Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Culture

Palestine Jews on Lockdown Following Violence

1914 • 100 years ago

Betrayed by Sister and Husband

Nine years ago, Sam and Ida Weiner were married and living happily in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn, where he worked as a carpenter in a trim factory. The Weiners had three lovely children: 7-year-old Rosie, 5-year-old Sam and 2-year-old Saraleh. About nine months ago, Ida Weiner’s younger sister, 19-year old Sarah Lakovsky, came from her family’s shtetl, Sokolke, to stay with the Weiners. After a while, Ida Weiner noticed that her pretty younger sister was getting along a little too nicely with her husband, so she asked if Lakovsky would move to another sister’s home, in West Hoboken, New Jersey. But Sam Weiner and his sister-in-law had already hatched a plan: He emptied his and his wife’s bank account of their $75 life savings and sold a small lot he owned in Jersey City to a fellow carpenter; then he and Lakovsky disappeared. Now Ida Weiner is stuck without a cent and with three young children to feed, all of whom keep asking, “When is Papa coming home?”

1939 • 75 years ago

Palestine Jews on Lockdown

As a result of renewed disturbances, the British military powers in Palestine have halted transit for Jews in and out of Jerusalem and are investigating potential terrorist activity in the neighborhoods of Rechavia and Romema, and on Jaffa Road. The British have also instituted a collective punishment on three poor Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem and have begun to do the same in Haifa. A sum of $5,000 was demanded from the neighborhoods of Beit Yisrael, Habukharim and Meah She’arim. Traffic in and out of Jerusalem was suspended after an Arab was lightly wounded during a shootout on King George Avenue. Police began house-to-house searches in Rechavia after a bomb was thrown at a truck, wounding three Arabs. Among the houses searched was that of Menahem Ussishkin, well-known Zionist ideologue. After the bombing, the British shut down the entire neighborhood, refusing to permit traffic to enter, and not permitting residents to go to work.

1964 • 50 years ago

State Department Unrest

The State Department has sharply condemned the 13 ambassadors, all from Arab countries, who signed a letter claiming that the current visit of the Israeli premier, Levi Eshkol, to the United States was in order to buy weapons and to undermine the good relations that exist between the Arabs and the United States. Under Secretary of State George W. Ball called all 13 ambassadors into the State Department and told them that their statement was an insult to the integrity of America’s foreign policy. U.S. foreign policy experts claimed that such an admonition to so many different countries had never been given. Other foreign policy wonks said the Arab statement was a “mistake,” and “nonsense.”

A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.