August 13 In History
1311: Birthdate of King Alfonso XI of Castile. During his reign, in 1348, Alfonso issued decrees prohibiting Jews from charging interest when lending money and prohibiting them from collecting unpaid debts. (The same rules applied to Moslems, but not Christians.) At the same time, Jews were still allowed to own land during his reign.
1315: Louis X of France marries Clemence d'Anjou. In 1315, Louis X also overturned the decree of his predecessor that allowed the Jews to return to France, and accorded them a charter "in answer to the demands of the people."
1391: In Spain, anti-Semitic mobs attacked the Jews of Lerida, reportedly killing 75. Other Jews were forcibly baptized and were forced to see their synagogue turned into a church.
1453: Seventeen Jews were burned at the stake in
Silesia
(now
Poland
and/or
Czech
Republic
).
1516: The Treaty of Noyon between France and Spain is signed. Francis recognized Charles's claim to Naples, and Charles recognized Francis's claim to Milan. Twice, Charles would issue edicts expelling the Jews from Naples. The second one, issued in 1533, would take effect despite Jewish attempts to dissuade him.
1551: Jews of Great Poland were granted limited self-government.
1620(4th of Av): Rabbi Menachem Azariah da Fano (Rama), author of Alfasi Zuta, passed away
1624: In France Cardinal Richelieu was named first chief minister of finance by King Louis XIII. The Cardinal gave new meaning and depth to the term “power behind the throne.” Many historians contend that any decree issued by King Louis XIII was really the work of Richelieu. This would include a decree issued in 1632 after the French had taken the fortress city of Metz that allowed the Jews to remain in the city. The decree was necessitated by the fact that the King had issued a decree in 1615 banning all Jews from living in France. This decree is an oddity in its in own right since when it was issued Jews were supposedly not living in the Gallic realm to start with.
1713: Birthdate of David Franco Mendes, the native of Amsterdam, a successful businessman who used his leisure time to write poetry, study Talmud and play a prominent role in the Spanish-Portuguese community.
1804: Birthdate of Israel Franklin Moses the native of Charleston, South Carolina who became known as Franklin J. Moses, Sr. – prominent planter, politician and jurist.
1846: Birthdate of Sir Otto Jaffe, the Hamburg native who became a successful British businessman and Lord May of Belfast.
1847(30th of Av, 5634): Rosh Chodesh Elul
1851: Birthdate of Felix Adler. Born in
Germany
, Adler’s family moved to the United states when he was five. His father, Rabbi Samuel Adler, was head of Temple Emanu-el, the leading Reform Congregation in
New York City
. In 1873, Adler became professor of Hebrew and Oriental Literature at
Cornell
University
. In that same year he delivered a major address at his father’s congregation entitled “the Judaism of the Future.” He proposed ridding Judaism of its superstitious traditions in order to better focus on the ethics that he felt were central to any human community. The congregation was receptive to his emphasis on ethics but was loathe to cast aside 3000 years of religious tradition. Adler soon found himself beyond the pale. In 1876, he founded the New York Ethical Cultural Society. He remained a champion of the Ethical Cultural Movement until his death in 1933.
1860:In response to a public call, signed by a number of influential citizens, a meeting was held at the Tract-Society House today afternoon, to consider the subject of the Christian massacre in Syria, and to adopt measures for rendering assistance to the sufferers. About twenty persons were present, among them some of our most prominent clergymen. During the meeting it was noted that meetings for the same purpose were being held in England and France by Jews as well as Christians.
1861: Birthdate of Dr. Marcus Jastrow, Jr., the Warsaw native who moved to Philadelphia with his father, the famed Talmudist Marcus Jastrow and became a noted Orientalist.
1867: Birthdate of Arthur Eichengrün, the German-Jewish chemist who holds 47 patents but is best known for his claim to really have been the inventor of Asprin.
1867: Birthdate of Dr. Lee K. Frankel, the Philadelphia native who gained fame for his work with various Jewish philanthropies.
1871:The Grand Lodge of the Ancient Jewish Order of Kesher Shel Barzel held their annual banquet this evening at the corner of Seventh Avenue and 14th Street in New York City. The lodge has 4,000 members. The dinner was attended by 110 members including thirty delegates from various parts of the United States.
1871: In Chicago, Rabbi Elkan Herzman was physically forced to leave his synagogue on Fifth Avenue. Some of the congregants had complained because Herzman had violated Jewish law by eating ice cream on a day when he should have been fasting. When Herzman arrived at the synagogue he found another rabbi in his usual place. Following the altercation, Herzman complained to the police who said that there was nothing they could do about. Herzman has threatened further political action. (I have not been able to find any further reference to this Rabbi or a synagogue on fifth avenue, so if you have, please let me know.)
1872: Birthdate of German born chemist, Richard Willstätter. Willstatter won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1915 for his study of the structure of chlorophyll and other plant pigments. He resigned his position on the faculty at a university in
Munich
over the issue of anti-Semitism. After Hitler’s rise to power, he fled to
Switzerland
where he died in 1942.
1872: Birthdate of Jacob de Haas, an English journalist who was one of Herzl’s earliest supporters. After Herzl’s death, de Haas became a lead of the Zionist movement in Israel.
1874(30thof Av, 5634): Rosh Chodesh Elul
1874: It was reported today that George Walling, the Superintendent of the New York Police Department had written to Henry Honscheidt, the Sheriff of McLean County, Illinois, telling him that in his opinion the man who had confessed to the Sheriff that he had killed Benjamin Nathan was “either insane or an imposter.”
1875: Birthdate of Arthur Yitzhak Biram, Israeli philosopher, philologist, and educator, who died on the first day of the Six Days War.
1877: Midhat Pasha, the head of the “Young Turkey” Party is in Vienna where he hopes to negotiate a treaty with Austria and England that will protect the Ottoman Empire and avoid a Holy War. Pasha is the son of a Bulgarian Jew who converted to Islam to enhance his commercial opportunities in the lands of the Sultan.
1876: The Anglo-Jewish Association’s description of a Jewish community living in India was published today. According to the reported the community is known as the Beni-Israel (Children of Israel) and has been in existence for a thousand years. They dress like Hindus and speak the Hindu language. While they know little Hebrew, they follow the Levitical Code and strictly observe the Sabbath. They are separate from other Jewish communities in the subcontinent.
1881: It was reported today that the government is taking “strong measures” to suppress the anti-Semitic riots in Pomerania including the arrest of 21 rioters at Koslin.
1883: The New York Times published a letter to the editor from Raphael Lewin in which the author disputes the account of the Damascus Libel of 1840 published in the Times on August 6 describing it as being slanted and anti-Jewish.
1884: The Board of Governors of the Hebrew Union College re-elected Bernhard Bettmann as President. Rabbi Henry Berkowitz of Mobile, Alabama and Rabbi Max Landsberg of Rochester, NY, were chosen to serve as new members on the board.
1884: It was reported today that Russian Jew on his way to his brother’s wedding in Paris was detained for 4 days by authorities because he did not understand French and could not answer their questions. While in custody, a rope was kept around his neck; he was handcuffed and knocked about by those holding him. When the mayor heard of the incident he called for an investigation
1884: It was reported today that Mrs. Morris Cohn, the daughter of Michael Englemann (the Salt King of Manistee, Michigan) has left her husband and returned to her parents after his arrest on charges of numerous counts of forgery. Cohn, a prominent Chicago Jewish businessman had spent the $50.000 wedding gift from Englemann and turned to criminal activity to support their lifestyle.
1886: It was reported today that numerous homes of Jews living in Kiev have been destroyed during anti-Jewish riots in the Russian province.
1887: It was reported today that Israel Lipski’s solicitor has new facts that will prove that he did kill Miriam Angel, the woman he was convicted of killing. Lipski’s lawyer has met privately with Judge Stephen convinced him of his client’s innocence.
1887: Henry Mathews, the Home Secretary has refused to interfere in the case of Israel Lipski who has been sentenced to hang for murdering Miriam Angel.
1889: It was reported today that Theodore Cohn, the young man who stole $610 from A.H. & King is in the Tombs awaiting trial on a charge of grand larceny,
1891: The Russian government prohibited the collection of funds or the publication of appeals for financial assistance to Jewish immigrants today
1893(1st of Elul, 5653): Rosh Chodesh Elul
1896: Herzl meets with the Turkish ambassador, Mahmud Nedim Bey, in Vienna.
1900: The Fourth Zionist Congress convened in London with five hundred delegates in attendance. Max Nordeau gave the opening in address which included an account of the appalling conditions faced by the Jews of Romania and a tribute to the Kaiser for his treatment of the Jews of Pomerania and
East Prussia
.
1900: In
London
, an open air meeting for the evangelizing of Jews was held near Queen’s Hall where the Zionists were holding their congress.
1903: In Salt Lake City, Utah President Joseph F. Smith of the LDS (Mormon) Church gave the dedicatory address at the cornerstone laying for Congregation Montefiore.
1907: The first American taxicabs appear on the streets of New York City. At least two Jews played a major role in the introduction of this type of conveyance in the United States. In 1915, John Hertz, a Hungarian born Jew started the Yellow Cab Company in Chicago, Il. In 1922, a Russian born Jew named Morris Markin formed the Checker Cab Company and in 1929 he bought the Yellow Cab Company from Hertz
1911: At
Basel
,
Switzerland
, the 10thZionist Congress, adopted a resolution to establish a Zionist immigration office in
Berlin
1912: Franz Kafka met Felice Bauer in Berlin. The relationship between these two had a profound effect on Kafka’s literary output as well as his personal life. One critic recently wrote that Kafka’s correspondence with Bauer “is the most useful key to Kafka’s thoughts and actions during the decisive years of his emergence as a writer.”
1912: Birthdate of Italian born biologist Salvador Luria. In 1969 he and Max Delbruck shared the Nobel Prize in medicine for the “Luria-Delbruck experiment” which “demonstrates that in bacteria, beneficial mutations arise in the absence of selection, rather than being a response to selection. This reinforces the Darwinian notion of evolution by natural selection acting on random mutations.”
1917: The Turkish military leader Djemal Pasha announces the Turkish government has become convinced that the Jewish colonies inside
Palestine
must be destroyed, so they won't present a danger to the integrity of
Turkey
.
1918: Birthdate of Judith Iris Martin, the Newark native who created the long-lived children’s theater group, the Paper Bag Players which would become a New York City institution (As reported by Douglas Martin)
1922: Birthdate of Ruby Burman, the native of Columbus, Ohio, who as Ruby Cohn became “a theater scholar who espied the genius of Samuel Beckett early on in Paris and became a leading authority on his work as well as his friend…” (As reported by Bruce Weber)
1922: Establishment at
Jerusalem
and other places in the
Holy Land
of many Jewish suburbs which show a likelihood of developing into big municipalities is described in a letter from Dr. Arthur Ruppin made public today by Samuel Untermeyer, President of the Palestine Foundation Fund.
1928: Birthdate of Yehuda "Nimrod" Lapidot “an Israeli historian and former professor of biochemistry. Lapidot was a member of the Irgun and an officer in the Israel Defense Forces. In 1980 he was appointed head of Lishkat Hakesher by former Irgun commander and then Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin. Lapidot received a Ph.D. in biochemistry from Hebrew University in 1960 and later became a professor.”
1928: At the casino in Deauville, Charles A. Levine punched the editor of The Boulevardier after the latter admitted that he was the one who had been taking “dirty cracks” at Levine. The two were separated and Miss Mabel Boll, who was reportedly Levine’s mistress, took him away. Levine, a non-observant Jew, claimed to be the first passenger to fly the Atlantic in 1927.
1929: Jewish financier Felix Warburg and Lord Melchett, the famous British nobleman whose picture appeared on the cover of Time Magazine on
October 29, 19
28
, each donate five hundred thousand dollars to start a financial concern aimed at helping development in
Palestine
.
1933:The Jewish Telegraphic Agency published an article that estimated that there were about 660,000 non-Aryans living in Germany of which 500,000 are "official" Jews and 160,000
of Jewish descent.
1934: The comic strip “Li’l Abner,” created by Al Capp, made its debut. Born Alfred Gerald Caplan in
New Haven
, in 1909, Capp was a successful syndicated cartoonist by the age of 19. He created Li’l Abner and all of his Hillbilly friends during the depths of the Great Depression. One of the most famous characters in the strip were the Schmoos. These characters could jump into your pot or skillet and “cook up” to taste like any food you wished for. To Jewish kids, the Schmoos sounded an awful like the manna in the Bible.
1936: Felix M. Warburg,
New York
banker and philanthropist, today was named chairman of the American division of the executive committee of the Council for German Jewry.
1937: A proposal to settle 200,000 Jews in
Palestine
within the next three years, involving an investment of about $175,000,000, was laid before the World Zionist Congress today. The proposal was made by Elieser Kaplal, treasurer of the Zionist executive committee, who said American Jewry was expected to contribute $2,000,000 to the Zionist movement and
Palestine
fund in the current fiscal year.
1938(16th of Av, 5698): As they bicycled from Ramatayim to Petah Tikva Benjamin Babayoff and his wife were shot and killed by gunmen firing from an orange grove and their seven year old daughter who was riding on the handlebars was severely wounded.
1940(9th of Av, 5700): Tish'a B'Av
1940: During World War II, the Battle of Britain begins as the Luftwaffe attacks British airfields. Field Marshall Goering told Hitler that the Luftwaffe could bomb the British into submission making an invasion unnecessary. On the other hand, by destroying the RAF, the Germans would be able to invade the
British Isles
with complete control of the skies insuring a Nazi victory. If the British had lost the Battle of Britain, the Final Solution would have been that much closer to being truly “final.” For more about the role of Jews in actually fighting the Battle of Britain see http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/ww2/sugar4.html. Failure to win the Battle of Britain soured Hitler on the capabilities of the Luftwaffe and caused him to turn his face eastward towards the
Soviet Union
. The invasion of the
Soviet Union
would result in the millions of Jews coming under the sway of the Final Solution.
1942(30thof Av, 5702): Rosh Chodesh Elul
1942: The Jewish communities at
Mir
,
Belorussia
, and
Gorodok
,
Ukraine
, are liquidated.
1942:
Switzerland
forces Jews (mostly French) already safe in
Switzerland
back across the border. The Swiss government will turn back 10,000 Jews to their deaths during the remainder of the war on the grounds that only political refugees can be admitted into
Switzerland
, not "racial refugees." The Swiss government does, however, welcome the gold that the Germans extract from the mouths and fingers of the dead Jews.
1942: For the next fourteen days, 53,750 Jews from
Warsaw
will be deported to the Treblinka death camp.
1942: United States State Department officials and the British Foreign Office decide that the Riegner Cable outlining details of the Holocaust be kept secret.
1945: Thirty-five Jews sacrifice their lives to blow up Nazi rubber plant in
Silesia
1946: British authorities open detention camps on the
island
of
Cyprus
to hold Jewish refugees who have been prevented from entering
Palestine
due to British restrictions on immigration.
1948(8th of Av, 5708): Silent screen star Elaine Hammerstein, daughter of Arthur Hammerstein and granddaughter of Oscar Hammerstein, died in an automobile accident.
1952: In New York Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt welcomed the 50,000th visitor to the
Bond Drive
’s Israeli Industrial Exhibition. The Hebrew lettering on a gleaming, Kaiser-Frazer car, assembled in
Israel
, made a great impression.
1955: Two years after the death of Joseph Stalin, old-line Bolshevik Semyon Dimanstein was rehabilitated by the Communists running the Soviet Union. Born in 1886, Dimanstein reportedly became a Rabbi after studying at a Chabad Yeshiva before becoming a Russian revolutionary. He was widely identified with Jewish issues inside the Soviet Union including the Jewish Autonomous Oblast in the Far East and Yidn in FSSR (Jews in the Soviet Union). He was a victim of Stalin’s murderous purges in 1938. Rehabilitation is sort of like the Communist version of Resurrection.
1959(9th of Av, 5719):Tish'a B'Av
1973(15th of Av, 5733): Maurice Bisgyer, retired executive vice president of B'nai B'rith, the Jewish service organization, died today at the age of 75.
1973: The body of Sir Moses Montefiore, father of modern Jewish settlement in Eretz Israel, will be returned to Jerusalem a century after his death, the Israeli Government said today. The body will be moved from Ramsgate to Israel in 1975.
1977: President Carter’s administration rejected the Israeli request for the co-production rights of the F-16 fighter-bomber and announced that
Israel
would not be able to purchase the 250 planes as requested. This number had been reduced to 50 or 75 on grounds that the Israel Air Force no longer needed to maintain its air superiority over the Arabs.
1978(1st of Av, 5738): Rosh Chodesh Av
1991: The publisher Robert Maxwell said today that he had reached a private agreement with the publisher and other shareholders of
Israel
's Ma'ariv-Modin Group to acquire the majority of shares in the company, which owns the Israeli daily Ma'ariv. Ma'ariv is published in Hebrew in Tel Aviv. Financial details were not given. A statement said Mr. Maxwell would be the chairman and publisher and hold more than 70 percent of the shares. Dov Judkowski, who with Mr. Maxwell controls more than 75 percent of the shares, will be editor in chief and deputy chairman. "I shall put at the disposal of Ma'ariv-Modin all the funds necessary for the swift development of the paper, for the benefit of both the group and its staff," said Mr. Maxwell, who recently acquired The Daily News in
New York
.
1999(1st of Elul, 5759): Rosh Chodesh Elul
2000: The New York Times book section featured a review of Half-Jew: A Daughter's Search for Her Family's Buried Past by Susan Jacoby and Rodinsky’s Room a mystery about David Rodinsky coauthored by Iain Sinclair and Rachel Lichtenstein, granddaughter of Polish Jewish refugee Gedaliah Lichtenstein.
2001: In the fight against West Nile Virus, pesticides are applied at Baron Hirsch Cemetery In New York
2005: The 20th annual Conference on Alternatives in Jewish Education (CAJE) opens at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst
2006: A Woman in
Jerusalem
by A. B. Yehoshua (translated from the Hebrew by Hillel Halkin) was reviewed in the Book Section of the New York Times. A human resources manager is described as “the nameless main character” of this latest acclaimed novel. Finally a novel features a Jewish human resources manager – how can one not be excited at the prospect of reading this?
2006: The Book Section of the Washington Post featured a review of Peter Hartcher’s Bubble Man: Alan Greenspan and the Missing 7 Trillion Dollars which the reviewer describes as a “flawed jeremiad” that attempts to blame Greenspan for the collapse of the dot com bubble and the losses that may or may not have taken place.
2006(19th of Av, 5766): Mahadi Hiyat, 83, was killed when a rocket crashed directly into his house near the town of Shlomi. Hiyat was the sole Egyptian resident of the northern Jewish community of Ya'arah.
2007: A copy of Faye Kellerman’s latest novel, The Burnt House is contributed to the Temple Judah in Cedar Rapids, thus insuring that its library will have a complete collection of her detective mysteries. With The Burnt House, Kellerman returns to her literary roots with Rina and Peter Decker, the Jewish couple that solves murders. Besides the fact they are slick yarns, where else can you be on the trail of multiple murderers while one of the characters talks about “hashgacha pratite” and another reassures his spouse that they could enjoy a visit to Santa Fe since “they have a Chabad there.”
2007: Some 75 people from the Jewish community of Rochester, New York, attended a dedication ceremony today to honor a rediscovered burial plot, long unknown to the community, where over 100 Jews from the 19th century were buried.
2008: Forty Reform Jews land in
Israel
for a first-of-its-kind trip to meet the Israeli Reform movement. The 10-day trip is titled "Reform Family Experience: Move Beyond the Tour Bus," and may be a sign of the times in seeking to connect Reform Jews more powerfully than in the past to an Israel that is more complex and diverse than that seen by most tourists.
2008: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez met with Jewish leaders today, pledging to work together against anti-Semitism and open up channels of communication despite differences on Middle East politics. Both Chavez and leaders of the World Jewish Congress called the meeting a success
2009: Funeral for Robert William Levine, the businessman and philanthropist who worked to aid Russian immigrants is scheduled to take place at Temple Emanuel in Newton, MA followed by burial at Memorial Park in Sharon, MA.
2009: In Jerusalem, the Yiddishpiel Theatre helps prepare people for the High Holidays by presenting a “unique musical event which combines stories about the great cantors and Jewish and cantorial soul songs.
2009: In Jerusalem, Beit Avi Chai, A cultural center that explores concepts of Jewish and Israeli identity and creativity presents a workshop led by Dr. Meir Buzaglo, Department of Philosophy, at Hebrew University entitled Rambam in the 21st Century that asks the questions, “How does the Rambam’s thinking relate to the basic questions of the modern age?”\
2009: The Israel Defense Forces said today that they were investigating reports of a kidnapped soldier. A previously unknown Palestinian group calling itself the "Al-Quds Army" claimed that it had kidnapped an Israeli soldier the Palestinian news agency Ma'an reported.
2009: Rai Ephraim Simon, co-director of Friends of Lubavitch and a father of nine donated one of his kidneys to Samar Chasid living in Williamsburg who is the father of ten.
2010(3rd of Elul, 5770): On the Hebrew calendar today marks the 75th anniversary of the passing of Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak HaCohen Kook. He passed away on the 3rd of Elul, 5695. During the British Mandate, “Rabbi Kook was the first Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi of the Jewish population in the Land of Israel in modern times, and had great love and respect for the secular Zionist movement…”
2010: Temple Judah is scheduled to celebrate the 88th birthday of Marianne Bern at the Oneg following Friday night services.
2010: The man who killed Meir Kahane in 1990 claims he did not carry out the shooting alone, as previously thought, but was part of a three-man terrorist cell with links to al-Qaida. Its original target was future prime minister Ariel Sharon, according to a newly-leaked US government document. During his investigation for an article into alleged counter- terrorism blunders published in Playboy magazine today, freelance journalist Peter Lance uncovered official FBI memos which bring new information to light about the murder of the Israeli politician in New York. According to the documents, Kahane’s killer, El-Sayyid Nosair, told detectives in 2005 that he had planned to assassinate Sharon, who was then Israel’s minister of housing and construction. “Nosair further stated that Ariel Sharon was his original target and that he went to a hotel prior to Sharon’s coming to visit, but decided against it,” the document read. He added that on the night he shot Kahane dead, he was accompanied by two co-conspirators to the Marriot Hotel in Manhattan where Kahane was speaking – one of whom was also carrying a gun. The men, Bilal al-Kaisi of Jordan and Mohammed Salameh, a Palestinian illegal alien later involved in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, have never been charged for their part in the slaying. “Nosair further stated that on the night of Kahane’s murder he was in the auto[mobile] with Alkaisi and Salameh three blocks from the hotel where Kahane was speaking that evening,” the FBI report read.“Nosair possessed two guns and gave one of the guns to Alkaisi. He further stated that on the night of the murder, Kahane had just finished speaking to the crowd and Nosair said to Alkaisi that ‘this is the moment,’ (meaning they were going to kill him). Alkaisi told Nosair to ‘be patient, let’s take our time.’ Nosair further stated the opportunity to shoot Kahane presented itself, and he shot Kahane. At the time of the shooting Nosair did not know Alkaisi’s location.” Salameh is currently behind bars in the US for carrying out the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, which left six dead and 1,042 wounded. Al- Kaisi’s whereabouts, however, are unknown. “In my opinion, [the FBI is] embarrassed because they let this al-Qaida terrorist go in 1994,” Lance told The Jerusalem Post on Friday. “He did a few months and now he’s out in the wind, as they say.” Kahane was the leader of Kach, a right-wing political party banned by Israel because it incited racism against Arabs. Nosair was tried in court for the killing of Kahane alone. The Egyptian- born US citizen was initially acquitted of the murder, but convicted of assault and possession of a firearm in a highly controversial decision by the jury. The ruling was overturned in a retrial after new information came to light regarding his membership in al-Qaida. He later confessed to carrying out the killing, and is serving a life sentence. (As reported by the Jerusalem Post)
2010: The reopening of Shaarei Torah, the synagogue of Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak HaCohen Kook, luminary sage and father of modern religious Zionism, coincided with the 75th anniversary of Rabbi Kook's death.
2011: The Gaga Summer Intensive that included Ohad Naharin's Repertoire is scheduled to come to a close today. Ohad Naharin “is an Israeli contemporary dancer, choreographer, artistic director, and musician.”
2011(13th of Av, 5771): Shabbat Nachamu
2011: The Summer Israeli Folk Dance Mostly Couples Marathon is scheduled to take place at Buttenwieser Hall in New York City.
2011: Social protests took place throughout Israel today, with demonstrators turning out en masse in Haifa, Be’er Sheva and Afula. This was the first time since the start of the social protests nearly a month ago that Tel Aviv did not hold a march. Protests also took place in Eilat, Rosh Pina, Nahariya, Dimona, Modi'in, Petah Tikva, Ramat Hasharon, Hod Hasharon, Netanya, Beit She’an as well as other cities throughout Israel.
2011: Gunmen abducted an American Jew after breaking into his house in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore today in an unusually brazen raid that illustrated the threat to foreigners in this militancy-wracked, US-allied country. The US Embassy identified the victim as Warren Weinstein. A man by that name serves as the Pakistan country director for J.E. Austin Associates, a development contractor that works with the aid arm of the American government, according to a profile on the LinkedIn networking website. (As reported by Ynetnews)
2012:Five short films created by Israeli directors - Occupy Rothschild, Wall to Wall, Busted, Word Games, A Wonderful Day – are scheduled to be shown in NYC
