November 5
1912: Woodrow Wilson was elected President, defeating Progressive Republican Theodore Roosevelt and incumbent Republican William Howard Taft.Wilson
2011: Nadina Wintraub (piano), Yelena Tishin (violin), Avraham Leventhal (viola) and Dmitry Golderman (cello) are scheduled to perform “Favorite Piano Quarters” as part of The Best of Chamber Music program at Edin-Tamar Music Center.
1370: King Casimir III of Poland III was seen as a cut above the average ruler. He was favorably disposed toward Jews. On October 9, 13 44 he confirmed the privileges granted to Jewish Poles in 1264 by Boleslaus V. Under penalty of death he prohibited the kidnapping of Jewish children for the purpose of forcible Christian baptism. He inflicted heavy punishment for the desecration of Jewish cemeteries. Although Jews were living in Poland earlier, Casimir allowed them to settle in Poland in great numbers and protected them as king's people.
1605: The Gunpowder Plot, an attempt to blow up the House of Lords which would be the first move in putting a Catholic on throne, was thwarted today. This event which is tied in the popular mind to Guy Fawkes could have had a negative impact on the small, concealed Jewish population of the British Isles since a Catholic on the throne at this time might have tied the kingdom to Spain the home of the Inquisition.
1615: Birthdate of Ibrahim I, another of the Sultans who reigned during the seventeenth century, a period of decline for the Ottoman Empire. He did employ at least one Jew in close capacity, Doctor Moshe Raphael Abravanel who changed his name to Hayati Zade.
1655: In New Amsterdam, the government refused to allow Jews to stand guard, requiring them to pay a tax instead. In effect, this made Jews “second class citizens.” Jacob Barsimon and Asser Levy refused to pay the tax petitioned to stand guard. At first they were met with resistance, but Asser Levy performed the guard duties anyway just like any other burgher of the town. He would later be granted full citizenship rights in New Amsterdam , the first for a Jew in North America .
1685: Congregation Bracha V'Shalom of Surinam was dedicated. It was one of the oldest congregations in the Americas.
1688: William of Orange lands at Brixham marking the start of the Glorious Revolution which was financed, in part, “by the Jewish banker Francisco Lopes Suasso who lent two million guilder and when asked what security he desired, Suasso answered: ‘If you are victorious, you will surely repay me; if not, the loss is mine.’”As King William III he would be the English monarch who knighted a Jew - Solomon de Medina,
1735: In Mantua province of Lombardy
1785:the council of Pennsylvania, under the presidency of Benjamin Franklin, ordered that a pension be paid to Colonel Solomon Bush, the brother of fellow solider Jonas Bush, for his meritorious services during the American Revolution.
1785: Birthdate of Dutch teacher and author Moses Leman whose works included Spirit of Talmudic Lord and Test of Talmudic Mathematics.
1779(26th of Cheshvan, 5540):Isaac Simon Cohen Kats-Shamash who had been born at Amsterdam in 1701 passed away today in his native city.
1816: Birthdate of historian Siegfried Hirsch who “published an award winning essay on King Henry I” but who died before he could finish “his treatise on Holy Roman Emperor Henry II.”
1826(5th of Cheshvan, 5587): Élie Halévy, a French Hebrew poet and author who was the father of Fromental and Léon Halévy passed away. Born in 1760 at Fürth in Bavaria, Halévy moved to Paris, where he became cantor and secretary to the Jewish Consistoire of Paris. His knowledge of the Talmud and his poetical talent earned him the esteem of many French scholars, particularly the well-known Orientalist Sylvestre de Sacy. His first poem was "Ha-Shalom", a hymn composed on the occasion of the treaty of Amiens; it was sung in the synagogue of Paris, in both Hebrew and French, on the 17th Brumaire (8 November) 1801. The poem was praised in Latin verses by Protestant pastor Marron. In 1808 Halévy composed a prayer to be recited on the anniversary of the battle of Wagram; in 1817, with the help of some of his co-religionists, he founded the French weekly "L'Israélite Français", which, however, expired within two years. To this periodical he contributed a remarkable dialogue entitled "Socrate et Spinosa" (ii. 73). His "Limmude Dat u-Musar" (Metz, 1820) is a text-book of religious instruction compiled from the Bible, with notes, a French translation, and the decisions of the Sanhedrin instituted by Napoleon. Halévy left two unpublished works, a Hebrew-French dictionary and an essay on Æsop's fables. He attributes the fables to Solomon (comp. I Kings v. 12-13 [A. V. iv. 32-33]), and thinks the name "Æsop" to be a form of "Asaph".
1828(28th of Cheshvan, 5589):Berr Isaac Beer a French manufacture passed away. Born at Nancy in 1744, he came from “a rich and estimable family; received an excellent education, especially in Hebrew and rabbinical literature—in the latter from Jacob Perle, chief rabbi of Nancy. Inheriting the title of syndic of the Jewish community of Nancy, bestowed upon his father in 1753 by King Stanislaus, he took an active part in the direction of the affairs of the community. In 1789 he was elected by the Jews of Alsace deputy to the States-General, where he was admitted to plead for Jewish emancipation before the Assembly. At about that time he published a pamphlet in which he refuted the anti-Jewish discourse delivered by De la Farre, bishop of Nancy. Berr was appointed successively member of the Assembly of Notables and member of the Sanhedrin; and he cooperated effectively in the organization of Jewish worship in France and in Italy. In his old age he retired, pensioned by the king, to one of his estates called "Turique"—the name of which he added to his own with the royal permission.”
1834: At Angenrod in the grand duchy of Hesse- Darmstadt, Mayer Bamberger and his wife gave birth to Isaac Bamberger, the German Rabbi who made a great effort to aid the Russian Jews who took refuge in Germany after 1882 when the Czar’s anti-Jewish laws began to have their most pernicious effect.
1835: Birthdate of Moritz Szeps, the Galician born journalist who was editor-in-chief of the Vienna Morgenpost and a friend of Crown Prince Rudolf
1849(20th of Cheshvan): Rabbi Elijah ben Jacob Raoler of Kalisz, author of Yad Eliyahu passed away today
1852: The New York Times correspondent sent a report to from Constantionple ten years ago Smyrna had had a population of 130,000 which included 13,000 Jews. Today the population has grown to 160,000 with percentage of Jews remaining about the same.
1852: The New York Times reported that “the Senate of Frankfort, supported by a resolution of the German Diet, has cancelled the article of the law of 1849 securing equality of political rights to citizens of all persuasions, thus excluding Jews from all share in the elections. New elections will take place immediately,” at which time only Christians will be allowed to vote.
1853: In a column entitled "Australia" published today reported on the wonders of the land down under including a description of Melbourne, a town with streets that were broader than those of New York and filled with a strange medley of people that including Jews, among others.
1853: Birthdate of Marcus Samuel founder of the company which eventually become known as Royal Dutch Shell.
1855: Birthdate of Eugene V. Debs, labor activist, reformer and Socialist Candidate for President of the United States Davis
1860(20th of Cheshvan, 5621): Birthdate of Sholom Dovber Schneersohn, the fifth Lubavitcher Rebbe. There is no way this blog can do justice to this Rebbe who provided leadership through the difficult days of the May Laws and World War I.
1863: In New York, the Hebrew Benevolent and Orphan Asylum under the leadership of President Benjamin I. Hart and Superintendent Herman Baar “dedicated its orphan asylum on East 77th Street.
1871: It was reported today that the Jewish Messenger has expressed its opposition to the attempt by some Jews to stop observing the Hebrew Sabbath and shift to observing the Christian Sunday. The Messenger takes issue with those who claim that change is allowed since the observance of the Sabbath was intended for a specific place (ancient Israel) and/or that it was to political measure intended to curry favor with the laborers of ancient time. The Messenger claims that there is no basis in fact for these claims. It quotes the commandment to prove its point that the Jewish Sabbath is a blessing to be observed on the seventh day.”The children of Israel shall observe the Sabbath, to keep it throughout their generations for a permanent covenant; it is a sign between me and the children of Israel forever.”
1873: An article published today described the origins and current status of the various religious groups found in New York City. The unnamed author reported that the while the exact date of the arrival of the first Jews is not known, the date usually used is 1660 which is four years before the English took control of the city from the Dutch. Regardless of the exact date, the Jews were here before the Roman Catholics or the Episcopalians. The early Jews had to deal with various forms of “persecution” but are now successful members of the community who build not only beautiful houses of worship but have established numerous institutions for the care of the sick, the aged and the helpless. There are approximately 40,000 Jews living in New York, most of whom who have come in the last 25 years. The city has 26 synagogues valued at $2,500,000. The average salary for a Rabbi is $2,200. The lowest paid makes $500 and the highest paid makes $6,000. For a point reference Unitarians earn an average of $5,000 and Lutherans earn an average of $1,800.
1875: Based on information that had first appeared in the Times of London, it was reported today that Czar has given a young Jew named Frehmann a commission in the Russian Army. If so, this would make him the first Jew to ever serve as an officer in the forces of the Czar. [This would seem to contradict claims that Joseph Tumpeldor was the first Jewish officer in the Russian Army.]
1877: It was reported today that supporters of Thomas C.E. Ecclesine, a candidate for the New York State Senate have taken advantage of his German sounding name to pass him off as being Jewish in those part of the district that have a large Jewish vote. However, they have also claimed that he is an Irish Catholic in an attempt to garner that segment of the vote. (Since he was married at St. Ann’s Church by Father William Jackson, it is fair to say that his attempt to gain the Jewish vote was not based on fact. The ruse attests to the growing importance of the Jewish Vote.)
1881: It was reported today that the Deutsch Tagblatt, an anti-Semitic newspaper has announced that the Conservative Committee has sent a telegram to Bismarck declaring their continued opposition to the Progressives in the Reichstag.
1881: Based on information that first appeared in the National Zeitung, it was reported today that Chancellor Bismarck has declared that he “would never entertain a proposal to curtail the rights of Jews.”
1881: In response to a request by a an interdenominational committee, rabbis throughout the United States are expected to address their congregations during Shabbat services about the creation of James Garfield Hospital in Washington, DC and solicit their financial support for the creation of this memorial to the late U.S. President. Christian ministers will address their congregations on the subject tomorrow.
1882: “Not Prejudiced Against Jews” published today contains a list of prominent citizens including Dr. Abraham Jacobi, Felix Adler and the Seligmans attesting to the fact that ex-Governor Edward Salomon “does not entertain any prejudices against the Jewish race.” (Salomon is not to be confused with Edward Selig Salomon who was a German Jewish immigrant and who also served as a governor)
1883: It was reported today that the preparations for celebrating the centennial of Moses Montefiore which will take place next year have the added proof of putting to rest doubts among some Englishman that any person has attained the age of 100.
1885(27th of Cheshvan, 5646): Jonas Strauss, the head of the dry goods firm of J. Strauss, Brother & Company passed away today in New York. He was also a partner in Levi Strauss & Co. in San Francisco. The San Francisco company was a started in 1851 by Jonas, Louis and Levi Strauss (the man who gave us Levi jeans). Twenty-one year old Jonas Strauss stayed in New York and shipped material “around the Horn” to his brothers in California. His prosperity could be measured by his generous contributions to various Jewish charities and not by his life-style which was so simple that he refused to purchase his own horse and carriage.
1885: Birthdate of famed historian Will Durant. Unlike other historians of world civilization like Arnold Toynbee he did not view the Jews in a negative manner. In his volume of The Story of Civilization – The Reformation, Durant wrote, "So prominent was the Jewish role in the foreign commerce of Europe that those nations that received the Jews gained and the countries that excluded them lost in the volume of international trade."
1887: It was reported today that the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society for Children will be hosting a benefit performance next week.
1887: Birthdate of Paul Wittgenstein “an Austrian-born concert pianist, who became known for his ability to play with just his left hand, after he lost his right arm during the First World War. He devised novel techniques, including pedal and hand-movement combinations that allowed him to play chords previously regarded as impossible for a five-fingered pianist.The Wittgenstein family had converted to Christianity three generations before his birth on the paternal side and two generations before on the maternal side; nonetheless they were of mainly Jewish descent, and under the Nuremberg laws they were classed as Jews. Following the rise of the Nazi Party and the annexation of Austria, Paul tried to persuade his sisters Helene and Hermine to leave Vienna, but they demurred: they were attached to their homes there, and could not believe such a distinguished family as theirs was in real danger. Ludwig had already been living in England for some years, and Margaret (Gretl) was married to an American. Paul himself, who was no longer permitted to perform in public concerts under the Nazis, departed for the United States in 1938. From there he and Gretl…managed to use family finances (mostly held abroad) and legal connections to attain non-Jewish status for their sisters. The family finances supposedly consisted of the voluntary surrender of all properties and assets in Germany and occupied lands with a total value of about US$6 billion at the time, which may have been the largest private fortune in Europe. Essentially all family assets were surrendered to the Nazis in return for protection afforded the two sisters under exceptional interpretations of racial law, allowing them to continue to live in their family palace in Vienna.” He died in New York City in 1961
1888(1st of Kislev, 5649): Rosh Chodesh Kislev
1888(1st of Kislev, 5649): Seventy-nine year old orientalist Louis Lowe who traveled to Palestine where he studied the practices of the Samaritans and the works of the Karaites and who headed two different Jewish schools in England passed away today.
1888: It was reported today that among the books now available in New York are Idylls of Israel and Other Poems by D. J. Donahue and The Wandering Jew, a three volume work by Eugene Sue.
1888: “Government By The People” published today summarized a lecture by Dr. Gustav Gottheil in which he contended that the concept of popular government has its origins in Biblical Judaism. According to the rabbi, “The whole idea of popular government pervaded the law of god and the sentiments of the Jews.”
1893: “Candidates of the Parties” published today provided profiles of those running on Democratic State ticket in New York including Simon W. Rosendale, native of Albany who is running for Attorney General and who a trustee of Congregation Anshe-Emeth, President of the Jewish Home Society and a leader of B’nai B’rith
1893: Tammany Hall closed the campaign tonight with three mass meetings including one at the Hebrew Institute.
1893: “Work of the Reichstag” published today described activities at the current session of the German parliament including the introduction of bills designed to “counteract the dismemberment of the large estates and to regulate interest on loans and mortgages” which are both said to have an “anti-Semitic flavor” because the landed gentry who borrow from Jewish bankers pay off their debts by selling portions of their landed holdings.
1893: According to the annual report delivered by Morris Goodhart, President of the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian a summary of which was published today, the society is caring for 2,339 children, 974 of whom were born in the United States, 521 of whom were born in Poland, 367 of whom were born in the Austro-Hungarian Empire with balance coming from places as disparate as Britain, Germany, France, Holland, Spain, Sweden and Jerusalem.
1893: Five Polish Jews continued to be held in jail at Hudson, NY as they await Grand Jury action on charges of “illegal registration”
1894: The speeches at the rally for Congressman Timothy J. Campbell were delivered in a variety of foreign languages including Russian and Hebrew which would provide some indication as to the importance of the Jewish immigrant vote in the upcoming election.
1895: A list of the bequests left by the late Julius Lipman published today including $500 to be given to each of the following: Mount Sinai Hospital, the Montefiore Home, the United Hebrew Charities and Congregation B’nai Jeshurun.
1895: At 8 o’clock this evening Isaac Klein and M.D. Rothschild were the only two leaders of Confederated Good Government Clubs to be found at its headquarters on Broadway where reports of a Tammany victory were being received with the expected dismay and disappointment.
1895: In the response of Dr. Maurice H. Harris to Israel Zangwill’s views on Reform Judaism published today the rabbi at Temple Israel said, “It may be easy for critics to formulate a rational Judaism, or a poetic Judaism, a Judaism conservative or a Judaism radical. It is not a better Judaism that we want but better Jews.”
1896(29th of Cheshvan, 5657): Eighty-year old Rachel, Countess d’Avigdor second daughter of Sir Isaac Lyon and Isabel Goldsmid and wife of Count Salamon Henri d'Avigdor who “was at one time president of the Ladies' Committee of the Jews' Deaf and Dumb Home, and honorary secretary of the West End Charity; also a member of the committees of the Jewish Convalescent Home, of the workhouse committee of the Jewish Board of Guardians, and of the West End Sabbath School” passed away today.
1898: “Books and Authors” published today included a review of several works translated by Dr. Samuel A. Binion the native of Suwalki who was educated in both Hebrew and the Talmud before he moved to England in the 1860’s where he converted to Christianity. He also exposed a manuscript reputed to have been written by Maimonides which had been purchased by Adolph Sutro, the first Jewish mayor of San Francisco as being a forgery.
1899: The twentieth annual meeting of the Directors of the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society was held today. Samuel D. Levy, President of the Board of Trustees, read his annual report, which included the report of the Treasurer for the fiscal year just ended. The income from bequests and membership fees was $102,911.19, and the disbursements $102,725.52.
1899: Rabbi Samuel Schulman delivered a talk today entitled “Zangwill’s Children of the Ghetto, an Incomplete Picture of Jews and Judaism.”
1902: Herzl's London representative, Leopold Greenberg, met Lord Cromer, British Counsel-General in Egypt, and Egyptian prime minister Boutros Ghali Pasha. He succeeded in winning them over to the Zionist cause.
1909: The Turkish Ministry of Interior asked the Council of State to accelerate the passage of immigration laws. On the same day several hundred Jewish recruits presented themselves for enrollment in the Turkish Army.
1910: It was reported today that Alfred M. Heinsheimer has donated one million dollars to the New York Foundation, a non-sectarian organization he founded “to promote charitable, educational and philanthropic enterprises. The one million dollars had been a bequest from the late Louis A. Heinsheimer, which, according to his will, was supposed to be left to 6 existing Jewish charities if they could come together and form one common federation within two years. When they failed to do so, under the terms of the will, the money then went to Alfred. Alfred was so intent on fulfilling his brother’s wish of creating a Jewish Federation, that he said he would waive his claim to the money if five of the charities would come together. They failed to do so and Alfred acted in a manner consistent with his brother’s generosity.
1911: After declaring war on the Ottoman Empire on September 29, 1911, Italy annexed Tripoli and Cyrenaica marking the end of 350 years of Ottoman rule. There were approximately 20,000 Jews living there at the time. Over the next twenty years, the Jewish population would increase as Italian Jews made their way to this area which is known as Libya. While one source describes this “as a golden age for Libya’s Jews” others note the clashes that took place between the native population and their co-religionists who came with the Italian conquerors.
1912: Woodrow Wilson was elected President, defeating Progressive Republican Theodore Roosevelt and incumbent Republican William Howard Taft.
1912: Maxim Birnkraut was elected to the New York State Legislature.
1912: Maurice Caro of Boston, MA was elected to the State Legislature.
1912: P.C. Cohn of Sacramento, CA was elected to the State Legislature
1912: In Pittsburgh, PA. Adolph Edlis was re-elected Treasure of the School Board.
1912: Mark Eisner of New York City was elected to the State Assemly.
1912: Henry Elgart of Colchester, CT was elected to the State Legislature.
1912: In Rhode Island, Jacob A. Eaton was elected to the State Legislature.
1912: Sam B. Bradner of Benson, AZ was elected as member of the State Constitutional Convention and the State Legislature.
1914: Great Britain declared war on the Ottoman Empire -- a move which would lead, ultimately to the creation of the state of Israel.
1914: Birthdate of Alexander Abramovich the native of Moscow who gained fame as Israeli composer Alexander “Sasha” Argov.
1914: Publication of The Daybegan in New York City.
1914: Birthdate of Salomon Gluck, the Swiss born French physician who served in the Resistance and who was murdered by the Nazis along with the other victims aboard the infamous Convoy 73.
1915: Birthdate of Martin Dannenberg the native of Baltimore, MD who served as chairman of the Sun Life Insurance Company and who, while serving with Patton’s Third Army who“discovered an original copy of the Nuremberg Laws signed by Adolf Hitler.”
1912: Reverend George Blyth, the Anglican Bishop of Jerusalem who shifted his attempts at conversion from fellow Christians to Jews and Muslims passed away today.
1917: In Buchanan v. Warley,The Supreme Court unanimously agreed to strike down as unconstitutional a Louisville KY
1923: Following the collapse of the German mark, several thousand impoverished German descended upon Berlin
1924: Jesse H. Metcalf who as early as June of 1933 would join in the attack on the Nazi treatment of the Jews when he declared “We as a nation can only declare the existence of racial or religious prejudice to be untenable as a national ideal” was elected to the United States from Rhode Island, a position he would hold until 1937.
1931: In the Flatbush section of Brooklyn, former Ann Seidlitz and William Herzenberg gave birth to Leonard Arthur Herzenberg, the Nobel Prize winning immunologist. (As reported by Douglas Martin)
1933:Dr. Judah L. Magnes, Chancellor of the Hebrew University Jerusalem
1937: The Palestine Post reported that an Egged bus driver and two his passengers were wounded when their vehicle was fired on, at the infamous Kilometer 5 of the Jerusalem-Jaffa road. A lone Jewish lorry driver was shot there and wounded. The Egged Bus Company was founded in 1933. The Hebrew word Egged means “union.” The company was so named because it was formed from the merger of four smaller bus companies. Today, the Egged Bus Company is the second largest transportation company in the world.
1937: The Palestine Postreported that the Arab terror continued when the Iraqi petroleum pipeline was punctured and set on fire. Shots were fired and a bomb was thrown at the Beisan police station
1937: Hitler chairs a secret conference in which he informs the High Command and others of his racial, geopolitical, and military plans to dominate Europe . The conference is recorded by Colonel Friedrich Hossbach and called after him. Hitler lays out the core of his policy to his military leaders. "The aim of the German policy was to make secure and to preserve the racial community and to enlarge it. It was a question of SPACE.""Germany Germany Britain France France Britain Italy Russia Italy England France
1938(11th of Cheshvan): Yiddish poet Abraham Liessin passed away.
http://archive.jta.org/article/1938/11/07/2844004/abraham-liessin-yiddish-poet-and-editor-dead-at-68
1940(4th of Cheshvan, 5701): During World War II, as the Greeks fought against the invading Italians Haham Raphael Joseph Antzelou was killed in the Battle of Kalpaki on the Albanian front. Many Jews of Ioannina, a city in northwest Greece
1941: Birthdate of Kay Leipzig, an ayshis chayel in the truest sense of the word.
1942(25th of Cheshvan, 5703): The Nazis deported the last 1,800 Jews from Ciechanow, Poland. Jews had lived in the town since the middle of the sixteenth century. During the deportation an SS man politely asks a Jewish woman to hand him her baby. When she complies, the trooper smashes the baby to the street headfirst, killing it. Some of the deportees took part in the uprising at Auschwitz . Approximately 100 people from the town survived the war but they did not try to restore their community.
1942: Jewish men from Stopnica , Poland
1942: Peasants in Siedliszcze , Poland
1942: Six hundred Jews from Borislav , Poland
1942: In France Paris Auschwitz . After arrival, Jews awaiting entry into the gas chamber spy a truck loaded with corpses but continue on to their deaths
1942: Over the next six days, 1060 Greece-born Jews in and around Paris are seized and deported to Auschwitz Bernhard Lichtenberg, the anti-Nazi priest whom among other things prayed daily from his pulpit in the St Hedwig Cathedral for the both Jews and Jewish Christians as well as other victims of the regime.
1942: The Gestapo arrested Regina Jonas, the first woman ordained as a rabbi and deported her to Theresienstadt
1942: Birthdate of Richie ScheinblumBronx-born outfielder for the Kansas City Royals. Scheinblum became the only Jewish switch-hitter (and 7th switch-hitter total) to bat .300 during a full season.
1943: While waiting to be deported to Dachau, 67 year old Bernhard Lichtenberg, the anti-Nazi priest whom among other things prayed daily from his pulpit in the St Hedwig Cathedral for the both Jews and Jewish Christians as well as other victims of the regime died today.
1943: Gertrude Luckner, a Christian social worker involved in the German resistance to Nazism, was arrested by the Gestapo before she could transfer funds destined for the last Jews of Berlin and imprisoned at Ravensbruck concentration camp.
1943(7th of Cheshvan, 5704):Operation "Harvest Festival" continued at Poniatowa as 15,000 Jews were killed in one day. The children of the Siaulia Ghetto in Lithuania
1945: This evening, following a second of anti-Jewish rioting in several Libyan cities, “the British authorities, who had been in control of Libya since the defeat of the German-Italian forces there in 1943, imposed a curfew.” The curfew failed to halt the violence which would continue unabated for at least two more days.
1948: “Ben Gurion reported his cabinet: Jerusalem
1948: Israeli forces retake Yad Mordecai from the Egyptians.
1948: The Provisional State Council, the body that temporarily governed Israel until January of 1949, decided that the Constituent Assembly (later called the Knesset) would have 120 members.
1948: In Béni Saf, French Algeria, millionaire businessman André Lévy and his wife gave birth to Bernard-Henri Levy author of Who Killed Daniel Pearl?
1950: Chaya and Yehezkel Bornstien, have found refuge in the Rosh Pina ma'abara immigrant transit camp. Both are natives of Lodz, Poland; both escaped to the Soviet Union before the Nazis entered their hometown, and managed to survive the Holocaust. Now they are on a quest to find their daughter Lusia whom they had sent the Zionist Coordination for the Redemption of Jewish Children when they were still living in post-war Poland because of economic duress and the outbreak of anti-Semitic violence as typified by the pogrom at Kielce.
1953: Armed Jordanians murdered a guard in a nighttime attack upon a post along the railway track north of Hadera in the coastal plain.
1953 U.S. premiere of “How To Marry A Millionaire,” a comedy co-starring Lauren Bacall, a cousin of Shimon Peres and future convert to Judaism Marilyn Monroe featuring a score conducted by Alfred Newman.
1956: During the Sinai Campaign, British and French troops land at the Suez Canal and move south under the pretext of protecting the canal from the warring Egyptians and Israelis. The Anglo-French force meets a political defeat when the Eisenhower Administration immediately pressures its two NATO allies to promise to remove the troops without delay. At the same time, the Soviets remind the Israelis that they have missiles capable of hitting the Jewish state with nuclear warheads. In trying to evaluate the situation Ben Gurion dispatches Golda Meir and Shimon Peres to see if the French will stand by the Israelis if the Soviets move to intervene. This is another example of Jewish history being played out against a much larger tapestry of world events; in this case the Cold War between the East and the West and the conflict between third world nationalism and European colonialism.
1967: The last of Aden's Jews arrived in Israel marking the end of this ancient Jewish community.
1968: Republican Richard M. Nixon won the presidency, defeating Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey and third-party candidate George C. Wallace. From the perspective of Jewish history, Nixon’s shining moment came when he ordered the re-supply of Israeli forces during the Yom Kippur War in 1973. According to some experts, without this, the Israelis well might have been defeated and the state of Israel
1974: Richard Stone was elected to the U.S. Senate from Florida
1975(1st of Kislev, 5736): Rosh Chodesh Kislev
1975(1st of Kislev, 5736): American author and critic Lionel Trilling passed away at the age of 70.
1979(15th of Cheshvan, 5740): Al Capp the cartoonist who created the comic strip Lil' Abner passed away at the age of 70. The eastern Jew created the imaginary hillbilly community of Dog Patch complete with Ma and Pa Yokum, Daisy Mae, Marryin’ Sam, and the ever popular Schmoos (rhymes with Schmooze and reminds one of the descriptions of manna in the Bible).
1984(10th of Cheshvan, 5745):The Hon. Ivor Goldsmid Samuel Montagu (23 April 1904, London, a British filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, film critic, writer, table tennis player and apparent Soviet spy passed away.
1987(13th of Cheshvan, 5748): Elimelekh Rimalt passed away. A native of Galicia, he was an ordained Rabbi who earned a PhD in psychology. He made Aliyah in 13. A member of the Knesset fro Likud, he served as Minister of the Postal Services in 1969 and 1970.
1989 (7th of Cheshvan, 5750): Pianist Vladimir Horowitz passed away at the age of 85. (As reported by Bernard Holland)
1989:In “The Legends of Kibbutz Country,” published today Mathew Nevisky describes the role that the Jezreel Valley Israel Mount Tabor Mount Gilboa Jezreel Valley Israel Galilee or along the coast, the Jezreel heartland offers insight into another aspect of Israel
1990 (17th of Cheshvan, 5751): Meir Kahane was murdered by an Arab terrorist.
1991(28th of Cheshvan, 5752): Robert Maxwell passed away at the age of 68. Born Ján Ludvík Hoch in pre-war Czechoslovakia
1993: The family Hannah Szenes living in Israel was informed today that a Hungarian military court convened after the fall of the Communist regime had officially exonerated her.
1995: President Clinton is scheduled to leave today for Jerusalem where he will attend the funeral of Prime Minister Rabin.
1995: “Assassination In Israel” published today described the reaction of American leaders including President Clinton and former Secretary of State Warren Christopher to the murder of Prime Minister Rabin.
1996: United States President Bill Clinton defeats Republican challenger Robert J. Dole and Reform party candidate H. Ross Perot to become the first democratic president since Franklin Roosevelt to win a second term in office. Three of the major events of Clinton’s second term centered around Jews. The first was the Monica Lewinsky Scandal. The second was the Camp David Peace initiative that Clinton mounted in 2000. The meetings between Ehud Barak and Yassar Arafat failed to produce a peace treaty; a failure for which Clinton blamed Arafat. The third was the pardon of Marc Rich issued on Clinton’s last day in office. In one of those ironies of life, Rich was represented by Lewis “Scooter” Libby. Libby, who was Jewish would end up being denied a pardon by President Bush for his role in the case of Valier Plame; a denial that would cause a public split between Bush and Dick Cheney.
1996: The Coming Street Cemetery, the Charleston South Carolina burial site that is one of the oldest in the United States having been founded in 1762 was listed on the National Register of Historic Places today.
1997(5th of Cheshvan, 5758): Isaiah Berlin passed away at the age of 88(As reported by Marilyn Berger)
1999: A.M. Rosenthal wrote the last of his twice-weekly “On My Mind” columns today entitle “Please Read This Column” which was the name of the first of these columns written in 1987.
2000:The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or about topics of Jewish interest including The Bialy Eaters: The Story of a Bread and a Lost World by Mimi Sheraton
2002: After over 20 years in elected public life, Linda Lingle was elected as Hawaii U.S. St. Louis Hawaii California State University Honolulu Hawaii Israel
2003: At a Jewish forum in New York City, George Soros “partially attributed a resurgence in anti-Semitism to the policies of the Bush administration and the Sharon administration” as well as the perception that “Jews rule the world” based on his role in affairs.
2005: Haaretz and The Jerusalem Post reported that the Secretary General of the United Nations had canceled his upcoming trip to Iran Iran Israel Israel
2006: The New York TimesSunday book section features a review of David Mamet’s, The Wicked Son: Anti-Semitism, Self-Hatred, and the Jews.
2006: Under the title “His devils made him do it,” Jeffrey Meyers reviewed Isaac B. Singer: A Life by Florence Noiville, translated from the French by Catherine Temerson.
2006: Under the title “The Altered States,” The Times of London
2006: Opening of the 10th Annual Dayton
2006: Yuli Tamir named acting Science and Technology Minister.
2007:Jerome Groopman, a physician at Harvard Medical School Washington , D.C.
2007: In a Time magazine article entitled “The Genius Who Wanted to Be a Hack” Lev Grossman reviews Gentlemen of the Road by Michael Chabon.
2007: In Canada
2008: New York premier of “The Little Traitor.” “Based on Panther in the Basement by world-renowned novelist, Amos Oz, this beautiful story of an implausible friendship between an amiable British soldier and a spirited, 11-year-old Israeli militant who wants the occupying imperialists off his land takes place just a few months before Israel achieves independent statehood.
2008: Following a successful run on Broadway, Jake Ehrenreich’s “A Jew Grows in Brooklyn has its Chicagoland” premier at the North Shore Center for the Performing Arts.
2008: The New Republicmagazine includes reviews of The Life and Thought of Hans Jonas: Jewish Dimensions by Christian Wiese and Memoirs by Hans Jonas; edited by Christian Wiese and translated by Krishna Winston.
2009: “Ambassadors and diplomats from 44 countries, military attaches from 27 armies in the world, and the international media were invited by the IDF and the Foreign Ministry to show them the weapons and munitions seized from the Francop ship.”
2009: The 40th Annual Book Festival sponsored by the JCC of Greater Washington opens with presentations by Steve Roberts, author of From Every End of This Earth and Peter Yarrow author of Day is Done.
2010:A Free Tour of Herodian in Honor/Memory of Ehud Netzer z"l the famous archeologist who passed away on October 28 is scheduled to take place in Jerusalem
2010:A new documentary, “Jews and Baseball, an American Love Story,” which opened today in New York, is a film that largely succeeds at telling the story of a great American people (the Jews that is) via the tale of a great American pastime. It may not be a grand slam, but it’s at least a double. (As reported by Jordana Horn)
2010: Agudas Achim in Iowa City is scheduled to host its annual New Comers’ Shabbat Dinner
2010: Friends and family share in the joy of Kay Leipzig’s birthday.
2010: It was reported today that “new findings contradict the conventional belief that Italians began to enforce anti-Semitic laws only after German troops occupied the country in 1943, and then reluctantly. In a spate of studies, many of them based on a little-publicized Italian government report commissioned in 1999, researchers have uncovered a vast wartime record detailing a systematic disenfranchisement of Italy’s Jews, beginning in the summer of 1938, shortly before the Kristallnacht attacks in November....
Ilaria Pavan, a scholar at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, said a series of incrementally more onerous laws in 1939 and 1940 revoked peddlers’ permits and shopkeepers’ licenses, and required Jewish owners of businesses — as well as stock or bond holders — to sell those assets to “Aryans.” Bank accounts were ordered turned over to government authorities, ostensibly to prevent the transfer of money out of the country. There is little record of the sums involved in the confiscations and forced sales of Jewish-held property between 1938 and 1943, said Ms. Pavan, who was a member of the official government commission charged with investigating the anti-Semitic plundering. But between 1943 and 1945, when the Italian government was under the direct supervision of German overseers, the looting of property of Jewish Italian citizens and Jewish refugees who had fled to Italy in hopes of sanctuary, she said, totaled almost $1 billion in today’s values....
2010: The New York Times featured a review of I Remember Nothing And Other Reflections by Nora Ephron.
2011: Nadina Wintraub (piano), Yelena Tishin (violin), Avraham Leventhal (viola) and Dmitry Golderman (cello) are scheduled to perform “Favorite Piano Quarters” as part of The Best of Chamber Music program at Edin-Tamar Music Center.
2011: Opening night of the 6th Annual JCC of Northern Virginia Book Festival
2011: Remembrance Shabbat is observed at Temple Judah in Cedar Rapids commemorating three major November Events: The Balfour Declaration, Kristallnacht and the UN vote approving partition which created the Jewish State.
2011(8th of Cheshvan): Yahrzeit of Avraham Elimelch ben Yosef Dov, whose nickname was Melech and whose English name was Abraham Levin, of blessed memory.
2011: As Jews read Lech-Lecha, will any Rabbi deliver a sermon tying the ancient words from Bereshit with the anniversary of the Balfour Declaration which was observed 3 days ago?
2011:Israel Defense Forces aircraft struck targets in the southern Gaza Strip this evening, thwarting an attempt by Islamic Jihad to launch a rocket into Israel.
2011:"It will take a year, two years, but I will return. I will never leave you again." These words were written by missing IAF navigator Ron Arad, whose plane was shot down over Lebanon in 1986, to his wife Tami and his daughter Yuval. Arad's diaries were obtained by Channel 2 and shown today. He most likely wrote them during his first weeks in captivity. The notes were written on pages ripped from books Arad's captors gave him.
2012: The Palestinians will press ahead with a bid to upgrade their status at the United Nations, a senior official said today, brushing off a request by Israel to halt the initiative.
2012: The UJA-Federation of New York released $10 million in Hurricane Sandy emergency relief aid to its network agencies and synagogues this morning (As reported by JTA)
2012: Microsoft launched its Windows 8 smartphones in Israel today
2012: At the University of Chicago, Professor Hanna Holbron Gray is scheduled to deliver a lecture entitled “European Émigré Scholars and the American Academy After 1933."
2012: “Coffee and Conversation for Holocaust Survivors” is scheduled to take place the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center in Skokie, Illinois.
2012:TheJewish Genealogical Society of the Conejo Valley and Ventura County (JGSCV) is scheduled to present: "From the Spanish Inquisition to the Present: A Search for Jewish Roots"
2013: The five day bike ride sponsored by the Arava Institute Hazon that began in Jerusalem is scheduled to end today in Eilat.
2013: Retired Ambassador Daniel C. Kurtzer, the S. Daniel Abraham Professor in Middle East Policy Studies at the Woodrow Wilson School of Princeton University is scheduled to talk about the conflicts in the Middle East at the San Diego Jewish Book Fair.
2013: In London, the Pears Institute For The Study Of Anti-Semitism is scheduled to sponsor by Professor Philip Spencer on “The Recurrence of Genocide Since the Holocaust.”
2013:US Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Israel this evening and visited Rabin Square in Tel Aviv, the location of Prime Minister Yizhak Rabin's murder on November 4, 1995. "I can promise Israelis that America will stand by the side of Israel every step of the way," Kerry said. (As reported by Gilad Morag)
2013: Residents in 38 municipalities – from the tiny town of Migdal, near Tiberias, to Petah Tikva – voted today in second-round elections for mayor. (As reported by Henry Rome and Lahav Harkov)
2014: For the first time ever “Cats” is scheduled to be performed in Israel starting today at Tel Aviv’s Charles Bronfman Auditorium.
2014: In Sydney, “Night Will Fall” and “Regarding Susan Sontag” are scheduled to be shown at the Jewish International Film Festival.
2014:Christie’s is scheduled to sell Schiele’s 1910 watercolor “Town on the Blue River,” today in conjunction with a restitution agreement that treats the work as looted art and provides compensation to the heirs of “Fritz Grünbaum, a Viennese cabaret performer whose large art collection was inventoried by Nazi agents after he was sent to the Dachau concentration camp, where he died.”
2014: The Skirball Center is scheduled to host “Israel in the Eyes of the Media: From Menachem Begin to Today.”