Forward Looking Back
Image by Forward Association
1916 100 Years Ago
New York City’s cloak makers have responded with a massive strike after bosses locked organizing workers out of their factories last week. When the clock struck 11 on a Wednesday morning, tens of thousands of cloak makers stood up, left their machines and walked out of their factories. With so many on the picket lines, the Cloakmakers Union leaders, Benjamin Schlesinger, Jacob Halpern and Saul Metz, along with others, addressed the workers while a roll call was made of all the striking shops. All told, 2,317 shops were counted among those that the strikers shut down. While New York City police were fairly tolerant of the strikers, several New Jersey strikers were arrested: eight in Jersey City and six in Bayonne.
1941 75 Years Ago
According to the Bulgarian newspaper Yutro, the first thing the Nazis did upon successfully occupying Greece was to institute anti-Jewish laws. In order to make it appear as if these laws were being enacted locally, the Nazis demanded that the Quisling Greek government they installed announce the anti-Semitic legislation and, additionally, blame the Jews for the war. The campaign in Greece is similar to what the Nazis have done in Yugoslavia; there, however, the Nazis spread the rumor that Jewish students convinced other Yugoslavian students to protest against the Nazis. This is because Yugoslavian students played an integral role in attempting to defend their country from the Germans.
1966 50 Years Ago
Under political pressure from the Arab states, the Soviet Union has decided to cancel a scheduled appearance in Russia by the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. Talk in diplomatic circles has centered on the fact that the Syrian premier, who visited Moscow recently, convinced the Soviets that it would not stand them in good stead with their Arab allies if the Israeli orchestra played there. In fact, while the Syrian leader was visiting Moscow, both he and the Soviet premier made sharp attacks on Israel and on the Zionist movement. Diplomatic reports indicate that the USSR is seeking to move Syria, as well as other Arab countries, closer to the Soviet orbit. Among Israelis, there is worry that this episode will mark the beginning of a worsening of Israeli-Soviet relations.
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 so that we can be prepared for whatever news 2025 brings.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
