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18 notable Jews who died in 2022
(JTA) — Every year brings the opportunity to celebrate the accomplishments of well-known Jewish icons in every field and to mourn those we have lost.
Here are 18 Jews who died in 2022 and who leave outsized legacies on politics, the arts, sports and everything in between.
Madeleine Albright
Former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, pictured here in 2018, died March 23, 2022. (Bill O’Leary/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
The “first woman secretary of state in the United States” label will always follow Madeleine Albright, especially because of her success in such a male-dominated field of policy. But regardless of her gender, Albright’s moves as a part of Bill Clinton’s administration left a lasting mark on U.S. peacekeeping efforts around the world. Crucial to her worldview was her refugee story, which she did not fully grasp until after her time in the limelight. Her parents were Czech immigrants who had converted from Judaism to Catholicism and then Episcopalianism to avoid persecution before fleeing Europe. Albright did not like to talk about her parents’ choice to keep her in the dark, but when she did, it was in the voice of a blunt-edged diplomat who understood how the 20th century robbed some people of agency, and how they did what they had to do to reclaim it. “I can’t question their motivation. I can’t,” she told The Washington Post in 1997. Albright died March 23 in Washington, D.C., at 84.
Melissa Bank
American author Melissa Bank poses during a portrait session in Paris, Jan. 9, 2006. (Ulf Andersen/Getty Images)
Melissa Bank published just two books in her career, but both sets of short stories were bestsellers that explored the lives of Jewish women and still resonate with young readers decades later. Her 1999 debut, “The Girls’ Guide To Hunting And Fishing,” held a spot on The New York Times’ bestseller list for months. The comic misadventures of her two books’ Jewish protagonists often intersected with Jewish life: In “Wonder Spot,” Sophie Applebaum plays hooky from Hebrew class, considers taking a job with a Jewish newspaper, and contends with a cousin’s bat mitzvah and a sister-in-law’s passive-aggressive attempts to impose kosher rules on her home. Bank died of lung cancer at 61 in August.
Isaac Berger
Isaac Berger, left, at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. (Central Press/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
Setting Moses and the Maccabees aside, it’s not a stretch to call Isaac Berger one of the strongest Jews ever. Known as “Ike,” Berger won three Olympic medals, two World Championships and eight U.S. national championships in weightlifting during a dominant stretch in the 1950s and 60s. At the 1957 Maccabiah Games, Berger was the first athlete to break a world record in any sport in Israel. His gold medal was presented by Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, who called Berger the “gibor Yehudi,” or “mighty Jew.” Berger was inducted into the U.S. Weightlifting Hall of Fame in 1965 and the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 1980. Berger died in June at 85.
Peter Bogdanovich
Peter Bogdanovich at the 1999 New York City premiere of “RKO 281.” (Ron Galella/Getty Images)
Peter Bogdanovich was an Oscar-nominated movie director and actor whose films, ego and off-camera exploits encapsulated the personality-driven excesses of 1970s Hollywood filmmaking. He got his start making low-budget fare for shlock pioneer Roger Corman, then broke into the big leagues in 1971 with “The Last Picture Show,” a coming-of-age drama set in small-town Texas starring Jeff Bridges and Cybill Shepherd (who became the director’s partner after he began an affair with her during filming). “The Last Picture Show” became a critical and commercial smash, scoring Bogdanovich Oscar nominations for best director and best adapted screenplay, and turned its 32-year-old director into a wunderkind whom the press frequently compared to his idol, Orson Welles. Bogdanovich’s 1972 follow-up “What’s Up, Doc?” was also a hit, and as a bonus, the screwball comedy helped make a Jewish sex symbol out of star Barbra Streisand. Though Bogdanovich rarely discussed his religious background in interviews, he was proud of his father’s role in rescuing his Jewish mother from Europe. “He was a really great painter and very highly praised in the former Yugoslavia,” Bogdanovich said of his father Borislav in a 2019 interview with New York magazine, “but he gave all that up to save my mother and her family because they were Jewish. He wasn’t, but they were.” Bogdanovich died Jan. 6 in Los Angeles at 82.
James Caan
James Caan stands under casino lights in a scene from the 1974 film “The Gambler.” (Paramount/Getty Images)
One of the leading movie stars of the 1970s, James Caan once said he was twice honored as New York City’s “Italian of the Year.” It made sense, in a way: his fans were used to seeing him in tough guy roles, including one in arguably the most famous Italian gangster flick of all time, “The Godfather.” But Caan was born to German-Jewish immigrants in Queens, where his father was a kosher butcher, before starring in movies such as “Brian’s Song,” “The Gambler,” and, later in his career, Will Ferrell’s hit comedy “Elf.” His onscreen (and offscreen) persona did much to break stereotypes about weak, wimpy Jewish men. “He’s in his own lane, Jew-wise,” Seth Rogen wrote in a 2021 memoir, calling Caan an unusually “scary Jew.” Caan died July 6 in Los Angeles at 82.
Elana Dykewomon
Lesbian author, poet and playwright Elana Dykewomon, photographed at her home in Oakland, Calif., on May 1, 2022, died Aug. 7, 2022. (Jane Tyska/Digital First Media/East Bay Times via Getty Images)
Despite never earning mainstream commercial success, Elana Dykewomon was a pioneer in the world of lesbian-themed fiction. “Beyond the Pale,” her award-winning 1997 novel, traced the intertwined stories of Jewish lesbians from Kishinev, Moldova, to the Lower East Side, in a saga that included both Russian pogroms and the deadly Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. “It can’t be that we are the first generation of Jewish lesbian activists on the planet,” Dykewoman said at the time. “So part of what the novel is about is searching for our ancestors and ancestral community as Jewish lesbians.” Born Elana Nachman in New York City in 1949, Dykewomon changed her name after the publication of her first novel, “Riverfinger Women,” in 1974. She wanted to distance herself from the Nachman line of rabbis from whom she descended, she told J. The Jewish News of Northern California, in 1997. She adopted Dykewoman, then Dykewomon, to demonstrate her allegiance to the lesbian community — but later regretted not using her name to assert her Jewish identity, too. “If I had to do it all over again, I might have chosen Dykestein or Dykeberg,” she said at the time. Though she rejected religion after becoming a radical feminist, she said, she studied Yiddish, Torah and Talmud while writing “Beyond the Pale”; often wrote on Jewish themes; and frequently included Jewish characters in her work. The 2009 novel “Risk,” for example, featured a Jewish lesbian who lives in Oakland and makes a living tutoring high school students. Dykewomon died in August at 72 from cancer.
Hanna Pick-Goslar
Hannah Pick-Goslar seen at the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam, Oct. 11, 2012. (Marcel Antonisse/ANP/AFP via Getty Images)
Hannah Pick-Goslar appears multiple times in Anne Frank’s iconic diary — as both a close friend and a premonition of the Holocaust horrors to come for Frank’s family. As Anne wrote after having a nightmare about her friend: “[Her] eyes were very big and she looked so sadly and reproachfully at me that I could read in her eyes, ‘Oh, Anne, why have you deserted me? Help, oh, help me, rescue me from this hell!’” Their final meeting would be at a fence in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. After recuperating from her liberation from the camp in the Netherlands and then later in Switzerland with her aunt and uncle, Pick-Goslar emigrated in 1947 to Israel, where she became a pediatric nurse and Holocaust speaker. Her friendship with Frank was the subject of a book, “Memories of Anne Frank: Reflections of a Childhood Friend,” and a Dutch film, “My Best Friend Anne Frank” (2021). Pick-Goslar died in Jerusalem on Oct. 28 at 93.
Gilbert Gottfried
Gilbert Gottfried at SiriusXM Studios in New York City, Feb. 3, 2020. (Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images for SiriusXM)
For a comic known for his grating, nasally voice and extremely R-rated jokes, Gilbert Gottfried was a surprisingly sweet and loving Jewish dad who grew more in touch with his Jewishness after marrying his wife in 2007. The man known as the Aflac duck voice got himself nearly canceled more than once: In 1991, Fox apologized after Gottfried, hosting the Emmy awards, kept joking about fellow comic Pee-wee Herman’s arrest for masturbating in an adult movie theater. He continued to score gigs in movies, on talk radio (frequently with Howard Stern), on sketch shows and sitcoms, and as a voice on cartoons. He was the funny animal sidekick, Iago the parrot, in Disney’s “Aladdin.” Then he famously told perhaps the first joke about the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, just a few days after terrorists piloted airplanes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. “I’ve always said tragedy and comedy are roommates,” Gottfried told Vulture in 2019. Gottfried died Feb. 28 at 67 in New York from complications related to myotonic dystrophy, a rare condition.
Estelle Harris
Estelle Harris and Jason Alexander greet each other at the after-party for “The Producers” at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles, May 29, 2003. (Kevin Winter/Getty Images)
Born Estelle, immortalized on TV as Estelle — Estelle Costanza, to be exact, the always shrill and frequently apoplectic mother to George Costanza, on the sitcom “Seinfeld” from 1992 until the show’s finale in 1998. According to Deadline, it was kismet: the character was named Estelle before Harris landed the part. Harris was born in New York City in 1928 where her parents, Jews of Polish descent, owned a candy store in Manhattan. When Harris was 7 years old, the family moved to Tarentum, Pennsylvania, where Harris suffered from antisemitic bullying at school. She quickly to turning to the theater, aided by elocution lessons, and found her calling. Though Harris went on to a prolific career recording voiceovers for commercials and playing minor characters in movies and TV shows, she became so identified with her “Seinfeld” role that fans frequently stopped her on the street to tell her her she reminded them of their own mothers. Jason Alexander, who played her character’s son George on “Seinfeld,” remembered his “tv mama” in a tweet after her death. “One of my favorite people has passed – my tv mama, Estelle Harris. The joy of playing with her and relishing her glorious laughter was a treat. I adore you, Estelle,” he wrote. Harris died in April at 93.
Chaim Kanievsky
Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky at his home in Bnei Brak, Israel, Dec. 26, 2019. (Yaakov Nahumi/Flash90)
For one of the most revered Torah scholars on Earth, at least for many haredi Orthodox Jews, Chaim Kanievsky had surprisingly small handwriting. People would write to him from around the world with questions on postcards, and he would usually give “quite short answers,” a professor told JTA. “But from all his answers there are many books,” she added. After the 2017 death of Rabbi Aharon Leib Shteinman, Kanievsky became the preeminent leader of Israel’s non-Hasidic haredi Orthodox community, an authority on matters of Jewish law. He was an isolated figure who kept to himself and studied Jewish texts in the city Bnei Brak, but he became more vocal on political topics late in life. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Kanievsky first lobbied for yeshivas to stay open, but once vaccines became available, he bucked the opinions of many in his community and pushed Jews to get vaccinated — earning some death threats in the process. Kanievsky died at 94 in Bnei Brak in March.
Aline Kominsky Crumb
Aline Crumb and Robert Crumb attend A Night at Crumbland celebrating Stella McCartney and Robert Crum Collaboration and the R. Crumb Handbook at the Stella McCartney Store, in New York City, April 12, 2005. (Nick Papananias/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)
In one of her autobiographical comics, Aline Kominsky Crumb wrote about seeing one Jewish girl after another coming into high school on Long Island after plastic surgery. “Me ‘n’ my friends developed a ‘big nose pride,’” she wrote, and one of the characters says, “I could not stand to look like a carbon copy!” Working with her husband Robert Crumb, also a leading underground comics artist, and then on her own, Kominsky-Crumb brought raw self-lacerating accountability to the genre, subverting stereotypes about Jewish women along the way. Seen by many in the 1970s and 80s as overly crude or controversial, she’s now an icon for many feminist artists. Roz Chast said her influence is seen in “every woman who creates her own cartoon voice.” Kominsky-Crumb died of pancreatic cancer at 74 in November.
Sam Massell
Mayor Sam Massell , center, and his daughter Melanie, seated, welcome members of the Jackson Five to the mayor’s office in Atlanta, April 7, 1971. (Photo by Afro American News via Getty Images)
Sam Massell was Atlanta’s first Jewish mayor, serving from 1970-1974, and the city’s last white mayor. But he was remembered as more than a single-term bookend: Massell was the first mayor to prove that the city’s Blacks had clout enough to elevate their chosen candidate to office, and he embedded Black leaders in government and built its mass transport system, forever changing the city. During his term as mayor, the number of Blacks in leadership positions doubled, to 40%. “Being black means you are always different,” he would say. “But being Jewish means I am always different, too.” Massell died March 13 at 94.
Miriam Naor
Supreme Court President Miriam Naor speaks during a swearing-in ceremony for newly appointed judges for the Supreme Court at the President’s residence in Jerusalem, Jun. 13, 2017. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
Miriam Naor served on the Israeli Supreme Court for 14 years and became the second woman to helm the court as chief justice. Her tenure presided over a period when the court made several significant rulings around religious pluralism in Israel. One of the most important came in 2016, when the court ruled that Israel must recognize conversions to Judaism performed in Israel outside of the rabbinate, which controls all religious matters in Israel, for the purposes of citizenship under the country’s Law of Return. During her tenure, the court also ruled that mikvehs, or ritual baths, in Israel had to be made available for the use of non-Orthodox converts to Judaism. Speaking at her swearing-in ceremony in 2015, Naor spoke about the need to preserve Israel’s character as a “Jewish and democratic state that upholds the principle of equality” as well as to “protect human rights and the rule of law.” Naor died in Jerusalem on Jan. 24 at 74.
Nehemiah Persoff
Nehemiah Persoff has hundreds of screen credits from classic Hollywood films and TV shows. Clockwise from top left: “Some Like It Hot,” “On The Waterfront,” “Red Sky at Morning,” “Yentl” and “Playhouse 90” (as Benito Mussolini). (Nehemiah Persoff/Photo illustration by Grace Yagel)
Few openly designate themselves as “character actors,” but Nehemiah Persoff didn’t shy away from the term. From the years following Israel’s independence through the Golden Age of Hollywood and beyond, Persoff had 200 stage and screen roles, working with directors such as Billy Wilder, Alfred Hitchcock, Barbra Streisand and Martin Scorsese (playing a rabbi for the latter in “The Last Temptation of Christ”). He often played gangsters, including in the Marilyn Monroe classic “Some Like it Hot.” Born in Jerusalem, Persoff followed his family to the United States in 1929, and after World War II reconnected with his Israeli roots by performing onstage in the country. Though Persoff was not religious, he remained a devout Zionist his entire life and expressed regret for forgoing fighting in the 1948-49 War of Independence in order to further his acting career back in the United States. Persoff died in April at 102.
Svika Pick
Israeli singer Svika Pick, who died Aug. 14, 2022 at the age of 72, poses in a 1985 photo. (Moshe Shai/Flash90)
One of the most famous figures in Israeli cultural history, musician Svika Pick was a pioneer in his adopted country in many senses. He lightened up Israel’s pop music with simple chords and lyrics; he borrowed sounds from Mizrahi music and employed Black backup singers at a time when his government was trying to deport many would-be immigrants; and he set fashion trends with a feminine, Bowie-like aesthetic. In 1998, he wrote Israel’s third Eurovision winner, “Diva,” for Dana International, the first transgender person to win the contest. In his later years, Pick became a judge on reality shows and his daughter Daniella became paparazzi fodder when she married American director Quentin Tarantino, who moved to Tel Aviv to join the family. Pick died Aug. 14 in Ramat Hasharon, Israel, at 72.
Bob Saget
Comedian Bob Saget performs at the Improv Comedy Club at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Hollywood, Fla., Feb. 24, 2006. (Ralph Notaro/Getty Images)
A wholesome dad on network TV, and one of the raunchiest standup comedians in the business — few could boast a resume like Bob Saget’s. Before he got to Hollywood, Saget honed his comedy as a misbehaving Hebrew school student at Temple Israel in Norfolk, Virginia. “I go back and forth with my belief system, by the way. I’m not the best, most observant Jewish person you’ve ever met or talked to, and yet I’m Jewish and proud to be,” he once said. After a short stint contributing to CBS’ “The Morning Program,” Saget was cast to play a morning show host on TV. As Danny Tanner on “Full House,” Saget played a widowed dad and TV host raising three daughters in San Francisco with the help of his brother-in-law and his best friend. Saget was also known for hosting “America’s Funniest Home Videos.” The respected standup died in January at 65 from complications after a blunt head trauma.
Gerda Weissman Klein
President Barack Obama presents Jewish Holocaust survivor Gerda Weissmann Klein a 2010 Presidential Medal of Freedom, during a ceremony in the East Room of the White House in 2011. (Brooks Kraft LLC/Corbis via Getty Images)
Gerda Weissmann Klein’s liberation from concentration camps came after a brutal 350-mile death march to avoid the advance of the Allied forces. Of the 4,000 women who started the march, fewer than 120 survived. After moving to the United States, Weissman Klein became a bestselling author of 10 books, including her 1957 autobiography, “All But My Life,” which is frequently used as a text by Holocaust educators, and “The Hours After: Letters of Love and Longing in War’s Aftermath,” a chronicle of her and her husband’s correspondence in the years between liberation and their marriage. Decades later, Weissmann Klein’s story became the basis of the 1995 HBO short documentary “One Survivor Remembers,” which won both an Emmy and an Oscar (and is currently available for streaming on HBO Max). At the Oscars, she was almost played off before she could deliver an acceptance speech; but she stood her ground, and delivered a memorable message, concluding with, “Each of you who know the joy of freedom are winners.” Klein died April 3 in Phoenix, Arizona.
A.B. Yehoshua
Israeli novelist A.B. Yehoshua speaks after receiving an honorary degree at the University of Palermo, Sept. 10, 2019. (Francesco Militello Mirto/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Many of Israel’s leading writers take aim at the country’s moral and political dilemmas. But few attacked the subjects with such blatant intensity as A.B. Yehoshua, who authored 11 novels, three collections of short stories and four plays, in addition to other essays. His fiction centered on the on-the-ground lived experiences of Israelis, but there were always larger societal themes and critique. He experimented with format, too, leading critic Harold Bloom to compare him to William Faulkner in 1984. But he was arguably as well known for his sharp public statements on his homeland, politics and Diaspora Jews. A firm believer in a two-state solution who critiqued both the Israeli occupation and Palestinian leaders, Yehoshua also infuriated U.S. groups by saying “Only those living in Israel and taking part in the daily decisions of the Jewish state have a significant Jewish identity.” He died on June 14 in Tel Aviv at 85.
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The post 18 notable Jews who died in 2022 appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Haley Stevens shocks Democrats by endorsing Republican Mike Rogers. Her move could sway Jewish voters in Michigan.
Rep. Haley Stevens, a Michigan Democrat who lost a heated Senate primary to progressive Israel critic Abdul El-Sayed, endorsed his Republican opponent, Mike Rogers, on Sunday in a stunning break with her party just two days before Election Day. The move could shake up one of the country’s most closely watched Senate races.
The endorsement came after a weekend of growing tension between Stevens and El-Sayed, whose fierce criticism of Israel and association with online personalities accused of antisemitism alienated some Jewish Democrats. If elected, El-Sayed would become the first Muslim in the U.S. Senate.
Stevens, a staunch supporter of Israel who received significant backing from AIPAC during the primary, had been snubbed by El-Sayed amid efforts to unite Democrats ahead of Tuesday’s election. Just last week, she told CNN she would vote for El-Sayed and was scheduled to join him at a unity rally Sunday.
But a feud escalated over the weekend after El-Sayed refused to condemn the content of an ad from a PAC supporting his campaign that blamed U.S. aid to Israel for rising grocery prices. El-Sayed, in return, accused Stevens of “relitigating a primary that ended three months ago” and again mentioned the support she received from AIPAC.
“Our Democratic nominee for Senate said I was no longer welcome in his campaign and that I should stay away,” Stevens said in a video posted on X after attending church services in Detroit with Rogers.
Speaking to the media alongside Rogers, Steven also referenced Hasan Piker, a popular left-wing pundit who has been accused of antisemitism and has campaigned alongside El-Sayed. “I don’t belong in Abdul’s campaign,” she said. “I do not stand with Hasan Piker, who gets trafficked on our college campuses.”
The surprise endorsement could influence Jewish Democrats who have struggled with whether to support El-Sayed despite their concerns about his rhetoric on Israel and antisemitism. After the March attack on Michigan’s Temple Israel, El-Sayed said, “Hurt people hurt people,” referring to the attacker having lost family in an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon. He later apologized for the comment.
Some Jewish Democrats had considered leaving the Senate race on the ballot blank, similar to what the pro-Palestinian “uncommitted” movement did in the 2024 presidential election to protest the Biden-Harris administration’s support for Israel in the war against Hamas in Gaza.
Jewish voters make up just 1.4% of the electorate in the state. However, in a race so close, they could make the difference. The latest YouGov poll of likely voters in Michigan has El-Sayed up by 4 points.
Trump carried the swing state in 2024 by about 80,000 votes. In the Senate race that same year, Democrat Elissa Slotkin defeated Rogers by fewer than 20,000 votes. Even before Sunday’s development, the Republican Jewish Coalition had spent $2 million to target approximately 50,000 Jewish voters, primarily in Oakland County, who backed Stevens in the primary.
The divisions have also become personal for Stevens, who is considering converting to Judaism. Her Jewish fiancé, Jason Turkish, attended a RJC forum last week and said he would vote for Rogers.
AIPAC’s super PAC, United Democracy Project, sent direct mailers to 130,000 identified Jewish voters in the swing state. It also sponsored get-out-the-vote phone calls.
Democrats try to limit the damage
The development marks one of the biggest public splits among Democrats over Israel this election cycle, as the party is fighting to win control of the Senate.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, the highest-ranking Jewish elected official, called Stevens’ endorsement of Rogers “a despicable betrayal.”
Schumer stood by his endorsement of El-Sayed. In a statement Sunday, he accused Republicans of “racist, Islamophobic, and over-the-top false attacks” against the Democratic nominee. He did not directly address the Stevens endorsement. Stevens, who said she is “still a very proud Democrat,” said she wants to see Schumer become Senate Majority Leader.
The endorsement also sparked a firestorm within Stevens’ own office, with her chief of staff and other aides resigning in protest. Stevens did not seek reelection to the House after running for Senate, and her term ends in December.
Republicans seized on the divide.
“Wow, this is BIG!” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post. “Her following is huge, and the level of respect from the People of Michigan, especially our African American and Jewish populations, is virtually unparalleled. Haley said what few people are willing to say.”
Some Jewish Democrats also heavily criticized Stevens on Sunday, saying she was hurting the party and the country. “Anyone who makes an election this important about themselves, and not Michiganders and our democracy, should think hard about whether they are serving the greater good,” Slotkin, who is Jewish and who has hit the campaign trail with El-Sayed, wrote on X.
The Jewish Democratic Council of America, an organizing body for Jewish interests in the Democratic Party, had pointedly not endorsed El-Sayed during the campaign. Yet following Stevens’ announcement, its CEO Halie Soifer wrote, “A vote for any Republican in 2026 is a vote for Donald Trump.”
Nonnegotiable Michigan, a coalition of Michigan rabbis and Jewish Democrats, scheduled an online forum for Sunday afternoon to discuss their choices — whether to support the Republicans or leave the ballot blank — after El-Sayed ignored its repeated requests to engage. “Now, with voting underway and Election Day approaching, the question is no longer only what El-Sayed will do — but what Jewish voters will do,” the group said in a statement released before the Stevens endorsement.
Piker, on social media, called Stevens “a self interested striver who’s weirdly obsessed with Israel and has been paid handsomely for this strange obsession.” El-Sayed has distanced himself multiple times from Piker since they campaigned together in the primary, including this week after Piker compared a heavily Jewish Michigan suburb to “a KKK neighborhood.”
A shift in the Jewish vote on Tuesday could help decide the Senate race. It could also offer an early test of whether divisions over Israel will cost Democrats Jewish support beyond this election and heading into the 2028 presidential race.
JTA contributed to this report.
The post Haley Stevens shocks Democrats by endorsing Republican Mike Rogers. Her move could sway Jewish voters in Michigan. appeared first on The Forward.
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Looking for a Yiddish-related event?
The Forverts website now includes a new feature. Each week, you’ll find a listing of upcoming events related to the Yiddish language or culture, both online and in person.
The list will include lectures in English or Yiddish; concerts; plays; day trips; conversation groups and reading circles.
If you know of a Yiddish-related event coming up, let us know by emailing schaechter@forward.com.
Sunday, Nov. 1, 2 p.m. ET. In this Zoom event, L.A. Yiddish culture activist Miri Koral will discuss a unique translation project of 160 works written by diverse masters of Yiddish poetry who perished in the Holocaust. Poet and Holocaust survivor Binem Heller compiled the anthology in 1951 to ensure that the works of these wonderful poets aren’t forgotten, and Koral is determined to get them all translated into English, opening them up to a much wider audience. The program will be in Yiddish. Register.
Sunday, Nov. 1, 2 p.m. ET. Some of the most passionate Yiddish love poetry and prose was written about Crotona Park in the Bronx, an area that fell off the beaten track in the last century. In this on-site tour in Yiddish, scholar Eve Jochnowitz will guide us as we explore the neighborhood and the literature it inspired. The event is free but a donation of $18 is suggested. The group will meet at the corner of Charlotte Street and Crotona Park East. Register.
Sunday, Nov. 1, 2 p.m. ET. Come shmooze in Yiddish with people all over the world at the shmueskrayz hosted by the Parizer yidish-tsenter. The atmosphere is friendly and relaxed. Feel free to sip coffee or a glass of wine. No registration necessary. Zoom link here
Thursday, Nov. 5, 7 p.m. ET. In this Zoom event, we’ll hear an English translation of detailed Yiddish letters written by Shlomo Vorobeichic, a Jewish man in Vilna before the war, to his siblings who had settled in the U.S. Although Shlomo, his wife and two children perished in the Holocaust, two children survived and kept the letters. One of them, Moi Ver, became a well-regarded photographer. In the 1990s, Moi Ver’s daughter Lilian Falk translated her grandfather’s letters into English, giving us a vivid view of Vilna in the early 20th century. Register.
Friday and Saturday, Nov. 6-7. Stockholm khevre: Attend a Yiddish film festival that includes contemporary Yiddish works like the 2026 film Moishe Badkhn (Moishe the Wedding Entertainer); Welcome to Yiddishland (2024), and the Yiddish-Ukrainian film SHTTL (2023). All films are subtitled in English. Tickets.
Sunday, Nov. 8, 3 p.m. ET. Folks in the DC/Maryland/Northern Virginia area: Join the DMV Jewish Labor Bund for a bimonthly Yiddish song circle at Maryland Meadworks. All levels of Yiddish and singing ability are welcome.
Tuesday, Nov. 10, 3 p.m. ET. Toronto folks: Yiddish studies scholar Sonia Gollance will discuss and read excerpts of Tea Arciszewska’s Yiddish play Miryeml, which Gollance translated as part of her project to uncover Yiddish plays by women. The play is often described as a powerful memorial to the 1.5 million children murdered in the Holocaust. The in-person lecture will take place at the University of Toronto and will be in Yiddish. More info.
Wednesday, Nov. 11, 7 p.m. ET. Attend an in-person staged reading of Sh. An-ski’s legendary folk drama, The Dybbuk, directed by Mikhl Yashinsky. The play, originally written in Russian between 1913 and 1916, was translated into Yiddish by An-ski himself and inspired countless film, opera, and ballet adaptations. Register.
Thursday, Nov. 19, 7 p.m. ET. Learn what makes Quebec an essential place on the world map of Yiddish culture historically and today in this Zoom talk between the Yiddish Book Center’s director of special projects, Sebastian Schulman, and Brian Calvert from Jewish Heritage Travel. The discussion will feature a sneak peek at the Center’s upcoming group tour to Montreal and Quebec City. The trip is a unique chance to experience Yiddish-Quebecois culture—its history, art, music, cuisine—as well as Montreal and Quebec City as historic and contemporary centers of Jewish life and creativity. Register.
The post Looking for a Yiddish-related event? appeared first on The Forward.
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These rivals in a close House race agree on Israel. They’re fighting over who Jewish voters can trust.
Israel and antisemitism have emerged as central issues in several closely watched midterm races. But in New York’s 17th Congressional District, where Jewish voters could help decide one of the country’s most competitive House contests, the two candidates have more in common on those issues than their campaigns suggest.
Cait Conley, the Democratic challenger to incumbent Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Lawler, is not a progressive Democrat who Republicans have been warning Jewish voters about in recent campaigns. An Army combat veteran and former national security official, she strongly supports Israel, opposes additional conditions on U.S. military aid and rejects accusations that Israel committed genocide in Gaza. She has also criticized New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani over his statement marking the third anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attack and has vowed to confront antisemitism within her own party. But that may not be enough to win Jewish votes from Lawler, who is popular with Jewish voters.
The district includes Rockland and Putnam counties and parts of Westchester and Dutchess. It has one of the largest Jewish populations in the country, with Jews making up an estimated 19% of its population, according to a 2024 study. It is one of the key House races where Jewish voters could make the difference in a closely contested election that will determine which party controls Congress.
Kamala Harris carried the district by a narrow 50-49 margin in 2024, and it voted for Joe Biden by a 59-39 margin before that. The late Jewish congresswoman Nita Lowey, a Democrat, represented the district for three decades until her retirement in 2020. Her successor, former Rep. Mondaire Jones, chose not to run in the redrawn district in 2022 and instead lost a bid for a House seat representing parts of Manhattan and Brooklyn. During his unsuccessful 2024 campaign against Lawler, Jones had to delete a social media post that some deemed insulting to Orthodox Jews after he remarked that the former Republican House Speaker’s meeting with Rabbi David Twersky, the 86-year-old spiritual leader known as the Skverer Rebbe in Rockland County, “was a waste of everyone’s time.”
Conley, 31, faces a difficult challenge in her bid to unseat Lawler, who has deep relationships with Orthodox and Hasidic voters since he first won his seat in the 2022 midterms by a narrow margin of about 2,000 votes, thanks in part to strong support from the large Hasidic communities in Monsey, New Square and New Hempstead in Rockland County.
That makes the race a test of whether a moderate, pro-Israel Democrat can win back Jewish voters who have grown concerned about the growing influence of progressives within the Democratic Party.
In separate interviews with the Forward, Conley and Lawler both stressed their support for Israel and commitment to fighting rising antisemitism. To draw a contrast, Lawler, 40, questioned whether Conley would stick to her positions if elected, while Conley accused him of using his ties to Jewish voters to distract from his support for President Donald Trump’s agenda.
A Democrat who rejects conditions on Israel aid
Conley, a West Point graduate and 16-year Army combat veteran who later served as counterterrorism director on President Joe Biden’s National Security Council and oversaw election security efforts at the Department of Homeland Security, occupies a different position on Israel than many progressive Democrats.
She supports Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish and democratic state, backs continued U.S. military assistance and opposes imposing conditions on that aid, including on offensive weapons.
“I do not believe that what is going on in Gaza is a genocide, and I do not believe in further conditioning assistance to Israel, so it continues to have the means to defend itself against the very real threats that are posed,” Conley said in an interview. “I will be an effective and strong advocate for the Jewish community and assistance to Israel in the Democratic Party.”
Conley said her experience serving in the Middle East shaped her understanding of the threats Israel faces, particularly from Iran and terrorist organizations.
At the same time, she supports a two-state solution and believes American politicians should be able to criticize Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or other Israeli leaders without questioning Israel’s legitimacy. She expressed concern, though, that criticism of Israeli government policies can sometimes become an excuse for targeting Jews. Conley also supports expanding federal security grants for synagogues and other religious institutions.
Conley said she supported the targeted American strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities in 2025, but opposes Trump’s war with Iran because she believes it has made the United States less secure and increased energy prices.
Lawler isn’t buying Conley’s pro-Israel pitch
Lawler dismissed the suggestion that he and Conley hold essentially the same positions on Israel and antisemitism.
“That’s laughable on its face,” he said in an interview.
His central argument is that Conley may sound like a moderate on the campaign trail but would ultimately follow Democratic leaders in Congress, as support for Israel becomes increasingly divisive within the party.
“She’ll be a rubber stamp on whatever the majority of the Democrats want to do,” Lawler said, citing the July vote to eliminate the $3.3 billion in annual military assistance to Israel. A record 103 of 212 Democrats supported the measure. Another 10 Democrats abstained. Conley “is not going to stand up and be a lone voice on these issues,” he said.
“At the end of the day,” Lawler added, “I have a very clear record of delivering on these issues, and there’s staunch differences in approach.”
A Republican who speaks the community’s language
Lawler’s relationship with Orthodox and Hasidic voters goes beyond his positions on Israel. A practicing Catholic, Lawler has made those relationships part of his political brand, going back to his election to the State Assembly in 2020. He has taken credit for lowering the temperature in Rockland County after local GOP officials in 2019 posted a video widely criticized as antisemitic. He regularly attends community celebrations and has helped arrange meetings between local rabbis and religious leaders, President Donald Trump and Republican leadership.
Earlier this year, William Paul, the son of Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, confronted him in a Washington bar, believing the New York congressman was Jewish. Paul later apologized and said he has a drinking problem for which he is seeking treatment.
His presence in the community has become so familiar that his campaign even has Yiddish materials and songs promoting his reelection. The songs are shared in popular WhatsApp groups, played at weddings and blasted from trucks driving through Hasidic neighborhoods to encourage people to vote.
Lawler’s campaign is aiming to surpass the 22,000 votes he received in Hasidic neighborhoods in 2022 and 26,000 votes in 2024, as polls show the race is a dead heat. In an interview with Punchbowl News, he predicted 30,000 Orthodox votes, arguing that the community’s participation is difficult for pollsters to capture.
In his interview with the Forward, Lawler said his popularity comes from a simple strategy: showing up.
“I am really the first elected official that has shown up, you know, consistently and publicly in this community, and not just to see the leadership of the community, but to meet the people,” he said. Lawler has even picked up some Yiddish vocabulary along the way. Asked what word he had learned, Lawler quipped, “I love the word shanda to describe Chuck Schumer,” using a Yiddish term for disgrace about the Senate Democratic leader, who is Jewish.
Lawler believes his efforts have helped build support beyond the Orthodox and Hasidic communities, including among Reform and secular Jews who might otherwise vote Democratic but are concerned about their party’s direction on Israel. “Democrats have effectively abandoned Jewish Americans,” he said.
Conley acknowledged Lawler’s visibility in the community but questioned whether it is matched with policies that benefit Jewish families. “Mike Lawler shows up for the photo op, but when it comes to acting, he turns his back on the community every time,” she said. Conley pointed particularly to his support for Republican-led legislation cutting Medicaid spending and other federal benefits.
A fight over antisemitism in politics
Conley said her own outreach has focused on convincing Jewish voters that she understands their security concerns and shares their commitment to Israel, even as she disagrees with Lawler on domestic policy.
She also spoke of a personal connection to the Jewish community as a member of the LGBTQ community, recalling how Jewish Americans stood up for LGBTQ rights. “That’s why I proudly stand beside them and let them know that there are people who deeply care and will proudly stand shoulder to shoulder with them and fight back against antisemitism,” she said.
As Lawler highlights his ties to Jewish voters and questions whether Conley would stand up to anti-Israel voices in the Democratic Party, Conley accuses him of associating with Republicans who have faced accusations of antisemitic rhetoric and ties to white nationalists.
She said Lawler had a double standard: condemning antisemitism among Democrats while supporting Republicans who have faced accusations of antisemitic rhetoric or associations with white nationalists. “He is the biggest hypocrite,” she said of Lawler. “He is a political operative who will do whatever is politically convenient for his political ambition.”
Conley cited, for example, Peter Oberacker, a Republican state legislator running against Democratic Rep. Josh Riley in the neighboring 19th District, who came under fire after a Facebook post from Veterans Day 2015 resurfaced in which he paid tribute to his grandfather who served in the Nazi-German military during World War II. Lawler attended Oberacker’s campaign launch last year and praised him. Lawler also contributed $5,000 to his campaign.
Conley described Oberacker as an “overt Nazi sympathizer” and said Lawler’s support for him undermined his claim to be a defender of Jewish Americans. Conley also pointed to Lawler’s past connections with members of the New York State Young Republicans, whose group was disbanded following a Politico investigation exposing racist and antisemitic messages. Lawler condemned it and called for those involved to resign from leadership positions.
Asked directly about the criticism, Lawler defended Oberacker. “He’s not an antisemite,” Lawler said, adding that Oberacker represents Jewish constituents in the state Senate. He dismissed Conley’s accusations as an attempt to distract from her own political alliances. “I think Cait is grasping at straws,” he said.
Lawler pointed to Conley’s decision to run on the Working Families Party ballot line, a progressive party that endorsed Mamdani in last year’s mayoral primary and has accused Israel of genocide. He also noted her remarks in a September interview, when she said that she “respects” what Mamdani represents to many New Yorkers. “I don’t respect antisemites,” Lawler said.
Lawler was the lead sponsor of the bipartisan Antisemitism Awareness Act that would require the Department of Education to use the controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism — which classifies most anti-Zionism as antisemitic — when investigating allegations of discrimination. It passed in the House in 2024 by an overwhelming majority of 320-91, but was stalled in the Senate due to resistance over constitutionally protected free speech. It was reintroduced in the House last year.
More recently, Lawler partnered with Rep. Josh Gottheimer, a Jewish moderate Democrat from New Jersey, on a bipartisan House resolution condemning antisemitic rhetoric from online personalities including Hasan Piker and Candace Owens.
Conley said she recognizes the rise of “extremism and antisemitism in both parties” and has heard from Jewish voters who feel abandoned by some of the same political allies they once supported. By speaking out on these issues and committing to confront them within her own party, Conley is aiming to convince these voters that they do not have to support a Republican to feel protected.
“The Jewish community knows they have a home in the Democratic Party. Period,” she said.
The post These rivals in a close House race agree on Israel. They’re fighting over who Jewish voters can trust. appeared first on The Forward.
