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Volume 2, Number 30
 
Volume 2, Number 133
 
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Today's Postings

Tuesday, June 3, 2008
{Click on a headline to jump to story or scroll leisurely through our report}

Middle East

Israel, at 60, has many kvelling points by Dorothea Shefer-Vanson in Mevasseret Zion, Israel

Syria's 10-meter problem at the Kinneret by J. Zel Lurie in Delray Beach, Florida

The Arts


Masterful retelling of Shoah in Vilna by Donald H. Harrison in San Diego

From Red Diaper Baby to Citizen Josh by Carol Davis in San Diego

Lifestyles

Are you lazy? You can put the blame on your genes—when you get around to it by Natasha Josefowitz in La Jolla

Adventures in San Diego Jewish History

December 16, 1946: That's What I Think by Ray Solomon
December 16, 1946: J.C.S.C. by Joe Wertheim
January 9, 1947: Robt. R. Nathan-Wollheim To Speak Here Monday

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The Week in Review

This week's stories on San Diego Jewish World: Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Sunday, Monday

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A HERALD IN ZION


Israel, at 60, has many kvelling points

By Dorothea Shefer-Vanson

MEVASSERET ZION, Israel—Turning sixty is not generally an event to be celebrated. It marks a turning-point between being middle-aged and elderly, though perhaps that is not as clear-cut today as it once was. But for a country, and especially one whose initial survival was uncertain, it is a significant milestone. Today Israel’s existence, though still questioned by some on the terrorist fringe, is firmly entrenched and its achievements are far from insignificant.

There is no need here to go into the details of Israel’s struggle to combat the initial onslaught by the Arab countries surrounding it. Suffice it to note Israel’s integration of the myriad Jewish refugees from Europe and the Arab countries, when its population doubled in the first five years of its existence. Those Arab countries refused to invest even one hundredth of their vast resources in absorbing their own refugees, preferring to leave their fellow-Muslims to rot in refugee camps, thereby deliberately perpetuating the problem.

Israel’s record in absorbing immigrants has been recognised as an unparalleled social and economic achievement. At the same time Israel has managed to mark up achievements in agriculture, education, science, the arts and industry that are the envy of many larger, richer and longer-established countries.

In this era of ecological awareness it is worth noting that back in the 1950s Israel made the use of solar power for heating water mandatory in all new buildings. The Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, together with the Technion in Haifa and the universities in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Beersheba, stand at the forefront of global academic research. Israel’s bio-tech and pharmaceutical industries are also among world leaders. Contrary to George Steiner’s expectations, Israel has even managed to produce several Nobel Prize laureates in the sciences

Despite adverse conditions, Israel’s agriculture has flourished. Today Israel’s fruit, flowers, vegetables, and even its wines, are welcomed in global markets, while demand for its organic produce outstrips supply.

One of the world’s leading high-tech companies, Intel, esteems Israeli brain-power so highly that it has made Israel one of the leading centres of its R&D activities, with several development units in Israel. It is also the site of some of its largest factories, or ‘fabs’, in which micro-processors, the ‘brain’ of the computer, are made. So when you see the words ‘Intel inside,’ you can read them as ‘Israel inside.’

Israel’s literary production—and consumption—is phenomenal, with new and veteran writers being published at an unprecedented rate. Israel’s market for books is among the largest in the world relative to population size. Fifty Israeli writers whose books have appeared in French were feted at the recent International Book Exhibition held in Paris. Many more Israeli authors were left out for lack of room and resources. Furthermore, the Israeli film, ‘Beaufort,’ based on a novel by Ron Leshem, was a candidate for best foreign film at the recent Oscar ceremony, and took first prize at the Berlin Film Festival.

Alongside such established names as Zuckerman, Barenboim and Perlman, Israeli musical talents continue to gain international renown. At the recent Rubinstein Piano Festival no first prize was awarded but the joint second prize was awarded to young pianists from Taiwan and Israel—the first time an Israeli has achieved this. A young Israeli cellist took first place at a recent music competition in England. And Israeli names appear frequently on the international art and design scene. Israeli talents even grace the international football world.

While this is no time for complacency, Israel’s achievements are remarkable by any criterion. They can—and should—constitute a source of pride for all Jews everywhere.

By J. Zel Lurie

DELRAY BEACH, Florida--Now that Syria and Israel are talking peace once again, this time under the auspices of Turkey, I am reminded of my visit to the Golan-Syrian border in March of 1994.

It was at at the Fifth Annual Conference of Jewish Media convened in Jerusalem by the World Zionist Conference.  We Jewish journalists  were taken by the WZO public relations department  to the Golan Heights where the WZO was spending $25 million a year.

The WZO was maintaining the fiction that the Jewish Agency was not using American tax-exempt charity dollars in the conquered territories. The fact that most of the WZO’s income came from the Jewish Agency was ignored.

First, the WZO took us to a military base for a briefing. In a small auditorium before a model of the Golan a colonel explained to us that we would not see many tanks during our tour of the Golan because he had only a few. He said that in case of another surprise attack. Like the one on Yom Kippur in 1973, it would take Israel two to three days to fully mobilize.

The function of the Golan garrison was to stave off the Syrians for two or three days while the country fully mobilized all of its reserve units.

While I haven’t spoken to an Israeli colonel lately, it is clear that the preponderance of force today in Israel’s standing army and air force lessens the need for sacrificial soldiers to hold off an attack. When Ehud Olmert offered  to return the Golan to Syria in exchange for peace he was not giving up an important military advantage.

After this eye-opening military briefing we saw the ranches and grape farms, the moshavim and kibbutzim that civilian Israel would be giving up . In the intervening fourteen years since our visit hundreds  of millions of dollars of private and public funds has been invested in building and expanding tourist attractions.

The Golan Heights today is Israel’s playground and summer resort.

Last April, after my granddaughter’s wedding in a circus tent near Netanya, we drove up to the Golan. Perched on top of a mountain we found a crowded restaurant run by a kibbutz in the valley below. On a clear day, we were told. you could see the sea.

When the Arab residents of the Golan, estimated by Wikipedia at 53,000, fled to Syria in 1967, the Druze on the Syrian border stayed in their homes and villages. In 1994, during our vist, there was a furor over the Isreli demand that they become Israeli citizens, like their co-religionists in Israel.

The Druze in Israel are not only citizens as are their Arab neighbors. But unlike the Arabs, the Druze young men are drafted like the Jews and serve three years of compulsory military service.

I have a photo of myself with the mukhtar of one of the Druze villages. He is a handsome young man, a head taller than me with black hair and mustache, I remember him saying: “We Druze like to protest but in the end we will become citizens as I have.”

Acceding to Wikipedia fewer than 30 percent of the Golan Druze have become Israeli citizens. The rest maintain their Syrian citizenship. 

The majority ostracize those who have become Israelis. On the other hand, says Wikopedia, they live freer lives and have a higher standard of living than their cousins in Syria. Girls in Syria are willing to wed boys in the Golan with the knowledge that their trip across the border will be a one-way trip. Their visits with their mothers will be confined to shouts across the no-man’s land as seen in the movie “The Syrian Bride.”

Syria was united with Egypt under Nasser in 1973. It did not follow big brother Egypt in making peace with Israel. The U.S. brokered peace talks in 1999-2000 broke down over a ten-meter strip of land  in the n northeastern corner of the Kinneret.

The Kinneret a.k.a. the Sea of Galilee is the reservoir for  most of Israel’s water supply.  Israel is able to maintain full control because the international treaty negotiated by  the British and the French in 1923 sets the border at ten meters from the shore. However before 1973 it was no-man’s land and Syrian fishermen hauled their boats across the ten-meter strip in the northeastern corner of the lake.

After the debacle in the U.S-brokered talks eight years ago, Syria joined with Iran in supporting Hamas and Hezbollah. It assisted Saudi suicide bombers to cross into Iraq to kill Americans and Iraqis.  It became a leading member of the axis of evil while its economy went down the tubes.

Bashir Assad decided that he would attempt to reverse course to allow  his people to eat. He initiated peace talks with Israel a year ago. He appointed technicians to meet secretly with Israelis and search for a solution to the ten- meter problem that would satisfy both sides.  All this was an attempt for a rapprochement with the United States to secure financial aid.

President Bush has not been encouraging to say the least. . The recent announcement in Ankara that Israel and Syria are negotiating under the auspices of Turkey was greeted by Dana Perino, the White House spokeswoman with the announcement; “The United States is not participating. This decision was undertaken by Israel. We were not surprised by it. We do not object to it.”

She added: “W e hope that this is a forum to address various problems that we all have with Syria -- its support of terrorism, repression of its own people, and we will see how this progresses.”

Bashir had asked how much am I bid? What can I expect from the United States if I make peace with Israel, give up my treaty with Iran and stop supporting Hamas and Hezbollah?

The answer he received from the White House spokeswoman  is “We are not buying.”

Bashir immediately dispatched his foreign minister to Iran to assuage the little Hitlerian president and assure him that nothing has changed between Syria and Iran.

Not until January 20, 2009, anyway.



THE JEWISH CITIZEN

Masterful retelling of Shoah in Vilna

Until Our Last Breath by Michael Bart and Laurel Corona, St Martin’s Press, 2008, 308 pages including end notes, U.S. $25.95,

SAN DIEGO—This is a history in which excellent research by Michael Bart is married to the fine writing of Laurel Corona, a writer with a straightforward style who, for the most part, lets the facts of the Holocaust speak for themselves.

The result is an engrossing account about the parents of Michael Bart of San Diego and the experience of the Jews of Vilna during the Holocaust. We glimpse their life before the war, experience the torment of the ghetto, break loose with them to the forests to join the partisans, and weep with relief when after the war they reach the safety of life in America.

Most adult readers already are familiar with the chronology of the Nazis’ genocide against the Jews; what this book does perhaps better than others is to help us understand the calculations that captive Jews made as they weighed whether this choice or that would more likely result in their staying alive.

Life in the ghetto was not simply a passive affair, waiting for the executioner; it was a deadly chess game.  The trouble was the Nazis had bishops, knights, castles, and a queen, and the Jews had but a few pawns.

Should they report for a work assignment, or should they stay hidden in a maline (a secret hiding place in a building)?  If they don’t work, they won’t get a ration card for food; but if they do go to work, it may be to dig their own graves in Ponary, the forest where tens of thousands of Jews were machine-gunned into pits. 

Should they try to recruit every able-bodied Jew to a resistance movement in order to have sufficient numbers, or should they keep the resistance a secret in order to better their chances of not being discovered?

Should they attempt guerrilla warfare against the Germans in the ghetto, and possibly bring massive retaliation on the entire population, or should they wait until they can escape the city and join the partisans in the forests? 

Once in the forest, should they kill Nazi sympathizers who live on the farms they must raid for food, or should they send them away?

Should they allow themselves to be integrated into other Partisan units of Lithuanians or Soviet fighters, or should they maintain their separate identity as Jewish fighters?

Into these kinds of questions are woven the personal stories of Leizer Bart and Zenia Lewison Bart, he a Polish Jew, she a Lithuanian Jew.  Once her “higher class,” in the view of her family, would have prevented them from making a marriage, but these were extraordinary times.

Leizer had secretly been a member of the resistance, even while serving as a German-supervised Jewish gate guard at the ghetto.  In this job, he sometimes had to make a big show of patting down someone returning from work outside the ghetto, and if indeed he felt contraband under that person’s jacket, to keep right on patting without changing expression.

But could that person be a Nazi agent, carrying the contraband to test him?  If he allowed  the person to pass through, would he be shot?

As a member of the Jewish police force, Bart often fell under the suspicion of the other ghetto residents, who, not knowing of his role in the resistance, wondered if he was a collaborator with the Nazis.   But eventually his judiciousness and demeanor won him a reputation among the Lithuanian Jews as “one of the good ones.”  

Zenia had met him at a social affair, and was drawn to the shy man until she learned of his gate guard role.  Then she wanted nothing to do with him, until friends persuaded her that he was different from the others. 

They began to spend more and more time together, never alone, because in a ghetto where strange families were required to share the rooms of small apartments, and even beds, couples were never alone.  Even in the forest, where Partisans slept together in bunkers, they were not alone.  Alone had to wait until after the war, but at least Leizer and Zenia were able to be together.  

And when at last Leizer told Zenia of his role in the resistance—which she did not know even existed—she decided that she would choose to join the Partisans too, even if it meant going to the forest with him and leaving her family behind in the ghetto.

So many, many choices—but none of these choices were of their choosing.

Harrison, editor and publisher of San Diego Jewish World, may be contacted at
editor@sandiegojewishworld.com





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ARTS IN REVIEW

From Red Diaper Baby to Citizen Josh

By Carol Davis                                 

SAN DIEGO—I bumped into Matt Thompson of the newly formed Compass Theatre, formerly 6th @ Penn (he’s their new artistic director) and Steve Lipinsky at the Josh Kornbluth solo artist show as part of the Lipinsky Family Jewish Arts Festival at the San Diego Rep. where Kornbluth presented his Citizen Josh piece.

Steve told me that after seeing Kornbluth in Haiku Tunnel, his first feature film which he co-directed with his brother Jake (it was based on a 90- minute monologue) that he called Josh in San Francisco and convinced him to come down to San Diego to tell his story and to be a part of the Festival, which he did.


Josh did two shows for the festival: Red Diaper Baby, and Citizen Josh.  In Red Diaper Baby, his monologue is about his upbringing as the child of Jewish Communists in New York in the ‘60’s and ‘70’s. Originally when the piece was done Off Broadway Josh Mostel directed it, as he did here.

In Citizen Josh, directed by David Dower, he makes reference to his upbringing as well, but this monologue takes a different turn.  He starts off very low keyed by introducing himself and then asking why we’re not asking him, “Hey Josh, why tell a story about democracy? Isn’t democracy over?” Then he goes on to tell us that he is a monologist and democracy is a dialogue. “For the last few years, haven’t we been exporting democracy to other places around the world?” “Democracy is people power and I freeze when it comes to participating in political rallies. I’m really a pacifist who doesn’t belong at rallies.” And so he continues bringing us to the why of his search.

Kornbluth was raised in New York but now lives in Berkeley with his family.  He’s a very funny guy in a very serious way. Most humorists I’ve listened to throughout the years see life and everything around them through different eyes. His 90-minute show talked about democracy, a subject dear to his heart when it comes to leaving a legacy for our children, his included. It seems that when he completed his classes at Princeton 25 years ago he never wrote his thesis to get his degree but his dean told him he could write it and submit it anytime. But wait, this is how Citizen Josh came to be.

Through his dialogue (which seemed like a work in progress), Kornbluth weaves his autobiographical story, including his college days and why and how he never got to write his thesis, to how he came up with the idea, which began right after he voted in the 2004 elections. “America seemed so utterly divided politically, and in my despair I realized how much I missed the context that Wolin (one of his Princeton professors) had introduced me to through courses in political theory.”

In his haste to reconnect, Josh found his old professor’s number on line and contacted him. With some fast-talking, he told his professor that he was finally ready to write his thesis. Much to his surprise, Wolin agreed to be his advisor once again. “After I explained that I perform autobiographical monologues for a living, he suggested I do my thesis as one."

Suffice it to say, by evening’s end we learn that he finally used his story idea on looking for democracy in all places to fulfill his thesis requirements while teaching us all a lesson in the art of using the democratic processes. From building a new playground in a park across from his house, to his parents agonizing over the care of his preemie brother, to demonstrating at Princeton, to the last election, to his academic involvement with his friends, his college professors and finally to his love for his son, he convinces us to get involved in change at all levels of government. 

It all begins with just one person and that’s you!

He will be taking his Citizen Josh, his third collaboration with director David Dower, to the Arena Stage in Washington, DC  and performing it there for the three weeks leading up to the 2008 November elections. According to Josh, the two plan to keep tinkering with the show in the interim. The last time I saw Josh, which was immediately after his performance of Citizen Josh, he was schlepping his suitcases behind him, checking on some airline tickets. He will be doing the show at the Ashby Stage in Berkleey from June 26 through July 20. So…if you happen to be in the Bay Area, give it a try.

It’s not surprising that this program was co-sponsored by Ion Theatre and Sledgehammer Theatre; both produce cutting-edge shows.

The festival continues next on June 16 and 17 with two new Jewish Plays, Bluish, by Janece Schaffer and The Wandering Jew by Matt Thompson to be presented at the North Coast Repertory Theatre in Solana Beach. These will be staged readings. Hope to see you there.




DOING IT BETTER

Are you lazy? You can put the blame on
your genes—when you get around to it


By Natasha Josefowitz, Ph.D.

LA JOLLA, California—Most of us, as we grow older, experience having less energy than in our younger years or need to take a short nap while reading a book, and so it is easy to fall into a lazy frame of mind.

Yes, I said, “lazy,” although lazy is a negative word—for it implies a person who should be active and productive but is irresponsible and chooses to let others do the work.

Actually, laziness is in our genes according to clinical psychologist Dr. Nando Pelusi. There was a time when conserving energy was a survival tactic. For most of human existence, predation and starvation were constant threats. Our ancestors lived for the fulfillment of immediate needs: thirsty: look for water, hungry: look for food, cold: look for shelter. Thinking long term made no sense in a world where the future was uncertain and the present required one’s full attention. Laziness, by definition, is an unwillingness to expend energy; in a world that only rewarded instant gratification, putting things off that had no immediate reward was smart.

Today, we call this postponement, procrastination and deem it a negative behavior. All of a sudden in the history of human evolution, we have more distant goals; we must plan for a future. And whether it is cleaning out the file cabinet, studying for an exam, preparing our tax returns, or finally starting work on that book we are forever planning to write, our natural propensity is to avoid it, opting instead for some task with an immediate reward. We fool ourselves by believing that we’ll do it tomorrow; we find reasons to avoid doing now something which could wait, saying to ourselves, it’s too difficult or time-consuming, feeling an aversion to start tackling that task immediately.

This feeling of aversion which changes into inertia and an inability to get going is what is ingrained in us and needs to be dealt with. Once we understand that we are programmed to feel this way, we can consciously overcome it using several strategies. I have always believed that by making our unconscious more conscious, we have the means then to deal with it.

First realize you are doing battle with yourself and your own natural propensity to procrastinate.

Then look at the task at hand and divide it into small segments. Can you do this for 30 minutes, an hour? And then push yourself to finish it in the allotted time.

Be wary of interruptions—you may encourage them thereby sabotaging yourself.

Write down a schedule for getting it done—what day, what time, for how long.

Tell someone of your plan and ask that person to prod you if necessary and then monitor your progress.
Give yourself a reward upon completion, such as permission to rest on your laurels and be lazy for awhile.

Some people can only finish a task when there is a deadline to be met, and they then wait until the last minute to start working feverishly at it. This is in fact a strategy for overcoming the inertia.

So even as you grow older and indeed must conserve energy for the tasks of daily living, putting aside some energy for a long-term goal becomes another kind of reward—you have overcome your genetic predisposition, you have conquered, and you have won. Congratulations.

This article also appeared in the current issue of La Jolla Light




ADVENTURES IN SAN DIEGO JEWISH HISTORY



Robinson-Rose House

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Editor's Note: We are reprinting news articles that appeared in back issues of various San Diego Jewish newspapers. You may access an index of the headlines of those articles by clicking here. You may also use the Google search program on our home page or on the headline index page to search for keywords or names.


That's What I Think
From Southwestern Jewish Press, December 12, 1946, page 6

By Ray Solomon

Last week I attended a meeting of the Homefor the Aged Auxiliary, and as I listened to Al Hutler, guest speaker of the afternoon, tell of conditions abroad affecting the Jews, I couldn't help but feel grateful fr the circumstances which had enabled me and my immediate family to escape the horrible experiences which were the fate of numerous aunts, uncles and cousins of mine.

Then I looked around at the women listening attentively to Mr. Hutler, executive director of the United Jewish Fund, and I had the warm feeling that at last we here in San Diego had a leader with the ability, as well as the determination and sincerity to lead us to the realization of a completely co-ordinated community—a goal which has long been the ardent desire of so many of us.

Already in the short time that Mr. Hutler has been with us, he has accomplished much that had seemed unattainable. Perhaps most important of his accomplishments have been the organization of a President's Council and a Jewish Youth assembly—both formed for the purpose of joining all Jewish factions. In general Hutler has created an atmosphere of optimism throughout the entire community.

In the past many of us have been accused of disinterest in communal problems, but with the competent leadership that Mr. Hutler has indicated so far, this 'disinterest'—perhaps actually frustration (a personal helplessness to remendy what seemed a hopeless situation) will be dispelled.

I can foresee an era of great achievement. The degree of achievement of Mr. Hutler will depend entirely on the assistance and cooperation that he receives from every individual in this community.

*

This week we learned that the 1947 goal for the United Jewish Appeal will be $170,000,000 which means that every single Jew in the United States will be called upon to support this tremendous but imperative goal. Locally, this will mean that every Jewish family in San Diego will be obligated to contribute. Not just a few carry the entire burden, but every single person doing his just share.

J.C.S.C
From Southwestern Jewish Press, December 12, 1946, page 7

By Joe Wertheim

The co-ordination of Jewish activities through a central council represented by all clubs and organizations in the San Diego area was the keybnote of the talk given by Mr. Albert A. Hutler, Executive Director of the United Jewish Fund of San Deigo before the Jewish Community Social Club on Thursday, December 5, at the Temple Center. Building of a Jewish Community Center to house all the gorups, maintain an athletic, cultural and social program, coordinate money-raising drives and act as a center of all Jewish activities in this city was the hope expressed by Mr. Hutler. We cergtainly would like to thank Mr. Hutler for his enlightening talk and to assure him that the Jewish Community Social Club is solidly behind him.

Final arrangements for the bowling affair have been made and it was announced by Don Goodwin that everyone is invited to participate on Tuesday, December 17, at 8:30 p.m. at Sunshine Bowling Alleys, 6th and Broadway. It would be well to leav eyour name with Don at the next meeting so that he will know just how many will be present that night.

It was also announced that at the next meeting to be held on Thursday, December 12, 8:30 p.m., at Temple Center, 3rd and Laurel, nominations will be accepted for new officers for the next club year. In addition interim plans for the New YEar's Party will be discussed and a poll taken as to how many people will attend.

Refreshments and dancing will follow the business meeting.


Robt. R. Nathan-Wollheim To Speak Here Monday
From Southwestern Jewish Press, January 9, 1947, pages 1, 8

In the second of a series of open forums sponsored by the United Jewish Fund, Robert R. Nathan, the noted economist and author, former Deputy Director of War Mobilization and Reconversion will speak. The Lasker Lodge B'nai B'rith is joint sponsor of the forum which will take place Monday, January 13th, at 8:30 p.m. at Temple Center, 3rd and Laurel Streets.

Mr. Nathan, who resigned the position he held with the Department of Commerce fornine years to join the U.S. Army gained widespread notice recently with the publication of the CIO-Nathan report and with his excellent economic study of Palestine. He returned to government service in 1945.

Also speaking at this forum will be Norbert Wollheim, Vice Chairman of the Central Jewish Committee in the British Zone in Germany, who was instrumental in saving 7,000 Jewish children from the Nazis, {and} has just arrived in the United States, where he will act as a spokesman for the 1,500,000 Jeiwsh survivors in Europe on whose behalf the United Jewish Appeal for Refugees, Overseas Needs and Palestine will wage a $170,000,000 campaign in 1947.

A prominent leader of the German Jewish youth movement, and a trained social worker, Mr. Wollheim spurned all opportunities to leave Nazi Germany while he had the chance. Assisted by the British Baldwin Fund, he stuck to his post of organizing transports of Jewish children to England, Sweden, france and Belgium, right up to the beginning of the war. In connection with a mission for the Central Organization of German Jews, he returned to Berlin three weeks before the outbreak of the war and was imprisoned by the Nazis.

He was drafted for slave labor and in 1943 was shipped to the Auschwitz death camp, where hiswife, his only child, and other relatives were murdered. His indominitable spirit unbroken, he braved constant death by establishing liaision with British prisoners of war, and succeeded in smuggling information to the outside world, which described in detail the Nazi extermination terror.

When the Russian Armies approached Auschwitz, he was among nearly 6,000 Jews who were driven westward. Thousands died on the roads. The weak and faltering were clubbed and shot by Nazi guards. Finally they were cut off from two sides by the advancing Allied Armies. When the Germans began to kill systematically the decimated remnants of the surviving Jews, Mr. Wollheim and a handful of his comrades escaped through the German lines and reached American advance units.

Through the cooperation of American Army authorities, he established the first direct contact with the outside world in over five years, and did valuable work in the organization of the Joint Distribution Committee's relief program, supported through the United Jewish Appeal.

As Vice-Chairman of the Centeral Jewish committee in the British Zone, he has been entrusted with many vital tasks since the end of the war. He has just returned from a trip to London where he consulted with government officials, including the Minister of War and Minister for Germany. As a result of those conferences, the British Government has agreed to recognize two Jewish spokesmen representing the 23,000 displaced Jews in the British Zone. Mr. Wollheim will act as one, and Joseph Rosenzaft, Chairman ofthe Committee, is the other.

Our indexed "Adventures in San Diego Jewish History" series will be a daily feature until we run out of history.

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SAN DIEGO JEWISH WORLD THE WEEK IN REVIEW

Monday, June 2, 2008 (Vol. 2, No. 132)

Middle East
Ehud Olmert, does clock tick for thee? by Ira Sharkansky in Jerusalem
Jerusalem Day at Mercaz Harav Yeshiva by Judy Lash Balint in Jerusalem
Operation Homefront: Helping our American troops, no matter our politics by Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal in San Diego
The Arts
Zohan restyles Jewish comedy by Rabbi Simcha Weinstein in New York
A production you'll get a big bang out of by Carol Davis in Solana Beach, California
Lifestyles
Why the Bella Family Circle stopped its annual tradition of selling white elephants by Sheila Orysiek in San Diego
Adventures in San Diego Jewish History
December 12, 1946: Bergen Belsen Director to Speak
December 12, 1946: Black Book Now at Public Library
December 12, 1946: Welcome Home...A Job Well Done

Sunday, June 1, 2008 (Vol. 2, No. 131)

Middle East
Zbig's efforts to accommodate Iranian mullahs didn't work then; won't work now by Shoshana Bryen in Washington D.C.
Author asserts Palestinians' ancestors converted under pressure from Islam by Donald H. Harrison in San Diego
Judaism
The Sinai and the modesty commandment by Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal in San Diego
Yes, she was Jewish, but she had to ask her father what Yom Kippur was all about by Rabbi Baruch Lederman in San Diego
The Arts
'
La Jolla North' at the Statford Festival with Des McAnuff; Shaw Festival also pleases by Carol Davis in Stratford, Ontario, Canada
Adventures in San Diego Jewish History
November 7, 1946: Junior Charity League
November 7, 1946: Relatives Sought
December 12, 1946: Maxwell Kaufman To Be Honored At Dinner


Friday-Saturday, May 30-31, 2008 (Vol. 2, No. 130)


Yael Bugin in Kibbutz Kfar Aza, Israel: Kfar Aza resident to Hamas: We are here!
Cynthia Citron in Los Angeles: Ford, Lebouef and Spielberg team up for another hilarious Indiana Jones adventure
Carol Davis in San Diego: Zeji Ozeri starts San Diego Jewish Art Festival off with a zesty Israel tribute
Ulla Hadar in Ibim, Israel: Students have village of own in Ibim
Donald H. Harrison in San Diego: WIZO dinner, JAFI director provide perspectives on North American Jewry
Sheila Orysiek in San Diego: Chapter Ten in the serialization of her novel, Reluctant Martyr
Ira Sharkansky in Jerusalem: Olmert probe may trigger government crisis
Adventures in San Diego Jewish History: What was the Jewish community news in 1946? Who were the newsmakers? Our archives answer these questions in daily installments


Thursday, May 29, 2008 (Vol. 2, No. 129)


Shoshana Bryen in Washington, D.C.: Israel-Syria deal wouldn't sweep away Iran
Donald H. Harrison in San Diego: Songwriter versifies about religion, food, loneliness—'whatever is happening'
David Strom in San Diego: The Jewish boy who became a Nazi mascot
Janet Tiger in San Diego: Naval Supply Center hosts Holocaust survivor at remembrance days observance
Adventures in San Diego Jewish History: What was the Jewish community news in 1946? Who were the newsmakers? Our archives answer these questions in daily installments

Wednesday, May 28, 2008 (Vol. 2, No. 128)


Carol Davis in San Diego: Busy Salovey launches 15th Annual Lipinsky Family San Diego Jewish Arts Festival 
Donald H. Harrison in San Diego: Jewish Agency for Israel, UJF weigh Ibim Student Village partnership's direction
Evelyn Kooperman in San Diego: San Diego Jewish Trivia: Football
Brian Schaefer in San Diego: A Jew contemplates his new right to marry
Adventures in San Diego Jewish History: What was the Jewish community news in 1946? Who were the newsmakers? Our archives answer these questions in daily installments


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