rigidity'' but that he was not reading much into them.

2002: In the following article entitled “When Jews Found a Place Among European Artists,” Grace Glueck provides a fascinating trip through the world of Jewish art as she reviews an exhibition at the New York’s Jewish museum, ''The Emergence of Jewish Artists in 19th-Century Europe''

Except for Camille Pissarro and maybe Max Liebermann, you may not have heard of most of the artists in ''The Emergence of Jewish Artists in 19th-Century Europe'' at the Jewish Museum. But star names are not important here. The salient fact is that after centuries of isolation from Western European culture, there were Jewish artists. Before the 19th century, Jews were absent from art history in part because of their own religious restrictions, to say nothing of the legal limitations on where they could live, work and study. The liberating ideas of the Enlightenment in the 18th century and the French Revolution helped to change the social and political status of the Jews, and by the mid-19th century they had begun to establish identities as artists within the mainstream of European culture. Some kept to Jewish subjects; others ventured into more challenging arenas, like, well, nudes and the avant-garde. But what they had in common was a new freedom to choose art among other professions. They could study in Rome or Paris, join collegial societies and compete freely for honors and commissions. And they quickly seized their opportunities. The show, organized by Susan Tumarkin Goodman, senior curator at large, is billed as the first museum survey of Jewish artists in Europe between the 1820's and the 1910's. It sets out nearly 70 works by 21 of the leading Jewish artists active in England, France, Italy, Germany, Holland, Austria-Hungary and Poland. The artist often described as the ''first Jewish painter'' is Moritz Daniel Oppenheim (1800-82), born in a ghetto community near Frankfurt, who was able to study in Rome and later became a citizen of Frankfurt. Although he is remembered today mainly for schmaltzy paintings of Jewish family life that were made into widely sold prints, he also did well-regarded portraits, particularly of the Rothschilds, the Jewish banking family, who became his patrons. Two are in the show, handsome likenesses of Charlotte von Rothschild and her cousin Lionel, whose spectacular wedding in 1836 also melded two of the great European fortunes. Charlotte is seated in front of Mount Vesuvius, a reference to the bank in Naples owned by her father, and Lionel is seen against the background of an English park, a comment on his father's clout in London. A more poignant Oppenheim painting comments directly on the pull that Jews of the period felt between the observance of their religion and accommodation to the outside world. In ''The Return of the Jewish Volunteer From the Wars of Liberation to His Family Still Living in Accordance With Old Customs'' (1833-34), he depicts a wounded Hussar reunited with his Orthodox family on the Sabbath, after fighting for the Germans in the 1813-14 Napoleonic wars. The family greets him lovingly despite his uncovered head and the Iron Cross, an unwelcome Christian symbol that he wears. The depiction of the two generations is meant to show the conflict between Jewish tradition and loyalty to the state, a theme embedded in the consciousness of many Jewish painters. The ambitious field of history painting attracted a painter born to a wealthy Polish-Jewish family, Maurycy Gottlieb (1856-79). To that end he studied in Munich, but with the unconventional aim of using Jewish history as his text. One surprising result was the unfinished ''Christ Preaching at Capernaum'' (1878-79), a New Testament episode. This huge canvas, whose composition was borrowed from Rembrandt, shows Jesus as Jewish, preaching in a synagogue and wearing a skullcap and prayer shawl as he delivers, before an open Torah scroll, a message of togetherness for peoples of the world. Expressing his universalistic vision through such paintings was one way in which the artist hoped to bring about brotherhood between Jews and Poles and help ''eradicate all the prejudices against my people,'' as he wrote to a friend. The Solomons, [Abraham (1824-62), Rebecca (1832-86) and Simeon (1840-1905)] was a family of Jewish artists in England who were attuned to mainstream culture. Born to prosperous parents who developed contacts with high English society, the Solomons were much affected by the Victorian sentiments and the pre-Raphaelite aesthetic of their day.
A painting by Abraham, ''First Class -- The Meeting and at First Meeting Loved'' (1854), caused a scandal when it was exhibited at the Royal Academy. It depicts a young man and woman flirting -- to our eyes chastely -- in a railway car as her male chaperon dozes. Knuckling under to Victorian mores, the artist repainted the scene, this time with the chaperon properly awake and seated between the now docile couple. (Only the first version is shown here.) But Abraham's younger brother, Simeon, was involved in a much heavier breach of morals. Well known by the time he reached his early 20's for his Jewish religious subjects, painted in pre-Raphaelite style, he broadened his reach to include works of religious mysticism as well as pagan themes. Idealized figures of Italian Renaissance art served as his models, and he was regarded by his pre-Raphaelite colleagues as an important Symbolist. But his homoerotic approach brought public disfavor. And his open homosexuality caused his conviction for indecency in 1873. Ostracized by his family, he became an alcoholic and eventually died in a London poorhouse. His 1892 self-portrait, ''Head (St. Peter, or 'Help, Lord, or I Perish'),'' which shows a bearded, skullcapped head floating on turbulent waters, is an eerie, over-the-top and very Victorian attempt to illuminate his touching plight. There were, of course, more aesthetically adventurous Jewish artists. One was Liebermann (1847-1935), born in Germany to a bourgeois family. Although he studied in Berlin and Weimar, he opposed the German academic tradition and at first turned his attention to French painting à la Millet and the Barbizon School, painting people at humble pursuits. Later he melded realism with Impressionism to produce paintings of the leisure class, like ''Bathing Boys'' (1900), a lively beach scene of frolicking youths. Retaining his Jewish identity, he also painted a series in Amsterdam's Jewish neighborhood, among them ''Jewish Street in Amsterdam'' (1908), a heavily brushed view of customers around a food-laden pushcart. The founder and first president of the breakaway, internationalist-oriented art movement known as the Berlin Secession, Lieberman was denounced in Germany for his lack of national pride. But he held top posts in the Berlin art community, capping an acclaimed career that no previous artist of Jewish origin had enjoyed. A lesser light was Jacob Meyer de Haan (1852-95), born to a wealthy Orthodox family in Amsterdam. For a while he painted Jewish themes, albeit ambivalently, but in 1888 he moved to Paris, became acquainted with members of the French avant-garde and then went to Brittany with Paul Gauguin where he became part of the Pont-Aven school. His ''Self-Portrait'' (1889-91), depicting him liberated from conventional dress in Breton costume, is a respectable Pont-Aven image, its strong outlines and non-natural color affected by this anti-Impressionist group. But today de Haan is remembered, if at all, less for his own work than his appearance in Gauguin's. The 19th-century Jewish artist most in sync with the secular world, and perhaps the most famous, was Pissarro (1830-1903), one of the founding fathers of Impressionism. Born in the Virgin Islands, the son of a Sephardic Jewish businessman, Pissarro, although regarded as a Jew by his colleagues, early on took a negative view of religion, including Judaism, as ''inappropriate'' for a modern, rational society. A radical and an anarchist, he was interested in peasant life and the land rather than in the institutions of capitalism, which he railed against. But his paintings are more concerned with aesthetics than politics. ''Avenue de l'Opéra, Place du Théâtre Français: Misty Weather'' (1898) offers a wide panoramic view down the long avenue suffused with a fine Impressionist mist. Aside from the work of masters like Pissarro, and a few discoveries like the German Lesser Ury (1861-1931), whose voluptuous ''Reclining Nude'' (1889) is symbolic of the radical departure from Jewish religious traditions brought about by the 19th century, the issues highlighted in this show are more historical and cultural than aesthetic. Still, there are some pictures here that tap the emotions more than lightly -- and an understanding of their context, so well explained in the catalog, enhances their impact.

2004: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including The Battle For Rome The Germans, the Allies, the Partisans, and the Pope, September 1943-June 1944 by Robert Katz (author of Black Sabbath, a Holocaust study of the deportation of the Jews of Rome) and The Doctor’s Plague: Germs, Childbed Fever, and the Strange Story of Ignac Semmelweis by Sherwin B. Nuland.

2004: Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel said today that he saw no risk that Palestinians could undermine Israel's Jewish identity by gaining a demographic majority, dismissing a reason pressed by some members of his Likud faction for a swift exit from some of the occupied territories. ''I don't see any demographic danger,'' Mr. Sharon said. Speaking at a news conference with foreign correspondents here, Mr. Sharon also said Israel is willing to resume peace negotiations with Syria, provided that Syria halted all support for terrorism and droppped any conditions of its own for talks

2006: The New York Times described the struggle of F Line Bagels to remain open despite attempts by the MTA to stop the owners from selling what has been a traditionally New York Jewish delight in an atmosphere that resembles a sanitized version of a subway station.

2006: Senator Barak Obama visits a remote Israeli town with Chicago ties. Illinois Senator Barack Obama flew to areas along the northern border with Lebanon today. Obama's first Middle East visit took him to a small village that is well-wired to Chicago. Israel may be a Jewish state, but more than a million people who live there are non-Jews, most of them Christian. But the Christian population in Israel is rapidly declining. That exodus has attracted the attention of the Chicago Catholic Archdiocese and the Chicago Jewish Federation. Israel's loss of its Christian minority attracted the attention of Senator Obama. Three hours from Jerusalem, as far north in Israel as possible, just before Lebanon, this is the town of Fassouta, and this is where the village worships. All 3,000 residents of Fassouta are Israeli, Palestinian and Catholic. The Catholic pastor for this entire village in upper Galilee welcomed visiting Illinois Senator Barack Obama, who is traveling with leaders of Chicago's Jewish community. Fassouta is a living example of interfaith good will in action, an overseas extend-a-hand. A computer lab is part of a literacy project funded by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago and the Jewish Federation of Metro Chicago. "This community center had been built not long before that, but it's empty. Ours was the first project that went into it, and it became a draw for the other things that are now functioning in here. Children's ballet classes, chess classes," said Linda Epstein, Chicago Jewish Federation. Senator Obama may be the first member of congress ever in Fassouta, and a grateful mayor and village leaders proudly gave him a look around. A prominent Northwestern and Tel Aviv University professor says his visit sends an important signal. "Israel has a minority of 20 percent non-Jewish Arab minority, And the visit of the senator to this village is an acknowledgment that there is this minority that needs to be acknowledged and seen," said Elie Rekhess, Northwestern University. But the real winners are the young people of Fassouta, who for the first time have new computers and are wired to the world. Many villages along the northern Israel border have a more troubling distinction. They are easy targets of Hezbollah terrorists just over the border in Lebanon. For years Lebanese militant groups perched just north of Israel have opened fire on Israeli border towns. Most recently, on December 22, the village of Kiryat Shmona was hit by Hezbollah rockets. ABC7 news flew with Illinois Senator Barack Obama in an Israeli army Blackhawk helicopter to the border zone. The news crew flew over Israel's most vulnerable border areas,the narrowest part of the country between the West Bank and the Mediterranean Sea, over Arab villages in the Galilee and then on to the Lebanese border region that recently came under attack. It also visited one of the Israeli homes that was hit by Katyusha rockets in the overnight barrage that killed 14. The family that lives in the house was asleep when the terrorist missiles hit. They survived but their home is badly damaged and their lives shaken. "I thought it was a gas tank that had exploded, because it smelled like fire. We couldn't come out of the room because this room was all filled with shrapnel," said Kiryat Shmona, Israeli. Israeli military officials mapped out for Illinois' junior senator how Hezbollah terrorists unsuccessfully tried to kidnap Israeli soldiers during the attack. They offered information to Obama that the militant militia group is going unchallenged by Lebanese leaders and United Nations commanders, hoping Obama and the US will press Lebanon to stop the border assaults. The Palestinian problem has recently received far more attention than the Lebanese border stand-off with Hezbollah. With the country now preoccupied by the recent stroke of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and upcoming elections, military commanders on the ground in northern Israel are concerned that the rocket attacks will get worse.

2006: The Nation published Elizabeth Holtzman's essay calling for the impeachment of U.S. President George W. Bush for authorizing "the wiretapping of hundreds, possibly thousands, of Americans, in violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act."

2007: The free newspaper Israeli which is poised on the brink of closure published its last edition. Israeli is a Hebrew language daily with a press run of 150,000 copies that is handed out free at such locations as bus and train stations, as well as malls and other business centers.

2007: Ruth Dayan was awarded the Partner of Peace Award by the Neve Shalom/Wahat al-Salam community, a cooperative village of Jews and Arabs mid-way between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv

2007: The Baltimore Jewish community bade farewell to Morton “Sonny” Plant at his funeral held at Chizuk Amuno Congregation.

2008: Today's edition of the Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles published a detailed report about The Spinka Financial Controversy alongside a number of subsidiary articles. The article was the papers cover story and was written by the paper's religion editor Amy Klein. The paper revealed from court documents that the FBI informant was Robert A. Kasirer a prominent LA businessman who is Jewish. Kasirer had been wiretapped by the FBI in conversation with Spinka officials negotiating over the percentage kick-back to be kept. According to an affidavit cited, Kasirer turned states evidence after being confronted with the evidence. The scam according to taped conversation between Kasirer and the Spinka Rebbe revealed in court, was instigated by his Kasirer's father, a major LA Jewish philanthropist. The article also quoted experts on the Orthodox Jewish world, with Joel Cohen arguing that:“Only with the open denouncement of wrongdoing from within the particular observant community can the community hope to demonstrate and protect the Torah's commitment to honesty in one's interpersonal dealings as being at least equal to, if not greater than, its commitment to technical observance of mitzvoth.” Some have suggested that the informant identified as Kasirer should be termed a moser - an informant. The Rabbinical Council of California spokesman commented that the body has discussed the issue but declined to take a view. [Samuel Heilman]], of City University of New York, commented on the controversy in The Forward "There is a great temptation among these rabbis, who come from a culture that often views the ‘government’ as in the hands of enemies, to believe that for ‘higher’ motives is acceptable, in fact, often their temptations are driven by more venal and selfish aims than they might acknowledge. " The Spinka Financial controversy is a case in which five Spinka charitable organisations under the auspices of Grand Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Weisz, the Spinka Rebbe of Boro Park, as well as Weisz himself, his personal assistant, and five others were charged with various counts of tax fraud and money laundering. Their indictment alleges that the five charities were used to launder money and to avoid payment of tax on taxable income by issuing fraudulent receipts for bogus charitable contributions, and charging fees for transfers of funds. Among those charged are four men from Los Angeles, California and two from Tel Aviv. These include a diamond merchant, a business person and an attorney. The five Spinka charitable organizations are Yeshiva Imrei Yosef, Yeshivath Spinka, Central Rabbinical Seminary, Machne Sva Rotzohn, and Mesivta Imrei Yosef Spinka, all based in Brooklyn. The accusations include receiving up to eight-figure sums in contributions to Spinka charities while secretly promising to refund up to 95% of contributors' donations, allowing contributors to then illegally claim tax deductions on money they in fact kept. The scheme allegedly saved the participating donors millions of dollars in federal income taxes. Over the course of ten years at least $8.7 million in donations were involved, out of which the charities kept nearly $750,000. The rest was refunded to donors who allegedly claimed bogus donations on their income tax returns. The case was broken apart with the help of a secret cooperating witness, a Los Angeles businessman who had contributed $1.7 million to the scheme, after he agreed to turn state's evidence and secretly record his former colleagues. [ed. note: Shades of Madofff.]

2008: In New York City, the 92nd Street “Y” presents “Desert Soul Music” featuring Matt Turk and Basya Schechter, the founder of the neo-Chasidic world music band Pharaoh’s Daughter..

2009: In Irvine, CA, Volley Ball Team USA trys out as part of the 18th Maccabiah Games.

2009: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including The Letters of Allen Ginsberg, edited by Bill Morgan, The Selected Letters of Allen Ginsberg and Gary Snyder edited by Bill Morgan and The Journey by H.G. Adler.

2009: The Washington Post featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Sashenka, Simon Montefiore's first novel and With Wings Like Eagles by Michael Korda.

2009: A pro-Israel rally was held at Lincolnwood Jewish Congregation this afternoon to respond to the spate of hate crimes and support Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip. The synagogue's rabbi, Joel Lehrfield, called the perpetrators of the hate crime "cowardly thugs who support Hamas." "We're more worried about Israel than we are about ourselves," Lehrfield said. Jewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago executive vice president Michael Kotzin said it was ironic that he was on a solidarity mission in southern Israel when he heard about the attacks back home. "I wouldn't say that we're in the front lines in Chicago like here, but there are people who are hostile to and hate Jews here and there, and we have to address it," Kotzin said. "It's important that law enforcement takes it seriously. But we won't be frightened or intimidated, just like the people of Israel. Their behavior strengthens us."

2009: Israel's "Waltz with Bashir" won the Golden Globe for best foreign language film.The victory at Sunday's awards ceremony solidifies its front-runner status to win Israel's first Oscar at the Academy Awards next month.The edgy, animated film about a traumatized veteran -- director Ari Folman -- trying to recover his memories of the first Lebanon War beat out entries from Germany, France, Italy and Sweden. In his brief acceptance speech, Folman dedicated his Golden Globe to the eight babies, including three of his own, born to the film's production staff during the four years it took to complete the picture. "I hope that when they grow up, these babies will watch this film together and will see it as an ancient video game that has nothing to do with reality," he said. Many critics now are noting the picture's relevance to the current fighting in the Gaza Strip. The Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which awards the Golden Globes, honored filmmaker Steven Spielberg with the Cecil B. DeMille Award for lifetime achievement. Veteran director Woody Allen's film "Vicky Christina Barcelona" garnered top honors for best musical or comedy picture. Earlier this month, "Waltz with Bashir" was named the best picture of 2008 by The National Society of Film Critics and was named best film at the Ophir Awards, Israel's equivalent of the Oscars.

2009: Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd delivered a moving eulogy today at the military funeral of a Jewish soldier killed by the Taliban in Afghanistan. At the request of the slain soldier's family, donning a yarmulke, Rudd delivered a euology, telling almost 2,000 mourners at Melbourne's Lyndhurst Jewish Cemetery that Pvt. Gregory Sher's death was not in vain.,"He believed not just in the service of which he was a proud member, but also in the ideals to which Australia was committed in the fight against terrorism," Rudd said. Sher, a 30-year-old South African-born soldier, was killed Jan. 4 in a rocket attack on a military compound southwest of Kabul. Dozens of dignitaries followed Rabbi Philip Heilbrunn from the makeshift marquee to the grave site, including opposition leader Malcolm Turnbull, Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard, Defense Minister Joel Fitzgibbon, members of the military's top brass and Israeli Ambassador Yuval Rotem. They were joined by dozens of soldiers and war veterans. Private Sher's casket, draped in the Australian flag, arrived at the burial site in a gun-carriage escorted by members of Australia's elite forces and an honor guard from his own company. A volley of gun shots was fired before Sher's coffin was buried. The prime minister joined the Sher family and other mourners in shoveling earth into the grave. Sher is the eighth Australian soldier, and the first of the country's reservists, killed in Afghanistan since Australia sent forces to aid the United States-led coalition against the Taliban and al-Qaida in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks. He is believed to be Australia's first Jewish military casualty at least since the Vietnam War. Fitzgibbon, the defense minister, told local media that Sher was "an Australian hero.""He understood the risks but willingly did what his country asked of him," Fitzgibbon said. Michael Danby, a Jewish parliamentarian in Rudd's government, told JTA he had never seen a funeral like it before. "There will probably never be a funeral like that ever again, where not just parents but the prime minister, leader of the opposition and three generals helped bury Greg Sher," he said. Rabbi Ralph Genende, the local Jewish chaplain to the armed forces, told the Australian Jewish News that Sher was "a courageous soldier, a mensch and a committed Jew." Sher received a farewell from his comrades at a military ceremony Thursday in Afghanistan; a Star of David was hung above his casket in the hangar before his body was repatriated to Melbourne Jan. 9. In a statement issued issued through the Defense Department late last week, the Sher family declared: "Greg was a man of purpose and committed determination" and "was an extremely positive person with a kind soul. He was the sort of mate who would do anything for anyone, and his friends knew him for the great guy that he was." Sher had previously served in East Timor, where he received several medals. He was also awarded the Afghanistan Campaign Medal, the NATO medal and the Australian Defense Medal. He moved to Australia with his family in 1986, and is survived by his two brothers, his parents and his partner.

2009: JTA reported that As Good As Anybody by Richard Michelson and illustrated by Raul Colon, a book that traces the lives and friendship of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel won the Sydney Taylor Award for Young Readers which is an award for Jewish children's literature. The book tells the story of how King and Heschel, religious civil rights leaders from different backgrounds, came together to fight prejudice. Brooklyn Bridge by Newbery medalist Karen Hesse, won the award in the older readers category for her immigrant novel. A Bottle in the Gaza Sea by Valerie Zenatti, a poignant story that tackles the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from the voices of two teens, won the award for teen readers. The three winners share a theme of bridging community, said Kathe Pinchuck, chair of the Association of Jewish Libraries’ awards committee. Other titles set in Israel are among this year’s recognized books, including “Freefall," a novel for teens, and "Jodie’s Hanukkah Dig," both by Israeli writer Anna Levine; "The Bat-Chen Diaries: Selected Writings by Bat-Chen Shahak"; and "Keeping Israel Safe: Serving in the Israel Defense Force," by Barbara Sofer. This is the first time in the award's 41-year history that one author, Michelson, won the main book award as well as winning an honor for his young readers picture book, “A is for Abraham,” illustrated by Ron Mazellan, according to Pinchuck. The Sydney Taylor Awards, named after the popular author of the beloved "All-Of-A-Kind-Family" series, is among the most coveted awards for writers and illustrators of Jewish children's literature.

2010: The Oy!hoo Music Festival, which is designed to bring together established, new and emerging artist in the Jewish and Israeli music scene in New York City is scheduled to take place at The City Winery in New York City.

2010: The Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel (SPNI) is scheduled to conduct a walking tour for English speakers living in Jerusalem of Montefiore's Windmill and the Yemin Moshe neighborhood.

2010: The U.S. Army will double the value of emergency military equipment it stockpiles on Israeli soil, and Israel will be allowed to use the U.S. ordnance in the event of a military emergency, according to a report in today’s issue of the U.S. weekly Defense News. The report, written by Barbara Opall-Rome, the magazine's Israel correspondent, said that an agreement reached between Washington and Jerusalem last month will bring the value of the military gear to $800 million. This is the final phase of a process that began over a year ago to determine the type and amount of U.S. weapons and ammunition to be stored in Israel, part of an overarching American effort to stockpile weapons in areas in which its army may need to operate while allowing American allies to make use of the ordnance in emergencies. The agreement was signed by Brig. Gen. Ofer Wolf, who heads the Israel Defense Forces' technology and logistics branch, and Rear Adm. Andy Brown, the logistics director of U.S. Army European Command. The United States began stockpiling $100 million in military equipment in Israel in 1990, 12 years after it first began storing weapons within the territory of key allies, starting with South Korea. An American defense official told Defense News that the U.S.-Israel agreement reflects the Obama administration's continued commitment to Israel's security and the understanding that changes in U.S. economic conditions and inflation have limited the weapons available to Israel. The deal allows Israel access to a wider spectrum of military ordnance, and the U.S. official said his government was considering which forms of military supplies would be added to stores in Israel. Missiles, armored vehicles, aerial ammunition and artillery ordnance are already stockpiled in the country. The agreement is expected to aid Israel in its effort to bolster its weapons stockpiles for use in an emergency. Israel's stores of aerial and artillery ammunition were depleted during the Second Lebanon War in 2006, nearly reaching levels the IDF considers dangerously low.

2010: A leading pro-Israel congressman hosted a business meeting in his offices between Israeli officials and a defense contractor in which he profitably invested. Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives Middle East subcommittee, told the New York Daily News, which published the revelation today that he did not profit in any way from the meeting between Alan Magerman, the founder of Xenonics, and two Israeli officials.Magerman tried to sell the Israelis on the NightHunter, a high-powered flashlight, but they demurred, the newspaper said. Business meetings benefiting involved lawmakers are banned under congressional rules.Ackerman had invested $14,000 in Xenonics in 2002 and cashed out $100,000 in 2005 and 2006.It's not clear from the Daily News story when the meeting took place and whether it was held before or after Ackerman had ended his investment in the firm.In a later statement to the media, Ackerman left the sequence of the meeting on his investment unclear. He said the meeting took place "eight years or so ago" and that on March 12, 2002, he took out a loan to make the investment from his friend Selig Zises, who owns the largest stake in New York-based Xenonics."I did no more than arrange an introduction so the parties could decide on the merits whether the product fit their needs and sale capabilities," Ackerman said in his statement. "I understand that no business was ever done between Israel and Xenonics as a result of that meeting or at any other time. I did nothing else in this matter -- not another meeting, not another conversation, not seeking an earmark, not helping with any grant. Ever."Ackerman repaid the loan in 2004 at 6 percent interest.

2010: Remains of a prehistoric Tel Aviv building, which is the earliest ever discovered in the area and estimated to be 7,800-8,400 years' old, have been unearthed in an archaeological excavation,the Israel Antiquities Authority announced today.. The excavation was carried out prior to the construction of an apartment building in the "Green Fichman" project in Ramat Aviv. Ancient artifacts thought to be between 13,000 and 100,000 years' old were discovered there. Archaeologist Ayelet Dayan, director of the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority, said the discovery was "both important and surprising" to researchers of the period. "For the first time, we have encountered evidence of a permanent habitation that existed in the Tel Aviv region 8,000 years ago," she said. "The site is located on the northern bank of the Yarkon River, not far from the confluence with Nahal Ayalon. It is assumed that this fact influenced the ancient settlers in choosing a place to live. The fertile alluvium soil along the fringes of the streams was considered a preferred location for a settlement in ancient periods." Remains of an ancient building that consisted of at least three rooms were discovered at the site. The pottery shards found there attest to the age of the site, which dates to the Neolithic period. During the Neolithic period (also known as the New Stone Age), man went from a nomadic existence of hunting and gathering to living in permanent settlements and began to engage in agriculture. In addition, flint tools such as sickle blades were discovered, as well as numerous flakes left over from the knapping of these implements, which are indicative of an ancient tool-making industry. Flint implements ascribed to earlier periods were also discovered at the site: a point of a hunting tool from the Middle Paleolithic period (100,000 BCE) and items that date back to 13,000 BCE. Other interesting finds were a fragment of a base of a basalt bowl and animal remains, including hippopotamus bones and teeth that probably belonged to sheep or goats.

2010: Miep Gies, the office secretary who defied the Nazi occupiers to hide Anne Frank and her family for two years and saved the teenager's diary, passed away today at the age of 100. Gies' Web site reported that she died Monday after a brief illness. The report was confirmed by museum spokeswoman Maatje Mostar, but she gave no details. The British Broadcasting Corp. said she died in a nursing home after suffering a fall last month. Gies was the last of the few non-Jews who supplied food, books and good cheer to the secret annex behind the canal warehouse where Anne, her parents, sister and four other Jews hid for 25 months during World War II. After the apartment was raided by the German police, Gies gathered up Anne's scattered notebooks and papers and locked them in a drawer for her return after the war. The diary, which Anne Frank was given on her 13th birthday, chronicles her life in hiding from June 12, 1942 until August 1, 1944. Gies refused to read the papers, saying even a teenager's privacy was sacred. Later, she said if she had read them she would have had to burn them because they incriminated the "helpers." Anne Frank died of typhus at age 15 in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in March 1945, just two weeks before the camp was liberated. Gies gave the diary to Anne's father Otto, the only survivor, who published it in 1947. After the diary was published, Gies tirelessly promoted causes of tolerance. She brushed aside the accolades for helping hide the Frank family as more than she deserved - as if, she said, she had tried to save all the Jews of occupied Holland. "This is very unfair. So many others have done the same or even far more dangerous work," she wrote in an e-mail to The Associated Press days before her 100th birthday last February. "The Diary of Anne Frank" was the first popular book about the Holocaust, and has been read by millions of children and adults around the world in some 65 languages. For her courage, Gies was bestowed with the "Righteous Gentile" title by the Yad Vashem. She has also been honored by the German Government, Dutch monarchy and educational institutions. Nevertheless, Gies resisted being made a character study of heroism for the young. "I don't want to be considered a hero," she said in a 1997 online chat with schoolchildren. "Imagine young people would grow up with the feeling that you have to be a hero to do your human duty. I am afraid nobody would ever help other people, because who is a hero? I was not. I was just an ordinary housewife and secretary." Born Hermine Santrouschitz on Feb. 15, 1909 in Vienna, Gies moved to Amsterdam in 1922 to escape food shortages in Austria. She lived with a host family who gave her the nickname Miep. In 1933, Gies took a job as an office assistant in the spice business of Otto Frank. After refusing to join a Nazi organization in 1941, she avoided deportation to Austria by marrying her Dutch boyfriend, Jan Gies. As the Nazis ramped up their arrests and deportations of Dutch Jews, Otto Frank asked Gies in July 1942 to help hide his family in the annex above the company's canal-side warehouse on Prinsengracht 263 and to bring them food and supplies. "I answered, 'Yes, of course.' It seemed perfectly natural to me. I could help these people. They were powerless, they didn't know where to turn," she said years later. Jan and Miep Gies worked with four other employees in the firm to sustain the Franks and four other Jews sharing the annex. Jan secured extra food ration cards from the underground resistance. Miep cycled around the city, alternating grocers to ward off suspicions from this highly dangerous activity. In her e-mail to the AP last February, Gies remembered her husband, who died in 1993, as one of Holland's unsung war heroes. "He was a resistance man who said nothing but did a lot. During the war he refused to say anything about his work, only that he might not come back one night. People like him existed in thousands but were never heard," she wrote. Touched by Anne's precocious intelligence and loneliness, Miep also brought Anne books and newspapers while remembering everybody's birthdays and special days with gifts. "It seems as if we are never far from Miep's thoughts," Anne wrote. In her own book, "Anne Frank Remembered," Gies recalled being in the office when the German police, acting on a tip that historians have failed to trace, raided the hide-out in August 1944. A policeman opened the door to the main office and pointed a revolver at the three employees, telling them to sit quietly. "Bep, we've had it," Gies whispered to Bep Voskuijl. After the arrests, she went to the police station to offer a bribe for the Franks' release, but it was too late. On Aug. 8, they were sent to Westerbork, a concentration camp in eastern Holland from where they were later packed into cattle cars and deported to Auschwitz. A few months later, Anne and her sister Margot were transported to Bergen-Belsen. Two of the helpers, Victor Kugler and Johannes Kleiman, were sent to labor camps, but survived the war. Around 140,000 Jews lived in the Netherlands before the 1940-45 Nazi occupation. Of those, 107,000 were deported to Germany and only 5,200 survived. Some 24,000 Jews went into hiding, of which 8,000 were hunted down or turned in. After the war, Otto Frank returned to Amsterdam and lived with the Gies family until he remarried in 1952. Miep worked for him as he compiled the diary, then devoted herself to talking about the diary and answering piles of letters with questions from around the world. After Otto Frank's death in 1980, Gies continued to campaign against Holocaust-deniers and to refute allegations that the diary was a forgery. She suffered a stroke in 1997 which slightly affected her speech, but she remained generally in good health as she approached her 100th birthday. Her son Paul Gies said last year she was still receiving "a sizable amount of mail" which she handled with the help of a family friend. She spent her days at the apartment where she lived since 2000 reading two daily newspapers and following television news and talk shows. Her husband died in 1993. She is survived by her son and three grandchildren.

2011: The 92nd Street Y is scheduled to present a program entitled “Undoing the Inquisition” featuring Rabbi Juan Mejia.

2011: The Historic 6th & I Synagogue in Washington, DC, is scheduled to host “Food for Thought: Digesting Ethics, Mysticism and Philosophy with Rabbi Yosef Edelstein of MesorahDC.

2011: A senior Islamic Jihad militant was killed today by an Israel Air Force missile while he was driving a motorcycle in the southern Gaza Strip, according to local Palestinian officials. Gaza emergency services said that the targeted militant Mohammed A-Najar, 25, was killed immediately and that an additional casualty had been evacuated to hospital for treatment. Israel Defense Forces sources confirmed the attack, and said that Najar had been planning a terrorist attack within Israeli territory and with rocket-launching cells.

2011: Debbie Friedman was eulogized at her funeral today by friends, rabbis, and fellow musicians, both in words and through the songs she composed and sang, which transformed Jewish worship in synagogues and summer camps. Her acoustic guitar lay on top of her casket during the funeral service at Temple Beth Sholom in Santa Ana, California, the Orange County Register reported. Friedman died Jan. 9 at the age of 59, after being diagnosed with pneumonia and admitted to a hospital a few days earlier. She blended the folk music roots of the 1960s an 1970s and combined them with traditional Jewish prayers and liturgy, and was frequently described as the "Joan Baez of Jewish song." Mourners at the service joined Craig Taubman and other performers in singing such famous Friedman works as "Sing Unto God," "Devorah's Song," "You Are The One," "Miriam's Song" and "L'chi Lach." Perhaps Friedman's best known composition is "Mi Sheberach," a popular version of the prayer of healing for the sick. During the funeral, Rabbi Heidi Cohen of Temple Beth Sholom described Friedman as a modest artist, despite her fame, adding, "If Debbie were here today, she would say, 'What's the big fuss? I don't need this. I don't want this.'" Rabbi Richard N. Levy of Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles said of his former colleague, "Debbie wanted us to believe that God is good and God takes our prayers seriously. Even though all our prayers did not (heal her), they provided an escort into the next world that sang unto God, this woman is going to rock your throne."

2011: The Los Angeles City Council adjourned its meeting in memory of Friedman, whom Councilmember Paul Koretz eulogized saying "Anyone who has ever attended a liberal Jewish synagogue or summer camp or youth group event has been touched by Debbie Friedman. He added: "She was always ahead of the curve -- be it in songs for lifecycle events, Jewish feminist music, or interfaith spirituality. May her memory -- and her music -- be a blessing."

2011: The Jewish Book Council announced today that “When They Come for Us, We’ll Be Gone: The Epic Struggle To Save Soviet Jewry,” Gal Beckerman’s comprehensive history of the popular movement to save Soviet Jews in the latter half of the 20th century is the winner of the Jewish Book of the Year Award

2011: Today, the Jerusalem Post published the following list of notable who passed away in 2010:
Theodore "Ted" Sorensen, 82, was President John F. Kennedy's speechwriter, a longtime adviser and a ghostwriter of Kennedy's "Profiles in Courage."
Daniel "Danny the Red" Bensaid, 63, a French philosopher and former student radical who was a leader in the student revolt in Paris in 1968, was described as France's leading "Marxist public intellectual" upon his death.
Ruth Proskauer Smith, 102, was an abortion rights pioneer.
Harry Schwarz, 85, was a South African anti-apartheid activist who was his country's ambassador to the United States during the transition from apartheid to the Mandela government. He also was a leader of South Africa's Jewish Board of Deputies, and he worked with Israeli leaders to ensure the safety and future of South African Jewry. Schwarz told his own story as part of a museum exhibit of German refugees in South Africa.
David Kimche, 82, was a founding father of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency and a spy who worked undercover in Africa and with the Christian Phalangists in Lebanon before Israel's 1982 war there.
Dov Shilansky, 86, was a former Speaker of the Knesset.
Tony Curtis, 85, actor and artist, was born in the Bronx as Bernard Schwartz. A major sex symbol on the big screen from the 1950s on, Curtis helped finance the rebuilding of the Great Synagogue in Budapest in honor of his Hungarian roots.
Tom Bosley, 83, was probably best known as Richie Cunningham's dad, Howard, on the sitcom "Happy Days." The Jewish Exponent published a piece on Bosley in 2006 when he appeared in a stage production of "On Golden Pond" in Philadelphia.
Zelda Rubinstein, 76, a diminutive (4-foot-3) actress who won a science fiction film award for her role in "Poltergeist" in 1982, was an activist for "little people."
Harold Gould, 86, was best known for his role as the father of Rhoda Morgenstern in the TV sitcoms "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and "Rhoda." Gould, who held a doctorate in theater, taught for four years at the University of California, Riverside, before turning to acting. He appeared in dozens of TV shows and movies, including "The Sting." Gould was originally cast as Howard Cunningham in "Happy Days."
Maury Chaykin, 61, known for portraying detective Nero Wolfe on TV, had film roles in "Dances With Wolves," "WarGames" and "My Cousin Vinny."
Steve Landesberg, 74, an actor, comedian and voice actor, was best known for his work on TV's "Barney Miller."
Bud Greenspan, 84, who was best known for his production of documentaries about the Olympics, was called a "trailblazing filmmaker" by The Los Angeles Times.
Irvin Kershner, 87, a film director, was most noted for "The Empire Strikes Back," the 1980 sequel to the original "Star Wars" film.
Ingrid Pitt, 73, a Holocaust survivor, was an actress in horror films in the 1960s and 1970s.
Eddie Fisher, 82, was a pre-rock-era pop singer. He was married to actress Debbie Reynolds, but left her, scandalously, for actress Elizabeth Taylor -- a move that cost him his "Coke Time" TV series and a recording contract in 1959. Fisher made the first commercial recording of "Sunrise, Sunset" from "Fiddler on the Roof."
Mitch Miller, 99, a record company executive and conductor who became famous for his 1960s TV show "Sing Along With Mitch," (video clip here) was known for speaking derisively about rock and roll. He passed on signing contracts with Elvis Presley and Buddy Holly.
Malcolm McLaren, 64, was a rock and punk music impresario and performer who was most noted for managing the Sex Pistols, a seminal British punk band in the 1970s. London's The Telegraph ran an extensive obituary and photographs after his death.
Doug Fieger, 57, was co-founder of the power pop band The Knack and writer of the 1979 hit song "My Sharona."
David Soyer, 87, was founding cellist of the Guarnieri String Quartet, one of the modern era's most celebrated chamber music ensembles.
David Deckelbaum, 71, a Canadian/Israeli folk musician from the group "The Taverners," was described by the Israeli daily Haaretz as an "iconic banjoist" on the folk music scene in Israel. Click here to see a video of Deckelbaum and the Taverners on Israeli television.
Daniel Schorr, 93, was an award-winning journalist whose name appeared on Richard Nixon's "enemies list" and who angered both government officials and his employers for being a stickler for journalistic ethics and the protection of sources. Schorr spent many years as a commentator for National Public Radio. The station produced a lovely package of stories, audio clips and tributes about Schorr after his death.
Harvey Pekar, 69, was a cartoonist best known for his autobiographical comic series, "American Splendor." His life was the subject of a 2003 film with the same title, starring actor Paul Giamatti as Pekar and featuring a cameo by Pekar himself.
J.D. Salinger, 91, was one of the 20th century's most celebrated and reclusive American authors. Salinger's 1951 novel, "The Catcher in the Rye," still sells a quarter-million copies a year. The New York Times critic Michiko Kakutani said Salinger "domesticated the innovations of the great modernists" and presaged the work of writers such as Philip Roth and Saul Bellow.
Erich Segal, 72, was an author and professor whose novel (and later film), "Love Story," became a touchstone of youthful romance in the 1970s. The film's signature line, "Love means never having to say you're sorry," was 13th on the American Film Institute's list of top 100 movie quotes. Segal, the son of a rabbi, also produced scholarly works in the fields of Greek and Latin literature.
Abraham Sutzkever, 96, was an acclaimed Yiddish poet who was considered one of the great poets of the Holocaust. Born in the Russian Empire, he was a partisan during World War II and spent more than 50 years in Israel, writing what Israeli scholar Miriam Trin called some of the greatest poetry of the 20th century. However, he was largely unknown in Israel because he wrote in Yiddish.
Shmuel Katz, 83, was a well-known Israeli caricaturist and illustrator of children's books. Haaretz said Katz, an Austrian Holocaust survivor who immigrated to Israel in 1948, drew some of Israel's "best-loved" children's books.
David Slivka, 95, who once famously made a death mask of his friend Welsh poet Dylan Thomas, was a sculptor and painter. The New York Times described Slivka as "one of the last living members of the New York school of Abstract Expressionists." His paintings and sculptures are in the permanent collections of many major museums, including the Smithsonian's Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden and the Brooklyn Museum.
Martin Ginsburg, 78, was an internationally renowned taxation law expert and law professor, as well as the husband of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Howard Zinn, 87, was a radical historian and author of, among other titles, "A Peoples History of the United States."
Adam Max Cohen, 38, was an associate professor of English at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. A Shakespeare scholar, he wrote about how the illiteracy caused by his terminal brain tumor enabled him to gain new insights into appreciating Shakespeare's plays as performance art, and not only as great literature.
Martin Grossman, 45, was executed in Florida 26 years after his conviction for the murder of a Florida wildlife officer. The Orthodox world campaigned to keep Grossman from execution.
Rosa Rein of Switzerland, who was believed to be the world’s oldest Jew and the oldest Swiss citizen, died in February, just weeks before her 113th birthday.
Mark Madoff, 46, was an American businessman and son of the infamous Bernard Madoff.
Miep Gies, 100, was a non-Jewish Dutch woman who enabled Anne Frank and her family to hide, and who later discovered and preserved Frank's diary. She was honored by many organizations in later years, including the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial organization in Israel.

2012: ‘The Bintel Brief Exhibit’ is scheduled to open at the Sixth and I synagogue in Washington, D.C.,

2012: “400 Miles to Freedom,” the untold story of the 1984 exodus of co-director Avishai Mekonen and his secluded Jewish community from the mountains of Northern Ethiopia is scheduled to be the opening feauture at the New York Jewish Film Festival.

2012: Yeshiva University Museum is scheduled to present: Curator’s Tour: Old and the New: Mark Podwal’s Textiles for the Altneuschul in Prague

2012: “The Cantor’s Son” is scheduled to be shown at the Yiddish Film Series/ Fundación Marcelino Botín in Santander, Spain

Created and Edited by Mitchell Levin Cedar Rapids, IA melech3@mchsi.com
Copyright; January, 2012; Mitchell A. Levin