In the ancient fishing village of Capernaum, above the northwestern shore of the Sea of Galilee, visitors may examine a partially reconstructed 2nd- or 3rd-century synagogue and glimpse portions of the underlying remains of an earlier synagogue in which Jesus is said to have preached. The town’s name derives from the Hebrew name K’far Nachum,…
Tag: Israel
Furor over United Church pastor-editor (1969)
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Can’t See the Forrest for the Trees Editor’s note: In July 2012 the United Church of Canada is considering a boycott of Israeli goods, a proposal that nine Canadian senators have condemned. This is only further evidence that, when it comes to relations with Israel and the Jews, the Church has had a long and…
Samuel Kernerman at 101: a man of three centuries
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For a man who has lived in three centuries, Samuel Kernerman, who will be 101 years old on January 19, 2000, has a simple request. “I just want to see my great-grandchildren grow up,” he said. He has 28 great-grandchildren. Interviewed at the Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre veterans wing, Kernerman, a veteran of World War…
How Yad Vashem computerized names of victims
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Faced with a non-negotiable deadline of March 31, 1999, an army of some 1,200 data entry clerks, software technicians, Holocaust scholars and other specialists worked at a feverish pitch through late February and March to computerize the names of three million or more Holocaust victims from a collection of documents at the Yad Vashem Holocaust…
The Falsified Passports Affair: a classical dialogue
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Note: this piece was written in response to the so-called “falsified passports affair” of 1997, when Israel was lambasted for falsifying Canadian passports as a means of assisting in its war on Muslim fundamentalist terror. * * * HORATIO: I am much disturbed and aggrieved, Plutonius, at the extent of the trickery and deception practised…
Moses Montefiore, a man of his people
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His name was Moses; he was a leader of his people; he spent much time in Egypt and the desert; he wandered incessantly; he is associated with a fiery mountain and the holiday of Passover; and his life lasted longer than a century. These traits describe the biblical Moses, of course, but they also refer…
Intrigue and history at American Colony Hotel
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A few paces over the line between east and west, the American Colony is reputedly the finest hotel in Arab East Jerusalem, and no less steeped in legend and lore than its more famous counterpart, the King David Hotel, in the western, more prosperous section of the city. Part of the exclusive Relais & Chateaux…
Vered Hagalil, popular ranch north of the Sea of Galilee
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Yehudi Avni has a dream — to mount one of the 20 horses at Vered Hagalil, his horse ranch and guest farm north of the Sea of Galilee, and ride around the lake and through the valley to Amman, the capital of Jordan. “When peace will come, and if it will be a real peace,…
Good ship Paducah smuggled Jews to Palestine
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A recent ceremony at the U.S. Holocaust Museum paid tribute to the captain and crew of the Paducah, an aging American gunship that was sold as surplus after WWII and retrofitted to smuggle Holocaust survivors through the British blockade to Palestine in 1947. The captain of the Paducah was Rudolph Patzert, a 35-year-old New York…
Touring Israel’s Upper Galilee
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Israel’s Upper Galilee is famed for many things, including natural beauty, archaeological ruins, and being the source of the Jordan River. Visitors could easily spend much time in this region, touring parks, ancient sites, museums and towns like Kiryat Shmona and the fascinating mystical jewel known as Safed. The towering forests and rippling waterways of…
