Uncategorized
Ben Helfgott, one of two Holocaust survivors to compete in the Olympics, dies at 93
(JTA) — Ben Helfgott, one of two known Holocaust survivors to go on to compete in the Olympics, died Friday at 93.
Helfgott survived the Holocaust as a teenager, and he went on to become a champion weightlifter and a champion of Holocaust education. He was knighted in 2018.
“Sir Ben Helfgott was one of the most inspirational people I have known,” said Britain’s Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, according to London’s Jewish News. “He was a charismatic and passionate leader, who promoted the values of compassion, understanding, love and peaceful coexistence. His own horrific experiences inspired him to work tirelessly for a more peaceful and unified world and he inspired us to do likewise.”
Helfgott was born in Piotrkow, Poland, in 1929. He once said his parents were troubled about their future as Jews in Poland, and in 1935 his family had secured paperwork to leave for then-Palestine. But his grandmother did not want to leave, so they stayed.
The Nazis invaded Poland in 1939, when Helfgott was 10. His family was forced into a ghetto, the Nazis’ first in Europe. Helfgott’s father led efforts to smuggle food into the ghetto, while Helfgott himself took advantage of his blond hair by spending time outside the ghetto — without his Star of David armband.
Helfgott would spend three years in the ghetto before he and his father were sent to the Buchenwald concentration camp. Other members of his family were deported to Ravensbrück.
Helfgott would ultimately be separated from his father, who he later learned was killed attempting to escape a death march. Helfgott was sent to the concentration camp in Schlieben and later Theresienstadt, which was liberated three weeks later. At 15, Helfgott was alive and an orphan.
That’s when he jumped at an opportunity to go to England, where he would be reunited with his sister. That’s also where Helfgott would discover weightlifting.
The 5-foot-5 Helfgott would go on to become Britain’s lightweight champion in 1955, 1956 and 1958. He represented the United Kingdom in the 1956 and 1960 Olympics, and he won gold medals at the Maccabiah Games in 1950, 1953 and 1957. He was inducted into the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 1995.
Despite his athletic achievements, Helfgott’s greatest passion was his work supporting fellow survivors. He served as chairman of ‘45 Aid Society, an organization created by and for the young survivors — often called “the boys” — who in 1945 arrived in England, 732 children in all.
“Ben was one of the greatest ambassadors for the Boys and, indeed, for all Holocaust survivors,” read a statement from the organization.
—
The post Ben Helfgott, one of two Holocaust survivors to compete in the Olympics, dies at 93 appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Uncategorized
Police denied Jewish community’s request for more security before Sydney massacre, commission finds
(JTA) — Days before a massacre on a Hanukkah event at Bondi Beach, Sydney, the region’s Jewish security organization asked the police to send officers to Hanukkah events in the city.
The organization, the Community Security Group, had already worked with Chabad of Bondi to create a security plan for the event that included fencing off an area that normally had no barriers.
Now, in the message to police, the group emphasized that Jews in Sydney were facing unusual danger. The threat level, it wrote, was “HIGH. A terrorist attack against the NSW Jewish Community is likely and there is a high level of antisemitic vilification.”
The police responded by saying that they could not devote additional officers to the events but would send patrols by. Three days later, 15 people, including rabbis and a child, were killed when two men opened fire on the event, known as Chanukah by the Sea.
The sequence of events appears in the first report issued by Australia’s Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion, formed in the wake of the massacre amid pressure on the government to do more to keep Australian Jews safe.
The report, issued Thursday, contains 14 recommendations, some of which were obscured from public view for security reasons. They include elevating and strengthening counter-terrorism policing and improving policing of Jewish events.
The top recommendation: “The procedures adopted by NSW Police in respect of Operation Jewish High Holy Days should apply to other high risk Jewish festivals and events, particularly those that have a public facing element.”
The Australian Jewish Association welcomed the report’s release but said it was marred by failing to address the form of antisemitic extremism said to have motivated the Bondi Beach shooters.
“The report’s credibility is undermined by its failure to address the issue of radical Islamist extremism. No serious analysis of the lead-up to the Bondi massacre can ignore this,” it said in a statement. “It’s concerning that the report identifies no urgent legislative changes required. There were serious failings by multiple agencies. If the legislation is adequate, then these failings are inexplicable.”
In particular, the group said, the commission should explore the fact that gun-control laws bar private security from being armed in Sydney, adding, “Whether different security settings could have changed the outcome is a matter that warrants urgent examination.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Police denied Jewish community’s request for more security before Sydney massacre, commission finds appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
Jewish man arrested for allegedly firing pellet gun at left-wing activists in Rome
(JTA) — Italian Jewish leaders are condemning the alleged acts of Jewish man who was arrested this week after police said he fired a pellet gun at participants in a parade marking Italy’s Liberation Day from Nazism and fascism.
Eitan Bondì, 21, was charged with attempted homicide in connection to the shooting of Rossana Gabrieli and Nicola Fasciano, two members of the National Association for Italian Partisans, a group founded by members of the Italian resistance, during the Rome parade.
Neither victim was seriously injured by the attack, according to Italian media.
Bondi’s arrest marks the second instance of confrontations involving Jews during Liberation Day festivities this year. In Milan, pro-Palestinian activists, including members of ANPI, blocked participants honoring the Jewish Brigade, a Jewish military unit that fought the Nazis in Italy during World War II.
Bondi said he was affiliated with the Jewish Brigade. Davide Romano, the director of the Jewish Brigade Museum in Milan, wrote in a post on X that the organization did not know Bondì, and that he felt “horror and condemn in the most resolute manner, and without any justification, anyone who dares to use the name of the Jewish Brigade to carry out acts of violence.”
“The Jewish Brigade fought for freedom and human dignity. Instrumentalizing its name to justify or cover up violent behavior is an outrage to its memory and to all those who sacrificed themselves under that flag,” Romano wrote, adding that the organization reserved the right to “pursue legal action against all those who use the name of the Jewish Brigade to associate it with this shameful act.”
Victor Fadlun, the president of the Jewish Community of Rome, condemned Bondì’s alleged acts in a statement, saying that his detention “fills us with dismay and outrage” and voicing his organization’s “full solidarity and closeness” to the victims.
“The Jewish Community of Rome condemns and dissociates itself unreservedly from any form of anti-democratic violence,” Fadlun said, according to the Italian news agency Ansa. “In such a tense moment … we appeal to political and civil society to avoid any exploitation (of the case) that could fuel hatred and generate new violence.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Jewish man arrested for allegedly firing pellet gun at left-wing activists in Rome appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
British police pledge 25M pounds for Jewish security in wake of London stabbing
(JTA) — British police have allocated 25 million pounds, or about $33 million, in new funding to keep Jewish communities safe, officials announced on Thursday.
The announcement came a day after a stabbing in the Orthodox neighborhood of Golders Green left two men injured and a community reeling. The stabbing has been ruled a terrorist attack.
“There’s no getting away from the fact that this was not a one-off,” Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who visited the neighborhood on Thursday, said during a press conference. “This has been a series of attacks on our Jewish community, particularly in recent weeks, and there is a very deep sense of anxiety, of concern about security, about safety, about identity frankly.”
A new group called Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiya, or the Islamic Movement of the People of the Right Hand, that has claimed attacks on Jewish targets across Europe said it was responsible for the stabbing. British officials said they were investigating that claim.
They disclosed that the 45-year-old man arrested in the stabbing, who was first subdued by Jewish security forces, was a British national who had come to the country “lawfully” from Somalia as a child.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, who joined Starmer in Golders Green, told the BBC that she was treating the spree of antisemitic incidents as “absolutely an emergency,” though she declined to adopt language used by Starmer’s terrorism advisor that there was a “national security emergency” because of its implications on civil liberties.
Still, she said, she believed that frequent pro-Palestinian protests in London contained “far too many instances” of hate crimes and she spoke of her opposition to antisemitism in terms of her own religious identity.
“When I take the stand that I am taking against antisemitism, I am doing so as a practicing Muslim. It is absolutely in line with my faith,” Mahmood said. She added about British Jews: “This land is their land. It is my land too. We share this land and we must all work together to keep each other safe.”
The incident, which followed arsons at synagogues and of ambulances owned by a Jewish emergency service as well as a deadly attack on a Manchester synagogue last year, has prompted an escalation of fear among British Jews. Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis warned that visibly Jewish people — those wearing symbols of their Jewish identity — were “not always safe” in England.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post British police pledge 25M pounds for Jewish security in wake of London stabbing appeared first on The Forward.