Jewish History

An impressionistic tour of Germany and Austria

Our guide book indicated the location of Hitler’s underground Chancellery on our walk. The place where he died has no marker anywhere. There are nomarkers anywhere in the world memorializing Hitler’s existence. The location shown on our map was Potsdamer Platz, where an entire city within the city of Berlin was under construction. We counted twenty-five giant cranes in this ten square block area. I could only approximate where the Chancellery was, and so a symbolic spit was the best I could do to memorialize “Der Fuhrer.” [Ira Spector]

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International, Jewish History, Travel and Food

Nazi symbolism found in GOP County Chair’s old video

A decades-old video involving San Diego County Republican chairman Tony Krvaric and images of Adolf Hitler and Nazi symbols has been brought to light by KPBS reporters Amita Sharma and JW August. It prompted San Diego City Council candidate Marni von Wilpert to call upon her opponent Joe Leventhal — who is Jewish — to return a $1,200 contribution he received from Krvaric “and demand new leadership in the Republican party that doesn’t casually traffic in hate.” [Our Shtetl San Diego County column by Donald H. Harrison]

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Donald H. Harrison, Jewish History, San Diego County, Science, Medicine, & Education, USA

Three takeaways from Holocaust, Immigrant biography

This is a story well told, except that you won’t know any more about the identity of the Mafia boss after reading this book than you do now.  Whoever he was, he took a liking to Helen Pinczewski, Solomon’s hardworking mother, after she and her husband David opened a candy store in an Italian section of Brooklyn.  He made it his personal mission not to allow any of the tough guys in the neighborhood to harass the couple, for whom he developed a great sympathy after learning they were Holocaust survivors. From my point of view, there were three important takeaways from this biography. [Book review by Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, International, Jewish History, USA

San Diego Jewish World endorses Sara Jacobs for Congress

With only nuance separating them on Middle East issues, and practically no discernible differences on domestic issues, I’ve been watching the tenor of their two campaigns to help me in my deliberations. There, I have to say, Sara Jacobs has been far more positive in her approach to the voters than Georgette Gomez. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Donald H. Harrison, Jewish History, Middle East, San Diego County, USA

Leading Italian fascists and their Jewish lovers

Columbia University historian Victoria de Grazia, who has written extensively about women in Fascist Italy (How Fascism Ruled Women), and America’s imperial drive to spread consumer capitalism abroad (Irresistible Empire: America’s Advance through Twentieth-Century Europe), has written a book where its title and subtitle are telling two different, but overlapping, stories. [Mitchell J. Freedman]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, International, Jewish History

Learning about farming and sex in the Catskills

Across the road from the colony was “Louis Cohen’s dairy farm.” The only way to tell he was Jewish was the name. He didn’t look Jewish! Louis had a raw bone, muscular body, honed by years of hard farm work. His voice didn’t sound Jewish. He was quiet and soft spoken, a rarity in my heritage, Jewish farmers in America were as rare then as underpaid professional athletes are today. Louie had a fine herd of milking cows grazing in a flat pasture that became my playground. It was great adventure to overturn hard, white granite rocks speckled with black syinite specks and find one or more garter snakes wiggling angrily at being discovered. The rock homes sheltered the reptiles from the hot sun’s rays. I always searched with my head down, carefully avoiding the innumerable “cow paddies.” [Ira Spector]

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Jewish History, Trivia, Humor & Satire, USA

A Torah giant, up close and personal

Myriads of articles and books will be written on the life and legacy of Rav Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz, who passed away on Friday, the 17th of Av, and was buried on Har Hazeitim – the Mount of Olives. The diversity of people who accompanied him to his final rest spoke to the miracles he accomplished in his lifetime. Once in a generation – if we’re lucky – are we to witness to the creation of such a vast body of Torah work by one person; he has revolutionized Jewish scholarship for hundreds of thousands – perhaps millions — of people, and for future generations. Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, who was a keynote speaker at a dinner in honor of the Rav in 2018, said, “He was trained as a scientist but has the soul of a poet.” [Toby Klein Greenwald]

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Jewish History, Jewish Religion, Middle East, Obituaries & memorials, Toby Klein Greenwald

NHL’s Halpern a Jewish sports honoree

Halpern will become only the second hockey player to be inducted into the Jewish Sports Heritage Association, joining Mike Hartman, who played 58 of his 397 career games with the 1992- 93 Lightning during nine NHL seasons. NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman also has been so honored. The induction ceremony at Temple Israel of Lawrence on Long Island, New York., was originally planned for April 26, but the Coronavirus pandemic forced cancellation of the program until 2021, at a date to be announced. Among this year’s other inductees are former Boston Red Sox infielder Kevin Youkilis, former NBA Commissioner David Stern, author Mitch Albom, boxing analyst Al Bernstein, and the late Ed Sabol and his son, Steve, co-founders of NFL Films. [Bruce F. Lowitt]

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Bruce F. Lowitt, Jewish History, Jewish Religion, Sports & Competitions, USA

Jews cheer, jeer Kamala Harris as Biden’s VP nominee

Back in June 2016, when California’s then Attorney General Kamala Harris was successfully campaigning for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate to succeed the retiring Barbara Boxer, I asked her at the United Domestic Workers Union Hall in San Diego about the ongoing Israel-Palestinian dispute. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Donald H. Harrison, Jewish History, Middle East, San Diego County, USA

Postcards and the Kindertransport

This story is built around 50 delicate letters, most written on the back of German period piece postcards: including garden scenes of fairy tales gnomes, elfs, leprechauns, and teddy bears designed for children. The letters, starting in February 1939 were by Max Lichtwitz, a Berlin lawyer, to his six-year-old son Heinz or Heini Lichtwitz, the future Henry Foner. They evoke love, longing, and irreparable loss. Max, a widower, sent his six-year son Heinz to England to live in Swansea, Wales with Morris and Winifred Foner. Max, his new wife and stepdaughter never got out of Germany, and were murdered in Auschwitz. [Oliver Pollak]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, International, Jewish History, Oliver Pollak