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Margot Stern Strom, who founded pioneering Holocaust education program Facing History, dies at 81
(JTA) — Margot Stern Strom, who drew on the pain of her Jewish childhood in the Jim Crow South to create one of the most widely used Holocaust education programs in American schools, died March 28 at her home in Brookline, Massachusetts. She was 81.
The Boston Globe reported the cause as pancreatic cancer.
Strom was a schoolteacher in 1976 when she co-founded Facing History & Ourselves, which drew on draft lessons piloted in her classroom. For three years in the mid-1980s, the U.S. Education Department denied funding for the Holocaust curriculum, in part because of consultants opposed to the curricula and because of right-wing groups, such as Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum, that objected to the program.
However, due to persistent congressional support for the grants, the program finally broke through in 1989 and began to receive federal funds. During the nearly 40 years Strom spent as head of the nonprofit until her retirement in 2014, its curriculum expanded into classrooms in all 50 states and more than 100 countries.
In recent years, in addition to training thousands of teachers, Facing History brought aging survivors of the Holocaust and other important historic events into hundreds of classrooms to share their stories.
“Margot Strom is a visionary,” former Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow said when Strom received the 2015 Massachusetts Governor’s Award in the Humanities. “She had a unique idea and she has translated that idea into an organization that has an impact around the world.”
Margot Stern was born Nov. 10, 1941 in Chicago, Illinois to Fan and Lloyd Stern. After the family moved to Memphis, Tennessee, she was exposed to the racism facing Black people and the intolerance that extended to her small Jewish community. “One Jewish cheerleader at a time was the custom on our high school squad,” she recalled, according to a reminiscence by Facing History. “We had Jewish high school sororities and one Jew a year was chosen as an honorary member of a Christian sorority. We all lived by these rules.”
In 1964, Strom earned a bachelor’s degree in history at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. After graduating she became a teacher, starting out in Skokie, Illinois and eventually moving with her husband Terry Strom and their young family to the Boston suburbs, where she taught eighth grade language arts and social studies.
In the spring of 1975, according to Facing History, she and fellow teacher Bill Parsons attended a workshop on the Holocaust and realized how little they taught and how little their students knew about the genocide of Jews during World War II. (Parsons, who would later serve as chief of staff at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, died in 2016.)
They went on to secure interest and funding from local philanthropists and educators to expand her lesson plans into a curriculum used in classrooms around the country.
“As an educator, Margot believed in her students — whether they were in middle school, high school, or if they were teachers themselves — and their capacity to think deeply about history, about the world we live in, and about how our choices shape society,” Facing History said in a statement. “She imbued in them the ability to act as moral philosophers, and apply the lessons they learned in class to the world around them.”
Roger Brooks succeeded Strom as Facing History’s president and CEO on Dec. 1, 2014. “She deeply understood the need for upstander education and used her charismatic leadership skills to impart this import to teachers and students around the world,” he said in a statement, using a word popularized by Facing History to refer to the opposite of “bystander.”
In comments that presaged the current debate over teaching about racism and gender in public schools around the country, Strom once commented on the schoolroom atmosphere she faced when first promoting the Holocaust studies curriculum.
“There was a powerful silence about race and racism and no mention of antisemitism or the Holocaust,” she wrote in a personal history of the organization. “‘Bad history’ was best forgotten. The Civil War was the War Between the States and we were taught how the South won the major battles. In my Tennessee history class I did not learn who lost the Civil War.”
Strom is survived by her son, Adam, the executive director and cofounder of the Boston nonprofit Re-Imagining Migration; daughter, Rachel Fan Stern Strom of Brooklyn; and four grandchildren. Her survivors also include her brother Gerald Stern, who was an attorney with the civil rights division of the U.S. Justice Department under then-Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, and her sister, Paula Stern of Washington, D.C., who formerly chaired the U.S. International Trade Commission.
Her husband, Terry Strom, a renowned researcher in organ transplant immunology, died in 2018.
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US Hails Progress in Ukraine Peace Talks But Security Questions Unresolved
US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, US Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll and and other members of the US delegation, and Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine Andriy Yermak and other members of the Ukrainian delegation sit before closed-door talks on ending Russia’s war in Ukraine, at the US Mission in Geneva, Switzerland, November 23, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Emma Farge
The United States said it had made significant progress on crafting a plan to end the war in Ukraine during talks on Sunday but no agreement was reached on how to guarantee Kyiv’s security amid concerns about the threat posed by Russia.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio led the talks in Geneva with a high-level Ukrainian delegation after Kyiv and its allies voiced alarm about a US-backed plan because of what they saw as major concessions to Russia, and pressed for changes.
Rubio said work remained to be done on questions including the role of NATO and security guarantees for Ukraine, but that his team had narrowed down unresolved issues in a 28-point peace plan for Ukraine championed by President Donald Trump.
“And we have achieved that today in a very substantial way,” Rubio told reporters at the US mission in Geneva.
Earlier, Trump said Ukraine had not been grateful for American efforts over the war, prompting Ukrainian officials to stress their gratitude to the US president for his support.
European officials joined the US and Ukrainian delegations for talks late on Sunday after crafting a modified version of the US plan for Ukraine that pushes back on proposed limits to Kyiv’s armed forces and mooted territorial concessions.
The European plan proposes that Ukraine be granted a larger military than under the US plan and that talks on land swaps should start from the front line rather than a pre-determined view of which areas should be considered Russian.
On Friday, Trump said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had until Thursday to approve the plan, which calls on Ukraine to cede territory, accept limits on its military and renounce ambitions to join NATO.
For many Ukrainians, including soldiers fighting on the front lines, such terms would amount to capitulation after nearly four years of fighting in Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War Two. On Saturday, Trump said the current proposal for ending the war is not his final offer.
Rubio said the United States still needed time to address the pending issues. He hoped a deal could be reached by Thursday but suggested that it could also take longer.
US and Ukrainian officials were discussing the possibility of Zelensky traveling to the United States, maybe as early as this week, to discuss the peace plan with Trump, two sources familiar with matter said on Sunday.
The main idea is that they would discuss the most sensitive issues in the peace plan, such as the matter of territory, one of the sources said. There is no confirmed date for now, the source added.
ORIGIN OF U.S. PLAN STIRS CONTROVERSY
The main talks between US and Ukrainian officials got under way in a stiff atmosphere at the US mission, soon after Trump complained in a Truth Social post that Ukraine’s leadership had shown “zero gratitude” to the US for its efforts and Europe continued to buy Russian oil.
Rubio interrupted the meeting to speak to reporters, saying the talks had been probably the best the US had held with Ukraine since Trump returned to power.
He said changes would be made to the plan to work towards a solution that both Ukraine and the US could support.
“Obviously this will ultimately have to be signed off with our presidents, although I feel very comfortable about that happening given the progress we’ve made,” said Rubio.
Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian delegation, was at pains to thank Trump for his commitment to Kyiv during the brief interlude. Minutes later, Zelensky also thanked Trump.
Yermak did not reappear with Rubio when the talks ended.
Since the US plan was announced, there has been confusion about who was involved in drawing it up. European allies said they had not been consulted.
Before heading to Geneva, Rubio insisted on X that Washington had authored the plan after remarks from some US senators suggesting otherwise.
Senator Angus King said Rubio had told senators the plan was not the administration’s position, but “essentially the wish-list of the Russians.”
A PERILOUS MOMENT FOR UKRAINE
The draft US plan, which includes many of Russia’s key demands and offers only vague assurances to Ukraine of “robust security guarantees,” comes at a perilous moment for Kyiv.
Russia has been making gains on parts of the front, albeit slowly and, according to Western and Ukrainian officials, the advances have been extremely costly in terms of lives lost.
The transportation hub of Pokrovsk has been partially taken by Russian forces and Ukrainian commanders say they do not have enough soldiers to prevent small, persistent incursions.
Ukraine’s power and gas facilities have been pummeled by drone and missile attacks, meaning millions of people are without water, heating and power for hours each day.
Zelensky himself has been under pressure domestically after a major corruption scandal broke, ensnaring some of his ministers and people in his close entourage.
He has warned that Ukraine risked losing its dignity and freedom – or Washington’s backing – over the US plan.
Kyiv had taken heart in recent weeks after the United States tightened sanctions on Russia’s oil sector, the main source of funding for the war, while its own long-range drone and missile strikes have caused considerable damage to the industry.
But the draft peace plan appears to hand the diplomatic advantage back to Moscow. Ukraine relies heavily on US intelligence and weapons to sustain its war against Russia.
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Who Was Tabtabai, Hezbollah’s Military Leader Killed by Israel?
People inspect a damaged building, after Israeli military said on Sunday that it struck a militant from the Lebanese Iran-aligned Hezbollah group, in Beirut’s southern suburbs, Lebanon November 23, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mohammed Yassin
The Israeli military on Sunday killed Hezbollah’s top military official, Haytham Ali Tabtabai, in a strike on the outskirts of the Lebanese capital that came despite a year-long ceasefire.
His killing was announced by Israel’s military. Hezbollah later confirmed his death, hailing him as “the great jihadist commander” who had “worked to confront the Israeli enemy until the last moment of his blessed life.”
Israel had already eliminated most of Iran-backed Hezbollah’s leadership during a war that raged between October 2023 and November 2024, when a US-brokered truce was agreed.
But Tabtabai, who was appointed as the group’s chief of staff after its recent war with Israel, was killed in a rare post-ceasefire operation against a senior Hezbollah figure.
MILITARY LEADER ROSE THROUGH HEZBOLLAH’S RANKS
Tabtabai was born in Lebanon in 1968 to a father with Iranian roots and a Lebanese mother, according to a senior Lebanese security source. He was not a founding member of Hezbollah but was part of its “second generation,” deploying with the group to fight alongside its allies in Syria and Yemen, the source said.
Israel’s military said Tabtabai joined Hezbollah in the 1980s and held several senior posts, including in its Radwan Force, an elite fighting unit. Israel killed most Radwan figures last year ahead of its ground invasion into Lebanon.
During last year’s war, Tabtabai led Hezbollah’s operations division and rose in rank as other top commanders were eliminated, the Israeli military’s statement said.
Once the ceasefire came into force, Tabtabai was appointed chief of staff and “worked extensively to restore their readiness for war with Israel,” according to the statement.
The Lebanese security source confirmed Tabtabai was swiftly promoted as other top Hezbollah officials were killed, and had been appointed chief of staff over the last year.
The Alma Center, a security research and teaching organization in Israel, said Tabtabai had survived other Israeli attacks both in Syria and during the war in Lebanon.
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Netanyahu, Smotrich to Meet on Israeli 2026 Budget that Faces Battle for Approval
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks with Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich during the weekly cabinet meeting at the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv, Israel, January 7, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun/Pool
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and senior ministry officials will present Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later on Sunday with the state budget and planned structural reforms for 2026, Smotrich’s office said.
“The Finance Minister will present to the Prime Minister the necessary measures to ensure continued economic growth and to combat the high cost of living,” it said.
It added that cabinet ministers would vote on the budget on Dec. 4 but it is unlikely the budget would be approved by year end.
According to Israeli law, the budget must be approved by parliament by the end of March or new elections are triggered.
Its final approval faces an uphill battle that could ultimately lead to new elections.
The government has splintered in the past two years over the Gaza war, the ceasefire which has halted it and demands by ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties to exempt Jewish seminary students from mandatory military service.