Five hundred years ago, the Jews of Catholic Spain were expelled from their homeland by the practitioners of a religious fanaticism who believed that they had God on their side. The talents and contributions of minorities, whether Jewish or Muslim, were unwanted in a religiously pure Iberia. Those Jews who did not prostrate themselves before the priests of Ferdinand and Isabella left to seek new … Read more
An Interview with Gerald Kaufman MP 5 August 1992 CS: I believe that you apologized to your constituents shortly after Labour’s defeat in the 1992 elections for not being in a position to do more to help eradicate their poverty. GK: I didn’t apologize. What I said was that those of my constituents who were in a … Read more
What do Disneyland and Israel have in common? Both have a bad record when it comes to disposal of toxic waste. Despite its benevolent image, Disneyland was fined a considerable sum a couple of years ago by the Environmental Protection Agency. Israel produces 100,000 tons of toxic waste each year which is transported to and … Read more
Communism was deemed by its adherents to be eternal. Few could contemplate its decay and a final crumbling into the dust of ages. Its meaning was its existence. Most who lived under Communism accepted their lot, avoided trouble and got on with living their lives as best they could. Few possessed the courage and foresight … Read more
One year ago, the two Germanies became one. The hated Berlin Wall was literally pulled down by the will of the people. The Stalinist gerontocracy which had ruled East Germany for more than four decades collapsed like a pack of cards. Their eyes and ears, the members of the Stasi secret police, were run to … Read more
MARGARET THATCHER’S current difficulties seem to herald the end of an era: three foreign secretaries within as many months; the exit of an experienced team from the uppermost echelons of government to the back benches and less important posts; the trouncing of the Tories in the European elections — the first defeat since she entered … Read more
At the end of 1988, full page advertisements appeared in the national press in Britain which exhorted Jews to embrace Jesus Christ as the Messiah and effectively to convert to the Christian faith. The reaction of most Jews was initially one of astonishment that, in this day and age, large sums of money should be … Read more
Mandela was arrested in August 1962, formally for his work in Umkonto we Sizwe, the underground wing of the ANC whose activities were directed at sabotaging installations—often ineptly. Nearly a year later, the entire leadership of Umkonto we Sizwe were surprised by a police raid on the home of Arthur Goldreich in Rivonia near Johannesburg. … Read more
ALL British Jews alive today know that their survival during the Nazi period was determined essentially by geography and little else. Fortunately, the Nazi empire did not expand fast enough or last long enough to realize the finality of the Final Solution. Thus, for those Jews, for whom fate decreed that their forebears would settle … Read more
THE presence of six alleged war criminals in Britain is a serious and emotional. matter. The issue raises important questions, not least about how they arrived and what should be done with them if they are identified as perpetrators of genocide. Why has it taken until 1987 to bring this issue forward in this … Read more