January 16
27 BCE: Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus is granted the title Augustus by the Roman Senate, marking the beginning of the Roman Empire. Ten years earlier Augustus had appointed Herod as King of Judea, of whom he said “he would rather be a pig in Herod’s house than one of his family.” For more about why the clash between the Judeans and the Roman Empire did not have to lead to the destruction of the Temple and the end of a Jewish state, see Rome and Jerusalem: The Clash of Ancient Civilizations.
550: During the Gothic War, The Ostrogoths, under King Totila, conquer Rome after a long siege, by bribing the Isaurian garrison. The Ostrogoths was the name applied to the eastern Goths. The Goths were Germanic in origin and and are often thought of as part of the various Barbarian Hordes that destroyed the Roman Empire. Unlike other such groups such as the Visigoths and Vandals, the Ostrogoths, at least under their greatest leader Theodoric the Great, were known for their religious toleration which was extended to the Jewish people.
929:Emir Abd-ar-Rahman III established the Caliphate of Córdoba. This came during what is called the “Golden Age” Due to their treatment by the rulers, the Jews of Cordoba supported the state and were active in commerce, industry and the study of science.
1120: The Council of Nablus is held, establishing the earliest surviving written laws of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem. This is the same Nablus that will be a Fatah stronghold at the end of the 20th Century and the same Jerusalem that is the capital of modern day Israel.
1232: In London, The Domus Conversorum known in English as the House of the Converts was founded by order of Henry III to provide a home and free maintenance for Jews converted to Christianity.
1412: The Medici family is appointed official banker of the Papacy. According to the Jewish Virtual Library “the organized Jewish communities of Florence, Siena, Pisa and Livorno were political creations of the Medici rulers. And like the Medici Grand Dukedom itself, these communities took shape in the course of the sixteenth century. For more about the unusual relationship between this famous Italian family
1547: Ivan the Terrible was crowned Czar of Russia. From the point of view of the Jewish people Ivan deserved to be called “the Terrible.” In 1563, he gave the Jews of Polotsk, Lithuania, the choice of converting or dying. When the Jews refused the cross, Ivan had his soldiers drill holes in the frozen Dvina River and then pushed three hundred Jewish men, women and children through them to their death.
1600: The 400 Jews of Verona completed their synagogue after their move into the ghetto. This date was actually celebrated as a "Purim" until the French Revolution, since many felt that the ghetto provided some protection, and since in an unusual move the keys of the ghetto were given to the Jewish leaders.
1739: “Saul” an oratorio by George Handel based on the story found in the 1stBook of Samuel was “first performed at the King’s Theatre in London.”
1756(14thof Shevat, 5516): Rabbi Jacob Joshua Falk (Yaakov Yehoshua ben Tzvi Hirsch) passed away today at Offenbach,Born at Cracow in 1680, on his mother's side he was a grandson of Joshua of Cracow, the author of "Maginne Shelomoh." While a youth Jacob became examiner of the Hebrew teachers of Lemberg. In 1702 his wife, his child, and his mother were killed through an explosion of gunpowder that wrecked the house in which they lived. Jacob himself narrowly escaped death. He was then called to the rabbinate of Tarli and Lisko, small Galician towns. In 1717 he replaced Ḥakam Ẓebi in the chief rabbinate of Lemberg; and thence he was called to Berlin in 1731. Having displeased Veitel-Heine Ephraim, one of the most influential leaders of the community, by rendering a judgment against him, he was compelled at the expiration of his term of office (1734) to resign. After having been for seven years rabbi of Metz he became chief rabbi of Frankfort-on-the-Main; but the unfavorable attitude of the local authorities toward the Jews, and the fact that the community was divided by controversies, made his position there very precarious. Soon afterward the quarrel between Jacob Emden and Jonathan Eybeschütz broke out. The chief rabbi, because of his opposition to Eybeschütz, was ultimately compelled to leave the city (1750). He wandered from town to town till he came to Worms, where he remained for some years. He was then called back to Frankfort; but his enemies prevented him from preaching in the synagogue, and he left the city a second time. Jacob was one of the greatest Talmudists of his time. He wrote "Pene Yehoshua'," novellæ on the Talmud, in four parts. Two of them were published at Frankfort-on-the-Main (1752); the third, with his "Pesaḳ bet-Din Ḥadash," at Fürth (1766); the fourth, which, in addition to Talmudic novellæ, contains novellæ on the Ṭur Ḥoshen Mishpaṭ and "Liḳḳuṭim," also at Fürth (1780). He wrote also a commentary on the Pentateuch, which is mentioned by the author himself, but has not appeared in print. (As reported by Schechter and Seligsohn)
1764: For the next 12 months, starting from today, according to entries in the records of the New York Custom House, there were only 4 “Jewish entries all for Sampson Simpson. His cargoes which included iron, sugar, wine, skins and rum, were sent to South Carolina and the Mosquito Coast. Although his name is unknown to most, he was a highly successful businessman. During the Seven Years, which ended in 1763, he outfitted four ships as privateers. Simpson was the only Jewish member of the “prestigious Chamber of Commerce which was created in 1768.”
1765(23 Tevet, 5525): Isaac Zerahiah Azulai, the father of 18th century rabbinic scholar and author Chaim Joseph David passed away today in Jerusalem.
1774: Birthdate of Levi Salomon, “the London financier and underwriter” who lived near the Great St. Helen’s Synagogue. He passed away in January of 1843.
1794: English historian Edward Gibbon, author of The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire passed away. Those who think that the acknowledgement of the Jewish origins of Christianity is a twentieth century phenomenon are not acquainted with this classic of ancient history. In chapter 15 of the first volume of this classic, Gibbon makes it quite clear that Christianity is rooted in the Judaism of the first century of the Common Era.
1802: Birthdate of Joel Jolson who was baptized as a Lutheran at seventeen and gained fame as Friedrich Julius Stahl, the German lawyer and politician.
1826: Forty-seven year old Aharon ben Moshe was laid to rest at the Bath Jewish Burial Ground
1852(24thof Tevet, 5612):Meir Eisenstaedter (Meir ben Judah Leib Eisenstädter) a nineteenth-century rabbi, Talmudist, and paytan) also known as Maharam Asch (a Hebrew acronym for "Morenu ha-Rav Meir Eisenshtadt" meaning "our teacher, Rabbi Meir Eisenstadt") passed away today.
1852: Mt. Sinai Hospital, known as Jews Hospital, was founded in New York City
1853:General Sir Ian Standish Monteith Hamilton who commanded the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force during the Gallipoli Campaign which meant that he was the ultimate commander of the Zion Mule Corps, the first All-Jewish force to take the field of battle since the days of the rebellions against Rome.
1875: David James played the role of “Perkyn Middlewick” in Henry James Byron’s “Our Boys” which opened at the Vaudeville Theatre. James was the son of Agar and Abraham Julian Belasco who was named David Belasco at birth but changed his name so that he would not be confused with his second cousin and namesake David Belasco.
1876: It was reported today that The Alliance Israelite Universelle of Paris has just published a pamphlet describing the discriminatory conditions under which the Jews of Romania continue to live. The Romanians have successfully circumvented previous attempts to improve the conditions of the Jews, including those resolutions adopted at the Convention of Paris in 1858, by declaring that Jews born in Romania are not Romanian citizens. Since they are not citizens, the Romanians contend it is legal to deny them such basic rights as the rights to own property and vote.
1876: Newman Leopold, a “French Hebrew loan broker” shot himself this afternoon at his home on Adelphi Street in New York. The wound did not prove immediately mortal and the reason for the shooting was not immediately known.
1879: In Paris, Edward de Forest and Juliette Arnold gave birth to Maurice Arnold de Forest who, along with his younger brother Raymond were, after the death of their parents, “were adopted by the millionaire Baroness Clara de Hirsch, née Bischoffsheim, wife of Jewish banker and philanthropist Baron Maurice de Hirsch de Gereuth, and given the surname de Forest-Bischoffsheim.
1879: Mr. Henry Bergh delivered a lecture tonight at the Young Men’s Hebrew Association in which he said “it was astonishing” that so little attention had been paid to the treatment of “dumb animals” in the United Sates. He felt that the clergy had not shown sufficient interest in the topic. He expressed his opinion that Christians might learn from the Turks and “old Jewish laws” if they wished to improve the situation.
1881: “An insane inmate” under the care of the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society, set the facility on fire. This unnamed individual was the only fatality.
1882(25thof Tevet, 5642): Seventy-four German born poet and linguist whose “hopes for a university career were doomed to failure, because he declined to be baptized” passed away today in Brussels where he had been living in self-imposed political exile.
1884: In Charleston, SC, Rabbi Levy officiated at the married of Julius Jacobson to Johannah Hoffman, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. G. Hoffman.
1884: The orthodox synagogue in St. Apern Straße was dedicated in Cologne
1888: Birthdate of Osip Maksimovich Brik, a Russian avant garde writer and literary critic who “was one of the most important members of the Russian formalist school, though he also identified himself as one of the Futurists.”
1889(14thof Tevet, 5649): Fifty six year old “Russian scientist and publicist” Hirsch Rabinowitz passed away today in St. Petersburg.
1890: It was reported today that in the last ten years disbursements by the United Hebrew Charities have more than doubled going from $35,000 to $72,000.
1890: It was reported that the past five years the Jewish immigrants arriving in New York included, 18,535 in 1885; 27,348 in 1886; 25, 788 in 1887; 29,602 in 1888 and 23, 674 in 1889.
1890: Birthdate of Karl Freund. In his time, Freund was one of the most famous directors and cameramen. He worked on everything from an early cinematic version of Dracula to episodes of the television sitcom Our Miss Brooks.
1890: Oscar S. Straus is scheduled to deliver “a few informal remarks” at a meeting of the Young Men’s Association of Ahawatch Chesed which is being held at Steinway Hall.
1890: As his health worsened, the children of 87 year old Chief Rabbi Nathan Marcus Adler were called to his bedside for one more visit.
1891(7th of Shevat, 5651): Isaac Aaron Ettinger, Reb Itzsche, passed away today. Born at Lemberg in 1827, he followed Zebi Hirsch Ornstein as the rabbi of Lemberg in 1888, a position he held until the day he passed away.
1892: “The Nautch Girl,” a comic opera that featured the music of Anglo-Jewish theatre man Edward Solomon closed today after two hundred performances at the Savoy Theatre.
1893: Theodor Kohn, the cleric with Jewish grandparents, began serving as Archbishop of Olomouc. He would eventually be forced to resign from the post.
1893: It was reported today that Joseph Barondess is leading a move to reorganize the Cloakmaker’s Union following its unsuccessful strike against Meyer Jonasson & Co. (Barondess was the son of Rabbi Samuel Barondess and a distant relative of Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis. His connection with the cloakmakers was so strong that he was as the “King of the Cloakmakers.”
1894: In New York City, at the meeting of the Board of Police Superintendent reported that Roundsman Michael Downs and Patrolmen John Kenny and Kerwin Larkin have been suspended from duty and arrested on charges that they extorted money from Jewish peddlers.
1894: As the general economic conditions worsen It was reported today that New York Mayor Gilroy’s Relief Committee had made disbursement’s to various charities aiding the needy including two thousand dollars to the United Hebrew Charities.
1894: It was reported today that the East Side Relief Work has paid $4, 496.26 “for street sweeping and manufacturing” – work which is done primarily by Austrian and Russian Jews.
1894: It was reported today that R.H Macy & Co, which is owned by the Straus family donated another $1,346.26 to the Mayor’s Relief Committee
1894: Dr. C.F. Valentine was defeated in his bid to be elected President of the New York County Medical Association. It had been “hinted” that he was defeated because he was Jewish.
1896: It was reported today that last year’s Hebrew Charity Ball raised $12,000 for the Montefiore Home and it is hoped that this year’s ball will raised even more money.
1896: It was reported today that 70 per cent of the population living at the settlement area at 26 Delancy Street is made up of Jewish immigrants from Russia. The area which has been inhabited by successive groups of immigrants, the last of which the Irish, is one of the most difficult in which the University Settlement Society has ever worked because of the over-crowding and lack of opportunity.
1898: Birthdate of Irving Rapper, the British born movie director who moved to Hollywood in the 1930’s where “he made his directing debut with the 1941 film “Shining Victory.”
1898: It was reported today that Anatole France and Emile Zola are among a group of “prominent doctors, lawyers’ and writers” who “have signed a petition in favor” of having the Dreyfus decision reviewed because of the “violation of judicial forms and the mysteries surrounding it.”
1898: “The annual meeting of the Hebrew Technical School for Girls was held” this “afternoon at the school headquarters” on Henry Street.
1898: Paris was the scene of another night of violence as “bands of students paraded” denouncing Emile Zola, “shouting…death to the Jews,” smashing café windows, and in a case of mistaken identity, smashing the windows of a house they thought belonged to Zola.
1898: “France At Its Worst” published today described the current crisis over Alfred Dreyfus as demonstrating the “degeneracy” of the French people.
1898: It was reported today that there are two factions arrayed against Emile Zola, the editor and author who has taken the lead in defending Alfred Dreyfus. One is made of “those who would support the so-called ‘honor of the army’ at any sacrifice against individual justice.” (In other words, Dreyfus may be innocent but to overturn the verdict would hurt the military.) The other groups are the anti-Semites which including the students rioting in the street a number of those serving as Deputies in the French legislature.
1899: It was reported today that “the few attempts made to incited the populace” of Hungary “against the Jews have been fruitless, which is in marked contrast to the success of the anti-Jewish campaign in Austria. (More for 2014)
1899: Herzl writes to Bertha von Suttner, famous Austrian peace activist, to request an audience with the Czar.
1899: It was a reported today that in Duluth, a mob of 150 Jews attacked the Coroner when he went to open the grave of Mrs. Wlfound, whom it was claimed was buried alive. The Jews did not approve of what they considered was a desecration of the remains of a co-religionists.
1903: Herzl ate lunch with Lord Rothschild and had a meeting with Sir Thomas Sanderson, Undersecretary for Foreign Affairs in Downing Street. Herzl submits the itinerary of the Commission and the membership. Sanderson recommends Sir Benjamin Baker, builder of the Aswan Dam, as irrigation engineer. Herzl is concerned about each and every detail.
1900: In Aachen, Germany, Rosa Stern and Abraham Holländer gave birth to their youngest child Edith, who would become Edith Frank when she married Otto Frank – a union that would produce the diarist Anne Frank.
1903: Birthdate of David Shaltiel, the native of Berlin who was “the district commander of the Haganah in Jerusalem” during the 1948 War for Independence.
1903: Following the death of Henry de Worms seven days ago, The Jewish Chronicle wrote “Lord Pirbright was for several years president of the Anglo-Jewish Association, but resigned in 1886 owing to objections raised to his having attended the nuptials of his eldest daughter in a church. During his parliamentary career he was a warm advocate of the cause of Jews in lands of oppression, especially Rumania.”
1906: Opening of the Algeciras Conference during which “the US representatives ensured that the Conference documents praised the Sultan's Government for improvements in conditions of Jews and asked it to guarantee to treat all Moroccans equally.
1906: Bezalel, The Academy of Arts and Design, was founded in Jerusalem by Boris Schatz. Born in 1867, Schatz was a painter and court sculptor to King Ferdinand of Bulgaria. He died in 1932. The school was named after biblical artisan Bezalel, son of Uri, who was one of the main architects of the Tabernacle. It has well over 1000 students and offers degrees in art, architecture, and design.
1909: Birthdate of Clement Greenbergthe most famous American art critic since Bernard Berenson, who was born “to a Yiddish-speaking socialist family and was brought up in Brooklyn and the Bronx.”
1915(1st of Shevat, 5675): Rosh Chodesh Shevat
1915: “Oppose Immigration Bill” published today told of Hebrew Sheltering and Immigrant Aid Society to host a series of mass meetings in Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, Chicago, Cleveland, Providence, Newark and New York to designed to help defeat the Smith Burnett Immigration Bill which contains a literacy test that would hamper Jewish immigration from Russia because the Czar’s government restricts their efforts to gain an education.
1917: Eighty-six year old Solomon Ullman, the former president of the Western Synagogue was buried today at the Edmonton Western Jewish Cemetery.
1917:J. Walter Freiburg, President of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations announces a gift of $100,000 from Jacob H. Schiff for the establishment of a fund to provide for pensioning superannuated rabbis.
1917: German Foreign Secretary Arthur Zimmermann sends the Zimmermann Telegram to Mexico, proposing a German-Mexican alliance against the United States. The Zimmerman Telegram by Jewish historian Barbara Tuchman provides one of the best descriptions and explanations of this little known episode in American history that helped lead the United States into World War I.
1919(15thof Shevat, 5679) Tu BiShvat / טו בשבט
1919” In Detroit, MI, Louis and Belle Horwitz gave birth to Jerome Phillip Horwitz “a scientific researcher who created AZT in 1964 in the hope that it would cure cancer but who entered the medical pantheon decades later when AZT became the first successful drug treatment for people with AIDS…” )As reported by Paul Vitello)
1920: The 18th Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified today. Its ban on the manufacture, sale or transportation of intoxicating liquors would present a set of unique problem for Jews who wished to observe the law of the land yet needed wine for Shabbat, Pesach (and other holidays) weddings and circumcision ceremonies.
1922: In Port Jervis, NY, Russian immigrants Gussie and David Levinson gave birth to Harry Levinson “a psychologist who helped change corporate America’s thinking about the workplace by demonstrating a link between job conditions and emotional health — a progressive notion when he began developing his ideas in the 1950s…” (As reported by Claudia Deutsch)
1923: Birthdate of poet Anthony Hecht. Hecht won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1968 for “The Harder Hours.” He passed away in 2004.
1925: Leon Trotsky was dismissed from the Russian Revolution Military Council as he lost the battle for power with Stalin.
1926(1stof Shevat, 5686): Rosh Chodesh Shevat
1926: Grigori Sokolnikov completed his service as People’s Commissar for Finance of the USSR.
1929: Birthdate of political activist Allard Lowenstein
1930: Birthdate of Norman Podhoretz. Editor of “Commentary Magazine” Podhoretz has moved from being a liberal to a conservative.
1932:Philadelphian Jacob Billikopf, who had been associated with the recently deceased Julius Rosenwald in welfare activities for the last quarter of a century, expressed the opinion today that Rosenwald’s work on behalf of “the American Negro” was one of his most outstanding contributions to humanity.
1933(18thof Tevet, 5693): In Los Angeles, Mamie Klein the widow of Henry Klein, the co-owner of Klein-Norton Co. passed away today.
1933: Birthdate of photographer Nathan Louis Finkelstein whose photographs of Andy Warhol, Edie Sedgwick, and the Velvet Underground would become some of the most famous images of Warhol’s Factory and its revolving cast of characters.
1933: In New York Mildred and Jack Rosenblatt gave birth to Susan Rosenblatt who gained fame as Susan Sontag
1935: Rabbi Stephen Wise spoke at luncheon of the Women’s League for Palestine where “it was announced that $21,000 has been received in gifts and pledges toward building a home for needy girls at Tel Aviv.” The home is similar to one already being operated in Haifa and will cost a total of $40,000 to complete.
1935: Leaders of the Jewish National Fund announced that it had raise $20,000 which represents 40% of the goal of $50,000 needed to buy additional land in Palestine “as perpetual national property.”
1935: Morris Rothenberg, President of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), announced today that Sunday, January 20, 1935, has been designated as Palestine Day, with observances planned in more than 400 cities across the United States.
1937(4th Shevat, 5697): Seventy-seven year old Annie Humphrey Johnston, the daughter of Moses and Esther Lazarus, sister of poet Emma Lazarus and wife of John Henry Johnstone passed away today in Venice.
1938: Funeral services will be held today for Albert Ottinger, the former New York State Attorney General who lost to FDR in the 1928 gubernatorial race, at his home with burial in Union Field Cemetery.
1938: Birthdate of Robert Lipsyte, “an American sports journalist and author” who “is a member of the Board of Contributors for USA TODAY's Forum Page, part of the newspaper’s Opinion section.
1938: Benny Goodman refused to play Carnegie Hall when African-American members of his band were barred from performing
1938: The Palestine Post reported that a Jewish constable, Shaul Levy, 22, was killed and his companion, Yitzhak Zeldenberg was severely injured by an Arab in the Sanhedria quarter of Jerusalem. The murderer escaped.
1938: The Palestine Post reported Police found a small Arab arsenal in Ein Zeikun village.
1938: The Palestine Post reported that a government trade school had opened in Haifa.
1938: The Palestine Post reported In Romania, Jews were forbidden to employ Christian women under 40.
1939: “Jews emigrating from Germany are forbidden from taking jewelry and valuable items with them. All they are allowed to have is a single piece of dining silver each, wedding rings, and a watch worth no more than 100 Reichsmarks.” (As reported by Austin Cline)
1939: As the war clouds form over Europe that would become WW II, the physicist Neils Bohr, who was “half-Jewish” arrived in New York en route to accepting a position at Princeton. He told Hungarian born Jewish physicist Leo Szilar that his worst fears had come to pass. Two German physicists had successfully split the uranium nucleus giving Hitler’s government a major edge in what would become the race to build the first Atom Bomb.
1940: A two-day forced march of 880 Polish POWs all whom were Jewish came to an end with 600 of them being shot by the Nazis. (Jewish Virtual Library)
1941: Tonight Axis airplanes raided airfields near Tel Aviv.
1942: Senitsa Vershovsky, a major in the Soviet Army, is shot by an Einsatzkommando unit at Kremenchug, Ukraine, for protecting Jews.
1942: The Nazis begin “resettling” the Jews in the Lodz Ghetto to the Chelmno Extermination Camp
1944: Secretary of the Treasury Henry J. Morgenthau, Jr. presented a report entitled “Report to the Secretary in the Acquiescence of This government in the Murder of Jews” to President Roosevelt. Prepared by several non-Jewish technocrats working at the Treasury Department, “the document cited chapter and verse of the State Department’s ‘procrastination and willful failure to act…even willful attempts to prevent action from being taken to rescue Jews from Hitler.’” The report concluded ‘Unless remedial steps…are taken immediately…the government will have share for all time responsibility for this [Jewish] extermination.’ The authors of the report recommended that “refugee policy be removed from the State Department jurisdiction.”
1945: Three years after the “resettlement” of the Jews from Lodz began, the Soviets liberate the town and find 870 Jews still alive.
1945: Roy Nielsen from Milorg and Max Manus from Kompani Linge planted ten limpet mines 50 centimetres (1.6 ft) under the waterline along a 60-metre (200 ft) section of the port side of the SS Donau, became known as the "slave ship" after the SS and Gestapo transported 540 Jews from Norway to Stettin, from where they were taken by train to Auschwitz while she was docked in Oslo.
1945: The Red Army liberated Czestochowa, including its 800 surviving Jews.
1947: Birthdate of Dr. Laura Schlessinger. Her popularity among some Orthodox Jews would seem to run contrary to the admonitions found in Chapter I, Verse 5 of Pirke Avot concerning avoiding the gossip of women.
1948(5thof Shevat, 5708): Thirty five members of the Haganah set out to bring supplies to the besieged four Kibbutzim known as the Etzion Bloc. Located the Hebron hills, the four Kibbutzim were defended by thirty armed fighters. They had already fought off one attack by hundreds of Arabs who were so confident of victory that they had brought bags to cart off the loot. Due to the lack of equipment which was quite common among the Jewish forces, the thirty five set off without a radio. According to information gathered later, the column was given inaccurate directions by a local Arab who then alerted those who were besieging the Etzion Bloc. The Arabs fell upon the Haganah column and killed all of them. Their bodies were found and brought into the Bloc whose defenders now realized that they were completely on their own.
1948(5th of Shevat, 5708): Seventy-two year old Jacob W. Mack, a former chairman of the Board of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations and a brother of the later Judge Julian W. Mack passed away in Cincinnati, Ohio. (As reported by JTA)
1948: In New York City, Ernst and Miriam (née Brudno), Reichl to “American food writer” Ruth Reichel.
1949: Elias Sassoon and King Abduall met today to discuss the possibility of a prisoner exchange between the Israelis and the Jordanians before the armistice negotiations had been completed at Rhodes.
1950: Birthdate of American stand-up comedian, Robert George "Bob" Schimmel.
1952: U.S. premiere of “The Light Touch” directed by Richard Brooks (born Reuben Sax) who also wrote the screenplay.
1953: The Jerusalem Post reported Soviet Jewry's fears that a major anti-Jewish policy statement was being prepared and would soon be announced in Moscow. Four knowledgeable Jewish Communist leaders fled from East Germany in anticipation of the oncoming persecution. The Israeli government stopped the distribution of the Communist daily Kol Ha'am to soldiers and warned that unless the newspaper stopped "naming the poor Jewish doctors in the Soviet Union as murderers and spies, it will be closed as endangering public security." The Histadrut Executive, by 27 votes to one, banned Communist members from participation in any trade-union activities.
1956: Egyptian President Nassar pledged to re-conquer Palestine. The immediate result of this boast was the Israeli victory in the Sinai Campaign of 1956.
1958:One of Israel's fondest dreams was fulfilled today with the opening of a new highway linking Elath and Beersheba.
1964(2ndof Shevat, 5724): Sixty-two year old Aharon Zisling, Israel’s first Minister of Agriculture and member of the first Knesset passed away today.
1964: David Merrick’s musical ''Hello, Dolly!'' starring Carol Channing opened on Broadway, beginning a run of 2,844 performances.
1968: At midnight, the INS Dakar set sail from Gibraltar. After submerging, the Israeli submarine was supposed to sail across the Mediterranean to Israel.
1977: Shlomo Hillel begins serving as Interior Minister
1977: The Marx Brothers were inducted into the Motion Picture Hall of Fame
1978: The Jerusalem Post reported that the foreign ministers of Israel, Egypt and
the US, agreed to hold a "political conference" in Jerusalem.
1983: Jan Peerce who was recovering from a stroke that had left him partially paralyzed on the right side of his body, was forced to postpone a concert that had been scheduled for today.
1991(1st of Shevat, 5751): Rosh Chodesh Sh'vat
1991:Zubin Mehta, the music director of the New York Philharmonic, who was to fly back to New York from Munich today changed his mind and headed for Tel Aviv instead. "He felt he needed to be in Israel" to demonstrate his affection for the country during the Persian Gulf crisis, said Neil Parker, a spokesman for the Philharmonic. Mr. Mehta, who was born in Bombay, has also been the music director of the Israel Philharmonic since 1968. In 1981, the orchestra named him music director for life. He had been in Austria to conduct the Vienna Philharmonic, then had driven to Munich for a flight to Paris, where he was to board the Concorde and return to New York. In Paris, he changed plans and flew to Israel instead. "He feels that the entire country has adopted him and that it was not possible to be anywhere else at this moment but Israel," Mr. Parker said
1992: Birthdate of Diana Golovanov, the Russian born Israeli singer and actress.
1995(15thof Shevat, 5755): Tu B’Shevat
1995: Funeral services are scheduled to be held for real estate developer and civic leader Monte Henry Goldman at Fairlawn Cemetery in Oklahoma City.
1995: Malcolm Irving Glazer purchased the Tampa Bay Buccaneers franchise
1996(24thof Tevet, 5756): Ninety-two year old author and music critic Marcia Davenport, the daughter of Bernard Glick and Alma Gluck passed away today. (As reported by Eric Pace)
1996:President of Israel, Ezer Weizmann, gave a speech to both Houses of Parliament of Germany. He gave this speech in Hebrew to the Germans, fifty years after the Holocaust, and in it he beautifully summed up what Jewish history is. He said:
"It was fate that delivered me and my contemporaries into this great era when the Jews returned to re-establish their homeland ... "I am no longer a wandering Jew who migrates from country to country, from exile to exile. But all Jews in every generation must regard themselves as if they had been there in previous generations, places and events. Therefore, I am still a wandering Jew but not along the far flung paths of the world. Now I migrate through the expanses of time from generation to generation down the paths of memory..."I was a slave in Egypt. I received the Torah on Mount Sinai. Together with Joshua and Elijah I crossed the Jordan River. I entered Jerusalem with David and was exiled with Zedekiah. And I did not forget it by the rivers of Babylon. When the Lord returned the captives of Zion I dreamed among the builders of its ramparts. I fought the Romans and was banished from Spain. I was bound to the stake in Mainz. I studied Torah in Yemen and lost my family in Kishinev. I was incinerated in Treblinka, rebelled in Warsaw, and emigrated to the Land of Israel, the country from where I have been exiled and where I have been born and from which I come and to which I return.” I am a wandering Jew who follows in the footsteps of my forbearers. And just as I escort them there and now and then, so do my forbearers accompany me and stand with me here today."I am a wandering Jew with the cloak of memory around my shoulders and the staff of hope in my hand. I stand at the great crossroads in time, at the end of the twentieth century. I know whence I come and with hope and apprehension I attempt to find out where I am heading. "We are all people of memory and prayer. We are people of words and hope. We have neither established empires nor built castles and palaces. We have only placed words on top of each other. We have fashioned ideas. We have built memorials. We have dreamed towers of yearning, of Jerusalem rebuilt, of Jerusalem united, of a peace that will swiftly and speedily establish us in our days. Amen."
1997: Benny Begin completed his terms as Science and Technology Minister
2000: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including America Divided:The Civil War of the 1960sby Maurice Isserman and Michael Kazin, I’m Not Done Yet!Keeping at It, Remaining Relevant, and Having the Time of My Lifeby Edward I. Koch with Daniel Paisner and Fire In The Night:Wingate of Burma, Ethiopia, and Zion by John Bierman and Colin Smith.
2001: In an article entitled: “Unorthodox Cinema; An Israeli Filmmaker Imagines the Unimaginable,” Deborah Sontag provides a sympathetic review of Joseph Cedar's ''Time of Favor,'' called ''Hahesder'' (''The Arrangement'') in Hebrew, which swept the 2000 Israeli Academy Awards. The film concerns a plan by a brilliant, deranged settler to blow up the Dome of the Rock, which would also blow up the region. Locally, this is the ultimate sensational plot. But Mr. Cedar is rare here, an Orthodox Jewish filmmaker in an art world dominated by secular leftists. And in his hands, the sensational, while still sensational, is grounded in an authenticity that lends a haunting pathos to what emerges as a kind of art-house thriller, flawed but gripping.
2003: Space Shuttle Columbia took off for what would prove to be its final mission. The shuttle was carrying Ilan Ramon, the first Israeli astronaut.
2004: U.S. premiere of “Along Came Polly” a “American romantic comedy film written and directed by John Hamburg, starring Ben Stiller.”
2005: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Seven Types of Ambiguity by Elliot Perlman
2005: David Klein completed his term as Governor of the Bank of Israel.
2006(16th of Tevet, 5766): Dr. Stanley Biber passed away.
2006: Shav Glick, legendary sports writer, retired from the LA Times. Glick was known for his coverage of auto racing. He gained early fame writing about Jackie Robinson his classmate at Passadena Junior College.
2006: The High Court of Justice rejected Jonathan Pollard's petition to be recognized as a Prisoner of Zion on the grounds that he was jailed by US authorities for spying against his country and not for conducting Zionist activity in a country where such activity is prohibited. According to the law, a Prisoner of Zion is defined as someone who was imprisoned "because of his Zionist activity in a country where such activity was illegal."Typical Zionist activity would include identifying with the State of Israel and its cultural contents such as teaching Hebrew and encouraging aliya." Someone incarcerated for such activities would be eligible for Prisoner of Zion status. But according to theHCJ spying for Israel does not belong to this category of activities. This would be all the more so in case involving the United States, a country in which Zionist activity is not prohibited.
2006(16thof Tevet, 5766):Eighty-two year old “Stanley H. Biber, a small-town Colorado doctor who for decades was internationally renowned as the dean of sex-change surgery, died today at a hospital in Pueblo (As reported by Margalit Fox)
2007: An exhibition entitled “From the Heart: The photojournalism of Ruth Gruber” opened at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City.
2007:Following the conclusion of several months of probes into the summer's Lebanon war, IDF Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Dan Halutz announced his resignation.
2008: Avigdor Lieberman completes his term as Deputy Prime Minister
2008: At the 92nd Y in Manhattan Jewish author Carl Bernstein discusses his extensive research on Hillary Rodham Clinton, including her political rise and current campaign, and his most recent book, A Woman In Charge: The Life of Hillary Rodham Clinton. Bernstein shared a Pulitzer Prize with Bob Woodward for their coverage of Watergate for The Washington Post.
2008: The second episode of “The Jewish Americans” airs on PBS. The three episode series traces the history of the Jews in America starts with the arrival of the first 23 Sephardic Jews in New Amsterdam in 1654 and “ends with Maisyahu, the Chasidic hip-hop star, one of about six million Jews in America today.” For more information see:
2008: Ahawkish faction of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmerts coalition pulled out of his government today following the start of talks this week over how to resolve the most vexing issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Yisrael Beiteinu, or Israel Is Our Home, withdrew its 11 lawmakers from Olmert's coalition, leaving his government in control of 67 of parliament's 120 seats. The move, often threatened over the past year of preparation for a new round of U.S.-backed peace talks, was in protest over the start of talks on the future borders of a Palestinian state, the status of Jerusalem, and the right claimed by Palestinian refugees to return to homes inside the Jewish state.
2008:A stone seal bearing the name of one of the families who acted as servants in the First Temple and then returned to Jerusalem after being exiled to Babylonia has been uncovered in an archeological excavation in Jerusalem's City of David, a prominent Israeli archeologist said today. The 2,500-year-old black stone seal, which has the name "Temech" engraved on it, was found earlier this week amid stratified debris in the excavation under way just outside the Old City walls near the Dung Gate, said archeologist Dr. Eilat Mazar, who is leading the dig.
2009:The American Jewish Historical Society and the American Society for Jewish Music present:“Ethel Raim and the Center for Traditional Music and Dance: Three Decades of Showcasing Jewish Music as part of the Jewish Music Forum featuring Ethel Raim and Professor Mark Slobin of Wesleyan University.
2009:Two Grad rockets fired from Gaza hit Kiryat Gat this afternoon, wounding three people and causing heavy damage.
2009: Guy Cook, an attorney sends an e-mail stating that “Sholom Rubashkin denies all 99 charges…” The denial refers to additional charges filed against Rubashkin on Thursday, January 15, 2009.
2010: As part of the effort to aid Haiti following the devastating earthquake that struck the country on January 13, a field hospital operated by IDF medical teams became operational today. Today a search and rescue team from the ZAKA International Rescue Unit pulled eight Haitian college students from a collapsed eight-story university building.Overnight Saturday, in what staff described as one of the most fulfilling moments of their work, the Israeli doctors delivered a baby boy, whose mother, Gubilande Jean Michel, promptly declared would be named "Israel."
2010: At the New York Jewish Film Festival, the New York premiere of “The Jazz Baroness,” a documentary created by filmmaker Hannah Rothschild that tells the story of her great aunt Baroness Pannonica “Nica” Rothschild de Konigswarter who “abruptly leaves her family and creates a new one among celebrated jazz musicians in postwar New York.”
2010: The 10thannual Atlanta Jewish Festival features a screening of “Anita,”film that revolves around terrorist bombing of the AMIA Jewish Community Center in 1994 that killed 85 people and wounded hundreds more and its impact on the life of Anita Feldman a girl with Down syndrome.
2010: The Museum of Modern Art features the first showing of Amos Gitai’s Carmel which opens with“quotes from Josephus on the Jewish Wars of two millennia ago, then segues to present-day Israel and his family, with a focus on the remarkably articulate Efratia, the filmmaker’s late mother, whose letters about life in Israel and abroad are read by Jeanne Moreau.”
2010(1stof Shevat, 5770): Rosh Chodesh Shevat
2010(1stof Shevat, 5770):Ninety-year old Hungarian born radio host George Jellinek passed away today.
2011: András Schiff told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung that he had become "persona non grata" in Hungary and would probably never perform there again "or even visit." This followed charges by Schiff that Hungary was guilty of "racism, discrimination against the Roma, and anti-Semitism…”
2011: The Minneapolis Jewish Humor Festival is scheduled to present a program entitled“5000 Years of Kvetching – Illustrated with cartoonist, Ken Krimstein” during which the New York cartoonist “will discuss the development of his newly published book, Kvetch as Kvetch Can, full of 90 original cartoons, some of which have been published in The New Yorker, Barrons, The National Lampoon, and The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists
2011: The U.S. premiere of the restored version of “Lies My Father Told Me”, a film set in the 1920s Montreal Jewish immigrant community, is scheduled to take place at The New York Jewish Film Festival.
2011: In Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Hadassah sponsored a Tu B’Shevat Seder at Temple Judah
2011: “The Social Network” based on the life of Mark Zuckerberg won the Golden Globe award for Best Picture.
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2011: In Israel the Cabinet is expected this to approve Israel's acceptance of membership in the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women.
2011: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Binocular Vision by Edith Pearlman and the recently released paperback edition of The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama by David Remnick
2011: The Los Angeles Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Binocular Vision: New & Selected Stories by Edith Pearlman
2011:There were a number of attacks against Jewish institutions in Montreal sometime between yesterday evening and this morning, local media reported today. Vandals reportedly smashed the windows of three synagogues, a Jewish day school, and a Jewish daycare center in the Côte-St-Luc and Hampstead neighborhoods. Local authorities said that there might be a connection between the attacks and that they may have been perpetrated by the same person or group of people
2011(11thof Shevat, 5771): Milton Levine, the co-creator of “Uncle Milton’s Ant Farm which was an instant hit in the fad-crazy 1950s” passed away today at the age of 97 (As reported by Valerie Nelson)
2012: “Remembrance,” a film inspired by actual events that depicts a remarkable love story that blossomed in the terror and squalor of a Nazi concentration camp in 1944 Poland, is scheduled to have its New York Premiere at the New York Jewish Film Festival.
2012:Touro Synagogue Weekend of Peace March-MLK,Jr. Parade is scheduled to take place in New Orleans, LA.
2012: The 10th Annual Used Book Sale at Beth El Hebrew Congregation is scheduled to come to an end in Alexandria, VA.
2012:An Israel Defense Forces court sentenced a Palestinian man to five life sentences today, after he was convicted of murdering five members of the Fogel family in the West Bank settlement of Itamar in 2011. Amjad Awad, a 19-year-old student, carried out the crime with his cousin, Hakim Awad, who was already sentenced to five consecutive life sentences in October 2011. The judges' panel contemplated whether to give Awad the death penalty, saying the youth "doesn't have a fragment of regret in his heart." However, ultimately the judges said that despite the horrid acts he carried out, they decided not to sentence him to a harsher punishment than the one the military prosecution had requested.
2012:Hackers shut down both the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE) and El Al’s respective websites today, one day after a hacker network threatened to carry out attacks on both sites. The network, which goes by the name “nightmare group,” was able to cause severe problems for both sites
2013: In Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the Hadassah Book Club is scheduled to discuss Unorthodox by Deborah Feldman
2013: At least five rockets were launched from the Gaza Strip in the direction of Ashkelon, at approximately 2:00 am today.
2013: At The Wiener Library in London,Dr Joanna Beata Michlic from the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute is scheduled to deliver a lecture that “discusses early postwar memories of Jewish survivors and their rescuers concerning wartime rescue in Warsaw and Warsaw province, and the relationships between rescuers and their Jewish charges in the immediate postwar period.”
2013: “Aya” is scheduled to be shown at the Jerusalem Jewish Film Festival.
2013:A week before the January 22 elections, representatives of the eight largest political parties running for Knesset will face off before the English- speaking public at The Jerusalem Great Synagogue tonight.
2013: Today the Jerusalem District Court convicted the "Jewish Terrorist" Jack Teitel of murdering two Palestinians and an assortment of other crimes between 1997 and 2008.
2014: The San Diego Center for Jewish Culture is scheduled to host a “Collage Workshop with Irene Neimark.”
2014: “Saul Bass Shorts” and “Cupcakes” are scheduled to be shown at the New York Jewish Film Festival
2014: The Daniel Cooney Gallery is scheduled to host the reception which marks the opening of “Inframen” a project of Nir Arieli.
2014(15th of Shevat):According to the tradition of the Bene Israel of India, the prophet Elijah ascended to heaven
2014(15thof Shevat, 5774) Tu BiShvat / טו בשבט
2014: Sirens went off tonight in the Ashkelon region as rockets were fired from Gaza for a second straight night.
2014: Among those nominated for Oscars today were “The Act of Killing”Joshua Oppenheimer and Signe Byrge Sørensen for Best Documentary Feature and Emmanuel Lubezki for Cinematography for his work in “Gravity”
2014: The Ministry for Senior Citizens announced today that it canceled its NIS 25,000 ($7,000) support for a remembrance event organized by the city of Ramat Gan for International Holocaust Remembrance Day, after a Ynet report revealed that participants would be charged a NIS 20 ($6) entrance fee, including Holocaust survivors. (As reported by Gilad Morag)
2015: “An Unmarried Woman” is scheduled to be shown at the 92ndStreet Y as part of the winter film series.
2015: The NIFY Southern Winter is scheduled to begin at Memphis, TN.