A dispute over a Nazi death camp memorial pitting a New York activist rabbi against the American Jewish Committee and the Israeli and Polish governments is turning personal and, literally, dirty. The rabbi, Avi Weiss, went to the Belzec death camp in Poland last week, spending the wee hours of the morning of July 30…
By age 13, David Einhorn was writing poems in Hebrew. He continued to write his popular poems, often for the Forverts, until his passing in 1973. On the occasion of his 30th yahrzeit, excerpts from several of his poems ran in the pages of the Forverts devoted to “Pearls of Yiddish Poetry.” What follows is…
Poland’s official National Institute of Remembrance, created to investigate historic crimes of the Nazi and communist eras, is currently investigating allegations that Jewish partisans participated in a massacre of civilians in Poland in early 1944. The institute launched the investigation in February 2001 at the request of the Canadian Polish Congress. Robert Janicki, deputy commissioner…
MONTREAL — Morris Fish, a 64-year-old judge widely respected for being a “mensch on the bench,” last week became the first Quebec Jew named to the Supreme Court of Canada. He is only the second Jew ever appointed to the high court. The late Bora Laskin, an Ontarian, served as chief justice from 1972 until…
Just six days after Tisha B’Av, the Ninth of Av — the day of mourning commemorating the destruction of the First and Second Temples — comes the often-overlooked joyous holiday of Tu B’Av, the 15th of Av, which falls this year on the eve of August 12 and the day of August 13. On this…
JERUSALEM — Israeli politicians have begun gearing up for a battle of succession as Prime Minister Sharon struggles against a mounting wave of legal investigations and charges of corruption that could potentially drown his political career, perhaps in the coming months. During the last two weeks, hardly a day has gone by without another serious…
For many Americans, Sami Michael’s novel “A Trumpet in the Wadi,” released this month for the first time in English, will serve as an entrée into literature written by Iraqi-born Jews living in Israel. But Michael’s work, which has become increasingly popular in the West, is only part of a rich array of an Iraqi-Israeli…
A reproduction of a 15th-century Torah crown from Arles, France, is on view at the Yeshiva University Museum. Bernard Bernstein, a silversmith from New York who reproduced the crown, first became interested in the crown in 1963, after stumbling upon the catalog of the 1878 “Exposition Universelle” (“World Exhibition”) in Paris, which made reference to…
An Austrian lawmaker is calling for a formal inquiry into charges that Vienna is blocking an Israeli investigation of alleged campaign finance violations by Prime Minister Sharon — purportedly in exchange for Jerusalem’s agreement to restore diplomatic ties with the alpine nation. The lawmaker, Peter Pilz of the Green Party, formally requested a parliamentary investigation…
My wedding took place just before the current intifada started. While I know this is a meaningless coincidence, I’ve often thought that if I were a literary character, there might be some odd symbolism lurking between my peaceful marriage and the agony in Israel over the past three years. This literary character, of course, would…
Lectures and Discussions One on One: Rabbi William Berkowitz, host of the Dialogue Forum Series, interviews Avi Hoffman about his career in television, stage and music. Hoffman has performed in several off-Broadway productions — including his one-man shows “Too Jewish?” and “Too Jewish Two!” — and in both Israeli and American television and film. He…
