This Day, March 11, In Jewish History by Mitchell A and Deb Levin Z"L

This Day, March 11, In Jewish History by Mitchell A and Deb Levin Z"L

March 11

222: Severus Alexander began his reign as Roman Emperor during which a table in Intercisa (Hungary) was inscribed as follows: “To the Eternal God! For the salvation of our Lord; the pious, felicitous Emperor Severus Alexander and the Empress Julia Mamea, mother of the Emperor; Cosmius, chief of the Spondilla customhouse, head of the synagogue of the Jews, gladly fulfills his vow.” (Raphael Patai)

https://books.google.com/books?id=LLuPS1yVDf8C&pg=PA22&lpg=PA22&dq=The+Intercisa+tablet&source=bl&ots=yCzDcl2KUi&sig=O5OHF4BxiH_sYJdbyzAbDGR_k6I&hl=en&sa=X&ei=BTT-VKC7HtK1oQSr4oCoAg&ved=0CDwQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=The%20Intercisa%20tablet&f=false

1296: John le Romeyn, who on his way home from the Papal Curia at Rome in 1292 met in Paris his old acquaintance , Bonami, the Jews and acquired from his claim to a debt of £300 which was owed to Bonami by the Brindlington Priory, completed his term as Archbishop of York.

1344: In Speyer, a year after the Jews had been the victims of an Easter Time blood libel the citizens “requested the king's permission to confiscate the houses of these Jews for the benefit of the city” – a request which was granted

1415: Pope Benedict XIII banned the study of the Talmud in any form and tried to restrict Jewish life completely. The town of Tortosa, Spain, was the scene of a disputation between Christians and Jews from 1412 through 1414.  These disputations were always rigged so that the Christians would win.  The Pope (or as he described by some the anti-Pope) was enraged by the lack of conversions which was the cause of the ban.

1513:  Leo X elected Pope.  Leo X succeeded Julius II, the Pope who paid for the painting of the Sistine Chapel.  “To Martin Luther, Leo was the functioning head of a “kingdom of Antichrist.’”  Even his admirers might say that Leo was more a man of the Renaissance than a Vicar of Christ.  He respected learning, even when that learning was Jewish.  In a dispute concerning the Talmud, Leo took the side of Johann Reuchlin one of the Christian scholars who could read Hebrew.  He defended the Talmud, saying that it did blaspheme Jesus or Christianity.  Despite the pressure on him to burn the Talmud to the opposed tact and had a Christian printer produced the text in its entirety, without censorship.  Leo banned the requirement of the Jew Badge in his French possessions and refused to enforce it in his Italian holdings. 

1640: Today, after his brother had had his hand chopped before being burned at the stake and following “week of bands of Old Christians rioting against New Christians ( many of whom were Jews forced to converts, the Franciscan friar Henrique Solis left Portugal bound for Amsterdam where he “took the name Eleazar” and remained a leading member of Dutch Jewry until 1656.

1638(25th of Adar I, 5398): Simon Auerbach, the son of Rabbi Meshullam Solomon Fischhof-Auerbach and his wife Miriam Lucerna and the bother of Rabbi Menahem Mendel Auerbach, “who at the age of twenty-three wrote a penitential poem on the occasion of epidemic that broke out among children in Vienna in 1634,” passed away today at Eibenschütz

1670: Birthdate of John Toland, Anglo-Irish author and philosopher who in 1714, at a time when Jews were still considered to be outsiders by many Englishmen, wrote “Reasons for Naturalizing the Jews” in which he advocated “full citizenship and equal rights for the Jewish people

1704: Clement XI issued “Propagandae Per Unicersum,” a Papal Bull that “confirmed all the benefits given to converts under Paul II and expanded them to include giving them the rights over properties owned by non-converted members of the their families.” (As reported by jewishhisotry.org)

1739: In Bordeaux, France, Sara and David Nones gave birth to Mardochee Nones.

1762: Although Rhode Island was considered more liberal than other states, and although a few Jews had been previously granted citizenship, the state refused to grant citizenship to Aaron Lopez and Isaac Eliezer. The court stated that “no person who is not of the Christian religion can be admitted free of this colony.” Lopez was granted citizenship by Massachusetts, and the sentence “upon the true faith of a Christian” was excluded from the oath. Lopez was probably the first Jew to be granted citizenship in Massachusetts.

1763: Birthdate of Baruch Schottlander who gained fame as Benedict Schott, the itinerant teacher who served as a “tutor in the house of Herz Beer, the father of composer Jacob Mayerbeer and as an author who petitioned Napoleon on the matter of improved education.

1770(14th of Adar, 5530): Purim

1770: In Birtsmorton Court, Malvern, Worcestershire, William and Elizabeth Huskisson, gave birth to one of four sons, MP William Huskisson who supported toward full emancipation of the Jews and in 1830 “presented a petition signed 2,000 merchants from Liverpool” calling for the removal of all civil disabilities.

1774: Birthdate of Laupheim, Germnay native Helene Essinger, the wife os Samuel Gronum Wallersteiner with whom she had six children.

1777: In Amsteram, Jonah Jones and his wife gave birth to Andrew Abner Jones, who first married New York native Miriam Marks with whom he had three children and then married Rebecca Jones, the mother of Sarah Rebecca Jones.

1778: David Barrack Hays and Esther (Hetty Asher) Hays gave birth to “Yitlah” Hays.

1785: Spanishtown, Jamaica, native Abraham Rodrigues De Leon and his wife gave birth to Esther De Leon.

1787(21st of Adar): Rabbi Elimelekh of Lizhansk, author of Noam Elimelekh, a commentary on the Torah, passed away today. He was the brother of Rabbi Zušya, of Hanipol (one of my favorite Chassidim) and a student of the Maggid of Mezeritch the successor to the Baal Shem tov.

1789(13th of Adar, 5549): Ta’anit Esther; Erev Purim observed as George Washington makes his way to New York to be inaugurated as President.

1794: In Mt. Pleasant, NY, Jochabed Isaacks and Michael Marks gave birth to Samson Marks.

1796: New York native Moses Myers and Eliza Judah gave birth to Frederick Myers.

1800(14th of Adar, 5560): First Purim of the 19th century

1801: Paul I of Russia is assassinated, leading the way for his son Alexander I to accede the throne. Paul’s death was no loss to the Jews of Russia. At the time of his death, Paul was preparing to implement the recommendations contained in a report entitled, “An Opinion on How to Avert the Scarcity of Food in White Russia Through the Curbing of the Jews’ Avaricious Occupations, Their Reformation and Other Matters.”  Alexander began his reign by adopting a series of policies that were designed to further degrade and impoverish the Jews.  As the threat of Napoleon loomed on the horizon, Paul’s policies towards the Jews softened and improved.  The first Lubavitcher Rebbe urged Jews to support Alexander in the fight against Napoleon.  After the Napoleonic threat disappeared Alexander’s treatment of the Jews became increasingly less sympathetic.  By the time of his death, he had returned to the reactionary views that had marked the start of his reign. 

1807: Birthdate of Arnaud Aron, the German trained Talmudist who served as a rabbi in Hegenheim before becoming the Chief Rabbi of Strasburg in his native Alsace.

https://opensiddur.org/profile/arnaud-aron/

 1810: One day after she had passed away, 74-year-old Hannah Emdin, “the widow of Gumpel Emdin” was buried today at the Brady Street Jewish Cemetery.

1811(15th of Adar, 5571): Shushan Purim

1812: Prussian Jews were granted civil rights. The price of citizenship included the adoption of family names in the Western style. Although later reaction revoked most of this freedom, the discrimination never returned to the level existing in the "Middle Ages." That is, until the rise of Hitler.

1816: One day after she had passed away, Frances Jacobs, the wife of Lieb Jacobs was buried today at the Brady Street Jewish Cemetery.

1819(14th of Adar, 5579): Purim

1824(11th of Adar II, 5584) Fast of Esther observed because 13th Adar fell on Shabbat.

1827: Birthdate of Moritz Ellstätter the native of Karlsruhe and “son of a Jewish furniture trader who served as minster in the government of Baden.

1827: Two days after he passed away, 20-year-old Solomon Marks, the son of Gedaliah and Catherine Marks was buried today at the “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery.

1829: James Graham Lewis married Harriet Davis today at the Great Synagogue.

1831: Birthdate of Adolf Neubaur, the native of Hungary and student of rabbinical literature who worked in the Austrian Consulate at Jerusalem where he began publishing articles about the Jews of that city. Eventually he made his way to Oxford where he enjoyed a distinguished career as a reader in Rabbinic Hebrew and sub-librarian at Bodelian Library. Besides his extensive cataloguing work, this unsung intellectual hero edited the Aramic text of the Book of Tobit and discovered a Hebrew fragment of the wisdom text of “Ben Sira.”

http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/11456-neubauer-adolf

http://www.oxfordjewishheritage.co.uk/notable-jews/modern-period/204-adolf-neubauer-1831-1901

1833: In Amsterdam, Aron Mendes Chumaceiro, who served as the “chakam of Curacao in the Dutch West Indies” and his wife gave birth to Jacob Mendes Chumaceiro who “was inspector of the Jewish schools of Amsterdam, head and librarian of the bet ha-midrash Ets Haim, and editor of Het Israelietisch Weekblad.”

1838: Birthdate of Leo Blumenstock von Halban, native of Cracow, the Austrian trained physician who became “chair of forensic medicine in 1881.”

1838: Abraham Marks married Phoebe Simmons at the Great Synagogue today.

1841: In Venice, birthdate of Luigi Luzzatti who “served as the 31st Prime Minister of Italy between 1910 1911; making him the second Jew to hold this position.

1843: Birthdate of Borsborn Germany native Karl Abraham.

1846(13th of Adar, 5606): Ta’anit Esther; Erev Purim

1852: In “Benjamin Disraeli” published today described the various views, most of them negative, on the appointed of Disraeli to serve as Chancellor of the Exchequer.  Much of the criticism was based on Disraeli’s career as the author of several novels.  Apparently being a man of letters should have disqualified him for such a post.  According to the author of the article, Disraeli’s literary background gives him unique qualifications for public life.  Besides which, he was the most capable member of his party serving in the House Commons where the Conservatives were in need of leaders.

1852: Joel ben Alexander married Ziporah bat Joseph at the Great Synagogue today.  

1853(1st of Adar II, 5613): Rosh Chodesh Adar II

1853: The Jewish Disabilities Bill came up in the House of Commons for a second reading. Mr. Ernal Osborne argued “that religious liberty was violated in the exclusion of Jews from Parliament and thought the question not one of Jewish disabilities, but of the right of Christians to be represented by whom they pleased.”  Several Members of Parliament “totally opposed the bill on Christian grounds.”

1853(1st of Adar II, 5613): Sixty-eight-year-old Pinchas Selig Rubino passed away.

1855: In Kensington, Middlesex, England, Nathaniel Mayer Montefiore, the Sussex born son of Henriette and Sir Abraham Montefiore, and his wife Emma Montefiore gave birth to Charlotte Rosalind Montefiore who became Charlotte Rosalind McIver when she married Sir Lewis McIver, the Baronet of Salisbury.

1855: In Uhrichville, OH, Amelia Maye and Elias Wolf gave birth to Philadelphia educated businessman and Jewish community leader Edwin Wolfe, the husband of Miriam Fleischer, the father of Blanche Kohan and attorney Morris Kohn and the grandfather of “librarian Edwin Wolf II” who “a member of the banking and brokerage firm Wolf Brothers & Co. from 1900 until his death,” President of the Jewish Publication Society, a member of Congregation Rodeph Shalo and the first Jew to be elected chairman of the Board of Education of Philadelphia.

1857: Moritz Jacobi of Florence, SC married Charlotte Phillips at Timmonsville, SC.

1857: Moss Emanuel married Fanny Cohen today at the Great Synagogue.

1861: In Bakau, Romania, Leib Ehrlich and Sarah Kaufman gave birth to Joseph Ehrlich the multi-lingual fresco painter who “came to the United States in June of 1889, where he eventually became the United States Immigrant Inspector at the port of Philadelphia while serving as the secretary of the Hebrew Literature Society and as the director of a Chevra Kadisha in the City of Brotherly Love.

1861: Birthdate of S. Kutner, the native of Poland who became Director of the Jews’ Deaf and Dumb Home in 1894 where his wife served as a matron and who authored several books including Kutner’s Aid to Solid Geometry.

1865(13th of Adar, 5625): Parashat Tetzaveh; Shabbat Zachor; erev Purim

1865: Corporal Jacob Kaufman began his service with Company A of the 101st Regiment.

1869: Birthdate of Lednitz, Hungary native Julius Lowenbein who settled in Asheville, NC where he was president of B’nai B’rith and organized the seventh annual Zionist conference of the Seaboard Region.

1872(1st of Adar II, 5632): Rosh Chodesh Adar II

1872: In Cornwell, England, Jemima Ridpath, and her husband George Cornwell gave birth to Kathleen Calrice Louise Cornwell, known as the author K.C. Groom who was the second wife of Herman Klein, the son of Anglo-Jewish Latvian immigrants with she had three children – Adrian, Daryl and Denise – two of whom followed in her literary footsteps.

1873: Birthdate of Philadelphia native Dr.Walter Edward Wyle, the University of Pennsylvania trained economist and author.

http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/lookupname?key=Weyl%2C%20Walter%20E.%20(Walter%20Edward)%2C%201873-1919

1873: In a letter written today, W. Archdall O’Doherty stated that it was a year ago to the day that he had delivered “control of the Erie Railway to a little London Jew of the name of Bischsoffsheim.” The letter continues with his explanation of the financial machinations that the new owners have engaged in since the sale. [Editor’s Note – The reference is to Bischoffsehim and Goldschmidt, British bankers, who were the leaders of a group of English shareholders seeking to oust Jay Gould from his controlling position of the railroad which he was ruining for his personal financial gain.  Gould was one of the villains of the Robber Baron Era.  The letter was written by a shadowy figure whose role was emerging during the multiple investigations that were being conducted.  His resort to an anti-Semitic smear was not unusual in certain circles at that time,]

1874(22nd of Adar, 5634): Sixty-nine-year-old James Bondi, a native of Dresden who came to the United States where he served as rabbi of “the Norfolk Street Synagogue” in New York and proprietor/editor of The Hebrew Leader.

1876: It was reported today that the Purim Ball, which has been held for several years at the Academy of Music did not take place this year.  No reason was given for the change which came as a surprise because it was so popular with both Christian and Jewish citizens of New York.

1883: Hermann Ullman, the Czech born son of Rabbi Benjamin Ullman and Teresia Ester Ullmann and his wife, Bertha Ullman gave birth to Hugo Ullmann

1884(14th of Adar, 5644): Purim

1884(14th of Adar, 5644): Seventy-three-year-old Levi Herzfeld the historian and rabbi who, while personally strictly Orthodox, favored “moderate” reforms passed away at Brunswick, Germany

1886: In Chicago, Rabbis Lesser, Anexter and Oalperstein officiated at the appraisal of four casks of wine and liquor shipped from Jerusalem for using during the upcoming holiday of Passover.  According to the appraiser, the wine will carry a duty of three dollars a gallon.  The wine looks liked “ordinary Rhine wine and tastes like hard cider.”  After the Appraiser finished his work, the religious leaders sealed the casks and recited the appropriate prayers over them.

1887: In South Carolina, Rabbi Rubin officiated at the marriage of Harris Frank and Sarah C. Isear.

1889: U.S. Secretary of State James G. Blaine took up the case of Herman Kempinski a Russian born American citizen who had been imprisoned by the Czar’s government went he returned to his native land on a business trip.

1890: Birthdate Albert Lorch “Al” Loeb who played Center for the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets football team in Atlanta, GA “where he was nicknamed ‘The Yiddish Wildcat’”

1890: “Found Dead In A Cellar” published today described the events surrounding the discovery of a female corpse in a building that is used as a dry goods store by Moses Levy on the ground floor and as a school by Aitz Chaim, a Talmud Torah occupying the second and third floors under the direction of Isaac Libermann and Hermann Rothstein.

1891: Ignatz Klein swore before Coroner Levy that a girl that he had seen in the United States named Rose Kohlmeyer was in fact Esther Soloymis, the girl he was accused of murdering nine years ago in Hungary as part of an alleged blood libel.

1892: Authorities are investigating reports of patient neglect at North Brothers Island, the site where numerous typhus fever, many of whom are Russian Jewish immigrants, are supposed to be held until they regain their health or pass away.

1892(12th of Adar, 5652): Sixty-two-year-old Mason Hirsh, an umbrella manufacturer from Philadelphia, passed away today in New York after being hit by a car two days ago.  He was the Treasurer of the United Hebrew Charities of Philadelphia.

1894: “The Treaty in the Reichstag” published today described the debate taking place in the German parliament over the adoption of a Russian-German Commercial Treaty; a debate filled with ant-Semitism. Baron von Hammerstein and Lieberman von Sonnenberg called the treaty “monstrous” because it would allow Russian Jews to enjoy all the privileges of Germans while avoiding military service.  They “warned the government that these Russian Jews would inevitably overrun and monopolize entire villages and absorbed the prosperity of the provinces.

1895: In Knoxville, TN, attorney Louis Alexander Gratz, the son of Salomon and Henrietta Gratz, who was a Major in the Union Army serving with the Army of the Cumberland and fighting at the Battle of Chickamauga with the 6th Kentucky Cavalry and the Mayor of North Knoxville and his wife Marion gave birth John Fisher Gratz who rose to the rank of Captain in the U.S. Army

1896: Herzl met Reverend William Hechler chaplain to the British Embassy in Vienna who was tutor in the household of the Grossherzog von Baden who knew the German Kaiser and thought he could get Herzl an audience with the German ruler.

1897: Mount Sinai Hospital, the Hebrew Benevolent Orphan Asylum, the Montefiore Home, the Home for Aged and Hebrews are each to receive bequests of three thousand dollars from the late Simon Goldenberg. The United Hebrew Charities and the Hebrew Technical Institute each will receive bequests of five thousand dollars.

1897(7th of Adar II, 5657): Seventy-seven-year-old lexicographer Daniel Sanders who “published a translation in verse of the Song of Songs in 1866” passed away today in Strelitz, Germany.

1899: “Africa” published today provides a review of The Redemption of Africa in which Frederic Perry Noble includes a description of the impact of Abraham’s journey to Egypt on the continent’s religious and social development.

1899: “The Best of Histories” published today listed 143 works that should be purchased by anybody forming a historical library including The Story of the Jews by J.K. Hosmer and The History of the Jews by Josephus Falvius translated by William Whiston

http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Story_of_the_Jews_ancient_Mediaeval.html?id=rlxmnQEACAAJ

http://sacred-texts.com/jud/josephus/

1900: In Konitz, West Prussia, 19-year-old Ermst Winter, the son of an architect from Prechlau who was going to school in Konitz did not return to his boarding house.  It was assumed that he had fallen through the ice and a search was begun.  Unbeknownst to everybody, including the Jews of Konitz, this would mark the start of Konitz Affair, a 20th century blood libel.

1900(10th of Adar II, 5660): Seventy-two-year-old Henrietta Joseph, the Charleston, SC born daughter of Catherine and Elias Abrahams, the wife o Lizar Horace Joseph and the “mother of Avery S. Joseph; Sarah Lehmann; Franklin Joseph; Joseph Joseph; Annabel Nathans; Abigail Joseph; Kate Eiseman; Arthur Joseph; Louisa Joseph and Cecelia M. Eiseman” passed away today in New Orleans, LA.

1900: It was reported today that Australian born, English author Joseph Jacobs has come to the United States “to assist in the work of preparing the Jewish Encyclopedia which will be a complete collection of everything relating to the Jewish race, its religion, its customs and its history” which has the support of “almost every Jewish scholar of note in American, England and continental Europe.

1901: It was reported today that Reverend Robert S. MacArthur, the Christian evangilists plans on having two rabbis attend the upcoming meeting that will include Andrew Carnegie Wu Ting-Fang, “the Chinese minister.

1901: Bloomingdale’s advertised that its “Show Days of Spring Millinery” would being “informally today.

1902: Twenty-eight-year-old Israel Strauss, the Brown University undergraduate and Columbia University trained neurologist who was the Pawtucket, RI born son of Alexander and Hannah Strauss married Hilda Newborg today.

1903: Zionist leader Oskar Marmorek returns to Vienna.  While few may know his name today, the Austrian born architect was an early convert to Zionism joining Max Nordau and David Wolffsohn as one of Herzl’s key supporters.

1903: In New York, Mortimer Schiff and Adele (Neustadt) Schiff gave birth to Dorothy Schiff who “was an owner and publisher of the New York Post for nearly 40 years.”

1904: Birthdate of Cleveland native and Western Reserve University alum Julia Stuhlberg Klineman, the wife of Emory Klineman, the retired chairman of Majestic Specialists and mother of Robert and William Klineman who “was an officer of the National Council of Jewish Women and the American Jewish Committee” and who suffered a fatal heart attack in St. Lucia in 1971.

1904: Birthdate of leading childhood obesity and anorexia researcher Hilde Bruch. Raised in a small German town, Bruch originally wanted to become a mathematician. An uncle convinced her that medicine was a more practical career for a Jewish woman, and she earned her doctorate in medicine at the University of Freiburg in 1929. After giving up her academic career for private practice in response to anti-Semitism within the university, Bruch fled Germany altogether in 1933, immigrating to England. After a year in London, she moved to the United States, where she began working at Babies Hospital in New York City. Bruch began researching obesity in children in 1937; her work in this area would prove to be groundbreaking. Yet she left this research in 1941 to study psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins University. Returning to New York in 1943, she both established a private psychoanalytic practice and joined the faculty at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons. In New York, and at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, where she joined the faculty in 1964, Bruch's research increasingly focused on the underlying causes of anorexia nervosa. She published both scholarly and popular articles on eating disorders and continued to see patients until her eightieth birthday. Her collected work, published as Eating Disorders: Obesity, Anorexia Nervosa and the Person Within in 1973, is still considered a definitive work on the subject. Bruch died in Houston in December 1984.

1904: It was reported today that in Russia, Jewish doctors, who represent a disproportionate number of the Physicians drafted to serve “in the East” receive nine hundred rubles for traveling expenses while their Christian counterparts receive 1,250 rubles for travel expenses.

1905: In Berlin, “a group of Jews here issued a statement this evening drawing attention to the inauguration of a new period of persecution of Jews in Russia and alleging that Russian anti-Semites, are making a systematic attempt to arrange a repetition of the Kishineff massacre.”

1906(14th of Adar, 5666): Purim

1906: In “Most Interesting Educational Experiment In New York” published today described efforts of Miss Olive M. Jones and Miss Julia Richman to educate the children of Russian Jewish immigrants.

1906: During a service held today in the Alexandrovsky Monastery sponsored by the League of the Russian People, “the orators openly summoned their followers, the ‘Black Hundreds’ to kill the Jews…”

1906: The West End Synagogue is scheduled to host “an entertainment for the Sunday School in the synagogue at Amsterdam and 82nd Street.

1906: This afternoon the Hebrew and Sunday School of Congregation Beth Israel Biku Cholim are scheduled to host a Purim celebration at Lexington Avenue and 72nd Street.

1906: The Jewish Endeavor Society is scheduled to host a Purim celebration this afternoon for 150 religious school students.

1906: “The Young Men’s and Young Ladies’ Auxiliary of the Consumptives’ Sanitarium in Denver, Colorado” is scheduled to host a bazaar and Purim Ball tonight at the Grand Central Palace.

1906: In a column entitled “Talk With Josef Lhevinne,” the Jewish pianist who is visiting the United States discussed a wide range of topics including the impact of Anton Rubinstein on his career, his love and admiration for America and his disappointment that he will not be able to go fishing while in this country.  “Fishing is favorite diversion, aside from tennis which he plays constantly to keep down his weight and to diversion to the muscles of his arms.”

1907: It was reported today that a new orchestra of 75 American musicians conducted by Manuel Klein, the English born son of Jewish immigrants from Latvia is scheduled to perform for the first time at the Hippodrome on March on March 17.

1907(25th of Adar, 5667): Seventy-four-year-old Prussian born Kentucky attorney and uncle of Justice Louis Brandies, Lewis Naphtali Dembitz who was one of those who placed Lincoln’s nomination in at the Republican Convention in 1860 and was an early supporter of the Zionist movement passed away today in Louisville.

https://archive.org/details/jewishservicesin00demb

https://books.google.com/books?id=xXcpAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA179&lpg=PA179&dq=lewis+n.+dembitz+obituary&source=bl&ots=1ACMxVwxwB&sig=0rnENeZfFzij0TXhNGtyNVF23JM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjdvKONoM3SAhVKTSYKHegABAAQ6AEILTAD#v=onepage&q=lewis%20n.%20dembitz%20obituary&f=false

1908(8th of Adar II):  Hebrew novelist Isaiah Bersadsky passed away

1909: Birthdate of Jules Engel “a Jewish-Hungarian American filmmaker, painter, sculptor, graphic artist, set designer, animator, film director, and teacher.”

1909: Birthdate of Sidney “Sid” Goldin the Georgia Tech basketball player who won a Bronze Star while serving in the United States Navy during WW II and worked for Shell Oil for 40 years.

http://gatech.giftplans.org/index.php?cID=230

1910: Birthdate of physicist Henry Solomon Lipson, the native of Liverpool who “was the co-inventor of the Beevers-Lipson Strip, a calculating device in crystallography.

1911(11th of Adar, 5671): Parashat Tetzaveh; Shabbat Zachor

1911: Jacob Frank, the Burlington, VT born son of Dora Shufrom and Joseph Elihu Frank and graduate of the University of Vermont was promoted to the rank of first lieutenant in the Coast Artillery Corps of the United States Army.

1911: Birthdate of Haim Cohen, the Lübeck, born Israeli legal scholar and jurist who wrote The Trial and Death of Jesus in 1968 in which he argued that it was the Romans, not the Sanhedrin, who tried and executed Jesus.

1912: Elevating a Husband written by Clara Lipman and Samuel Shipman which had originally opened on Broadway at the Liberty Theatre moved to the Criterion Theatre today.

1912: “Seek Work for the Deaf” published today described the organization of “a new Jewish charitable society…to be known as ‘The New York Jewish Committee for Deaf” the purpose of which “is to furnish industrial education and obtain work for the unemployed Jewish deaf persons in New York” who, according to Rabbi Barnett A. Elzas number between 1,800 and 2,000.”

1913(2nd of Adar II, 5673): Forty-two-year-old Chicagoan Victor B Strelitz, a member of the firm of Strelitz Brothers and the husband of Sarah Strelitz passed away “suddenly in New York City” today.

1913: The funeral of Pauline Phillips, the wife of Herman Philips is scheduled to take place today followed by burial at Waldheim Cemetery.

1914(13th of Adar, 5674): Ta’anit Esther; Erev Purim

1914: This afternoon fifty members of the I.W.W.’s Army of the Unemployed “gathered at the doors of the Stulz-Inzer Synagogue and demanded that they be provided with supper, shelter for the night, breakfast and a meeting with the Joseph Finkelstein, the president of the congregation who sent word that he would meet with them after he and his 300 co-religionist had finished with a service that was undoubtedly tied to the Fast of Esther and who would have gladly feed them if they had shown patience instead of acting in such an unruly fashion that the police had to be called to disperse the demonstration.

1915: The Red Cross Fund which Jacob Schiff serves as Treasurer now totals $467,779.75.

1915(25th of Adar, 5675): Eighty-four-year-old Leopold Caspari, a French-born businessman and politician from Natchitoches, Louisiana who in 1884 while serving as state representative pushed for the establishment of Northwestern State University.

1915: It was reported today that more than $200,000 has been sent to aid Jews in Russia suffering from the effects of the Great War while another $150,000 has been by American Jews to aid their co-religionists “to that part of Poland now held by the Germans.”

1916: Today, “in a telegram to the Russian and French ambassadors” Sir Edward Grey, the British Foreign Minister, “put forward a proposal that the Allies together issue a public declaration supporting Jewish aspirations in Palestine” which was one step along the path to issuing the Balfour Declaration in 1917

1916: Mr. and Mrs. Isaac W. Brill, who moved to Chicago from Cincinnati to live with their daughter Mrs. Samuel Hoffman celebrated their golden wedding this evening at the Metropole Hotel.

1916: The New York Warheit published an interview city editor Isaac Gonickman conducted with Jacob H. Schiff where the leading member of the American Jewish Committee expressed concerns about the upcoming congress to be held in Philadelphia of the danger presented by Zionists who might attend and because of a “possible loss of the respect and good-will which have shown to so great an extent” to the Jewish people.

1916(6th Adar II, 5676): Parshat Vayikra

1916(6th Adar II, 5676): Samuel Dalkowitz a merchant, passed away today in San Antonio, TX.

1917: Sam Franko, who has returned from Europe performed a concert devoted to Mozart today at the Aeolian Hall.

1917: In Manhattan, services are scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. at Beth-El Temple where the sermon will be on “Priest, Prophet and Mystic.”

1917: In Manhattan, Mayer and Rose Guarlnick gave birth to Aaron Gurlanick, who gained fame as Aaron Gural, the NYU trained accountant who went from meter-reader to real estate tycoon, who married Marion Kat after his first wife Harriet Feil passed away and was the father of Jeffrey, Jane and Barbara Gural.

http://www.timesofisrael.com/seattle-shul-vandalized-with-graffiti-saying-holocaust-is-fake-history/

1917: At the Free Synagogue meeting in Carnegie Hall, Dr. Herbert S. Bigelow is scheduled to preach on “What Shall We Do With Our Millionaires!”

1917: In New York Dr. Silverman will deliver a sermon at Temple Emanu-El on “What the World Should Know About the Idealism of the Jews.”

1917: During World War I Baghdad falls to the Anglo-Indian forces commanded by General Maude. Those welcoming the British included, “red-fezzed oriental Jews in misfit European clothing…” Baghdad was part of the Ottoman Empire.  According to General Maud, Jews, not Moslems, made up the majority of the city’s population.  Maude probably overstated the actual number of Jews.  But he did not overstate the economic role the Jewish population played in an area that children of Israel had lived in since the days of the Babylonian exile. According to Martin Gilbert, for several years afterwards, their arrival was celebrated by the Jews of Baghdad as "a day of miracles."

1918: Mrs. Felix Warburg opened her home on New York’s Fifth Avenue, for a reading by Miss Jenny Mannheimer which was intended to be fundraiser for the War Relief Fund.

1919: Grigori Yakovlovich Sokolnikov began serving as a “full member of the ‘the 7th Bureau and the 7th Secretariat of the Russian Communist Party.’”

1920: Birthdate of Transylvania native and Harvard trained attorney Benjamin “Ben” Berell Ferencz, the WWII Army Veteran and husband of Gertrude Ferencz who was “the chief prosecutor for the United States Army at the Einsatzgruppen Trial, one of the 12 military trials held by the U.S. authorities at Nuremberg, Germany.”

https://www.ushmm.org/genocide-prevention/simon-skjodt-center/work/ferencz-international-justice-initiative/benjamin-ferencz

1920: Birthdate of Polish native Hirsz Lejb Marczak who survived the war in Liege.

1921: The British C-I-C for Palestine quashed all military proceedings against Jabotinsky and 19 of his comrades for what came to be seen as self-defense measures taking during the Arab riots in Jerusalem.

1921: Birthdate of Elisabeth Jenny Jeanne Meynard who gained famed as Elisabeth Maxwell, the wife of British media tycoon Robert Maxwell.

1922(11th of Adar, 5682): Parashat Tetzaveh; Shabbat Zachor

1922(11th of Adar, 5682): Pauline Morpurgo, the wife of David Leopold passed away today in Vienna.

1922: Bernard Baruch and Henry Morgenthau were among those who pledged to raise $100,000 for the Woodrow Wilson fund of $1,000,000 which is to be used in the establishment of annual prizes for meritorious public service.

1923: Thirty-eight-year-old Columbia trained attorney and resident of Bayonne, NJ, Aaron Melniker, the Odessa born son of Julius and Henrietta (Katz) Melkiner who was a combat veteran of the A.E.F and Republican Party Leader married Gladys Witt today.

1923: The Hebrew Sheltering and Immigrant Aid Society of America which was “an amalgamation of the Hebrew Sheltering House Association organized in November of 1888 and the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society organized in 1901” held its 14th annual meeting today.

1923(23rd of Adar, 5683): Seventy-four-year-old Hungarian born and Viennese trained doctor Arpad G. Gerster a surgeon at Lenox Hill Hospital and Mount Sinai Hospital as well as a Professor of Clinical Surgery at Columbia while writing such books as Recollections of a New York Surgeon while raising a son with his wife, the former “Anna Barnard Wynne of Cincinnati”, passed away today.

1924: Today, Dr. Chaim Weizmann, the head of the Zionist World Organization, spoke at luncheon at the Ritz-Carlton arranged by Herman Bernstein, the editor of The Jewish Tribune, where he told “a group of New York journalists, “that in the future the might be of inestimable value in reclaiming the desert and the waste lands of the Near East in cooperation with the Arabs” and that the land was “capable of absorbing 2,000 immigrants a month” which is double the number now being allowed to settle there.

1925: It was announced today that Rabbi Alexander Basel will be in charge of the upcoming drive to liquidate “the funded debt” connect with the newly dedicated Jacob Schiff Center in the Bronx.

1925: The Jewish Daily News published “With Independent Artists” by American art critic Marie Trommer the Ukraine born daughter of Bertha Edline and Bernard Trommer.

1926: The Jewish Agricultural Society issued a report today compiled by Gabriel Davidson, the general manager of the society that showed that during the last 25 years, “the Jewish farm population in the United Sates has grown from one thousand to seventy thousand” with Jews farming “approximately one million acres.”

1926: “An announcement was made today by Felix M. Warburg, the honorary Chairman of the $6,000,000 United Jewish Campaign of New York, of a contribution of $30,000 from Louis D. Beaumont, the American banker and philanthropist.

1927(7th of Adar II, 5687): Sixty-two-yea-old SS Titanic Dr. William Frauenthal, the Wilkes-Barre, PA born son of Samuel Frauenthal and Henrietta Gertrude Frauenthal and husband of Clara Heinsheimer who was on his honeymoon and survived the sinking of the ill-fated ship reportedly took his own life as a result of feelings of guilt over having survived but not before having written a will which left a bequest of between three hundred thousand and four hundred thousand dollars to the Hospital for Joint Diseases which he had founded.

https://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/dr-henry-frauenthal---one-of-the-titanic-survivors-5379.html

1927: Samuel Lionel "Roxy" Rothafel opened the theatre that bears his name – Roxy Theater- in New York City.  Six years later he would open an even more famous venue – Radio City Music Hall – that feature the “Roxyettes” who were later known as the “Rocketts.”  (And you thought those leggy gals were named after a missile.)

1928: Rabbi Stephen S. Wise and State Supreme Court Justice Louis E. Gibbs were the speakers at tonight’s dinner at the Concourse-Plaza Hotel which kicked the drive to raise $150,000 which is the amount the Bronx has been assessed by the United Palestine Appeal.

1929: Seventy-seven-year-old Joseph Toole, who while Governor of Montana laid the cornerstone for Temple Emanu-El in Helena passed away today.

1929: After recording exclusively for Columbia since July of 1923, violinist and conductor Leo Reisman signed a contract to record with Victor (RCA Victor)

1929: As the world of movies entered the era of “the talkies” “Asphalt” – one of the last silent films directed by Joe May – was released in Germany.

1929: Tonight “in the Crystal Room o the Ritz-Carlton” Rabbi William Fineshriber of Philadelphia officiated at the wedding of attorney Sylvan Hobson Hirsch and Ruth Butler who became Ruth Spiegel when she married Frederic William Spiegel four ears after the death of her first husband.

1929: A year before moving up to the Light Heavyweight Division, twenty-two-year-old Abie Bain won his third straight lightweight bout each of which ended with knocking out his opponent in the first round.

1930: The allied Jewish campaign for reconstruction in Eastern Europe and development in Palestine has been formally set in motion by a conference at Washington.

1930: Chief Justice MacDonald of the Court of Appeals found the defendant Simche Hinkis, a Jewish policeman not guilty of premediated murder but guilty of willful killing overturning the death sentence that had been meted out for his role “in the murder of an Arab family at Jaffa in the riots last August.

1931: Birthdate of media entrepreneur Rupert Murdoch. Murdoch’s mother was Jewish.

1931: A bridge party and Spring fashion show” is scheduled to”begvein aboard the liner Conte Grande this afternoon “ by the Women’s Division of the American Pro-Falasha Committee of which Mrs. David E. Goldfarb is chairman.

1932: In the UK, Joan Elisa Davis and commodity-trader Ralph Lawson, the son of Gustav Leibson, gave birth to Nigel Lawson, the Conservative Party leader and journalist who would become the Lord Lawson of Blaby

1932: At NYC City Hall, Mayor Jimmy Walker met with 10 of 13 of the athletes who will be participating in the Jewish Olympics before they set sail this evening on SS Majestic. The mayor praised the group saying that the co-ed cohort of athletes would bring honor and glory to the United States and New York City.

1933(13th of Adar, 5693): Parashat Tetzavah; Erev Purim

1933: In New Orleans, LA, Isadore Rosen, a dentist and Anna Rosen gave birth to Benjamin “Ben” M. Rosen the Chairman and Acting Chief Executive Officer of Compaq Computer Corporation and “co-founder of the Sevin Rosen Funds” who was the husband of Donna Perret Rosen.

http://ethw.org/Benjamin_M._Rosen

1933: Jewish-owned department stores in Braunsshweig were looted.

1933: Florence and Aaron Zacks gave birth to Gordon Zacks who became Chairman of the Board of R.G. Barry Corporation in 1979.

http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2014/02/03/gordon-zacks-obit-compassionate-businessman-friend-to-israel.html

1934: “A fund of $3,000,000 is to be sought in this country to finance a program of reconstructive aid for German Jews who are victims of the anti-Semitic program of the Hitler regime, it was announced today. The drive will be under the combined direction of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee and the American Palestine Campaign, and the money will be used for the rehabilitation of Jews both within and without Germany.

1934: It was learned today that Dr. Benno Walter, vice president of the German Jewish fraternity B'nai B'rith, was taken into custody by secret police on Feb. 28

1935: The fourteenth triennial convention of the National Council of Jewish Women is scheduled to continue for a second day under the leadership of Mrs. Arthur Brin of Minneapolis.

1936(17th of Adar, 5696): Seventy-one-year-old Russian born New York realtor, Zionist and philanthropist Morris Polsky passed away today.

1936: “The Federation of Polish Jews in America made public tonight a telegram to the Polish Ambassador at Washington that charged local authorities of Przytyk, Poland, with collusion in anti-Semtic riots there and demanded that the officials involved be punished.”

1936: “The ant-Semitism in some countries of Europe is due to the efforts of the ruling groups to conceal from the masses their failure to cope with critical economic conditions, Soviet Ambassador Alexander A Troyanovsky.”  (Editor’s note – It would be interesting to hear his explanation for anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union.)

1937: As Arab violence continued to mount, The Palestine Post reported that armed Arabs attacked Jews who plowing fields near Afula.  Two Kfar Tavor farmers, Jacob Kizler and Shlomo Rothenstein, were seriously injured during the attack by armed. Stanislav Sluga, the 46-year-old Pole who was shot in a Ness Ziona orange grove, died after being taken to the hospital. Dogs tracked his alleged Arab assailant.

1937: In Berlin, the Ministry of the Interior announced plans for “a further intensification of the anti-Jewish boycott in Germany”

1937(28th of Adar, 5697): Moscow born theatre director turn movie director Alexis Granowsky (Abraham Azarkh) who moved from the Soviet Union to the Weimar Republic after the Russian Revolution and whose works included “Jewish Happiness” and “Taras Bulba” passed away today.

https://letterboxd.com/director/alexis-granowsky/

https://cy.wn.com/alexis_granowsky

1938: Birthdate of Petr Klager who was deported from Prague in 1942 to Ujazdow where he was murdered.

1938: The German army entered Vienna. Austrian Jews were instantly deprived of all civil rights. Physical and mental oppression of Austrian Jews began, and Austria ceased to exist as in independent state.

1938: Birthdate of Joseph Kaplan, the native New Yorker who gained fame as song and jingle writer Joseph Brooks whose works include “You’ve Got a Lot to Live” for Pepsi and “Good to the Last Drop Feeling” for Maxwell House coffee the producer of the famous Passover hagadah.

1938:  As the prowess of Szapsel Rotholc continued to grow, “the Idishe Bilder newspaper ran a front-page headline proclaiming "Our Szapsel, the boxing hero." The article went on to point out that Szapsel  the Yiddish version of the Hebrew name Shabtai, means sheep, but his army of fans saw him as a far more dangerous animal. "Who would ever have imagined," the correspondent waxed, "that the Jewish people, the People of the Book, would take the sport of boxing to their hearts? After all, Jews - who are, by their very nature, gentle souls - have never been thought capable of such things." The article went on to describe Rothholc as "our jewel, who made the Germans eat dirt."

1939(20th of Adar, 5699): Parashat Ki Tisa; Shabbat Parah

1939: Rabbi Samuel H. Goldenson is scheduled to deliver a sermon on “Seeing God in Retrospect” this morning at Temple Emanu-El.

1939: Rabbi Nathan Stern is scheduled to deliver a sermon on “Living on the Heights” this morning at West End Synagogue.

1939: Rabbi Louis I. Newman is scheduled to deliver a sermon on “Our Affirmations as Jews Today” this morning at Temple Rodeph Sholom.

1939: Rabbi Hyman Judah Schachtel is scheduled to deliver a sermon “My Reasons for Hope” this morning at Temple Israel.

1939: Rabbi Alexander Zegel is scheduled to deliver a sermon this morning on “A Foretaste of Paradise” at the Fort Washington Synagogue.

1939: The Fort Washington Synagogue is scheduled to its annual reception this evening at the American Woman’s Association in Manhattan.

1939: Rabbi Harold H. Mashioff is scheduled to deliver a sermon “No One Has a Monopoly on Brotherhood” this morning at the Temple of the Covenant.”

1939: Rabbi Asher Block is scheduled to deliver a sermon on “Idle Worshippers at Temple Gates of Israel.

1940(1st of Adar II, 5700): Rosh Chodesh Adar II

1940(1st of Adar II, 5700): Charles Polakoff, the former president of the Jewish Federation of Buffalo passed away today.

http://nyheritage.nnyln.org/digital/collection/p16694coll1/id/3699/

1941 The list of donors to the Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies, an organization opposed to the isolationist America First Committee, published in the newspapers today included H.Z. Szold and Mrs. Herbert H. Lehman in the $500 to $1,000 category and Aaron Straus, Alvin Untermyer and Irwin Untermyer in the $250 to $500 category.

1941: Mrs. Isaac Herzog, the wife of the chief rabbi of Palestine is in the United States helping in the campaign to establish Palestine “as the Jewish national homeland.”

1942: “In Covington, GA, just east of Atlanta,” Harry Dietz, “an immigrant from Russia who owned a dry goods store” and his wife “Iola (Parker) Dietz” the local librarian gave birth to Elizabeth Camillla Dietz who gained fame as Camilla Dietz Bergeron, the stockbroker turned jewelry maven and wife of Jean Maurice Georges Bergeron. (As reported by Sam Roberts)

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/29/obituaries/camilla-dietz-bergeron-stockbroker-turned-jeweler-dies-at-76.html?hpw&rref=obituaries&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region&region=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well

1942: Birthdate of Binghamton, NY native producer David Weisman whose works included “Kiss of the Spider Woman” and “Ciao! Manhattan” and who is the brother of director Sam Weisman.

1942:  The Gestapo used Jews for target practice at Janowska labor camp. Chief Dibauer and Lieutenant Bilhause would pick them off from their window as they carried loads of rocks.

1942: Fifty-year-old Rudolf Propper who had been transported from Pilsen to Terezin earlier in the year was transported from Terezin to Isbica today where he was later murdered.

1943: Birthdate of Robert Bryant “Bob” Plager the Ontario native and son of a hockey official who played in the NHL for the Rangers and the St. Louis Blues.

1943: “The Sephardic Jewish community of Monastir, historically the largest Jewish community in Macedonia was deported…In cooperation with the Germans, Bulgarian military and police officials rounded up 3,276 of Monastir's Jewish men, women, and children, deported them to German-controlled territory and turned them over to the custody of German officials. The Germans transported the Jewish population of Monastir and environs to their deaths in Treblinka as part of their plan to murder all European Jews.”

1943: “Bulgarian police monitored by SS rounded up the entire Jewish population of Skopje, Bitola and Štip.The population was sent to temporary detention center in the state tobacco warehouse known as "Monopol" in Skopje. Among 7,215 people who were detained in warehouses there were:[34]

 539 children less than 3 years old,

 602 children age 3 to 10 years

 1172 children age 10 to 16 years

 865 people over 60 years old

 250 seriously ill persons (tied to the bed)

 4 pregnant women who have given birth in the detention camp

 4 people died at the arrival in the camp.”

http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/this_month/march/09.asp

1943: Birthdate of Mark R. Cohen, “a leading scholar of the history of Jews in the Middle Ages under Islam” with degrees from Brandeis, Princeton and Columbia who “won the National Jewish Book Award” for his tome Jewish Self-Government in Medieval Egypt.

https://press.princeton.edu/titles/331.html

1944(16th of Adar, 5704): Parashat Ki Tisa

1944(16th of Adar, 5704): Eighty-eight-year-old Newark, NJ department store owner and philanthropist Louis Bamberg the Baltimore born son of Theresa Hutzler “whose family ran Hultzer Brothers” department store and Elkan Bamberger and the brother of Caroline Bamberger Fuld, his business partner “who sold his department store to R.H. Macy and Company” and who supported several charities including “Newark’s YMHA, the Newark Museum, and the New Jersey Historical Society” passed away today after which “all flags in Newark were flown at half-staff for three days, and his large department store closed for a day.”

https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/bamberger-louis

https://newarkmemories.com/memories/511.php

https://www.hamiltonplace.com/products/product/louis-bamberger-department-store-innovator-and-philanthropist-barnesnoble-690d98

1944: The plan of Captain von Breitenbach to carry a pistol into a staff meeting and shoot Hitler today was thwarted by “a Führer directive excluding junior officers from Führer briefings.”

1945: Birthdate of Mark Stein vocalist/organist and founder of Vanilla Fudge.

1946: Birthdate of Antony Lerman, “a British writer who specializes in the study of anti-Semitism, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, multiculturalism, and the place of religion in society.”

1946: “I Am a Fugitive” a Spanish language comedy with a script co-authored by Hans Wilhelm was released today in Mexico.

1947: Levy Shklonik, the secretary of the Tel Aviv Labor organization told its members today “that the time would come when the labor movement would have to undertake a bloody anti-terrorist struggle.  His message echoed the words of Hashomer Hatzair (Young Guard Movement) which called on the Federation of Jewish Labor to join in the fight against terror and kidnapping.

1947: “The American League for a Free Palestine distributed an announcement in the name of the American Sea and Air Volunteers for Hebrew Repatriation which identified itself as the organization that had had recruited the volunteer crew of the Ben Hecht.

1947: Kibbutz Yakum (He Shall Rise) was established on the Plain of Sharon north of Tel Aviv.  The collective was founded by members of the Hashomer Hatzair (Young Guard Movement).

1947: A group of American, Rhodesian and South African Jewish war veterans who had served variously with the American military, the British Army and South Africa’s Sixth Armored Division have founded Maayan Baruch (Spring of Barch), a kibbutz in the Upper Galilee near the borders with Syria and Lebanon.  The kibbutz is named in honor of Bernard Gordon of blessed memory who had served as vice president of the South African Zionist Federation and who had left half of his large estate to the Jewish National Fund.

1948(30th of Adar I, 5708): Rosh Chodesh Adar II

1948(30th of Adar I, 5708): Arabs bombed the headquarters of the Jewish Agency. The explosion of the car bomb in the courtyard of KH-UIA's building, tragically claiming the lives of Keren Hayesod - United Israel Appeal's Director, Leib Jaffe and 11 other Keren Hayesod - United Israel Appeal employees.

The Jewish Agency was the unofficial government of the Jewish Community (the Yishuv) in what was to become the state of Israel.  This attack was part of the unofficial war waged by the Arabs designed to "drive the Jews into the sea" prior to the British leaving Palestine in May, 1948.

1948: Today “President Truman declared that a story by a columnist whom he did not name writing in The New York Mirror, quoting him” as saying “that New York Jews were disloyal was ‘vicious’ and ‘a lie out of the whole cloth’” after which Drew Pearson issued a statement identifying himself as the columnist and standing by his story.

1948: “Forty-one Democratic members of the Senate and the House of Representatives” made public a letter to Secretary of State Marshall in which among other things they expressed their surprise at “the unilateral course adopted by” the United States “prohibiting the export of arms to the Middle East thus increasing ‘the odds against the Jewish defenders’  while Arab bands, supported by neighboring Arab states were being supplied with stocks of weapons, some of which were coming from current British shipments.”

1949: The first Israeli troops reached the Gulf of Aqaba where a white bedsheet with a hand drawn blue Star of David is hoisted as a sign of the Jewish state’s claim to the area around Eilat.

1950(22nd of Adar, 5710): Dr. Mordecai Elash, Israel’s Ambassador to Great Britain, passed away today.

1950: “Perfect Strangers” a comedy produced by Jerry Wald and featuring Thelma Ritter and Ned Glass was released in the United States today.

1950: “The visiting Istanbul Fenerbache soccer players were carried off the hield on the shoulders of Israeli fans today after they had whipped the Tel Aviv Hapoel 3 to 0 in the first mach of their Israel tourney.”  The enthusiastic demonstration was probably the result of Turkey’s announcement this week that it was recognizing the state of Israel, making Turkey the first Moslem country to do so.     

1950:  In Milwaukee, WI, “Charlotte A. (Lefstein) Zucker” and “real estate developer Burton C. Zucker” gave birth to director Jerry Zucker the brother of David Zucker and actress Susan Breslau, whose works included spoofs like “The Kentucky Fried Movie” and “romantic mysteries” like “Ghost.”

1951: Birthdate of MK Aryeh Gamliel

1952(14th of Adar, 5712): Final Purim observed during the Presidency of Harry S Truman

1952: The Jerusalem Post reported that the Israel Medical Association warned that the "deteriorating nutrition situation was inherently dangerous." The Minister of Agriculture, Levi Eshkol, voiced full support for "Magen David Yarok" ­ the planting of vegetables in home gardens. Urgent steps were taken to solve the problems of theft, pilferage and smuggling in the Haifa port which assumed dangerous proportions.

1953: “My Three Angels” “a comedy by Samuel and Bella Spewack…opened on Broadway at the Morosco Theatre” today.

1954: “The Golden Apple,” a Jerome Moros musical opened today at the Phoenix Theatre where it “was one of the first musicals produced “Off-Broadway.”

1955(17th of Adar, 5715): Anna Freud, a sister of Sigmund Freud, passed away.

1955(17th of Adar, 5715): Seventy-eight-year-old NYU and JTS alum Bernard Calonius Ehreneich, the Hungarian born son of Henry Reuben and Hannah Ehrenreich, the husband of Irma Bock and the father of Rosemarie and Louis Sigmund Ehrenreich who served as a rabbi at Congregation Beth Israel in Atlantic City, Congregation Adath Jeshurun in Philadelphia and Congregation Kahl Montgomery in Montgomery, AL passed away today.

http://digifindingaids.cjh.org/?pID=109204

1955: Archibald Maule Ramsay the former British military officer and Member of Parliament who was such a rabid anti-Semite and so sympathetic to the Nazis that he became the only member of the House of Commons “to be interned under Defense Regulation 18B which allowed the government to suspend habeas corpus to imprison Nazi sympathizers.

1956: At the Terrace Room of the Plaza Hotel Dr. Israel Goldstein officiated at the wedding of Carole Sue Rosenfeld and Phi Beta Kappa Dartmouth graduate Arnold Katz.

1956: It was announced today textile consultant J. B. Goldberg and Ephraim Freedman, the head of Macy’s Bureau of Standards are scheduled to speak at the three day conference sponsored by the International Rayon Synthetic Fibers Committee to be held in Sweden starting on October 1.

1957: Funeral services are scheduled to be held in New York today for Phillip Abramson, the “beloved brother of “Murray and Peggy Zucker.”

1957: The 1957 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament which would be dominated by Lennie Rosenbluth and the North Carolina Tarheels opened today in Kansas City.

1957: Funeral services are scheduled to held today at the Pelham Funeral Home for David Gutman, Colonel, U.S Army (ret), the husband of Ali Bergman Gutman.

1959: Premiere of “Raisin In The Sun” the controversial play produced by Philip Rose who personally raised the money to bring the drama to Broadway.

1960(12th of Adar, 5720): Seventy-year-old Brooklyn native Samuel R. Gerber the “industrial engineer and pioneer in the field of time management,” and “a graduate of Cooper Union and the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn” who was President of both the Kent Metal Manufacturing Company and the Ortho Chemical Corporation and who was married to Tyl Gerber with whom he had one son and one daughter passed away today.

1962(5th of Adar II, 5722): Eighty-year-old Smolensk native and NYU trained lawyer Alexander Kahn, the general manager and publisher of The Jewish Daily Forward passed away today.

1962: In New York City, Sally and Laurence “Larry Berg” gave birth to actor and director Peter Berg.

1963: Malcolm Cowley announced today that “twelve artists, including Leonard Baskin, the graphic arts and sculptor on the faculty of Smith College and Stanley Kuntiz, the author of three volumes of poetry, have been elected to the National Institute of Arts and Letters.

1964: Birthdate of actor Peter Berg, best known as Dr. Billy Kronk on TV's Chicago Hope whose father is Jewish and his mother was Catholic.

1964: Release date for “Becket” with a script by Edward Anhalt and music by Laurence Rosenthal.

1966(19th of Adar, 5726): Nineteen days before his 60th birthday, Morris Adler, the rabbi of Shaaray Zedek in Detroit who had been shot by mentally ill attacker during Shabbat services on February 12 succumbed to his wounds in Sinai Hospital in the presence of his “wife, the former Resnkick” and their daughter Shulameth.

https://www.thejewishnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Rabbi-Adler.pdf

1966(19th of Adar, 5726): Seventy-five-year-old Riga born Harry Edison “one of five brothers who started with one shoe store in Atlanta in 1921 and built into the nationwide chain of Edison Brothers, Inc consisting of 535 stores and who raised two children, Edna and Sidney, with his wife “the former Mae Goodhart, passed away today.

https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1966/03/12/79971628.pdf

1967(29th of Adar I, 5727): Parashat Pekudi; Shabbat Shekalim

1967(29th of Adar I, 5727): Eighty-one-year-old Abraham Shapiro, the cantor emeritus of Temple B’nai Abraham in Newark, NJ, the father of Carl and Leon Shapiro passed away today in Beth Israel Hospital in Newark.

https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1967/03/12/83028201.html?pageNumber=86

 

1967: “Israel's "ruling circles" were accused today by Izvestia, the Soviet Government newspaper, of participating in an anti-Soviet cold war led by the United States.”

1967: At the Temple Young Israel in the Bronx, Rabbi Max Hoch officiated at the wedding of Bernice Nierenberg, a NYC English teach and Edward H. Wenger.

1967: At Temple Beth-El in Long Island, Rabbi Edward T. Sandrow and Cantor Samuel T. Dubrow officed at the wedding of Ileene Toby Ruin and Seaman Jason Michael Stern, U.S.N.

1968:  Birthdate of singer and songwriter Lisa Loeb.

1969(21st of Adar, 5729): Robert “Bob” Briscoe the son of Lithuanian immigrants who served in the Irish Parliament for almost thirty years passed away today.

1971: “The Law Man,” a western directed and produced by Michael Winner, with music by Jerry Fielding and co-starring Lee J. Cobb was released in the United States today.

1971: “A New Leaf” a comedy written and directed by Elaine May (in her first directorial role) who co-starred alongside Walter Matheau was released in the United States today.

1972(25th of Adar, 5732): Parashat Vayakhel-Pekudi; Shabbat HaChodesh.

1972(25th of Adar, 5732): Sixty-one-year-old Shmuel Abarbanel, the Polish born writer and “anarchist” who spent WW II in the Soviet Union, moved to Israel in 1949 and who “was co-editor of the anarchist Problemen (Problems), edited from 1964, and of the memorial volume for Skarżysko-Kamienna (Tel Aviv, 1973),  wrote for Fraye shriftn (Free writings) in Vilna, as well as Forverts (Forward) and Fraye arbeter shtime (Free voice of labor) in New York)” passed away today.

https://congressforjewishculture.org/people/5462/Abarbanel,%20Shmuel%20(July%2015,%201910%E2%80%93March%2011,%201972)

1972: Birthdate of Benjamin Cohen the French singer no known Benjamin Diamond.

1973: Today, the New York Times “reported on dwindling enrollments at Jewish day school” which “was somewhat odd” because this was “at a time when ‘a reordering of priorities seems to have been taking place in Jewish life as mounting concern about Jewish cultural survival was metropolitan areas Jews to place greater importance on Jewish education

1975(28th of Adar, 5735): Fifty-two-year-old former MK Meanchem Cohen passed away.

1975(28th of Adar, 5735): Sixty-year-old Ella Drori, the St. Petersburg born daughter of Alexander Govorkovski and Ester Goverkovsky and wife of Amnon Drori passed away today in Tel Aviv.

1975(28th  of Adar, 5735): Victor Perlmutter, a native of Russia who came to the United States in 1920 and became a leader of the Jewish community in Washington, DC, passed away today in Miami Beach.

1976(9th of Adar II, 5736): Daniel Ezrin, the Ritual Director at Beth El Congregation passed away today.

1976: “Robin and Marian” an off-beat look at aging Robin Hood and Maid Marian with a script by James Goldman was released today in the United States.

1977:” The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh,” “an American animated musical anthology comedy film produced by Walt Disney Productions featuring classic songs by the Sherman Brothers including "Winnie the Pooh" and "The Wonderful Thing About Tiggers" was released today in the United States.

1977: The Jerusalem Post reported from Washington that Hanafi Moslem terrorists held more than 100 mostly Jewish hostages in three buildings and threatened to chop off their captives’ heads, unless their demands were met. Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was pleased with US President Jimmy Carter¹s definition of peace and with his distinction between "defense lines" and "legal borders." But he forecast a tough clash with the US over Israel¹s final borders.

1977: More than 130 hostages held in Washington, D.C., by Hanafi Muslims were freed after ambassadors from three Islamic nations joined the negotiations.  The B’Nai Brit building was one of the three buildings which the Muslims had seized.

1977(21st of Adar, 5737): Palestinians killed 34 Israelis on the Tel Aviv-Haifa Highway.

1978(1st of Adar II, 5738): Rosh Chodesh Adar II

1978: The Palestine Liberation Organization carried out a massive terrorist attack in Israel. PLO terrorists from Lebanon first killed Gail Rubin, an American Jewish photographer. 

1978: “In his study at Temple Emanuel, Rabbi Ronald Sobel officiated at the wedding of university of Wisconsin graduate Susan Lee Grant, “an arbitrator with the American Arbitration Association, is owner and president of S. L. Grant Securities Inc., and the vice president of the Commerce Reporting Company, stenotype reporters” and Morton Libov, “president and owner of Morton Libov Productions Inc., Los Angeles and New York producer of television specials, shows and commercials. His father was in the wholesale and retail tobacco and confectioner.”

1978: Eleven Palestinian terrorists landed in Zodiac boats on a beach just outside Ma'agan Michael and from there ventured towards Tel Aviv in a hijacked bus in what has become known as the Coastal Road massacre where 39 Israelis were killed.

1978: Terrorists killed 45 Israelis during an attack on a mail truck at Tel Aviv.

1979(12th of Adar, 5739): Seventy-eight-year-old Rabbi Maxwell Henry Dubin, the Lithuania born son or Rose Paglin Dubinksy and Harry Hessel Dubinksy who in 1925 was hired by the Wilshire Boulevard Temple “to direct the Religious School and adult program” and served as an associate rabbi with “Rabbi Magnin for 50 years.”

https://hup.medium.com/modernity-zionism-and-the-menorah-6aa2421fabd2

 https://www.si.edu/object/archives/components/sova-aaa-kraspete-ref203?destination=collection/search%3Fpage%3D3%26edan_q%3D%252A%253A%252A%26edan_fq%255B0%255D%3Dobject_type%253A%2522Notes%2522%26edan_fq%255B1%255D%3Dtype%253A3d_package%2520OR%2520type%253Aead_collection%2520OR%2520type%253Aead_component%2520OR%2520type%253Aecr%2520OR%2520type%253Aedanmdm%2520OR%2520type%253Aevent%2520OR%2520type%253Aobjectgroup%2520OR%2520type%253Asi-unit%26edan_local%3D1

1980(23rd of Adar, 5740): Mikhail Abramovich Kaufman, the native of pre-Revolution Bialystok who gained fame as a cinematographer and photographer passed away today in Moscow.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/10/movies/dziga-vertov-films-at-museum-of-modern-art.html?_r=0&login=email

1980: In the Moscow Igor Guberman was the defendant in the “anti-Zionist” trial that began today.

1982: In an article entitled “The Dance: By Pola Nirenska,” New York Times correspondent Anna Kisselgoff described the travailed filled life of this accomplished dancer and choreographer whose life took her from pre-war Poland, through the days of the Holocaust to a new life in America.

1983: “10 to Midnight” a crime-thriller filmed by cinematographer Adam Greenberg was released in the United States today.

1984: In the “The British and The Beginnings of The Jewish State” published today J. Robert Moskin provided a detailed reviews of The High Walls of Jerusalem by Ronald Sanders that examines the origins of the Balfour Declaration and the British Mandate in Palestine.

1985: Mikhail S. Gorbachev, who promised “a policy of openness (glasnost) and restructuring (perestroika) was appointed General Secretary of the Communist Party today.

1986: The Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles granted Leo Frank a pardon, citing the state's failure to protect him or prosecute his killers, though they stopped short of exonerating him.

1987: Secretary of State George P. Shultz today called the Israeli spy case ''very disheartening'' and said a decision by the Israeli Government to investigate would have ''a cleansing effect.''  Testifying before the Foreign Operations Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee, Mr. Shultz also confirmed reports that all United States officials in Israel had been ordered to have no contact whatever with Col. Aviem Sella or with the Tel Nof Air Base, which he commands. Colonel Sella has been indicted by a Federal grand jury on charges of espionage in the case of Jonathan Jay Pollard, a United States Navy employee who has been sentenced to life in prison for giving intelligence information to Israel.

1989: In Leningrad, “Irina (née Korina) and Viktor Yelchin, a pair figure skaters who were celebrities as stars of the Leningrad Ice Ballet for 15 years” gave birth to Russian-born, American actor Anton Yelchin. 

https://www.theguardian.com/global/2016/jun/20/anton-yelchin-obituary-film-actor

1989: “Eighteen years after Yuli Edelstein first applied for an exit visa to Israel, he and his family finally left the Soviet Union.” (As reported by Laura Bialis)

1990(14th of Adar, 5750): Purim

1992(6th of Adar II, 5752): Seventy-nine-year-old screenwriter and director Richard Brooks whose versatility enabled him to create films about inner city teenage delinquents and decadent southerners passed away today.

http://www.nytimes.com/1992/03/13/movies/richard-brooks-79-screenwriter-and-director-of-dramas-is-dead.html

1992(6th of Adar II, 5752): Eighty-seven-year-old “Laslo Benedek, a cameraman, screenwriter and director whose directing credits include "Death of a Salesman" (1951) and "The Wild One" (1953), passed away today at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx.”

http://www.nytimes.com/1992/03/14/arts/laslo-benedek-87-film-director-known-for-wild-one-is-dead.html

1993: Silent Screen, “an American Champion Thoroughbred racehorse” owned by Sonny and Leah Ray Werblin died today in Lexington, KY.

1994(28th of Adar, 5754): Sixty-six-year-old Arthur B. Cohn, the son of Louise and Arthur Benjamin Cohn passed away today after which he was buried in Waynesville, MO.

1994: U.S. premiere of “The Hudsucker Proxy” directed by Joel Coen, produced by Ethan Coen with a script by the Coen brothers and Sam Raimi and starring Paul Newman.

1995(9th of Adar II, 5755): Parsahat Vayikra; Shabbat Zachor

1995: Queen’s Holy Land” published today described the impact of those come to pay homage at the Rebbe’s burial site.

https://www.nytimes.com/1995/03/11/nyregion/queens-holy-land-paying-homage-at-rebbe-s-grave.html?searchResultPosition=2

1997: A revival of “Lady in the Dark is a musical with music by Kurt Weill, lyrics by Ira Gershwin and book and direction by Moss Hart” opened “on the West End at the Royal National Theatre” starring Maria Friedman.

1997(2nd of Adar II, 5757): Eighty-four-year-old composer Hugo Weisgall passed away today. (As reported by Paul Griffiths)

http://www.nytimes.com/1997/03/12/arts/hugo-weisgall-opera-composer-dies-at-84.html?scp=1&sq=%22The+Stronger%22+%22Hugo+Weisgall%22&st=nyt

1999: In ceremonies at New York City's 92nd Street Y, Rachel Adler was awarded the National Jewish Book Award for Jewish Thought. The award recognized “Engendering Judaism: A New Theology and Ethics,” which set forth a new model for integrating modern feminism with traditional Jewish theology.

2000(4th of Adar II, 5760): Parashat Pekudi

2000: At the Hilton in Short Hills, NJ, Rabbi Charles A. Kroloff officiated at the marriage of University of Wisconsin graduate Sally Anne Lewis and Indiana University graduate Steven Adam Meisner.

2001(16th of Adar, 5761): Shushan Purim

2001: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or special interest to Jewish readers including “Martyrs' Crossing” by Amy Wilentz and “Paradise Park” by Allegra Goodman.

2001: A Class Act, “a quasi-autobiographical musical loosely based on the life of composer-lyricist Edward Kleban, who died at the age of 48 in 1987” “ transferred to Broadway today at the Ambassador Theatre, where it ran for 30 previews and 105 regular performances.”

2001: In New York, premier performance of “I Will Bear Witness: The Diaries of Victor Klemperer” by Victor Klemperer; adapted by Karen Malpede and George Bartenieff; translated by Martin Chalmers.

2002: Israel lifted Yasser Arafat's three-month confinement in West Bank.

2003: Representative James P. Moran, a Democrat from Virginia apologized today for telling an Episcopal Church forum  that “Jewish leaders were influential enough to push” the United States “toward war” because “if it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for this war with Iraq we would not be doing this” i.e. invading Iraq.

2004: Seventy-one-year-old “Gordon Zacks is stepping down as president and chief executive officer of R.G. Barry Corp. after 50 years with the company.”

http://www.bizjournals.com/columbus/stories/2004/03/08/daily22.html?page=all

2004 The Colloquium “Jacques Faitlovitch and the Jews of Ethopia being held in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv came to an end today.

2004: In “in the first modern Islamist attack on European soil 191 people were killed and another 1,857 were injured when a series of terrorist bombs were detonated today in Madrid.

2005: The United States government reached a $25.5 million settlement with the families of Jewish Hungarian Holocaust victims in the so-called Nazi "Gold Train" affair and will acknowledge the U.S. Army's role in commandeering a trainload of the families' treasures during World War II.

2006: A London revival production of “Once in a Lifetime” written by Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman came to an end today.

2006: Spain began a somber remembrance of the Madrid terror bombings on this, the second anniversary of the attacks - with plans for Christians, Muslims and Jews to join in prayers for peace, and for silence to descend at a memorial set up for victims

2007 In Nagoya, Jewish professional wrestler Matt Bloom and Travis Tomko defeated Manabu Nakanishi and Takao Ōmori to win the IWGP Tag Team Championship.

2007: After 117 performances the curtain came down on a revival of the “The Apple Tree with music by Jerry Bock and Lyrics by Sheldon Harnick which had been produced by the Roundabout Theatre Company.

2007: The Central Conference of American Rabbis, a 1,500-member group representing Reform Rabbis opened its annual meeting in Atlanta, Georgia.

2007: An exhibition entitled “Biblical Art in a Secular Century: Selections, 1896-1993” featuring that includes the works of such Jewish artists as George Segal and Ben-Zion Weinman, as well as outstanding non-Jewish artists, at New York’s Museum of Biblical Art comes to an end.

2007: The Reconstructionist movement formally names Rabbi Toba Spitzer to head its Rabbinical Association. Rabbi Spitzer is the first avowed Lesbian to lead such a Jewish group.

2007: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including “The Gospel of Food: Everything You Think You Know About Food Is

 Wrong” by Barry Glassner and “At the Same Time” by Susan Sontag 

2007: The Washington Post features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including “Waiting for Daisy” by Peggy Orenstein.

2008: The 92nd Street Y presents “Dennis Prager: The Case For Judaism,” featuring the popular radio talk show host and author.

2008: In Jerusalem famous Israeli singer Ronit Shahar performs in an acoustic concert at Beit Shmuel, singing many of her hit songs.

2008: The Belgian government and banks agreed to pay €110 million ($170 million) to Holocaust survivors, families of victims and the Jewish community for their material losses during Word War II.

2008: A Kuwaiti newspaper published unprecedentedly harsh criticism of the terror attack which killed eight students at Mercaz Harav Yeshiva. "The attack at the yeshiva was a barbaric murder of eight children who were engaged in religious study," read an op-ed in the daily Al-Watan. "This odious and inhuman terror attack exemplifies the extremist and inhuman path of the terror organizations Hamas and Hizbullah." The writer goes on to assert that "the terror attack must prompt the free world to comprehend the magnitude of terrorism and its threats and to realize that a clear and unequivocal stance must be assumed against it. There can be no negotiations with terrorism that indiscriminately aims itself at students, women and babies without any consideration for the means and the targets." Contrasting the terror attack with the IDF's operations in the Gaza Strip, the writer explains that "there is no link between a murderous terrorist act and the inadvertent killing of civilians in response to the firing of rockets by Hamas." The piece presented a stark contrast to the main current in the Arab press, which presented almost sweeping praise for the "heroic operation."

2008: Jewish American playwright David Mamet announced a shift in political view and allegiance with an essay in The Village Voice, “Why I Am No Longer a 'Brain-Dead Liberal'.”

2009 (15 Adar, 5769): Shushan Purim

2009(15th of Adar, 5769): Physicist David Medved, the son of Ukrainian Jewish immigrants whose “interest in science” stemmed from a chemistry set he received for his Bar Mitzvah and who almost made it as an astronaut going to Mars passed away today.

http://www.jpost.com/Israel/David-Medved-scientist-and-entrepreneur-dies-at-83

http://townhall.com/tipsheet/michaelmedved/2009/03/12/the_legacy_of_david_medved_a_zest_for_life_guest_blog_by_diane_medved

2009: In Sterling, Virginia, Rabbi Bonny Grosz of the Community Rabbi Foundation leads the first of three study sessions on "Turning Torah: Studying the Weekly Torah Reading Using Different Approaches."

2009: This evening two Palestinian Authority Arab men attacked Jewish soldiers and civilians in the Binyamin region.

2010: Construction began on Barclay’s Center, the pride and joy of Bruce Ratner

2010: At the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue, The Jewish Studies Centers is scheduled to present “Judaism and Islam: Mirrors and Echoes - Tales from the Koran and Torah” during which Afroze Mohammed and Stephanie Lowitt will trace the stories about Joseph, or Yusuf, through both scriptures, and you’ll learn how this always fascinating character is pivotal to both Jewish and Muslim traditions.

2010: United States Vice President Joe Biden warned Israelis in a direct address from Tel Aviv today that the status quo in the Middle East was not sustainable and vowed that the United States would do everything in its power to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons while urging both Israelis and the Palestinians look toward direct negotiations to end the long-standing conflict. ".

2010: The New York State Attorney General appointed Judith Kaye as an independent counsel to investigate allegations that the Governor had violated ethics laws.

2010: “The Sherman Brothers (Richard and Robert) were presented with a Window on Mainstreet Disneyland in Anaheim, California in honor of their contribution to Disney theme parks.

2011: Despite the fact that that the faculty members of the Jewish Studies program at UC, Irvine had asked the Orange Couty District Attorney to drop the charges, eleven Muslim students, who have been charged with disrupting a February 2010 speech by Israeli U.S. Ambassador Michael Oren at the University of California, Irvine are scheduled to appear in court today at Santa Ana, CA

2011: After snowing throughout the day yesterday, the snow was expected to taper off last night with rain in the north forecast for today.

2011: The “women building a bridge” festival at the Valley of Springs near Ashdot Ya’acov is scheduled to be held on the Jordan River banks near the border between Jordan and Israel today.

2011:  The Song of Songs minyan is scheduled to come together for a community Kabbalt Shabbat at the Jewish Community Center of the East Bay as part of The Jewish Music Festival.

2011(5th of Adar II: Anniversary of Moses’ last day as leadership of the Jewish people.  According to Chabad, this took place on 5th of Adar 1273, BCE.

2011: Hours after an 8.9 magnitude earthquake followed by a devastating tsunami struck Japan today, Jewish and Israeli humanitarian groups pledged to help relief efforts in the island nation. Today, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) announced it was collecting funds for relief efforts and has reached out to the Japanese Government to offer its expertise in earthquake and tsunami-related response. Meanwhile, IsraAID-FIRST, an Israeli umbrella group of relief organizations, said this morning it was preparing to send a team of experts to the island nation to assist in relief efforts. “We’ve been looking past few hours at the damage and the needs,” IsrarAID head Shahar Zehavi said. “Our main agenda is to send a delegation of earthquakes specialists and water purification experts to the region.” Zehavi said the delegation should arrive in Japan by tomorrow morning but that its schedule depends on air traffic to and from Japan.

2011(5 Adar II, 5771): Five members of an Israeli family were killed tonight when a suspected terrorist broke into their home in the West Bank settlement of Itamar and stabbed them all to death. According to police, the suspect broke into the house armed with a knife and stabbed the mother, father and three children, aged 11, three and an approximately one-month-old baby. Magen David Adom rescue services arrived at the scene and found them all dead. The victims of the brutal murders are Rabbi and IDF tank unit officer Udi Fogel, his wife Ruth, 11-year-old Yoav, four-year-old Elad and three-month-old Hadas.

2011(5 Adar II, 5771): Eighty-seven-year-old Danny Stiles a New York disc jockey who styled himself as the “King of Nostalgia and “The Vicar of Vintage Vinyl” passed away today. (As reported by the Eulogizer)

2011(5 Adar II, 5771): Eighty-two-year-old Stan Ross, the producer-engineer who co-founded Gold Star Studio passed away today in Burbank, CA. (As reported by Valerie Nelson)

http://articles.latimes.com/2011/mar/17/local/la-me-stan-ross-20110316

2012: Major General Nitzan Alon is scheduled to officially take up his post as head of the Central Command at the headquarters in Jerusalem.

2012: Dan Shapiro and Julie Fisher are scheduled to be honored at tonight’s JPDS-NC Purim Ball, sponsored by the only Jewish Day School in Washington, D.C.

2012: “Ahead of Time” is scheduled to be shown at the Sacramento Jewish Festival in Sacramento,CA

2012: “Einsatzgruppen: The Death Brigades” is scheduled to be shown at the Vancouver Jewish Film Festival in Vancouver, CA.

2012: Stephen Stern is scheduled to moderate “Modern Judaism Wrestles with Spinoza” featuring Rabbi Lyle Fishman and Joel Schwartz as part of the backstage events surrounding the performance of “New Jerusalem.”

2012: The Eliat Chamber Music Festival, which will include an appearance by violinist Valery Soklov, is scheduled to open tonight.

2012: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including “The Escape Artists: How Obama’s Team Fumbled the Recovery” by Noam Scheiber and “Beautiful Souls: Saying No, Breaking Ranks, and Heeding the Voice of Conscience in Dark Times” by Eyal Press.  “Beautiful Souls” contains a vignette about Paul Grüninger, a Swiss police commander, who “broke the law to help Jewish refugees flee from Austria” after the Nazis annexed  the country.

 

2012: Residents of southern Israel suffered another day under siege today as Palestinians in the Gaza Strip fired about 50 more rockets at the Negev. Two Grad-type Katyusha rockets fell in Be'er Sheva after the Iron Dome battery that had been protecting it suffered a technical malfunction. One rocket hit a school, which was empty since schools in the city were closed today, and the other hit a parked car. Fifteen people were treated for shock, though there were no other casualties. The rockets ¬ and the ball bearings that they ejected hundreds of meters ¬ caused heavy damage to buildings and vehicles. Another rocket hit a chicken coop in Moshav Carmia in the Ashkelon Coast Regional Council, causing heavy damage. Since Friday, 104 rockets were fired toward Israel, 43 of which were intercepted by the Iron Dome defense systems. The IAF carried out 23 strikes in the Gaza Strip. Defense Minister Ehud Barak warned today that "the current escalation is liable to be lengthy." He said that he plans to have the Iron Dome anti-rocket defense system declared a "national emergency project," so as to expedite the manufacture and deployment of additional batteries. A fourth Iron Dome battery is being prepared for deployment and is expected to be operational within weeks. Some 200,000 pupils will remain at home again tomorrow as schools remain closed in Be'er Sheva, Ofakim, Ashdod, Yavneh, Ashkelon, Kiryat Malakhi and Netivot, and in all the other smaller communities that are between seven and 40 kilometers from the Gaza Strip. Earlier today, security officials said the Iron Dome systems performed extraordinarily over the weekend. The systems use a missile called "Tamir" to intercept incoming rockets, and each missile is priced at approximately NIS 200,000. (As reported by Gili Cohen, Yanir Yagna, and Ave Issacharoff)

2013: Rabbi Sidney Kleiman’s 100th birthday on the Today Show

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYfYsm95g9o

2013: In Brooklyn, Judge Eric Vitaliano “rejected a Jewish attorney’s request to exclude Jews from a jury involving a client facing charges of lying about joining the Taliban” ruling “that it would be unconstitutional to bar a prospective juror because of religion.” The attorney is Frederick Cohn who is representing Abdel Hameed Shehadeh.

http://www.timesofisrael.com/us-judge-rejects-request-to-exclude-jews-from-jury/

2013: An 11-day mission to Israel sponsored by The Jewish Federation of North America’s

Network of Independent Communities is scheduled to being today.

2013: NASHIM Annual Women's Seder is scheduled to begin at 6:00pm

2013: Publication date for Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead by Sheryl Sandberg 

2014: Historic 6th & I Synagogue is scheduled to host “Food for thought- Digesting Ethics, Mysticism, and Philosophy with Rabbi Yosef Edelstein of MesorahDC

2014: In Denver, CO, Temple Emanuel is scheduled to host “The Dishes of Our Lives: Jewish Cookbooks, Jewish Stories.”

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/178388#.Ux-JoZuYapo

2014(9th of Adar II, 5774): Seventy-two-year-old Judge Edmond Levy, a retired member of the Israeli Supreme Court and author of the Levy Report, passed away today.

2014: Three terrorists from Islamic Jihad were killed by an IAF strike while an IDF UAV crashed over Gaza following “a technical malfunction.”

2014: Dutch political leader Onno Hoes began serving as Chairman of the Dutch Center for Information and Documentation Israel (CIDI)

2014: The IDF insisted today that Raed Zeiter, a Jordanian citizen who was shot dead yesterday morning at the Allenby crossing into Israel, had attacked soldiers and tried to grab a weapon before he was shot dead. (As reported by Gil Ronen)

2014: The Knesset passed the amendment to the Basic Law on The Government known as the “Governance Law,” with 67 in favor, and none voting against or abstaining. The law limits the number of government ministers to 18 and stipulates that all ministers will have portfolios. It also raises the electoral threshold required for a party to enter the Knesset to 3.25% of the total votes cast in national elections. (As reported by Gil Ronen)

2015: Mandolin star Avi Avital is scheduled to join the Venice Baroque Orchestra in an evening almost pure Vivaldi at Carnegie Hall.

2015: The Center for Jewish History is scheduled to present “Echoes of the Borscht Belt” with Marisa Scheinfeld.

2015: Professor Daniel J. Schroeter is scheduled to deliver a lecture on "There Are No Jews in Morocco, Only Moroccan Subjects Responding to Vichy's Anti-Jewish Laws in Colonial Morocco during World War. II.

2015: Bruce Guenther, recently retired Chief Curator of the Portland Art Museum, and Susan Winkler, author of Portrait of a Woman in White are scheduled to discuss “Looted Art: The Unfinished Business” at the Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education.

2015: Annie Cohen-Solal and Met Curator Marla Prather are scheduled to discuss the works of Mark Rothko at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

2015: The Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies is scheduled to host “an historic conference on the topic of the contemporary Jewish scene in Britain, with four distinguished speakers.”

2015: “Owners of the Leviathan field said that the Palestine Power Generation Company had canceled a $1.2 billion agreement, signed in 2014, to buy 4.75 billion cubic meters of gas over 20 years.” (As reported by Stuart Winer)

2015: “Speaking on HuffPost Live today, Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, the founders of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream, seemed open to the idea of a pot-infused ice cream after a viewer asked about it.” (As reported by Julie Wiener)

2015: Comedian Sarah Silverman posted a message on the internet today calling on supporters of Meretz to vote in Israeli elections scheduled to take place on March 17. (As reported by Stuart Winer)

2016(1st of Adar II, 5776): Rosh Chodesh 2, Adar II

2016: “The Muses of Isaac Bashevis Singer” is scheduled to be shown this afternoon before the start of Shabbat at the Houston Jewish Film Festival.

2016: “Shari Redstone Prepares for Battle to Control a Media Empire” published today profiles the daughter of media mogul Sumner Redstone.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/13/business/media/shari-redstone-prepares-for-battle-to-control-a-media-empire.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

2017(13th of Adar, 5777): Parashat Tetzaveh; Shabbat Zachor; Erev Purim. 

2017: Tonight, Ahmed Daqamseh, the Jordanian soldier responsible for the 1997 killing of the Israeli schoolgirls” including “13-year-old Adi Malka” was released from jail today after serving a sentence of 20 years.

2017: In Paris, the symposium “The Holocaust in Ukraine. New Perspectives on the Evils of the 20th Century,” is scheduled to come to an end today.

2017: The Oxford University Jewish Society is scheduled to host its annual “Purim Extravaganza” complete with the traditional Megila reading followed a “Purim Partaaay!”

2017: In Atlanta, the Breman is scheduled to host a preview party introducing its newest exhibition “Atlanta Collects Contemporary” featuring unique items that “normally reside in private Metro Atlanta homes.

2017: Today, “Seattle police were investigating a suspected hate crime after graffiti claiming the “Holocau$t i$ fake hi$tory” was spray-painted on the wall of a local synagogue.”

http://www.timesofisrael.com/seattle-shul-vandalized-with-graffiti-saying-holocaust-is-fake-history/

2018: The Beth Chai-Jewish Humanist Congregation of Greater Washington is scheduled to host a screening of “Rosenwald” at the Burning Tree Elementary School in Bethesda, MD.

2018: JW3 is schedule to host a screening of “Bombshell: The Hedy Lamar Story.”  (Yes, in the list of the many things they did not tell us when we were kids was the fact this femme fatal was as Jewish as Ruth or Esther)

2018: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Behemoth: A History of the Factory and the Making of the Modern World by Joshua B. Freeman and the recently released paperback editions of Steven Spielberg: A Life in Films by Molly Haskell and The Imagineers of War: The Untold Story Darpa, the Pentagon Agency That Changed the World by Sharon Weinberger

2018: In honor of Israel’s 70th anniversary, The Breman Museum and The Atlanta Jewish Music Festival are scheduled to partner with the Israeli Consulate to bring one of Israel’s hottest acts, Yemen Blues, with Ravid Kahalani to Atlanta.

2018: “Destination Unknown” is one of the films scheduled to shown at the 5th annual JCC Chicago Jewish Film Festival.

2018: In “Never Again: Fighting Hate in a Changing Germany With Tours of Nazi Camps” Katrin Bennhold described attempts to change anti-Semitic mindsets with trips to concentration camps.

2018: The Goldring Family Foundation and Morton Katz are scheduled to be honored today in New Orleans Jewish Endowment Foundation “Annual Event” at the Westin Hotel. (As reported by Crescent City Jewish News, the source and resource for all things Jewish in Cajun Country)

2018: “The Ancestral Sin,” “The Rock in the Red Zone,” “Starting Over Again” and “The Band’s Visit” are scheduled to be shown at the New York Sephardic Film Festival.

2018: The Streicker Center is scheduled to host “A Celebration of Jewish Books” – “a day filled with Jewish storyteller” and more than fifty “Jewish storytellers.”

http://emanuelstreickernyc.org/events/celebration-jewish-books-2/

2019: In suburban Washington, DC, the Haberman Institute for Jewish Studies is scheduled to host “a talk with Professor Pamela Nadell, Patrick Clendenen Chair in Women's and Gender History, American University” where she discusses what it means to be a Jewish woman in America.

2019: The New York Sephardic Jewish Festival is schedule to host the U.S. premiere of “Stockholm” directed by Israeli Daniel Syrkin.

2020(15th of Adar, 5780): Shushan Purim

2020: In JW3 is scheduled to host a screening of “Escape from Pretoria.”

2020: Voting is scheduled to close for selecting the slate of delegates of attend the World Zionist Congress, or as some call it “the international parliament of the Jewish People.”

2020: In the wake of the coronavirus, the “S.F.-based Jewish Community Relations Council annual fundraiser scheduled for this evening has cancelled.

2020: Benjamin Ferencz, “the last surviving prosecutor at the Nuremberg” is scheduled to turn one hundred today.

https://www.benferencz.org/tablet/index.html

https://www.theguardian.com/law/2017/feb/07/nazi-death-squads-nuremberg-trials-benjamin-ferencz

https://www.ushmm.org/genocide-prevention/simon-skjodt-center/work/ferencz-international-justice-initiative/benjamin-ferencz

2021: Golden Globe-nominated actress Emmy Rossum is scheduled to serve as emcee at the Western Regional Virtual Event sponsored by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

2021: Israeli celebrity chef Ruthie Rousso is scheduled to talk, online, about putting an Israeli twist on Passover foods and upgrading socially distanced Passover celebrations.

2021: Former Israeli ambassador to the U.S. and current Knesset member Michael Oren, who is writing a book about Israel’s War of Independence, is scheduled to give the Mimi Epstein Memorial Lecture for Temple Isaiah in Lafayette.

2021: North Peninsula Jewish Community and JCRC are scheduled to present S.F. police oversight office director Paul Henderson talking about inequity in the criminal justice system.

2021: Oshman Family JCC and JCC Literary Consortium are scheduled to present actress, activist and author Annabelle Gurwitch talking about her memoir, subtitled “Adventures in Downward Mobility,” in conversation with author Dave Barr.

2021: Today’s virtual visit to the Jewish Museum is scheduled to include an exploration of the highlights of the Jewish museum’s galleries and discover the history of this museum’s collection including the oldest Hanukah lamp made in Britain to the inspiring story of our WWII Nurses’ Cape.”

2021: The Jewish Arts Collaborative is scheduled to present online “Kitchen Explorations” with “chef Michael Leviton as he cooks and discusses some of his favorite Passover recipes from the archives of the Jewish Heritage Center at the New England Historic Genealogical Society.”

2021: The APJCC is scheduled to present Soprano Anat Baird performing a tribute to Jewish Broadway composers from George Gershwin to Stephen Schwartz.

2021: The LBI is scheduled to present a discussion of Legal Sabotage: Ernst Fraenkel in Nazi Germany with author Douglas G. Morris and commentators David Abraham and Claudia Koonz.

2021: With less than 12 days until the elections, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled pay his first visit to the United Arab Emirates today. (YNET)

2022: The Sir Martin Gilbert Learning Centre is scheduled a lecture by Professor Shirli Gilbert on “Wandering Jews: Migration in Modern Jewish History.”

2022: The Americans and the Holocaust” traveling exhibition is scheduled to be shown for the last time today at the University of Hawaii, Penn State, Georgia Southern and the University of California, Irvine.

2022: Hamuiska is scheduled to broadcast “Early Music from Ein Kerem” live on Kan Kol.

2023: In Milwaukee, Nathan Zachary Silber, the son of Rebecca and David Silber and the grandson of Laurie and Dr. Bob Silber is scheduled to be called to the Torah this morning as a bar mitzvah.

2023: The solo exhibition of Israeli artist Navot Miller is scheduled to come to an end at the Yossi Milo Gallery.

2023: The Jewish Children’s Regional Service is scheduled to present “a glamping adventure at the Jewish Roots of Summer Camp Gala at the Ritz-Carlton New Orleans.”

2023: The East Bay International Jewish Festival is scheduled to host a screening the documentary “Dream Girl: The Making of Marilyn Monroe” and “Karaoke.”

2023: Prime Minister is scheduled to continue his visit to Italy today.

2023(18th of Adar, 5783): Shabbat Parah

2024: The Streicker Center is scheduled to host the first class “Femme Fatale for Fierce Woman Warrior” taught by feminist Torah scholar and soon-to-be rabbi, Sivan Rotholz is the Education Director for Achayot.

2024: Seattle’s YWIN and the Stroum Jewish Community center are scheduled to host a “Jewish Community Bake” with attendance limited to “Jewish female-identifying and non-binary people in their 20’s and 30’s.”

2024: In Metairie, LA, Chabad is scheduled to host a “Women’s Gathering” in which attendees can “discover the power of One Wow Moment with the women's Rosh Chodesh Society” and “explore 7 biblical women that changed history in one powerful moment.”

2024: YIVO is scheduled to host a lecture by Nathan Cohen the author of Yiddish Transformed: Reading Habits in the Russian Empire, 1860-1914 on “Jewish Reading Habits in the Russian Empire.”

2024(1st of Adar II, 4784): Rosh Chodesh Adar II; for more see https://downhomedavartorah.blogspot.com/

2024: As March 11th begins in Israel, the Hamas held hostages begin day 157 in captivity.  (Editor’s note: this situation is too fluid for this blog to cover so we are just providing a snapshot as of the posting at midnight Israeli time.)