December 20
1926: Birthdate of David Levine, painter and artist who is famous for his caricatures.
69: General Vespasianus occupied Rome on the same day that the Emperor Vitellius was murdered. Vespasianus is better known as Vespasian, the Roman general who was in charge of putting down the Great Revolt in Judea. He broke off his military action to come back to Rome and seize power. His son Titus would destroy the Temple in 70. Before leaving for Rome, Vespasian gave permission for the establishment of what would become the community of scholars at Yavneh.
1192: Richard the Lionhearted captured in Vienna. Richard was returning home after the Third Crusade when he was taken prisoner by Leopold, duke of Austria. Leopold then sold him to the Henry VI, the Holy Roman Emperor. Henry offered to return Richard to his homeland if his brother Prince John paid the ransom. The Jews of England paid 5,000 marks towards the ransom. This was three times the rate paid by the Christian citizens of the realm.
1497: Isaac Abravanel completed the “Yeshu'ot Meshiḥo" (The Salvation of His Anointed).
1522: Suleiman the Magnificent accepts the surrender of the surviving Knights of Rhodes, who are allowed to evacuate the Isle of Rhodes. Based on references in the Book of the Maccabees, Jews had lived on Rhodes since the second century BCE. However, in 1500, The Grand Master of the Knights of Rhodes “expelled all the Jews who did not choose to convert to Christianity” making the Island “Jew Free” for a couple of decades. Suleiman the Magnificent conquered the island “he invited Jews from various parts of his empire to come to Rhodes and start a new community. The Jews that came were Sephardim, the ones who had found refuge in the Ottoman Empire following the expulsion from Spain in 1492. These Jews brought with them their culture, their customs and traditions, one of the cultural aspects was linguistic, the language they spoke was Espanyol, as they called it, also known as a "Ladino" and "Judeo-Spanish" The Jewish Quarter of the city was affectionately known as "La Juderia". Suleiman is also the Sultan who rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem and was the patron of Dona Gracia and Joseph Nassi.
1629: Edward Pococke, the Hebrew scholar who wrote Porta Mosis, extracts from the Arabic commentary of Maimonides on the Mishnah, was ordained as a priest in the Church of England today.
1704: Johann Andreas Eisenmenger “the most dangerous libeler of the Talmud who wrote a two-volume, two thousand page book on the “wickedness of the Talmud” entitled Endecktes Judenthum” passed away today.
1783(25th of Kislev, 5544): As Jews in America observe Chanukah, the holiday that celebrates the defeat of a tyrant takes on a special meaning since this is the time the holiday is celebrated after the close of the American Revolution.
1786: In Charleston, SC, Rebecca De Pass, the daughter of Doctor Raphael De Pass who was originally from Jamaica married Joseph Da Costa.
1803: The Louisiana Purchase is completed at a ceremony in New Orleans as huge swath of land stretching from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains became part of the United States. Jewish settlement in the region had been hampered by the anti-Semitic codes and practices of the European powers – Spain and France – that had owned the land. Now that it was the hands of the United States, the territory Jews could settle and thrive in a land that would come to include cities like New Orleans, St. Louis, and Denver each with their own thriving Jewish communities.
1821: Birthdate of Michel Levy, the native of Phalsbourg who became a prominent French publisher.
1827: In New Orleans, a group of Jews with Germanic roots led by Jacob Solis formed Shaarei Chesed, an Orthodox Synagogue. In 1881, the congregation merged with Neufutzot Yehuda to form what would become Touro Synagogue, one of the Crescent City’s leading Reform congregations.
1828: Birthdate of 4.Friedrich Korányi “Hungarian physician and medical writer who earned his doctor’s degree at Budapest in 1851.
1844(10th of Tevet, 5605): Fast of the Tenth of Tevet
1844(10th of Tevet, 5605): Sixty-four year old Nathan of Brselov, “the chief disciple and scribe of Rebbe Nachman of Breslov, founder of the Breslov Hasidic dynasty who is credited with preserving, promoting and expanding the Breslov movement after the Rebbe's death” passed away today.
1844: The Jewish Chronicle challenged Nathan Marcus Adler, the new chief rabbi, to handle the controversy between ”those who wished to move ahead quickly, too quickly, and those who would rather not move at all” in a “temperate” way.
1848(25th of Kislev, 5609): As Jews observe Chanukah, the term Chanukah Gelt takes on a special meaning since this is the first time the holiday is celebrated after the start of the California Gold Rush.
1849: Birthdate of Jacob Samuel Speyer, the native of Amsterdam who earned his Ph.D. at Leyden in 1872 and became a leading philologist.
1860: South Carolina becomes the first state to secede from the United States. Jews had been living in South Carolina since colonial times. It was in South Carolina that a Jew was for the first time elected to serve in the legislature. The Jews of South Carolina served with distinction in the American Revolution and Beth Elohim has been a part of Charleston since the beginning of the 19th century. When war the Civil War began Benjamin Mordecai donated $10,000 to “The Cause” and at least 182 Jews from South Carolina fought with the CSA. [During the Sesquicentennial of the Civil War, Charleston will be site of a symposium on the role of Jews, Slavery and the Civil in 2011.]
1861:In the U.S. House of Representatives Congressman Williams S. Holman’s of Indiana “resolution, instructing the Committee on Military Affairs to report a bill amendatory of the present laws, so as not to exclude in the appointment of chaplains any religious societies, was adopted. Mr. Holman mentioned that at present Jewish Rabbis were excluded, notwithstanding there were large numbers of Hebrews in the army.
1861: Arnold Fischel, a Rabbi from New York City who had gone to Washington, DC to seek President Lincoln’s help in changing the law so that Rabbis could serve as chaplains in the Union Army wrote a letter to Henry Hart describing his visit to the city, the fruits of his labor and a detailed description of his visits to the camps and hospitals of the Army of the Potomac which, according to him the number of Jews is very large.
1863: Hevrat Mefizei ha-Haskalah (Society for the Promotion of Culture Among the Jews of Russia) was founded was founded in Russia.
1867: Austrian laryngologist Johann Schnitzler and Luis Markbreitr, his wife, gave birth to their third child and first daughter Gisela.
1870: The Executive Committee in charge of the Hebrew Charity Fair voted to donate an assortment of items valued at $1,000 to the Soldier’s Orphan Fair taking place at the armory on Broadway. The donation is the committee’s way of thanking the non-Jewish community for their support of the Jewish fundraising event.
1878(24th of Kislev, 5639): In the evening, Kindle the first light of Chanukah
1880: It was reported today that 2,000 people attended a meeting in Berlin during which a resolution “was passed in favor of the suppression of the liberty of the Jews.” They also passed resolution to opposed the return of any Liberal to Parliament who would not vote “for such suppression and to buy nothing from Jewish shops or firms.”
1881: Edward Elias Sassoon and his wife gave birth to Sir Ellice Victor Sassoon
1882: It was reported today that former New York Assemblyman Charles W. Dayton is representing Abraham Meyer, a Jewish merchant who did business on Sunday. In his opening remarks, Dayton said that while there should be a “day of rest” the Jews, under the Constitution, had a right to choose on which day they should rest. Too force him to stay closed for two days would work an undue hardship on Meyer.
1882: Henry Phillips, a leading member of the Sephardic (Spanish and Portuguese) Congregation Mickvé Israel of Philadelphia, presided at the "bar dinner" given to Chief Justice Sharswood on the retirement of the latter. This was the last public occasion in which he participated as a member of the Philadelphia bar, of which he had become a leader.
1882(10th of Tevet, 5643): Asara B’Tevet
1882(10th of Tevet, 5643): Seventy two year old Philipp Ehrenberg, the second son of Henriette and Samuel Meyer Ehrenberg who “succeeded his father as principal of the Samsonschule in Wolfenbuettel” passed away today.
1885: Birthdate of Albert C. Cohn who served as Justice on the New York State Supreme Court. He was the father of Roy Cohn, the infamous lawyer who worked for Joe McCarthy.
1885: Through its first five days, the Ladies Fair has brought in $21,196 which will go to support the Hebrew Free School Association.
1886: It was reported today that 185 young Jewish men have “signified their intention of joining” the newly organized Young Men’s Hebrew Association.
1888: Birthdate of Yitzhak Baer a German-born Israeli historian whose expertise was medieval Spanish Jewish history and whose works include Land of Israel and Exile to the Medieval Ages and History of Jews in Christian Spain.
1889: A revival of Halevy’s “La Juive” starring Paul Kalisch as “The Jew” will be featured tonight at the Steinway Music Hall in New York.
1890: Birthdate of Bella Fromm the German journalist who covered the rise of Hitler until she fled to the United States where she published “Blood and Banquets. A Berlin Social Diary: A Berlin Social Diary.”
1890: “Coroner Levy” is scheduled to deliver a “lecture today at the Eldridge Street Synagogue for the benefit of the Hebrew Sheltering House on Madison Street” entitled “The Condition of Jews in Russia.”
1890: “Judas Maccabaeus,” a five act dramatic presentation of the Jewish war with Antiochus by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow is scheduled to “presented by the Edwin Forrest Amateur Dramatic Society this evening at Turn Hall in New York City.
1891: “Among the Philadelphians” published today described civic activities in the City of Brotherly Love including the $100,000 offer made by the Mercantile Club, a Jewish social and business organization to by the building on North Broad Street that had been the home to the now defunct Delaware Club.
1891: The summary of the annual report by the President of Johns Hopkins included among the school’s accomplishments a lecture by Dr Herbert B. Adams at the Young Men’s Hebrew Association on Confucius.
1892: Members of the State Board of Arbitration are in Woodbine, NJ, the Jewish colony to “see what they can do to settle the differences between the cloakmakers and the New York ‘sweater’ contractors who have become an evil in the settlement.”
1895: A.M. Palmer, Agustin Daly, Daniel and Charles Frohman, Tony Pastor, Kirke La Schelle and W.A. Brady are among those who will participate in benefit performance at Palmer’s Theatre that will provide additional funds for the charity fair being held at Madison Square to raise money for the Hebrew Technical Institute and the Educational Alliance.
1895(3rd of Tevet, 5656): Fifty year old Leopold Jacob, the son of Cantor the German born Socialist and Poet passed away today in Zurich.
1897(25th of Kislev, 5658): Chanukah celebrated for the first time during the Presidency of William McKinley.
1898: Jacob H. Schiff the donated a new building to the Young Men’s Hebrew Association located at Ninety-Second Street and Lexington Avenue in New York City.
1899: "The retired British priest and die-hard Egyptophile Greville Chester" wrote a letter today describing the destruction of the Ben Ezra building in Cairo
1901: Birthdate of Louis I Kahn. This world famous architect had trouble getting commissions early in his career because he was Jewish. His work can be found from the Yale Campus, to the Salk Institute, to Fort Worth to Bangladesh. He passed away in 1974.
1902: Birthdate of columnist Max Lerner whose famous quotes include “When you choose the lesser of two evils, always remember that it is still an evil.” “Either men will learn to live like brothers, or they will die like beasts.”
1902: In Brooklyn, Austrian Jewish immigrants Jennie and Isaac Hook gave birth to philosopher and author Sidney Hook.
1903(1stof Tevet, 5664): Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1904: At a meeting of the Council of Jewish Women Mrs. Solomon Schechter presented a paper entitled "The Problem of Religious Observance" which contended that congregational singing is an important factor in the religious services of the Jews, and pleaded for a return to the use of beautiful ancient melodies, which at present are sadly neglected and almost disappearing.
1905: Forty-four year old Henry Harland who, early in his career wrote the “Jewish Tribology” – As It Was Written, Mrs. Peixada and The Yoke of the Torah– under the penname of Sidney Luska passed away today.
1906: Dr. Solomon Schechter, President of the Jewish Theological Seminary presided over a mass meeting in Cooper Union which was sponsored by the Zionist Council of Greater New York. When Dr. Schmarja Levin, a member of the recently dissolved Russian Duma, was introduced the crowd waved small Zionist flags in the pattern adopted by the Zionist Convention held in Basle, Switzerland in 1897. Speaking in Yiddish, Levin presented the Zionist argument that Jews would always be treated as outsiders and needed to establish their own nation in their historic homeland.
1907: Albert Abraham Michelson wins the Nobel Prize for Physics. The physicist was the first American to win a Noble Prize in a field of science.
1908: Ossip Gabrilowitsch was injured today in Danbury, Connecticut, when he rescued Clara Clemens from run-away sleigh that overturned when the horse pulling the sleigh bolted. Clemens is the daughter of Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain, the famous American author. [Gabrilowitsch was a Russian-Jewish pianist, composer and orchestra conduct who had settled in the United States. He would marry Clara in 1909 and would be the father of Samuel Clemens’ only grandchild.]
1911:Birthdate of Hortense Calisher. The daughter of a Southern Jewish perfume-maker and a German immigrant, author Hortense Calisher was born in New York City. She has written about her own family in three memoirs. The most recent, Tattoo for a Slave (2004), traces the history of her father's family from before the Civil War to her own lifetime. A 1932 graduate of Barnard College, Calisher published her first short story, "The Middle Drawer," in 1948. She did all of this while raising two young sons. Like much of her later work, this O. Henry Award-winning story drew upon themes of Calisher's own life. Most of Calisher's fiction features Jewish characters, but their ethnic identity is usually background rather than a dramatic element. Calisher has been a Guggenheim fellow twice and a National Book Award finalist three times. Though popular fame has eluded her, she has been lauded as a "writer's writer" with a wide imaginative and formal range, and has been praised for both intricate plot and rich character development. (As reported by the Jewish Women’s Archives)
1911: Caricature of Lucien Wolf with the caption “Diplomaticus” was published in Vanity Fair. Born in 1857, this native of London was journalist, historian and advocate of Jewish rights who passed away in 1930.
1914: “The American Jewish Relief Committee for War Suffers of which Felix M. Warburg is Treasurer raised and additional $18,000 today bringing the fund’s total to $222,122.
1914: The Jewish Emancipation Committee received this statement tonight; “Advices from Jerusalem and Jaffa indicate that close 50 000 Jews are on the verge of starvation there and that relief is need immediately to save hundreds from perishing.”
1914: The Battle of Champagne in France started on this day. Many Oriental Sephardim fought in this battle, and gave their lives. Many of them were Jews from the Ottoman Empire who were educated in the Alliance Israelite Universelle schools in Turkey. These Jews felt they owed a debt to France.
1915: During World War I the last ANZAC troops evacuated Gallipoli. If Gallipoli had succeeded, the Allies would have been able to open a supply route to Russia and end the stalemate on the Western Front. This would have meant no Russian Revolution and no humiliating peace that would give the Nazis a road to power. The Zion Mule Corps served at Gallipoli. The Jewish unit acquitted itself with distinction and help. This helped to convince the British to create regiments of Jewish troops that would help to liberate Palestine under General Allenby. The Zion Mule Corps is one of the progenitors of the modern IDF.
1916(25th of Kislev, 5677): 1st day of Chanukah is observed just two days after the bloody Battle of Verdun came to and for the first time with Lloyd George as Prime Minister of Great Britain.
1917: Cheka, the first Soviet secret police, which eventually become the feared NKVD is founded. Regardless of its various names, Jews could be counted among the members of, and victims of the Secret Police. For example, Genrikh Grigor'evich Yagoda whose father was a Jewish watchmaker (his mother was a Russian) was head of the NKVD during the 1930’s where he oversaw the show trials and murders of such Old Bolsheviks as Lev Kamenev and Grigory Zinoviev both of whom were born Jewish before giving up Moses for Marx and Lenin. Yagoda himself would fall victim to Stalin’s wrath and would arrested and executed by the same NKVD.
1917: Colonel Sir Ronald Storrs, the newly appointed British Military Governor for Jerusalem, arrived in the City of David.
1917: Birthdate David Bohm, American-born physicist, philosopher, and neuropsychologist. Bohm worked on the Manhattan project. Like many others who worked with Oppenheimer, Bohm fell afoul of the spirit of McCarthyism in the 1950’s
1919: Birthdate of Everett Grennbaum, the Buffalo native who the script writer whose span of creativity went from the banal – The Love Boat—to the sophisticated – MASH.
1920: Birthdate of Aharon "Aharale" Rabinovich Yariv, the native of Moscow who made Aliyah at the age of 15 and became a key member of the Israeli intelligence service and advisor on counterterrorism.
1922(1st of Tevet, 5683): Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1922: The New York Times reported that "A rumor is circulating here that Henry Ford is financing Adolf Hitler's nationalist and anti-Semitic movement in Munich.”
1922(1st of Tevet, 5683): Eighty-five year old French banker Louis Raphaël Cahen d'Anvers the son of Meyer Joseph Cahen d'Anvers and Clara Bischoffsheim both of whom were members of prominent French banking families passed away today.
1924: Adolf Hitler freed from jail before completing his full sentence. This attests to his growing political power and popularity. Hitler had spent 8 months in Landsberg Prison for his role in the famed, failed 1923 Beer Hall Putsch in Munich. The term was a slap on the wrist and presaged the anarchy that would envelop the Weimar Republic. While in prison, Hitler wrote Mein Kampf, his “literary masterpiece” that was a blueprint for the havoc he would unleash on the world.
1924: Spanish newspapers published a signed decree from the king of Spain saying Sephardic Jews dispersed along the Mediterranean coast and in other countries, which "in one way or another" claim descent from families, which once lived in Spain can apply for full Spanish citizenship.
1926: Birthdate of David Levine, painter and artist who is famous for his caricatures.
1928: Tel Aviv Mayor, David Bloch, is scheduled to arrive in New York today aboard the SS Leviathan. Mayor Bloch is coming to the United States to seek financial support for the development of Zionist programs in Palestine. A delegation of “Jewish and labor leaders headed by Abraham Shiplacoff the former Assemblyman of Brooklyn” is scheduled to greet the Mayor and his associated including Dr. C.H. Arlasaroff and Miss Goldie Meyerson. Miss Meyerson would gain lasting fame as Golda Meir, Israel’s first female prime minister.
1928: Ernest Bloch’s “America: An Epic Rhapsody in Three Parts for Orchestra,” has its first performance at today’s matinee performance of the New York Philharmonic
1930: At services this morning, Rabbi Louis Newman will deliver a sermon on “Compassionate Marriage and Other Marriage Problems” at Rodeph Shalom in New York City
1930: At services this morning, Rabbi Israel Goldstein will deliver a sermon on “Compassionate Marriage: What is wrong with it?” at B’nai Jeshurun in New York City.
1930: Cleveland’s Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver will deliver a sermon on “The Role of Religion in a Changing World” at the Free Synagogue which is meeting in Carnegie Hall.
1930: Rabbi Nathan Krass will deliver a sermon on “If I Were a Jew” at Temple Emanu-El today.
1931(10th of Tevet, 5692): Asara B’Tevet
1931(10th of Tevet, 5692): Eighty-four year old Carl Edvard Cohen Brandes Danish politician, critic and author, and the younger brother of Georg Brandes and Ernst Brandes as well as the father-in-law of Norwegian chemist George Dedichen passed away today in Cophenhagen.
1934(14th of Tevet, 5695): Ninety year old Caroline Meyer Mehrbach, the widow of Moses Mehrbach, passed away at White Plains, NY.
1936: “Arturo Toscanini and his wife arrived by plane today from Alexandria, Egypt and then drove to Tel Aviv where he will conduct the Palestine Symphony Orchestra.
1937: The Palestine Post reported that Simon Less, 24, a milkman, was killed near the Jerusalem quarter of Beit Hakerem. Shlomo Ben-Nun, 27, a policeman, was kidnapped and later murdered by armed Arabs near Kfar Hittin. A police squad killed one Arab terrorist and jailed another. Jewish buses were shot at and a number of passengers were wounded.. In Berlin, Herr von Schwabach, a prominent half-Jewish banker, committed suicide when refused permission to marry his Aryan fiancée. The Lwow University closed owing to renewed anti-Jewish violence.
1939: Miss Sophia Harris daughter of Mrs. Louis I. Harris and the late Dr. Harris, one-time Health Commissioner of New York was married tonight at the Hotel Whitehald to Rabbi Leo Geiger of Congregation Sha'arey Israel in Macon GA. Rabbi Nachman Arnoff performed the ceremony.
1940: Starting today, “various humanitarian aid organizations” including “Jewish French organizations tolerated by the Vichy Regime” “intervened to lend their services to the inmates at Gurs by setting up “posts” inside the French fascist concentration camp.
1940: A group of Zionist met today in Bendzin, Poland.
1940: Captain America Comics #1 — cover-dated March 1941 went on sale today. Captain America was the creation of Joe Simon (born Hymie Simon) and Jack Kirby (born Jacob Kurtzberg)
1942: The Nazis shot 560 Jews in the Rakow forest. “The story of the massacres that took place at the Rakow forest is typical of the Nazi atrocities during the WWII. The Nazis liquidated the ghetto of Piotrokov, the first ghetto built by the Germans in Poland. While most of the inhabitants of the ghetto were deported to be murdered at Treblinka, one group of 560 Jews was shot to death in the forest outside of town.”
1943: The United States Senate Foreign Relations Committee unanimously approved a resolution by sponsored by Iowa’s Senator Guy Gillette and 11 of his colleagues proposing “that President Roosevelt set up a commission of diplomatic, economic and military experts to devise ways ‘to save the surviving Jewish people of Europe from extinction at the hands of Nazi Germany.’ The Nazis were charged in the resolution with having ‘exterminated close to two million’ Jewish men, women and children in Europe.”
1944: During negotiations with the Germans to save Hungarian Jews, Dr. Rudolf Kastner arrived in Switzerland.
1944: In response to the activities of Lechi (the Stern Gang), Churchill “dropped all discussion of the Jewish state proposal that had been scheduled for promulgation on this date.”
1944: Lazar Kaganovich ended his term as People’s Commissar for Transport in the Soviet Union.
1945: Fifty-two Palestinian Jews detained at a camp at Latrun halfway between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv…were transferred to military custody today and deported to Eriterea.” The British believe that the Jews are part of an “underground terrorist organization” but have not formally charged them with any crimes. The 52 join 300 Jews already imprisoned at Eriterea under similar conditions. When other prisoners at Latrun found out about the deportations they began a hunger strike.
1945: In an article entitled “Baghdad Worried by Zionist Issue and the Russian’s Activity,” Clifton Daniel reports that “Iraq is probably the fountainhead of the pan-Arab movement and hotly anti-Zionist.”
1945: Council Law No. 10 was signed by 23 countries establishing the war crimes commission at Nuremburg. Approximately 5000 people were tried with 600 receiving the death sentence
1945: The British deport 52 suspected Jewish terrorists who have been held at Latrun to Eritrea.
1946: Birthdate of Romanian born author and poet Andrei Codrescu. Codrescu is a naturalized American who teaches at LSU and is a regular contributor on National Public Radio.
1946: Today the Jewish Agency for Palestine announced establishment of an annual grant to the Children's Foundation of the Holy Land in memory of Miss Henrietta Szold founder of Hadassah, the Women's Zionist Organization of America, on what was the 86th anniversary of her birth.
1946: In Tel Aiv Itzhaak Geller (Gellér Izsák), a retired army sergeant major, and Manzy Freud a distant relative of Sigmund Freud gave birth to Israeli psychic Uri Geller.
1948: Canada recognized the state of Israel.
1948: King Abdullah of Palestine appoints Sheikh Hussan Medin Jarallah as mufti of Jerusalem. Haj Amin el Husseini is recognized as mufti of Jerusalem by other Arab states.
1949: The UN Trusteeship Council asks Israel to call off transfer of its government to Jerusalem.
1949: The UN Economic Survey Mission plans several projects to be covered by the aid program for Arab refugees including irrigation and hydroelectric development in Arab Palestine and Arab countries. No funds are allotted for Israel which is absorbing thousands of Jewish refugees who have been forced to flee from the Arab and/or Moslem countries in which they have been living.
1952(2nd of Tevet, 5713): 8th day of Chanukah
1954(25thof Kislev, 5715): Chanukah
1954: U.S. premiere of “The Silver Chalice” which much to his later shame marked the debut of Paul Newman with music by Franz Waxman.
1956: In New York City Jack Garfein, “a Czech Jew and Holocaust survivor” and actress Carroll Baker who had converted to Judaism gave birth to Blanche Garfein who gained fame as actress Blanche Baker.
1960: Auschwitz-commandant Richard Bär was arrested in German Federal Republic.
1961: U.S. premiere of “Lover Come Back produced by Martin Melcher and Stanley Shapiro who also co-authored the script.
1961(13th of Tevet, 5722): Dramatist Moss Hart passed away.
1963: Birthdate of Tal Friedman, the native of Kiryat Ata who served in the Israeli Sea Corps and went on to become a popular comedian, actor and a musician
1963: Guy de “Rothschild was on the cover of TIME magazine in a story that said he took "over the family's French bank during the disorder of war and defeat, changed its character from stewardship of the family fortune to expansive modern banking.”
1964: Rachel Rubin became Rachel Adler today when she married Rabbi Moshe Adler.
1964: Prime Minister Levi Eshkol formed his cabinet and became head of the Israeli government. Eshkol was a compromise candidate of whom little was expected. In one of the irony of history, Eshkol would be Prime Minister when Israel was faced with its greatest military challenge in May and June of 1967. Under Eshkol’s leadership, the Israeli forces won the Six Days War, which among other things, resulted in the re-unification of the city of Jerusalem.
1966: Albert Günther Göring, the younger brother of Nazi leader Hermann Göring who worked to save Jews from Hitler and was an anti-Nazi, passed away.
1966: Gene Klein and business associate Sam Schulman, plus a group of minority investors, obtained the National Basketball Association franchise for the city of Seattle, Washington
1966: A Chanukah Festival for Israel featuring Sophie Maslow and company is scheduled to be held at Madison Square Garden.
1967: Premiere of "The Graduate", starring Dustin Hoffman
1968: Israeli author and Editor Max Brod passed away. His most famous work wasThe Redemption of Tycho Brahe. He edited the works of Franz Kafka and was executor of Kafka’s estate.
1969: Peter, Paul & Mary's "Leaving on a Jet Plane" reaches #1
1969: In Zurich, Jacqueline (née Burgauer) and Gilbert de Botton gave birth to author, philosopher and television personality Alain de Botton. De Botton’s father was part of a prominent Egyptian Jewish family that was expelled by Nasser along with most of the rest of the Jews living in Egypt. (This part of the Middle East refugee problem that you did not hear about)
1972: Neil Simon’s "Sunshine Boys" premiered in New York.
1974: “The Jackson-Vanik Amendment was overwhelmingly approved by the U.S. Congress, making U.S. trade concessions and low-interest loans to any “non-market economy” (communist) conditional on “respect for the right to emigrate.”
1976: Israel's Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin resigned. Rabin was forced to resign over a financial indiscretion that took place while he had been Ambassador in Washington. His resignation opened the way for the election of the Likud and Menachem Begin. Up until then, Labor had controlled the Israeli governments chosen since 1948. This opening for the Right wing changed the political equation in Israel both in foreign and domestic affairs.
1977: “The Water Engine,” “a play by David Mamet that centers on the violent suppression of a disruptive alternative energy technology” opened today at The Public Theatre.
1977: The Jerusalem Post reported from Cairo that Egypt and Israel agreed to incorporate all principles of UN Resolution 242 on their agenda. In the Knesset a number of members of Likud, Labor and the National Religious Party expressed fears about Menachem Begin's peace plans for Judea and Samaria and asked for explanations. It became evident that the prime minister faced a serious challenge from many of his own ardent supporters. The chief editor and political analyst of the Egyptian influential daily al-Ahram, Ali Hamdi el-Gammal, welcomed Begin's peace proposals as "very promising and encouraging."
1979(30th of Kislev, 5740): Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1982(4th of Tevet, 5743): Ninety-five year old pianist Arthur Rubinstein passed away.
1984(26thof Kislev, 5745): Fifty-one year old Dr. Stanley Milgram, the noted psychologist, passed away today. (As reported by Daniel Coleman)
1985: Howard Cosell retired from television sports after 20 years with ABC
1987: "Nuts" with Barbra Streisand premieres.
1987:Today, Egypt summoned the Israeli Ambassador, Moshe Sasson, to the Foreign Ministry to express concern over what it called ''the brutal, oppressive measures taken by Israel against the Palestinian people.'' It was the fifth protest statement issued by Egypt in the eight days.
1989:On the day of the American invasion, Mike Harari, a 62-year-old retired agent of the Israeli intelligence service, Mossad, rumored to have been an Israeli spy, a gun-runner, and a military adviser to General Manuel Antonio Noriega vanished from Panama
1991: U.S. premiere of “Father of the Bride” co-produced by Howard Rosenman and Nancy Meyers who also co-authored the script.
1992(25th of Kislev, 5753): First Day of Chanukah
1992(25th of Kislev, 5753): Eighty-eight year old Nathan Milstein, the Russian-born violin virtuoso, died yesterday at his home in London. (As reported by Harold C. Schonberg)
1992(25th of Kislev, 5753): Ninety-one year old “Stella Adler, an exponent of Method acting whom many considered the leading American teacher of her craft, died today at her home in Los Angeles. (As reported by Peter B. Flint)
1995:The trial of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin's confessed assassin opened today only to be postponed for a month, while Israelis received an unexpected replay of the killing in an amateur video not made public before.
1996(10th of Tevet, 5757): Astronomer and science celebrity Carl Sagan passed away at the age of 62. (As reported by William Dicke)
1996(10th of Tevet, 5757): Asara B'Tevet
1998: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including The House of Rothschild Money's Prophets, 1798-1848 by Niall Ferguson and The Lord Will Gather Me In: My Journey to Jewish Orthodoxy by David Klinghoffer
2002(15th of Tevet, 5763):An Israeli rabbi was shot and killed on the Kissufim corridor road in the Gaza Strip while driving with his wife and six children to attend a pre-wedding Sabbath celebration in Afula. Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the attack.
2003: The Klezmatics perform "Holy Ground: The Jewish Songs of Woody Guthrie," at the 92nd Street Y, featuring songs inspired or written by Guthrie's mother-in-law, Aliza Greenblatt.
2004: Paula Abdul the daughter of Syrian born Jew Harry Abdul and Canadian born Jew Lorraine Rykiss was involved in an automobile accident today in Los Angeles.
2005: The Jerusalem Post reported on clean-up efforts at Beth El Synagogue in New Orleans. The work is being done by college students who are using their winter break to help clean up damage left in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Beth El was covered by ten feet of water and was the only synagogue in New Orleans completely destroyed by the storm.
2006: “Cantors in Concerto” featuring Eliezer Kepecs, Yehuda Rossler, Davide Montefiore, Alex Stein and Michael Trachtenberg will take place at 8 o’clock this evening at Merkin Concert Hall.
2006: Haaretz reported on a case of technology, academia and physical courage converging to protect the history of the Jewish people. Emory University is planning to translate a professor's Web site on Holocaust denial into Arabic, Farsi and other languages common to countries where anti-Semitic views are widespread. Professor Deborah Lipstadt, who runs the site Holocaust Denial on Trial (www.hdot.org), said she hopes the translations will provide resources to people who have no historical accounts of the Holocaust in their native tongue.
2006(29th of Kislev, 5767): Fifth Day of Chanukah
2006(29th of Kislev, 5767): Rabbi Dovid Barkin the son-in-law of Rabbi Eliyahu Meir Bloch and former Rosh Yeshiva of the Telshe Yeshiva passed away today.
2007: In the afternoon, Palestinian terrorists fired three rockets toward southern Israel with one hitting about forty yards from a school in downtown Sderot forcing twelve students to seek treatment for shock.
2007: In the evening five Palestinian terrorist were killed and Israeli soldier was badly wounded in fighting in Gaza about a mile from the border with Israel as forces of the IDF sought to put an end to the continuous missle attacks on southern Israel including the town of Sderot.
2007:According to a unnamed sources in Los Angeles, the Spinka Rebbe has hired top criminal defense Attorney Donald Etra to defend him.
2008:”Imagine This!,”a five million Pound West End production depicting the tragic story of the Warshowsky Family theater group who defy the oppressors and the ghetto's meager resources to put on a musical on the siege of Masada and warn their audience of the fate awaiting them in Treblinka, closes only a month after its official opening at the Drury Lane New London Theatre.
2008: In New York, as part the JCC Manhattan, Beit Midrash, Yonatan Gefen facilitates a presentation entitled, “Why Do I Write? (Zionism as an Anti-depressant)” Poet, playwright, author of 20 books, translator, lyricist and satiric performer, Yehonatan Geffen has been a correspondent for Maariv since 1992 and his column appears there every Friday. A third generation member of the renowned Dayan family, he served as an officer in the Israeli Paratroopers and in the Golani infantry brigade. His talk will focus on writing as a weapon, as an attempt to find out the truth, as communicating and therapy, writing as falling in love and finally, the significance of writing in a language that was dead for over 1900 years.
2008: The slender Saturday edition of the Cedar Rapids Gazette reads like a Jewish newspaper with articles entitled ‘Israeli election hopefuls siik the Obama touch” (complete with a picture of the President-elect at the Western Wall), “Hamas declares end of truce with Israel,” “Jewish Festival of Lights begins Sunday” and “Potential buyers showing interest in Agriprocessors.”
2009: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including the recently released paperback editions of Hot, Flat and Crowed: Why We Need a Green Revolution — And How It Can Renew America by Thomas L. Friedman and A Photographer’s Life: 1990-2005 by Annie Leibovitz.
2009: The Washington Postfeatures reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Herblock: The Life and Work of the Great Political Cartoonist by Haynes Johnson and Harry Katz.
2010: The 92nd Street Y is scheduled to present a program entitled “The Chosen Peoples and Their Enemies” featuring Michael Walzer and Jackson Lears, Todd Gitlin and Liel Leibovitz.
2010:“Some 1,200 new species and varieties have been discovered during the just-concluded first world “census” of marine life. The director of the census, Jesse Ausubel, will participate in a conference today at the Israel Academy of Sciences and the Humanities in Jerusalem. The occasion will also be marked by the screening there of Oceans, completed last year, which is considered one of the greatest nature films ever made.
2010:The Los Angeles Times featured a review of The Memory Chalet by Tony Judt, of blessed memory.
2010:An IDF soldier reported that three individuals attempted to stab him near a gas station in Givat Ze'ev in Jerusalem.
2010: Seven mortar shells were fired from the Gaza Strip into the Eshkol regional council today.
2010: Nearly 50 Conservative (Masorti) rabbis have signed a halachic statement allowing home rentals or sales to non- Jews in Israel, in a move to counter the statement recently signed by nearly 50 city rabbis that prohibited just that.
2010:Roni Daloomi released her debut album titled "Ktzat Acheret" (A Little Different)
2010(13th of Tevet, 5771): Seventy-four year old “Steve Landesberg, an actor and comedian with a friendly and often deadpan manner who was best known for his role on the long-running sitcom ''Barney Miller,'' died in Los Angeles today. (As reported by Hamilton Boardman)
2011(24th of Kislev, 5772): In the evening, kindle the first light of Chanukah
2011(24th of Kislev, 5772): Ninety year old “Jacob E. Goldman, a physicist who as Xerox’s chief scientist founded the company’s vaunted Palo Alto Research Center, which invented the modern personal computer” passed away today.” (As reported by John Markoff)
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/22/business/jacob-e-goldman-founder-of-xerox-lab-dies-at-90.html?_r=0
2011: The Mobile Menorah Parade is scheduled to roll through uptown, downtown, and the French Quarter as Chabad celebrates Chanukah
2011: The Sephardic Music Festival is scheduled to open in NYC
2011:Girl-power aficionado Gloria Steinem is scheduled to join the activism-inclined five-piece pop rock band Betty for their late show.
2011:A jazz ensemble, featuring David Freeman, Oren Neiman, Doug Drewes and Ivan Barenboim, is scheduled to perform original compositions inspired by Chanukah, as well as new arrangements of music from the YU Museum’s “Jews on Vinyl” exhibition.
2011:Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak condemned violence by right-wing extremists today, vowing to use all means to eradicate the phenomenon.
2011:A State Comptroller report released today revealed significant gaps in coordination for the a possible emergency scenario between local and state authorities. Officials from the State Comptroller’s office visited seven separate local authorities in
2011: “The 'Iranian Schindler' who saved Jews from the Nazis” published today described the exploits of Abdol-Hossein Sardari who risked his life to saved thousands of Iranian Jews from the Holocaust.
2012: Following a screening of “Roman Holiday” at the 92nd Street Y, Andrew Dickos is scheduled to lead a presentation on “Hollywood’s Blacklisted Filmmaker,” a disproportionate number of whom were Jewish.
2012: “Martha Marcy May Marlene” is scheduled to be shown at the Jerusalem Jewish Film Festival.
2012: Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Ron Prosor today called on Europe to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organization.
2012:Former IDF chief of staff Lt.-Gen. (res.) Amnon Lipkin-Shahak was "a true hero," Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said at his funeral this afternoon.
2013: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi is scheduled to tour Jerusalem’s Old City and visit the Western Wall before leaving Israel for Algeria. (As reported by Raphael Ahren)
2013: “A program of the best Israeli songs from all time from Argov through Naomi Shemer: is scheduled to be performed by “the soloists of the Israeli Opera’s Meitar Opera Studio.
2013: In Coralville, Iowa, Agudas Achim under the leadership of Rabbi Jeff Portman is scheduled to host a complimentary Shabbat Dinner followed by a musical service welcoming the Sabbath Queen.
2013: “Washington Square,” the cinematic version of the novel by Henry James, is scheduled to be shown at the Jerusalem Jewish Film Festival.
2013: Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree today to pardon jailed Jewish tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky (As reported by Nataliya Vasilyeva)
2013:“The leader of Lebanon's Hezbollah warned today that the Israelis would be "punished" for killing a leader of the Shiite party, an assassination in which Israel has denied any involvement.”
2013:”The U.S. Senate voted 59–34 for cloture on Janet Yellen's nomination
2013(17thof Tevet, 5774): Seventy year old Marjorie Katz passed it way.
2014: The Kol Ami Community Chanukah Party is scheduled to take place in Arlington, Va.
2014: “The War of the Buttons” and “Jadoo” are scheduled to be shown at the Jerusalem Jewish Film Festival.