A Widow in Print
Dawn of Hebrew Printing The dawn of Hebrew printing naturally followed hot on the heels of the earliest books published in Europe, circa 1455. The first year to figure in Hebrew print was 1475, beginning...
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History Obliterated
Everyone’s Story The Holy Land’s ancient vistas and treasures play a vital role in the identity and faith of many hundreds of millions the world over. Though certain biblical locations have gained World Heritage status,...
Haman’s Pockets
Purim Powidl The triangular pastries that developed in Central Europe and spread eastward beyond the Carpathian Mountains have in recent generations become a central Purim motif. Known in Hebrew as oznei haman, or Haman’s ears,...
Megilla with a Secular Twist
The Megilla’s Darker Side Itzik Manger was born in 1901 in Czernowitz, although one version of the biography he invented for himself claimed that his tailor father had migrated from Romania, and that he himself...
In the Service of the Czar
The Czar of Progress Peter I, also known as Peter the Great (1672–1725), is a controversial figure in Russian history. His admirers are as many and varied as his detractors, and his life and works...
The Youngest Maccabee
Guerrillas in the Hills The year 160 BCE found the Hasmonean family in a sorry state. Judah had fallen in battle, his army decimated and the Maccabee rebellion all but quashed. Seleucid king Demetrius I...
Fighting for Heart and Soul
Why Hannukah? And Judah, and his brethren, and all the congregation of Israel decreed that the day of the dedication of the altar should be kept in its season from year to year for eight...
Cast a Giant Shadow
Antiochus' Castle People generally assume the history of Hasmonean Jerusalem began with the Seleucid conquest of Judea from the Egyptian Ptolemies, escalated with Antiochus Epiphanes’ anti-Jewish edicts and the idol he placed in the Temple,...
Long Before Balfour
Two Famous Declarations Almost two and a half millennia separate the two famous declarations that restored the exiled Jewish people to its homeland of Zion – the Cyrus Declaration of 538 BCE and the Balfour...
Damned If You Do
Weary and Drained Germany’s surrender to the Allied forces in May 1945 marked the official end of World War II. Soldiers returned home, and Europe set about rebuilding itself. Germany was divided into zones controlled...
Eilat’s Treasures
We Prefer it Open Traversing the rickety road from the Israeli port of Eilat to its Egyptian equivalent in Taba, past thousands of imported cars lined up in spectacular order, glinting in Eilat’s glaring sun,...
