Author: Glen Berd

Sidney Poitier and the Jewish Waiter who Taught Him How to Read The famous actor found success after a kindly Jewish waiter taught him to read. Sidney Poitier, who died last week at the age of 94, was a towering presence for much of his life. The first Black Hollywood movie star, Poitier was the first Black actor to win an Academy Award for Best Actor, for his starring role in the 1963 movie Lilies of the Field. He appeared in over 39 movies and worked as a director, novelist and served as ambassador from the Bahamas (where his family lived) to Japan and the UN. “I walked with kings,” Poitier said about his seemingly charmed life. Yet in a 2013 interview, he revealed the secret to his early success: an elderly Jewish man who taught him to read, enabling Poitier to escape from poverty and illiteracy to achieve his potential. Born in 1927, Poitier’s parents Reginald and Evelyn Poitier were impoverished tomato farmers. “There...

Moses: A Man for all Seasons Peter Beyfus What do you know about Moses? Most people have an image of a man with a long beard, no not God, staff in hand, leading a vast multitude through a wilderness, bound for the Promised Land; and that is not to forget the crossing of the Red Sea, the waters of which were held back to allow the Israelites to cross dry-footed. This popular impression, bolstered by the creative imagination and wonder-works of Hollywood, is about what most lay-people can confidently describe.   In Torah we are given much detail of the man and his deeds, and the Talmud and Midrashim amplify the critical moments in the prophet’s life. In Parasha Shemot we are given an account of the origins of Israel’s greatest prophet, how a child born to Amram and Jochebed became the adopted son of Pharaoh’s daughter, and how on witnessing the desperate state of the Hebrew slaves became a fugitive after killing an...

Chief Rabbi’s secret mission for Manchester mother in twins custody battle Revealed: Rabbi Mirvis flew to Vienna to help British woman caught in decade-long fight for children   by JENNIFER LIPMAN   JANUARY 06, 2022 Trauma: Beth Alexander (Photo: Blake Ezra) The Chief Rabbi secretly flew to Austria in an unprecedented mercy mission help a British mother at the centre of a decade-long custody battle, the JC can reveal. Moved by the plight of Cambridge graduate Beth Alexander, 37, who has seen her 12-year-old twin sons just once in person in the past five years, Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis led an unpublicised delegation to Vienna to directly appeal to her former husband and local Jewish leaders. Desperate to try to effect change on her behalf, the Chief Rabbi vowed that if what it took was him getting on a plane and going in person, he would do so. In an extraordinary step, Rabbi Mirvis spent time with her twins, who were on a summer camp at their Jewish school, assessing their...

Holocaust survivor Freda Wineman’s ‘remarkable life’ remembered following death at 98 Health Secretary Sajid Javid and Shoah educators lead heartfelt tributes to French-born survivor who was “softly spoken” and “exuded warmth and charm” Freda Wineman (© Blake Ezra Photography Ltd) The “remarkable life” of Holocaust survivor Freda Wineman has been remembered following her death at the age of 98. Staff at the Holocaust Educational Trust (HET) and Health Secretary Sajid Javid are among those pay tribute to Ms Wineman, who lived in the UK and shared her experience at schools so that history would not be forgotten. As a French-born Jewish teenager at the outbreak of the Second World War, Ms Wineman was deported with her family to Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp by the Nazis. She was separated from her family, disinfected, and branded with the code A.7181. To mark last year’s anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, Ms Wineman shared her experience in The Independent “in order to stop the atrocities of the past from happening again”. She...

On New Year's Eve 1941, members of the Jewish ‘Dror’ underground in Vilna gathered in Anton Schmid’s apartment. What is so noteworthy about this particular meeting? Schmid was a German Army Corporal who was risking his life to help save Jews in the ghetto. To express their gratitude to Schmid, these Jewish young people told him that after the war they would invite him to the Land of Israel and give him a golden Star of David. "I will wear it with pride," Schmid replied. Unfortunately, none of those present at the meeting lived to see that day. Soon after, Anton Schmid was caught and executed; most, if not all of the Jews present at the meeting were killed in the Holocaust. The promise made to Anton Schmid, however, was not forgotten. It was described in a report by Lonka Koziebrodzka, a courier of the Zionist underground, who wrote a detailed account about the brave soldier and his rescue efforts. The report was added to...

This Remarkable Woman Made the First Israeli Flag in Jerusalem By Frieda R. F. Horwitz 28.12.2021 “I have waited my entire lifetime to see the rebirth of a Jewish state. I do not intend to miss it." Photo from the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People at the National Library of Israel     Passionate, adventurous, attractive, well-educated, a cosmopolitan world traveller and a gifted organizer, Rebecca Affachiner led an unusual life in the early 20th century, as a single religiously observant Jewish woman who held many professional firsts, as a woman without children who was deeply involved in the life of children of all ages, and as a woman who travelled globally without a chaperone or companion. Rebecca was born in Nesvizh (in present-day Belarus) in 1884 to the Sephardic Affachiner family who had lived there since the early 19th century. Children stand outside the Great Synagogue in Nesvizh, early 20th century. From the Center for Jewish Art at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, part...

  Simon Wiesenthal, born December 31, 1908. - Rabbi Marvin Hier reflecting on Simon Wiesenthal’s birthday. “One day Simon called and said that he would like to celebrate his 90th birthday with a few friends in Vienna. I asked him where he would like to celebrate. He said, ‘I have one unfulfilled wish, to have a party at the Imperial Hotel.’ He told me that it was Hitler’s favourite hotel and that both Hitler and Himmler had permanent suites there. They built enormous bunkers beneath the hotel, which still exist today, because Hitler thought that this would serve as an ideal headquarters from where he could conduct the Second World War. During the Third Reich, it would have been unthinkable, Simon said, for a Jew to be seen at the Imperial Hotel. ‘And I want to make sure,’ he said, ‘that all the taboos of the Third Reich are broken and that the record of this hotel would affirm that Simon Wiesenthal celebrated his 90th...

Staff Problems? By Peter Beyfus I am sure there are few people who have not seen, at least once, Cecil B DeMille’s 1956 epic The Ten Commandments; and that film, perhaps more than any other pictorial influence from the Renaissance to the present day, has left in the viewer’s mind an indelible image of Moses, staff in hand, leading the people of Israel out of Egypt. It is the role of Moses’ staff in the Exodus that I wish to explore in this article, and which features among the so-called wonders in this week’s  parasha Vaera, meaning I appeared; and the G-d who speaks to Moses cites His earlier manifestations to the Patriarchs, thus continuing the unbroken history of divine revelation to the Jewish people. When Moses first encountered G-d on Mount Sinai he was told that he was to return to Egypt. Moses, the fugitive, was understandably bewildered that the voice emanating from the “Burning Bush” should ask him to go back...