Photographer Dina Goldstein and Myles Peterson, one of her model-collaborators, at Goldstein’s OG Punk exhibit, which is at the Polygon Gallery until Jan. 2. (photo by Dina Goldstein)
Walking past the Polygon Gallery in North Vancouver, it is hard not to be drawn to the photographs adorning the walls. The powerful portraits of self-described original – OG – punks were taken by Jewish community member Dina Goldstein, whose work is known for its thought-provoking social commentary.
The exhibit OG Punk is on display at the gallery until Jan. 2. Curated by Helga Pakassar, it comprises portraits of major figures from the punk rock scene in Vancouver and Victoria, which were taken by Goldstein over the past year. It is accompanied by an audio guide written by author Michael Turner.
Turner notes, “Goldstein gave her model-collaborators little instruction on what to bring to their shoot, apart from their ‘leathers.’ As for poses, these too were left to the model-collaborators, though it should be noted that the poses chosen for display, as portraits, were decided by Goldstein and exhibition curator Helga Pakasaar.”
“I met some of my model-collaborators by chance around my neighbourhood,” Goldstein told the Independent. “They are artists, musicians and punk devotees; most of them over 50, in punk regalia, hairdos, piercings and tattoos. I was excited by their stories and memories of their time as punks during the late ’70s, ’80s and into the ’90s. There was a vibrant punk scene in Vancouver and Victoria, with local bands, like DOA, incorporating activism and social commentary into their music.
“I have always been attracted to individualism – those who openly express themselves, are unconventional and live an authentic existence,” she said. “Some of the punks were ailing and not well. Some key figures had already passed. Most recently, the iconic Chi Pig, who passed a couple of years ago. I felt an urgency to document this generation of local punks. The project evolved into a series when I was able to collect a good amount of participants.”
Among the participants featured are Murray “The Cretin” Acton, Myles Peterson and wendythirteen. Goldstein sent out questionnaires to better understand the participants. Turner discusses some of the responses to the questions – such as “Has punk changed much since the 1980s?” and “Is punk here to stay?” – in the audio guide, the script of which can be found at mtwebsit.blogspot.com/2021/11/og-punk-2.html.
Though none of the model-collaborators to date are Jewish, Goldstein noted that she “will be continuing to photograph more people for this series in January.”
As for what punk means to her, Goldstein said, “I have always been rebellious. I am non-conventional and have a DIY mentality. My photography requires critical thinking and is a form of activism. My art has been described as satirical, irreverent and subversive.
“As one of my model-collaborators Lisa Jak said and I totally agree: ‘Anywhere and anytime that there is oppression, ignorance, intolerance and f–king stupidity – some punk will be there to question and fight it!’”
Frank London recently released a new album, Ghetto Songs (Venice and Beyond). (photo by Chuck Fishman)
Trumpeter and composer Frank London, an unwavering presence in numerous musical genres for more than four decades, released a new album, Ghetto Songs (Venice and Beyond), on Felmay Records earlier this year. The project incorporates music from around the world and delves into the history of “ghetto music.”
Coming out this past April – to coincide with the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943 – the concept for Ghetto Songs began in 2016, when the Grammy Award-winning London found himself in Venice on a residency with Beit Venezia, a foundation that aims to promote Jewish thought and culture, and serve as a bridge between people of all cultures and religions.
“It all started with my being invited by Dr. Shaul Bassi and Beit Venezia to go to Venice and conceive a special way to commemorate the 500th anniversary of the opening of the Venice Ghetto, the first segregated urban area to be called a ghetto,” London told the Independent. “The particularity of the Venice Ghetto and the universality of ghettos themselves inspired Ghetto Songs.”
The Jewish ghetto in Venice was situated in the polluted grounds of an ancient copper foundry, or geto. By the early 20th century, the term ghetto came to signify the crowded urban quarters of any minority group.
As London sees it, ghettos are historically complex phenomena. They offer both freedom and restriction, protection and imperilment. By isolating specific groups from the outside world, they become cultural “petri dishes” in which the ghettoized group’s culture can thrive.
Ghetto Songs celebrates the music and poetry that emerges from and about the world’s many ghettos. The playlist for the new release includes 17th-century music and poetry from the Venice ghetto (works from Salomone Rossi, Benedetto Marcello and Sara Copia Sullam); a piyyut (Jewish liturgical poem) from a mellah, a Moroccan Jewish quarter; kwela, street music from South Africa’s townships; and works by Cantor Gershon Sirota, who lived and died in the Warsaw Ghetto. There is also version the 1972 hit by the band War, “The World is a Ghetto.”
When it came to selecting what pieces would be the best fit for an album covering ghetto music encompassing five centuries and numerous locations, London recounted, “This is my favourite part of the process! I do the deep dive: tons of research into music from the world’s ghettos throughout history, across time and place. I pick out songs that I love, but that also tell a story, that inform each other, that complement each other, and that work together as a unified whole despite their incredible differences.”
London has assembled an array of talent for the release. Among the vocalists are tenor Karim Sulayman, Cantor Svetlana “Sveta” Kundish, Yaakov “Yanky” Lemmer (considered one of the best in the new generation of chazzans) and singer/guitarist Brandon Ross. They are joined by drummers Kenny Wollesen and Zeno De Rossi, cellists Francesca Ter-Berg and Marika Hughes, bassists Greg Cohen and Gregg August, and multi-instrumentalist Ilya Shneyveys.
“What might have been seen as challenging – getting the right musicians who can play such a diverse, variegated set of musics, styles, genres, etc., was really no problem. I am blessed to know and work with some of the world’s finest musicians and, with them, there were really no big challenges,” said London. “I have worked with each of these fantastic musicians in different projects and situations – mine, theirs, and as side musicians for others – over my 40-year career.”
To summarize London’s career in the space of an article, let alone a paragraph of two, is not an easy task. Among the artists he has worked with are Itzhak Perlman, Allen Ginsberg, LL Cool J, Mel Tormé, Iggy Pop, John Cale and Jane Siberry. He is a member of the Klezmatics and Hasidic New Wave, as well as leader of the Frank London’s Klezmer Brass All Stars and the Glass House Orchestra, a band that plays Austro-Hungarian Jewish music. London has made 30 solo recordings, is featured on more than 400 CDs and is the recipient of the Hungarian Order of Merit.
The veteran musician is working on several projects at present. These include Ich Bin Eine Hexe, a dance/theatre spectacle about pioneering performance artist Valeska Gert; “Rube G (Music for Brass Trio and Percussion,” a dance score for choreographer and filmmaker Jody Oberfelder; ESN: Songs from the Kitchen, a cooking and music video with Lorin Sklamberg and Sarah Gordon; Salomé: Woman of Valor, a CD with poet Adeena Karasick (jewishindependent.ca/salome-cd-launched); and Transliminal Rites, a CD of improvised music with Eyal Maoz and Guy Barash, who, together with London, make up the EFG Trio.
Sam Margolishas written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.
Left to right: Drew Carnwath, Measha Brueggergosman and Sam Rosenthal are the main creatives behind the podcast The Christie Pits Riot. (photo by John Ebata)
On Aug. 16, 1933, Toronto experienced what is viewed as one of the worst race riots in Canadian history. Earlier this fall, the Hogtown Collective, an immersive theatre company, released a four-part podcast that recreates the events of that summer evening 88 years ago.
The eponymously named podcast, The Christie Pits Riot, is seen through the eyes of its 12-year-old protagonist, Joey Rosenbaum. Created by Sam Rosenthal and Drew Cranwath of Hogtown Collective and set amid the circumstances of the Great Depression, Hitler’s rise to power in Germany and escalating ethnic unrest within Toronto, the series also contains an interactive walking tour through the neighbourhood where the riot took place.
The centre of the conflict is a baseball diamond in Christie Pits Park. Tensions began festering during a playoff between two local teams, the Harbord Playground, consisting mostly of Jewish and Italian players, and St. Peter’s, a club sponsored by a local church. Fights erupted and a full-on riot ensued. There were many injuries, but no fatalities.
The mass brawl, which lasted six hours, started after the final out of the second game of a quarterfinal pitting Harbord against St. Peter’s. Two nights earlier, at the first game, a swastika had been displayed by some fans. In the weeks before these games, troubles in Toronto had been brewing more broadly between some Jewish residents and antisemitic groups, primarily those calling themselves the Swastika Club.
A number of Jewish boys and young men who had heard about the swastika incident at the first game rushed to destroy the swastika unfurled at the end of the second. Supporters of both sides, including the Italians, who supported the Jews, joined in the melee.
In the podcast, narrated by Rosenthal, the listener gets a snapshot of life in the city at the time and follows Joey through his day – running errands for his father’s drugstore – along Bloor Street, near the ballpark.
“We wanted the audience to be able to access this story through an emotional, not just historical, perspective,” Rosenthal told the Independent. “Making our hero a young boy allowed us to show the world from his perspective.
“Exploring the deeper issue of systemic racism and antisemitic behaviour can be challenging,” he added. “Our young hero doesn’t understand hatred the way an adult might, so his character provides a means of asking questions about antisemitic racism. We also wanted a way to keep things rooted in the present simultaneously, so as to be able to draw clear parallels to the same problems and issues” that still exist.
The first three instalments take the audience through Depression-era Toronto, with the final episode coming to a head at the fateful game. When the riot breaks out in the story, we find Joey trying to get his friend Rachel home. They are helped along the way by Nala – voiced by Juno Award-winning soprano Measha Brueggergosman – who encourages Joey to stand up for what he believes.
In addition to providing her vocal talent, Brueggergosman was the podcast’s musical supervisor.
In releasing a theatrical production during the pandemic, the creators spotted a chance to provide audiences with a safe and tangible way to experience where the riot happened via the walking tour.
“To look out at Christie Pits Park and imagine what it would be like being in the middle of 1,000-plus people fighting is a terrifying thought, and so it makes the story land in a more visceral way if one can actually be there while listening in,” Rosenthal said. “Since my grandfather owned a store at the corner of Bloor and Manning, the walking tour is a perfect addition to share some of my family history within the broader scope of this chapter from Toronto’s history.”
Several scenes in the story are situated in the drugstore operated by Rosenthal’s grandfather from the early 1920s until the late 1950s. Rosenthal’s father, Joseph, grew up in the neighbourhood and worked there. Joseph was born after the riot, and knew about it from his own father.
“My dad shared many stories of being a young boy in a deeply divided antisemitic Toronto,” said Rosenthal. “When he told me there were once signs posted at the Balmy Beach Club that said, ‘No Jews or Dogs,’ and that there were Swastika Clubs in the 1930s, I felt compelled to tell this story. My father and his friends were often brutalized or threatened whilst walking home from school. I wonder how many Toronto residents know this about our city’s past, and why it seems still entrenched in our present.”
Rosenthal’s hope for the production is that younger listeners not only learn that the riot was a dark chapter in Canadian history, but see it as a way to honour previous generations who paved the way for the diverse culture that Toronto is celebrated for today.
The Christie Pits Riot is available online from multiple providers. The Anchor app can be used by anyone interested in taking the guided walking tour through the Toronto neighbourhood where the riot transpired – the app can be found at hogtownexperience.com.
Sam Margolishas written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.
Left to right: Eve Barlow, Noa Tishby and Bari Weiss participate in a Nov. 3 panel hosted by the Friends of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre for Holocaust Studies. (screenshot)
In a time of burgeoning antisemitism and anti-Zionism, Jews need to lean into their identities, says a leading voice in the fight against anti-Jewish racism.
“In other instances in Jewish history, we believed, wrongly, that the way to get acceptance, the way to get along, was to self-abnegate and erase who we are,” said Bari Weiss. “If there has been one lesson in thousands of years of Jewish history, it’s that that is a terrible strategy.”
Weiss is a former writer at the New York Times. She resigned her position there, citing a hostile work environment, and is the author of the book How to Fight Antisemitism. She was speaking as part of a panel convened Nov. 3 by the Friends of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre for Holocaust Studies (FSWC). She was joined by Eve Barlow, a pop-culture writer who grew up in the United Kingdom and has worked in music journalism as deputy editor for NME New Musical Express but who, most recently, is using her voice to stand up against antisemitism. Also on the panel was Noa Tishby, an Israeli-American actor, producer and author of the book Israel: A Simple Guide to the Most Misunderstood Country on Earth.
The three women have become prominent voices, online and off, in the fight against the latest upsurge of antisemitism and anti-Zionism. The Nov. 3 discussion took place in Los Angeles, where all three women are now based. They were joined by Michael Levitt, president and chief executive officer of FCSW, and the panel was moderated by journalist Jamie Gutfreund, both of whom traveled from Toronto for the event, titled State of the Union: Fighting Back Against Hate.
Weiss said the first step in confronting the problem must be vocal and unequivocal pride in Judaism and Zionism.
“The mere act of doing that is radical and contagious and changes the whole conversation,” she said. Doing grassroots work building alliances is another overlooked key to confronting the issue, she added.
“Let’s take a page from the book of our political opponents,” she said. “How have they done what they have done? Deep work inside communities on a grassroots level.”
The Black Lives Matter organization – not the wider movement, Weiss stressed, but the leadership of the organization – has exhibited problematic approaches to Jews and Israel. But no one should concede that there are not plenty of African-Americans (and Canadians) who are allies, she said.
“There are huge parts of the Black community that the Jewish community in America can still be allied with; there are other parts of it that we would be extremely foolish to try and ally ourselves with,” Weiss said. “There are other communities though. I’m thinking about Hispanics, I’m thinking about Hindus, I’m thinking about all kinds of other groups that I don’t see our community actively and affirmatively reaching out to and trying to build relationships with based on our mutual interests.”
Weiss warned that the polarization of politics in the United States and across the West does not bode well for Jews.
“That puts Jews in a deeply uncomfortable position because, I believe, where the political centre thrives, Jews thrive because, if the political centre is thriving, it means that there is room for nuance, that there is room for disagreement, that it’s not a kind of Manichaean, black-and-white, pure-impure, red-blue thinking. Right now, that is the world we are living in and – guess what? – we Jews don’t easily slot into either of those categories. We are both hyper-successful and also we are the victims of more hate crimes than any other group in this country. We are white-passing and yet white supremacists hate us because we are the greatest trick the devil has ever played. We predate the newfangled notions of ethnicity, of race, of religion. We are before all of that. I think that there is a dovetailing between fighting antisemitism and fighting Jew-hate, and standing up for liberalism, broadly defined, because, where liberalism thrives … Jews thrive too.”
Much of the panel’s discussion was about flourishing anti-Jewish hatred online, but Barlow warned that no one should assume there is a substantive difference between what happens online and what happens offline.
“We have seen how [online hatred] has contributed vastly to the amount of physical violence that happens offline and you would have to be extremely ignorant to … say right now that what happens online does not have offline ramifications,” said Barlow.
Tishby agreed, but suggested that offline violence may not be inspired by online hate but rather is part of a broader battle.
“Social media is just the tip of the iceberg of a well-funded political campaign that has been waged against Israel in the past 20 years,” Tishby said. “This is not by accident. This happened by design. The language, everything that we are seeing right now, originated in the Durban conference against racism in Durban in 2001 that was so antisemitic that the U.S. and Israel pulled out of it…. They have been putting a lot of money, a lot of effort and a lot of groundwork in going into these social justice causes, going to Black Lives Matter, going to the Women’s March, going to gay and lesbian marches in San Francisco, going to unions and actually slowly changing their minds and poisoning them basically with lies to make them shift against Israel. These are nefarious powers and nefarious countries that want to dismantle the Jewish state, period, end of story.”
At a panel discussion hosted by the Friends of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, journalist Bari Weiss warned of the potential dangers in pressuring social media giants like Facebook to censor certain messages. (screenshot)
Acknowledging that some of the most prominent anti-Zionists are themselves Jews, Barlow called the phenomenon “koshering antisemitism.” However, she advocates a compassionate response.
“I believe that how we deal with them has to be different than how we deal with non-Jewish antisemites because they are part of our people, we love them regardless and they are part of our tribe and I think we have to really understand the nuances of why people become anti-Zionist,” Barlow said. “I think a lot of what I see is trauma from the Jewish community and a rejection of the Jewish community that presents itself in this anti-Israel fashion.”
She offered up what she acknowledged as a controversial joke: “Don’t blame Israel for your daddy issues.”
Tishby laid much of the blame for anti-Zionist Jews on the Jewish education system.
“We need to take a good look at ourselves and what we did in order to allow for this,” she said. “We took our kids, put them through … this beautiful Jewish education, we give them all the values and we tell them Israel is the most amazing people and place in the world and we send them off to college without ever acknowledging the concepts of ‘ethnic cleansing,’ ‘apartheid.’ We let college talk to them about this for the first time.… Nobody ever [said], let’s talk about why people call Israel an apartheid state. Let’s have a conversation about this, not when they get to college, [but] when the kid is 12, 13, 14, bring it up. Say, here’s the argument, here is where it’s completely false, here are the facts. Let’s talk about what’s happening in the West Bank.”
Weiss, who has spent her career in mainstream media, said those media outlets are “the most intellectually homogenous environment I’ve ever been in in my entire life.” But she warned against swallowing conspiracy theories.
“I think sometimes people in the Jewish community who are frustrated by this bias imagine some kind of secret conspiratorial meetings where they’re cooking up how to screw the Jews and the Jewish state,” Weiss said. “It’s just a reflection of the consistent bias among all the people that work there.”
The power of social media giants like Facebook and their haphazard responses to hate speech are a problem, Weiss said, but Jews and Zionists may be hastening their own defeat by pressuring them to censor certain messages.
“I think it is a genuinely knotty and complicated question whether or not the Jewish community should be going to these big tech companies and saying, in the same way that you’re censoring x, y and z, also censor the people who hate us,” she said. “My fear is that, in asking these companies [to] do more censorship on our behalf, then, in a way, we are actually feeding the fuel that will come to burn all of us. The ideology that is currently dictating the choices at many of these companies is an ideology that says Zionism is racism. That is part of that broader worldview.… What happens six months from now when … they want to go and censor Zionists because now they have decided that Zionism, to follow the Soviet lie, is a form of racism? Would we be happy with that? I don’t think so.”
A few of the clocks that were stolen from Jerusalem’s L.A. Mayer Museum for Islamic Art in 1983, and eventually found and returned. (photos by Daniella Golan)
Over the past few weeks, many countries, including Canada, switched from daylight savings time to standard time. So, it seems like the right time (no pun intended) to talk about the biggest clock and watch robbery in Israel’s history.
Back in 1983, more than 100 antique timepieces vanished from Jerusalem’s L.A. Mayer Museum for Islamic Art. I remember visiting the museum about a year after the robbery, only to find the empty stands and cases – as if the museum staff hoped the watches would magically reappear.
For years, the Israeli police didn’t know where to go with this case. In fact, they struggled for a quarter of a century to solve the mystery of the 102 (a number of media reports stated 106) missing clocks. All that was clear was that, one spring night in 1983, these timepieces disappeared from the museum.
These missing clocks were not like the ones a regular person hangs on their kitchen wall or sits on their nightstand. They were highbrow antiques. Some were inlaid with jewels. Many had been cast from gold. One was made by famed watchmaker Abraham-Louis Breguet for Queen Marie Antoinette, but she met up with the guillotine 34 years before Breguet finished the timepiece – actually, Breguet’s son finished what is called an “open-work” watch.
Altogether, the stolen clocks and watches were worth millions of dollars. Given the magnitude of the theft, a special task force within the police was set up. Reportedly, Interpol was contacted, and the company that had insured the collection hired private investigators.
For years, police theorized that only a group of robbers could have taken so many clocks in one night. It turned out, however, that one thief did the job.
The alleged thief was Naaman Diller, also known as Naaman Lidor. He took advantage of the museum’s incompetence at that time. For example, he discovered that the museum’s alarm system did not work. And, while the museum windows apparently had bars, they were more for show than anything else – Diller/Lidor was able to bend a few of them. He had no difficulty entering and exiting undetected with the stolen items and placing them in his truck outside.
Many of the clocks were physically small and relatively light (i.e., pocket-size timepieces). He took most of them out of Israel. Some were hidden in Holland, some in France and the rest went to the United States. Several ended up in the home he set up in the Los Angeles area.
Despite – or perhaps because of – the great monetary value of his haul and because of how renowned some of the pieces were, Dillor/Lidor found it was hard to sell them. He only managed to sell less than 10% of the stolen collection. The majority of these timepieces spent 25 years locked up, unseen.
Following the robbery, Dillor/Lidor lived on and off in Tel Aviv. In the early 2000s, he reportedly was hospitalized in Israel’s Tel HaShomer Hospital, suffering from skin cancer complications. When told that the cancer had spread to the bone, he refused radiation. In 2004, he died in his Tel Aviv apartment and was buried at Kibbutz Ein HaHoresh, his birthplace. In the end, he willed the clocks to his wife, Israeli ex-pat Nili Shamrat.
Within a few years of Dillor/Lidor’s death, an attorney representing the widow entered into a quiet, negotiated “buy-back” with the museum. According to the L.A. Mayer Museum for Islamic Art, in 2006, 39 of the original 102 stolen clocks were returned.
Two years down the road, the case further unraveled. The museum officially states that investigators located the remaining clocks in various bank safes. Some media reports said the clocks had been in France and in Holland. In any case, the clocks and watches have since made their way back to the museum. Unlike almost 40 years ago, they are now well-secured, with the clock exhibit housed in a sophisticated light-sensitive vault.
In the United States, the widow was charged with receiving stolen property. In 2010, however, she received a sentence of five years’ probation and 300 hours of community service. In her defence, her lawyer successfully maintained that she was a victim of circumstances – that is, her new husband (although they’d been together for many years, they’d been married for only a year when he died) had only told her about the clocks near the time of his death.
Deborah Rubin Fieldsis an Israel-based features writer. She is also the author of Take a Peek Inside: A Child’s Guide to Radiology Exams, published in English, Hebrew and Arabic.
Among Intergalactic Afikoman’s newest picture books is I Am Hava: A Song’s Story of Love, Hope & Joy, written by Freda Lekowicz and illustrated by Siona Benjamin. It tells the story of the song “Hava Nagila,” from its birth as a niggun (melody without words) in Ukraine, to Jerusalem, to when it received its name and lyrics (though exactly from whom is still a mystery), and its journey around the world to popularity well beyond the Jewish community.
Hava Nagila means “Come and Rejoice,” explains the book, and this story – told by the song herself, personified as a blue-skinned Indian-Jewish girl in a sari – is full of movement and colour. It boldly celebrates the diversity of the Jewish people and our culture.
“For me, Hava’s story is a story of universality and multiculturalism,” Benjamin, who grew up as a Bene Israel Jew in India, writes at the end of the book. “Universality is always born from the specifics. The specifics for me are my Jewishness, my Indianness and my Americanness.
“Many blue-skinned characters populate my paintings,” she continues. “Hava is blue because blue is the colour of the sky and the ocean. Blue is the colour of the globe. Blue is also such a Jewish colour. It’s in the tallit. It’s in the tzitzit. It’s in the Israeli flag.”
Montreal-born Lekowicz also connects personally with the story. She shares that her parents, after the Holocaust, were in a displaced persons camp in Germany. “Like other Holocaust survivors,” she writes, “they were broken and in mourning. Yet the joyful sounds of Hava Nagila sometimes echoed in the camp. ‘Let us celebrate,’ it urged. The song symbolized hope and resilience.”
This lovely and imaginative book does joyous justice to this well-known song.
Jewish Museum and Archives of British Columbia releases its new publication Looking Back, Moving Forward after its AGM on Nov. 16.
The Nov. 16 annual general meeting of the Jewish Museum and Archives of British Columbia (JMABC) is the culmination of the museum’s 50th anniversary year of celebrations. The special occasion will not only feature Dr. Morton Weinfeld, Chair in Ethnic Canadian Studies at McGill University and author of numerous books on Canadian Jewry, but also the release of the new JMABC publication Looking Back, Moving Forward: 160 Years of Jewish Life in BC.
Taking place at Congregation Beth Israel, the 6 p.m. AGM will be followed by a reception at 7 p.m. and the keynote address. Weinfeld’s most recent publication is a revised and updated version of his book Like Everybody Else but Different: The Paradoxical Success of Canadian Jewry. His virtual presentation will highlight the unveiling of the JMABC’s Looking Back, Moving Forward.
Local historian Cyril Leonoff, who passed away in 2016, established what has become the JMABC with a group of volunteers in 1970. In his research on the B.C. Jewish community, he combed ship manifests and discovered that the first Jews to arrive in the province came to participate in the Gold Rush, in 1858.
The museum’s new book is a testament to the variety and tenacity of Jewish life all over British Columbia. The publication comprises interviews, archival research and community contributions from more than 200 B.C. Jewish community members and it includes more than 400 photos.
Organized into four sections, the book begins with a collection of essays on the history of Jewish life in various regions of the province. This section is followed by short descriptions of historic, modern and new Jewish agencies and organizations that serve(d) the social, cultural, political and religious interests of the Jewish community. Short biographies of notable B.C. Jewish figures from all areas of public and communal life make up the third part of the book. And, finally, a family-sponsored section gives some personal descriptions of a variety of families within the community.
A central mission of the JMABC is to raise awareness of the importance of everyday artifacts to the overall picture of Jewish history in British Columbia. Photos of a family barbecue or a trip to the beach, flyers, letters and other such memorabilia personalize history. Over the years, the museum has created exhibits, films, books and other research material, making its archives as accessible to the public as possible.
The JMABC is hoping to ride the wave of enthusiasm and support from the past year of 50th anniversary activities, as it continues its role as both keepers and disseminators of history within the community and as ambassadors of the Jewish community to broader B.C. society.
Copies of Looking Back, Moving Forward: 160 Years of Jewish Life in BC are now on sale through the JMABC website at a 10% discounted price up until Nov. 16. After the AGM, the price will increase to $50 in general and to $100 for the limited edition hardcover version.
It’s no secret that antisemitism around the world has been increasing for years. As recently as Sept. 30, MLA Spencer Chandra Herbert saw his office window hit with a spray-painted red swastika. Make no mistake: there is no place for antisemitism in our world. That’s why Chabad Richmond is offering the four-week Rohr Jewish Learning Institute program called Outsmarting Antisemitism on Wednesdays Nov. 3, 10, 17 and 24 from 7:30-9 p.m.
“Join me each week as we explore the ethical impacts of history repeating itself, both within the Jewish community and beyond, by those who believe that antisemitism and hatred are accepted and encouraged practices and attitudes,” said Rabbi Yechiel Baitelman, director of Chabad Richmond.
Outsmarting Antisemitism takes on this subject directly and unapologetically, with a sense of optimism, faith and a distinctly Jewish approach.
“Through insightful source texts and fascinating case studies, this course examines the sources of this ancient scourge, along with the appropriate strategies for overcoming it. It’s time to find the confidence to fight hate with hope, and to stand tall against antisemitism,” said Baitelman.
“Upon concluding our series Outsmarting Antisemitism, you will be better equipped to campaign publicly against those who oppose both Israel and the Jewish people, and ensure we do everything possible to condition society to bring out the best in humans, rather than their more sinister elements,” he added.
Outsmarting Antisemitism will be offered both in-person and online via Zoom. Sign-in information will be provided at the time of registration. The cost to attend is $75 per person or $130 per couple, and includes the textbook.
This course will also be offered to lawyers for B.C. Law Society accreditation on Nov. 25, Dec. 2, 9 and 16 from 7:30-9:30 p.m. and will take place in person, at Chabad Richmond, 4775 Blundell Rd. The cost is $540 including textbook and the course is applicable for eight CLE approved credits.
To register for either Richmond course, call 604-277-6427 or visit chabadrichmond.com/jli.
The JLI course is also being offered at Lubavitch Centre (604-266-1313), starting Oct. 26, and Chabad of Nanaimo (250-797-7877), starting Nov. 9.
Jonas Noreika, who was executed by the Soviets in 1947, has been revered in his native Lithuania and by its expatriate community as a national hero and an anti-communist patriot.
This vaunted hero, however, has come under intense scrutiny of late, largely as a result of the findings of his own granddaughter, Silvia Foti. Her research has revealed that Noreika, whose nom de guerre was “General Storm,” was in fact a Nazi collaborator, responsible for the murder of thousands of Lithuanian Jews – sometimes, on his own initiative.
In her new book, The Nazi’s Granddaughter: How I Discovered My Grandfather Was a War Criminal (Regnery Publishing, 2021), Foti documents her path from hearing stories about his almost legendary stature to her discovery of the disturbing truth.
The book, the writing of which had been undertaken to fulfil Foti’s mother’s (Noreika’s daughter’s) dying wish, was intended as a tribute. Foti succeeded in assembling hundreds of documents related to Noreika’s life, including an antisemitic pamphlet that he authored in 1933, and KGB transcripts of his prison interrogations.
At first, Foti did not want to believe the story that was emerging from the various written sources, finding it “too scary, too painful, too shameful.” Nonetheless, as a journalist, she could not ignore the rumours that she encountered during her investigative trips to Lithuania. She pursued the matter, in the hope that an examination of her grandfather’s acts during the Second World War would exonerate him. Ultimately, she found so much evidence about his role in killing Jews that it was impossible to act as though it did not exist.
“I wanted to throw the manuscript away so many times, to just drop the whole project. I kept asking myself, Why me? Why am I the one to discover all this? I finally came to realize that, because I am the granddaughter, I would most likely get the most attention,” Foti told the Independent. “I am a practising Catholic, and I pray over this story constantly. My strength came from believing that this is the truth, and the truth needs to prevail, no matter the cost to me.”
What started out as a journey of discovery has now been the recipient of international attention. Foti’s story has been covered by the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times and the BBC, among others.
“So much seemed accidental, inadvertent. I didn’t mean to discover that my grandfather was a Holocaust perpetrator. I didn’t mean to discover that the government of Lithuania refuses to acknowledge his role in the Holocaust and, instead, has declared him a hero,” Foti said.
In 2018, when she was 18 years into her project and believing it was nearing completion, she learned of a lawsuit by Grant Gochin, who lost 100 relatives in the Holocaust, against the Genocide Research and Resistance Centre of Lithuania. They compared notes and joined forces in getting the story out to the international community.
The revelations about Noreika were, to say the least, not easy for many Lithuanians to accept.
“Today, now that the book is out, I face anger, fear and resentment from many Lithuanians who are still in denial over Lithuanians’ role in the Holocaust. I get hate email and death threats, accusations that I work for the Russians, that I’m a traitor to Lithuania, even that someone else wrote the book instead of me. So many Lithuanians think Grant wrote the book,” Foti recounted.
“Grant has an accounting degree and I have two writing degrees and yet, for Lithuanians, it’s easier for them to think Grant hypnotized me and wrote the book,” Foti added. “Lithuanians still have a lot of superstitions concerning Jews. They just can’t believe a Lithuanian would accuse her own grandfather of such horrors. In some ways though, I understand them, because I was there about 20 years ago – minus the superstitions.”
Foti believes, at present, that Lithuania has backed itself into a corner and needs to admit that the Genocide Centre, “its great arbiter” of what took place in the country during the Holocaust, has made a grave error in deeming Noreika a hero. Nevertheless, she does not think such an about-face will happen anytime soon.
“It would be a hari-kari move that would necessitate that the Genocide Centre fall on its sword. How could a mere granddaughter in Chicago uncover so much information about Jonas Noreika, and how could the nation’s legions of historians under the government’s payroll not?” she asked.
“This was Lithuania’s last graceful chance to own up to its role in the Holocaust,” she said. “It could have saved face if its legal system did its due diligence. Unfortunately, the court systems there have a reputation for being corrupt; holdovers from the Soviet era. Because Grant Gochin has exhausted all legal avenues in Lithuania, he now is able to take it to the European Union’s International Court of Human Rights.”
The Nazi’s Granddaughter was edited by Lisa Ferdman of Vancouver.
Sam Margolishas written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.
This photo was taken at the home of Harry and Ida Fishman, 4862 Ridgelawn Dr., in Burnaby, in the 1960s. If you recognize anyone in it, please email Roni (Fishman) Wosk at [email protected].
