Conversations with B’nai B’rith

On this episode of the Conversations with B’nai B’rith Podcast, Honorary CEO Dan Mariaschin speaks with Tulane University Professor Joel Dinerstein about his new book, “The Last of the Ellis Island Jews: A Brooklyn Memoir,” and the lost world of 20th century Jewish New York.

 

Growing up in 1960s and ’70s Brooklyn, Dinerstein was the youngest child of immigrant parents in a working-class Jewish neighborhood. As that Brooklyn fades from living memory, his tragicomic memoir chronicles a disappearing world and presents a microcosm of social change, race, urban diversity and rock ’n’ roll.

 

The two discuss his parents, who escaped Russia's pogroms as children, everything Brooklyn gave to American Jewish culture and how a kid from Flatbush came to write the first history of “cool.”

 

Watch this episode on the B’nai B’rith International YouTube channel.

Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @bnaibrith.

Follow us on the B’nai B’rith International Facebook page.

Follow us on Twitter/X at @bnaibrith.

From Eastern Europe’s shtetls to Manhattan’s “Yiddish Broadway”: How did Yiddish theater come to be, and how did it capture the immigrant experience? What led to its long mid-20th century decline—and what’s fueled its modern revival?

 

“Immigrant Songs: Yiddish Theater and the American Jewish Experience,” the first major documentary film produced by the Milken Archive of Jewish Music, tackles these questions and more.

 

On this episode of the Conversations with B’nai B’rith Podcast, Honorary CEO Dan Mariaschin speaks with Dr. Jeff Janeczko, curator of the Milken Archive and director of “Immigrant Songs.” Together, they trace how Yiddish theater grew from melodrama into a serious art form, and how its music blended the synagogue and the shtetl with European classical and American popular song into something distinctly American and Jewish.

 

Watch this episode on the B’nai B’rith International YouTube channel.

Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @bnaibrith.

Follow us on the B’nai B’rith International Facebook page.

Follow us on Twitter/X at @bnaibrith.

During World War II, Polish-Jewish immigrant Arthur Szyk so effectively attacked the Nazis that Hitler reportedly put a bounty on his head—yet Szyk never fired a shot. Driven by an unrelenting passion for freedom and dignity, he used his art to show Americans what was happening to the Jews of Europe during the Holocaust, to challenge segregation years before that was safe ground for an artist, and so much more.

 

After his death in 1951, Szyk quickly faded from public memory. That we know so much about his work today is thanks to one man: Irvin Ungar. Ungar has devoted the past three decades to scholarship on Szyk, championing his legacy across the U.S., Europe and Israel.

 

On this episode of the Conversations with B’nai B’rith Podcast, Honorary CEO Dan Mariaschin speaks with Ungar about his new book about their intertwined lives, “Reviving the Artist Who Fought Hitler: My Life with Arthur Szyk,” and Ungar’s quest to restore this singular figure in 20th-century art.

 

Watch this episode on the B’nai B’rith International YouTube channel.

Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @bnaibrith.

Follow us on the B’nai B’rith International Facebook page.

Follow us on Twitter/X at @bnaibrith.

Four thousand years of Jewish history distilled into one short, compelling book. That’s no small feat—especially at a moment when that history is being debated, distorted and weaponized by voices across the political spectrum.

 

On this episode of the Conversations with B’nai B’rith Podcast, Honorary CEO Dan Mariaschin sits down with author Jared Stone to discuss “A Brief History of Israel and the Jewish People: From Abraham to October 7—and a Nation Reawakened.” Together, they trace the definitive arcs of the Jewish story—from biblical origins and exile to the rise of Zionism, the Holocaust and the founding of Israel. It is an essential historical framework written for anyone from students and educators to policymakers and general readers.

 

About the Author

Jared Stone is the author of “A Brief History of Israel and the Jewish People,” a historical primer endorsed by Rabbi David Wolpe, Dara Horn, Gil Troy and Yossi Klein Halevi, and used by congregations, day schools and community organizations nationwide. The book forms the foundation of Davar, a national initiative for Zionism and Israel literacy. Jared graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University in 2025 with a degree in Politics, having written his senior thesis on early Revisionist Zionism.

 

Watch this episode on the B’nai B’rith International YouTube channel.

Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @bnaibrith.

Follow us on the B’nai B’rith International Facebook page.

Follow us on Twitter/X at @bnaibrith.

Think about the toys that defined your childhood, or your children’s, or your grandchildren’s. The board games on a rainy afternoon. The action figures. The dolls. Chances are, the companies behind those toys were built by Jewish entrepreneurs—immigrants and their children who arrived in America with little more than ambition and an instinct for what might capture a child’s imagination.

 

On this episode of the Conversations with B’nai B’rith Podcast, CEO Dan Mariaschin sits down with author Michael Kimmel to discuss his fascinating new book, “Playmakers: The Jewish Entrepreneurs Who Created the Toy Industry in America.” Kimmel, himself a descendant of the founders of the Ideal Toy Corporation, tells the stories behind those toys—and the remarkable men and women who built them.

 

Watch this episode on the B’nai B’rith International YouTube channel.

Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @bnaibrith.

Follow us on the B’nai B’rith International Facebook page.

Follow us on Twitter/X at @bnaibrith.

At just 21 years old, Ira Kohler left his home in Plainview, Long Island, moved to Israel and enlisted in the IDF’s elite Paratrooper Brigade as a Lone Soldier. Less than two years later, he found himself on the front lines of Oct. 7th—engaged in face-to-face combat with Hamas terrorists, witnessing the massacre at Kibbutz Be’eri and surviving a rocket strike on his helicopter mid-flight. He would go on to serve more than 100 days in Gaza.

 

On this episode of the Conversations with B’nai B’rith Podcast, CEO Dan Mariaschin sits down with Kohler, author of “Once a Paratrooper: The Story of a Lone Soldier in the Gaza War”—an unflinching, on-the-ground account of what it means to serve, to sacrifice and to grapple with questions of identity and responsibility in a time of crisis.

 

Kohler also reflects on the loss of his close friend Omer Neutra—a fellow Long Island native killed on Oct. 7, whose body was taken into Gaza by Hamas—and what it means to carry that story alongside his own.

 

Watch this episode on the B’nai B’rith International YouTube channel.

Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @bnaibrith.

Follow us on the B’nai B’rith International Facebook page.

Follow us on Twitter/X at @bnaibrith.

By the end of World War II, Holocaust survivors had lost their families, their homes and their entire way of life. Their response was quintessentially Jewish: they turned to stories. Drawing on a long history of self-narration, survivors gathered together to write yizkor—or memory—books, remembering all that had been destroyed and honoring the vanished worlds they had left behind.

 

On this episode of the Conversations with B'nai B'rith Podcast, CEO Dan Mariaschin speaks with historian Jane Ziegelman about her rich, illuminating new book, “Once There Was a Town: The Memory Books of a Lost Jewish World.” They explore the history of yizkor books and their role in keeping alive the memory of the Jewish communities destroyed in the Shoah—including Luboml, Ziegelman's own family's ancestral shtetl.

 

Watch this episode on the B’nai B’rith International YouTube channel.

Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @bnaibrith.

Follow us on the B’nai B’rith International Facebook page.

Follow us on Twitter/X at @bnaibrith.

 

Once There Was a Town: The Memory Books of a Lost Jewish World

For generations, American Jews have embraced a narrative of refuge and opportunity. But does anti-Semitism only surface in moments of national crisis, or has it been woven into the country’s fabric from the very start?

 

On this episode of the Conversations with B’nai B’rith Podcast, CEO Dan Mariaschin speaks with distinguished historian and author Professor Pamela S. Nadell about her powerful new book, “Antisemitism, An American Tradition.”

 

Together, they trace this history from colonial America to the present, confronting what it reveals about anti-Semitism as an enduring and pernicious force in American life. Their conversation explores how these prejudices have permeated every generation—from the 17th-century arrival of Jewish settlers in New Amsterdam to the Civil War and the eugenics movement of the 20th century.

 

This discussion also addresses the contemporary “high tide” of anti-Jewish hatred, examining how anti-Semitism is amplified by social media algorithms in ways fundamentally different from earlier eras. Professor Nadell offers vital perspective on how understanding this long tradition can help the Jewish community confront and combat these modern challenges.

 

Watch this episode on the B’nai B’rith International YouTube channel.

Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @bnaibrith.

Follow us on the B’nai B’rith International Facebook page.

Follow us on Twitter/X at @bnaibrith.

 

More about Antisemitism, an American Tradition

Sid Caesar didn't just perform comedy—he invented the blueprint for it. Author David Margolick joins us to discuss the legendary "King" of early television.

 

Comedy has always played a profound role in shaping American culture, and Sid Caesar stands at the center of that history. On this episode of the Conversations with B’nai B’rith Podcast, CEO Dan Mariaschin speaks with award-winning author David Margolick about his new book, “When Caesar Was King: How Sid Caesar Reinvented American Comedy.”

 

Together, they explore Caesar’s meteoric rise, his legendary writers' room (which launched icons like Mel Brooks and Neil Simon), and how he redefined what television could be. They examine how his sketches laid the groundwork for everything from Saturday Night Live to The Carol Burnett Show and the modern sitcom, while discussing why his work remains a vital influence on generations of writers and comedians today.

 

Watch this episode on the B’nai B’rith International YouTube channel.

Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @bnaibrith.

Follow us on the B’nai B’rith International Facebook page.

Follow us on Twitter/X at @bnaibrith.

 

More about “When Caesar Was King: How Sid Caesar Reinvented American Comedy.”

𝙍𝙚𝙖𝙙𝙮 𝙩𝙤 𝙧𝙤𝙘𝙠? B'nai B'rith CEO Dan Mariaschin speaks with David Fishof, founder of Rock 'N' Roll Fantasy Camp, about the origins of Rock Camp, his experiences working with rock legends like Ringo Starr, Roger Daltrey and The Monkees, the role Judaism plays in his professional and personal life, and much more.

 

Fishof also executive produced the 2021 documentary “Rock Camp: The Movie," and has been a pioneer in the entertainment world for more than four decades.

 

Thanks for listening! Subscribe to the B'nai B'rith podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen. Please leave us a rating!

 

Stay connected with B'nai B'rith on Twitter (X), Facebook, Instagram, Threads and YouTube.