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Grigory Kanovich, award-winning author who chronicled Lithuanian Jewry, dies at 93
(JTA) — Grigory Kanovich, a Lithuanian-born Jew and award winning author who endeavored to tell the story of his people despite Soviet pressure, died on Friday at 93 in his home in Tel Aviv.
Kanovich’s repertoire includes more than 30 plays and screenplays, a dozen novels and several collections of poems and short stories, almost all of which are devoted to stories of Lithuanian Jews.
Kanovich was born in 1929 in the shtetl of Janova, an almost entirely Jewish village just north of Kaunas, which was the capital of independent Lithuania in the interwar period. In his youth, the city was home to over 3,000 Jews, 80% of its population. There were hundreds of Jewish-owned shops, a Jewish bank and several synagogues and Jewish schools. Over 2,100 of Janova’s Jews were murdered in a series of massacres in the summer of 1941.
Karnovich’s family were among the lucky ones and escaped during the brief period of Soviet Occupation in between the Russian-German non-aggression pact in 1939 and Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941. The family went east through Latvia and deeper into Soviet-controlled Central Asia, where they rode out the war.
When the war ended, Kanovich returned to the region of his youth to study at the University of Vilnius, but the world he knew there was forever gone. From as early as 1949, he began to put his thoughts about that loss down onto paper, both eulogizing the world of Lithuania Jewry and documenting the new Soviet Jewish reality.
Though he wrote largely in Russian, his works weaved the Talmudic thought of Lithuania’s yeshivas with the Yiddish wit that remained a part of Soviet comedy long after the Holocaust.
“Kanovich wrote about the fate of the Jewish people, about their relationship with Lithuanian and Russian culture. At the center of his works is the ‘little man,’ who stubbornly opposes evil and for the author embodies a person in general,” Wolfgang Kazak, a German Slavicist, once said of Kanovich’s work.
Kanovich’s first trilogy of novels, written between 1974 and 1979, and based on short stories he wrote in 1959 and 1967, was written through the eyes of a young yeshiva student navigating the Holocaust.
“Kanovich wrote about tragedy, but about the tragedy of people who, even in the face of inevitable death, did not lose either their dignity or a sense of belonging to their people and their civilization,” wrote Vitaly Portnikov, a Ukrainian journalist and editor, in a tribute for Radio Svoboda, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Russian service. “He took us back to biblical times, to the times of parables and prophets. We, his readers, felt human, we felt strong. We felt like we were in flight,”
The themes of Kanovich’s work, such as nostalgia for a past steeped in religiosity and struggle against assimilation, limited the reach of his work in the Soviet Union; it was only permitted to be published within the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic, where he lived. Still, it became beloved by Jews throughout the Soviet Union. After the fall of the Iron Curtain, Kanovich was briefly elected president of the Jewish community in newly-independent Lithuania, but like so many other Eastern European Jews, he chose to immigrate to Israel in the 1990s. There he kept writing, continuing to tell the story of the Lithuanian shtetl, with work being published as recently as 2019.
“He was a stranger to Russian writers because he wrote about Jews. And he was a stranger to Jewish writers, because he wrote about those Jews whom Soviet literature did not want to know and notice – about the Jews of the Book and deed, about Jews who not only were not ashamed of their origin, but also did not consider themselves ‘little brothers,’ did not want to please the ‘big brother,’ tell him stupid jokes and share cooking recipes,” Portnikov wrote.
After the fall of the Soviet Union, Kanovich was a recipient of the Israel Writers Union Prize and the Commander’s Cross of the Order of the Grand Duke of Lithuania Gediminas — one of Lithuania’s highest honors — and was named the Laureate of the Prize of the Government of Lithuania in the field of culture and art. He is survived by his two sons and wife Olga.
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Pezeshkian Says Iran Will Not Bow to Pressure Amid US Nuclear Talks
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian attends the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit 2025, in Tianjin, China, September 1, 2025. Iran’s Presidential website/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Saturday that his country would not bow its head to pressure from world powers amid nuclear talks with the United States.
“World powers are lining up to force us to bow our heads… but we will not bow our heads despite all the problems that they are creating for us,” Pezeshkian said in a speech carried live by state TV.
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Italy’s RAI Apologizes after Latest Gaffe Targets Israeli Bobsleigh Team
Milano Cortina 2026 Olympics – Bobsleigh – 4-man Heat 1 – Cortina Sliding Centre, Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy – February 21, 2026. Adam Edelman of Israel, Menachem Chen of Israel, Uri Zisman of Israel, Omer Katz of Israel in action during Heat 1. Photo: REUTERS/Athit Perawongmetha
Italy’s state broadcaster RAI was forced to apologize to the Jewish community on Saturday after an off‑air remark advising its producers to “avoid” the Israeli crew was broadcast before coverage of the Four-Man bobsleigh event at the Winter Olympics.
The head of RAI’s sports division had already resigned earlier in the week after his error-ridden commentary at the Milano Cortina 2026 opening ceremony two weeks ago triggered a revolt among its journalists.
On Saturday, viewers heard “Let’s avoid crew number 21, which is the Israeli one” and then “no, because …” before the sound was cut off.
RAI CEO Giampaolo Rossi said the incident represented a “serious” breach of the principles of impartiality, respect and inclusion that should guide the public broadcaster.
He added that RAI had opened an internal inquiry to swiftly determine any responsibility and any potential disciplinary procedures.
In a separate statement RAI’s board of directors condemned the remark as “unacceptable.”
The board apologized to the Jewish community, the athletes involved and all viewers who felt offended.
RAI is the country’s largest media organization and operates national television, radio and digital news services.
The union representing RAI journalists, Usigrai, had said Paolo Petrecca’s opening ceremony commentary had dealt “a serious blow” to the company’s credibility.
His missteps included misidentifying venues and public figures, and making comments about national teams that were widely criticized.
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Iran Prepares Counterproposal as Trump Weighs Strikes
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks with members of the media on board Air Force One en route to Palm Beach, Florida, U.S., January 31, 2026. REUTERS/Nathan Howard
Iran’s foreign minister said on Friday he expected to have a draft counterproposal ready within days following nuclear talks with the United States this week, while US President Donald Trump said he was considering limited military strikes.
Two US officials told Reuters that US military planning on Iran had reached an advanced stage, with options including targeting individuals as part of an attack and even pursuing leadership change in Tehran, if ordered by Trump.
Trump on Thursday gave Tehran a deadline of 10 to 15 days to make a deal to resolve their longstanding nuclear dispute or face “really bad things” amid a US military buildup in the Middle East that has fueled fears of a wider war.
THREATS OF ATTACK FOLLOW CRACKDOWN ON MASS PROTESTS
Asked on Friday if he was considering a limited strike to pressure Iran into a deal, Trump told reporters at the White House: “I guess I can say I am considering” it. Asked later about Iran at a White House press conference, Trump added: “They better negotiate a fair deal.”
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said after indirect discussions in Geneva this week with Trump’s Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner that the sides had reached an understanding on main “guiding principles,” but that did not mean a deal was imminent.
Araqchi, in an interview on MS NOW, said he had a draft counterproposal that could be ready in the next two or three days for top Iranian officials to review, with more U.S.-Iran talks possible in a week or so.
Military action would complicate efforts to reach a deal, he added.
After the US and Israel bombed Iran’s nuclear facilities and some military sites in June, Trump again began threatening strikes in January as Tehran crushed widespread protests with deadly force.
Referring to the crackdown on Friday, Trump said there was a difference between the people of Iran and the country’s leadership. He asserted that “32,000 people were killed over a relatively short period of time,” figures that could not immediately be verified.
“It’s a very, very, very sad situation,” Trump said, adding that his threats to strike Iran had led the leadership to abandon plans for mass hangings two weeks ago.
“They were going to hang 837 people. And I gave them the word, if you hang one person, even one person, that you’re going to be hit right then and there,” he said.
The US-based group HRANA, which monitors the human rights situation in Iran, has recorded 7,114 verified deaths and says it has another 11,700 under review.
Hours after Trump’s statements on the death toll, Araqchi said that the Iranian government has already published a “comprehensive list” of all 3,117 killed in the unrest.
“If anyone doubts the accuracy of our data, please speak with evidence,” he posted on X.
ARAQCHI SAYS DEAL POSSIBLE IN ‘VERY SHORT PERIOD’
Araqchi gave no specific timing as to when Iranians would get their counterproposal to Witkoff and Kushner, but said he believed a diplomatic deal was within reach and could be achieved “in a very short period of time.”
United Nations spokesperson Stephane Dujarric reiterated concerns about heightened rhetoric and increased military activities in the region.
“We encourage both the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran to continue to engage in diplomacy in order to settle the differences,” Dujarric told a regular news briefing at the U.N.
During the Geneva talks, the United States did not seek zero uranium enrichment and Iran did not offer to suspend enrichment, Araqchi told MS NOW, a US cable television news network.
“What we are now talking about is how to make sure that Iran’s nuclear program, including enrichment, is peaceful and would remain peaceful forever,” he said.
He added that technical and political “confidence-building measures” would be enacted to ensure the program would remain peaceful in exchange for action on sanctions, but he gave no further details.
“The president has been clear that Iran cannot have nuclear weapons or the capacity to build them, and that they cannot enrich uranium,” the White House said when asked about Araqchi’s comments.