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In New Yorker doc ‘Nina & Irena,’ a director helps his grandmother open up about the Holocaust

(JTA) — Daniel Lombroso sees “Nina & Irena,” his documentary short film about his grandmother, a Holocaust survivor, as a coda to his 2020 documentary “White Noise,” in which he followed leaders in the “alt-right” movement.

For the four years during the making of “White Noise,” he was surrounded by neo-Nazis, who were on the cusp of a resurgence around the 2016 presidential race. “I never thought about my own connection to the material in any detail, and then I realized the reason I cared so much about this story before anyone else in the country was because of my grandparents,” he told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “It was the stories that I grew up with that made me vigilant about extremism and curious and concerned.”

In “Nina & Irena,” which will be released through The New Yorker on the magazine’s digital channels on Wednesday, Lambroso’s Polish-born grandmother Nina Gottlieb — 90 during filming and 91 now — opens up after eight decades about her experiences during the Holocaust, when she lost about 25 members of her family, including her sister, Irena. Only she and her parents survived.

The New Yorker Studios film relates Gottlieb’s tale through on-camera interviews with Gottlieb that are interspersed with archival footage. Much of the film depicts simple moments of joy with her family, such as doing Zoom yoga with her grandson and her 90th birthday party surrounded by her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren. Gottlieb is fully independent, lives alone in Long Island and still has an active lifestyle.

“The film is about the richness of her life,” Lombroso said. “There’s a lot of what they call Holocaust fatigue that we all grew up watching a lot of Holocaust films and hearing from survivors and you expect certain things. You expect the train tracks and you expect Auschwitz and smoke and it was very important for me to not necessarily avoid the horrors — you have to understand the horrors — but also balance them with the comedy of her life. She’s so funny.”

The film has been a success on the festival circuit, including winning best short film at the Mountainfilm Festival in Telluride. The documentary festival DOC NYC included it among its “Short Lists” predictions for top contenders for Oscars and other awards.

Growing up in New Rochelle, New York, Lombroso knew that his grandmother was a Holocaust survivor, but she never spoke about her experiences during the war. She thought her stories were too horrible for her children and grandchildren when they were young. She always thought she would tell them later, but later never came. Lombroso realized that now was his chance to finally ask, before it was too late.

In the film, Gottlieb talks about her childhood in Kielce, Poland, and her relationship with her sister, spying on Irena and tattling to their mother. Even when discussing her sister’s disappearance, she has a matter-of-fact way of telling these stories, accepting what happened and not dwelling on the past.

Lombroso said her testimony helped him avoid the cliches of documentary filmmaking. Too often, he explained, “you’ve gotten your main subject to pour themselves out in front of the camera like it’s a therapy session. My grandmother doesn’t go there,” he said. “At first, I thought that would be a problem.” However, “with distance and going through screenings, I realized that’s what makes the film so different and special. Her message is one that you don’t hear much: Keep going in life. Don’t feel sorry for yourself. And if someone like her doesn’t feel sorry for herself [after] losing upwards of 20 family members, then I certainly can’t.”

Another surprising aspect of the documentary is Gottlieb’s compassion for her tormentors. Having been evacuated to Prague, she saw the liberated Czechs pour tar on German officers and burn them alive. She was horrified.

“One of the worst moments of the Holocaust for her was watching a German officer be burned alive by Czech bystanders. She says, ‘You don’t do that to other people. We’re all born little adorable children. What happens to us?” Lombroso said. “The person she has sympathy for is her perpetrator and I just find that so rare in this day and age.”

In order to get this level of honesty from his grandmother, Lombroso approached this project, his first personal film, like his previous work at The New Yorker, where he is a staff filmmaker, and before that at The Atlantic.

“I’m used to embedding myself with people who I disagree with. I always try to understand subjects in the same way. Even when I was dealing with Richard Spencer, who is a famous white nationalist, I was trying to understand the root of his ideology and how he became who he is today,” he said. “I wanted to understand how someone becomes that f–ked up. We went skiing together and I met his mother. That’s the kind of reporting I just love doing and I think people open up to me because I don’t feel judgmental towards them. I just want to understand.”

And despite his love for his grandmother, he tried to keep a certain creative distance. “My grandmother had no editorial control,” Lombroso said. “She saw the film for the first time a few days before it premiered, and I told her you cannot change anything. And sure, there’s a tenderness in the film that comes through because I love her and feel close to her, but it was important to me not to compromise my practice in any way with her story.”

The one time he did let her weigh in is when he showed her a synopsis of the film that mentioned survivor’s guilt. She was furious.

“She said, ‘I don’t feel guilty about anything,’” Lombroso said. “I think it’s important to see someone like her and that’s what makes her so inspiring.”


The post In New Yorker doc ‘Nina & Irena,’ a director helps his grandmother open up about the Holocaust appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

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Israeli Strike on Tehran Kills Bodyguard of Slain Hezbollah Chief

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi lays a wreath as he visits the burial site of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, on the outskirts of Beirut, Lebanon, June 3, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir

A member of Lebanese armed group Hezbollah was killed in an Israeli air strike on Tehran alongside a member of an Iran-aligned Iraqi armed group, a senior Lebanese security source told Reuters and the Iraqi group said on Saturday.

The source identified the Hezbollah member as Abu Ali Khalil, who had served as a bodyguard for Hezbollah’s slain chief Hassan Nasrallah. The source said Khalil had been on a religious pilgrimage to Iraq when he met up with a member of the Kataeb Sayyed Al-Shuhada group.

They traveled together to Tehran and were both killed in an Israeli strike there, along with Khalil’s son, the senior security source said. Hezbollah has not joined in Iran’s air strikes against Israel from Lebanon.

Kataeb Sayyed Al-Shuhada published a statement confirming that both the head of its security unit and Khalil had been killed in an Israeli strike.

Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli aerial attack on Beirut’s southern suburbs in September.

Israel and Iran have been trading strikes for nine consecutive days since Israel launched attacks on Iran, saying Tehran was on the verge of developing nuclear weapons. Iran has said it does not seek nuclear weapons.

The post Israeli Strike on Tehran Kills Bodyguard of Slain Hezbollah Chief first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Hamas Financial Officer and Commander Eliminated by IDF in the Gaza Strip

Israeli soldiers operate during a ground operation in the southern Gaza Strip, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, July 3, 2024. Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg/Pool via REUTERS

i24 News – The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), in cooperation with the General Security Service (Shin Bet), announced on Friday the killing of Ibrahim Abu Shamala, a senior financial official in Hamas’ military wing.

The operation took place on June 17th in the central Gaza Strip.

Abu Shamala held several key positions, including financial officer for Hamas’ military wing and assistant to Marwan Issa, the deputy commander of Hamas’ military wing until his elimination in March 2024.

He was responsible for managing all the financial resources of Hamas’ military wing in Gaza, overseeing the planning and execution of the group’s war budget. This involved handling and smuggling millions of dollars into the Gaza Strip to fund Hamas’ military operations.

The post Hamas Financial Officer and Commander Eliminated by IDF in the Gaza Strip first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Report: Wary of Assassination by Israel, Khamenei Names 3 Potential Successors

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei waves during a meeting in Tehran, Iran, May 20, 2025. Photo: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS

i24 News – Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei named three senior clerics as candidates to succeed him should he be killed, the New York Times reported on Saturday citing unnamed Iranian officials. It is understood the Ayatollah fears he could be assassinated in the coming days.

Khamenei reportedly mostly speaks with his commanders through a trusted aide now, suspending electronic communications.

Khamenei has designated three senior religious figures as candidates to replace him as well as choosing successors in the military chain of command in the likely event that additional senior officials be eliminated.

Earlier on Saturday Israel confirmed the elimination of Saeed Izadi and Bhanam Shahriari.

Shahriari, head of Iran’s Quds Force Weapons Transfer Unit, responsible for arming Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, was killed in an Israeli airstrike over 1,000 km from Israel in western Iran.

The post Report: Wary of Assassination by Israel, Khamenei Names 3 Potential Successors first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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