August 5
135: Betar fell to the Romans
1100: Henry I is crowned King of England at Westminster Abby. During Henry’s reign the first attempts were made to introduce the continental principle - that all Jews were the king's property. Under King Henry, a clause to that effect was inserted in some manuscripts of the so-called "Laws of Edward the Confessor."
1199: Birthdate of Ferdinand III of Castile. Catholics remember as the monarch who was canonized as Saint Ferdinand III. Jews remember him as the King who refused the Pope’s demand that Jews be forced to wear special badge and clothing. Apparently he was afraid that if the Jews mistreated they would flee to Muslim Granada, which would be disastrous for the revenues of the kingdom
1264: Anti-Jewish riots broke out in Arnstadt Germany
1381: Rabbis and communal leaders from Speyer, Worms and Mayence met at Mayence to review and reinforce laws pertaining to marriage and the rights of widows in the wake of the Black Death. One of the rules enacted was Tekanoth Shum which allowed a childless widow to receive a definite portion of her late husband’s property even though she had refused to marry her brother-in-law.
1391: More than 400 Jews were killed in attacks in Barcelona. Attempts by the city Fathers and Artisans to protect them were of no use. The attacks were instigated for the most part by Castilians, who had taken part in the massacres in
Seville
and
Valencia
.
1529: Francis I, King of France and Charles V, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire who was also King of Spain appear to settle their differences by signing the Treaty of Cambrai in which Francis agrees to give up his claim to Italy and Charles gives up his claim to Burgundy (a part of modern day France.) The Jews had been expelled from France in 1394, so officially there were no Jews for Francis to mistreat or exploit. Charles treatment of his Jewish subjects depended upon where they lived. As King of Spain, Charles followed the line established by his forbearers starting with the Spanish Inquisition. As Emperor he took a much more benign attitude towards his Jewish subjects living in central Europe. Pope Clement VII, whose support of the Jews earned him the “accolade of ‘favorer of Israel’ and a price gracious to Israel,” made the mistake of siding with Francis over Charles in their dispute. Once in control of Italy, Charles allowed his troops to sack Clement’s Rome, safe in the knowledge that no French troops would come to the Pope’s assistance. Dona Gracia, the famous Marrano businesswomen who reasserted her Jewish identity, lent money to both monarchs and her nephew was well known to both of these competing rulers.
1748: Empress Maria Theresa revoked the edict of expulsion directed at the Jews of Bohemia
1772: First of the three partitions of
Poland
begins. The Jews of what had been
Poland
and
Lithuania
will end up in the Prussian, Austrian and/or Russian Empires. Ironically, the bulk of them will end up living under Russian monarchs who had committed themselves to keeping Jews out of
Russia
.
1802: Birthdate of Eliakim Carmoly, a French born Jewish scholar and rabbi who would eventually resign from the rabbinate, move to Frankfurt and devote himself to Jewish literature and to the collection of Hebrew books and manuscripts.
1843: Birthdate of Jacob Ezekiel Hyneman, the son of Isaac Hyneman who was born in Richmond, Virginia but moved to Philadelphia, PA. When the Civil War broke out, the southern born Hyneman cast his lot with the Union, serving with the U.S. Army from 1862 to 1865.
1854: John Griffins, a native of Poland, was arrested today for swindling Reverend Stephen Wilkins, the pastor of a Baptist church in New York. Wilkins gave money to Griffins because the latter claimed to be collecting funds for a society for "aiding and better the conditions the Jews." Griffin’s claims were false.
1860: The consecration of the new synagogue to be used by congregation B'nai Israel, located on the corner of Stanton and Forsyth streets, took place this afternoon. The building, which is capable of holding about 800 people, was formerly a Baptist Church, before being purchased by these descendants of Dutch Jews. The congregation is Orthodox and the sanctuary includes a balcony for the women. The ceremonies of the consecration were arranged and conducted by Rabbi M.R. de Leeuw. Rabbi Morris Jerome Raphall, of the Greene-street Synagogue; Rabbi Samuel Myer Isaacs, of the Wooster-street Synagogue and Rabbi J.J. Lyons, of the Portuguese Synagogue were among the Jewish clergy who attended the ceremony.
1860: The London correspondent for the New York Times reported that the Times of London no longer enjoys any special advantage over its competitors because it has lost its monopoly on information. The accumulated wealth of the Times had given it access to the telegraph providing it with an advantage over its poorer competitors. “But since the monopoly of telegraphic communication has been secured by that clever and far-seeing German Jew, Mr. Reuters, all the journals are supplied, share and share alike, at the same time, and at the same tariff. In many specialties, such as "City Intelligence" and "Foreign Correspondence," the Daily News is nearly equal to the Times. The leading articles of the Telegraph are generally on the same subjects as those of its high-priced rival, and the Post, Herald and Star each appeal to their own peculiar class of readers.”
1861: At the meeting of the Board of Alderman in New York City this evening the report of the Committee donating $30,000 to the Hebrew Benevolent Society was adopted, but was subsequently reconsidered and laid over, on the motion of Alderman Tuomey.
1865: A correspondent for the Levant Herald wrote from Smyrna today describing the mortifying effects of the Cholera epidemic that has struck the city. Among other things he reported that Hyde Clark, the English engineer, has informed Sir Moses Motifiore of the suffering among the Jewish people. In response, the Jewish philanthropist has begun raising funds from the Jewish communities in London and France and it is thought that he and his associate, Dr. Hodgkins might personally come to the city with the necessary aid.
1878: It was reported today Peace Society had sent a delegation headed by Professor Leone Levi to the Congress of Berlin that was supposed to present a petition to the leaders of Europe calling for the use of arbitration as a method of settling international disputes. Britain’s Lord Salisbury expressed his sympathy with the effort but held out little hope for any action. Levi was an Italian born Jew who moved to Great Britain where he converted and became a lawyer and author.
1879: “Tracing Some Stolen Goods,” an article published today described how a Jew named Louis Pollard was arrested and falsely accused of stealing shoes worth five hundred dollars from a shoe factory on West Broadway last September. The police finally realized their error and release him.
1881: It was reported today that mobs have started to attack the synagogues and shops owned by Jews in Pomerania. The police had to be called to disperse the mobs.
1882: The Standard Oil of New Jersey is established. During the 1930’s “Standard of New Jersey…forged a synthetic oil and rubber cartel with the Nazi-controlled I.G. Farben.” This “helped the Third Reich to make significant gains “in the development of synthetic rubber and gasoline”; gains which would prove to be of invaluable assistance to the Nazis during WW II. During the 1930’s Farben’s holding in Standard of New Jersey “were second only to those of John D., Jr., himself.” (For more about Standard Oil and the Jewish people, see The Secret War Against the Jews by John Loftus and Mark Aarons.)
1883: It was reported today that there was an anti-Semitic riot at Presburg in protest over the not guilty verdicts rendered in the case of Esther Solymosi.
1883: “The Scientific Gossip” column published today explained earlier comments by M.G. Lagneau about the differences in birthrates between Catholics, Protestants and Jews. Although Jews have a lower birthrate than the other two religions, there mortality rate “is remarkably low” a condition attributed to their religious dietetic and hygienic regulations, early marriages, the fact that most Jewish women do not work out of the home and “general sobriety.”
1885: Herzl withdrew from the court service in order to become a writer.
1888: It was reported today that plans have been to provide the youngsters at the Sanitarium for Hebrew Children with an extra summer excursion.
1888: According to a review of Quince Culture by W.W. Meech published today, the fruit is so mild that In Palestine it is eaten as soon as it is picked from the tree. According to Jewish tradition, the quince was “the apple” that Eve used to tempt Adam.
1889: Salvatore Levy was arrested on charges of obtaining credit under false pretenses. A Greek Jew, Levy claimed to be the son of Elie Levy, who had a seat on the Bourse in Paris and had sent him to America.
1889: Assemblyman Charles “Silver Dollar Smith got into an altercation with Samuel Roberts at the Golden Rule Hotel during a meeting of Republicans of the 8thAssembly District. [Smith was a Jewish political leader named Solomon who, among other things, passed out free Matzot at his saloon each year before Pesach.
1889(8thof Av, 5649): Erev Tish’a B’Av
1889(8thof Av, 5649): Seventy-seven year old Isaac Phillips passed away this morning in New York City. A successful businessman, he worked in the cutlery industry in Philadelphia and New York before pursuing a life of public service including work as a Customs Examiner and Surveyor of the Port. He also edited the Courier Enquirer. A life-long Democrat, he attended the convention that nominated James K. Polk to serve as President of the United States.. An active member of the Sephardic community, he was one of the founders of Mount Sinai Hospital. In 1834, he married Sophia Phillips and after she died in 1855, he married Miriam Trimble, a gentile woman who had converted to Judaism. He was the son of Naphtali Phillips who held a position of responsibility at the Custom House and was editor of the National Advocate
1889: The members of gang called the Yellowstone Cowboys were sentenced to the Albany Penitentiary for their role in terrorizing a boarding house owned by Jew in Ulster County. (Compare this to what was going on in Russia at this time)
1892: A letter printed in an English publication, the Jewish Chronicle, “confirmed the failure of Baron de Hirsch’s colony in Argentina.” According to the writer, the conditions at Moiseville, the Jewish colony, “baffled description. The land selected for the settlement was ill chosen and an enormous number of the families are huddled together in tents and sheds, where they have been living for months in idleness and intrigue.” After failing to improve conditions, Colonel Goldsmid disbanded the colony and made arrangements for eight hundred of the colonists to sail back to Europe.
1895: Birthdate of William Sawelson, World War I recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor.
1902: Herzl’s trip to the
Ottoman Empire
begun on
July 22, 19
02
ends. Of the trip, Herzl writes, "The negotiations have again led to no results." Herzl comes to the conclusion that the direct road to
Palestine
was for the time being blocked. He hopes to advance the indirect road of El Arish.
Herzl offers to liquidate the entire Ottoman national debt in return for a concession to "
Haifa
and its environs."
1903: Herzl begins his journey to visit the Jews of Russia. The trip will end on the 18th day of the month.
1906: Today, eleven English-speaking Jews held a formal meeting in Havana with the intention of founding a congregation and cemetery. The venue was the home of Manuel Hadida at Pasaje Arcado No. 9. Hadida was a Sephardic Jew originally from Algeria, who apparently had migrated from North Africa to Paris, and then to the United States. Evidently it was from the United States that he moved to Havana. Typical of the period, most of the others were Ashkenazi "Americans," although some had been born in Europe. At the first meeting Louis Jurick was elected chairman of the Hebrew Congregation of Cuba, and Manuel Hadida was chosen as general secretary
1906: Birthdate of Nobel Prize-winning economist, Wassily Leontif. Born in St. Petersburg, the son of an economist, Leontif received his Ph.D. from
Berlin
University
. He began teaching at Harvard in 1932. He won the Nobel Prize "for the development of the input-output method and for its application to important economic problems." Later in life he developed an interest in environmental issues. He passed away in 1999 at the age of 92.
1908: Birthdate of Miriam Rothschild, the heiress who discovered how fleas jump, brought Chaucerian wildflowers back to modern England and was acknowledged as one of the world's most distinguished naturalists. Her extensive scientific and conservation achievements were matched by the might of her will and her delectably eccentric personality. Though she viewed herself as a naturalist, more of a describer than an experimenter, she was taken seriously as a scientist and often worked with distinguished colleagues. Her well-known work on butterflies making themselves toxic by means of their food choices was done with the chemist Tadeus Reichstein, a Nobel Prize winner. Her highly original observations helped confirm 19th-century theories of evolution that had awaited 20th-century chemistry. Given the title of dame by the queen in 1999 for her scientific achievements, she was more than a scientist, not least because she never had to fill out a grant application. Was it odd that a scion of the venerable Rothschild clan should become the world's leading expert on fleas? Hardly. Dame Miriam's father was the banker Nathaniel Charles Rothschild, who found more than 500 new species of fleas. His daughter's six-volume catalog of his collection of 30,000 specimens, which she completed in 20 years beginning in 1953, firmly established her as the flea authority other experts consulted. Her uncle Lionel Walter Rothschild's collections were just as inspirational. He amassed 2.3 million butterflies, 300,000 bird skins, 144 giant tortoises and 300,000 birds' eggs, among other things. From her earliest youth, Dame Miriam loved animals and plants. Her mind was free to roam, and she received no formal education until she was 17, when she demanded to go to school. She never earned any degree, but received an honorary doctorate from Oxford in 1968. Ranging from marine biology to chemistry to pharmacology to neurophysiology to horticulture to zoology, she came up with novel, often startling conclusions. Her research on insects eating substances that are poisonous to their predators was considered groundbreaking. After determining that butterflies' bright colors were warning signals of their toxicity, she found that other species evolved to mimic the danger-sign coloration. She found that odors emitted by toxic butterflies were mimicked by other species, vindicating 19th-century naturalists' speculations. Her enthusiasm for wildflowers led to her advising Prince Charles on plantings for his estate and Lady Bird Johnson on her program to beautify American roadsides. Her interests ranged far beyond science. During World War II she tenaciously pressed the British authorities to admit more Jews from Nazi Germany and at one point personally housed 49 Jewish children. She worked in the top-secret British effort at Bletchley Park to crack the Nazis' code. She fought for cause upon cause, including better treatment for laboratory animals, rights for homosexuals and free milk for schoolchildren. Her farm at the family estate of Ashton Wold, near Peterborough, was a passion and her main source of income. Her livestock and plants won awards. She did it all with a zestfully personal sense of style, wearing the loose-fitting clothes she designed for herself 50 years ago as she walked the grounds with her half-dozen pet Shetland sheepdogs. Miriam Louisa Rothschild lived her entire life at Ashton Wold Her mother, Rozika de Wertheimstein, was a top Hungarian sportswoman, and Dame Miriam herself played tennis, cricket and squash, the last in international competitions. Her childhood, as described in a 1987 New Yorker profile by Kennedy Fraser, was "like a fairy tale: the palatial houses stuffed with mysteries and treasures; the grandfather who liked to shower gold half-sovereigns from his carriage; the brilliant dotty uncle with his cassowaries and his white top hat."Her first love was nature. By the age of 4 she was collecting ladybugs and caterpillars and taking a tame quail to bed with her. Her world darkened when she was 15 and her father committed suicide. She temporarily lost interest in his passion, the natural world. But a year or two later, her enthusiasm was rekindled when she helped her brother dissect a frog. "I had never before seen fresh, internal organs, blood vessels and nerves," she wrote in an essay in Scientific American. Calling the experience "my road to Damascus," she wrote, "Their extreme beauty was a revelation." After taking some courses at the University of London, she worked in Naples and England studying a kind of mollusk. "During the first day of dissecting the bivalve," she wrote in Scientific American, "I found a specimen infested with larval trematodes," which are parasitic flatworms known as flukes. "It proved to be a hitherto undescribed species and a most extraordinary one from every point of view. My fate was sealed. I was completely hooked." She worked 16-hour days studying trematodes until a German bomb destroyed all traces of seven years of her research. With the war, she passed a test to be an air warden but was first assigned to work as a dairymaid. She was secretly summoned to work on the top-secret Enigma code-breaking project and labored 12 hours a day for several years with Alan Turing.In 1943 she married George Lane, a handsome Hungarian-born British commando. They had four children and adopted two more before divorcing in 1957. She is survived by one of her sons and three of her daughters. As she raised her children, her late-night attention turned to fleas. She began writing about them in clear, engaging prose. In "Fleas, Flukes & Cuckoos: A Study of Bird Parasites," which she wrote with Theresa Clay in 1952 (Philosophical Library), she argued that most people misunderstood fleas. "It is difficult for them to realize that fleas breathe through holes in their sides, have a nerve cord below their stomachs and a heart in their backs; or that certain arthropods lay eggs through their heads and regularly practice virgin birth." Using high-speed photography, she studied how fleas jump. She theorized that they descended from winged ancestors and employed modified flight structures. In a famous comparison, she said fleas jumped as high for fleas as the Empire State Building would be for humans. Turning to plants as well as animals, she became one of the first practitioners of the new interdisciplinary approach to biological studies called ecology. She began designing gardens to attract butterflies, writing extensively on the subject. "You can really abandon any romantic idea of creating a home for these angelic creatures," she wrote in "The Butterfly Gardener," published in 1983. "The best you can do is provide them with a good pub." She owned a pub for humans, in Ashton, decorated with natural history exhibits. In 1970 she began to collect, propagate and sell wildflower seeds. "In the early 1980's, I went to a lecture given by a distinguished zoologist who said we should preserve our medieval hayfields, because it would take a thousand years to grow one from scratch," she said. "After the lecture I told him I had done a good imitation in 10. From that moment, I thought I should spread the gospel."Spread it she did, to Mrs. Johnson and Prince Charles. As a result of the movement she led, British agriculture policies that favored replacing natural meadows with rye grass were reversed. She remained as down to earth as the stone ruin her own house became as she deliberately let an immense tangle of ivy, wisteria, clematis and roses envelop it. . She died at her home, Ashton Wold, in Northamptonshire at the age of 96.
1918: The New York Times reported that the Hebrew University has received a gift of five thousand shares of the Jewish Colonial Trust valued at $25,000 from Jacob Schiff.
1919(9th of Av, 5679): Tish'a B'Av
1920: Birthdate of Selma Diamond. Born in London, Ontario this comedienne with the gravelly voice gained lasting fame as Selma on the television hit, Night Court.
1925: In Brooklyn, Phillip and Minnie Shainmark Bloom gave birth to Joel Nachum Bloom “who in his 21 years as director of the science museum and planetarium at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia transformed a lackluster exhibition space into a bright and appealing one with hands-on experiments and walk-through exhibits, including a giant, pulsing human cell…” (As reported by Dennis Hevesi)
1926: Houdini stays in a coffin under water for more than one hour
1933: Archaeologists working for the Palestine Exploration Fund discovered an ancient synagogue, dating from the sixth century C. E near Nahalal.
1933: In Montreal, The arrival of Sir Herbert Samuel in Montreal, as leader of British delegation to the fifth biennial conference of the Institute of Pacific Relations, is made the occasion of attack by anti-Semitic newspaper, Le Patriot, which charges him with being the emissary of the "Elders of Zion" to open Canada to Jewish refugees from Germany.
1933: The Nazi Lawyers' Association addresses a formal letter to business establishments threatening them with a boycott if they continue to employ Jewish lawyers.
1933: In Frankfort, Court imposes a two months' imprisonment sentence upon a Jewish journalist for wearing a swastika, even though he contends that he renounced Judaism in 1922 and had applied for membership in the National Socialist Party.
1933: In Hamburg, The Heinrich Heine monument is removed from the city park.
1933: The Nazi Rhine officials issue an order prohibiting the employment of Jews as non-qualified labor in the entire Rhine district. Employers are warned of penalties if they employ Jews who do not produce a special card entitling them to employment.
1934(24th of Av, 5694): One hundred Jews are killed in an anti-Semitic pogrom at Constantine, Algeria.
1936: Arab disturbances and on the division of responsibilities between the
Palestine
and the British governments.
1937: The British Palestinian policy gained its first ground today when Dr. Chaim Weizmann, president of the World Zionist Congress, made an eloquent though guarded plea in favor of the partition principle to the biennial congress.
1937: Birthdate of Dan Shomron the Sabra who would play a key role in the 1976 Raid on
Entebbe
and served as the 13th Chief of Staff of the IDF.
1937: The 20th Zionist Congress, held in
Zurich
, decided by a vote of 285 against 115, to hold the political debate behind closed doors.
1937: In
Geneva
, the Permanent Mandates Commission reminded the British Colonial Secretary, Mr. Ormsby-Gore, that
Britain
administered
Palestine
on its behalf.
1938: As they attempted to halt Arab instigated violence, British troops clashed with a band of armed men, killing three and wounding four.
1940(1st of Av, 5700): Rosh Chodesh Av
1941(12th of Av, 5701): The Holocaust continued to gain momentum. In Rasaininai, 213 men and 66 Jewish women were murdered.
1941: A three day long slaughter of Jews begins in Pinsk that results in the death of eleven thousand Jews.
1942: In the Warsaw Ghetto German soldiers came to collect the 192 (there is some debate about the actual number and it may have been 196) orphans and about one dozen staff members to take them to Treblinka extermination camp. The children were under the care of Janusz Korczak, the pen name of Henryk Goldszmit a Polish-Jewish children's author, pediatrician, and child pedagogue, known as Pan Doktor(Mr Doctor). Korczak had been offered sanctuary on the “Aryan side” of Warsaw but turned it down repeatedly, saying that he could not abandon his children. Now too, he refused offers of sanctuary, insisting that he would go with the children. The children were dressed in their best clothes, and each carried a blue knapsack and a favorite book or toy. Joshua Perle, an eyewitness, described the procession of Korczak and the children through the ghetto to the Umschlagplatz(deportation point to the death camps):
... A miracle occurred. Two hundred children did not cry out. Two hundred pure souls, condemned to death, did not weep. Not one of them ran away. None tried to hide. Like stricken swallows they clung to their teacher and mentor, to their father and brother, Janusz Korczak, so that he might protect and preserve them. Janusz Korczak was marching, his head bent forward, holding the hand of a child, without a hat, a leather belt around his waist, and wearing high boots. A few nurses were followed by two hundred children, dressed in clean and meticulously cared for clothes, as they were being carried to the altar. (...) On all sides the children were surrounded by Germans, Ukrainians, and this time also Jewish policemen. They whipped and fired shots at them. The very stones of the street wept at the sight of the procession.
According to a popular legend, when the group of orphans finally reached the Umschlagplatz, an SS officer recognized Korczak as the author of one of his favorite children's books and offered to help him escape, but once again, Korczak refused. He boarded the trains with the children and was never heard from again.
Korczak's evacuation from the Ghetto is also mentioned in Władysław Szpilman's book The Pianist
"One day, around 5th August when I had take a brief rest from work and was walking down Gesia Street, I happened to see Janusz Korczak and his orphans leaving the ghetto. The evacuation of the Jewish orphanage run by Janusz Korczak had been ordered for that morning. The children were to have been taken away alone. He had the chance to save himself, and it was only with difficulty that he persuaded the Germans to take him too. He had spent long years of his life with children and now, on this last journey he could not leave them alone. He wanted to ease things for them. He told the orphans they were going out in to the country, so they ought to be cheerful. At last they would be able exchange the horrible suffocating city walls for meadows of flowers, streams where they could bathe, woods full of berries and mushrooms. He told them to wear their best clothes, and so they came out into the yard, two by two nicely dressed and in a happy mood. The little column was lead by an SS man who loved children, as Germans do, even those he was about to see on their way into the next world. He took a special liking to a boy of twelve, a violinist who had his instrument under his arm. The SS man told him to go to the head of the precession of children and play – and so they set off. When I met them in Gesia Street the smiling children were singing in chorus, the little violinist was playing for them and Korczak was carrying two of the smallest infants, who were beaming too, and telling them some amusing story. I am sure that even in the gas chamber, as the Zyklon B gas was stifling childish throats and striking terror instead of hope into the orphans hearts, the Old Doctor must have whispered with one last effort, ‘it's all right, children, it will be all right’. So that at least he could spare his little charges the fear of passing from life to death." The Pianist - Page 96
Sometime after, there were rumors that the trains had been diverted and that Korczak and the children had survived. There was, however, no basis to these stories. Most likely, Korczak was killed with most of his children in a gas chamber upon their arrival at Treblinka. There is a memorial grave for him at the Powązki Cemetery in Warsaw.
1943: Along with 11 other women Liane Berkowitz was executed Plötzensee Prison for their part in the German Resistance Movement.
1943: Harold Alfond, the founder of Dexter Shoes, married Dorothy Levine of
Waterford
,
Maine
.
1944: Polish fighters liberated the Gesoiowaka Labor Camp from the Germans. Among those freed were 384 Jewish prisoners.
1945: The Atom Bomb was dropped on
Hiroshima
. It was August 6th in
Japan
. The bomb certainly could not have been built without the help of several Jewish scientists. The project to build the bomb owed its start to the letter Einstein sent to
Roosevelt
in 1939. While views about the use of the bomb have grown over the years, the tens of thousands of Allied soldiers and sailors who were projected to die while invading
Japan
certainly were not bothered by the use of what some came to call "the Jewish bomb."
1947: Israel Rokach, the future Mayor of Tel Aviv is imprisoned in the prison at Latrun
1948: Today Austrian banker Sonja Kohn was born to Jewish refugees from Eastern Europe in Vienna. “She grew up in Vienna in a small Jewish community. In the 1970s, with her husband Erwin Kohn, she started an import-export business and moved to Milan, Italy. In 1984 she founded the Bank Medici in Vienna. One year later, she moved to New York. They lived in Monsey, a large, ultraorthodox Jewish community. Increasingly orthodox, she covered her hair as is customary for traditionally orthodox women. The Kohns founded a small brokerage firm, the Eurovaleur Inc. In New York City she became known as “Austria’s woman on Wall Street.” In 1990s, they moved back to Vienna. There, she cooperated with Gerhard Randa of Bank Austria. The Bank Medici was relaunched in 2003 as an Aktiengesellschaft. Sonja is shareholder of 75 percent and is head of the bank's supervising board. She also became consultant of the Vienna Stock Exchange and was member of the supervisory board of Italian Finlombardia bank.
1948: In light of the realities of the military situation and the failure of the UN to act, the Israeli government explicitly rejected the proposal for an internationalized
Jerusalem
.
1957(8th of Av, 5717): Nobel Prize winning chemist Heinrich Otto Wieland passed away. Wieland was not Jewish. According to one source, Wieland provided educational opportunities for Jewish students who were expelled under the terms of the Nuremberg Laws. Wieland was also an associate of members of the White Rose, a secret anti-Nazi organization whose membership was, for the most part, killed off by the Gestapo during the last years of the war.
1958: Birthdate of Israeli political leader Silvan Shalom, the native of Tunisia who made Aliyah in 1959 and served in a number of ministerial positions including Vice Prime Minister
1959(1st of Av, 5719): Rosh Chodesh Av
1962(5th of Av, 5722): Actress Marilyn Monroe was found dead in her Los Angeles home. She was 36. Her death was ruled a probable suicide from an overdose of sleeping pills.
Monroe
had converted to Judaism when she married playwright Arthur Miller.
1964: Mel Brooks marries Anne Bancroft.
1966: Birthdate of actor Jonathan Silverman the son of Rabbi Emanuel Silverman and the grandson of Rabbi Morris Silverman.
1975: Birthdate of Iddo Goldberg, the Israeli actor who played Yitzchak Shulman, in the film version of Defiance, the book and film that told the story of the Bielski partisans, a group led by three Jewish brothers who saved and recruited Jews in Belarus during the Second World War.
1976: Leonard Bernstein conducted the German-language premiere of Candide, at Wiener Stadthalle in Vienna.
1978: Birthdate of Israeli tennis player Harel Levy.
1981: Yitzhak Berman succeeded Yitzhak Moda’i as Minister of Energy and Water Resources.
1981: Mordechai Tzipori, succeeded Yoram Aridor as Communications Minister
1995(9th of Av, 5755): Because today is Shabbat, this evening is Erev Tisha B’Av
1995(9th of Av, 5755): Israeli composer Menachem Avidom passed away at the age of 87.
1999: Matan Vilnai succeeded Ehud Barak as Minister of Culture and Sport
1999: Yithak Vaknin began serving as Deputy Minister of Communications.
2001: The New York Times book section featured a review of Francine du Plessix Gray’s biography of Simon Weil, the ‘atheist Jew’ entitled Simon Weil
2005: Nicole Sarah Mackey, daughter of Mark and Karen Mackey, granddaughter of Harvey and Elaine Luber, and an all-around great person, becomes a Bat Mitzvah in Little Rock, Arkansas.
2006: Marissa Carson, daughter of Laura and Bill Carson is called to the Torah as a Bat Mitzvah in
Cedar Rapids
,
IA.
As the Israelis are battling those who would destroy the Jewish state, there is additional drama and poignancy to the opening words of her haftarah, “Comfort, ye, comfort my people – Nachamu, Nachamu ami.”
2006(11th of Av, 5766): Fadiya Juma'a, 60, and her daughters Sultana, 31, and Samira, 33 were killed by Hezbollah rockets.
2007: An exhibition entitled “Dateline Israel: New Photography and Video Art” comes to a close at the Jewish Museum in New York City.
2007: The Sunday New York Times Book Section reviewed Dalia Sofer’s first novel, The September of Shiraz, a “richly evocative, powerfully affecting depiction of a prosperous Jewish family in Tehran shortly after the revolution” and 15 Stars: Eisenhower, MacArthur, Marshall: Three Generals Who Saved the American Century by the Jewish author Stanley Weintraub.
2007: The Sunday Washington Post book section reviewed Girls Gone Mild by Jewish author Wendy Shalit and Fateful Choices: Ten Decisions That Changed the World, 1940-1941 by Ian Keshaw. “The last decision Kershaw explores -- moving to the industrial-scale murder of
Europe
's Jews -- wasn't so much a decision as the endpoint of a long trajectory of anti-Semitism that found its ultimate exponent in Hitler and its impetus in the speed of his victories in 1940 and 1941. This final chapter is a horrifying chronicle of the "spiral of radicalization" in Nazi thinking that led from Mein Kampf to Auschwitz-Birkenau. It is a fitting coda to Kershaw's thoughtful, far-reaching examination of events that echo down to today.”
2007: The Cedar Rapids Gazette featured an article about In Tolerance a precision contractor manufacturing company owned by Jewish community leader Robert Becker describing it as “a Cedar Rapids company leading the way in family-friendly policies.”
2008: In Little Rock, AR, opening session of From Ruins to Glory, a course of study based on a virtual tour of the Temple.
2008: In St. Paul, MN, the Modern Marvels series, “Jewish Adventures in the Graphic Novel”examines The Quitter by Harvey Pekar. Ostensibly covering Pekar's early years, this dark graphic novel tackles everything from his brief stint in the Navy to jazz criticism and mid-century race relations. The gritty and atmospheric artwork by American Splendor collaborator Dean Haspiel perfectly captures Pekar's cantankerous tone. But a surprisingly hopeful message ultimately surfaces. It's possible to find your way in the world, Pekar suggests, even if it takes a lifetime to do it. This series explores Jewish literature and culture through scholar-led discussions of contemporary and classic books on the theme of "Modern Marvels: Jewish Adventures in the Graphic Novel." The program is the result of a grant to the
University
of
Minnesota
- Twin Cities Libraries, which is partnering with The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library. Local support is provided by the Center for Jewish Studies at the
University
of
Minnesota
. Let's Talk About It: Jewish Literature, a reading and discussion series has been made possible through a grant from Nextbook and the American Library Association. (Editors note: With an active Jewish community like this, it does not seem so odd that the two leading contender for the
U.S.
Senate from
Minnesota
this fall are both Jewish despite the relatively small number of Jews living in the land of a thousand lakes.
2008: Shaul Mofaz officially entered the race to be leader of Kadima and received a blessing by Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef
2008: Yakov Kreizberg conducted his final symphony at the BBC Proms.
2009(15th of Av, 5769): Tu B’Av - “According to the Talmud (tractate Ta'anit, 30b-31a), Tu B'Av was a joyous holiday in the days of the Temple in Jerusalem: Unmarried girls would dress in simple white clothing (so that rich could not be distinguished from poor) and go out to sing and dance in the vineyards surrounding Jerusalem. One of the happier holidays on the Jewish calendar, the Fifteenth of Av is today considered the Israeli equivalent of Valentine's Day. Yet another holiday with agricultural origins, Tu B'Av is said to be the day that the members of the twelve tribes were first allowed to marry each other. While often forgotten elsewhere, Tu B'Av is a fairly big deal in Israel. People send cards and give flowers to their loved ones, and hold special "Holiday of Love" parties. http://www.sfjcf.org/resources/jholidays/
2009:The Times of Londonreported today that the Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah has stockpiled 40,000 rockets near the border with Israel and is training its guerillas to use missiles capable of striking Tel Aviv,. According to the report, militants are now being trained in the use of both long-range ground-to-ground missiles as well as anti-aircraft missiles to use against Israel. Israel, the United Nations and Hezbollah itself have all said that the milita is stronger today than it was during the Second Lebanon War. While the northern front has been relatively quiet since the 2006 conflict, Deputy GOC Northern Command Alon Friedman told The Times that the peace could "explode at any minute." Last month, Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah predicted that Israel would attack Hezbollah strongholds in southern Lebanon sometime before next spring. Nasrallah told Lebanese media his organization would launch missiles at Tel Aviv if Israel attacks the Shi'ite group's positions in Lebanon. He warned that "the equation had changed" in its method of resistance against Israel and threatened to attack Tel Aviv should the IDF bomb the southern suburbs of Beirut, as it did during the 2006 war. Senior Israel Defense Forces staff and defense establishment personnel have expressed extreme concern over the possibility of a serious incident on the Lebanese border in the near future. Tensions with Hezbollah have risen lately, especially since one of the organization's warehouses of Katyusha rockets in southern Lebanon blew up last month. In response, defense officials have held several high-level consultations on the situation. The explosion revealed that Hezbollah was still stockpiling rockets south of the Litani River, in violation of Lebanon's obligations under UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which marked the end of the Second Lebanon War. The Times obtained surveillance footage showing Hezbollah guerillas trying to extract rockets and munitions from the site of the explosion. UN peacekeeping forces were subsequently blocked from entering the site for investigation. Israel, meanwhile, has said that UNIFIL had precise information about the cache and a number of other installations where Hezbollah is storing rockets, but that peacekeeping force had done nothing. Senior IDF officers believe that Hezbollah has completely rebuilt its network of bunkers and arms stockpiles in south Lebanon, but has located them almost entirely inside Shi'ite villages rather than in open areas, as it did sometimes in the past. The warehouse explosion revealed this fact, and has prompted Hezbollah to worry that Israeli intelligence may know where its new bases are located.
2009(15th of Av, 5769): <span style='font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; fo