Local News
How did an English performance poet develop such a keen interest in Jewish nuclear physicists?
By BERNIE BELLAN Readers of this website may have read an earlier story I posted about a Fringe play titled “THE KID WAS A SPY,” by well-known Fringe writer and performer Jem Rolls. (You can read that story at https://jewishpostandnews.ca/faqs/rokmicronews-fp-1/fringe-show-asks-was-giving-the-secret-to-the-atomic-bomb-to-the-russians-morally-justifiable/)
I was so intrigued by the notion that Rolls had written, not one, but three entire Fringe plays centering around the lives of individuals he described as “Jewish nuclear physicists no one has ever heard of” that I wanted to find out from Rolls what led to his interest in the subject.
We were supposed to have met for an interview while the Winnipeg Fringe Festival was still occurring but, as events transpired, Rolls got caught up with other things that required his attention, and wasn’t able to meet with me.
Still, he contacted me to apologize for not having been able to sit down for a conversation and said he would still very much like to engage with me about his interest in “little-known Jewish nuclear physicists.”
As it was, Rolls recently found himself with more time on his hands when he was in Saskatoon, getting ready for that city’s fringe festival which, he described in an email to me as “the quiet bit after and before the madhouses,” i.e., the Winnipeg and Edmonton fringe festivals.
A little information about Jem Rolls: He’s one of the veteran of the fringe festival circuit. His performing at the Saskatoon Fringe Festival was to be his 150th different fringe festival appearance.
Born in Surrey, England, “from 1996 Jem ran the only successful poetry cabaret in Edinburgh in decades and in 2001 he moved there and set up a very successful fortnightly cabaret, while running Scotland’s first Poetry Slams.
“In 2001 he did the Toronto fringe and nothing was ever the same again. Confronted by the possibilities and demands of the hour show, Jem gleefully exploded into the freedom of it. The Fringe circuit has very few rules and can provide the artists a complete liberation. Jem has been making a living creating a new hour show every year since 2003.”
I also found out from Rolls that in recent years he has been spending his winters in India. Quite the vagabond, he suggested that “all I need is a passport, a laptop, and a bank card.”
We did end up talking over Messenger on Thursday, July 31. I began our conversation by asking Rolls what led him to develop his particular interest in “little-known Jewish nuclear physicists?”
He explained that several years ago he “was stuck in Dauphin with not very much to read.
“I discovered a book about Nazi scientists,” he said.
That book happened to mention a Jewish physicist by the name of Lise Meitner. Rolls was sufficiently intrigued by Meitner’s story that he determined to find out more about her.
Later that year he found himself spending the winter in Edmonton. Rolls said he went to the University of Alberta to do some research on Meitner and came across another book that proved to be instrumental to his developing what would subsequently turn into three separate fringe shows. The book was titled “The Making of the Atomic Bomb,” by Richard Rhodes.
That book, which was first published in 1987, went on to win a Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. It is described as the “definitive history of nuclear weapons—from the turn-of-the-century discovery of nuclear energy to J. Robert Oppenheimer and the Manhattan Project—this epic work details the science, the people, and the sociopolitical realities that led to the development of the atomic bomb.”
Rolls’ initial interest in Meitner subsequently led to an interest in the life of Leo Szilard, who became one of five Hungarian-born Jewish physicists – nicknamed “the Martians,” who were all eventually to play key roles in the Manhattan Project and, ultimately, the development of the atomic bomb. The others were: Theodore von Kármán, John von Neumann, Edward Teller, and Eugene Wigner. Apparently a running joke among their Western colleagues in scientific circles at the time was that “Martians had landed in Hungary sometime around 1900 but soon departed after finding the planet unsuitable. However, these higher beings stayed just long enough to leave behind offspring, which turned into exceptionally brainy scientists, later nicknamed ‘The Martians.’ “
Without going into detail about the scientific work undertaken both by Meitner and Szilard in this story, suffice to say that Rolls was able to mine their stories sufficiently to create two separate shows about them: The first was “THE INVENTOR OF ALL THINGS, “about Leo Szilard, which Rolls first performed in 2015 (and then again in 2017).
In 2019 Rolls created a show about Meitner titled “THE WALK IN THE SNOW,” which he also performed in 2022.
(I should note that Rolls, who has now appeared at 150 different fringe festivals, performs a particular show repeatedly on the fringe festival circuit in any given year. As he explained, “the hard work is done three months before” a show is premiered, as he writes the material and rehearses it on his own prior to taking it before a live audience.)
Both those previous shows proved enormously successful for Rolls, garnering “multiple sellouts and five star reviews.”
Winnipeg audiences, however, have mostly come to know Rolls as a “performance poet,” something, as noted previously, he first brought to Canada at the Toronto Fringe Festival in 2001.
Putting on a show in Winnipeg, however, has always been an especially pleasurable experience for Rolls because, as he put it, “Winnipeg is an excellent place where to find out how good a show is.”
Still, ever curious to try to develop new material, Rolls said that he doesn’t like to bring back shows from the past once he says to himself that he is done with them.
Thus, as he has now been performing his latest show, the aforementioned “THE KID WAS A SPY,” in front of audiences across North America this year, Rolls observed that he “may do this show again in another two years,” but then he’ll be done with it.
In my story about “THE KID WAS A SPY,” I noted how controversial much of the show was, having to do as it was with the fact that the protagonist of the show, Ted Hall, turned out to be a spy for the Russians. Hall did end up giving the Russians vital information about the development of the atomic bomb – and was never arrested even though both the FBI and MI6 in Britain had their suspicions about him.
During the course of the show, Rolls attempts to create a balance in the minds of audience members between the conflicting moral decisions that led to Hall’s actions. He was determined to help the effort to create the atomic bomb before Nazi German scientists would succeed in doing so, but he also wanted to keep America from having a monopoly on owning the secret to the atomic bomb – which led to his approaching the KGB and offering to hand over to them the keys to the bomb.
I asked Rolls whether he honestly thought that the Americans and the Russians could be put on the same moral plane – which is something he posited during his play? I also wondered about the very sympathetic treatment he gives to Ted Hall.
Rolls suggested that for him, “Ted Hall was a very likeable and sympathetic guy.”
But, I argued, when he asked audience members to vote on whether Hall was justified in doing what he did, the results were bound to be skewed heavily in favour of voting in Hall’s favour by the mere fact that fringe festival audiences are probably so much more left-wing than the general population.
Rolls noted, however, that the audience make-up for this particular show has leaned heavily older, and that a good portion of audiences would certainly have enough knowledge of history to be able to come to reasoned determinations about the relative moral culpability of America and the Soviet Union over the years. He also observed that Hall was not atypical among young American Jews in the 1930s. “There were an awful lot of radical left-wing Jews” around that time, he suggested.
“I spend 57 minutes trying to give an accounting that weighs the zeitgeist of the time,” he said, against our current thinking about the historical record of America and the Soviet Union.
“This show was quite a bit more difficult to do than his other shows,” Rolls said – especially his performance poetry shows which, he noted, “were funny.”
Even his earlier show about Leo Szilard, Rolls observed, had quite a bit of humour in it.
Given the heavily Jewish theme of each of Rolls’ shows about Jewish nuclear physicists, I asked Rolls whether he’s ever been approached to put on any of the shows by a Jewish theatre company. So far, he hasn’t, he answered, but he’s certainly open to the idea.
Local News
Who is Rabbi Ephraim Bryks and how did his time in Winnipeg prove so convulsive?
By BERNIE BELLAN (Posted December 30) Thirty-five years after Rabbi Ephraim Bryks left this city his name is now back in the news as the result of a new lawsuit that names Rabbi Bryks, the Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregation – for which Bryks served as rabbi for 12 years, and two rabbinical organizations as defendants. You can read more about that lawsuit and what it alleges elsewhere on this website at “lawsuit filed.“
But, aside from questions about why this lawsuit was filed now – some 38 years after the acts for which Bryks is accused of having committed against the plaintiff, there are still so many unanswered questions about Rabbi Bryks’ time in Winnipeg.
In his seminal history of the Jewish people of Manitoba, Allan Levine wrote: “The biggest controversy in the Herzlia’s history – in fact, arguably the most controversial matter in the annals of the Winnipeg Jewish community – involved Rabbi Ephraim Bryks, the synagogue’s rabbi from 1978 to 1990. Bryks arrived in Winnipeg in 1978 at the age of twenty-four, with his wife Yochevaed…”
Levine noted that “Under Bryks’ leadership, the synagogue’s membership increased. He established new programs for youth and immersed himself in the Jewish community. He also initiated Torah Academy, an Orthodox elementary school that operated out of Herzlia and soon had a sizable (sic.) enrollment (sic.).” (Gee Allan, didn’t anyone check your book for spelling mistakes?)
Levine’s story about Bryks goes on to note that controversy first began to circulate openly around Bryks in 1985 in the pages of what our paper was then called, which was the Jewish Post. (We didn’t become The Jewish Post & News until 1987, which was when we took over what had been The Western Jewish News.)
Bryks had been writing a weekly Torah commentary in our paper until three rabbis – Rabbis Rappaport, Weizman, and Neil Rose, sent a letter to the editor (who was my late brother, Matt, at the time) accusing Bryks of having plagiarized several of his columns from a book by Rabbi Reuven Bulka. Matt investigated and discovered that Bryks had indeed plagiarized at least two columns from Bulka’s book. When Matt reported what he had found, Bryks stopped writing his column for us.
“Far worse was yet to come,” Levine’s section about Bryks continues. “In 1987, several parents of young (male and female) children attending Torah Academy alleged that Bryks had sexually abused their children. The Herzlia board properly investigated the matter and heard evidence. According to a CBC-TV documentary on the case, the parents and their children were accused of being liars.”
Levine goes on to note that Winnipeg South Child and Family Services were asked to investigate the matter by the synagogue board, but the agency concluded that “Bryks’ behaviour of having children sit on his lap while he tickled them was ‘neither appropriate nor professional’, but not illegal. That might have been the end of it, but another allegation was made, this time to the Winnipeg Police by parents of an eight-year-old boy who claimed Bryks had fondled him. The police consulted a Crown lawyer, who decided not to pursue it since it came down to the child’s word against that of a rabbi.
“The case tore the Herzlia congregation apart, and some members left the synagogue,” Levine writes.
In 1990, Bryks left Winnipeg for Montreal, where he had been hired to head a Jewish school until parents there learned of the allegations against him in Winnipeg and the offer of employment was rescinded.
Subsequently, Bryks moved to New York, where he founded another private religious school in Queens – this time for children of Russian immigrants.
In 2003, however, Bryks resigned his membership in the Rabbinical Council of America. According to a report on “Newsday,” Bryks had “been dogged by allegations of sexual abuse against at least one Winnipeg child for more than 15 years.” He had headed two different yeshivas in New York, but no longer did so.
That Winnipeg child’s name was Daniel Levin. He was the son of Martin and Sarah Levin. (Martin Levin had been editor of the Jewish Post until 1983. He later became the books editor of the Toronto Globe & Mail.)
In Allan Levine’s account of what happened, “Daniel Levin had attended Torah Academy from kindergarten to Grade 2. …A troubled teenager, Daniel alleged that Bryks had molested him. According to Sarah Levin, Bryks had given Daniel candy to keep him quiet and told him that God would punish him if he ever told anyone what had transpired. The threat of retribution was echoed by other children who came forward. Daniel (who, by 1993, was living in Toronto) gave a taped statement to the Toronto Police, who inexplicably botched the taping and requested he repeat his statement. He never did. On Yom Kippur, 1993, Daniel, seventeen years old, committed suicide.”
In 1994, the CBC aired a documentary about the Bryks controversy titled “Unorthodox Conduct.” Myron Love wrote a detailed report about the airing of that documentary and the subsequent reaction to it from members of the Herzlia. You can read Myron’s full article on our website simply by entering the name “Rabbi Bryks” in our Search Archive portal. The first two articles to appear will be the first and second pages of Myron’s comprehensive report.
According to information online Rabbi Bryks now works as a mortgage broker in New York. For a time, he was also a self-styled marriage counsellor, providing services to women seeking religious divorces.
In 2018, we spoke with a woman in New York who told us that, 18 or 19 years prior, she had contacted Rabbi Bryks to try to help her get a “get” (religious divorce) from an uncooperative husband. That woman claimed that Rabbi Bryks showed up at her apartment and tried to take advantage of her under the guise of offering to help her obtain a “get” from her husband. As the woman continued her story, she said Rabbi Bryks had forced himself upon her to the point where he pushed her on to her bed and lay on top of her. She was eventually able to break free and demanded he leave her apartment.
There are many other references to Bryks on the internet. The recently filed lawsuit only adds to what is already one of the most controversial stories about a rabbi you’re ever likely to read.
Local News
Former Winnipegger files lawsuit against Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregation, former Herzlia Rabbi Ephraim Bryks, and two other defendants over allegations of sexual abuse and assault by Rabbi Bryks in 1987
By BERNIE BELLAN (Posted December 29, 2025) A former Winnipegger by the name of Ruth Krevsky (née Pinsky) has filed a lawsuit in Court of King’s Bench in Winnipeg on December 9, 2025 naming “Ephraim Boruk Bryks, Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregtion Inc., Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, and Rabbinical Council of America” as defendants.
The lawsuit seeks damages in the total amount of $4,200,000.
In the 30-page statement of claim Krevsky alleges that “In or around 1984, when the Plaintiff was approximately 19 years of age, Bryks sexually abused and assaulted the Plaintiff. The particulars of same include, but not (sic.) are not limited to the following:
” (a) initiated and engaged in physical contact of a sexual nature with the Plaintiff in his bedroom;
” (b) strapped the buttocks of the Plaintiff;
” (c) engaged in other sexual activities with the Plaintiff; and
” (d) in order to facilitate the abuse Bryks engaged in a pattern of behaviour which was intended to make the Plaintiff feel that she was special in the eyes of Bryks and Judaism.
“The abuse occurred in Bryks’ house located in Winnipeg, Manitoba.”
The lawsuit goes on to allege that “After the aforementioned abuse occurred, Bryks exploited his position of seniority and the trust he had cultivated with the Plaintiff to manipulate and control He used this dependency to discourage the Plaintiff from disclosing his actions, including by threatening her and by withholding reference letters essential for her academic and professional advancement.”
The lawsuit further alleges that “In or around 1987, while employed by the Congregation, Bryks was accused by (sic.) of several sexual offences involving young girls and women, including students at the School. (Ed. note, the reference is to Torah Academy, which Bryks started.) Although no criminal charges were filed at the time, the allegations were brought to the attention of the Congregation, the Union (of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America) and/or the Council (Rabbinical Council of America). Since then. additional individuals have come forward with similar allegations of sexual abuse by Bryks.”
The lawsuit also names the Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregtion Inc., as defendant, citing ten different rules that “the Congregation taught the Plaintiff as well as other members of the Synagogue, including
“that it was forbidden to report a Jewish religious figure such as a rabbi to secular authorities and that any such reporting would constitute a serious violation of religious duty and loyalty to Judaism.”
Further, “The Plaintiff pleads that the aforementioned rules, principles and ideologies of the Congregation created an opportunity for Bryks to exert power and authority over the Plaintiff. The power and authority allowed Bryks to engage in the aforementioned behaviour and to continue to engage in same without resistance or question of the Plaintiff, without risk of getting caught, and thereby put the Plaintiff at risk of being abused by Bryks…
“As a result, the Congregation is vicariously responsible and liable for the actions of Bryks.”
The lawsuit goes on to list a series of behaviours in which it alleges Bryks was engaging and alleges the Congregation ignored many aspects of Bryks’ behaviour, including, among others: “Bryks’ difficulties with alcohol” and “Bryks’ difficulties with his sexuality.”
The lawsuit lists a long series of damages the Plaintiff alleges she has suffered as a result of Bryks’ behaviour and the refusal of the other defendants, including the Herzlia Congregation, to take any action against Bryks.
It should be made clear that, at this point, the allegations are unproven and are yet to be defended against and yet to be tested in the courts of Manitoba.
We have reached out to Ruth Krevsky, her counsel, counsel for the Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregation, and the president of the congregation for comment. To date, we have not heard from either Ms. Krevsky or her counsel. We did hear from the president of the congregation, who asked us to refer any questions to counsel for the congregation. We did speak with counsel for the congregation, but at this point he indicated that he had just been recently hired to represent the congregation and was just beginning to acquaint himself with the file.
The Rabbi Bryks story was one that tore the Winnipeg Jewish community asunder. The Jewish Post had a number of stories about the allegations that were levelled against Rabbi Bryks. (You can find those stories by going to our “Search Archive” link and entering the name “Rabbi Bryks.”)
We will have much more about Rabbi Bryks in the days to come. Keep referring to this website as we add to the story.
Local News
Newly announced Vivian Silver Centre for Shared Society to further former Winnipegger’s lifelong efforts to foster Jewish-Arab co-operation in Israel
By MYRON LOVE Vivian Silver (oleh Hashalom) devoted her life to working toward dialogue and collaboration between Arabs and Jews in Israel. The culmination of her efforts was the Arab-Jewish Center for Empowerment, Equality, and Cooperation – Negev Institute for Strategies of Peace and Economic Development (AJEEC-NISPED), which she co-founded 25 year ago with her sister peace activist, Dr. Amal Elsana Ahl’jooj.
Tragically, Vivian was of the 1,200 Israeli Jews, Bedouin and foreign farm workers who were slaughtered during the Hamas-led pogrom of October 7, 2023.
Last month, AJEEC-NISPED announced plans to create the Vivian Silver Center for Shared Society in her memory – a new national hub for Jewish-Israeli Arab collaboration and social innovation in Be’er Sheva – backed by an initial $1 million donation from UJA-Federation of New York, along with support from the Meyerhoff Foundation, the Gilbert Foundation, and other philanthropic partners committed to strengthening shared society in Israel.
“It’s a great honor and a beautiful gesture,” comments Vivian’s son, Yonatan Zeigen, “and I hope it will be a central building for civil society, both in the physical sense, that it will become a substantial home for the organization and for other initiatives that will use the spaced and also symbolically, as a beacon for this kind of work in the specific location in the Negev.”
As this writer noted n an article earlier this year in relation to the announcement of the launch of the Vivian Silver Impact Award by the New Israel Fund (NIF) – of which she was a long time board member, and which was developed in conjunction with her sons, Yonatan and Chen), Vivian made aliyah in 1974. She first went to Israel in 1968 – to spend her second year at university abroad at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, studying psychology and English literature.
In an article she wrote in 2018 in a publication called ”Women Wage Peace,” she related that during her final year at the University of Manitoba, she was among the founders of the Student Zionist Alliance on campus and was invited to its national conference in Montreal. There she met activists in the Habonim youth movement who planned on making aliyah and re-establishing Kibbutz Gezer. The day she wrote her last university exam, she boarded a flight to New York to join the group.
She spent three years in New York, where she became involved in Jewish and Zionist causes, including the launch of the Jewish feminist movement in America.
“It was a life-changing period,” she recalled. “I came to understood that in addition to being a kibbutz member, I was destined to be a social change and peace activist.”
Vivian and her group made aliyah in 1974 and settled on Kibbutz Gezer. In 1981, she established the Department Promoting Gender Equality in the Kibbutz Movement. She moved to Kibbutz Be’eri near the Gaza border in 1990, along with her late husband, Lewis, and their two sons
In 1998, Vivian became the executive director of the Negev Institute for Strategies of Peace and Development in Beer Sheva, an NGO promoting human sustainable development, shared society between Jews and Arabs, and peace in the Middle East. Soon after, she was joined by Amal Elsana Alh’jooj as co-directors of AJEEC-NISPED, winning the 2011 Victor J. Goldberg Peace Prize of the Institute for International Education.
In the article she wrote for “Women Waging Peace,” she noted that “while we later focused on empowerment projects in the Bedouin community in the Negev, initially we worked with Palestinian organizations on joint people-to-people projects. I spent much time in Gaza until the outbreak of the second intifada. We continued working with organizations in the West Bank. I personally know so many Palestinians who yearn for peace no less than we do.”
According to a report in the Israeli newspaper Arutz Sheva, in the November 24th edition, the Vivian Silver Centre – which is expected to open in the spring – will be located within AJEEC-NISPED’s soon-to-open AJEEC House, and will provide a permanent home for programs that promote equality, leadership, and cooperation among Israel’s diverse communities.
“The Vivian Silver Center for Shared Society, within AJEEC’s headquarters, “the Arutz Sheva report noted, “will serve as a regional platform for dozens of Israeli Arab and Jewish social organizations. Through AJEEC’s educational, vocational, and leadership programs, the center will support thousands of young adults each year – offering mentorship, professional training, and opportunities for cross-cultural collaboration.
“These programs,” the report continued, “already reach more than 15,000 participants nationwide, helping young people integrate into higher education and meaningful employment while narrowing social and economic gaps.”
AJEEC House is located in Be’er Sheva’s Science Park, near Ben-Gurion University. The three-storey AJEEC House has been designed to foster cooperation and dialogue. It will host community partnerships, provide shared workspaces for social entrepreneurs, and serve as a hub for initiatives addressing social and economic development across the Negev and beyond.
Readers who may be interested considering a donation can dial into NISPED’s website – – for further information.