Forward Looking Back
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1916 100 Years Ago
Torah Scrolls Cut Up and Returned
The congregants of the Ahavas Achim Synagogue in New Bedford, Massachusetts, are roiling with fury. Anger reached a peak with the discovery of six desecrated Torah scrolls. Because the scrolls were cut up and then returned to their places in the ark, it is suspected that a member of the congregation is the perpetrator. Damages are thought to be in the thousands of dollars. Local detectives are searching for the culprit.
1941 75 Years Ago
A ‘Jew-Free’ World
As the Nazis drive Jewish populations out of some areas they’ve occupied, some areas become completely “Jew-free,” as the Nazis like to say, but others wind up with too many Jews. Krakow, for example, once a major Polish-Jewish city, has become completely Germanized, with 75,000 German citizens brought in to fill the empty houses that formerly belonged to Jews. Meanwhile, many of Krakow’s Jews made their way to Tarnow, which is now estimated to be 85% Jewish. The Nazis in many cities have followed this policy of removing Jews and replacing them with Germans. The Jews are being incarcerated in ghettos.
1966 50 Years Ago
Israel Wins at the U.N.
With only six delegates voting for the anti-Israel motion in the United Nations Security Council proposed by Jordan and Mali, the Arab countries suffered a failure. The remaining nine members of the council opposed the motion proposed the previous week, when the Arab countries lobbied hard for an official condemnation and sanction of “Israeli aggression.” Representatives from the United States, France, England, New Zealand, Holland, Uruguay, Japan, China and Argentina opposed the motion, nearly all of them arguing that the Jordanian-Malian proposal was one-sided and unjust. The Israeli ambassador, Michael Komey, was pleased with the result and said the country would consider turning the current standstill it has with Syria into a peace treaty.
