Tag: Jewish History

This is one of those issues that ought to be shocking, but about which nothing is done. For years — I’ve written about this before — the Muslim waqf that controls the Temple Mount has been systematically destroying archaeological artifacts of Jewish provenance at the site.

The main holiday events took place on the last day of Sukkot, Hoshana Raba. The Gaon would lead the people around the Temple Mount, and then the crowd made its way to the Mount of Olives. After they climbed the mountain, they circled it seven times. A monumental stone marked the spot where God looked over the Temple Mount. The Gaon would sit on this stone as he spoke to the assembled crowd.

Defying historical fact, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad continued his existential verbal attacks on the State of Israel, claiming Israel has no historical basis in the Middle East Region.

On the issue of demographics, the numbers make things quite clear that even before modern Zionism began, the city was Jewish and only Muslim repressive policies artificially kept the numbers of Jews down before the mid-19th century.

The ancient synagogue in Meron is located on a hill above the grave of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai. Like other Galilean synagogues from the Byzantine era, its entrance faces south, towards Jerusalem. But what makes this synagogue special is a story from its later history.

There is an old rabbinic anecdote about a rabbi who was called on to deliver a eulogy for someone who had no redeeming social value whatsoever. The rabbi was hard pressed to think of anything positive to say about this person. So when he spoke he solemnly pronounced: “No matter how evil the deceased truly was, he was still a far better person than was his brother!”

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The message of the Biblical account of the Spies has tremendous relevance today, here in the modern State of Israel. With a nuclear threat from Iran, enemy states on its borders, the ever-constant fear of terrorism, and pressure from the International Community, Israel is not without its challenges. But it’s also the ‘Start Up Nation,’ with a healthy, growing economy when most of the world’s economies are failing.

Everybody reads comics. From the New York Times to the Post there is hardly any periodical published that doesn’t sometimes feature a cartoon or comic; some kind of drawn image with text to entertain or provide commentary. Even the Jewish Press. When most people think of comics they immediately think of fictional comic books that kids read or the comic strips in the daily newspapers for adults.

The campaign for recognition of the Bergson Group’s Holocaust rescue efforts took another step forward last week when a prominent historian who previously had been unsympathetic to the group publicly praised Bergson.

Rabbis Jonathan Sacks, Adin Steinsaltz, Shlomo Riskin and Berel Wein are among those publishing new works with Maggid Books, a division of Koren Publishers Jerusalem.

During the Holocaust, one group of killers stood out as more vicious, murderous, and bloodthirsty than all others.

Although Israel's economy stands strong amid a world recession, the political future of the Jewish state has perhaps never looked bleaker. Iran's nuclear threat looms large, Israel's West Bank settlements may soon become part of a Palestinian state, and Jerusalem stands threatened with division.

When Dr. Israel Shahak died on July 2, 2001, the Monitor speculated that he “presumably had ample opportunity by now to compare notes with Hitler, Stalin and the other equally distinguished residents of his new, supernaturally heated neighborhood.”

It has been more than 10 years since its conception, but finally the long-awaited groundbreaking ceremony for the Museum of Jewish History of Polish Jews has been set for June 26, 2007.