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U.N. exhibit remembers when the world turned its back on stateless Jewish refugees
(New York Jewish Week) — In 2017, Deborah Veach went back to Germany, looking for the site of the displaced persons camp where she and her parents had been housed after World War II. They were in suspension, between the lives her parents led in Belarus before they were shattered by the Nazis, and the unknown fate awaiting them as refugees without a country.
To her dismay, and despite the fact that Foehrenwald was one of the largest Jewish DP centers in the American-controlled zone of Germany, she found barely a trace. A complex that once included a yeshiva, a police force, a fire brigade, a youth home, a theater, a post office and a hospital was remembered by almost no one except a local woman who ran a museum in a former bath house.
“It was sort of an accident of history that we were there in that particular camp in Germany, of all places, with no ties, no extended family, no place to call home,” said Veach, who was born at Foehrenwald in 1949 and lives in New Jersey. Now, “they renamed it. They changed the names of all the streets. There is nothing recognizable about the fact that it had been a DP camp.”
Veach is part of a now-aging cohort of children born or raised in the DP camps, the last with a first-hand connection to the experience of some 250,000 Jewish survivors who passed through them at the end of the war. To make sure memories of the camps survive them, the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research and the United Nations Department of Global Communications have staged a short-term exhibit, “After the End of the World: Displaced Persons and Displaced Persons Camps.”
On display at U.N. headquarters in New York City Jan. 10 through Feb. 23, it is intended to illuminate “how the impact of the Holocaust continued to be felt after the Second World War ended and the courage and resilience of those that survived in their efforts to rebuild their lives despite having lost everything,” according to a press release.
Residents of a displaced persons camp in Salzburg, Austria. Undated, post-Second World War. (YIVO Institute for Jewish Research)
Among the artifacts on display are dolls created by Jewish children and copies of some of the 70-odd newspapers published by residents, as well as photographs of weddings, theatrical performances, sporting events and classroom lessons.
The exhibit is “about the displaced persons themselves, about their lives and their hopes and their dreams, their ambitions, their initiatives,” said Debórah Dwork, who directs the Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Crimes Against Humanity at the Graduate Center-CUNY, who served as the scholar adviser for the exhibition.
“There’s no point where the residents of these DP camps were just sitting around waiting for other people to do things for them,” she told the New York Jewish Week. “They took initiative and developed a whole range of cultural and educational programs.”
As early as 1943, as the war displaced millions of people, dozens of nations came to Washington and signed onto the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Authority. (Despite its name, it preceded the founding of the U.N.) After the war, the British and U.S. military were in charge of supplying food, protection and medical care in hundreds of camps throughout Germany and Austria, and UNRRA administered the camps on a day-to-day basis.
Early on, Jewish Holocaust survivors — some who suffered in concentration camps, others who had escaped into the Soviet Union — were put in DP camps alongside their former tormentors, until the U.S. agreed to place them in separate compounds. Unable or unwilling to return to the countries where they had lost relatives, property and any semblance of a normal life, they began a waiting game, as few countries, including the United States, were willing to take them in, and Palestine was being blockaded by the British.
Abiding antisemitism was not the only reason they remained stateless. “Jews were [accused of being] subversives, communists, rebels, troublemakers, and the world war quickly gave way to cold war, and with it the notion that Hitler had been defeated and what we have to worry about is the communists,” David Nasaw, author of “The Last Million,” a history of the displaced persons, told the New York Jewish week in 2020.
In 1948 and 1950, Congress grudgingly passed legislation that allowed 50,000 Jewish survivors and their children to come to the United States. The rest were eventually able to go to Israel, after its independence in 1948.
The U.N. exhibit focuses less on this macro history — which includes what became another refugee crisis for the Palestinians displaced by Israel’s War for Independence — than on life in the DP camps.
“The exhibition illustrates how the displaced persons did not shrink from the task of rebuilding both their own lives and Jewish communal life,” said Jonathan Brent, chief executive officer at YIVO, in a statement.
Among those rebuilding their lives were Max Gitter and his parents, Polish Jews who had the perverse good luck of being exiled to Siberia during the war. The family made its way to Samarkand, in Uzbekistan, where Gitter was born in 1943. After the war ended, his parents returned to Poland, but repelled by antisemitism sought refuge in the American zone in Germany. They spent time in the Ainring DP camp, a former Luftwaffe base on the Austrian border, and at a small camp called Lechfeld, about 25 miles west of Munich.
Dolls made by stateless Jewish children residing in a DP camp near Florence, Italy, known as “Kibbutz HaOved.” The dolls are attired in local costumes based on the districts of the Tuscan city of Sienna. (YIVO Institute for Jewish Research)
“I was there until we came to the United States when I was six and a half, so I have some very distinct memories and some hazy memories,” said Gitter, emeritus director and vice chair of the YIVO board. One story he hasn’t forgotten is how his father and a friend were walking through the camp when they came upon a long line of people. “They were from the Soviet Union, so they knew that when there’s a line that it might be of interest.” It turned out to be a line for the lottery that would allow them to get into the United States under the Displaced Persons Act of 1948.
The family came to the United States in 1950, to “pretty shabby lodgings” in the Bronx, before his father bought a candy store and moved to Queens. Max went on to attend Harvard College and Yale Law School, and became a corporate litigator.
Gitter’s brother was born in one of the camps, and the exhibit includes a poster depicting the population increase between 1946 and 1947 at the Jewish DP center Bad Reichenhall. The birthrate in the camps has often been described as evidence of the optimism and defiance of the survivors, but Dwork said the truth is somewhat more complicated.
“There was a very high birth rate among the Jews in DP camps. This is the age group of reproductive age, at 20 to 40,” she said. “However, this image of fecundity hides what was rumored to be a significant abortion rate, too. And women had experienced years of starvation. Menstruation had only recently recommenced. So many women, in fact, miscarried or had trouble conceiving to begin with.”
A chart by artist O. Lec depicts the natural population increase of the Jewish Center Bad Reichenhall, Germany, 1946-1947. There was a very high birth rate among the Jews in DP camps. (YIVO Institute for Jewish Research)
“There is no silver lining here,” she added. “People live life on many levels. On the one hand, DPs look to the future and look with hope; at the same time, they carry tremendous burdens of pain and suffering and trauma and trepidations about the future.”
Veach, a member of the YIVO board, hopes visitors to the exhibit understand that such trauma is hardly a thing of the past.
“I think the real lesson is that history keeps repeating itself,” said Veach, growing emotional. “Basically we have DPs on our border with Mexico, you have DPs from Ukraine. I don’t think people realize the repercussions for these people who are trying to find a place to live. These are good people who are just placed where they are by history.”
Gitter, who like Veach will speak at an event Jan. 24 at the U.N. marking the exhibit, also hopes “After the End of the World” prods the consciences of visitors.
“A lot of the countries, a lot of places, including the United States, would not accept Jews after the war,” he said. “The issue of memory, the issue of statelessness, the issue of finally there was some hope for the Jews in their immigration to Israel and the United States — that part of the story also needs to be told.”
“After the End of the World: Displaced Persons and Displaced Persons Camps” is on view from Jan. 10-Feb. 23, 2023, at the United Nations Headquarters, 405 E 42nd St, New York, Monday-Friday, 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. Entrance to the United Nations Visitor Centre in New York is free, but there are requirements for all visitors. See the United Nations Visitor Centre entry guidelines.
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The Guardian Clarifies ‘Misunderstanding’ About ‘Antisemitic’ Opinion Piece Targeting Israeli-Founded Bakery
April 4, 2025, London, England, United Kingdom: Exterior view of a Gail’s bakery in Covent Garden. Photo: ZUMA Press Wire via Reuters Connect
The Guardian edited an opinion piece on Tuesday about a popular Israeli-founded bakery in the United Kingdom after the column was widely criticized for claiming that the store’s location near a Palestinian bakery was an “an act of heavy-handed high street aggression.”
The opinion piece was originally published on Saturday and mentioned Gail’s Bakery, which was founded by British-Israeli baker Gail Mejia in the 1990s and turned into a café chain with the help of Israeli entrepreneur Ran Avidan.
Gail’s now has almost 200 locations across the UK, and neither Mejia nor Avidan are still involved in the business. Gail’s largest shareholder is the American venture capital firm Bain Capital, which invests in Israeli defense and cybersecurity companies. The firm signed an open letter in support of Israel after Hamas’s invasion of the Jewish state on Oct. 7, 2023, but Gail’s has repeatedly stated that it has no ties to any foreign entity or government outside of the UK.
A newly opened branch of Gail’s in London’s Archway area had its windows smashed twice within a week of opening, and the store was vandalized with graffiti that read “Free Gaza,” “reject corporate Zionism,” and “Boycott Gail’s Funds Israeli Tech.”” An anti-Israel demonstration also took place at the same Gail’s location, according to reports. No arrests have been made for the vandalisms.
The Guardian opinion piece originally published on Saturday by the publication’s columnist Jonathan Liew is titled, “A corner of north London where food has become a battleground in the Israel-Gaza war.” It claimed Gail’s “very presence” in the Archway neighborhood near a Palestinian cafe called Cafe Metro was “symbolic” of “heavy-handed high-street aggression.” The accusation was made in a paragraph that said Bain Capital “invests heavily” in Israeli security companies.
“Campaigners point out that its parent company, Bain Capital, invests heavily in military technology, including Israeli security companies,” the piece previously read. “And so even though Gail’s describes itself as ‘a British business with no specific connections to any country or government outside the UK’, its very presence 20 meters away from a small independent Palestinian café feels quietly symbolic, an act of heavy-handed high-street aggression.”
On Tuesday, the claim about Gail’s “heavy-handed high street aggression” was moved in the article and now follows accusations about the bakery “accelerating gentrification and squeezing out smaller outlets.” The article also now says that Gail’s is acting just “like the multinationals that landed before it.” The mention about Bain Capital and Gail’s having “no specific connections to any country or government outside of the UK” has been moved to its own paragraph.
Liew also wrote that Cafe Metro was “a marker of the Palestinian identity that Israel’s bombs and snipers are so intent on erasing” and described Gail’s as a “predator” in the neighborhood. Those references have not been edited or removed from the article.
Jonathan Liew’s opinion piece for The Guardian before it was edited. Photo: Screenshot
Jonathan Liew’s opinion piece for The Guardian after edits were made on March 17. Photo: Screenshot
A note from the editor, posted at the end of the article, explained that the reference to Gail’s new location in London mimicking “an act of heavy-handed high street aggression” has been “repositioned to clarify it meant to refer to the described fears about the chain’s impact on small traders.” The note also tried to clarify the notion among critics that the article mitigated the recent acts of vandalism targeting Gail’s.
“A comment contrasting activism that is capable of influencing global events with ‘small acts of petty symbolism,’ which was not intended to minimize local vandalism but rather to suggest its misdirected futility, has been removed to avoid misunderstanding,” it said. Editors also removed from the article its introduction, which read: “A smashed window here, a provocative sticker there. In an age when protest feels increasingly meaningless, it’s no wonder that acts of petty symbolism are on the rise.”
Before the changes were made, the article had been accused of perpetuating antisemitism and was heavily criticized by Jewish groups, pro-Israel activists, politicians, radio hosts, Gail Bakery’s chief executive Tom Molnar, and journalists, including Jewish staff members at The Guardian. Gail’s supporters claimed the article inappropriately targeted the bakery chain because it happened to open a branch in close proximity to a Palestinian cafe.
The article has also been accused of attempting to justify the vandalism it has faced recently.
The British charity Campaign Against Antisemitism said the piece was “encouraging anti-Israeli sentiment among its readers,” while the UK’s Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch called the article “antisemitic,” “utterly ridiculous,” and “appalling.” The media-monitoring organization CAMERA UK said the column was “downplaying the campaign of intimidation against a Jewish-linked business while presenting activists in a sympathetic light.”
Alex Gandler, the spokesperson for Israel’s Embassy in the UK, said the piece was “an astonishing exercise in bigotry disguised as moral commentary.”
“Beneath its surface lies a familiar and ugly trope: the re-packaging of antisemitic prejudice in fashionable political language … the insinuation that Jewish success or presence represents some form of encroachment by powerful ‘global’ forces,” he added. “For a newspaper that presents itself as a guardian of liberal values, publishing such rhetoric is deeply disappointing. Opinion pages should encourage debate and scrutiny. They should not revive centuries-old stereotypes under the guise of social commentary. This piece should never have been written, and it certainly should never have been published.”
The Board of Deputies of British Jews said: “It is not acceptable to relate to the opening of a bakery as an act of ‘aggression’ … Most people will find this article, seeped in tropes and innuendos, as deeply insidious, and will want to know why The Guardian thinks an op-ed seemingly justifying tensions between communities has a place on its pages.”
A pro-Israel protest was also held outside The Guardian headquarters in London on Wednesday in response to the offensive opinion piece.
The edits to the article were insufficient for many observers, including Camera UK. “So, it was all just a silly ‘misunderstanding,’” it posted on X. “No apology. Nothing to see here. And, certainly, NO antisemitism.”
“That is not how you correct this travesty of an ‘opinion,” Gandler wrote on X. “Correction in hindsight, after this failure should be a complete withdrawal, not a rewriting of history.”
Tom Molnar, the bakery chain’s chief executive, responded to the article on Monday.
“We live in a democracy that welcomes different opinions, but we will not accept hate and intimidation in our bakeries,” he said, as reported by The Times. “We are a neighborhood bakery that is on a mission to feed more people, better. We are firm believers that a healthy high street is a diverse one made up of many different businesses, from many different backgrounds, each playing its part. We want to serve the best possible food to our communities, and the vandalism we experienced in Archway serves as a distraction from doing just that.”
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WikiLeaks: From Classified Database to an Anti-Israel Propaganda Platform
WikiLeaks Julian Assange in an interview with Fox News. Photo: Screenshot.
Founded in 2006 as a platform for leaked documents exposing war, espionage, and corruption, WikiLeaks built its reputation on radical transparency.
Despite the controversy surrounding its publication of classified material, the organization gained global recognition, winning numerous awards and becoming best known for releasing documents related to the US wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Today, its X account tells a very different story.
With more than 5.6 million followers, WikiLeaks has increasingly become a hub for anti-Israel conspiracy theories — content that bears little resemblance to its original mission of publishing classified material.
Rather than exposing new information, the account now appears to construct narratives about Israel and the Jewish people using documents that are neither classified nor newly revealed, amplified through carefully timed posts.
The pattern is clear. Two months into Israel’s war with Hamas, WikiLeaks resurfaced a document it first published in 2010 claiming that an “Israeli intelligence chief encouraged Hamas’ takeover of the Gaza Strip” — a framing that shifts blame for the conflict onto Israel.
Since the start of 2026, the account has posted 15 times (excluding replies). Of those, 11 focused entirely on Israel or the Jewish people.
Its most recent example is particularly telling. WikiLeaks “leaked” a document dated July 21, 1947, written by US President Harry S. Truman, which includes derogatory remarks about Jews.
What the account failed to mention is that the document was made public in 2003 and is therefore not a leak. Nor did it provide the broader historical context, including Truman’s decision to recognize the State of Israel immediately after its founding.
Instead, the post highlights a willingness to promote inflammatory material to an audience primed to accept it. In doing so, WikiLeaks helps sustain an online echo chamber where misleading anti-Israel narratives circulate with little scrutiny.
This dynamic is amplified by high-profile activists such as Shaun King and Susan Abulhawa, who readily repeat and disseminate such claims to large audiences, transforming misleading posts into widely shared talking points.
The trend is not new. In October 2025, WikiLeaks helped spread the false claim that pro-Israel influencers were being paid $7,000 per post to “increase global influence.” Yet the documents cited provided no evidence for such payments or any breakdown of how funds were allocated.
WikiLeaks’ fixation on Israel is not limited to its social media output. Its founder, Julian Assange, has his own record of anti-Israel activism, raising further questions about the organization’s impartiality.
In 2012, Assange launched The Julian Assange Show, produced by the Russian state-controlled network RT. His first guest was Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, whom Assange allowed to portray Israel as an “illegal state” while framing media coverage as a “war” against Hezbollah.
Assange’s activism has also been taken to the streets. More recently, in August 2025, Assange was seen leading a pro-Palestinian protest in Sydney that featured flags of terrorist organizations and imagery of their leaders.
If WikiLeaks was founded to expose censored information in the public interest, its current trajectory raises serious questions about its purpose. Rather than prioritizing transparency, the organization now appears increasingly focused on amplifying anti-Israel narratives detached from its original mission.
With a platform reaching millions – and bolstered by influential amplifiers – misleading claims are circulated and legitimized with little scrutiny. What emerges is not a commitment to truth, but an ecosystem in which information is selectively curated to reinforce an anti-Israel worldview.
The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.
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Argentine Jewish Community Commemorates Deadly Israeli Embassy Bombing as Justice Remains Elusive, 34 Years Later
A display of posters at the AMIA Jewish center in Buenos Aires, Argentina, highlighting the plight of hostages seized by Hamas. Photo: Reuters/Añeli Pablo
Argentina’s Jewish community on Tuesday marked the 34th anniversary of the devastating bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, a brutal attack that still casts a long shadow of unresolved grief and unanswered questions.
On March 17, 1992, a truck bomb exploded outside the embassy, ripping through the building and killing 29 people while injuring more than 240 others in one of Argentina’s deadliest terror attacks.
The blast was widely attributed to operatives linked to the Iran-backed Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah with support from Tehran, though no one has ever been brought to justice for the tragedy.
A 34 años del atentado contra la Embajada de Israel en Buenos Aires, recordamos a las 29 víctimas asesinadas el 17 de marzo de 1992 y rendimos homenaje a todos los afectados por este brutal acto terrorista.
Esclarecer este ataque sigue siendo un deber irrenunciable de nuestra… pic.twitter.com/OXTUuTiL8w
— Casa Rosada (@CasaRosada) March 17, 2026
Just two years later, the country was shaken by another horrific attack when a bomb destroyed the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) Jewish community center, killing 85 people and injuring over 300 others.
More than three decades on, those responsible for either atrocity have yet to be brought to justice, leaving survivors and families still searching for accountability.
On Tuesday, the Israeli Embassy in Argentina hosted a remembrance ceremony where officials, including Argentine President Javier Milei, gathered to mark the anniversary, pay respects to the victims, and call for justice that has long been delayed.
“There can be no truce against terrorism. Iran despises life and seeks to destroy freedom,” Milei said during a speech at the ceremony.
“Argentina is Israel’s ally, and we are bound by the same values,” he continued.
The Argentine leader also reaffirmed his steadfast support for the United States and Israel in the ongoing war with Iran, describing it as a critical turning point and highlighting his dedication to international cooperation.
The Delegation of Argentine Israelite Associations (DAIA), the country’s Jewish umbrella organization, also paid respect to the victims while emphasizing the community’s enduring strength and unity.
“Memory is not just remembrance: it is a collective responsibility to build a society without impunity, where terrorism has no place,” DAIA wrote in a post on X.
A 34 años del atentado perpetrado contra la Embajada de Israel en Argentina, acompañamos un nuevo acto de memoria, recogimiento y compromiso.
Recordamos a las víctimas, abrazamos a sus familias y renovamos el pedido de justicia, que sigue siendo una deuda pendiente.
La memoria… pic.twitter.com/NhZZrUT71c
— DAIA (@DAIAArgentina) March 17, 2026
In 2024, Argentina’s second-highest court ruled that the 1994 attack in Buenos Aires was “organized, planned, financed, and executed under the direction of the authorities of the Islamic State of Iran, within the framework of Islamic Jihad.”
Argentine authorities concluded that the terror attack was carried out by Hezbollah terrorists acting on what they described as “a political and strategic design” orchestrated by Iran.
The court additionally ruled that Iran was also responsible for the truck bombing of the Israeli embassy.
Argentine investigators concluded that the 1992 bombing was likely carried out in retaliation for then-President Carlos Menem’s cancellation of three agreements with Iran involving nuclear equipment and technology.
Despite Argentina’s longstanding belief that Hezbollah carried out the devastating attack at Iran’s request, the 1994 bombing has never been claimed or officially solved.
Meanwhile, Tehran has consistently denied any involvement and has refused to arrest or extradite any suspects.
Earlier this month, the lead prosecutor in the case requested the indictment of 10 Iranian and Lebanese nationals suspected of involvement in the deadly attack.
Among those named was Ahmad Vahidi, who was recently appointed the new head of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), an Iranian military force and internationally designated terrorist organization.
He replaced Mohammad Pakpour, who was killed during the US-Israeli military campaign against Iran, which has resulted in the death of several high-ranking officials.
In 1994, Vahidi commanded the IRGC’s Quds Force, which is responsible for managing Iran’s proxies and terrorist operations abroad.
Despite Interpol issuing red notices for their arrest, neither Iran nor Lebanon has handed over any suspects, allowing them to remain beyond the reach of Argentine authorities.
For the first time, Argentina has now ordered that suspects be tried in absentia following a legal change in March that removed the requirement for defendants to be physically present in court.