December 12 In History
456 BCE (1st of Tevet, 3305): Ezra opened convocation on the problem of intermarriage.
627: A Byzantine army under Emperor Heraclius defeats Emperor Khosrau II's Persian forces, commanded by General Rhahzadh at the Battle of Nineveh. This meant that The Byzantine or Eastern Roman Empire regained control of the Middle East, including Jerusalem. Unfortunately, Heraclius, the Byzantine Emperor did not keep his promise to his Jewish allies to give them control of David’s City and its environs.
1098: During the First Crusade, Christian forces breach the walls of Ma'arrat al-Numan in Syria and massacre about 20,000 inhabitants. Some view this is as a “dress rehearsal” of the massacres that took place when the Crusaders arrived in Jerusalem and slaughtered the Jewish and Moslem inhabitants
1474: Isabella crowns herself queen of Castile and Aragon in what will become a milestone on the road to end of the Jewish Community in Spain in 1492. Ironically two of the people who would help her come to power and/or consolidate her crown were Don Isaac Abravanel and Don Abraham Senior.
1479: The Jews were expelled from Schlettstadt, Alsace by Emperor Frederick III
1484: At Soncino, Italy, Joseph Solomon Soncino printed the first copy of “Beḥinat ha-'Olam” (The Examination of the World) by Jedaiah ben Abraham Bedersi a Jewish poet, physician and philosopher. Born in 1270 at Béziers, he was the son of Abraham Profiat, another French-Jewish poet. He passed away in 1340. Beḥinat ha-'Olam (The Examination of the World), called also by its first words, "Shamayim la-Rom" (Heaven's Height), a didactic poem written after the banishment of the Jews from France (1306), to which event reference is made in the eleventh chapter. The 37 “chapter” poem concludes with an expression of Bedersi’s admiration of Maimonides.
1505: In Ceske Budejovice, Czechoslovakia, ten Jews were tortured and killed after being accused by a local shepherd of killing a local girl. Years later on his deathbed, the shepherd confessed that he made up the whole story.
1524: Pope Clement
VII
approved the organization of a Jewish Community in Rome
1574: Selim II, Ottoman Sultan, passed away. During his reign, Selim appointed Joseph Nassi as the Duke of Naxos. He appointed his physician Solomon Nathan Eskenazi to serve as ambassador in Venice where he participated in negotiations for a treaty between the Turks and the Spanish. When Turkish forces took Cyprus, Selim had five hundred Jewish families settle on the island. This was a way of improving the economic environment on the island while ensuring the presence of a loyal local population.
1626: Inquisitional authorities arrested Francisco Maldonado de Silva, after his sister (a devout Catholic) turned him because he told her he believed in Judaism, as their father had. His passion for Judaism came after studying a book written in 1391 by the Bishop of Burgos. The Bishop, a convert Jews who was born as Solomon Halevi, wrote the book to defend the Catholic faith. Halevi's words put doubt into Francisco's mind about Catholicism, and brought him closer to Judaism-the religion Francisco's father had already been following. In the end Francisco went to his death January 23, 1639 for his faith in Judaism.
1653: The Short Parliament was dissolved today leaving Oliver Cromwell, who held the title of Protector of the Realm, as the king-like ruler of England. This may have actually helped Manasseh ben Israel in his effort to gain readmission of the Jews since Cromwell, unlike some of his allies, actively supported the Jews attempts to return to the British Isles.
1670: Today the Sephardic Jewish community of Amsterdam acquired the site to build a synagogue
1787: Pennsylvania became the second state to ratify the U.S. Constitution. Religious qualifications for holding state and local office were abolished in 1790. Jews had been part of Pennsylvania even before the coming of William Penn. The community had its start with Jewish traders who operated in what would be the southeastern corner of the soon to be founded colony. Mikveh Israel (Hope of Israel) the Philadelphia’s first synagogue was established in the 1740’s. When an enlarged Mikveh Israel, under the leadership of Gershom Mendes Seixas was dedicated in 1782, a wide variety of public officials attended. Jews were earlier settlers of Lancaster where a Jewish burial plot was established in 1747. The size of the Jewish population was exaggerated due to that fact that the English confused Yiddish speaking Jews with the German speaking Pennsylvania Dutch.
1806: Birthdate of Rabbi Isaac Lesser, one of the most important leaders of the 19thcentury American-Jewish community whose accomplishments included completing the first translation of the Bible from Hebrew in English published in the United States.
1831: In Jamaica, a tankard was presented to Moses Delgado in recognition of his work on behalf of Jewish rights
1841: Jacob Frankfort arrived in Los Angeles as part of the Rowland-Workman party. Frankfort, one of the earliest Jewish settlers in New Mexico had been living in Taos when he hurriedly left town because authorities believed he was part of a group of Texans seeking to take control of the territory. He and some of his confederates joined a scientific expedition and traveled with them to California.
1851: “Interesting Hebrew Relic” published today reported that in Washington, DC, Colonel Lea, the Commissioner of Indian affairs has in his possession “four small rolls or strips of parchment, closely packed in the small compartments of a little box or locket of about an inch cubical content. On these parchments are written, in a style of unsurpassed excellence, and far more beautiful than print, portions of the Pentateuch, to be worn as frontlets and intended as stimulants to the memory and moral sense.” The item was brought to Washington from the Pottawatomie Reservation on the Kansas River by a man named Dr. Lykins. Lykins got them from a member of the tribe name Pategwe who had gotten them from his aged grandmother. Originally there had been two boxes, but one of them had been lost long ago when the Indians were crossing some river rapids. The Indians believed that the lost box contained a description of the creation of the world. Nobody seems to know how the boxes first came into the possession of the Indians. They cannot remember a time when they did not have them in their possession. The article concludes, “The question occurs here, does not this circumstance give some color to the idea, long and extensively entertained, that the Indians of our continent are or less Jewish in their origin?”
1853: Rabbi Raphall delivered the last in a series of lectures on “The Sacred Poetry of the Hebrews” in New York City.
1855(3rd of Tevet, 5616): 8th and final day of Chanukah
1861: At today’s regular meeting of the Board of Councilmen the report in favor of donating $30,000 to the Hebrew Benevolent Association was finally adopted.
1874: It was reported today that it appears Russian government has ordered to the managers of the nation’s railway companies to fire all of the Jews in their employ and not to hire any Jews in the future.
1875: 1875: During the past week, the Hebrew Charity Fair raised $66, 421.19 for Mt. Sinai Hospital
1878: Joseph Pulitzer begins publishing "St Louis Dispatch." Pulitzer’s father was Jewish. His mother was Roman Catholic.
1880(10thof Tevet, 5641): Asara B’Tevet
1880(10thof Tevet, 5641): Fifty-year old Hyman Vollenburg, a Jewish tailor was found dead in his room on Baxter Street in New York. He was said to be so observant that he refused to accept anything which had been purchased from Jews who worked on Shabbat.
1880: It was reported today that among Mrs. Jacob Hess, Mrs. A.H. Allen, Mrs. J.J. Bach, Miss Alice Solomon and Miss Essie Content (who portrays the Biblical Rebecca at the well) are among the young ladies the Mrs. Isaac Phillips has enlisted to work during the ten day long Hebrew Charity Fair in New York.
1881: According to reports published today the burial of the victims of the theatre fire in Vienna that claimed the lives of 580 people was public ceremony that began with speeches by a Rabbi, a Catholic Prior and an Evangelical Provost. The Jewish victims were the first to be buried with their ceremonies beginning at daybreak.
1882: Sarah Bernhardt had a major marital row with her husband Jacques Damala during she which she would no longer support his dissolute lifestyle. This marital breakup came while she was starring in the hit play Fedora by Victorien Sardou. Sardou refused to let him have a part in the play so Sarah let him serve as manager of the theatrical company, a position that he was totally unfit to hold. Following his dismissal he turned to drugs and humiliating her at every turn. The role of “Mr. Sarah Bernhardt” was one that he could not play.
1882: Birthdate of famed chess player Akiba Rubenstein.
1884: In New York, Marx Cohen, who has already been charged with receiving “$7 worth of goods” stolen from Bates, Reed & Cooley, is expected to be charged with more serious crimes today. According to the police, is a Fagan-like figure who organizes youngsters into gangs of thieves and then fences the stolen merchandize. The Jewish store owner has denied all allegations.
1884: It was reported that in Russia, the Minister of Interior, Count Tolstoi, “has ordered the expulsion of all Jews living in Odessa, Kiev and other cities” if they hold foreign passports and do not have special permits from the government. This has caused a great deal of concern for Jews doing business in this city who are afraid the new rules will force them into liquidation.
1884: It was reported today that fighting has broken out among Jewish and anti-Semitic university students in Vienna
1885: In New York, Rabbi S. Schocher, of Russ, a city near Memel, Prussia gave a lecture at Or Chaim in the classical style of the old-fashioned Derashot.
1886: In New York, four undercover officers arrested for Polish Jews for selling dry goods in violation of the Sunday Closing Laws.
1887: It was reported today that the Hebrew Free School Association which had been providing services to 520 students in 1876 had grown to providing 2,581 students ten years later (1886).
1887: It was reported today that the Hebrew Free School Association had chosen new officers for the following year including: President – M.S. Isaacs; Vice President – Uriah Herman; and Treasurer – Newman Cowen.
1888: “Four Couples Made Happy” which was published today reported that two Jewish couples were among what was described as the four “fashionable weddings” that occurred in New York City.
1889: Birthdate of Phillip Carl Katz, the San Francisco native who earned the Medal of Honor while serving as a Sergeant in the U.S. Army
1889: Poet Robert Browning passed away. Browning wrote “Rabbi ben Ezra.” The poem is based on the life Abraham ibn Ezra. Ibn Ezra lived from 1092 until 1167 and was a leading figure in what was known as the Golden Age in Spain. Ibn Ezra was second only in fame to Rashi as Torah commentator. He was the first two attribute that the last section of Deuternomy describing the death of Moses was written by Joshua. He was also the first two attribute the last 26 chapters of the Book of Isaiah to a different writer now known as the Second Isaiah. The poem begins with the famous line “Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be…”
1893: Birthdate of actor Edward G Robinson. Born Emanuel Goldenberg in Romania, Robinson came to the United States in 1902. Robinson gained early fame playing in gangster movies including the classic Little Caesar and Key Largo. He also had a deft comedic ability. One of his most often seen, and poorest performances, is as the grumbling Jew in “The Ten Commandants.” He passed away in 1973.
1895: In New York, the Hebrew Fair continued to draw “immense crowds” and enjoy three days of increasing financial success.
1897: Anti-Jewish violence broke out in Bucharest, Romania.
1901: Birthdate of Howard E. Koch, playwright, screen writer and victim of the Hollywood Blacklist.
1902(12thof Kislev, 5663): Seventy year old Edwin Warren Moise passed away in his native South Carolina.
http://sc150civilwar.palmettohistory.org/edu/people/Moise-EdwinW.htm
1903(23rd of Kislev, 5664): Solomon Loeb, one of the founders of the banking firm of Kuhn, Loeb &Co., passed away this evening in New York City at the age of 74.
1904” Birthdate of Nicolas Louis Alexandre, Baron de Gunzburg the Parisian native who served as editor at Vogue, Harper’s Bazar and Town & Country.
1905: Birthdate of Manès Sperber an Austrian born French novelist, essayist and psychologist who also wrote under the pseudonyms Jan Heger and N.A. Menlos. He was also the father of Italian historian Vladimir Sperber and French anthropologist and cognitive scientist Dan Sperber.
1905: Birthdate of Iosif Solomonovich Grossman who gained fame as Soviet author and journalist Vasily Semyonovich Grossman.
1906: The Brownsville Retail Kosher Butcher’s Association was meeting at the same time that the women of Brownsville were holding a mass meeting designed to gain support for a boycott of the Beef Trust. The mass meeting was chaired by Israel Reichman. There were 350 butchers at the Kosher Butcher’s meetings, 100 of whom have closed their shops in support of the attempts to end the Beef Trust.
1906: Leopold Greenberg, owner of a successful British advertising agency, publisher of “The Jewish Yearbook” and an ardent Zionist writes Jacobus Kann, his friend a Dutch Zionist, that “The Jewish Chronicle” is for sale and he has begun negotiating for its purchase.
1909: Birthdate of Hans Alex Keilson, “a Jewish German/Dutch novelist, poet, psychoanalyst, and child psychologist who wrote about traumas relating to what happened in Europe during WWII. In particular, he worked with traumatized orphans. Some of his novels deal with the same time period, though his first one was published in 1934. He was also active in the Dutch Resistance. Francine Prose has called him one of ‘the world’s very greatest writers.’" (As reported by William Grimes)
1911: During the days of the British Empire, Delhi replaced Calcutta as the capital of India. Shalom Aaron Cohen who came to India from Aleppo in 1790 was one of the first Jews to settle in Calcutta. The arrival of Jews from Baghdad during the 19th century marked an upturn in their economic and social power that lasted until the power World War II rise of Indian nationalism.
1913: Hebrew language officially used to teach in schools located in Eretz Israel.
1915: Birthdate of Frank Sinatra. Sinatra “may have been one of America 's most famous Italian Catholics, but he kept the Jewish people and the State of Israel close to his heart, manifesting life-long commitments to fighting anti-Semitism and to activism on behalf of Israel . Sinatra stepped forward in the early 1940s, when big names were needed to rouse America into saving Europe's remaining Jews, and he sang at an "Action for Palestine” rally (1947). He sat on the board of trustees of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and he donated over $1 million to Jerusalem’s Hebrew University, which honored him by dedicating the Frank Sinatra International Student Center . (The Center made heartbreaking headlines when terrorists bombed it in 2002, killing nine people.) As the result of his support for the Jewish State, his movies and records were banned in some Arab countries. Sinatra helped Teddy Kollek, later the long-serving mayor of Jerusalem but then a member of the Haganah, by serving as a $1 million money-runner that helped Israel win the war. The Copacabana Club, which was very much run and controlled by the same Luciano-related New York Mafia crowd with whom Sinatra had become enmeshed, happened to be next door to the hotel out of which Haganah members were operating. In his autobiography, Kollek relates how, trying in March 1948 to circumvent an arms boycott imposed by President Harry Truman on the Jewish fighters in Eretz Yisroel, he needed to smuggle about $1 million in cash to an Irish ship captain docked in the Port of New York. The young Kollek spotted Sinatra at the bar and, afraid of being intercepted by federal agents, asked for help. In the early hours of the morning, the singer went out the back door with the money in a paper bag and successfully delivered it to the pier. The origins of Sinatra's love affair with the Jewish people are not clear, but for years, the Hollywood icon wore a small mezuzah around his neck, a gift from Mrs. Golden, an elderly Jewish neighbor who cared for him during his boyhood in Hoboken, N.J. (Years later, he honored her by purchasing a quarter million dollars' worth of Israel bonds). He protected his Jewish friends, once responding to an anti-Semitic remark at a party by simply punching the offender. Time magazine reported that Sinatra walked out on the christening of his own son when the priest refused to allow a Jewish friend to be the godfather. As late as 1979, he raged over the fact that a Palm Springs cemetery official in California declared that he could not arrange the burial of a deceased Jewish friend over the Thanksgiving holiday; Sinatra again -- threatened to punch him in the nose. Sinatra famously played the role of a Jewish pilot in Cast a Giant Shadow, the 1966 film filmed in Israel and starring friend Kirk Douglas as Mickey Marcus, the Jewish-American colonel who fought and died in Israel's War for Independence (Sinatra dive-bombs Egyptian tanks with seltzer bottles!) He donated his salary for the part to the Arab-Israeli Youth Center in Nazareth, and he also made a significant contribution to the making of Genocide, a film about the Holocaust, and helped raise funds for the film. Less known is Sinatra in Israel (1962), a short 45-minute featurette he made in which he sang "In the Still of the Night "and "Without a Song". He also starred in "The House I Live In" (1945), a ten-minute short film made to oppose anti-Semitism at the end of World War II, which received an Honorary Academy Award and a special Golden Globe award in 1946.”
1917: Four days after the British arrival in Jerusalem, Dr. Yaakov Thon, convened a meeting of Jewish leaders with an eye toward establishing a City council of Jerusalem Jews.
1920: The Histadrut Ha-ovdim (General Labor Federation) was founded in pre-state Israel. Its founder, Berel Katznelson, a disciple of Ber Borochov, combined various labor groups to form a federation
1924: Birthdate of Edward I Koch. Koch served as Mayor of New York City from 1977 to 1989.
1924: In Berlin, Alexander Israel Helphand, the man who negotiated with the German’s during World War I to gain Lenin’s return to Russia from Switzerland which brought about the Communist Revolution and took Russia out of World War I passed away.
1925: The Majlis of Iran votes to crown Reza Khan as the new Shah of Persia. The new Shah removed “removed restrictions on Jews and other religious minorities.’ He prohibited the mass conversion of Jews and “Jews were allowed to hold government jobs.” But the Shah’s sympathetic view of Nazi Germany, along with an under-current of anti-Jewish sentiment, left the community with a sense of discomfort.
1928: In Manhattan State Supreme Court Judge Alfred Frankenthaler and his wife Martha gave birth to abstract expressionist painter Helen Frankenthaler
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Helen_Frankenthaler-1956.jpg
1931: Dr. Alexander Rosenfeld, vice president of the World Maccabee Association, spoke this afternoon over WLPH from the Lyric Theatre, Brooklyn. He talked about the forthcoming Maccabee Jewish Games which will be held in Tel Aviv in March, 1932 and in which more than 3,000 Jewish athletes from all parts of the world are expected compete.
1935: Heinrich Himmler begins the Lebensborn Project.
1937: Jewish writer Arch Oboler caused more controversy with his script contribution to today’s edition of The Chase and Sanborn Hour. In Oboler's sketch, host Don Ameche and guest Mae West portrayed a slightly bawdy Adam and Eve, satirizing the Biblical tale of the Garden of Eden. On the surface, the sketch did not feature much more than West's customary suggestive double-entendres, and today it seems quite tame. But in 1937, that sketch and a subsequent routine featuring West trading suggestive quips with Edgar Bergen's dummy Charlie McCarthy cause a furor that resulted in West being banned from broadcasting and from being mentioned at all on NBC programming for 15 years.
1937: The Palestine Postreported numerous assassinations, attempted murders, hold-ups and robberies perpetrated by Arab terrorists all over the country. In Haifa, Elimelech Gromet, 13, the victim of a terror attack in the Hadar Hacarmel quarter, died of his wounds. Sheikh Khatib, an Arab notable, and his bodyguard were murdered in the town's Arab quarter. In Jerusalem all gates of the Old City, except for the well-guarded Jaffa and Damascus gates, were closed from early in the evening until late the following morning.
1939:In eastern areas of Greater Germany, two years of forced labor is made compulsory for all Jewish males aged 14 to 60.
1939: Jews are expelled from Kalisz in the Warthegau region of Poland; many flee to Warsaw.
1940: The Salvador, a ship that set out from Varna, Bulgaria, a month ago, sinks in the Sea of Marmora; 250 Jewish refugees, including 75 children, drown. T. M. Snow, head of the British Foreign Office's Refugee Section, notes that "there could have been no more opportune disaster from the point of view of stopping this [Jewish refugee] traffic [to Palestine]."
1941: Adolf Hitler announced plans for the extermination of the Jews at a meeting in the Reich Chancellery
1941: In the second action in two weeks, the Germans killed another estimated 12,000 inhabitants of the Riga Ghetto.
1941: The German Army of Occupation began a house to house search in Paris looking for Jews.
1941: The SS Struma set sail from Constanţa, on the Black Sea
1942: The Jews of Volhunia revolt against a German round-up.
1942 Jewish prisoners at a labor camp in Lutsk, Ukraine, armed with knives, bricks, iron bars, acid, and several revolvers and sawed-off shotguns, revolt against Germans and Ukrainians. The uprising is crushed.
1943: The chairman of the Jewish Council in Wlodzimierz Wolynski, Poland, the site of street massacres in 1942, assures the remaining ghetto residents that they will be safe
1945: The U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved a resolution of U.S. aid to open Palestine to Jewish refugees.
1946: Arabs call for a general strike to protest the alleged abduction of an Arab in Salame, Palestine by the Haganah.
1946: Two illegal Arab Armies were merged by the Arab High Committee into the Arab Youth Movement.
1946: Birthdate of Steve Goldsmith, Harvard professor and former mayor of Indianapolis, Indiana.
1947: Gordon P. Merriam, chief of Division of Near Eastern Affairs, refers Dr. Irving E Medoff of New Jersey to the United Nations after he had written to the U.S. State department concerning his interest in organizing an air force group to operate in Palestine. Merriam’s referral is based on the U.S. view that matters pertaining to Palestine are under the control of the UN.
1947: King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia promised that the Arabs will protect and maintain American oil operations at the same time expressing the hope that the U.S. will correct its “mistake” on the issue of Palestine Partition
1947: British foreign minister Ernest Bevin asks the Jews for a moratorium on “illegal immigration” while the mandate is still in power.
1947:UN Trusteeship Subcommittee announces that internationalized Jerusalem will only have a police force which can call on UN Security Council if more order is needed. Legislature is legally "rigged" so a minority group will keep a balance of power between Jewish and Arab factors.
1947: The Arab League voted to provide funds, weapons and volunteers for an impending Palestine war designed to thwart the United Nation’s partition vote. An Arab Liberation Army under the command of an Iraqi staff officer named Ismail Safwat Pasha established its headquarters outside of Damascus and gave field command to Fawzi al-Qawujki a veteran terrorist leader of the uprisings during the 1930’s.
1947(29th of Kislev, 5708): An Arab gang stopped a BOAC truck leaving Lydda Airport. The Arabs told the Arabs on the truck to run away. The three Jews – Yitzhak Jian, David Ben Ovadia and Joseph Litvak - were then shot dead.
1948: Israel and Transjordan let Christians travel to Bethlehem for Christmas pilgrimages
1948: “Less than two weeks after the signing of the final cease-fire, the ‘Valor Road’ was opened by Ben-Gurion as a secure by-pass for travel from Jerusalem to the coast. The road replaced the famous ‘Burma Road’ and made it possible for Jews to travel the fifteen miles from the Judean hills to the coastal settlements without having to brave Arab sniper attacks.
1949: The U.S. asks Israel and Jordan not to do anything which would disrupt relations with other Arab states or the Vatican.
1949: Birthdate of Anglo-Jewish historian David Samuel Harvard Abulafia who is married to another famous historian Anna Sapir Abufia. (Can you imagine what a Shabbat dinner would be like at their house?)
1950: Paula Ackerman became the interim "spiritual leader" of Temple Beth Israel in Meridian, Mississippi after her husband, who was the congregation's rabbi, passed away.
1952: The Jerusalem Post reported that the Political Committee of the UN General Assembly passed, by 32 votes to 13, with 13 abstentions, a strongly-worded resolution calling for direct Arab-Israeli negotiations.
1952(24th of Kislev, 5713): In the evening, kindle the first Chanukah light
1953: Birthdate of Ben Shalom Bernanke, Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board.
1963: Kenya gains its independence from the United Kingdom. Jews began to settle in Kenya in the early years of the 20th century. In 1904, The Nairobi Hebrew Congregation was established in 1904 and the 20 families living in Nairobi built the country’s first synagogue in 1913. The community saw some growth after World War II. In 1955, “Israel Somen, the president of the Board of Kenya Jewry, was elected mayor of Nairobi.” A small Jewish community has continued to exist which has not been always been the case of former colonies in sub-Saharan Africa. Israel and Kenya continue to enjoy positive relations.
1966: A 27 year member of Local 338 writes to the national union headquarters expressing his despair over the deteriorating conditions in the bagel industry which are leading to cuts in pay, benefits and the number of jobs available for bakers.
1970: Birthdate of Jennifer Connelly who won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress 2002 for A Beautiful Mind and the 2002 Golden Globe 2002 for same role.
1971(24th of Kislev, 5732): In the evening, kindle the first Chanukah light.
1971(24th of Kislev, 5732): David Sarnoff,
CEO
of RCA and founder of NBC, passed away. Born in Russia 1891, Sarnoff reportedly studied to be a rabbi before joining the Marconi Wireless Company as a telegraph operator. He became the leading figure in the creation of RCA.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,989773,00.html
1974: In Jerusalem, an explosive device went off in Ben Yehuda Street. Thirteen people were injured lightly to moderately.
1975: In San Diego, CA, Barry Bialik and Beverly Winkelman gave birth to actress Mayim Bialik, who played Blossom Russo on “Blossom” and Amy Farrah Fowler on “The Big Bang.” “Hayim Nahman Bialik, Israel's national poet, was Mayim Bialik's great-great-grandfather's uncle”
1978(12th of Kislev, 5739): American painter Norman Raeben died of heart attack in the lobby of his apartment. Born in Russia in 1901, he was “the youngest of the six children of Yiddish author Sholom Aleichem.” “The pen-name 'Raeben' is probably derived from his family-name 'Rabinowitz'. Raeben moved to New York City with his family in 1914. He studied painting from Robert Henri, George Luks and John French Sloan, who all belonged to the Ashcan School. His studio was on the 11th floor of Carnegie Hall. His students include Bob Dylan, Bernice Sokol Kramer, Carolyn Schlam, Andrew Gottlieb, Janet Cohn, John Smith, Diana Postel, Lori Lerner and Rosalyn (Roz) Jacobs. Raeben's mission was to teach the art of painting through intuition and feeling, instead of through conceptualization.”
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://onlinemusicnews.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/bob-dylan.jpg%3Fw%3D270%26h%3D350&imgrefurl=http://onlinemusicnews.wordpress.com/2010/02/12/bob-dylans-first-paintings-exhibited-at-london-art-gallery/&h=350&w=270&sz=10&tbnid=_iux545og55DOM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=69&zoom=1&usg=__qw-YbB6DAXy_MGDsQIdAdoQMo4A=&docid=MKC71nuTN27GiM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=nL_HUN7oDsSi2QWUoIGADw&sqi=2&ved=0CCoQ9QEwAw&dur=1139
1979(22nd of Kislev, 5740): Elka de Levie, the only Jewish gymnast of the triumphant 1928 Dutch ladies’ gymnastics team, which won the Olympic title in Amsterdam in 1928 to survive the horrors of the Holocaust, passed away.
1988:Foreign Minister Shimon Peres urged the Palestine Liberation Organization today to direct its diplomacy toward Israel rather than the United States. ‘We criticize the Palestinian position and their declarations because they have been looking for expressions that travel well in Washington rather than for positions that make sense in Jerusalem,'' Mr. Peres told a meeting of American and Israeli officials and academics. ''The Palestinians must remember, as we do that coexistence between the Palestinians and Israel must take place in the Middle East and not in North America,'' Mr. Peres said. ''The Palestinians must not only talk peace - and I appreciate statements in favor of peace - but behave peacefully,'' he said.
1988: European countries are pressing the Palestine Liberation Organization and its Arab allies to moderate plans to seek United Nations recognition of an independent Palestinian state, diplomats said today. The effort came on the eve of a special meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. Yasir Arafat, the P.