January 13
1879: It was reported today that Thomas D. Conygham, the forger who swindled the people of Wilkes-Barre, PA out of $250,000 before fleeing the country was in turn the victim of a swindle perpetrated by Lazarus, a Sephardic Jew who conned him out of $70,000 in Haiti.
2011:A group of national religious youth, known as “Ra'ananim” [waking up], plans to launch a campaign today against buying fruits, especially figs, from Turkey for the upcoming Tu B'Shvat holiday. .”
2011: In an unprecedented step, some twenty senior Israeli ambassadors sent a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today, asking him to intervene in the Foreign Ministry workers' strike "in order to save Israel's foreign service."
2012: “The Klezmatics: On Holy Ground” – a documentary about one of the premier klezmer music groups – is scheduled to be shown at The Boston Jewish Film Festival.
2012: “The Last Jews of Libya” is scheduled to be shown at Temple Sinai in Springfield, MA
519 BCE: Darius had “a crown made for Zerubbabel out of gold sent by Jews in Babylon.”
1334: Birthdate of King Henry II of Castile who “was arguably the first ruler since the Visigothic King Ergica to utilise opposition to Jewish activities in Iberian Peninsula as part of his policy.”
1435: Pope Eugene IV,who would issue an edict prohibiting: building of synagogues, money-lending for interest, holding public office, testifying against Christians, issued “Sicut Dubum,” a bull banning the enslavement of inhabitants of the Canary Islands who had converted to Christianity. Both measures had the same purpose – the growth of Christianity at all costs.
1505: Birthdate of Joachim II Hector the Elector of Brandenburg who allowed the Jews to return to his realm after he was told that the charges of host desecration that had led to their expulsion were false.
1546(10th of Shevat): The responsa of Rabbi Nissim ben Reuben Gerondi were printed for the first time in Rome
1625: John Milton, author of “Paradise Lost” is admitted to Christ's College, Cambridge at the age of 16. During Milton’s lifetime, Jews were still officially not allowed to settle in the British Isles. Like many Puritans living in the England of Oliver Cromwell, Milton saw a connection between his brand of Christianity and the Israelites. Until his eyes weakened, he read the Hebrew Bible on a daily basis and expressed a positive view of Mosaic Law. Milton was a politician as well as a poet. He served as a secretary to Oliver Cromwell and, according to one of his biographers, was part of the group who negotiated for the return of the Jewish community to England.
1635: Birthdate of German Protestant theologian Philipp Jakob Spencer who differed with Lutherans on two major points one of which their belief that the conversion of the Jews was a required prelude to “the triumph of the church.”
1733: James Oglethorpe and 130 colonists arrive in Charleston, South Carolina on their way to found the colony of Georgia. The first Jews would arrive in Georgia with the second boatload of colonists who will arrive in July of 1733.
1777: During the American Revolution, Lewis Bush, a Jew from Philadelphia, was transferred from the 6th Pennsylvania Battalion to Colonel Thomas Hartley’s Additional Continental Regiment.
1778: Birthdate of Sir Isaac Goldsmid. A Sephardic Jew, Goldsmid was a prominent London University of London
1797: Birthdate of Emanuel Schwab the native of Roedelheim, Germany who married Sophie Hirsch in 1862 and served as a rabbi for congregations in Schenectady, New York and Bridgeport, CT.
1803: Birthdate of Dr. Nathan Marcus Adler, Chief Rabbi of the British Empire and one of the most prominent Jewish clerics of the 19th century.
1807 (4th of Shevat, 5567): Reb Moshe Leib of Sassov passed away. Born in 1745, Rav Moshe Leib was a disciple of Rabbi Shmelke of Nikolsburg, who was in turn a disciple of the Maggid of Mezeritch. As the many stories about his life demonstrate, Rav Moshe was committed to all three forms of love as enumerated by the Baal Shem Tov: love of God, love of Torah and love of Israel.
1810: Birthdate of Ernestine Louise Polowsky, the daughter of a wealthy Polish rabbi who gained fame as Ernestine Louise Rose, the American feminist and abolitionist.
1821: In London Austria
1825: Prior to his death Czar Alexander I expelled all the Jews from Mohilev and Vitebsk.
1830: When the Great Fire began in New Orleans today, the Jewish community numbered little more than thirty members but had already formed a congregation, Shaarai Chesed (Gates of Mercy), under the direction of Jacob Solis.
1847: Birthdate of Morris Rich, founder of Atlanta’s Rich’s Department Store.
1854(13th of Tevet, 5614): Judah Touro passed away. A native of Newport, Rhode, Island born in the same year as Lexington & Concord, Touro spent most of his adult life in New Orleans where he was a successful businessman and real estate investor. Touro also took part in the city’s signature event serving as a volunteer with Andrew Jackson’s forces that defeated the British in 1815. Touro was one of the great philanthropists of his time. Beneficiaries of his generosity included Touro Infirmary in New Orleans, The Bunker Hill (MA) Monument Fund and a residential settlement and almshouse in Jerusalem.
1873: It was reported today that the London Jewish Chronicle has published a story about the murder of a Russian Jewish family. Two laborers ordered brandy from Jewish innkeeper and then refused to pay for their drinks. They became abusive and eventually were forced to leave the tavern. Later that night, he innkeeper, his wife, his children and his brother were awakened by cries of “fire.” When they ran outside they were attacked by a mob of eight people including the two laborers. The mob ransacked the inn, set fire to the building and then threw the Jews in. They all burned to death except for a 12 year old boy who escaped into the woods.
1873: It was reported today that President Grant has instructed all United States ministers to inform the governments to which they are accredited that the U.S. has taken a “deep interest” in the Jews of Romania and would expect these governments to do what they can to intervene on behalf of this persecuted minority.Benjamin Franklin Peixotto, the American-Jew who is the U.S. Consul at Bucharest expressed his pleasure with the American government’s intervention. [This would be another example of the bogus charge that President Grant was an anti-Semite.]
1877: It was reported today that Lord Beaconsfield who celebrated his 71stbirthday on December 27 “is now utterly enfeebled and exhausted and reduced to a condition of intellectual decrepitude by the strains of office.”
1878: The Young Men’s Hebrew Association of Newark, NJ, held its first meeting this afternoon. The 172 members elected the following officers: President – Frank Marx; Vice President – Leopold Harzfeld; Recording Secretary – Oscar Wiener; Financial Secretary – Edward Hirschler; Treasurer – Joseph Goetz. The members voted to raise $2,000 by issuing 400 shares of stock at $5 a share.
1878: It was reported today that David Rosenberg of Columbus, Ohio whom it is assumed is a Jew “has issued a call for a national convention of all Israelites who are now willing to accept Jesus Christ as the promised Messiah of the world.” The Jews promptly repudiated the man and his scheme.
1878: It was reported today that The Jewish Messenger sees the “present tendency to break down the barriers of synagognism” and replace it with a “brotherhood of synagogues” as one of the most promising features of the Jewish-American landscape.
1879: It was reported today that Thomas D. Conygham, the forger who swindled the people of Wilkes-Barre, PA out of $250,000 before fleeing the country was in turn the victim of a swindle perpetrated by Lazarus, a Sephardic Jew who conned him out of $70,000 in Haiti.
1884: Birthdate of Sophie Tucker, “last of the Red Hot Momma.” The daughter of Russian-Jewish immigrants, Tucker exploited her size and loud voice to fashion a successful career in vaudeville, burlesque and night clubs. She used part of her fortune to endow a chair at Brandeis University
1884: The Hebrew Technical Institute elected the following as its first slate of officers: President- James Hoffman; Vice President – Leo Schlesinger; Treasurer – David L. Einhorn; Secretary – M.A. Kursheedt.
1886: In a small village near Minsk, Brokhe Tsharni (née Hurwitz) and Zev Volf, “a fervent Lubavitcher” gave birth to Baruch Charney Vladeck who gained famed as Baruch Nachman Charney, an American Jewish Labor Leader and manger of the Jewish Daily Forward
1890: It was reported today that the Hebrew Technical Institute is currently 120 pupils who are supported by the efforts of 557 patrons and members.
1890: It was reported today that Harmony Club, a Jewish social club, suffered 3,000 in damages as a result of the cyclone that recently struck St. Louis, MO.
1891: A ship carrying five hundred Jewish men, women and children who were all from Russia, arrived at Dover, UK
1891: It was reported today that the Hebrew Benevolent Society and the Sanitarium for Hebrew Children were among the charities named to receive bequests in the will of the late Emma Abbot Wetherwall who was not Jewish.
1891: “Objects To Working Saturday” described the objections that Judge Joseph E. Newberger, an Orthodox Jew has raised to hearing matters on Saturday morning. While at least one of his colleagues has agreed to cover for him, Chief Justice Ehrlich responded by saying that Newberger should have considered this before running for election.”
1892: Second day of a three day celebration marking opening of the Jewish Maternity Association's facility in Philadelphia, PA
1892: Charles Spurgeon, a leading British Baptist minister was quoted today as expressing his displeasure with the Russian treatment of her Jewish citizens. “If I had all the health and strength that could fall to the lot of man, I should be quite unable to express my feelings on reading of Russia’ intolerance of the Jews…The Czar is greatly injuring his own country by driving out God’s ancient people. No country can trample upon Israel with impunity…
1892: It was reported today that the annual expenses for the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society for the fiscal year ending October 1, 1891 were in excess of $92,000,000. The expenditures included part of the payment for the society’s new building. (More 2014)
1893: Birthdate of Chaim Sutin, the native of Belarus who gained fame as French painter Cahim Soutine. He owed part of his success to the support of Paul Guilluam, the French art dealer who championed the works of another Jewish artist, Amedeo Modigliani.
1894: Adolph L. Sanger lost in his bid to be elected President of the Board of Education in New York City.
1895: English author and historian Sir John Robert Seely, author of Ecce Homo and Natural Religion passed away. He believed that “the Hebrew Scriptures express in poetic for…the spirit of modern science”
1896: It was reported that a course in Hebrew will be offered by New York University as one of its summer school offerings starting this July.
1896: “Dr. Cohen On ‘Judaism A Force’: published today includes Dr. Cohen’s message that “the wealthy Jewish merchants of Philadelphia…built large temples, patronized the arts and sciences and were chairitalbe…but was there one among them who paid his employees liberally? In Philadelphia, as in other cities he knew of clothing fortunes that had been built from the blood of the poor Russian Jews…”
1898: Emile Zola published "J'Accuse." This famous letter appeared in Clemenceau's paper L'Aurore. Zola was a supporter of Alfred Dreyfus and the letter condemned the French establishment for wrongly convicting Dreyfus. (The Clemenceau mentioned above is the same Clemenceau who led France
1899: Magistrate Sims is scheduled to hear a case in which Mrs. Esther Wallenstein, President of the Hebrew Infant Asylum, has brought charges of trespass against the builders working on the asylum’s building. She is represented by Maurice Untermyer.
1899: It was reported today that Liebler & Company are committed to producing a dramatization of Israel Zangwill’s Children of the Ghetto which will be produced at the Herald Square Theatre starting in October. The theatrical company has accepted the scenario he presented and the Jewish author is now working on a multi-act treatment.
1903: Herzl begins the preparations for the meetings with the Foreign Ministry and with Lord Rothschild.
1904(25th of Tevet, 5664): Leo Napoleon Levi, a lawyer and one of the first Jews from Texas to gain national recognition, died of a heart attack. He was born in 1856 in Victoria, TX. “At age sixteen he enrolled at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, where he received the medal for being the best university debater and at age twenty received his law degree. He married Ray Bachrach, and they had six children. He settled in Galveston and became associated with the law firm Flournoy and Scott in 1876; later he became a partner in Scott, Levi, and Smith. Levi was a well-known orator, and officials at the University of Texas invited him to give the commencement address in June 1899. The Independent Order of B'nai B'rith published this speech and others by Levi in a book in 1905. In 1887 Levi was elected president of Temple B'nai Israel, and the next year he brought Rabbi Henry Cohen to Texas. Levi retained the presidency for twelve years. In Galveston he joined the Independent Order of B'nai B'rith, a Jewish fraternal organization, and was elected president of District Seven, which comprised seven Southern states. In 1900 Levi was elected national president of the IOBB. That same year he moved to New York City to pursue his work with B'nai B'rith. As president of B'nai B'rith, Levi he sent a petition to Czar Nicholas II, after the massacre at Kishinev, that demanded Russians stop abusing Jews. Secretary of State John Hay signed the Kishinev petition, and President Theodore Roosevelt endorsed it.
1904(N.S): Birthdate of Nathan Mironovich Milstein) a Russian-born American virtuoso violinist.
1907: A new building, which resulted from the remodeling of two townhouses opened today for the use of Congregation Orach Chaim.
1908: The Times of London published the obituary for Major General Sir Frederic John Goldsmid who passed away yesterday without mentioning the fact that his family was Jewish.
1912:Centenary celebration of the birth of Dr. Liebman Adler. Adler began his career in Germany Detroit Michigan Chicago
1915: Winston Churchill presented plans for an assault on the Dardanelles . This plan would come to be known as the ill-fated Gallipoli Campaign. If the campaign had succeeded, Turkey Russia United States Palestine
1916: Birthdate of Bella Lewitzky, founder of the internationally acclaimed Bella Lewitzky Dance Company. When she appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee, Lewitzky declined to testify saying, “I am a dancer, not a singer.”
1917:In Manhattan, The First Hungarian Congregation Ohab`Zedak offered prayers of special thanksgiving for the life and works of Jacob Schiff who had just turned seventy
1922:Today, Nahum Sokolow, President of the Executive Committee of the World Zionist organization, who is visiting the United States as the head of a European delegation of Zionist leaders, met with U.S. President Warren G. Harding.
1926: Birthdate of author and feminist Carolyn Gold Heilbrun.
1927: Birthdate of British born biologist Sydney Brenner. He shared the 2002 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with H. Robert Horvitz and John Sulston.
1929: Wyatt Earp, Western legend, passed away. Earp was not Jewish. But his wife was and she conspired to have him buried in a Jewish cemetery. This gave rise to erroneous rumor that Earp had converted before his death.
1935: Germany regains control of a valuable resource as the Saar rejoins the Reich following a plebiscite conducted by the League of Nations.
1936(18th of Tevet, 5696):Samuel Lionel "Roxy" Rothafel passed away. Born in 1882 at Stillwater, Minnesota “was a showman of the 1920s silent film era and the impresario for many of the great New York movie palaces that he managed such as the Strand, Rialto, Rivoli, Capitol, and his eponymous Roxy Theatre in New York City He also opened Radio City Music Hall in 1932, which featured the precision dance troupe, the "Roxyettes", later renamed the Rockettes.” Roxy also made a name for himself on radio, where he began broadcasting in mid-November 1922, and throughout the 1920s, his live broadcasts from the Capitol Theatre became increasingly popular. One estimate from 1924 placed his typical radio audience at about five million listeners, and he was said to receive thousands of pieces of fan mail weekly. (His weekly variety show, "Roxy and His Gang," was later heard on the NBC Blue network, by that time broadcasting from the Roxy Theatre. Rothafel has been credited with many movie presentation innovations, including synchronizing orchestral music to movies (in the silent film era) and having multiple projectors to effect seamless reel changes. The book The Best Remaining Seats by Ben Hall (1961), gives a good overview of the movie palaces of the 1920s and, specifically, of Roxy himself. Rothafel is buried in Linden Hill Jewish Cemetery in Queens, New York.”
1936: It was announced today that the annual donor luncheon of the Women’s League will be held at the Waldorf Astoria on January 15, 1936. Proceeds from the event will be used to pay for the completion of a facility being built in Tel Aviv for female refugees fleeing Hitler’s Germany.
1938: The Palestine Post reported on the opening of the Rockefeller archeological museum in Jerusalem
1938: The Palestine Post reported that Jewish buses were shot at in Haifa and there were various shooting incidents in Jerusalem.
1938: An article in The Palestine Postquoted extensively from the London's Financial Times, which reviewed the hopeless position of over five million Jews in Central and Eastern Europe, denied the means of existence or possible emigration. The report concluded that "it seemed too much to hope in the present state of the world that a political and economic effort will be made to stop this tragedy."
1938(11th of Shevat, 5698): Albert Ottinger, the former New York State Attorney General who was the Republican candidate for governor defeated by FDR in 1928 passed away today at the age of 59. He used his governmental positions to fight corruption and prosecuted those responsible for perpetrating frauds in the financial services industry. He was responsible for the introduction of voting machines. Ottinger was also active in Jewish communal affairs. [Many younger readers may be surprised to find out that the Republican Party in New York had a history of using government to protect the citizens from abuses by rapacious and/or crooked “capitalists.]
1941: James Joyce passed away. His most famous novel, Ulysses, featured a Jewish protagonist, Leopold Bloom.
1942: The deportation of 10,000 Jews from Lodz
1943: The German Foreign Minister, Ribbentrop, warned Italians that they would permit Jews to live in areas under German rule until March 31. After that time, "the Government won't be able to make any exceptions." In other words, Italian Jews would now become candidates for the Final Solution.
1943: Fifteen hundred Jews are deported from Radom , Poland
1944: Two United States Treasury Department officials--Josiah DuBois and Randolph Paul--threaten to resign and make public the report on their investigation into the State Department's scandalous activities in regard to the Jews. The report is originally entitled "Report to the Secretary [of the Treasury] on the Acquiescence of This Government in the Murder of the Jews." The report indicts officials of the State Department for their "willful attempts to prevent action from being taken to rescue Jews from Hitler.""They have not only failed to use the governmental machinery at their disposal to rescue Jews from Hitler, but have even gone so far as to use this governmental machinery to prevent rescue of the Jews.
1948 (2nd of Shevat, 5708): Solomon Mikhoels was killed by the secret police under Stalin's orders, as part of a campaign to eradicate Jewish intellectualism and culture. Born in 1890, Mikhoels was a leading Russian and Yiddish actor famed for his roles as Tevye and King Lear. During the war he had tried to win support for the Russian war effort by touring England United States
1948: In attempt to secure the road to Mt. Scopus Hadassah Hospital
1949: Birthdate of television executive, Brandon Tartikoff.
1953: An article published today in Pravdatouched off a wave of virulent anti-Semitism throughout Russia.
1953: The Jerusalem Negev topped $3 million. The heavy rain came too late, and not a drop fell in the Migdal-Ashkelon-Safieh region, where the loss was over IL 10m.
1954: Birthdate of Trevor Rabin. The South African native is best known as a writer and guitarist for the band “Yes.” Rabin, who changed his name from Rabinowitz, was raised in a Reform household. He grew up observing Shabbat and singing in his synagogue choir, and despite the name change, he has never really left Judaism. In 2004, he told the San Diego MOT . Indeed, Rabin wasn't the only Jew affiliated with Yes--their manager, Brian Lane
1961: Birthdate of Julia Louis-Dreyfus, the actress who played Elaine on the television hit “Seinfeld.”
1966: Abba Eban becomes the third Foreign Affairs of Israel.
1974(19th of Tevet, 5734): Sholom Secunda passed away. Born in 1894 at Oleksandriia, he “was a Jewish composer, born in Ukraine and educated in the United States. He wrote the melody for the popular song "Bei Mir Bist Du Schoen" in 1932. Together with Aaron Zeitlin he wrote the famous Yiddish song "Dos kelbl (The Calf)" (also known as "Donna Donna") which was covered by many musicians, including Donovan and Joan Baez. Along with Abraham Ellstein, Joseph Rumshinsky, and Alexander Olshanetsky, he was one of the "big four" composers of his era in New York City's Second Avenue Yiddish theatre scene
1974: A Gallup
1978: The Jerusalem Post published an exclusive interview with President Anwar Sadat of Egypt Israel West Bank and Sinai. He promised to build a "triple shrine" a mosque, a synagogue and a church at the top of Jebel Musa , Mount Sinai , where according to tradition Moses received the Ten Commandments.
1978: Former Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey passed away in Waverly, Minnesota Minneapolis Minnesota Senate Office Building
1980:"King of Schnorrers" closes at the Playhouse Theater in New York City after 63 performances. “King of Schnorrers” was a musical based on work of the same name by Israel Zangwill.
1981: Yigal Hurvitz, who had been serving as the Minister of Finance, left the cabinet.
1994(1stof Shevat, 5754): Rosh Chodesh Shevat
1994: Edward P. Djerejian, a Clinton appointee, presented his credentials as U.S. Ambassador to Israel.
1998: Daniel Charles Kurtzer presented his credentials as U.S. Ambassador to Egypt. (Yes an American Jew represented the United States in Cairo. Jewish diplomats representing the United States in Moslem countries is nothing new. It dates back to the days of the Ottoman Empire.]
2002(29th of Tevet, 5762): Canadian born comedian Frank Shuster, who gained fame as part of the comedy duo of Wayne and Shuster passed away.
2002: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish author and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Public Intellectuals:A Study of Decline by Richard A. Posner, Henry Ford and the Jews: The Mass Production of Hate by Neil Baldwin, two books of Al Hirschfield’s drawings - Hirschfeld's New York and 'Hirschfeld's Hollywood and Be My Knifeby David Grossman “an Israeli, widely known not just for his four previous novels but for two seminal books about the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories and for his -- as the Israelis say -- dovish'' articles and editorials in major newspapers around the world. With the exception of his first novel, however, the horrific political life of Israel -- the real world of intifada and reprisal -- plays virtually no role in the universe of Grossman's fiction.” Fifty eight year old
2003(10thof Shevat, 5763):Fifty eight year old Rabbi Steven Dworken, executive vice president of the Rabbinical Council of America, a professional body serving over 1,100 Orthodox rabbis, died suddenly at his home in Teaneck, N.J., of a heart attack
2006: Jeffrey Pollack was appointed Commissioner of the World Series of Poker.
2006: An exhibit of works by ceramicist Daisy Brand sponsored by the University of Minnesota Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies and the Northern Clay Center opened today.
2007: Senior archaeologists have come out in harsh criticism against the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) for authorizing plans for a bridge to connect the Dung Gate in Jerusalem Old City Temple Mount
2008: The Sunday New York Times book section featured a review of Bleeding Kansas by Sara Paretsky who grew up in a small eastern Kansas town, where she and her brothers were the only Jewish kids in school and is best known as the creator of the fictional female detective V. I. Warshawski, Vienna Blood by Dr. Frank Tallis in which the author returns to his previous literary landscape - fin de siècle Vienna complete with Sigmund Freud and Austrian anti- Semitism and Knew They Were Right: The Rise of the Neocons by Jacob Heilbrunn. As can be seen from one typical review, the book emphasizes the Jewish nature of the Neo-Con movement. “The story of the neocons is a saga of immigrant assimilation, whose seeds lie in the Jewish intellectual circles of the 1930s, when communists loyal to Stalin clashed with Trotskyites over communist theory and its applications in the real world. In tracing the evolution of neo-conservatism (including a look at the influence of the mysterious Leo Strauss), Heilbrunn shows how generations of Jews moved from the margins of political and intellectual life to replace the old WASP elite and now play a central role in determining U.S. policy in the Middle East.”
2008: The Washington Post book section featured a review of Bleeding Kansas by Sara Paretsky and a biography about Mstislav Rostropovich the renowned Baku
2008: An exhibition at the Corcoran Gallery of Art,"Annie Leibovitz: A Photographer's Life, 1990-2005 " comes to a close in Washington, D.C.
2008: The UK DVD of The Jazz Singer.
2008:”New Jerusalem: The Interrogation of Baruch De Spinoza at Talmud Torah Congregation: Amsterdam July 27, 16 56,” anew play by David Ives about the clash between religion and modernity focuses on the interrogation of the philosopher Baruch de Spinoza opens at the Classic Stage Company in New York
2008: Leonard Cohen announced today that he would make his first concert tour in 15 years starting in May of 2008 at New Brunswick.
2008: “They Called Me Mayer July”, the first major exhibition of Mayer Kirshenblatt’s work in the United States has its final showing at the Judah L. Magnes Museum in Berkley, California. The exhibition 65 paintings is a tribute to the 91 year old Mayer Kirshenblatt’s distinctive imagination and sharp recollection of his Polish Jewish home town before World War II, with images such as: the pregnant hunchback, who stood under the wedding canopy just hours before giving birth; the khayder teacher caught in bed with the drummer's wife; the corpse that was shaved; and the "black wedding" in the cemetery during a cholera epidemic.
2009: The 92ndSt Y presents an evening with newly minted Nobel Laureate, economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman.
2009: The Governor of New York nominated Jonathan Lippman to serve as the Chief Judge of the New York Court of Appeals.
2009:U.S. Senator Bill Nelson revealed during Hillary Clinton's confirmation hearing that he believes Robert Levinson is being held in a secret prison in Iran. "The door has been closed at every turn", Nelson said during Clinton's confirmation hearing. "We think he is being held by the government of Iran in a secret prison. (Levinson is the only Jew in this item)
2009:Hadassah began instituting a massive reduction in force today when it laid off 80 employees across the country, roughly a quarter of its national staff. The cuts are coming at all levels of the organization. Hadassah recently announced that it had in total $40 million invested in Bernard Madoff's Ponzi scam, as well as another $50 million the organization thought it had made in the scam. It was a significant hit to its endowment, which now stands at $412 million.
2010: Miriam Levinson, an expert on Jewish Cuban History is scheduled to present a lecture entitled “The Jews of Cuba: The Road to Paradise and the Land We Called Home” at the JCC of Northern Virginia.
2010: The 19th annual New York Jewish Film Festival opens with a showing of “Saviors in the Night.”
2010: In “For Some, ‘Kosher; Equals Pure,” Kim Severson reported that “this year, for the first time, glatt kosher food will be sold at the Super Bowl.” She then explained why “kosher” has become so popular among the food-eating public..
2010: The 10th annual Atlanta Jewish Film Festival opens with a showing of “Berlin ’36.”
2010: Israel’s deputy foreign minister issued a formal apology to the Turkish ambassador today after ostentatiously humiliating him earlier in the week and aggravating strains in a complex and increasingly troubled relationship between Israel and Turkey, its closest Muslim ally.
2010: According to a report entitled "Searching for the Study of Israel" that was released today, "the past three years have seen a huge jump in the number and variety of courses about Israel taught in America's top universities."
2011:“Sholem Aleichem: Laughing in the Darkness” is scheduled to have its world premier at the New York Jewish Film Festival.
2011: “The Klezmatics: On Holy Ground” is scheduled to have its New York premier at the New York Jewish Film Festival.
2011:Andrea Meislin Gallery is scheduled to host a reception in honor Naomi Leshem to mark the opening of Between Zones, an exhibition of the work of this acclaimed Israeli photographer.
2011:A group of national religious youth, known as “Ra'ananim” [waking up], plans to launch a campaign today against buying fruits, especially figs, from Turkey for the upcoming Tu B'Shvat holiday. .”
2011: In an unprecedented step, some twenty senior Israeli ambassadors sent a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today, asking him to intervene in the Foreign Ministry workers' strike "in order to save Israel's foreign service."
2012: “The Klezmatics: On Holy Ground” – a documentary about one of the premier klezmer music groups – is scheduled to be shown at The Boston Jewish Film Festival.
2012: “The Last Jews of Libya” is scheduled to be shown at Temple Sinai in Springfield, MA
2012: Israel's Counter-Terrorism Bureau warned Israeli citizens today to stay away from Thailand's capital, following the arrest of a Hezbollah militant suspected of planning a terrorist attack in the city.
2013: Gary Gilson is scheduled to perform “You Don’t Have To Be Jewish…But It Couldn’t Hurt” at e Minneapolis Jewish Humor Festival
2013: The New York Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to present “An Evening with the Safdie Brothers” featuring an in person appearance by directors Josh and Benny Safdei.
2013: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Zoo Time by Howard Jacobson, The World Until Yesterday by Jared Diamond and She Matters: A Life in Friendships by Susanna Sonnenberg.
2013: The Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington is scheduled to co-sponsor the presentation of “Life in Stills” and “Hava Nagila” as part of the Washington Film Festival
2013: Israeli forces evacuated a Palestinian outpost built on a controversial strip of land in the West Bank early this morning, less than a day after the High Court stayed the demolition of the small tent village.
2013: Cabinet ministers voted in favor of approving an upgrade in status for the Jerusalem-based Shalem Center, making it a recognized institute of higher education, and allowing it to open a program that has been widely touted as Israel’s “first liberal arts college.”
2014: Following “a formal mourning ceremony” which is scheduled to be held at the Knesset and attended by national leaders, Ariel Sharon is scheduled to be laid to rest at Shikmim Farm in the Negev next to his second wife Lily. (As reported by Times of Israel)
2014: “The Man with the Golden Arm” and “Bethlehem” are scheduled to be shown at the New York Jewish Film Festival
2014: Professor Joel Dimsdale is scheduled to deliver a lecture “Anatomy of Malice: Rorschach Records of the Nuremberg War Criminals” at the Lawrence Family JCC