September 18
825 BCE: The Jewish people began a 14-day celebration to dedicate the Holy Temple in Jerusalem. The Temple project was initiated by King David, and built by his son, King Solomon. Solomon's Temple was the spiritual center of Jewish life for 410 years, until its destruction by the Babylonians in 422 BCE (As reported by Aish)
31: Sejanus, Roman head of Praetorian Guard was murdered in the periodic intrigue that wracked Roman government at the imperial level. Born in 20 BCE, Sejanus was in the business of violently dispatching then enemies of the Emperor Tiberias. Sejanus had a reputation as anti-Semite and his patron Tiberius was no friend of the Jews.
53: Birthdate of Trajan who was Roman Emperor when the Jews in the Diaspora revolted in 115. The revolt ended in 117 but Trajan died before the Jews were vanquished.
323: Constantine the Great decisively defeats Licinius in the Battle of Chrysopolis, establishing Constantine's sole control over the Roman Empire. This victory came between the Edict of Milan (313) which legalized Christianity and the Council of Nicea (325) which was designed to bring conformity to Christian doctrine and practice. This victory by the first “Christian Emperor” would help in the drive to make Christianity the only acceptable religion throughout the Roman Empire.
1180: King Louis VII of France died. His reign had not been a good period for the Jews since in 1144 he expelled all the Jews who had converted to Christianity and then returned to Judaism. Also, during his reign I the first Blood Libel in France took place in Blois in 1171.
1180: Philip Augustus became king of France.Immediately after his coronation Philip Augustus ordered the Jews arrested on a Saturday, in all their synagogues, and despoiled of their money and their vestments. In the following April, 1182, he published an edict of expulsion, but according the Jews a delay of three months for the sale of their personal property. Immovable property, however, such as houses, fields, vines, barns, and wine-presses, he confiscated. The Jews attempted to win over the nobles to their side, but in vain. In July they were compelled to leave the royal domains of France (and not the whole kingdom); their synagogues were converted into churches. These successive measures were simply expedients to fill the royal coffers. The goods confiscated by the king were at once converted into cash.” Desperate for money, Phillip reversed his decisions and allowed the Jews to return in 1196. The conditions were humiliating for the Jewish community and exposed the avaricious nature of the French monarch. The King established special accounts to keep track of the financial condition of the Jews to ensure that he collected the maximum amount of money from that that was possible. At a time when serfdom was beginning to disappear, the Jews became the serfs of the King and his nobles. Just as they could dispose of “my lands” in any manner they so fit, so could they treat “my Jews” in any way they chose.
1346: The sons Judah ben Asher “the German Talmudist who became the Rabbi at Toledo” signed an agreement similar to the one already signed by their father and their uncle regarding “the disposition of their own earnings” for charitable purposed.
1380: The Cortes of Soria, Castile, denies the rights of Jews to judge their own criminal cases. The Cortes also reaffirmed King Enrique II's decree forbidding Jews from serving in the royal administration. These events help fuel the harangues of Ferran Martinez who lead the bloody anti-Jewish events of 1391.
1505 Consecration of Gian Pietro Carafa, who as Pope Paul IV had issued The bull, Cum Nimis Absurdum (the title stemmed from its opening phrase, "Since it is absurd") ordering the creation of a Jewish ghetto in Rome” which would have the immediate effect of reducing by half the Jewish population during a five year period.
1553(10thof Tishrei): Yom Kippur is additionally somber following the recent burning of copies of the Talmud.
1573: During the Eighty Years War, Spain attacked the Dutch city of Alkmaar. The Dutch forces would withstand the subsequent siege. Their victory proved to be a turning point in the Eighty Years, which when it ended would guarantee that the Netherlands would be an independent nation free from Spanish control. This meant that Holland would continue to be a place of refuge for the Jews of Europe, especially those fleeing the Spanish Inquisition, and provide a place where a Jewish community could flourish.
1612 (27 Elul): In Frankfurt, Vincent Fettmilch a former pastry cook and leader of the Guilds", calling himself the "new Haman of the Jews attacked the synagogue while the community was at prayer. Although many tried to organize a defense they were soon overpowered and many took shelter in the cemetery. He was beheaded four years later. His real crime was to turn against the ruling class of Frankfort. It was for this for which he lost his head.
1722: On “the eve of the New Year 5483” the Great Synagogue, which was later referred to as “Moses Hart’s Shul” was dedicated in London.
1739: The Treaty of Belgrade was signed today ending one of the many wars between the Ottoman Empire and the Habsburgs. As a result of the treaty, Belgrade and northern parts of Serbia were ceded to the Ottoman Empire. This was a positive event for the Jews of the region, many of whom were Sephardim whose progenitors had arrived after the Spanish Inquisition. At this time living under the Ottomans was preferable to life under the Habsburgs. Additionally, it made it easier for the Jews to engage in overseas trade.
1758(15thof Elul, 5518): Rabbi Akiv Eger author of Mishnas De'Rebbi Akiva who was rabbi of Zülz, Silesia from 1749 and Pressburg from 1756 and the grandfather of Rabbi Akiva Eger passed away today.
1764(Elul, 5524): Jonathan Eybeschütz, the Dayan of Prague who served simultaneously as the Rabbi of Alton, Hamburg and Wandsbek, passed away today.
http://www.yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Eybeschutz_Yonatan
http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/112378/jewish/Rabbi-Jonathan-Eybeschutz.htm
1765: Birthdate of Pope Gregory XVI. In 1836 the Jewish community of Rome will send a petition to Pope Gregory XVI begging him to stop the annual Saturnalia abuse of the Jewish community. He will refuse the request saying that, “It is not opportune to make any innovation.”
1773(1stof Tishrei, 5534): As the colonists try and figure out how to respond to the Tea Act of 1773 Jews observe Rosh Hashanah just 3 months before the Boston Tea Party.
1778: In “Frankfurt am main,” Bunle Oettingen Schuster and Salomon Loeb Schott” gave birth to Abraham Schott who eventually settled Amsterdam.
1783: Sixty-five year old Hebrew scholar Benjamin Kennicott, a fellow of Exeter College, Oxford and a fellow of the Royal Society who wrote The State of the Printed Hebrew Text of the Old Testament and Vetus Testamentum hebraicum cum variis lectionibus (Old Testament in Hebrew with a variety of lessons) and who in 1760 “issued proposals for collating all Hebrew manuscripts of date prior to the invention of printing” passed away today.
1790: Forty-four year old Prince Henry, Duke of Cumberland and Strathearn who was the patron of Jacob Philadelphia, “a Jewish magician, physicist, mechanic, juggler, astrologer, alchemist, and Kabbalist” passed away today.
1792(2ndof Tishrei, 5553): Second Day of Rosh Hashana
1806: Today “Louis-Mathieu Molé announced to the Assembly that the emperor was satisfied with the answers and that he intended, in order to give a religious sanction to the principles expressed therein, to call together a Sanhedrin. Like the Sanhedrin of old, this Sanhedrin was to be composed of seventy-one members, two-thirds rabbis and one-third laymen, having at their head one president and two vice-presidents.”
1808: Moses Nathan married Hava Samuel at the Hambro Synagogue today.
1810: Under the leadership of Bernard O”Higgins, Chile declared her independence from Spain. It would take Chile 8 years of effort to finally gain that independence. The new Chilean government would ban the Inquisition which would give Chile’s Convsersos a chance to begin practicing their faith in public. O’Higgins enjoyed support among the Convserso Community.
1818: During a period of reaction under King Frederick William III, the Jews of Prussia were no longer allowed to hold any academic positions. This led some Jews, including Heine, to conclude that the only road to real advancement passed through the Baptismal font.
1820(10th of Tishrei, 5581): As James Monroe seeks re-election in a Presidential election unique because he would win all but one of the votes in the Electoral College, Jews observe Yom Kippur
1825: Birthdate of Alexander Abraham de Sola, a Canadian Rabbi, author, Orientalist, and scientist. Originating from a large renowned family of Rabbis and scholars, De Sola was part of family long known for its Rabbis and scholars. He was recognized as one of the most powerful leaders of Orthodox Judaism in the United States during the latter half of the nineteenth century. He passed away on June 5, 1882.
1825: Birthdate of Seligman Baer, the native of Baden who was “a student of the Masoretic text, an editor of the Hebrew Bible and Jewish liturgy.”
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/2340-baer-seligman-sekel
1828(10thof Tishrei, 5589): As Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams square off in one of the nastiest Presidential campaigns of the young republic, Jews observe Yom Kippur
1830(1stof Tishrei, 5591): Rosh Hashanah
1830: Birthdate of Hungarian-born American Hebrew scholar and Rabbi, Adolph Huebsch
1831: In Budapest, Hermann Diamant, the maternal grandfather of Theodor Herzl and Johanna Katharine Diamant gave birth to Rosalie Reik
1832: Anna and Isaac Leonard Zeisler gave birth to
1833: Birthdate of Amsterdam native Henriette Raphael, the wife of Henry Lewis Raphael with whom she had nine children.
1839(10th of Tishrei, 5600): Yom Kippur
1839: Birthdate of Nathalie Levintass, the German born wife of Jacob Geissmar.
1842(14thof Tishrei, 5603): Erev Sukkoth
1842(14thof Tishrei, 5603): Fifty-five year old French diplomat Frédéric Cerfberr perished today at sea while traveling from New York to France.
1843: Aron Ezekiel Hart wrote to John Neilson , the editor of the Quebec Gazette today that his father, Ezekiel Hart, who was on Nielson’s “dearest friends” had passed away at the age of 73 on Saturday, September 26/
1848: In Popowitz, Bohemia, Jacob Robi and Josephine Arnstein gave birth to Adolph Robi, the husband of Josephine B. Hahn, the mayor and postmaster Northville, NY who finally settled in St. Louis in 1893.
1849(2nd of Tishrei, 5610): Second Day of Rosh Hashanah
1850: In New York, Benvenida Solis and Leon Ritterband gave birth to their seventh and youngest child David Solis Ritterband.
1851: The New-York Daily Times, which will become The New York Times,begins publishing. Adolph Ochs would acquire the Times in 1896. It is true that a Jewish family owns the New York Times. But it has never been “a Jewish newspaper.”
1854: In London, Solomon and Rachel Lubin Weinstock gave birth to Harris Weinstock, the New York businessman who followed the injunction to Go West Young Man, Go West by moving to California where he founded a department store with his half-brother David Lubin that would be known as “Weinstock’s”, served as a Colonel in the National Guard and who was the husband of Barbara Felsenthal with whom he had two sons and two daughters.
https://magnes.berkeley.edu/collections/archives/western-jewish-americana/weinstock-harris-papers-1878-1922
1854: A column styled “Items of German News” published today reported that two dozen Russian Jews have been detained at the Prussian city of Memel. Apparently, “they had smuggled themselves across the border” with Russia and had bordered an English steamer that was about to leave the city when they were discovered. They were detained because they did not have passports. At this time, nobody knows what will be done with them.
1858(10thof Tishrei, 5619): Yom Kippur
1858: Giuseppe Melchiorre Sarto who as Pope Pius X met with Theodore Herzl at the Vatican in 1904 and expressed the statement that “Jerusalem cannot be placed in Jewish hands” because the Jews did not recognize Jesus Christ, was ordained today as a Priest.
1858: Birthdate of Lawrence Alfred Isaacs, a graduate of University College School, a longtime member of the Jewish Working Men’s Club and Lad’s Institute which he served as treasurer of 11 years and the “representative of the Jewish Working Men’s Club at the Council of the Working Men’s Club and Institute Union who was a resident of West Hampstead.
1860(2ndof Tishrei, 5621): Second Day of Rosh Hashanah
1861(14th of Tishrei, 5622): Erev Sukkoth
1861: Birthdate of “Amalie (Emma) Henriette Jessen” the wife historian Ernst Bernheim who lost his position and reputation when the Nazis came to power and whose foster Hetti Meyer was killed at Theresienstadt.
1862: President Abraham Lincoln signed the commission naming Rabbi Jacob Franklin as the Jewish Hospital Chaplain for Philadelphia, PA which “was becoming ‘a central depository for sick and wounded soldiers’” including many Jewish members of the Union Army. A native of Bavaria, Germany, Frankel had been serving as the rabbi and cantor for Rodeph Shalom, before the Civil War. His appointment made him the first rabbi to be named as a chaplain after the law was changed to make this possible. Frankel served for three years while continuing to function as the leader of the Philadelphia congregation.
1863: In Summit, Mississippi, Ernestine and Abraham Wadel gave birth to Brunett Wadel, the successful Tyler, TX merchant and community leader.
1866(9thof Tishrei, 5672): Erev Yom Kippur; Kol Nidre
1868(2ndof Tishrei, 5629): Second Day of Rosh Hashanah
1868: Sabato Morais received “a life-time contract from Mikveh Israel in Philadelphia, PA
1868: On the second day of the Battle of Beecher’s Island Colonel George A. Forsyth’s Company of Scouts which included Sigmund Shlesinger continued their fight with a larger force led by Roman Nose and suffered so many casualties that Forsyth sent a runner to bring back reinforcements. (Be Shlesinger wished her was in synagogue even if the sermon was boring)
1870: In Maryland, a lawsuit was filed in Circuit Court for Baltimore City by members of the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation known as the Lloyd City Synagogue, claiming that changes have been adopted in ritual in a manner that violates the articles of incorporation.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9D0DE4DF113DE53BBC4152DFBE66838B669FDE
1870: It was reported today that the Jews are about to established a Hebrew University in Berlin. The university is expected will adopt the best academic practices of any European university and will be open to Jews regardless of the place of origin.
1871(3rd of Tishrei, 5632): Tzom Gedaliah
1871: Eighty-year old Amsterdam native Joseph Myers, who in 1819 had married Rebecca Cohen with whom he had three daughters was buried today at the “West Ham Jewish Cemetery.”
1874: In Baltimore, “Phillip Hamburger and Rachel Bernei” gave birth to Louis Philip Hamburger, the Johns Hopkins Medical School graduate and husband of Freda Hamburger who was “an instructor” at his alma mater who was “examining physician at the National Jewish Hospital for Consumptives” and “consulting physician at the Hebrew Hospital.”
1876(29thof Elul, 5636): Erev Rosh Hashanah
1878: Mayor Philips of New Orleans is scheduled to inform Mark Moses, the former Rabbi of the Jackson Street Synagogue who is now in Providence, Rhode Island, that his wife, two sons –Samuel aged 21 and Isaac aged 10 – and his 20 year old daughter Matilda have all passed away this week during the Yellow Fever Epidemic. The only survivor is his 4 year old daughter.
1879(1st of Tishrei, 5640): Rosh Hashanah
1879(1stof Tishrei, 5640): Seventy-year old Meïr Leibush ben Yehiel Michel Weiser known as the Malbim passed away today.
http://www.biu.ac.il/JH/Parasha/eng/vayikra/geller.html
1879: An article published today that decried the quality of the butter available today traced the history of the dairy delight back to the days of “the ancient Hebrews’; a little known fact that will come to a surprise to those who think butter is a modern invention.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9403EFD91F3FE63BBC4052DFBF668382669FDE
1880: Religious freedom was granted to the Jews of Morocco. The Moroccan Jewish community was an ancient one. The Rambam had lived at Fez after leaving in Spain. A large part of the Moroccan Jewish community would leave for Israel after the creation of the state in 1948.
1880: “Flying Men” published today includes the strange tale an 8thcentury Sicilian magician named Diodorous who converted from Christianity to Judaism. He carved statues for a living including a an elephants made from lava that could still be seen at Catania in the second half of the 19th century. According to legend, this “modern day” Icarus flew from Constantinople to Catina, a trick which led to him being burned at the stake by the local bishop.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9A01E4D6143FEE3ABC4052DFBF66838B699FDE
1880: It was reported today that based on studies of different religious denominations in Berlin 1 out of every 400 babies born to Jewish parents are deaf-mutes as compared to 1in 3,000 for Catholics and 1 in 2,000 for Protestants. The disparity between the Jews is attributed to the fact that Jews “encourage intermarriage with blood relations” as compared to Catholics who forbid it and Protestants who tolerate it.
1880 “Byron” published today provided a review of Byron a biography of the English poet by John Nichol which includes mention of the little known “Hebrew Melodies written in 1814” which show “the author’s familiarity with the Old Testament .”
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9A0CE5D6143FEE3ABC4052DFBF66838B699FDE
1881:
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=980CE7D9103CEE3ABC4052DFBF66838A699FDE
1882(5thof Tishrei, 5643): Seventy-two year old Alejandro Chumacero, the chakam (rabbi) of Curacao, Dutch West Indies and the father of four prominent sons -- Abraham Mendes Chumaceiro, Benjamin Mendes Chumaceiro, Jacob Mendes Chumaceiro and Joseph Chayyim Mendes Chumaceiro – passed away today at Amsterdam.
1883: Three days after he had passed away, Elias Davis, the son of Israel Davis and the former Rosetta Levy and he husband of the former Elisabeth Moses with whom he had five children was buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemeery.
1884(28thElul, 5644): Sixty-eight year old Abraham Stein passed away in Prague today where he had been serving as rabbi at the old Meisel Synagogue since 1864 when it changed “to a modern temple with a choir, organ and sermon.”
1884: “A Bid For Hebrew Votes published today described the events surrounding the race for Governor of Connecticut. The opponents of Henry B. Harrison have reminded voters of anti-Semitic language he used in a jury summation in 1857; language for which he has apparently never apologized.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9A0CE5D6143FEE3ABC4052DFBF66838B699FDE
1885(10thof Tishrei, 5646): In Alpena, Michigan, a cantor was retained for the first time to lead Yom Kippur services today.
1887(29thof Elul, 5647): Erev Rosh Hashanah
1887: “The Jewish New Year” published today reported that the Jewish New Year, 5648, will begin tomorrow, and that it is the most important holiday on the calendar with the exception of Yom Kippur. (What makes this item exceptional is that it appeared in on the nation’s leading secular newspapers, not a Jewish publication.)
1888: Birthdate of San Francisco and Salt Lake City theatre operator Harry David.
1890: The Bowling Circle of the Young Men’s Hebrew Association held its first meeting this evening and elected offices.
1890: Second Lieutenant Oren B. Meyer transferred from the U.S. 1stCavalry to the U.S. 2nd Cavalry.
1890: Professor W.R. Harper, the Chairman of the Hebrew Languages and Literature Department at Yale University was chosen to serve at the President of the University of Chicago.
1890(4th of Tishrei, 5651): Benjamin Franklin Peixotto, one of the most prominent Jewish leaders of the second half of the 19th century, died of consumption today at his home in New York City surrounded by members of his family including two children. His wife was not with him. She has a fatal heart condition and is lying near death at Baden Baden, where she is in the company of the couples other children. Peixotto’s father had come to New York from Amsterdam to serve as a rabbi. Peixotto was born in New York in 1834. When he was 13, his father died and he moved to Cleveland where eventually wrote for the Cleveland Plain Dealer and studied law. From his earliest days, Peixotto took an active interest in the affairs of the Jewish community serving as a Grand Master of the B’nai B’rith and a director of the Hebrew Orphan Asylum of Cleveland, an institution for which he had obtained the original charter from the Ohio State Legislature. He returned to New York in 1866 and then moved to San Francisco in 1867 where he practiced law. President Grant appointed him Consul to Bucharest in 1870, at a time when the civilized world was expressing their disgust at the persecution of the Jews of Romania. He held the position for five years where he effectively represented the interest of the United States while working to ameliorate the worsening condition of his co-religionist. He returned to the United States where he took an active role the campaign to elect Ruther B. Hayes as President. He turned down an offer to serve as U.S. Consul to St. Petersburg (Russia) in 1877 but accepted an appointment as U.S. Consul to Lyons, France, a position he held until 1885 when he returned to New York to resume he practice of law. In 1886, he found Menorah, a monthly publication devoted to topics related to the B’nai B’rith, Jewish literature and the Jewish religion.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9E07EEDA103BE533A2575AC1A96F9C94619ED7CF
1891: In Newark, NJ, Charles Lieberman, an active member of the synagogue on Bedford Street went to Justice Priesel and asked him to issue arrest warrants for six Polish Jews who “had entered the synagogue and held a bacchanalian orgy.
1891: Almost three thousand members of Temple Beth-El took part “in the consecration of their new house of worship” at the corner of 76th Street and 5thAvenue.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9B0CE5DA153AE533A2575AC1A96F9C94609ED7CF
1892: In Seattle, Washington, Ohaveth Sholum Congregation opened their synagogue which had been designed by Herman Stenman. It was the second synagogue to open in the state within a four day period.
1892: “Cholera Has Spared The Jews” published today described the results of an investigation by Jewish communal officials that could find only 40 cases of the disease among the quarter of a million of the Jews living in Russia. The study did not include Poland, but it would seem to disprove the contention that Russian Jews passing through Hamburg are responsible for the cholera epidemic
1892:
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=F70B12FE345515738DDDA10994D1405B8285F0D3
1892:
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=F40F14F8355D15738DDDAF0994D1405B8285F0D3
1892:
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=F40F14F8355D15738DDDAF0994D1405B8285F0D3
1892:
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=FB0A15FE345515738DDDA10994D1405B8285F0D3
1893(9thof Tishrei, 5654): Erev Yom Kippur
1893: “The musical portions of the services” at Temple Emanu-El, Temple Beth-El and Temple Ahavath Chesed are expected to “be especially beautiful” this evening.
1894: Members of Company D, 47th Regiment of the New York National Guard have been charged with vandalism in Tompkinsville including the destruction of the front fence of the town’s synagogue.
1894: Birthdate of Leo Perper, the native of Odessa who came to the United States in 1908 where he became a successful merchant.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=9E03E6DE173BE036A05750C2A9649D946690D6CF
1895: One day after she had passed away, 36 year old Rebecca Lyons, he wife of Nathan Lyons was buried today at the “West Ham Jewish Cemetery on Buckingham Road.”
1895: “Bavarian Enmity To Stern” published today described U.S. Ambassador Runyon’s effort to intervene on behalf of Louis Stern and Germany’s hostile reaction including attacks by Munich newspapers that claim “such efforts might be effective in Morocco but not in Germany.”
1896: Lucie Hadamard Dreyfus “signed a petition to the Chamber of Deputies that denounced "the negation of any sort of justice" represented by the conviction "on a charge that the prosecution produced unbeknownst to him, and which thereafter could not be discussed either with him or with his lawyer."
1897: In Austria, Isaac and Sarah Fernhoff gave birth William Fernhoff, the Vienna trained doctor who came to the United States in 1924 where a year later he married Tola Schwartz and practiced medicine until his death in automobile accident in 1955.
1897: “Will Support Seth Low” punlished today quotes The Hebrew Standard as, “As the leading Jewish papers in this city, The Hebrew Standard has always…been a staunch supporter of of Tammany Hall, but it now advocates Mr. Low because it proposes to be independent in this campaign and because such action voices the sentiment of the best element of the Jewish people of New York, who compose the bone and sinew of its commerce and trade…”
1898(2ndof Tishrei, 5659): 2nd day of Rosh Hashanah
1898: Charles Putzi who is thought to have been involved in the Dreyfus hung himself today aboard the SS La Gascogne a day after it had sailed from La Harve.
1898: In Pittsburgh, PA, Morris and Gitel Adler gave birth to Saul Adler for whom the Saul Adler Community Center in Monroe, LA was named.
1898: The first edition of Anti-Juif Stephanois was published today.
1898:
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=FA0712F93A5D11738DDDA10994D1405B8885F0D3
1898:
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=F60712F93A5D11738DDDA10994D1405B8885F0D3
1899: “The Children of the Ghetto” by Israel Zangwill will open today in Washington, DC for a week long run before moving to Baltimore for a week and Philadelphia for two weeks before finally opening in New York in October.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=F40D13FA3E5811738DDDA00994D1405B8985F0D3
more for 2014
1901: Birthdate of director and critic Harold Edgar Clurman whose first theatre experience came when as a child his parents took to him Yiddish productions on the Lower East Side of New York.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/harold-clurman-about-harold-clurman/557/
1902: Three days after she had passed away, seventy-one year old Dutch born “Nancy (Bosman) Abrahams, the widow Jacob Isaac Abrahams was buried today at the “West Ham Jewish Cemetery on Buckingham Road.”
1902(16th of Elul, 5662): Dr. Isaac (Yitzhak) Rülf who served as a Rabbi in the Prussian city of Memel and who was a Jewish teacher, journalist and philosopher passed away. Born in 1831, he became widely known for his aid work and as a prominent early Zionist – a role that set him apart from many of clerical brethren.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_R%C3%BClf
1904(9thof Tishrei, 5665): Erev Yom Kippur
1904(9thof Tishrei, 5665): Eighty-two year old the Baltimore born physician who spent almost four decades pursuing a medical career in the United States that included service during both the Mexican-American War and the Civil War.
https://books.google.com/books?id=q4mwAtj2r3UC&pg=PA302#v=onepage&q&f=false
1907(10th of Tishrei, 5668): Yom Kippur
1907: Birthdate of Gerda Baier who survived Theresienstadt only to be murdered at Auschwitz.
1907: In Vienna, “Malvine (Susman) and Samuel Aschkenazy” gave birth to Leo Aschenasy who gained fame as actor Leon Askin whose dream from childhood had been to be an actor.
His dream came true, and in the 1930s he worked as a cabaret artist and director at the "ABC Theatre" in Vienna: in this position he also helped the career of the writer Jura Soyfer get off the ground in 1935. Persecuted by the Nazis, Askin escaped to the United States via France, arriving in New York in 1940 with no money and less than a basic knowledge of English. When the U.S. entered the Second World War Askin joined the U.S. Army. While serving in the military he learned that his parents had been killed at Treblinka extermination camp. After the war, Askin went to Hollywood, invariably portraying foreign characters who speak English with a strong accent. He gained wide popularity by appearing as Gen. Albert Burkhalter in the sitcom Hogan's Heroes in the late 1960s.As opposed to other exiled Austrians, Askin never refused to work again in his home country. In 1994 he permanently took up residence in Vienna, where he remained active until his death in cabaret, as well as the Volksoper and Festwochen. He was awarded Vienna's Gold Medal of Honor. Leon Askin died in 2005 at the age of 97.
1909(3rdof Tishrei, 5670): Shabbat Shuva
1910: In Germany, Ottilie and Rabbi Julius Grünthal gave birth to Josef Grünthal who gained fame as Israeli composer Josef Tal.
http://joseftal.org/
1910(14thof Elul, 5671): Ninety year old Mrs. Malke Hesselsohn passed away.
1911: In Norfolk, VA, Miriam Umstadter, the daughter of Michael and Esther Umstadter became Miriam Blaustein when she married Dr. David Blaustein.
1913: When the trial of Governor William Sulzer came before the Impeachment Court in Albany today, his defense team was led by Louis Marshall. (Marshall was Jewish; Sulzer wasn’t)
1914: Three days after she had passed away, the former Susan Joshua, the widow of Edward Ferdinand Sichel was buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1914: Eighteen year old Leonard Keysor, the London born son of Julia and Benjamin Joseph Keyzor who won the Victoria Cross while fighting at Gallipoli enlisted in the British Army today
1915(10th of Tishrei, 5676): Thirty-one days after the lynching of Leo Frank, Jews observe Yom Kippur
1915: At Temple Israel, Dr. Maurice Harris made “a plea for social service” which he said “is religion’s latest word.
1915: At the New Synagogue, Rabbi Ephraim Frisch delivered a sermon on “Juggling With the Truth” in which he said Russia “has been the only country in Europe to deliberately and brutally crush every movement toward emancipation among her own unhappy people throughout the last half century.”
1915: At Temple Emanu-El Rabbi Joseph Silverman delivered a sermon on “The Pride of the Jew” in which he said “the pride of race and religion is the defense of the Jew against prejudice and ostracism.”
1915: At Temple Israel in Brooklyn Rabbi Nathan Krass “preached a sermon in which he analyzed social conditions “touching upon the condition of the Jew in Europe where so many rights were denied the Jew that he was practically dead.”
1915: Leon Sanders, President of the Hebrew Sheltering and Immigrant Aid Society spoke at the afternoon service at the immigration station at Ellis Island attended by 100 Jewish detainees on the subject of “The Old World and the New.”
1916: It was reported today that Dr. Samuel Schulman viewed as “deplorable” “the rejection by the democratic Jewish organizations” in the United States “of the peace plan” that would have led to the creation of an American Jewish Congress to demand equal rights for Jews in other countries.”
1916: “The campaign of the Federation for the Support of Jewish Philanthropic Societies to increase the yearly total of Jewish donations to $2,000,000 was begun” today “by Felix M. Warburg, the Chairman, who said he expected a successful campaign” but promised to issue period progress reports.
1917: In Springfield, Massachusetts, Morris Forer, “a Jewish emigrant from Russia” and Ida Robinson who combined Lithuanian Jewish and French Quebec ancestry gave birth to June Lucille Forer who gained fame as actress June Foray best known for providing the voices for countless animated characters include “Rocky the flying squirrel” and Natasha Fatal.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/27/arts/television/june-foray-prolific-voice-of-rocky-the-flying-squirrel-dies-at-99.html?_r=0
1917(2nd of Tishrei, 5678): Four days after the Provisional Government declared that Russia was a Republic, a move that filled many Russian Jews with hope for the future observance of the Second Day of Rosh Hashanah
1917: Second day of the special holiday campaign aimed at raising and additional one million dollars for the Jewish War Relief Fund led by Louis Marshall.
1918(12thof Tishrei, 5679): Major Rupert M. Burstan, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Solomon Burstan, a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy who took a commission with the U.S. Marine Corps after which “he served in Haiti for 18 months” before going to France where he “led a detachment of 1,100 Leathernecks” died today at the hospital in Dijon France after which his body was brought home for a funeral service in Chester, PA officiated by Rabbi Samuel Rabinowitz of Wilmington, Delaware.
1918: British General Allenby renewed his offensive against the Turks after having sat idle for almost a year following the capture of Jerusalem. Within a week the British will have driven the Turks from Nazareth and the Galilee.
1918: Birthdate of Austrian swimming star Judith Deutsch who refused to compete in the 1936 “Hitler Olympics.”
http://www.jewishsports.net/BioPages/JudithDeutsch.htm
1919: Pitcher Al Schacht made his major league debut with the Washington Senators.
1919: In Germany, premiere of “Madame DuBarry” directed by Ernst Lubitsch.
1920(6thof Tishrei, 5681): Shabbat Shuva
1920: Rabbi de Sola Menes is scheduled to deliver a sermon on “Annual Regeneration” today at the West End Synagogue.
1920: Rabbi David Davidson is scheduled to deliver a sermon “Right and Wrong Visionists” at Congregation Tifereth Israel
1920: In the United Kingdom, Dr. Conrad Ackner, a Jewish dentist from Vienna, who came to England before the First World War and his wife gave birth to Desmond James Conrad Ackner, “a British judge and Lord of Appeal in Ordinary.”
1920: Forty-two year old Hugo Morris Friend was appointed to be a “Judge of the Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois” from which position he serve on the bench during the trial related to the “Chicago Black Sox” betting scandal.
1920: Benjamin Friedman of Syracuse, NY wrote to the editors of The American Hebrew complimenting them on the quality of its New Year issue.
1920: In Chicago, “Frank and Minna (Skud) Cohen” gave birth to Selma Jeanne Cohen who sought to make dance scholarship a respected academic discipline and was “the founding editor of the International Encyclopedia of Dance.”
http://jwa.org/thisweek/jul/26/1998/selma-jeanne-cohen
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/selma-jeanne-cohen
http://archives.nypl.org/dan/19706
1921: Birthdate of Sydney Cohen, the expert on malaria and father of journalist Roger Cohen
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/25/sydney-cohen-obituary
1921: Amos Kidder Fiske, author of The Jewish Scriptures and The Great Epic of Israel passed away.
http://jwa.org/thisweek/jul/26/1998/selma-jeanne-cohen
1921: Amos K. Fiske, the former editorial writer for the New York Times and author of The Great Epic of Israel passed away today.
http://books.google.com/books?id=FoDYAAAAMAAJ&pg=PP1&lpg=PP1&dq=The+great+epic+of+Israel+by+fiske&source=bl&ots=FawjmddUWV&sig=dtkTFvjbHoLdHRyWOzHTRvIQE10&hl=en&sa=X&ei=09YYVOSAIea1sQTMv4HACg&ved=0CCQQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=The%20great%20epic%20of%20Israel%20by%20fiske&f=false
1924: In Boston, Harry Diamond and “the former Ida Epstein gave birth to Zelda Diamon who gained famed as “Zelda Fichandler, a seminal figure in the regional theater movement who led Arena Stage in Washington for 41 years.” (As reported by Bruce Weber)
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/30/arts/zelda-fichandler-a-matriarch-of-regional-theater-dies-at-91.html?hpw&rref=obituaries&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well&_r=0
1925(29thof Elul, 5685): Erev Rosh Hashanah
1926(10th of Tishrei, 5687): Yom Kippur
1926: Thanks to an order from Director of Public Safety Brennan, the Jewish policemen and firemen of Newark, NJ, are excused from active duty today.
1926: Birthdate of Joseph Kubert, “a titan among comic-book artists whose work stretched from the Golden Age of the superhero to the gritty realism of the graphic novel” (As reported by Margalit Fox)
1926: Birthdate of Siegfried Wortman who began his career with Hakoah Vienna National team and scored Austria's second and game winning goal in its victory over Czechoslovakia.
1926: Birthdate of Jonah J. Greenspan better known as Bud Greenspan whose cinematic activities have created a whole sub-culture in American sport. Greenspan is the preeminent master of sport films. A four-time producer of official films of the Olympic Games, Greenspan produced the official motion pictures of the 1984 (Los Angeles), 1988 (Calgary), 1992 (Barcelona), and 1996 Olympic Centennial Games in Atlanta. He also produced the non-official two-hour TV special on the 1994 Lillehammer Winter Olympics. His "The Spirit of the Olympics", a multi-screen visual/musical tribute to the quadrennial games, is on permanent display at the Olympic Museum in Lausanne, Switzerland His book, 100 Greatest Moments in Olympic History, published in November, 1995, has had multiple printings. Greenspan has produced numerous other Olympic-related productions, among them: 16 Days of Glory, Los Angeles, Triumph and Tragedy: The 1972 Olympics, The Measure of Greatness, An Olympic Dream, the television series For the Honor of Their Country, and the two-hour docu-drama, Time Capsule: The 1936 Berlin Olympic Games. The TV series: The Olympiad, produced with his late wife, Cappy, has been seen in more than 80 countries around the world.He has earned numerous industry honors, including: The Directors Guild of America Lifetime Achievement Award in 1995, and TV Academy Emmy Awards for The Olympiad series, his Olympic vignettes, and both of the 16 Days of Glory films--Calgary (1988) and Lillehammer (1994) Greenspan was awarded the Olympic Order in 1985 by International Olympic Committee President Juan Antonio Samaranch--the 17th American to receive this honor.
1927: Birthdate of Kurt Sauerquell, the native of Vienna, who would be known as Elliot Welles, a Holocaust survivor who spent the years after World War II as a tireless hunter of Nazis, which started with the man who murdered his mother. (As reported by Margalit Fox)
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/03/nyregion/03welles.html?_r=2&scp=1&sq=Elliot%20Welles&st=cse&
1927: Columbia Broadcasting System goes on the air. Williams S. Paley, a product of the Jewish neighborhood on Chicago's West Side and the Wharton School of Finance, was already a part owner of CBS. In 1928, he would become its President and later Chairman of the Board. While CBS may be have been "owned and run by a Jew" it was not a Jewish media outlet. On a personal level, Paley was a friend of Chaim Weizmann and a major financial supporter of the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel.
1928: In New York, Sigismund Lieberman, the Polish born “son of Adolph and Natalia Lieberman and his wife Mary S. Lieberman gave birth to “advertising copywriter Norma (Lieberman) Friedman.
1929: Western Union announced tonight that normal cable service between Palestine and New York has been resumed.
1929: In its commentary on the recent Arab attacks on the Jews of Palestine, “The Yiddish Communist daily Emes, continued its campaign against Zionism” today when it wrote, ‘Zionism was born on pogroms, existed on pogroms and has died on pogroms.’”
1933: Birthdate of director Roman Polanski. He is best known for such films asRosemary's Baby and Chinatown. He gained notoriety as the husband of the cruelly murdered Sharon Tate and for his sexual dalliance with an underage girl.
1934(9thof Tishrei, 5695): Kol Nidre
1934: This evening at Temple Israel in Manhattan, Rabbi William F. Rosenblum is scheduled to deliver a sermon on “We Bow the Head and Bend the Knee.”
1934: This evening as The Jewish Communal Center of Flatbush, Dr. Maxwell L. Sacks is scheduled to deliver a sermon on “A Lost and Found Department in Jewish Life!”
1934: Pitcher Syd Cohen made his major league debut with the Washington Senators.(Since there were no night games in those days he must have made it to the synagogue)
1935: Having opened in New York in August, “Broadway Melody of 1936” a musical comedy written by Moss Hart and Sid Silvers who starred in the film along with Jack Benny opened today in Los Angeles.
1936(2ndof Tishrei, 5697): 2nd day of Rosh Hashanah
1936: In his sermon today, Dr. Israel Goldstein told worshippers at Congregation B’nai Jershurun that “the Jews have no design upon the Arabs of Palestine” and that “they would not deprive them of any rights, even they had the power to do so” because the Jews “don wish to dominated the Arabs any more than they wish to be dominated by them.
1936: It was reported today that “the Italians” have been secretly “aiding extremist groups among the Arabs” while also encouraging “Jews to favor Italy as a possible mandatory power in Palestine replacing Britain” despite the fact that Jewish authorities have “let Italy know that Jewish policy was firmly pro-British under all circumstances.”
1936: At Temple Rodeph Sholom Rabbi Louis I Newman asserted that the British must “act firmly” to put an end to “disorders and protect Palestine while adding that “Jews were in Palestine in antiquity thousands of years before the country fell into Arab hands.”
1936: At Ohen Zedek, Rabbi William Margolis “urged Jews to ‘mind their own business of religious educational activity.’”
1936: At the Jewish Center on West 86th Street, Rabbi Leo Jung delivered a sermon entitled “The Survival of the Jew.”
1936: Dr. Jacob Katz led services today at the Montefiore Hebrew Congregation in the Bronx.
1936: At the Institutional Synagogue Annex, Rabbi Herbert S. Goldstein delivered a sermon entitled “The of Remembrance” in which he said “as Jews and as human beings each and every one of us can only free himself from his obligations to his fellow-men and fellow-Jews by a direct gift in money for our suffering brethren abroad.”
1936: In his sermon at Temple Oheb Shalom, “Dr. I. Mortimer Bloom” told worshippers that he “saw the growth of fascism in America as the ‘most sinister and portentous social development of our day.
1938: Dr. Bernhard Kahn, the European chairman of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee” who arrived in New York from Europe last week is planning on attending today’s meeting of the Plan and Scope Committee chaired by Rabbi Jonah B. Wise, which “is seeking to raise $5,100,000 for the aid of Jews from German, Poland, Romania and other European Countries.
1938: Hank Greenberg hit his 52nd and 53rd home runs of the season putting him ahead of Ruth’s 1927 record setting season. Greenberg still need 7 to tie and 8 to break the Bambino’s record.
1940: Secretary of State Cordell Hull sent a telegram to the American Embassy in Vichy, France, condemning the "activities as reported of Dr. Bohn and Mr. Fry and other persons, however well-meaning their motives may be” – a reference to their work trying to save Jews and others from German and Nazi forces.
1940: Secretary of State Cordell Hull today indicated that the activities of Baron Edgar von Spiege, German Consul General in New Orleans, who has figured in a State Department warning against foreign agents' discussion of American affairs, are still under scrutiny. Hull was not an isolationist and he was certainly not blind to threat posed by Germany and Japan. Possibly reflecting his background as veteran of the U.S. Congress who was not blind to the realities of American attitudes on race and religion, Hull was not supportive of measures designed to rescue the Jews from Hitler’s Europe. He opposed allowing ships with cargoes of Jewish refugees to land in the United States. He was successful in having those on board the SS St. Louis returned to Europe. However, Mrs. Roosevelt was able to thwart Hull’s desire to have the Jewish refugees on board the SS Quanza turned away from the shores of the United States.
1941: “Heinrich Himmler wrote to Arthur Greiser, the Gauleiter in Warthegau (the areas of Poland annexed by Nazi Germany), about Adolf Hitler's desire to have all Jews in German areas moved to the East.”
1941: The Nazis massacred the Jewish community of Shirvint, Lithuania.
1941: Birthdate of Highland Park, Illinois native University of Missouri journalism graduate Eric Jon Enberg, the longtime CBS news correspondent and husband of Judith Ann Klein.
1942: Food rations are dramatically reduced for Jews throughout Greater Germany.
1942: Sixty-year old Polish gentile Adam Rafalowicz was murdered in Radom by the Nazis today for helping Jews in the Ghetto
1942: Himmler stated in a letter to Autur Greiser that Hitler was demanding that the original Reich and the Protectorate be cleaned out from west to east and be rid of Jews as quickly as possible.'
1942: Reich Minister of Justice Otto Thierack and SS chief Heinrich Himmler agree that Jews and selected other camp inmates will be transferred to SS custody for Vernichtung durch Arbeit (extermination through work); i.e., hard labor until death.
1943: Two thousand Jews were deported to Sobibor where all but 12 die.
1943: Two thousand Jews in Minsk, Belorussia, are deported to the Sobibór death camp; 80 are selected for forced labor and the rest are gassed.
1943: The Nazis begin the deportation of the Jews of Lida, Belorussia to the Majdanek death camp
1943: Hitler orders the deportation of Danish Jews.
1944(1stof Tishrei, 5705): Rosh Hashana
1944: As Anglo-Jewish paratroops wait to board planes that will fly them to Arnhem will they jump into hell, some of them stand under the wing of their aircraft and daven the Rosh Hashanah
1944: Five hundred Jews participated in Rosh Hashanah services at the Naval Air Station Keflavik in Iceland. The sefer torah for the service had been flown from the United States.
1944: Fourteen hundred Jewish boys at Auschwitz are taken from their barracks to the children's block and are later gassed.
1944: Bernhard Bästlein an anti-Nazi resistance fighter was executed today at Brandenburg-Görden Prison.
1944: Birthdate of Richard Danzig an American lawyer who served as the 71stSecretary of the Navy and was a political advisor to Barak Obama.
1946: One portion of Emanuel Ringelblum's Warsaw Ghetto diary, which was secretly buried by Ringelblum, was discovered in a ruined house at 68 Nowolipki Street in Warsaw. Born in 1900, Ringelblum was a trained historian having received his doctorate in 1927. He spent many years before the war working in Jewish communal activities especially with those Polish Jews who were exiled from Germany in the 1930’s. After the Warsaw Ghetto had been built Ringelbaum was head of the cultural affairs section of the underground Jewish government. He created an archive unit known as Oneg Shabbat which would turn out to be the most complete record of the life of Poland’s Jews under the Nazis. Ringelblum hid his archival treasure trove including his diaries in three large metal containers. Ringelbaum took part in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and later escaped from Trawniki labor camp. Unfortunately, his hideout was discovered and he and his family were murdered on
1947: Hank Greenberg plays in his last major league baseball game.
1948: Ralph J Bunche was confirmed as acting UN mediator in Palestine. Bunche would win the Nobel Prize for Peace so successfully negotiating the armistice agreements between Israel and the Arab states that had attacked her.
1950: A meeting of the Mixed Armistice commission is held in the Jerusalem No-Man’s Land along the Green Line.
1950: In what appears to be a change of heart, a Jordanian spokesman denied reports that it would withdraw it complaint over what it considers the Israeli invasion of Jordanian territory above the confluence of the Yarmuk and the Jordan rivers.
1950: The Village I Knew, choreographed by Sophie Maslow, was performed for the first time.
1951(15th of Elul, 5776): Sixty-nine year Dr. Israel Abraham Rabin, the husband of Dr. Ester Else Rabin and native of the Ukraine who was a historian specializing in the study of ancient Hebrew literature passed away today in Haifa.
1951: “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” a science fiction classic co-starring Sam Jaffe and music by Bernard Herrmann was released today in the United States.
1951: The film version of “A Streetcar Named Desire” produced by Charles K. Feldman and with music by Alex North. was released today in the United States.
1952: The Jerusalem Post reported that a wide range of Israel-designed gowns, dresses, blouses, shirts and coats was flown to the US for a roving exhibition, arranged by the Bonds Drive, to promote Israeli exports. In the early days of the state of Israel, products marked "made in Israel" were not always of the highest quality. After all, it was a pioneer state. In those days, American Jews made a point of buying things stamped "made in Israel" as a way of showing solidarity and support for the infant nation.
1953: In Philadelphia, PA, Miriam and Ephraim Bloch, the owner of Perfect Fit Industries, gave birth to Lawrence “Larry” Clifford Bloch who built the Wetlands Preserve in TriBeCa into an influential rock club and a hub of environmental activism (As reported by James C McKinley, Jr.)
1954: In Montreal, Roslyn and Harry Pinker gave birth to psychologist Steven Prinker who was named one of Time Magazine's 100 most influential people in the world in 2004
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/19/science/steven-pinker-future-science.html?action=click&module=Discovery&pgtype=Homepage
1955(2ndof Tishrei, 5716): 2nd day of Rosh Hashanah
1957: In Tel Aviv, as athletes began another day of competition in the Maccabiah Games, “the United States trailed Israel in the team score 106 to 73.”
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=9806E5DC103EE23BBC4052DFBF66838C649EDE
1960(26thof Elul, 5720): Sixty-eight year old Chicago native and Kent College of Law graduate Benjamin Kahane who entered the motion picture industry as general counsel for what became RKO studios, after which he served as vice president of Columbia Pictures and president of the Motion Picture Academy of Arts and Sciences while being married to Mildred Kahane with whom he had two children – Shirley and Benjamin, Jr – passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1960/09/19/99804729.pdf
1963: “X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes” a scifi-horror movie featuring Don Rickles and Harold J. Stone was released today in the United States.
1964(12thof Tishrei, 5725): Tillie Asnis the mother of Dr. Moss Bart, Dr. Saul T. Asnis and Mrs. Gladys Levi, passed away today.
1964: Funeral services are scheduled to take place for Merry Abel Barg, the wife of Dr. Peter Barg, who passed away yesterday.
1964: ABC broadcast the first episode of “The Addams Family” created by David Levin and produced by Nat Perrin.
1964(12thof Tishrei, 5725): Samuel Abramowitz, the husband of Lillian Cohen Abramowtiz and the father of Judyth A. Weisser and Marcia A. Aronson passed away today
1965(21stof Elul, 5725): Parashat Ki Tavo; Leil Selichot
1965(21stof Elul, 5725): Forty-six year old Mildred Elizabeth Tarlow Woolridge, the daughter of Audra and Solomon Tarlow passed away today.
1967: CBS broadcast the first episode of “Love Is a Many Splendored Thing” a soap opera created by Ima Phillips who also served as the head writer – a combination that was very unusual at the time.
1967: U.S. Premiere of Arthur Hiller’s “The Tiger Makes Out” the movie version of Murray Schisgal’s play co-starring Eli Wallach, featuring Dustin Hoffman and filmed by cinematographer Arthur J. Ornitz/
1970: American music icon Jimi Hendrix who was managed by Shep Gordon the subject of the 2014 documentary “Supermensch: The Legend of Shep Gordon” passed away today.
1970: The following story documents how Israel saved the Kingdom of Jordan from coming under the control of Syria, as President Assad pursued his goal of creating Greater Syria that would include Lebanon, Jordan and Israel.
Today Syria, through the Palestine Liberation Army's (PLA) Syrian branch, whose headquarters were located in Damascus and which was controlled by the government, tried to intervene on behalf of the Palestinian guerrillas. The PLA sent in armored forces equivalent to a brigade, with tanks, some of them allegedly hastily rebranded from the regular Syrian army for the purpose. Other Syrian units were the 5th Infantry Division (with the 88th and 91st Tank Brigades and the 67th Mechanised Brigade with over 200 T-55 tanks) and Commandos. They were met by the 40th Armored Brigade of the Jordanian army. The Syrian air force, under orders of Defense Minister Hafez al-Assad, never entered the battle. This has been variously attributed to power struggles within the Syrian Baathist government (pitting Assad against Salah Jadid), and to the threat of Israeli military intervention. As King Hussein dealt with threats by both Palestinian refugees in his country and Syrian military forces crossing Jordan's border, the king asked "the United States and Great Britain to intervene in the war in Jordan, asking the United States, in fact, to attack Syria, and some transcripts of diplomatic communiques show that Hussein requested Israeli intervention against Syria." Timothy Naftali said. "Syria had invaded Jordan and the Jordanian king, facing what he felt was a military rout, said please help us in any way possible." A telegram indicates that Hussein himself called a U.S. official at 3 a.m. to ask for American or British help. "Situation deteriorating dangerously following Syrian massive invasion...," the document said. "I request immediate physical intervention both land and air... to safeguard sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence of Jordan. Immediate air strikes on invading forces from any quarter plus air cover are imperative." Israel, which found the move undesirable, performed mock air strikes on the Syrian column at the Americans' request. Possibly alarmed at the prospect of an armed conflict with Israel, Syria's government ordered a hasty retreat. Its involvement at the time remained a subject for historical debate. Assad told his biographer, Patrick Seale, that Syria's intention in invading northern Jordan was only to protect the Palestinians from a massacre .Whatever the case, the swift Syrian withdrawal was a severe blow to Palestinian hopes. Jordanian armored forces steadily pounded their headquarters in Amman, and threatened to break them in other regions of the kingdom as well. The Palestinians agreed to a cease-fire. Hussein and Arafat attended the meeting of leaders of Arab countries in Cairo, where Arafat won a diplomatic victory. On September 27, Hussein was forced to sign an agreement which preserved the right of the Palestinian organizations to operate in Jordan. For Jordan, it was humiliating that the agreement treated both sides to the conflict as equals.
1971: Birthdate of Jada Koren Pinkett Smith an American actress, producer, director, author, singer-songwriter, and businesswoman who is described as being of Portuguese-Jewish, African-American, West Indian and Creole ancestry. (Only in America)
1972(10th of Tishrei, 5733): Yom Kippur
1972: “One hundred fifty Jews from Russia who have settled in Israel” are visiting the United States will have “their first opportunity today to observe Yom Kippur under the guidance of Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, the Talmudic scholar and lead of the worldwide Lubavitcher movement of Hasidic Jews.”
1972: Among the thousands of people attending services this morning in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn “are 600 Jews from various parts of the world who will” then be returning home.
1972: Jews recite special prayers of mourning for those who were murdered at the Munich Olympics.
1972: In New York, “because of the Jewish holy day, Yom Kippur, the city’s public schools and the Board of Education headquarters and decentralized district offices will be closed today.”
1972: A crowd of over 10,000 people filled the plaza in front of the Wailing Wall where at “a few minutes after 6 p.m. the shofar…was blown marking the end of Yom Kippur” following which “he sober atmosphere gave way to bursts of singing and dancing.”
1972: Rabbi Menachem Schneerson was quoted today as saying that “only after self-analysis ‘can one positively influence fellow Jews for improvement.’”
1972: Sally J. Priesand, the 25 year old assistant spiritual leader of the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue, the first woman ordained to the rabbinate in the United States, preached her first Yom Kippur sermon today.
1972: In his sermon today, “Rabbi Louis Bernstein of the Young Israel of Windsor Park hailed the United States delegation to the United Nations for its veto in the Security Council of a resolution that would have censured Israel for its raids in Lebanon and Syria without at the same time condemning the acts of terrorism in Munich and elsewhere.”
1972: At Shearith Israel in New York “Rabbi Louis C. Gerstein called on the Jewish community to intensify its efforts in behalf of the Soviet Jews who wanted to find a new life in Israel and to give moral and spiritual support to Israel.”
1974: “Sovietskaya Rossiya reported a general decline in immigration to Israel because of the country’s high taxation to support the arms industry.”
1974: “Mendel Bodnya, one of the defendants in the 1970 Leningrad trial, arrived in Israel.”
1975(13thof Tishrei, 5736): Eighty-five year old Edith Harris Proskauer, the widow of NYSE member Richman Proskauer, who has been president of the Sunshine Day Nursery, vice president of the Lexington School for the Deaf and “founder of the women’s division of the American Jewish Committee passed away today.
https://www.nytimes.com/1975/09/19/archives/edith-h-proskauer-active-in-charities.html
1975(13thof Tishrei, 5736): Sixty-four year old Jerome Morton Comar “the chairman of the executive committee of the Maremont Corporation and leader of the Jewish community as can be seen by his service as “director of the Chicago Young Men’s Jewish council and president of the Jewish Federation and Jewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago passed away today,
1975: The Soviet Union ratified the Helsinki Accords
1977: Two days after he had passed away, seventy-six year old General Frank L. Lazarus, the West Point graduate and WW II veteran turned New York realtor and politician who was the father of Linda Lowenthal and Laura Hirsch is scheduled to be buried today at the Beth-El Cemetery.
1977: ABC broadcast “Young Joe, the Forgotten Kennedy” starring Peter Strauss in the title role.
1977: The Jerusalem Post reported from Washington that US President Jimmy Carter had once again denied that his country supported the concept of a separate Palestinian state. When you consider the general acceptance of this by Israelis today, this item seems like a tempest in a long-forgotten teapot.
1977: The Post reported that Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan who was originally scheduled to fly to the US returned unexpectedly from Brussels to Israel, giving rise to rumors that he had held secret important talks with Egypt.
1977: The Post reported that Moshe Shamir, Professor of Islamic History at the Hebrew University, was appointed Prime Minister Menachem Begin's adviser on Arab Affairs at a time when Israel's Good Fence aid to South Lebanon was well known and highly appreciated, according to Archbishop Maximos Saloum.
1977: Meshulam Riklis, a 54 year old Israeli businessman, married 23 year old Pia Zadora.
1978: Camp David Accords were signed between Egyptian president Anwar Sadat, Israeli Prime Minister, Menachem Begin and US President Jimmy Carter. The accords were based on the principal of total withdrawal for total peace including diplomatic ties, open borders, and trade relations. The agreement led to the formal peace treaty. In recent years there has been criticism of the accords and the treaty which after Sadat’s assassination became a "cold peace". Regardless of the criticism, the accords changed the equation in the Middle East. Three decades of violence including three wars, have been replaced by a quarter of a century of peace along the border between the Sinai and the Negev. Without Egyptian support, general war against Israel became unthinkable, even for those states that did not want to make peace. No matter how cynical one might be, one should never forget the courage of Sadat for making the peace. Nor should one forget that Begin took a big gamble. What would have happened if he had given back the Sinai and then the Egypt's had reneged on the deal the way they had after the Sinai Campaign of 1956?
1978: CBS begins the broadcast of the fourth season of “One Day At a Time” starring Bonnie Franklin
1980: Eighty-one year old Rose Vallard the French art historian and museum curator who protected art, much of it owned by Jews, from being stolen by the Nazis and then worked with the “Monument Men” including James Rorimer to retrieve the art passed away today.
1981: “Continental Divide,” a comedy written by Lawrence Kasdan and co-starring Allen Goorwitz was released today in the United States by Universal Pictures.
1982(1st of Tishrei, 5743): Rosh Hashanah
1982: CBS broadcast the first episode of “Gilligan’s Planet,” a cartoon show created by Sherwood Schwartz.
1983: Forty two year old Susan Harris (née Spivak) the creator of numerous television shows including the long running “Golden Girls” and the mother Sam Harris married for a second time today.
1985(3rd of Tishrei, 5746): Tzom Gedaliah
1985: The funeral of Julian Beck, founder of the Living Theatre, was scheduled to be held today in Manhattan
1986: NBC broadcast the first episode of “Crime Story” co-starring Joseph Wiseman and Ted Levine, a self-described “Hill-Billy Jew.”
1989: Birthdate of Daniel DeClue, a bright talented student and musician. A proud, practicing Jew, he is a kind, caring, decent human being.
1990: Frank Rich’s review of Linda Lavin’s performance in “Gypsy” was published today.
http://www.nytimes.com/1990/09/18/theater/review-theater-linda-lavin-takes-her-turn-as-mama-rose.html
1991(10thof Tishrei, 5752): Yom Kippur
1991: NBC broadcast the first episode of season three of the sitcom Seinfeld.
1992: CBS broadcast the first episode of “The Golden Palace,” a spin-off from the “Golden Girls,” starring Estelle Getty with theme music composed by Andrew Gold.
1992: “Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin's wife said today that a car rented for her use in Berlin had been replaced after vandals scratched a swastika on it. Leah Rabin, who fled Nazi Germany with her family in 1933 at the age of 5, said a rise in racism and anti-Semitism in Germany was evident on her three-day visit with her husband. She said she had not seen the swastika because the car was replaced immediately.”
1993(3rd of Tishrei, 5754): Shabbat Shuva
1993(3rdof Tishrei, 5752): Sixty-seven year old Bernard Ehrenreich, the “son of Simche and Reizel Ehrenreich passed away today.
1995(23rdof Elul, 5755): Eighty-eight year old Sir Rudolf Ernst Peierls, the award winning “Jewish German-born British physicist who played a major role in the Manhattan Project and Tube Alloys, Britain's nuclear program” who was described as "a major player in the drama of the eruption of nuclear physics into world affairs passed away today.
http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/history/Biographies/Peierls.html
https://www.atomicheritage.org/profile/rudolf-peierls
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-sir-rudolf-peierls-1602308.html
1996: The Drisha Institute for Jewish Education graduated its first class.
1998(27thof Elul, 5758): Ninety-six year old Frances Shohl Peiser, the widow of Rabbi Walter Gilbert Peiser passed away today after which she was buried at the Jewish Cemetery in Baton Rouge, LA.
1998: The Times of London reviews “Via Dolorosa” a new play about Israel by Sir David Hare.
1998: “A Soldier’s Daughter Never Cries” co-starring Barbara Hershey was relased in the United States today.
1998: “Rush Hour” a “buddy film” directed by Brett Ratner, produced by Roger Birnbaum and Jonathan Glickman, with music by Lalo Schifrin and filmed by cinematographer Adam Greenberg was released in the United States today by New Line Cinema.
1999(8thof Tishrei, 5760): Shabbat Shuva
1999(8thof Tishrei, 5760): Eighty-six film editor Harold F. Kress, who was nominated for six Oscars and won two – in 1962 for “How the West Was Won” and in 1974 for “The Towering Inferno.”
2001(1st of Tishrei, 5762): Rosh Hashanah
2001(1stof Tishrei, 5762) Future Oakland A’s first baseman Nate Freiman attended services at Temple Beth Elohim, in Wellesley, MA, a service of which he said, “It was packed---the most people I ever saw there.” (As reported by Hillel Kuttler)
2001: In “The Miracle of Improvising” published today Michael Robinson examined the life and career of “Lee Konitz, our greatest living jazz artist.”
2002(12thof Tishrei, 5763): Palestinian Islamic Jihad claimed credit for today’s bombing at Umm al-Fahm, a city in the Haifa District which is predominately populated by Arab citizens of Israel.
2002: Effi Eitam began serving as Minister of Energy and Water Resources.
2002: In “A Quest for a People Who May No Longer Exist,” published today Richard Bernstein examines the possible existence of one of “the ten lost tribes.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/18/books/books-of-the-times-a-quest-for-a-people-who-may-no-longer-exist.html
About 1,100 years ago, a Hebrew-speaking man named Eldad Ha-Dani appeared before the Jewish community of Tunisia and gave it the remarkable news that he belonged to the biblical tribe of Dan, one of the fabled 10 lost tribes of Israel. He lived, he said, in "the fertile and gem-rich `land of Havilah' near `the seven kings of Cush'— the biblical name for Ethiopia"— alongside three other lost tribes, Naphtali, Gad and Asher. For Hillel Halkin, author of "Across the Sabbath River," which is also an amazing tale of a lost tribe, Ha-Dani was the first to give the lost tribes a geographical identity, even if he himself was probably an impostor and the tribes he claimed to live among did not exist. In the centuries that followed, as Mr. Halkin shows in some fascinating background chapters, the lost tribes generated an enormous wealth of claims and speculation. But near the end of the 19th century, critical scholarship put to rest the notion that any of the tribes — sent into exile by the Assyrian king Shalmaneser in the eighth century B.C. — still existed. "Where are the 10 Tribes?" the Jewish Orientalist Adolf Neubauer asked in a book in 1889. "We can only answer, Nowhere." Not so fast, says Mr. Halkin, an American-born Israeli journalist and translator who in his way is a latter-day Ha-Dani, though clearly no impostor and also thoroughly imbued with the spirit of Western skepticism. In this learned book, rich in both geographical and intellectual adventure and spiked with wry wit, Mr. Halkin argues, contrary to his own expectations, that an actual lost tribe might really still exist. The people who deserve this designation — and who energetically claim it for themselves — are the Kuki, a Tibetan-Burmese group that lives in Manipur State in the arm of India between Bangladesh and Myanmar. In fact, the Kuki are one of several groups in Manipur and neighboring Mizoram — the Mizo and the Chin are the main others — who not only believe themselves to be descendants of the biblical lost tribes but believe themselves to be Jews as well. They have a first ancestor, Manasia, whose name, they say, derives from the tribe of Manasseh. They arrived in what is now northeast India after long peregrinations that took them first to China, where, they believe, the emperor forced them to work on the Great Wall and burned their Torah scroll. In recent years, having decided to assert their historical identity, they have built synagogues in which they conduct Hebrew prayers. They have formed organizations with names like Chhinlung Israel People Convention, which has 100,000 supporters and chapters in 280 villages, says its president, Lalchhanhima Sailo. The group has petitioned the United Nations to recognize its lost-tribe status. It also has a spiritual leader, an Israeli rabbi from Jerusalem, Eliahu Avichail, who has spent decades searching remote corners of Asia for descendants of the lost tribes. Mr. Halkin himself started seeking them in 1998 when he accompanied Rabbi Avichail on an expedition to southwest China and northern Thailand, a trip that allows him to demonstrate his flair for evocative travel writing. Continuing with the rabbi to northeast India, Mr. Halkin discovered the communities that have attached themselves to Rabbi Avichail as their mentor and lawgiver and that fiercely long to be accepted as Jews and to enjoy the right of return to Israel. A year later, Mr. Halkin, still reflecting on the people he met in northeast India, went back to write a book about them. "Either a Tibeto-Burmese people in a remote corner of Southeast Asia had a mysterious connection with ancient Israel, or they were the victims of a mass delusion," he writes. "Either way, there was a story to be written." For the most part, Mr. Halkin believes more in the mass-delusion explanation than in any historical connection to biblical Israel. He methodically interviews community leaders and elders trying to see if there is any more than a coincidental similarity between old tribal rites and Judaism. The task is made difficult because 50 or so years ago, most of the Mizos and Kukis were converted to Christianity, so the old rites, belonging to what the local people call the old religion, have fallen into abeyance. Mr. Halkin finds some of the most active purveyors of the lost-tribe idea to be little more than charlatans, and for many of its pages, "Across the Sabbath River" is more a tale of desperate identity search than it is about real lost tribes. For example, he meets with the argument that in Kuki folklore there is a great bird of prey identical to the roc of the "Arabian Nights," and since the roc is not native to Manipur, Mr. Halkin's interviewee maintains, this proves his people come from the Middle East. "As it stood," Mr. Halkin writes well along in his investigation, "I was one more unsuccessful Lost Tribe hunter." Then, when he was about to give up, he met Khuplam Lenthang, a doctor who had spent decades collecting local folk tales and collating them into a single volume called "The Wonderful Genealogical Tales of the Kuki-Chin-Mizo." Reading that book in translation, Mr. Halkin realized that Dr. Khuplam was an extraordinary figure who had carried out extraordinary ethnograhic research. No "Arabian Nights" rocs here, but rather, strong evidence of old religious practices and terms that seemed unexplainable except by recourse to a lost-tribes theory. But let Mr. Halkin himself provide the persuasive and closely examined details, which come at the end of a book that has many delights, a variegated cast of characters and a conclusion stimulating many thoughts about the persistence of ancient behavior and belief.
2003 (21st of Elul, 5763): Rabbi Emil Fackenheim passed away. He was born in Halle, Germany in 1916. He graduated from Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums in 1939 and obtained Ph.D. from University of Toronto in 1945. He was interned at the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in 1938 and 1939. After becoming a Rabbi, he left Germany for Great Britain, where he was interned as an enemy alien after World War II began. He was sent to Canada in 1940, where he was a rabbi (1943-48), then professor of philosophy (1948-84) at the University of Toronto. He subsequently moved to Israel, where he was associated with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Fackenheim explored the problem of revelation and the relationship of the Jews with God, believing that the Holocaust must be understood as an imperative requiring Jews to carry on Jewish existence and that the existence of the state of Israel is a rebuke to those who view the Jewish people as obsolete or dying. Among his books are God's Presence in History (1972) and To Mend the World(1982). 2003: Emil Fackenheim, author of the 614th commandment - Thou shalt not hand Hitler posthumous victories. To despair of the God of Israel is to continue Hitler’s work for him."- passed away.
2004 (3rd of Tishrei, 5765): Shabbat Shuvah
2004 (3rd of Tishrei, 5765): Seventy-four year old historian Norman F, Cantor, the native of Winnipeg who specialized in the medieval period and whose sound scholarship was embodied in an accessible style with narrative drive, which made his major textbook, The Civilization of the Middle Ages the most widely-read overview of medieval history, passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/21/obituaries/norman-f-cantor-74-a-noted-medievalist-is-dead.html?mcubz=0
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1473036/Norman-Cantor.html
2005: Agudath Achim, the Orthodox Congregation in Little Rock, Arkansas, celebrated its one hundredth anniversary with a gala dinner.
2005: The Jerusalem Post reported that some 25 Torah scrolls in the New Orleans area, jeopardized by Hurricane Katrina, were rescued by a number of Jewish groups acting in concert. A makeshift coalition of representatives from the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans, national leadership from the Reform movement, rabbis from Baton Rouge and New Orleans and local law-enforcement officials were responsible for the effort. "Among the 25 we saved were also a few that were rescued from the Holocaust, and here they've survived a second horrific disaster," said Rabbi David Saperstein, the director of the Reform movement s Washington-based Religious Action Center. Chabad officials, working with both Jewish and non-Jewish volunteers, rescued at least 15 additional scrolls. "It is a bittersweet occasion," said Rabbi Zelig Rivkin, the executive director of Chabad Lubavitch of Louisiana. "Hurricane Katrina has destroyed our homes, synagogues and our city but has not destroyed our community." Among the sites that had Torahs rescued were Chabad of Louisiana's New Orleans headquarters, the Chabad Jewish Center in Metairie, the Touro Synagogue, Temple Sinai, and the Federation building, which had housed Torahs belonging to Shir Chadash Conservative Congregation and the New Orleans Jewish Day School. Rabbi Saperstein noted that the rescued Torahs were sent to cities like Houston, Baton Rouge and Memphis to be with their respective displaced congregations.
Among the scrolls that remain in New Orleans are Torahs from Congregation Gates of Prayer, which, according to Rabbi Robert Lowey, were taken to a high-rise office building downtown before the evacuation.
2005: The 2005 Lasker Awards for medical research are going to scientists who discovered stem cells, invented genetic fingerprinting and developed a powerful technology that played a crucial role in mapping the human genome. And a nonscientist, Nancy Brinker, is the winner of the Lasker Public Service Award for creating the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, which has helped transform a disease once rarely mentioned in polite conversation into an international issue. The awards, widely considered the United States' most prestigious medical prizes, are being announced today by the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation. The two scientific awards each carry a $50,000 prize, split between the winners; the public service award has no monetary prize. Mary Lasker created the awards in 1946 as a birthday gift to her husband, Albert, the Jewish advertising man, in hopes of curing cancer in 10 years.
2005: The Washington Post Book Section reviewed The Lost One: A life of Peter of Peter Lorre by Stephen D. Youngkin. As the review points out Lorre was born Laszlo Loewenstein. He emigrated from his native Hungary to Berlin from which he fled to Vienna in 1933 due to the rise in anti-Semitism. If you can imagine, he was on the same train with the actor Oskar Homolka, director Josef von Sternberg and violinist Jascha Heifitz. When things worsened in Austria, Loree was able to escape to England due to a strange quirk of fate. He got a paid ticket to England to act in Alfred Hitchcock’s first version of the mystery film, The Man Who Knew Too Much.You might want to read the book to find how Lorre, who spoke know English, got the part.
2005:A weekend of events marking the dedication of the Uriah P. Levy Jewish Center and Chapel at the U.S. Naval Academy comes to climactic close a new chapel and student center on Sunday named for the nation's first Jewish flag officer, Commodore Uriah P. Levy, a man who fought to serve his country while still observing his faith.
2006: Media Matters for America hired Eric Alterman as a Senior Fellow and agreed to host Altercation, effective today.
2006: CBS broadcast the first episode of “The Class” a sitcom created by David Crane, co-starring Lizzy Caplan, Jon Bernthal and Heather Goldenhersh whose father was Jewish.
2006: Israel's Attorney General, Menachem Mazuz, stated that the likelihood of Moshe Katsav being the victim of a plot was "fairly slim."[
2006 Congregation Beth El, of Missouri City, Texas participated in celebrating the High Holidays with Jewish residents from the Brenham State School and the Richmond State School.
2006:The Winograd Commission - the committee appointed to investigate the management of the war in Lebanon - begins its proceedings.
2006: At a debate in Tysons Corner between Republican Allen and Democrat Webb, WUSA-TV's Peggy Fox asked Allen, the tobacco-chewing, cowboy-boot-wearing son of a pro football coach, if his Tunisian-born mother has Jewish blood. The Forward, a Jewish newspaper, reported that the senator's mother, Etty, "comes from the august Sephardic Jewish Lumbroso family" and continued: "If both of Etty's parents were born Jewish -- which, given her age and background, is likely -- Senator Allen would be considered Jewish in the eyes of traditional rabbinic law, which traces Judaism through the mother." The Presbyterian Allen joins public figures Madeleine Albright and John Kerry in discovering his Jewish roots.
2007: U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrives in Jerusalem for a round of talks in Israel and the Palestinian Authority to prepare for the Middle East peace summit scheduled for the second half of November. Rice is expected to meet separately with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, who will report on the progress made in their talks over the past few weeks.
2007: The Tenth Annual Israeli Music Celebration continues with a concert at The Ben-Gurion University, Beersheba
2007: In Bethesda, Maryland, Mitchell Bard holds a reading and autograph session to promote his new book, Will Israel Survive?
2007(6 Tishrei 5768): St.-Sgt. Ben-Zion Henman was shot to death during operations in Nablus.
2008: Temple Judah’s Joshua Siegel plays Seymour in Little Shop of Horrors at Kennedy High School.
2008: In Washington, D.C., a joint reading with local writer Peter Manseau, author of the debut novel Songs for the Butcher's Daughter,and poet Janet R. Kirchheimer, author of the collection How to Spot One of Us.
2008:“Dialects: Israeli Jazz & Klezmer”, featuring Omer Klein is the first of three concerts being held in celebration of Israel’s 60th anniversary. The concert features two of the best examples of the new face of American/Israeli music. Trumpeter Frank London recovers the lost sounds of klezmer, taking the music back to its 19th-century roots with the Klezmer Brass All Stars. And pianist Omer Klein, a rising star in the Israeli/New York jazz movement, offers a program of his deeply melodic, utterly original compositions, tinged with the sounds of the Middle East. This concert is partially underwritten by the America Israel Cultural Fund in celebration of Israel’s 60th Birthday.
2008: A revival of “All My Sons,” “Arthur Miller’s 1947 Tony Award winning play was previewed today at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre, a month before its scheduled Broadway opening.
2008: Mandy Patinkin starred as Propsero in a revival of The Tempest that opened today in New York.
2008: “Pilobolus in Israel,” a photography exhibition by Robert Whitman of the dance troupe’s visit to Israel earlier this year, opens today at New York’s Chelsea Market. This exhibit features 70 photographs of the dancers against Israel’s iconic landscape, including the Dead Sea, the Tower of David, and local marketplaces. This event, sponsored by the Consulate General of Israel in New York, is a tribute to Israel’s 60th anniversary and will feature several Israeli bands and Pilobolus.
2008: On her first day as Kadima's new leader, Tzipi Livni received a startling blow: Shaul Mofaz, whom she ended up beating in Wednesday's party primary by only 431 votes, announced that he was "taking a break" from political life.
A shocked Livni tried to reach Mofaz to persuade him to reconsider, but he refused to meet with
2009: Israel plays Spain in the World Group, 2009 Semi-finals of the Davis Cup competition.
2009: Stephanie Pritzker received the 2009 Samuel A. Goldsmith Award for Outstanding Young Professional in Jewish Communal Work. Samuel Goldsmith (1893-1987) came to Chicago from New York in 1930 to become executive director of Jewish Charities of Chicago. He helped to organize the Community Fund of Chicago, a forerunner of the United Way. A charter member of the Joint Emergency Relief Fund, Goldsmith also chaired the Health Division of the Council of Social Agencies during the 1930s. Samuel Goldsmith supported the use of public funds for relief and instituted a policy of reimbursing hospitals for care of the indigent. Goldsmith helped to create the Jewish Welfare Fund in 1936 and served as executive director. This agency provided funds and other assistance to European Jews during the Holocaust. After the Jewish Welfare Fund's merger into the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago in 1950, Goldsmith became its executive vice president. Active as a leader and speaker within the Jewish-American community, Samuel Goldsmith called on American Jews to support the needs and requirements of Jews abroad and the development of a modern State of Israel. Social worker and social agency administrator, Samuel Goldsmith (1893-1987) came to Chicago from New York in 1930 to become executive director of Jewish Charities of Chicago. Shortly after accepting that position, he helped organize the Community Fund of Chicago, a forerunner of the United Way. He was a charter member of the Joint Emergency Relief Fund and chairman of the health Division of the Council of Social Agencies during the 1930's. In this role, he instituted a policy of reimbursing hospitals with public funds for care given to the indigent. In 1936, he helped found, and served as executive director of the Jewish Welfare Fund of Chicago, which raised funds for European Jews in the midst of the Holocaust. The Jewish Welfare Fund eventually merged with other organizations to become the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago in 1950. Goldsmith served as executive vice president. The collection contains articles, reports, correspondence, minutes, clippings, and pamphlets. The materials pertain to the administration of Jewish welfare organizations in Chicago, New York and Europe as well as to the issues of social work, public health, refugees, senior citizens and child care.
2009: 29th of Elul, 5769): Erev Rosh Hashanah
2009: 29th of Elul, 5769): As Jews gather to mark the start of Rosh Hashanah at Ahavat Olam in Miami, a 131 year old Torah was to be read tonight as part of the congregation’s Rosh Hashanah observances. The sheepskin scroll was believed to have been completed in 1878, the date of the inscription on its wooden handle. The handle also bears the name of the couple who donated it to their congregation in Moravske Budejovice, in what is now the Czech Republic. It was kept in a warehouse with other Torahs and Judaica after Hitler came to power, coming under the Nazis' control. After the Nazis fell, the cache from the Central Jewish Museum in Prague was controlled by communists who eventually sold the scroll and 1,563 others to a London synagogue in 1963. The scroll came to Miami after Marmorstein placed the synagogue's name on a waiting list several years back. Like all the trust's scrolls, it remains the property of the London organization, on indefinite loan to the temple. Congregations are chosen, in part, based on their desire to incorporate the scroll into their worship. The scroll came to Miami after Rabbi Danny Marmorstein placed the synagogue's name on a waiting list several years back. Like all the trust's scrolls, it remains the property of the London organization, on indefinite loan to the temple. Congregations are chosen, in part, based on their desire to incorporate the scroll into their worship. Already, the history of the Torah has resonated with members. Bianca Lerner, 80, survived the Holocaust in part by being taken in by the parents of a Christian friend and then hiding in a Catholic orphanage. She remembers being forced with her parents from their home. Her father was killed in a Polish ghetto. Her mother died at the Treblinka extermination camp. "My parents just walked out of our apartment, which was beautifully furnished with antiques and Oriental rugs and we just walked out and that was it," she said. "Since then, I've thought material possessions don't mean anything." But a Torah, Lerner said, is different: It's not just the central symbol of her faith, but something used in actual prayer and worship. Irving Whitman, 88, says he was a young Army private from New Jersey when he helped liberate the Buchenwald concentration camp. Those memories are seared in his mind. And he sees the Torah as an extension of his wartime experience. "It's all part of the same story," he said. "It's all part of the same historical moment." Susan Boyer, the U.S. director of the trust, also heads the Czech Torah Network in Sherman Oaks, Calif., which has helped reunite Holocaust survivors with scrolls from their hometowns. When she thinks of the surviving Torahs, she wonders what happened to the people from its synagogue, the people who prayed with it. It is a sad story, she admits, but she says it is buffered by hope, because the faith has lived on. If the Nazis had prevailed, Jews would have faded away long before Ahavat Olam gained roots in South Florida five years ago. Hitler's army would have killed the men and women who bore its congregants. And the Torah never would have left SS hands. Marmorstein knew he wanted a Holocaust-surviving Torah since the congregation was born. He wanted to pay tribute to the Jews who died and could think of no better way than through the faith's most prized possession. The 54-year-old rabbi shows a black-and-white picture of 11 relatives, his great aunts and uncles, grandfather and great-grandparents. Only two in the photo survived the Holocaust: his father and an uncle who both were liberated from Auschwitz. When asked why getting the Torah was so important, his eyes well with tears. "It's in my blood, this whole history is in my family," he said. "It's easy for us to sit and talk about it. But when it was your own father, your own uncle, when your grandfather was killed, it’s different. That's why."
2009: 29th of Elul, 5769): Eighty-one year old Dr. Lawrence B. Slobodkin, author of “The World is Green” and one of the founders of the modern ecology movement passed away today. (As reported by Carol Kaesuk Yoon)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/22/nyregion/22slobodkin.html?_r=1&emc=eta1
2009: Last day of 5769; in the evening Erev Rosh Hashanah – 5770 לשׁנה טובה
2010(10th of Tishrei, 5771): Yom Kippur
2010: A Yom Kippur machzor which had been translated for the first time into Portuguese is scheduled to be used by the Jews in Brazil's Amazon. The prayer book includes the traditional Hebrew text of the Yom Kippur prayer services, together with a transliteration and translation into Portuguese. It incorporates the customs and prayers of the Moroccan Sephardim, which were brought to Brazil in the 19th century by Moroccan Jewish immigrants. Until now, Brazil's Jews of the Amazon were inserting the special prayers into their own machzors as separate, hand-written pieces of paper, according to Shavei Israel, a Jerusalem-based group that helped publish the machzor. "This machzor is really the first of its kind," said David Salgado, project director for Shavei Israel, who moved to Israel from northern Brazil together with his wife and children. "It will enable Portuguese-speaking Jews who use Nusach Sepharadi to better recite and understand the meaning and significance of the Yom Kippur prayers." The prayer books will be distributed in Belem and Manaus in Brazil, where some 700 Jewish families live.
2010:As Jews prepare to break their Yom Kippur fasts this evening, Israeli experts agree that the optimal way to end the fast is to drink a couple of glasses of water or a sugared drink. The first meal of solid food should be a light one. If you are still hungry, wait an hour or two after the light meal. Eating too quickly or too much after a fast can cause abdominal pain and sometimes even vomiting.
2010(10thof Tishrei, 5771): Eighty-nine year old Irving Ravetch, half of the husband wife screening team of Ravetch and Frank passed away today. (As reported by Bruce Weber)
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/21/movies/21ravetch.html
2010(10th of Tishrei, 5771): Seventy-four year old Chabad Chassid Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak HaKohen Tauber passed away Yom Kippur morning at Sheba Hospital in the Tel HaShomer Medical Center after a long illness.
http://lubavitch.com/news/article/2029680/Rabbi-Avraham-Yitzchak-Tauber-Holocaust-Survivor-Age-74.html
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/139687#.VBnxCZt0ypo
2010:93 people were treated by emergency health workers for falling ill as a result of fasting over the course of the Jewish High Holiday of Yom Kippur on Saturday. Of those, 22 people needed to be resuscitated. Four people also drowned during the last 30 hours. 242 children were treated for injuries incurred while riding bicycles. As there were virtually no cars on the country's roads for the duration of the holiest day on the Jewish calendar, many children took to the empty streets on bikes and skateboards. Though road traffic was light, 26 people were also injured in 30 car accidents across the country. 133 women went into labor and were transferred by ambulance to hospitals around the country over the course of the holiday. Magen David Adom reported 8 incidents of rocks being thrown at ambulances performing their duties. The temperate weather that prevailed in most parts of the country made it easier for those fasting on the Day of Atonement. Scattered rain drizzled for short periods of time in some parts of the country. There was a significant improvement in air quality as a result of the sparse road traffic. Police were on alert for the holidays, with thousands of officers on duty throughout the country. The closure on the West Bank restricted Palestinian travel to exceptional cases of humanitarian need, and will be lifted only at midnight. In Acre, where violent street fighting broke out on Yom Kippur two years ago, calmness prevailed. The Yom Kippur fast ended at 6:18 p.m. in Jerusalem and at 6:30 p.m. in Tel Aviv, Haifa and Be'er Sheva. Buses will gradually resume service from 7:30 p.m. At Ben Gurion airport, incoming flights will resume at 9:30 p.m. and outgoing flights will resume at 10:30 p.m.
2010: The Twins’ Danny Valencia hit a game winning three run homer.
2011: In New York, The Center for Jewish History the Leo Baeck Institute and the Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at NYU are scheduled to present “A Continuing Conversation: Moses Mendelssohn and the Legacy of the Enlightenment,” day of discussion and debate devoted to exploring the thought and legacy of Moses Mendelssohn, the 18th-century founder of modern Jewish thought.
2011:"While Six Million Lived: America and the Jewish Refugee Crisis, 1933-1939," the ninth national conference of The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies is scheduled to take place today at the Fordham University School of Law in New York City.
2011: The Concert is scheduled to shown in Davenport, Iowa, as part of the Jewish Federation of the Quad Cities’ Ninth Annual Jewish Film Festival.
2011: The New York Timesfeatured a review of “Wonderstruck,” a children’s book written and illustrated by Brian Selznick, a cousin of Myron and David O. Selznick.
2011: "Everything on It: Poems and Drawings" by the late Shel Silverstein is one of the books that the Los Angeles Times featured in an article about children’s books that will be published this fall. The book featured numerous drawings and poems that the author left behind when he passed away in 1999. The book, aimed at children ages 8 and up “presents a perfect combinations of pictures and stories that will appeal to young readers as well as their parents, who probably first read these wonderful authors long ago.”
2011: David L. Ulin, Los Angeles Times Book Critic includes "Quite Enough of Calvin Trillin," in his Fall Book Preview.
2011:The Tel Aviv District Court rejected a petition by social justice protesters today against the municipality, which intends to dismantle tent encampments in several parts of the city. The court announced that a previous injunction against the dismantling will be cancelled on September 21st by noon, leaving the protesters with a few days to pack up the tent cities. The decision was made after the municipality announced that it was not able to reach a compromise with the tent city representatives. Attorneys on behalf of the representatives are weighing whether to appeal the decision before Israel’s High Court. During the discussions between the municipality and the protest leaders, which lasted several days, the municipality offered the protesters the ability to maintain encampments in Jaffa and in south Tel Aviv’s Hatikva neighborhood, but refused the protesters demands to maintain tents on Rothschild Boulevard, Ben Gurion Boulevard, Nordau Boulevard, and Levinsky Park. The injunction will remain in place until September 21st to allow the protesters to dismantle their tents by themselves.
2011:Norway will recognize a Palestinian state, Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Store said today as Palestinians prepared to seek statehood recognition from the United Nations. "Only negotiations can solve matters between Israel and the Palestinians, and should commence immediately," Store wrote in an entry on his Facebook page. "But the Palestinians have a right to go to the UN. Norway will support this and is prepared to recognize a Palestinian state," he added. A Palestinian bid was expected during the UN General Assembly that opens tomorrow in New York. Store and Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg were due to attend the UN gathering. Before that, Store was to chair a meeting of a donor support group for the Palestinians, the so-called Ad Hoc Liaison Committee.
2011: The funeral of Suzy Eban, the widow of the late Abba Eban is scheduled to take place today at the Kfar Shemariyahu cemetery.
2012(2nd of Tishrei, 5773): Second Day of Rosh Hashanah
2012(2nd of Tishrei, 5773): Sixty-nine year old Stephen Douglas “Steve” Sabol, who along with his father Ed was one of the founder of NFL Films passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/sports/football/steve-sabol-creative-force-behind-nfl-films-dies-at-69.html
2012:Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat today referred to as "absolutely unacceptable," comments by US Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney that the Palestinians are not seeking peace.
http://www.jpost.com/USPresidentialrace/Article.aspx?id=285459
2012(2nd of Tishrei, 5773):Poet, songwriter, filmmaker and playwright Haim Hefer, one of the icons of Israeli culture, died on the second day of Rosh Hashanah at Sourasky Medical Center in Tel Aviv, after a long illness
http://www.jpost.com/NationalNews/Article.aspx?id=285448
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/21/world/middleeast/haim-hefer-israeli-songwriter-and-poet-dies-at-86.html?_r=0
2013(14thof Tishrei, 5774): Erev Sukkoth
2013: Mark Alfred Dreyfus completed his term as Attorney-General of Australia.
2013: The Gesher Jewish Day School in Fairfax, VA, is scheduled to a song and story hour in the Sukkah.
2013: In London, The Weiner Library is scheduled to host a screening of “The Children Who Cheated The Nazis” which “tells the story of how 10,000 children escaped the Holocaust.”
2013: “Signs of Life” with music by Joel Derfner, lyrics by Len Schiff, book by Peter Ullian and directed by Lisa Portes “based on the true story of the Czech ghetto, Terezin, is scheduled to open in Chicago.
2013: According to remarks published today Yediot Aharonot, Major-Gernal Yair Golan, the IDF commander on the Syrian border “Syrian President Bashar Assad could cling to power for years despite having lost overall control of his country.”
2013: “Enough Said,” a poignant little film starring Julia Lous-Dreyfus was released today in the United States
2013: US Vice President Joe Biden will address the upcoming J Street annual conference, the organization revealed today
2013(14thof Tishrei, 5774): Erev Sukkoth
2014: The Phasa Morgana Festival is scheduled to open today in Timna Park.
2014: UK Jewish Film is scheduled to host the final screening of “The Congress,” Ari Folman’s “indictment of the film business and Hollywood.”
2014: Friends and family celebrate the natal day of Daniel DeClue, Missouri’s greatest band teacher and a mensch of the first order.
2014: At the Weiner Library for the Study of the Holocaust and Genocide Dr. Alexander Watson is scheduled to speak on “Hell before the Holocaust: Jewish Communities in the Eastern War Zone, 1914-1918.”
2014: A 29 year old Bethlehem resident was found to be carrying an axe after he was arrested today by Border Polic when he approached officers stationed at the checkpoint next to the tunnels on the Jerusalem-Gush Etzion Road. (As reported by Yaakov Levi)
2014: “In the wake of Australia’s counter-terrorism raids today that detained 15 people and foiled an alleged beheading plot by Islamic State jihadists, Jewish community groups called on Australian Jews to remain vigilant during the High Holidays.”
http://www.timesofisrael.com/australian-jews-called-on-to-be-vigilant-following-terror-raid/
2014(23rdof Elul, 5774): Eighty year old Guinter Kahn, “inventor of baldness remedy” passed away today. (As reported by Douglas Martin)
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/20/business/guinter-kahn-inventor-of-baldness-remedy-dies-at-80.html?hpw&rref=obituaries&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&version=HpHedThumbWell&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well
2014: “Archaeologists have found what they believe to be the remains of a Byzantine monastery outside the city of Beit Shemesh west of Jerusalem, the Israel Antiquities Authority announced today.” (As reported by Ilan Ben Zion)
http://www.timesofisrael.com/archaeologists-find-byzantine-remains-near-jerusalem/
2014: Larry Ellison announced he was stepping down as CEO of Oracle
2014: Last week before the start of the Sabbatical Year.
http://hazon.org/shmita-project/overview/
https://www.adatshalom.net/spiritual-community-123/holidays/high-holy-days/13-cms-pages-2/264-shmita
2015: Lewis Black is scheduled to perform at the Kaaboo Festvial at the Del Mar Racetrack & Fairgrounds in Del Mar, CA.
2015: For the first time Jazz is scheduled to be performed in the Turkish Shuk at Haifa.
2015: In the evening start of Shabbat Shuvah
2016: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Mischling by Affinity Konar, “a novel that draw on the dark history of Josef Mengle,”
2016: In Rockville, MD, Dr. Melvin Urofsky is scheduled to deliver a lecture on “The Brandeis Legacy.”
2016: During the Emmy Award ceremony, Jill Soloway, the creator of “Transparent” compared Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler.
2016: In Bethesda, MD, Gideon Amir is scheduled to deliver a lecture entitled “It Ain’t Necessarily So”: Rereading Classical Bible Stories.
2016: In Atlanta, the Breman Museum is scheduled to host the opening of “Curating Your Family Story” a program co-created by the museum and Beit Hatfutsot.
2016: The Illinois Holocaust Museum and Educational Center is scheduled to host a lecture by Father Patrick Desbois the ‘French-Catholic priest recently featured on "60 Minutes," leading the truly historic undertaking of identifying and locating the mass graves of Jews, Roma, and other victims, killed by Nazi mobile killing units, Einsatzgruppen, during the Holocaust in Eastern Europe.”
2016: Rabbi Barry Cytron is scheduled to be the keynote speaker at the dinner celebrating the 20th anniversary of Iowa Jewish Historical Society in Des Moines, IA.
2016: The Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington and the National Museum of American Jewish Military History are scheduled to host a lecture on basketball in WW II by Douglas Stark, author of Wartime Basketball: The Emergence of a National Sport during World War II and The SPHAS: The Life and Times of Basketball's Greatest Jewish Team
2017: Today, “Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi in New York in the first-ever public sit-down between the two leaders.” (As reported by Raphael Ahren and Alexander Fulbright)
2017: Today, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday adamantly defended Orthodoxy’s religious monopoly in Israel…” (As reported by Raphael Ahren)
2017: The Center for Jewish History is scheduled to host another session of “Proust in Time: Swann’s Way” in which Rebecca Ariel Porte examines the writing of In Search of Lost Time.
2017: The Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington is scheduled to host a tour of “Jewish Downtown Washington” this evening.
2017: This afternoon, as world leaders gather for the annual meeting of the UN General Assembly, Prime Minister Netanyahu is scheduled to meet with President Trump followed “by meetings with the president of Panama, Juan Carlos Varela; the prime minister of Japan, Shinzo Abe; and Rwandan President Paul Kagame at the UN.”
2018: The government of “Israel has yet to comment” on Syrian claims that its “air defenses had intercepted and downed missiles” aimed at several targets at Latakia. (As reported by Daniel Salami and Liad Osmo)
2018: As Israelis prepare for the observance of Yom Kippur, they are also prepared to respond to another day of protests by residents of Gaza demonstrating “against the blockade” being enforced by Egypt and Israel.
2018(9thof Tishrei, 5779): In the evening, Kol Nidre
2019: USCJ is scheduled to close nomination for the Shoshana S. Cardin Leadership Awards named in memory of Shoshana S. Cardin as a way of inspiring “a new cadre of leaders for Conservative Judaism.
2019: In Alexandria, VA, Beth El Hebrew Congregation is scheduled to host “Janette Muir, Associate Provost for Undergraduate Education / Associate Professor, George Mason University” as she lectures on “The Evolving Role of a First Lady,” from Martha Washington to Melania Trump.
2019: In Foster City, CA, the Peninsula JCC is scheduled “Rabbis’ Roundtable” where local rabbis, including Rabbi Lavey Derby, the Peninsula JCC director for Jewish life, discuss “meanings and teachings for the High Holidays.”
2019: As of this morning, following elections in Israel, no announcement of a “winner” is scheduled to take place.