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Museum of Jewish Heritage to Host Talk on Polish-Jewish Artist’s Masterwork Haggadah
The Four Questions from The Haggadah. Łódź, 1935. Source: Irvin Ungar
The Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City will host a special lecture on the Polish-Jewish artist Arthur Szyk and his illustrated Haggadah, one of Szyk’s masterworks, by the world’s leading expert on his work.
The online talk, on Tuesday, April 8 at 7 pm, will be given by Szyk scholar Irvin Ungar and will explore “how and why Szyk is the artist of and for the Jewish people, and the ways his art and spirit remain eternal in the service of mankind,” according to the museum’s website.
Today, Szyk is perhaps best known for his The Haggadah, an “illuminated manuscript” which tells the story of the Passover Seder in a series of watercolor illustrations. It was thoroughly anti-Nazi, linking the oppression of Jews in Nazi Germany with the enslavement of Jews in Egypt and, ultimately, their Exodus.
Szyk’s Haggadah was one of the most expensive new books in the world upon publication in 1940, according to Ungar. The Times of London deemed it “worthy of being considered among the most beautiful of books ever produced by the hand of man.”
The talk will also explore how Szyk saw Hitler as the new Pharaoh and the Nazis as the new Egyptians who had come to annihilate his people, using an ancient text to deliver a modern message about persecution and freedom.
Written between 1934-1936 in the shadow of Hitler’s Germany, Szyk’s remarkably detailed visuals and impeccable Hebrew calligraphy combined to create a “visual commentary [calling] for heroism and emigration of Europe’s Jews to Palestine,” the site adds.
Born in 1894 in the city of Łódź during the Russian Partition of Poland, Szyk lived through a violent and epochal moment in history — an age of revolution, world war, and genocide — though his life ended prematurely in 1951. His works, from sketches of the Boxer Rebellion he drew at the age of six to his depiction of Hitler as Pharaoh — and later, Hitler as Anti-Christ — were expressive commentaries on troubled times.
After Germany’s invasion of Poland in 1939, Szyk fled to England and then America, where he earned a reputation as a “soldier in art” for portraying the Nazis and Axis leaders as primal mad men and using irradiating imagery to alert the world to the plight of the Jewish people under Nazi occupation, an issue that affected him personally. In 1940, his mother, Eugenia, was murdered in the Chełmno extermination camp, just 30 miles from the city in which he grew up. Many more of his relatives — and his wife’s — were murdered during the Holocaust.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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