Femme fatale Lauren Bacall was a star during Hollywood’s golden age in the 1940s. Strikingly beautiful, with a slim figure, a long mane of hair, seductive eyes and a low, husky voice which could set hearts aflutter, she was a complete unknown when she starred opposite Humphrey Bogart, her future husband, in the 1944 film To […]
Eighty years ago next month, the St. Louis, a luxury German passenger liner carrying more than 900 Jewish refugees, left the port of Hamburg bound for Havana, Cuba. The passengers, possessing valid Cuban visas, expected to be admitted to Cuba, but their hopes were cruelly dashed. The Cuban government turned them away and the vessel […]
Sami Alkolombris, a Bulgarian Jewish baker from Jaffa, earned a small fortune and achieved a measure of fame in Israel by selling mouth-watering boreks, or bourekas, a flaky Middle Eastern/Balkan pastry made of phyllo dough and filled with stuffings ranging from salty cheese and spinach to potatoes and meat. Sami initially sold his wares from […]
The Arab-Israeli conflict is no laughing matter. But in Tel Aviv On Fire, which will be screened by the Toronto Jewish Film Festival on May 2 and May 4, Sameh Zoabi, a Palestinian director, breaks this mould by means of black humor, using Israel’s long-running dispute with the Palestinians as a source of biting satire. […]
The children and grandchildren of Holocaust survivors usually have some kind of an affinity, if only a superficial one, with their parent’s or grandparent’s homeland. This is particularly true in the case of Poland, whose prewar Jewish population of 3.3 million was virtually annihilated by the Nazis and their local collaborators. Elise Otzenberger draws on […]
The Palestinian Arab inhabitants of the Gaza Strip have been consigned to purgatory since the first Arab-Israeli war in 1948. This theme is fleshed out in Gaza, a sad and expressive documentary by Gary Keane and Andrew McConnell scheduled to be screened at the Canadian International Documentary Festival (Hot Docs) in Toronto on April 30, […]
Lea Tsemel, an Israeli criminal lawyer, is a polarizing figure in Israel. Critics vilify her as a devil’s advocate. Admirers describe her as a champion of human rights. Rachel Leah Jones, the director of Advocate, a documentary scheduled to be screened at the Canadian International Documentary Festival (Hot Docs) in Toronto on April 28, April […]
Some survivors of the Holocaust were little more than children when they were subjected to cruelty beyond the imagination. The traumas they experienced are etched into their souls, if not their faces. Several of these individuals turn up in Arthur Cary’s absorbing documentary, The Last Survivors, which will be broadcast by the PBS television network […]
Lugano is an anomaly — a Mediterranean enclave inside nordic Switzerland. In this enchanting corner of the country, known as Ticino, a visitor can often count on sunny weather and expect to see palm trees, semi-tropical vegetation and the pastel hues of southern Europe. Predominantly Italian in ambience, this pleasant city is set on the […]
One of the wonders of the world, the Dead Sea, is dying a slow death. A horrible thought, but depressingly true. Rich in medicinal minerals, like magnesium, the world’s saltiest, lowest-lying body of water has shrunk by about one-third and its depth has fallen by 65 feet. The Dead Sea has receded because it has […]