Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on December 1, 2021

US Record price for looted van Gogh

A WATERCOLOUR by Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh that was stolen by the Nazis from its Jewish owner has been sold at auction for a record-breaking $35,855,000.

The 1888 work, Meules de bl or Wheatstacks, had been sold to Alexandrine de Rothschild when art collector Max Meirowsky left Germany for Amsterdam in the face of growing antisemitism in 1938. When she left for Switzerland, her collection was seized by the Nazis. The painting resurfaced in 1979 when it was purchased by American businessman Ed Cox.

Proceeds from the sale are set to be split between Coxs estate and the descendants of Meirowsky and Rothschild. Christies auction house said, The settlement agreement resolves the dispute over ownership and title passes to the successful bidder.

ROMANIAShoah education

THE Romanian Senate has adopted legislation that makes it mandatory from 2023 for all high schools and vocational schools to teach a specific subject on the history of the Holocaust and the Jewish people.

The curriculum will be decided by the countrys education ministry in collaboration with the Elie Wiesel Institute for the Study of the Holocaust in Romania.

Jewish lawmaker Silviu Vexler, who championed the law, said it aims at countering intolerance and extremism among youth.

LITHUANIAGravesite protected

MUNICIPAL authorities have halted the construction of a bicycle path near a mass grave of Holocaust victims in iauliai, according to a rabbi who raised the alarm about the project.

Rabbi Kalev Krelin, a former chief rabbi of Lithuania, said construction had been suspended after he and others raised concerns about the project, which could run the risk of unsettling the gravesites of the murder victims.

Earlier this year, the government dropped a plan to build a conference centre on the grounds of a historic Jewish cemetery, but didnt cite concern for the memory of the Jews buried there as a reason.

NETHERLANDSRabbi quits council

A PROMINENT Reform rabbi who drew parallels between COVID restrictions and Nazi practices has resigned from the Dutch Union for Progressive Judaism (DUPJ).

Tamarah Benima, 71, drew sharp rebuke over a speech she delivered last month in which she said those involved in enforcing public health measures have the best intentions, but as a Jew, what happened in Nazi Germany is a warning to me. Those in power all had the best of intentions. Also when they declared Jews a danger to public health. Also when they declared a war against the virus of those times. So dont play with fire by setting aside people in our society as a danger to public health.

Yvonne Walvisch-Stokvis, chairwoman of the DUPJ, criticised Benima for a misplaced comparison between the annihilation of people for who they were and the position of anti-vaccination people today.

USShule plot

A MAN from New Jersey accused of conspiring with members of a white supremacist organisation to vandalise synagogues in the US Midwest has been sentenced to a year and a day in prison, according to NJ.com.

Richard Tobin, 20, was accused of plotting with members of the neo-Nazi group The Base in 2019 to vandalise properties belonging to Jewish or Black groups.

Law enforcement officials became aware of Tobin after a number of shules were vandalised in 2019. Tobin had dubbed the plot Kristallnacht.

FRANCEZemmour in court

A FAR-RIGHT Jewish TV pundit who is expected to run for the French presidency next year went on trial this week for allegedly inciting racial hatred with his comments on unaccompanied migrant children.

In September 2020, on CNews, Eric Zemmour said, Theyre thieves, theyre murderers, theyre rapists, thats all they are. We must send them back.

Zemmour was previously convicted of incitement to racial hatred after justifying discrimination against Black and Arab people in 2010, and of incitement to religious hatred for anti-Islam comments in 2016.

In February, a Paris court acquitted him on a charge of contesting crimes against humanity for arguing in a 2019 television debate that the Vichys collaborationist government during World War II saved Frances Jews from the Holocaust.

UKAmbassador protest

POLICE have confirmed that no investigation will take place into the protests against Israeli ambassador Tzipi Hotovely outside the London School of Economics earlier this month.

Footage on social media showed protesters shouting and rushing up to Hotovelys waiting car as she left the university. Claims were made on social media that she was chased off campus.

Some communal leaders joined Home Secretary Priti Patel in calling for police to investigate the appalling incident.

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