Portal:Judaism/DYK

DYK 1

... that the Château Pastré (pictured) in Marseille, designed by Jean-Charles Danjoy for Eugène Pastré, was a haven for Jewish artists in World War II?
... that the creator of the TV series Homeland, Gideon Raff, is the son of a former Accountant General in Israel's Ministry of Finance?
... that Dr. Moshe Wallach, founder and director of Jerusalem's Shaare Zedek Hospital for 45 years, lived in the hospital and was buried beside it?
... that much like Anne Frank's diary, the letters of Philip Slier, discovered more than fifty years after his death, reveal the history of Nazi-controlled Netherlands through a personal perspective?
... that the Supreme Court of the United States decision in Zivotofsky v. Clinton concerned the status of Jerusalem in United States foreign policy?

... that the Monument to the Ghetto Heroes (pictured), site of Willy Brandt's Warschauer Kniefall in 1970, was made from labradorite intended to be used in monuments in Nazi Germany?
... that the Chaim Potok novel The Book of Lights is based on Potok's exposure to non-Jewish religions as a military chaplain in Korea and Japan?
... that Polish Jewish resistance fighter Vladka Meed was a central source of the 2001 television movie Uprising?
... that most Russian-speakers in the United States are Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union?

... that in the Garden of the Righteous Among the Nations (pictured), names of the Holocaust rescuers are engraved on Walls of Honor according to country?
... that Rabbi Akiva Ehrenfeld, founder of Kiryat Mattersdorf, Jerusalem, was the guest of honor at an official reception hosted by the President of Austria in Vienna's Hofburg Palace in 1995?
... that Steve Pestka resigned his judgeship to run the real estate business his father developed after surviving the Holocaust?
... that the daughter of Candice Cohen-Ahnine is a Jewish-Saudi princess whom French President Nicolas Sarkozy attempted to bring to France, but failed?
... that 1930 Wimbledon Championships mixed doubles runner-up Daniel Prenn was of Jewish origin and thus got expelled from the Germany Davis Cup team and subsequently moved from Nazi Germany to England?

... that an attempt to sell the aging Stanton Street Synagogue (pictured) on the Lower East Side of Manhattan to a Jesuit priest led to its resurgence as a Jewish house of worship?
... that it is theorized that Jews' Gate Cemetery in Gibraltar was founded on Windmill Hill due to the expulsion of Jews mandated under the Treaty of Utrecht?
... that when Rabbi Avraham Kalmanowitz cried, "even the State Department listened"?
... that "Miky", a bomb-sniffing police dog that only responds to commands in Hebrew, helped to revitalize the Jewish community in Helena, Montana, that built Temple Emanu-El?
... that the Jewish Military Museum was founded partly to counter the idea that British Jews have avoided serving in the armed forces?

... that the Jewish Orphanage of Berlin-Pankow (pictured) was originally intended to be a home for refugee children who escaped pogroms after the assassination of Alexander II of Russia?
... that some of the most active parents in the Orthodox Jewish day school founded by Rabbi David Rebibo in Phoenix, Arizona, in 1965 were members of the local Reform temple?
... that Da-Don took the office of chief rabbi of Croatia in 1998, more than fifty years since the last office-holder?
... that Peter Feldmann is the first politician of the Jewish faith to be elected mayor of Frankfurt since World War II?
... that about 40 Jews live in Mauritius as of 2006?

... that Sinan Reis, a Sephardi Jewish pirate and Barbary corsair whose family was expelled from Spain in 1492, helped Ottoman admiral Hayreddin Barbarossa defeat the Spanish at the 1538 Battle of Preveza (pictured)?
... that two months after Baruch Ben Haim arrived in Brooklyn to serve as Assistant Chief Rabbi of the Syrian Jewish community, he was engaged to the Chief Rabbi's daughter?
... that most epic poems about the Babi Yar massacres were written by Russian and Ukrainian Jews who managed to survive the Holocaust?
... that Margaret Michaelis-Sachs took photos of the Jewish market in Kraków which "carry the weight of history, offering a visual trace of a way of life that was destroyed by fascism"?
... that Simeon Magruder Levy was in 1802 the first Jewish graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point?

... that Ralli Hall (pictured) in Hove—founded 100 years ago today—has been an Anglican church hall, a Jewish place of worship, a wartime drill hall, a cinema, and a zumba venue, among other things?
... that when the British authorities attempted to deport Jewish refugees in Palestine to Mauritius aboard the SS Patria in 1940, the paramilitary organization Haganah sank the ship with a bomb?
... that Sir Philip Magnus began his career as an educational reformer while working as a rabbi at the West London Synagogue?
... that in 2012 Jewish Universalist rabbi Steven Blane, who encourages converts to join his online rabbinical school, ordained an ex-Muslim as a rabbi?
... that offensive tackles Mitchell Schwartz and Geoff Schwartz are the first Jewish brothers to play in the National Football League since Arnold Horween and Ralph Horween, in 1923?

... that the 13th-century illuminated manuscript North French Hebrew Miscellany (illustration pictured) contains biblical and religious texts as well as poetry, legal materials, and a calendar?
... that former Israeli Ambassador to Russia Anna Azari is married to a rabbi who leads a congregation in Tel Aviv?
... that Albert Seedman was the only Jewish chief of detectives for the New York City Police Department?
... that the Miller Introduction to Judaism Program at the American Jewish University has prepared thousands of people to convert to Judaism since 1986?
... that Mark Antony aided Herod the Great's siege of Jerusalem?