יום חמישי, י״ז תמוז תשפ״וThursday, July 2, 2026
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Saul Jay Singer serves as Senior Legal Ethics Counsel with the District of Columbia Bar and is a collector of extraordinary original Judaica documents and letters. He welcomes comments at sauljsing@gmail.com. Before commencing his career as a litigator and legal ethicist, he served for fourteen years as an actuary for several ratemaking organizations and insurance companies and as actuary for the National Flood Insurance Program.
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Newton was a devoted Christian raised in the Puritan tradition in the Church of England who nonetheless rejected key elements of religious orthodoxy, including principally the doctrine of the trinity, which he characterized as idolatry.
The experience of surviving both the Holocaust and imprisonment on Cyprus only strengthened the resolve of the Jews to get to Eretz Yisrael, who began referring to Cyprus as “erev Eretz Yisrael” (the eve of being in Israel).
The government, ruling out a state funeral, decided that the reinternment would be a private affair, to the point that Shimon Peres, then the Deputy Minister of Defense, refused to even permit the formal participation of the IDF.
In his first essay, a well received article published in The Orient (1844-45), he emerged as a powerful champion of traditional Orthodoxy and, as per his mentor, an opponent of Reform Judaism.
Kabbalistically, seven circuits represents completion and perfection, particularly with respect to G-d’s creation of the world.
I am a Jew. That is a fact [and] you do me no injury by reminding me of the race to which I belong and have never renounced and toward which I feel only gratitude and pride.
Temple proved to be one of the great outspoken advocates for the Jewish victims of the Reich. ... He regularly and unabashedly took publicly unpopular positions, including advocacy for England and its allies to grant asylum to Jews able to escape Hitler.
On several occasions after the meeting, Ben-Gurion expressed his enchantment with the Chazon Ish.
Baden-Powell supporters reason that given its emphasis on discipline and the supremacy of the “greater good” and his belief that “every boy ought to learn how to shoot and obey orders,” it is hardly surprising that authoritarian governments were drawn to some aspects of Scouting philosophy.
For example, New York Daily News sports editor Paul Gallico wrote in the mid-1930s that basketball "appeals to the Hebrew with his Oriental background [because] the game places a premium on an alert, scheming mind and flashy trickiness, artful dodging and general smart-alecness."
Oppenheimer was a strong Israel supporter who played an important role in the development of the Jewish state’s nuclear capability.
Though Rav Maimon lost his battle to include the phrase “and its redeemer,” he had the final word when, after Ben-Gurion completed his speech at the signing ceremony that fateful Friday afternoon, he rose and proudly recited the Shecheyanu blessing.
After recovering from their initial shock, rescue forces at the site began to evacuate people and treat the injured, but there were insufficient paramedics available to handle the emergency.
The public, furious that the very source of their confidence in its investment – the government’s backing of the loans – turned out to be a crucial factor in the Panama Canal Scandal, was eager for a scapegoat. Drumont came along and gave them one: the Jews.
Beginning in 1891, the Pasteur Institute opened facilities in different countries, and currently there are 32 institutes in 29 countries in various parts of the world.
Some people like Jews and some do not; but no thoughtful man can doubt the fact that they are beyond all question the most formidable and the most remarkable race which has ever appeared in the world.
Many critics maintain this entire scene is anachronistic in that Lee incongruously imposed her own after-the-fact 1960s sensibilities onto her 1935 characters, who were overwhelmingly unaware of the Nazi persecution against the Jews.
The official opening of the Community Center was on Washington’s birthday, February 22, 1926, and it went on to become the meeting place for several Jewish organizations, including B’nai Brith, Hadassah, and the American Jewish Committee.
Later in life, Parks frequently and vociferously spoke out against skinheads – who typically manifest neo-Nazi beliefs regarding Jews – and the Ku Klux Klan, whom she blamed for “keeping the flames of prejudice flickering” and for much of the continuing racism in America.
For almost half a century, there has been unremitting pressure on Israel – including, sadly, from the United States under certain administrations – to return the Golan to Syria.
If there was a historical "Palestinian" nation, when did it begin, when did it cease to exist, and what caused its demise?
The tale of Robinson’s integration of baseball in 1947 provided Jews with a reference for their own experience of post-WWII assimilation into American society.
During a journey down the Nile River, Mendes created a makeshift American flag, flew it from a mast, and persuaded the crew of his vessel to salute it and promise to defend it.
According to Segal’s own account, Eban shamed the Israeli authorities by arguing that Israel, as the only democracy in the Middle East, dare not censor freedom of artistic expression.
Although Kovner never came close to achieving the grandiose Nakam goal, he played a fundamental role in telling the story of Jewish rebellion and keeping alive the tales of Jewish heroism during the Shoah.
Anti-Semitism caused the first defection from the Impressionist movement when the deeply prejudiced Pierre-Auguste Renoir broke off all contact with Jews and ended his relationships with Jewish patrons.
Children’s train rides and sea/river cruises have long been an important part of many Lag BaOmer celebrations, and one of the highlights for Jewish children in pre-World War II Warsaw was the annual Lag BaOmer train ride.
Challenging medical orthodoxy, which held that only vaccines made of living viruses could provide effective, enduring immunity, Jonas Edward Salk (1914-95) produced a “killed-virus” vaccine that retained immunization capabilities. His discovery of the first poliomyelitis vaccine, which constitutes one of the greatest breakthroughs in immunology, rendered poliomyelitis (polio) a conquered disease and made Salk a […]
One exceptional way to best capture that feeling is to talk to the people who actually signed the Declaration, to experience history through those who lived it but, unfortunately, all 37 signers are gone.
The staging of a production with the scope, breadth, and vision of "The Eternal Road" represented an almost inconceivable challenge, as nothing on this scale had ever been previously attempted.
When the plague struck Vilna in 1848, Rav Israel Salanter directed all his energies toward relief efforts and sent his students out to care for the victims of the disease.
Before King Solomon built the Beit HaMikdash in Jerusalem in the mid-10th century BCE, Jews did have other places where they worshipped.
Proust read the Zohar and frequently made observations and employed language in 'Lost Time' that can only be characterized as Jewish-mystical.
MDA in Israel was arguably born twice: first after World War I and then again in 1930.
Nonetheless, Esperanto itself, stripped of its religious machinations, grew in popularity worldwide, albeit gradually.
Micrography, a creative medium particularly relevant to Jewish religious artistic expression, is a centuries-old manifestation of what is today characterized as “modernist art.”
A momentous and hostile philosophical battle ensued between Visser, who single-mindedly advocated non-cooperation with the Nazis, and Cohen and Asscher, who urged collaboration as the only way forward to maximize Jewish survival under the circumstances.
Rishon LeZion was officially founded on July 31, 1882 when 18 Chovevei Zion pioneer families from Ukraine (then part of the Russian Empire) led by Levontin took possession of 835 acres of land near Jaffa, then part of the Arab village of Eyun Kara.
He reportedly announced aloud to a notable Arab sheikh that "the land was given to us, and you should take your wives and your children, load up your camels, and go away."
The Hindenburg, a massive German zeppelin 803 feet long – almost the length of three football fields – departed Frankfurt, Germany on the evening of May 3, 1937, on the first of 10 scheduled round trips between Europe and the United States during its second year of commercial service. The airship had made 63 previous […]
Few people know that it was Hirsch’s rejection that prompted Herzl to write Der Judenstaat (The Jewish State, 1896), considered the seminal screed of modern Zionism.
In a postscript to the manuscript of Tomorrow sent (ironically) to Jewish editor, Waldo Frank, O’Neill referred to a booking agent as a “fat little Jew.”
As our letter demonstrates, this endeavor was strongly supported by President Sadat; it is not often that a head of state writes a personal note to thank a donor for a three-dollar contribution!
Joseph Trumpeldor (1880-1920) is known for his efforts in forming a Jewish military force to liberate and defend Eretz Yisrael and for founding the Zion Mule Corps and the Jewish Legion, but he is probably best known for his legendary defense of Tel Chai when he uttered the immortal dying words, “Ein davar, tov lamut […]
Machzor Kol Bo, first printed in 1699 and of disputed authorship, retells the R. Akiva story and observes that it “was on this basis that the custom of reciting Kaddish became widespread.”
As Stalin’s closest confidant, as a member of the Politburo, and as chairman of the Soviet Presidium, Kaganovich established the unification of state security forces that later became the infamous KGB.
Shown here is an invitation to transportation and engineering forces in the British Army in Persia and Iraq for the “[Jewish] Officers and Other Ranks of No. 1. Pal. Docks & L. of C. Checking Coy.R.E. Paiforce” in Baghdad. The invitation is for “a party to be held on the occasion of the first anniversary […]
Sadly, the passengers in the photo were most likely people denied entry to the United States and who were therefore forced to return home to Europe.
Unlike Kristallnacht, which was a propagandistic failure, “Der Ewige Jew” proved to be successful in inculcating the belief in the German people that the Jews – all of them – were dangerous predators who spread disease and corruption and needed to be exterminated.
During a 1926 investigation by Prohibition enforcement officials of 600 New York City rabbis suspected of inflating their congregation numbers, the distribution of sacramental wine fell from one million gallons to only 6,000 gallons in just one year.
Luis Martins de Souza-Dantas was a Brazilian diplomat who illegally granted Brazilian diplomatic visas to Jews in Vichy France during the Holocaust, saving a confirmed 425 Jews – and at least 400 other “undesirables,” including communists and homosexuals – from certain death. Besides issuing visas, he regularly intervened with local and foreign diplomatic officials, saving […]
Until George Gershwin, serious American orchestral composers were predominantly influenced by European schools of music. By composing original musical works based upon the rhythms, melodies, and moods of American popular music, Gershwin proved that the finer elements of jazz could be integrated into music to form the basis of symphonic creations typically and uniquely American. […]
When The American Girl failed to show up at Bourget Airfield in Paris as scheduled, the international media exploded with extensive coverage mourning the pilots’ deaths, declaring them presumably lost at sea, but joyous coverage ensued soon after with news of their rescue and survival.
In response to Rav Feinstein's call, thousands of Orthodox Jews...conducted a mass protest against Israel's handling of the "Who is a Jew?" issue.
He always viewed his photographs and films more as documentation than art, and most cinema commentators agree, some cynically.
During his career, the great Houdini only failed to escape a pair of cuffs once – when he was presented with a rigged set stuffed with buckshot, rendering the locking mechanism inoperative, even with the key.
Some German interviewees were averse to being interviewed on camera, so Lanzmann employed subterfuge in filming some of his interviews, pretending to be pro-Nazi and using hidden equipment.
We don’t know what will happen in the year 2100, and it is impossible to predict the future. But of one thing you can be certain – that in the year 2100, Jewish women will be lighting Shabbos candles.
Many of the Jewish prisoners, including most likely the author of our card, were members of the Underground who had been convicted for resisting Arab terrorism.
In Rumkowski's infamous speech, "Give Me Your Children," he urged the Jews not to resist deporting 20,000 of their children to be exterminated.
All the kosher food on the Titanic was prepared in a small and crowded kosher kitchen located near the third-class kitchen on the F Deck of the ship.
Frankfurter was a lifelong committed Zionist, beginning with his association with Brandeis, who enlisted him into ZOA membership and a leadership position with the Parushim.
Some academics suggest that Washington's letter, which virtually all agree presents his most prominent pronouncement on religious toleration, was actually drafted by Thomas Jefferson.
In 1946, Lansky ordered his men to help bring Holocaust survivors to Eretz Yisrael and facilitate the establishment of the Jewish state.
Hermann Karl Hesse (1877-1962), a Nobel Prize-winning German novelist and poet, is best known for his inspired explorations of self-understanding, spiritual realization, and psychology, particularly in Der Steppenwolf (1927), perhaps his best-known work. In Der Steppenwolf, he applied the tools of psychoanalysis and the conflict between the conscious and unconscious mind to analyze a middle-aged […]
It is undisputed that, unlike Leeser, Wise was an academic and rabbinical fraud.
Efforts quickly turned to providing humanitarian relief to quake victims in what is considered the first internationally-organized relief campaign.
By the time the Jewish Museum of the History of Polish Jews was opened across from the monument in 2013, the memorial had lost all its visual prominence and blended into the surrounding landscape.
The Second Maccabiah (Jewish Olympic) Games, which were held in Tel Aviv in April 1935, included flying competitions, and a group of Jewish fliers arrived from Germany with two German-built gliders.
Walt never met with Hitler, but it is beyond dispute that the Fuhrer adored Disney’s work.
In the wake of its election loss, the Black Panther movement essentially ended. It had failed to radicalize most Mizrachim. Nonetheless, the issues and needs of Mizrachim subsequently took a front and center position in Israeli politics.
Out of 13 candidates, mostly from Germany, Rav Adler made the “final four” list for chief rabbi along with Rabbis Samson Raphael Hirsch, Benjamin Hirsch Auerbach, and Hirsch Hirschfeld.
Thanks to the member from Washington, whose name I desire to know, and to you and your associates, Maryland has wiped from her escutcheon the stain of intolerance.
He also longed for the children he had left behind in Poland and therefore returned to Poland, albeit with a love for Eretz Yisrael that he carried with him until his death.
Many of our greatest artists have produced striking graphic works on these subjects, and I present here a selection of original artwork from my Shavuot collection.
Although Eisner later wrote many comics featuring overtly Jewish characters, “The Spirit” (which was created at a time when clearly identifying the religious affiliation of leading comic book characters was strongly disfavored) was not explicitly so.
I’m a lover of Yiddish, read some every week, and believe in its future, though that’s a complex subject.
Although Rubinstein’s maternal grandparents, with whom he and his family lived in Lodz, were strictly Orthodox, his parents were not, and he received little religious education, despite the plethora of Jewish schools in Lodz.
In On the Jewish Question, Marx contemptuously criticized Judaism (and, to a lesser extent, Christianity) from the standpoint of social emancipation, regarding Jews as the embodiment of capitalism and the creators of its evils.
The study and teaching of Jewish history established his own Jewish identity and constituted for him the ultimate proxy for Judaism itself.
Zishe’s parents wanted him to learn a trade, but wherever he was apprenticed, his masters took advantage of him by using his strength for business and taught him nothing.
[I]n every generation, our enemies stand up against us to destroy us, but G-d always saves us from their hands.
Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) was a British writer best known for his iconic Sherlock Holmes detective stories, but he was also a physician (Holmes was modeled after his former university teacher, Joseph Bell) and a prolific writer in the fields of science fiction, fantasy, humor, romance, poetry, theater, history, historical fiction, medicine, politics, architecture, and […]
However, Hitler’s rise to power presented a great challenge to Einstein who, though a pacifist, understood that to prevent war, it was sometimes necessary to use force, especially against a threat as monumental as that posed by the Nazis.
Secular educational experts argue that the state has the right – indeed, the duty – to prepare children to become responsible members of a democratic society, based upon Jewish values, including dignity, tolerance and love for the land of Israel.
In his memoir, Asimov writes that although he was never physically abused for being Jewish, he was occasionally attacked verbally by anti-Semitic “louts,” which he accepted as just the nature of things and deemed himself powerless to change.
Purim celebrations in Tel Aviv, which began in 1908, were the largest public events in Eretz Yisrael during the British Mandate period and an important exemplar of Jewish culture. The sometimes outrageous carnivals became both a source of pride to the citizens of Tel Aviv and a broader demonstration of the accomplishments and capabilities of […]
Charles Lindbergh (1902-74) earned worldwide fame for making the first solo, non-stop flight across the Atlantic on “The Spirit of St. Louis” in 1927. When “Lucky Lindy” returned from Paris, thousands of New Yorkers welcomed him with a ticker-tape parade and a celebration reportedly unparalleled in the city’s history. His public stature following this historic […]
The fate of the Exodus and its crew commanded international attention, and journalists who covered the dramatic struggle described to the entire world the brutality of the British.
Teddy Roosevelt became the first president known to donate personal funds to a Jewish cause.
After its 1949 elections, Israel filed yet a third application for membership, and this time the request was approved by the Security Council by a 9-1 vote on March 4, 1949.
Incredibly, five of the original signatories to the Buttonwood Agreement were Jews, all members of Shearith Israel.
Recent studies indicate that Lie and the American government played a more important role in the armistice negotiations than previously understood.
While the Vaad Halashon and others supported Amikam’s letter to the British and sought financial support from the Zionist Organization, the response was, at best, lukewarm...
Despite his own many accomplishments as a novelist, poet, composer, and musician, Max Brod (1884-1968) is perhaps best known as Kafka’s friend, supporter, and patron.
Luke, who previously served as Great Britain’s Governor of Jerusalem, thought he could nip the violence in its bud by summoning Haj Amin al-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, admonishing him for the rioting, and ordering him to cease and desist.
Many commentators characterize Straus’ appointment as a key early step in the depoliticization of the diplomatic service and its rendering as a true meritocracy.
Given the centrality of Torah study to Jewish life... it is not surprising that Jewish artists have frequently featured it in their work.
Although some argue Bush’s foreign policy was a complex mix of support and opposition to Israel’s foreign policy, a strong case can be made that the Bush administration was the most hostile to Israel in American history – until Barack Obama indisputably seized the presidential anti-Israel crown.
Raphall emphasized that the “slave,” in whom vests fundamental human dignity, must be served the best food and, if there is only one mattress, the slave gets it and the Jewish owner must sleep on the floor.
June 26, 2026 
