I Recited Kaddish Today

Did you know that the 10th of Tevet was "ordained by the Chief Rabbinate of Israel to recite Kaddish for Jews who perished in the Holocaust and whose yahrzeit is unknown"? Nowadays not too many are away of this. However, in the first decades following the rebirth of the State of Israel, the synagogues here were full of people reciting Kaddish for loved ones who were murdered by the Nazis and their accomplices. That is what I heard from Torah scholars old enough to know.

For the first time in my life a recited Kaddish for the elevation of the souls of my great-grandparents, who perished during the Holocaust in Bessarabia.

הי"ד

The Amazing Story of Ovadia and Aliza Baruch

The story of how the holocaust affected Greek Jewry is seldom told. Here is the amazing "love story" of Ovadia and Aliza Baruch:

Aliza describes the "experiments" she went through in block 10:

You can read more about Ovadia and Aliza here.

Baruch Kopold's Story

The Yad Vashem channel on YouTube has many excellent films. Here is the story of Baruch Kopold, a partisan fighter and holocaust survivor:

Rabbi Lau's Suitcase

Rabbi Lau Speaking Yiddish (With English Subtitles)

RabbI Lau is one of our national treasures:

Am KeLavi by Naftali Lau-Lavie

I just finished reading the book Am KeLavi by Naftali Lau-Lavi.  Naftali is Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau's older brother, and was instrumental in saving him during the holocaust.  After the war, Mr.  Lau-Lavie came to Israel.  He became a journalist who later went on the serve as a media advisor and spokesman for Moshe Dayan.  He was witness to and played a major role in some of the major events in Israeli history, such as the Camp David Accords.

The book is fascinating and well worth the read.  After reading it, one really appreciates the privilege of living here in the State of Israel.  An English version of the book is available for those of you that do not understand Hebrew.

Here are a few videos of the Lau brothers discussing their experiences during the holocaust:

Japanese Holocaust Rescuer: Sugihara 'Sempo' Chiune

Dvar Torah For Parashat VaYishlach

Last week's Torah portion ends with Ya'akov's confrontation with the master swindler, his father-in-law Lavan. In this week's portion Yaakov faces another dangerous confrontation, this time with his brother Eisav. As he gets ready for this encounter the Torah tells us the following:

וַיָּקָם בַּלַּיְלָה הוּא, וַיִּקַּח אֶת-שְׁתֵּי נָשָׁיו וְאֶת-שְׁתֵּי שִׁפְחֹתָיו, וְאֶת-אַחַד עָשָׂר, יְלָדָיו; וַיַּעֲבֹר, אֵת מַעֲבַר יַבֹּק. וַיִּקָּחֵם--וַיַּעֲבִרֵם, אֶת-הַנָּחַל; וַיַּעֲבֵר, אֶת-אֲשֶׁר-לוֹ

How are we to understand the verb וַיַּעֲבִרֵם , the causative of the root ayin-beit-reish,"to pass"? The JPS translation reads as follows:

And he rose up that night, and took his two wives, and his two handmaids, and his eleven children, and passed over the ford of the Jabbok. And he took them, and sent them over the stream, and sent over that which he had.

This translation fits in well with Nachmanides' understanding of the verse:

ויעבר את אשר לו, בצווי, כי חזר וציווה שיעברו לפניו ונשאר הוא אחריהם

And he transfered that which he had, by command, for he returned and commanded that they should pass before him and he remained behind them.

Rashi, however, interprets the verse according to the Midrash in Bereshit Rabbah:

את אשר לו - הבהמות והמטלטלין, עשה עצמו כגשר, נוטל מכאן ומניח כאן

that which he had - the livestock and the chattels. He made himself as a bridge, taking from here (one side of the stream) and placing here (on the other side of the stream).

In other words, Ya'akov personally, with his own hands, transferred all of his numerous possessions from one side of the Jabbok (Yabbok) to the other. Why would Ya'akov do such a thing? The Torah tells us that Ya'akov had

"... large flocks, and maid-servants and men-servants...".

Why would Ya'akov do all the work by himself when he had others who could have lent a hand?

Rav Teichtal, in his book Eim HaBanim Semeichah, tells us that the Midrash is coming to teach us something beyond the plain meaning of the verse. Ya'akov made himself like a bridge. A bridge has two "feet", one on each side of the river. Ya'akov figuratively had one foot in the exile, and one foot in the land of Israel. That is to say, his heart and head were in the land of Israel even when he was outside of the Holy Land. The fact that Ya'akov never forgot the land of Israel is what enabled him to save his possessions from falling into the hands of the wicked Eisav. Rav Teichtal, writing in the midst of the Holocaust, bemoans his generation which was so firmly entrenched in Europe and in many cases felt at home there. They forgot where their home really was, in the land of Israel. In the end, millions of them were murdered by the Nazis and their collaborators. The hard-earned possessions of European Jewry fell into the hands of Eisav.

Ya'akov, who never forgot where he really belonged, made it to the land of Israel, complete in body, Torah and worldly possessions (see Rashi on Genesis 33:18). May all the Jews living outside of the land of Israel realize that they are not as American as apple pie or as English as the Queen. May they follow Ya'akov Avinu's example. May they learn to always have (at least) one leg in the land of Israel.

Yom HaShoah VeHaGevurah

Tommorow "Yom HaShoah VeHaGevurah" will be observed here in Israel. Features of the day include the following:

1) At 10:00 AM (?) a siren will be sounded and you are required to stand silent for a couple of minutes until the siren fades out. This is a really lousy and annoying custom.

2) Israeli MSM photographers will show us pictures from ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods of those black-frocked dudes that don't stand still during the siren. If they don't succeed they have another opportunity next week on Israel's Memorial Day for fallen soldiers.

3) The radio stations will play depressing music.

4) The radio stations will broadcast depressing interviews with survivors and/or their children.

I'm not against "Yom HaShoah VeHaGevurah". I'm for observing it in a more meaningful and Jewish way.

See also this old post.

Liviu Librescu: Survivor Of The Deportation To Transnistria

First of all I must express my horror at what happened at Virginia Tech, my sympathies to the families of those murdered, and a speedy recovery to the wounded.

Much has been written, in the MSM and in the blogosphere, about the massacre at Virginia Tech. The heroic exploits of Professor Liviu Librescu were lauded by many, and rightly so. The man obviously loved his students, and was willing to put his life on the line to save them. May his memory be a blessing.

Something that touched me personally was the fact that Prof. Librescu was a survivor of the deportation of the Jews of Besserabia and Bukovina to Transnistria:

When Romania joined forces with Nazi Germany in World War II, he was first interned at a labor camp in Transnistria and then deported along with his family and thousands of other Jews to a ghetto in the Romanian city of Focsani, his son said.

According to a report compiled by the Romanian government in 2004, between 280,000 and 380,000 Jews were killed by Romania's Nazi-allied regime during the war.

"We were in Romania during the Second World War, and we were Jews there among the Germans, and among the anti-Semitic Romanians," Marlena Librescu told Israeli Channel 10 TV on Tuesday.

In the winter of 1941-1942 my great grandparents were exiled from their home in Besserabia by "Romania's Nazi-allied regime" to Transnistria. They were never heard from again.

Everyone knows about Auschwitz and the Warsaw Ghetto . The mass murder of Jews by the Romanians is not as well known. For more information see this web site.