Anatole Litvak’s Confessions of a Nazi Spy, the first anti-Nazi feature film produced by a Hollywood studio, was released by Warner Bros. on May 6, 1939, shortly before the outbreak of World War II. This taut espionage thriller stars the Romanian-born Jewish actor Edward G. Robinson as an FBI agent who breaks up a Nazi […]
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu projected optimism last month after speaking on the phone with U.S. President Donald Trump. He claimed they were on “the same side of every issue” from the current war in the Gaza Strip to Iran’s nuclear program. Trump concurred with Netanyahu, writing on his social media platform, Truth Social, that […]
Israel’s already complex relationship with Qatar has grown more complicated. Qatar, one of three Arab states U.S. President Donald Trump is due to visit next week on his second trip abroad since his inauguration in January, has in recent days been denounced by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. First, Netanyahu accused Qatar of “playing both sides” […]
Contemporary Israeli food is a fusion of diverse cuisines. Foreign conquerors, from the Greeks and the Romans to the Crusaders and the Ottomans, have swept through Israel, leaving behind gastronomic traces. But Ashkenazic and Sephardic Jewish immigrants, as well as Palestinian Arabs, have had the greatest impact on Israeli food, judging by Abraham’s Kitchen: Israeli and […]
Beth Lane’s Netflix documentary, Unbroken, tells what is perhaps a unique story of survival during the Holocaust. By a stroke of good fortune, all seven siblings in a Jewish family in Nazi Germany managed to surmount adversity. At a time when being Jewish or even half-Jewish was tantamount to a virtual death sentence in Adolf […]
The families, friends and supporters of the hostages held by Hamas have implored Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to widen the war in the Gaza Strip. “The expansion of military operations puts every hostage at grave risk,” the families said in a recent statement. “We implore our decision makers: Prioritize the hostages. Secure a deal. […]
The Houthis, Israel’s ferocious enemy and Iran’s proxy, struck a raw nerve on the morning of May 4, forcing Israel to respond almost immediately. They fired a ballistic missile from distant Yemen that crashed into an orange grove perilously close to Ben Gurion Airport, one of Israel’s most strategic sites. The projectile left a big […]
Al Jolson was in a class all by himself. From about 1912 until 1934, he was the most highly paid entertainer in the United States. What Enrico Caruso was to opera, Jolson was to popular song. Jolson’s friend, the comedian George Burns, once said, “There was nobody as good as Jolson. When he got through, […]
The late Herberts Cukurs, a Nazi collaborator in German-occupied Latvia, had blood on his hands. As a commander of the Arajs Kommando, a Latvian police unit under the authority of the German occupying force, he played a critical role in the mass murder of local Jews. Latvian historian Andrew Ezergailis, the author of The Holocaust […]
The Liberal Party won Canada’s federal election on April 28. Judging by the profusion of Liberal campaign placards planted on the lawns of homes in the mid-town district of Toronto-St. Paul’s, the Liberals were heading for a fourth consecutive victory. St. Paul’s, where I live, is a bellwether constituency whose neighborhoods range from upper-class Forest […]