Yiddish is most definitely not a dead/dying language.

First and foremost, let’s debunk the biggest myth about Yiddish: that the language died along with the six million of the Holocaust. Although the Holocaust devastated traditional Yiddish-speaking Ashkenazi society and hollowed out the shtetls and cities in which the language was spoken, Hitler did not succeed in removing Europe’s home-grown Jewish language from the earth. Yiddish survives, and not just in the form of colourful words that made their way into Hebrew and English, but as the full, natively-spoken language of hundreds of thousands of people, most notably Hasidic Jews in the USA and Israel (but also in many other Hasidic corners of the world, such as London’s Stamford Hill). As the native language of hundreds of thousands of souls within the Jewish world’s fastest-growing communities, Yiddish is very much alive and well. Eminent linguist Dovid Katz writes that Yiddish is ‘100% safe for centuries to come’ as a ‘virile written and spoken language’ in Hasidic communities, based on current sociolinguistic and demographic trends.

So, reports of the death of Yiddish have been greatly exaggerated. And as a great Yiddish writer reminds us, for two thousand years, Hebrew was called a dead language too.

2) Yiddish is not just broken German. Yiddish is not just broken Hebrew.

The Vilna Shul – Boston’s Center for Jewish Culture Newsleter , Fall 2014.

As you know, the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) has decided to establish a Commission of Inquiry (COI) to investigate Israel’s operations in the recent Gaza confrontation, to the consternation of our global Jewish community. The UNHRC has chosen Professor William Schabas to head the COI, known for his negative attitudes and biased pronouncements concerning Israel. We are attaching a backgrounder on the UNHRC and William Schabas which we believe will be very useful to you in your role as community leaders when you educate your members and constituents as to this counter-productive step taken by the UNHRC that demonstrates its ongoing anti-Israel bias. This COI was called for in a recent UNHRC resolution that condemned Israel for its actions in Gaza and made absolutely no mention of Hamas. We believe that this one-sided resolution will no doubt result in a prejudiced outcome that will only serve to once again single out Israel for blame. We are sending you the attached document that states our current position.
 
Kindly circulate this material to your membership since it is crucial that community leadership be fully apprised as to developments concerning Israel in the United Nations. The WJC will keep you informed as we continue to advocate for the fair treatment of Israel in the United Nations.
 
This is to advise you that this notice is not a call for any action on your part but mainly for you to know that we are monitoring the situation and will report to you further.
 

Amit Cotler, Shai Rajoan

Blogger Shai Rajoan, 25, has made it his mission to preserve Israeli metropolis in pictures and has a lot to say about the way we treat our own history.

Shema Yisrael, 1972

The Great Synagogue on 110 Allenby Street, corner of 23 Ahad Ha’am Street, immediately after its construction was completed(Photo: The G. Eric and Edith Matson Photograph Collection, Library of Congress)

See more at ynetnews.com

The open-ended ceasefire agreement should lead to an immediate halt to rocket attacks and other attacks by Hamas and other militant groups in Gaza against Israel. The Palestinian Authority should exercise its full government responsibilities in Gaza and establish its effective governance. Israel should lift Gaza closure regime, which would lead to the fundamental improvement in the living conditions for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip as well as to the economic development of Gaza.

The Foreign Ministry commends the efforts by the Egyptian government to broker this deal. Lithuania is ready to support the possible international mechanism endorsed by the UN Security Council.

 urm.lt

HAARETZ.com

U.S. Holocaust Museum and International Center of Photography in New York announce joint creation of digital database.

A vast U.S. archive of photographs of pre-Holocaust Eastern European Jewish life is being made available to the public and researchers.

The International Center of Photography in New York and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday announced the joint creation of a digital database to facilitate access to photographer Roman Vishniac’s archive.

by Geoff Vasil

photos by Milda Jakulytė-Vasil

Volunteers in Vilnius none the worse for the wear after an afternoon spent in the cobwebs and gloom of the old ghetto library

 As Litvaks resident and formerly resident in Vilna well know, the Vilna ghetto had its own library.

 Located on what was then Strashun and now Žemaitijos street in the Vilna Old Town, the library, called the Mefítsey Haskóle (or Mefitsey Haskolo in Ashkenazic Hebrew), existed prior to the establishment of the ghetto near the historic Jewish quarter, from about 1921. The street name seems to have been a source of confusion because of the “real” Strashun library located within the Great Synagogue, whose collections were largely bequeathed by a Mr. Strashun.

 Most of what we know went on in the Vilna ghetto that doesn’t come from the very few survivors, we know from the scrupulous diary kept by the Vilna ghetto librarian, the Polish refugee Herman Kruk. Kruk’s diary is longer than DeFoe’s “Journal of the Plague Year” and just as gruesome, if not more so, since the agent of the great death was not the plague, but our fellow man. 

New York Times, USA  20 August 2014

By RONALD S. LAUDER

WHY is the world silent while Christians are being slaughtered in the Middle East and Africa?

In Europe and in the United States, we have witnessed demonstrations over the tragic deaths of Palestinians who have been used as human shields by Hamas, the terrorist organization that controls Gaza. The United Nations has held inquiries and focuses its anger on Israel for defending itself against that same terrorist organization. But the barbarous slaughter of thousands upon thousands of Christians is met with relative indifference.

The Middle East and parts of central Africa are losing entire Christian communities that have lived in peace for centuries. The terrorist group Boko Haram has kidnapped and killed hundreds of Christians this year — ravaging the predominantly Christian town of Gwoza, in Borno State in northeastern Nigeria, two weeks ago. Half a million Christian Arabs have been driven out of Syria during the three-plus years of civil war there. Christians have been persecuted and killed in countries from Lebanon to Sudan.

BRUSSELS (EJP)— The European Union reiterated its call for ‘’all terrorist groups in Gaza to disarm and said the situation in the Gaza Strip ‘’has been unsustainable for many years and a return to the status quo prior to the latest conflict is not an option.’’

In conclusions on Gaza issued after a meeting of EU Foreign Ministers in Brussels, the EU stressed that ‘’adurable ceasefire’must lead to a fundamental improvement in the living conditions for the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip through the lifting of the Gaza closure regime and it must end the threat to Israel posed by Hamas and other militant groups in Gaza as demonstrated by rocket attacks and tunnel construction’’.

‘’The EU is extremely concerned about the fragile situation on the ground following the recent conflict in the Gaza Strip,’’ it said.

The EU strongly welcomed the ceasefire which has been in place since 11 August and called on all the parties concerned ‘’to agree on and abide by a durable ceasefire’’.

More at ejpress.org