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Jewish Life Stories: The Nobelist who confirmed the Big Bang, the ‘Bagel Queen’ of Atlanta
This article is also available as a weekly newsletter, “Life Stories,” where we remember those who made an outsize impact in the Jewish world — or just left their community a better or more interesting place. Subscribe here to get “Life Stories” in your inbox every Tuesday.
Arno Allan Penzias, 90, the Nobelist who confirmed the Big Bang
Arno Allan Penzias, a child survivor of the Holocaust who shared the 1978 Nobel Prize in physics for discoveries that would confirm the Big Bang theory, died Jan. 21 in San Francisco. He was 90.
In 1964, he and a colleague at Bell Labs, Robert Wilson, were trouble-shooting a radio telescope in Holmdel, New Jersey when they noticed an unexplained hiss. They would later determine it was a “cosmic echo” of the incendiary event that gave birth to the universe 13.7 billion years ago.
“The interference you see on an analogue television screen as you try to tune in to channels might seem an unlikely form of time travel, but within this static hiss lies a glimpse of the first moments of the universe,” the Nobel Foundation explains on its website. “Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson’s fortuitous discovery of a form of radio noise that bathes the cosmos provided a crucial piece of evidence for how the universe was created.”
Penzias was born in Munich to parents who had immigrated to Germany from Poland. In 1938 his family was placed on a train with other Jews of Polish origin for deportation to Poland. The Polish authorities refused to admit them and the train was turned back at the border. In 1939, Penzias, 6, and his brother Gunther, 5, were sent to London for safety as part of the Kindertransport rescue effort. They were reunited with their parents in 1940 and managed to secure passage to the United States.
The Holmdel horn antenna at Bell Telephone Laboratories in Holmdel, New Jersey. In 1964, radio astronomers Robert Wilson and Arno Penzias discovered the cosmic microwave background radiation with it, for which they were awarded the 1978 Nobel prize in physics. (NASA/Wikipedia)
Penzias grew up in the Bronx where he attended public schools and later City College of New York. After serving in the U.S. Army Signal Corps he received a doctorate in physics from Columbia University and joined Bell in 1963. In 1954 he married Anna Barras, a student at Hunter College who, according to his daughter, Rabbi L. Shifra Weiss-Penzias of Temple Beth El in Aptos, California, came from eight generations of rabbis.
Penzias and Wilson’s initial attempts to locate the source of the mysterious “hiss” included a theory that it was ambient radiation from pigeon droppings inside the telescope. Their search even inspired a bit of pop culture: In a 2015 episode of the Comedy Central series “Drunk History,” Jewish comedian Jenny Slate narrates a ribald version of their discovery. Actor Justin Long portrayed Penzias.
In 1992, Penzias arranged for the donation of parts of the telescope, known as the “Holmdel Horn,” to a museum in Munich. (The device itself is a National Historic Landmark.) “It was very important to my father to remind [the Germans] what they lost,” Weiss-Penzias told the Boston Globe. “He wanted his work to be a living reminder of the refugees who left and the people who died.”
Carol Lee Meyer Carola, 68, the “Bagel Queen” of Atlanta
Bagel shop owner Carol Lee Meyer Carola appeared on the cover of the Atlanta Jewish Times wellness supplement in 2021. (Atlanta Jewish Times)
For over 30 years, the Bagelicious bagel shop in East Cobb, Georgia, has been a mainstay of the Atlanta Jewish community, known for catering simchas at area synagogues. In recent years the community rallied around co-owner Carol Lee Meyer Carola in her fight to save the shop during the pandemic and in her own battle with breast cancer, which was first diagnosed in 2013. Friends and customers walked in Team Boobuleh’s A Breast Cancer Schmear campaign in support of Georgia’s annual 2-day Walk for Breast Cancer. “It’s not going to get to me. It will not get me,” the “Bagel Queen” told the Atlanta Jewish Times in 2021. “I have a business to run and people who depend on me. I can’t give up.” The Queens, New York native died from cancer on Jan. 28. She was 68. “She knew every customer by name, including their children and grandchildren,” according to a family obituary. “Despite the demands of the business, her husband Tommy, their children, and their grandchildren were the center of her world.”
Berish Strauch, 90, a pioneering plastic surgeon
Berish Strauch was the chief of reconstructive surgery at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx. (American Society of Plastic Surgeons)
Berish Strauch grew up watching his father, a tailor, and his mother, a hatmaker, wielding knives and scissors in their jobs. Their dexterity inspired him to become a surgeon, and after earning his degree at Columbia University’s medical school he became one of the most influential plastic surgeons of the past 50 years. He pioneered the toe-to-thumb transplantation technique, patented the “Strauch clamp” to restore male fertility post-vasectomy and developed the first inflatable prosthetic penis. The chair of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx from 1987 until 2007, he died Dec. 24, 2023, at the age of 90. His wife of 68 years, Rena Strauch, a former teacher and a stalwart at Beth El Synagogue Center in New Rochelle, New York, predeceased him by six weeks.
Michael S. Berman, 84, a consummate Washington insider
Michael Berman, a longtime Democratic politico and lobbyist, seen at the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles, August 2000. (Gary Friedman/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
Michael S. Berman, 84, an old-school Washington political operative and lobbyist who served as deputy chief of staff and counsel to Vice President Walter Mondale, died Jan. 12. A consummate insider who programmed Democratic National Conventions for decades, he helped prep future Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg for her Senate confirmation hearings. He and Kenneth M. Duberstein, President Ronald Reagan’s last chief of staff, formed a lobbying firm that worked both sides of the aisle. When he was a kid growing up in Duluth, Minnesota, Berman’s parents became godparents of another Minnesota Jewish boy, Bob Zimmerman, who later changed his last name to Dylan.
Howard Golden, 98, Brooklyn borough president who helped Crown Heights heal
Howard Golden, Brooklyn’s borough president from 1977 to 2001, seen in 1996. (Kenneth C. Zirkel, Wikipedia)
Howard Golden, whose 24-year tenure as Brooklyn borough president overlapped with what became known as the Crown Heights Riots, died Jan. 24. He was 98. For three days in August 1991, Black residents of the neighborhood attacked members of its largely Hasidic Jewish community after a car in the motorcade of the Lubavitcher Rebbe struck and killed a Black child. Within days of the unrest, Golden created what became known as the Crown Heights Coalition, an intergroup forum that met in his office for the following 10 years to keep the peace. “There are some 90 languages spoken in this borough,” the former City Council member and son of a deli owner told the Jewish Press. “Brooklyn is an amazing mosaic.”
Joel Lind, 68, a “mainstay of Cincinnati community theater”
Joel Lind of Cincinnati acted in local theater and did audience research for new and traditional media properties. (Courtesy)
Joel Lind, who ran a media research firm in the Cincinnati area, died Jan. 24 at age 68. His personality comes through in a family obituary:
A lifelong New Yorker in spirit and Yankees fan — memorably described in youth as “fuzzy in an intelligent sort of way, and intelligent in a fuzzy sort of way” — Joel was raised in New Rochelle, NY. He attended the University of Rochester as an undergraduate and Columbia Law School, but left a Manhattan entertainment-law career behind to return to his true calling in radio. Joel spent 20 years as the perceptual-research guru behind the “Mental Weaponry” division at Critical Mass Media, where his presentations blended quantitative analysis, the art of the monologue, and obscure lyrical references.
Joel taught a generation of Congregation Beth Adam Sunday-school students a Humanistic reading of Torah stories, under his “nom de chalk” Mr. Bozo. In his later life, Joel was a mainstay of Cincinnati community theater, and especially of his home group, Mason Community Players — a community whose care and generosity he described as boundless.
Joel’s last days were spent peacefully at Hospice of Cincinnati in Blue Ash, a decision he undertook, along with his children, after months of debilitating illness. He was gratified to learn that he outlived Ron DeSantis’ presidential campaign.
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The post Jewish Life Stories: The Nobelist who confirmed the Big Bang, the ‘Bagel Queen’ of Atlanta appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Iran Criticizes Arab-Islamic Summit Statement, Flags Objections After Doha Meeting
Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, Emir of Qatar, attends the emergency Arab-Islamic leaders’ summit in Doha, Qatar, Sept. 15, 2025. Photo: Hassan Bargash Al Menhali / UAE Presidential Court/Handout via REUTERS
Iran has criticized the final statement of the Arab-Islamic Summit held in Doha on Monday as insufficient, in the wake of last week’s Israeli attack targeting the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in Qatar.
In a statement released shortly after the summit, Iran reaffirmed its “unwavering support for the Palestinian people and their right to self-determination,” while arguing that a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict cannot adequately address the Palestinian issue.
According to the Iranian delegation, “the only real and lasting solution is the establishment of a single democratic state across all of Palestine, through a referendum involving all Palestinians inside and outside the occupied territories.”
On Monday, Qatar held a summit of Arab and Islamic nations in the aftermath of last week’s Israeli strike on Hamas, with leaders gathering to express support and discuss regional responses.
The Sept. 9 strike targeting leaders of the Palestinian terrorist group in Doha marked a significant escalation of Israeli military operations, reflecting Jerusalem’s broader efforts to dismantle the terrorist group amid the ongoing war in Gaza.
Expressing solidarity with Qatar, summit leaders condemned Israel’s strike, labeling it “cowardly, illegal, and a threat to collective regional security.”
In the final statement, the heads of state declared that “an assault on a state acting as a neutral mediator in the Gaza crisis is not only a hostile act against Qatar but also a direct blow to international peace-building efforts.”
Alongside the United States and other regional powers, Qatar has served as a ceasefire mediator during the nearly two-year Gaza conflict, facilitating indirect negotiations between the Jewish state and Hamas.
However, Doha has also backed the Palestinian terrorist group for years, providing Hamas with money and diplomatic support while hosting and sheltering its top leadership.
During the summit, Arab and Muslim leaders called for a review of diplomatic and economic relations with Israel while firmly opposing any attempts to displace Palestinians.
In the final statement, the heads of state also emphasized resisting Israel’s efforts to “impose new realities on the ground,” urged enforcement of International Criminal Court (ICC) warrants for Israeli leaders over war crime allegations adamantly denied by Jerusalem, and coordinated actions to suspend Israel’s UN membership.
Although Iran participated in the summit and endorsed the declaration, its delegation issued a separate statement shortly afterward clarifying that doing so “must in no way be interpreted, explicitly or implicitly, as recognition of the Israeli regime,” reaffirming its rejection of the Jewish state’s right to exist.
Iranian leaders regularly declare their intention to destroy Israel, the world’s lone Jewish state.
The statement also stressed that the Palestinian people have the right to employ “all necessary means to achieve their inalienable right to self-determination,” emphasizing that backing this cause is “a shared duty of the international community.”
As the heads of Arab and Islamic states convened for a summit on Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned he did not rule out further strikes on Hamas leaders “wherever they are.”
During a diplomatic visit to Israel, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio expressed strong support for Israel’s position, even as Washington previously voiced concerns over the strike in Qatar, a US ally.
Speaking alongside Netanyahu, Rubio said the only way to end the war in Gaza would be for Hamas to free all hostages and surrender. While the US wants a diplomatic end to the war, “we have to be prepared for the possibility that’s not going to happen,” he said.
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“Your Name Was Included”: UC Berkeley Cooperating With Trump Administration, Admits to Disclosing Names
Students attend a protest encampment in support of Palestinians at University of California, Berkeley during the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, in Berkeley, US, April 23, 2024. Photo: Carlos Barria via Reuters Connect
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) is cooperating with the Trump administration’s inquiry into campus antisemitism, providing materials containing the names of some 160 people identified in disciplinary reports and other official documents.
As first reported by The Daily Californian, UC Berkeley’s official campus newspaper, the university’s Office of Legal Affairs notified every person affected by the mass disclosure, writing to them on Sept. 4.
“Last spring, the [US Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights, or OCR]] initiated investigations regarding allegations of antisemitic harassment and discrimination at UC Berkeley. As part of its investigation, OCR required production of comprehensive documents, including files and reports related to alleged antisemitic incidents,” chief campus counsel David Robinson wrote. “This notice is to inform you that, as required by law and as per directions provided by the UC systemic Office of General Counsel, your name was included in report as part of the documents provided by OGC [Office of General Counsel] to OCR for its investigations on Aug. 18, 2025.”
He added, “These documents contained information about reports or responses related to antisemitic incidents.”
Anti-Israel activists told the Californian that the university is helping the Trump administration hunt witches.
“I think the message was sent to anybody has who has ever been accused of antisemitism, which of course, includes a lot of Palestinians,” one said, claiming that he has been falsely accused. “Whenever we teach about Palestine, it usually leads to an investigation. I think they flagged and sent all of that information to the federal government.”
Students for Justice in Palestine, infamous for its ties to jihadist terror organizations, also criticized the move, charging that the administration had promised to conceal their identities and thereby obstruct the government’s inquiry.
“Chancellor Rich Lyons should not have given assurances that he wouldn’t be giving our information to the federal government,” the group said. “Beyond that, he should never have bowed down so easily. I would think that a university that prides itself on being this liberal haven would at least stand up to a fascist like Donald Trump.”
UC Berkeley came under scrutiny in 2024 after a mob of hundreds of pro-Palestinian students and non-students shut down an event at its Zellerbach Hall featuring Israeli reservist Ran Bar-Yoshafat, forcing Jewish students to flee to a secret safe room as the protesters overwhelmed campus police.
Footage of the incident showed a frenzied mass of anti-Zionist agitators banging on the doors of Zellerbach. The mob then, according to witnesses, eventually stormed the building — breaking windows in the process, according to reports in The Daily Wire — and precipitated the decision to evacuate the area. During the infiltration of Zellerbach, one of the mob — assembled by Bears for Palestine, which had earlier proclaimed its intention to cancel the event — spit on a Jewish student and called him a “Jew,” pejoratively.
Other incidents, including the university’s employment of a lecturer who tweeted antisemitic images — one of which accused Israel of organ harvesting, a blood libel — the rewarding of academic benefits for participating in anti-Zionist activity, and the banning of Zionist speakers from Berkeley Law, have raised concerns about anti-Jewish hated on campus. In 2017, The Algemeiner ranked UC Berkeley as number five on “The 40 Worst Colleges for Jewish Students.”
In August, an Israeli professor sued the university, alleging that school officials denied her a job because she is Israeli — a claim its own investigators corroborated in an internal investigation, according to her attorneys at the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law.
Filed in the Alameda County Superior Court, the complaint is seeking justice for Dr. Yael Nativ, who taught in UC Berkeley’s Department of Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies as a visiting professor in 2022 and received an invitation to apply to do so again for the 2024-2025 academic year just weeks after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre across southern Israel.
A hiring official allegedly believed, however, that an Israeli professor in the department would be unpalatable to students and faculty.
“My dept [sic] cannot host you for a class next fall,” the official allegedly told Nativ in a WhatsApp message. “Things are very hot here right now and many of our grad students are angry. I would be putting the dept and you in a terrible position if you taught here.”
Berkeley’s Office for the Prevention of Harassment and Discrimination (OPHD) later initiated an investigation of Nativ’s denial after the professor wrote an opinion essay which publicly accused the school of cowardice and violations of her civil rights. OPHD determined that a “preponderance of evidence” proved Nativ’s claim, but school officials went on to ignore the professor’s requests for an apology and other remedial measures, including sending her a renewed invitation to teach dance. After nearly two years, the situation remains unresolved.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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Israel Issues Travel Warning Ahead of Jewish Holidays Amid Rising Attacks, Discrimination Targeting Israelis Abroad
A flag is flown during a protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, outside the European Parliament, in Strasbourg, France, Nov. 27, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Yves Herman
Israel has issued a travel warning ahead of the upcoming Jewish high holidays and the second anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023, atrocities, alerting citizens of heightened terrorist threats against Israelis and Jewish communities abroad.
On Sunday, the National Security Council (NSC) urged travelers to stay alert, cautioning that the two-year anniversary of the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel could trigger attacks by Iran-backed or Hamas-linked terrorist groups targeting Jews and Israelis abroad.
“The recent period has been characterized by continued efforts to carry out terrorist attacks against Israeli and Jewish targets by the various terrorist organizations (most of them led by Iran and Hamas),” the NSC said in a statement.
“Oct. 7 may again serve as a significant date for terrorist organizations,” the statement read.
Israeli officials warned that the threat mainly stems from Iran and its terrorist proxies, which have increasingly targeted Jews and Israelis beyond Israel’s borders.
In recent months, the NSC reported that dozens of plots have been thwarted, even as violent incidents — including physical attacks, antisemitic threats, and online incitement — have continued to rise.
“With the war ongoing and the terror threat growing, we are witnessing an escalation in antisemitic violence and provocations by anti-Israel elements,” the NSC said in its statement.
“This trend may inspire extremists to carry out attacks against Israelis or Jews abroad,” it continued.
According to the NSC, Iran remains the leading source of terrorism against Israelis and Jews worldwide, acting both directly and through proxies such as Hamas and Hezbollah.
“Iranian motivation is growing in light of the severe blows it suffered in the framework of ‘Operation Rising Lion’ and the growing desire for revenge,” the NSC said in a statement, referring to the 12-day war with Israel in June.
Amid rising tensions over the war in Gaza, Israeli officials have previously warned of Iranian sleeper cells — covert operatives or terrorists embedded in rival countries who remain dormant until they receive orders to act and carry out attacks.
In light of this reality, the NSC also warned that social media posts revealing ties to Israeli security services could put individuals at risk of being targeted.
“We advise against posting any content that suggests involvement in the security services or operational activities, including real-time location updates,” the statement read.
This latest updated warning comes amid a growing hostile environment and a shocking surge in anti-Jewish hate crimes targeting Jews and Israelis worldwide.
Across Europe, Israelis are facing a disturbing surge of targeted attacks and hostility, as a wave of antisemitic incidents — from violent assaults and vandalism to protests and legal actions — spreads amid rising tensions following recent conflicts in the Middle East.
On Saturday, a 29-year-old Israeli and his sister were attacked by three Palestinian men while on vacation in Athens, Greece.
According to local media reports, the two siblings were walking through the city’s center when three unknown individuals carrying Palestinian flags approached them, shouting antisemitic slurs.
The attackers assaulted the Israeli man, a disabled Israel Defense Forces (IDF) veteran, scratching him, throwing him to the ground, and striking him with their flagpoles, while his sister attempted to intervene and protect him.
October 7 is a global war against Jews & Israelis.
Pro-Palestinian radicals just attacked an Israeli man in Syntagma Square, Athens. via @N12News https://t.co/IZR2IdNrUI pic.twitter.com/9S2o4IjtO6
— Eylon Levy (@EylonALevy) September 14, 2025
Greek authorities arrested all five individuals involved in the incident. According to the Israeli man’s father, his son was placed in a cell with 10 Arabs, where he was reportedly beaten again and feared for his life.
In a separate antisemitic incident earlier this year, a group of Israeli teenagers was physically assaulted by dozens of pro-Palestinian assailants — some reportedly armed with knives — on the Greek island of Rhodes.
After leaving a nightclub, the teens were followed to their hotel, where they were violently assaulted, leaving several with minor injuries.
In another example of rising anti-Israel sentiment and hostility toward Jewish communities, one of Britain’s most prestigious military academies, the Royal College of Defense Studies, announced Sunday that it will bar Israeli students from enrolling next year, citing concerns over the war in Gaza.
In Belgium, two IDF soldiers attending the Tomorrowland music festival were arrested and interrogated by local authorities following a complaint from the Hind Rajab Foundation (HRF), an anti-Israel legal group that pursues legal action against IDF personnel, accusing them of involvement in war crimes.
According to HRF, the soldiers were seen waving the flags of the IDF’s Givati Brigade, which they claimed has been “involved in the systematic destruction of civilian infrastructure in Gaza and in carrying out mass atrocities against the Palestinian population.”
In France, a 34-year-old Algerian man was sentenced to 40 months in prison for threatening passengers with a knife and making antisemitic death threats after boarding a train at Cannes station.
In another incident earlier this year, a Jewish man wearing a kippah was brutally attacked and called a “dirty Jew” in Anduze, a small town in southern France.