Israel Beat

David Littman never knew his job helping Jewish children in Morocco was part of a secret illegal immigration mission called Operation Mural. He was one of the many who risked their lives helping Jews leave move to Israel after the Moroccan government banned aliyah. Another hero is Yehudit Yehezkeli Galili, a member of the Misgeret, a Jewish underground that ran self defense units and helped Operation Yachin in which tens of thousands of Moroccan Jews escaped persecution for a better life in the holy land.

Learn about the 1948 Anti-Jewish riots in Oujda and Jerada, the Bloody Days of Fez, the sinking of the Egoz and the heroism of Sultan Mohammed V who stood up to the Nazis.

NOTES:

* Interview with David Littman, Operation Mural

* The Moroccan connection: Exploring the decades of secret ties between Jerusalem and Rabat

* French Press Condemns ‘inhuman’ Moroccan Treatment of Jews

* 30,000 Jews Reported to Have Left Morocco Despite Emigration Ban

* Jews of the Maghreb on the Eve of World War II

* Late King Mohammed V of Morocco honored for protecting his country's Jews

* Sultan Mohammed V protected the Jews of Casablanca

* Under the nose of the king: the secret operation of the Mossad for the protection of Moroccan Jews

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Tu Bishvat is the new year for the trees and Israel is a pioneer in creating sustainable agriculture and water management. Meet Simcha Blass who invented modern drip irrigation and built Israel’s first pipeline to the Negev. Learn about his rabbinical family from Europe and the struggle to revive the deforested and arid land through the Netafim company, born in Kibbutz Hatzerim, an agricultural community pioneered by the Tehran Children who escaped the Holocaust via Iran.

Click here for last year’s History of Tu Bishvat podcast!

NOTES:

* Pollution in a Promised Land: An Environmental History of Israel

* Einstein Forest to Be Opened on Tu Bishvat

* “New Year of Trees”, Ancient Festival, to Be Celebrated in Palestine

* Arbor Day Proclaimed As “Afforestation Day” in Israel; to Be Dedicated to Heroes

* Thank This Jew For Inventing Drip Irrigation

* The “Tehran Children” and the Jewish Soldiers in "Anders’ Army”

* Engineer Simcha Blass- Encyclopedia of the Founders and Builders of Israel

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Thousands flocked to the Baba Sali both during his lifetime and on the annual memorial of his passing for miracles of healing and salvation. But the Baba Sali rejected all honor and insisted the miracles came not from him, but through the individual’s faith in God. Learn about Rabbi Yisrael Abuhatzeira and his illustrious family of sages: Rabbi Shmuel Elbaz, the Father of the Carpet, the musical poems of the Abir Yaakov, and the cruel execution of Rabbi David Abuhatzeira during the battles between the French and Moroccans. And finally, the story of the Baba Sali who settled in a working-class desert town in Israel’s south and brought with him a tradition of asceticism and faith.

NOTES:

* Interview with Baba Sali assistant David Golan

* Yodu Lecha Rayonai by the Baba Sali - National Library of Israel

* Yodu Lecha Rayonai by the Baba Sali - Torah-Box

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Operation Solomon, the massive airlift to rescue the Ethiopian Jewish community made history. Learn about the tragedy of the trek through the Sudanese desert, the abrupt halt of Operation Moses and Jewish-Ethiopian community leaders who risked their lives to covertly arrange immigration of thousands to Israel amid famine and political turmoil such as Baruch Tegegne, Ferede Aklum and Yona Bogale.

Plus the little-known back-story of Ethiopian Jews and their yearning for the land of Israel which dates back to the 1800s with Abba Mahari and the Ashkenazic Jewish leaders who connected to their struggle such as Dr. Jacques Faitlovitch and Rabbi Azriel Hildesheimer.

NOTES:

* Baruch's Odyssey : an Ethiopian Jew's struggle to save his people by Baruch Tegegne

* The Power of One: The Story of the Man who Opened the Route to Israel via Sudan for the Ethiopian Jews

* Airlift of 14,000 Ethiopian Jews Accomplished in Just 40 Flights JTA 1991

* Ethiopian Jews and Israelis Exult as Airlift Is Completed - New York Times 1991

* Operation Solomon - Jewish Virtual Library

* Redemption Song: The Story of Operation Moses

* Ethiopian National Project

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The tzitzit tassels on the tallit have great significance in Judaism. The blue fringe, or tekhelet color was thought to be lost but was rediscovered through the efforts of such people as the Radziner Rebbe, whose students fought the Nazis, Chief Rabbi Isaac Herzog, and Jewish scientists who combed Israel’s beaches looking for the elusive chilazon.

Plus, how a tallit saved Israeli soldiers during the Yom Kippur War, the creation of the Israeli flag, and the story of a grandfather who felt compelled to wear the biggest tallit he could find to his grandson’s bar mitzvah.

Thank you to the Kehillat Eretz Hemdah tzitzit project, Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins, author of Enveloped in Light: A Tallit Sourcebook, and all others who helped with this podcast.

NOTES:

* Kehillat Eretz Hemdah tzitzit for soldiers project

* Enveloped in Light: A Tallit Sourcebook by Dov Peretz Elkins

* Talis by Daniel Pinkwater, from the book Fish Whistle

* Talis by Daniel Pinkwater, from the book Fish Whistle - audio book

* Israel National Symbols: The Israeli Flag

* Who Designed Israel’s Flag?

* Spiritual armor for the IDF

* Demand for religious Jewish garments surges in IDF as soldiers seek spiritual protection

* Why Are Israeli Soldiers Snapping up Tzitzit?

* Rabbi Eliyahu Tavger - Blue Fringes

* Rabbi Eliyahu Tavger - Wikipedia (Hebrew)

* Rabbi Menachem Burstein

* In Search of the Lost Chilazon

* What Color Was Tekhelet?

* The Dyeing with Murex Extracts, an Unusual Dyeing Method of Wool to the Biblical Sky Blue

* To Identify Blue in the Tzitzit

* Messiah’s Snail - Calcalist news article

* History of Izhbitza Radzin Hassidus - official website

* History of Izhbitza Radzin Hassidus - Wikipedia Hebrew

* Rabbi Avraham Issachar Englerd of Radzin - Chabadpedia

* Rabbi Avraham Issachar Englerd of Radzin - Wikipedia (Hebrew)

* Rabbi Shmuel Shlomo Leiner of Radzin - Wikipedia (Hebrew)

* Rabbi Gershon Henoch Leiner of Radzin - Wikipedia (Hebrew)

* Rabbi Isaac Herzog

* Biologist Henri de Lacaze-Duthiers

* Azure in the ancient world

*

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The story of Uziel Gal, creator of the Uzi submachine gun, which defended Israel from the 1950s and beyond. Born in Germany, his family fled the Holocaust to a small kibbutz where young Uzi developed an early interest in innovative weapons. Learn about his father, the noted Bauhaus artist Erich Glas who was forced from his job and home by the Nazis, his brother the award-winning educator Michael Gal, and a side-note about the film Terminator 2.

NOTES:

* How a Kid Who Liked to Saw Rifles Became the Inventor of the Uzi

* History of the Uzi - News 1

* Inventor Uzi Gal - Washington Post

* Lieutenant-Colonel Uziel Gal - The Telegraph

* Uziel Gal obituary - The Guardian

* Tommy Gun: How General Thompson's submachine gun wrote history

* Development of the Uzi

* Uzi Protects Queen of England

* Uziel Gal Wikipedia Hebrew

* Uziel Gal Wikipedia English

* Erich Glas - Bauhaus Artist - official web site

* Erich Glas Wikipedia German

* Erich Glas Wikipedia Hebrew

* Michael Gal Wikipedia Hebrew

* Terminator 2 firearm training

* Linda Hamilton’s Military Training for Terminator 2

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The Tenth of Tevet is a Jewish fast day which marks the beginning of the siege on Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians. But it also served as Holocaust memorial day before Yom HaShoah and was used to protest unfair treatment of Russian Jews during the Soviet era. Learn about the Chamber of the Holocaust on Mount Zion, Rabbi Mordechai Nurock who initiated Holocaust commemoration in Israel, and how this minor fast day had major implications for keeping memory alive.

NOTES:

* Biography of Rabbi Mordechai Nurock

* Rabbi Lau at Tenth of Tevet Holocaust Memorial - 2023

* Memorial Services for Nazi-killed Jews Held in Israel - 1950

* Israel Parliament Fixes Annual Memorial Day for Victims of Nazis - 1951

* 6,000-10,000 Jews, Non-Jews, Whites, Blacks, Hold Demonstration in Foley Square 1970

* British Jews Observe Day of Fast; 2,500 Jewish Women in Silent March - 1971

* The First Yom HaShoah

* Desecrated Holy Scrolls in Roumania Are Interred at Private Ceremonies - 1928

* Tenth of Tevet - Asarah B’Tevet - Jewish Virtual Library

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In the 1940s, American Jewish soldiers lit the Chanukah candles with Holocaust survivors, Tel Aviv was ordered to hide their menorahs, and the annual torch relay marathon took place starting from the graves of the Maccabees in Modiin. Hear about Chanukah during World War II, during the fight against the British Mandate’s White Paper, and finally culminating with the first Chanukah in the newly established State of Israel in 1948.

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Singer-songwriter Yitzchok Meir Malek (Mayer Malik) talks about his 20 years of performing at Israel Defense Force army bases and compares today's conflict to the Second Lebanon War of 2006 during which he lost his friend Michael Levin. His Notes of Strength project helps boost the morale of Israeli soldiers. Hear stories about singing Jewish songs amid tanks, sirens, and hostage negotiations and getting lost on the Gaza border.

Notes of Strength projectEmpty Smiles new single by Mayer Malik on Spotify

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Interview with almost 100-year-old journalist Walter Bingham about his recent trip to Germany, the Netherlands and England for a special reenactment and commemoration of the Kindertransport which rescued nearly 10,000 Jewish children from Nazi-occupied Europe during the Holocaust. He describes the change in attitude of the German public towards Holocaust survivors and the reactions to the current Israel-Gaza war.

Notes:

Walter’s World with Walter Bingham podcast

The Walter Bingham File podcast

Walter Bingham article archive - Jerusalem Post

Kindertransport refugees retrace historic journey from Germany to UK - Jewish Chronicle

‘History is repeating itself’: 99-year-old Holocaust survivor issues warning as he returns to Germany - Telegraph

Kindertransport survivors call for hostage children to be released - Maariv

“Free kidnapped children in Gaza” say Kindertransport survivors - Israel HaYom

Holocaust survivor George Shefi retraces escape 85 years on - BBC

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