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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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Antisemitism in Switzerland Has Surged to ‘Unprecedented Level,’ New Report Finds
A pro-Hamas demonstration in Zurich, Switzerland, Oct. 28, 2023. Photo: IMAGO/dieBildmanufaktur via Reuters Connect
Antisemitism in Switzerland continued to surge to an “unprecedented level” across the country last year, compared to the months leading up to the Hamas-led massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, according to a new report published on Tuesday.
The Swiss Federation of Jewish Communities (SIG), in collaboration with the Foundation Against Racism and Antisemitism (GRA), released its annual report on antisemitism in German-, Italian-, and Romansh-speaking Switzerland last year.
To compile and evaluate all antisemitic incidents, the study used the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism as a reference.
According to the report, the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza prompted a historic surge in attacks on the Swiss Jewish community.
“The war in the Middle East continued to cause a high number of antisemitic incidents in 2024,” the report stated. “The associated wave of antisemitism gained momentum over the course of the reporting
year, reaching an unprecedented level compared to the period prior to Oct. 7, 2023.”
The 31-page report registered 221 “real-world,” or non-online, antisemitic incidents in 2024, marking a 43 percent increase compared to 2023 and a 287 percent rise compared to 2022, the year before the Hamas invasion of southern Israel in October 2023.
Of all the antisemitic incidents registered in 2024, 11 were physical attacks on Jews, including an attempted murder in Zurich and an attempted arson attack on a synagogue. In contrast, prior to the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel in 2023, hardly any such incidents had been reported.
One of the most notorious recent cases was the Zurich attempted murder, in which an Orthodox Jewish man was stabbed and left with life-threatening injuries by a Swiss teenager, an Islamic State supporter of Tunisian origin.
Described by SIG as the most serious antisemitic hate crime in Switzerland in the past two decades, the incident caused widespread shock and led to enhanced security for Jewish sites in Zurich.
According to SIG’s new report, there was a significant increase in antisemitic statements, with 103 reported in 2024 compared to 38 in the previous year and six in 2022.
The study also found that at least 45 percent of all antisemitic incidents were directly related to the Israel-Hamas war, with such a link established in around 28 percent of the total 1,596 registered incidents online.
“Antisemitism has reached the streets in Switzerland,” SIG Secretary General Jonathan Kreutner told Swiss Radio SRF, adding that, despite this development, freedom of opinion, such as support for “Palestine” and criticism of the Israeli government, should be possible in Switzerland.
Based on its analysis, the report explained that “Swiss Jews are often seen as Israeli and are thus held responsible for Israel’s military actions and policies,” leading to members of the Jewish community being targeted in antisemitic attacks because they are seen as responsible for the conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon.
For example, children and young people at schools and universities are being asked to distance themselves from the Israeli government, the study found.
Such rhetoric has fueled the anti-Jewish stereotype of dual loyalty “that Jews are only loyal to themselves and Israel and not real Swiss.” As a result, the report found that the Jewish community in Switzerland feels increasingly insecure, prompting many to hide religious symbols such as the Star of David or a kippah.
In their study, the SIG and GRA demanded that the safety of Jews be guaranteed and call on society and policymakers to ensure the long-term security of Jewish institutions through police action and active support for local security measures.
“Antisemitism in Switzerland is no longer at a crossroads; it has visibly prevailed against all resistance and taken a frightening turn,” the groups said in a statement.
“Whereas attacks such as verbal abuse, spitting, physical assault, and even brutal attacks on life and limb were previously only distant occurrences happening abroad, they are now a reality here, too,” the SIG and GRA added. “The sense of security felt by many Jewish people has deteriorated considerably.”
The post Antisemitism in Switzerland Has Surged to ‘Unprecedented Level,’ New Report Finds first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Miami Beach Mayor Withdraws Proposal to Evict, Withdraw Funding for Theater Screening Anti-Israel Film
Basel Adra and Yuval Abraham pose with the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature Film for “No Other Land” at the Governors Ball following the Oscars show at the 97th Academy Awards in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, US, March 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mike Blake
Miami Beach Mayor Steven Meiner on Wednesday morning rescinded his proposal to evict a local movie theater from a city-owned building and revoke funding for the venue because of its screening of an Oscar-winning documentary that is critical of Israeli military actions in the West Bank.
The decision was announced at a Miami Beach City Commission meeting, where many members of the community addressed the commission and spoke in opposition to Meiner’s proposal against O Cinema, a sponsor of the Miami Jewish Film Festival, and its sold-out screenings of “No Other Land.” The Orthodox Jewish mayor of Miami Beach withdrew his proposal and deferred discussion to an alternative proposal he introduced on Tuesday night, which encourages O Cinema to show films that “highlight a fair and balanced viewpoint.”
“I really am appreciative of the passion that we saw today,” Meiner said at the conclusion of Wednesday’s meeting. “I’m trying not to get emotional, but I legitimately view this as a public safety threat — not immediately. I don’t think anyone in Miami Beach is going to get hurt or attacked because this movie is being shown, but I see and I’m witnessing what is going on in our world,” he added, addressing the global rise in antisemitism.
“What I was trying to do was highlight a level of hurt and what propaganda — yes, it all needs to be heard — but a level of propaganda that eventually can lead to devastation, whether it be pogroms in Europe, the Holocaust, and certainly Oct. 7,” the mayor said, referring to Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel. “It stars with propaganda and dehumanizing people. And that’s why I brought this to the forefront because, in my view, it was a public safety issue.”
“Even though some of you said some things [that] were hurtful, I love you all. I really, really do,” he concluded. “We’re all Americans, we’re all proud to be in this country, it is a great country, and I really just want what’s best for us, our city, and our country, and the world. God Bless.”
Meiner introduced his eviction proposal last week, after he failed to convince O Cinema to cancel its screenings of “No Other Land” in a letter that he sent to its CEO Vivian Marthell on March 5. At the meeting on Wednesday, five of the commission members said they would oppose the eviction proposal, which also called to suspend grant money to the theater and discontinue any further funding.
On Monday, more than 700 international filmmakers — including Oscar winner Michael Moore and “Moonlight” director Barry Jenkins – signed an open letter supporting O Cinema and encouraging the Miami Beach commissioners to reject Meiner’s proposed eviction of the theater.
O Cinema began screening “No Other Land” on March 7. The film centers on the demolition of Palestinian homes in Masafer Yatta, a collection of villages in the West Bank, and the struggles of Palestinians who confront Israeli armed forces over being evicted from the land, which Israel wants to turn into a military training facility. The film portrays Israeli armed forces as violent land grabbers that oppress and displace Palestinian families in Masafer Yatta, without explaining that Palestinians illegally built homes on the land that Israel had claimed for a military training zone in the 1980s. The film was made by a collective of Israeli and Palestinian filmmakers and activists, including Israeli journalist Yuval Abraham and Basel Adra, a Palestinian who lives in Masafer Yatta with his family.
“No Other Land” won best documentary feature film at the 97th Academy Awards on March 2. It has won a slew of other awards as well, including the prestigious Berlinale Documentary Award and Panorama Audience Award for Best Documentary Film.
The post Miami Beach Mayor Withdraws Proposal to Evict, Withdraw Funding for Theater Screening Anti-Israel Film first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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NYC Mayoral Contender Cites Hamas-Produced Casualty Figures While Condemning Israel for Restarting Gaza Campaign
Zohran Mamdani. Photo: Ron Adar / SOPA Images via Reuters Connect
Zohran Mamdani, one of the top contenders in the New York City mayoral race, on Tuesday condemned Israel for restarting war operations in the Gaza Strip, accusing the Jewish state of committing a “genocide” and citing Hamas-produced casualty statistics.
“Israel’s renewed bombing of Gaza — funded by our tax dollars — has already killed more than 400 Palestinians in just a few hours, including scores of women and children. It is among the deadliest days of a genocide which has taken the lives of more than 50,000 civilians,” Mamdani said in a statement. “‘The Israeli government has chosen to give up on the hostages,’ an organization of Israeli families said this morning. The Trump administration must bring all of its pressure to bear on [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu to establish the ceasefire now.”
On Monday night, Israel resumed airstrikes targeting Hamas in Gaza under the directive of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose office said in a statement that the military action followed “Hamas’s repeated refusal to release our hostages, as well as its rejection of all of the proposals it has received from US presidential envoy Steve Witkoff and from the mediators.”
The Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry claimed that around 400 Palestinians were killed from the initial Israeli airstrikes, although the ministry does not distinguish between terrorist combatants and civilians. Moreover, researchers have shown that casualty figures published by Gaza’s Hamas-run health authorities have been inflated to defame Israel.
Mamdani, a representative within the New York State Assembly and progressive firebrand, has made anti-Israel activism a cornerstone of his political career. Mamdani, a self-described democratic socialist, has both advanced state legislation seeking to punish Israel and labeled the Jewish state’s defensive military operations in Gaza a “genocide.”
Although Mamdani is considered a threat to win the New York City mayorship, his position in the race has slipped. Mamdani commands 8 percent of the vote among New Yorkers, good enough for third place, according to a poll by Quinnipiac conducted between Feb. 27-Mar. 3. Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo holds a commanding lead at 38 percent, per Quinnipiac.
Comparatively, according to a poll conducted by Honan Strategy Group from Feb. 22-23, Mamdani previously sat in second place with 12 percent of the vote.
In 2021, Mamdani issued public support for the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement —an initiative which seeks to economically and diplomatically isolate Israel iasthe first step to its eventual destruction. He claimed that support for the anti-Israel movement is growing within New York City, saying on X/Twitter that “the tide is turning. The fight for justice is here. The moment is now.”
That same year, he also called for prohibiting New York lawmakers from visiting Israel, asserting that “every elected [official] must be pressured to stand with Palestinians.”
In May 2023, Mamdani advanced the “Not on Our Dime! Ending New York Funding of Israeli Settler Violence Act,” legislation which would ban charities from using tax-deductible donations to aid organizations that work in the West Bank. Mamdani argued that the legislation would help the state fight against so-called Israeli “war crimes” against Palestinians. The socialist dismissed critics of the legislation, saying that his anti-Israel proposal is “in line with the sentiments of most New Yorkers.”
On Oct. 8, 2023, 24 hours following the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust, Mamdani published a statement condemning “Netanyahu’s declaration of war” and suggesting that Israel would use the terror attacks to justify committing a second “Nakba.” Many Palestinians and anti-Israel activists use the term “Nakba,” or “catastrophe,” to refer to the establishment of the modern state of Israel in 1948.
Mamdani then said that Israel can only secure its long-term safety by “ending the occupation and dismantling apartheid.”
Five days later, he further criticized Israel’s response to the Hamas-led massacres, saying that “we are on the brink of a genocide of Palestinians in Gaza right now.”
In January 2024, he called on New York City to cease sending funds to Israel, saying that “Voters oppose their tax dollars funding a genocide.”
In addition, Mamdani is a high-profile member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), a far-left political organization with critical views of Israel. Though the DSA has long opposed Israel, the organization has ramped up its pro-Hamas rhetoric during the ongoing war in Gaza. On Oct. 7, the organization issued a statement saying that Hamas’s massacre was “a direct result of Israel’s apartheid regime.” The organization also encouraged its followers to attend an Oct. 8 “All Out for Palestine” event in Manhattan.
In January 2024, the DSA issued a statement calling for an “end to diplomatic and military support of Israel.” Then in April, the organization’s international committee, DSA IC, issued a missive defending Iran’s right to “self-defense” against Israel. In addition, the socialist group slammed former US Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) over his vote in favor of replenishing Israel’s Iron Dome air defense system.
Mamdani’s political ascendance comes amid a spike in anti-Jewish hate crimes within New York City.
New York City has been ravaged by a surge in antisemitic incidents in the 17 months following the Oct. 7 massacre. According to police data, Jews were targeted as the victims in a majority of all hate crimes in the city last year.
Meanwhile, pro-Hamas activists have held raucous — and sometimes violent — protests on the city’s college campuses, oftentimes causing Jewish students to fear for their safety. New York City schools are also currently facing criticism for failing to protect Jewish and Israeli students from antisemitism.
The post NYC Mayoral Contender Cites Hamas-Produced Casualty Figures While Condemning Israel for Restarting Gaza Campaign first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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