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Hannah Senesh’s example of Jewish pride and sacrifice gains renewed attention in our anxious era
More than 80 years after she parachuted into Yugoslavia as part of the only military operation in World War II that attempted to rescue Jews, the Jewish poet and kibbutznik Hannah Senesh is having her moment.
The play “Hannah Senesh” is running through Nov. 9 at the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene in New York — an excellent one-woman show, starring Jennifer Apple, that draws directly from Senesh’s diary and poems.
A new book by Douglas Century, “Crash of the Heavens: The Remarkable Story of Hannah Senesh and the Only Military Mission to Rescue Europe’s Jews During World War II,” is a work of nonfiction written with the pacing and tension of a thriller.
Early next year, the noted Israeli journalist Matti Friedman will tell the story of Hannah’s team of parachutists in “Out of The Sky: Heroism and Rebirth in Nazi Europe.”
And this week the New York Times gave Senesh the obituary treatment she had been denied in 1944, as part of its “Overlooked No More” project.
Why, in 2025, is the culture turning its attention to the story of this young poet, soldier and martyr? What does her life mean, especially, to Jews?
Hannah Senesh was born in Budapest in 1921 to an assimilated Hungarian Jewish family. Her father, Béla Szenes, was a well-known playwright and journalist who died when she was a child, and her mother, Katharine, raised her and her brother alone. Their home was cultured and secular.
As a schoolgirl, Hannah excelled in writing and was drawn to literature, but by her teenage years, antisemitism had begun to close in on Hungarian Jews. Rather than retreat, she grew more conscious of her Jewish identity and of the new Zionist movement that sought to combine Jewish pride with action.
In 1939, as the clouds of war gathered, Senesh left Budapest for Palestine. She studied at the Nahalal agricultural school for girls and later joined Kibbutz Sdot Yam near Caesarea, embracing the pioneer life. In the kibbutz she found a community rooted in the land and faith in the future of the Jewish people. There she also honed her poetic voice, writing verses that would later become part of Jewish collective memory.
I, along with countless young people, grew up singing her most famous poem in Jewish summer camps. That is “Eli, Eli” — “My God, my God, may these things never end: the sand and the sea, the rustle of the waters, the lightning of the heavens, the prayer of man.” The poem’s original title is “Walking to Caesarea,” which is where Hannah wrote it. Caesearea, the Roman capital of ancient Palestine, was where the sages suffered martyrdom. The reference to the site suggests Hannah could sense the possibility of her own martyrdom.
So does “Blessed Is the Match,” another of her best-known poems: “Blessed is the match consumed in kindling flame, blessed is the flame that burns in the secret fastness of the heart.”
As the Holocaust unfolded, Senesh could not remain on the sidelines. She volunteered for a special British unit to train Jewish parachutists who would drop behind enemy lines to aid Allied forces and assist persecuted Jews.
Hannah Senesh wears the uniform of the British Women’s Auxiliary Air Force, which she joined in 1943. (Yad Vashem Photo Archive)
In 1944, she parachuted into Yugoslavia as part of an Allied mission to reach occupied Hungary. Her goal was to make contact with the underground and help rescue Jews who were being deported to Auschwitz. After months of operating with Yugoslav partisans, she attempted to cross the Hungarian border but was captured by fascist forces. Tortured, interrogated and offered the chance to save her life by revealing secret details of her mission, she refused. When asked if she was British, she reportedly declared instead, “I am a Jew.”
Senesh was imprisoned in Budapest, tried for treason and executed by firing squad on Nov. 7, 1944. She was only 23. Her writings — diaries, poems, and letters — were preserved by her mother and later published, ensuring that her voice lived on. Nearly every Israeli household has a copy of her writings.
Like Anne Frank, Hannah left behind a diary chronicling her idealism and inner life. But where Anne Frank’s writings reflect a confined adolescence, albeit with a free-floating spirit, Hannah Senesh’s life was defined by agency and action.
She was not only a poet and diarist; she was a soldier who took up arms against the Nazi war machine. Her vision of heroism fused cultural Zionism with physical courage — a model of Jewish strength that is both intellectual and militant. She was, in many ways, a figure closer to Theodor Herzl than to Anne Frank: a Hungarian Jew whose secular upbringing gave way to a conscious and proud Jewish identity, and whose life was devoted to the realization of that identity in the land of Israel.
Like me, Douglas Century grew up learning Hannah’s story. In my conversation with him, he told me that “her martyrdom amazed and terrified” him. He came to know David Senesh, Hannah’s nephew, who is a therapist specializing in trauma (and who this month spoke to the Times of Israel about how his aunt’s story influenced his life and his work with former hostages and other traumatized Israelis). David had been a prisoner of war in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, and spent months undergoing torture. David’s father, George, had been in a POW camp in Vichy France, and his grandmother, Catherine, had been a prisoner of the Gestapo
As David wryly told Century: “I sometimes think it’s our destiny – or something in the Senesh family DNA.”
These converging story lines of Jewish agency and sacrifice suggest why Hannah’s story may be right for these fraught times, marked by antisemitism, anti-Zionism and moral confusion.
The Folksbiene production of Hannah Senesh and the books by Century and Friedman arrive at a time when Jews feel pressure to minimize or conceal their identity. The play’s climactic moment — when Senesh asserts her Jewishness to her captors — feels like a direct message to today’s audience: a call not to erase or apologize for who we are. It is both a historical reenactment and a moral demand.
To that end, the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene has launched a special fundraising initiative to make tickets for “Hannah Senesh” available free of charge for students — both Jewish and non-Jewish. With incidents of antisemitism, intolerance and hatred taking place at an alarming clip in the city, NYTF is committed to providing up to 1,000 free student tickets.
There is also a deep cultural hunger for stories of heroism and moral clarity. Senesh’s story even appears in the late Sen. John McCain’s memoir, “Why Courage Matters”: “I don’t think Hannah wanted to die for the sake of having her memory exalted in history or to prove herself equal to a romantic image she conceived for herself,” writes McCain. “Her purpose wasn’t to die. She died for her life’s purpose.”
Senesh’s story is also a rebuke to the way too many Jews and others remember the Holocaust. For decades, much of Holocaust representation has focused on Jewish victimhood and suffering. Senesh represents something different: defiance, action and dignity. Her story restores a narrative of Jewish power and resistance, embodied not by generals or politicians but by a 23-year-old woman who refused to compromise her Jewish identity. In an age when many feel ambivalent about that identity — when assimilation, fear, or politicized hostility challenge Jewish expression — her unwavering sense of purpose feels radical and necessary.
At a time when “Zionist” and its hateful cousin “Zio” are epithets, more often spat than spoken, the musical, in particular, reclaims that identity as a badge of courage. Moreover, it locates a Zionist identity where it belongs — as a symbol of idealism and resilience. In the show, Hannah makes it clear: Her Zionism echoes that of the philosopher Martin Buber, who believed that both Jews and Arabs could and would share the land.
Every time I lead services from the Reform prayer book, “Mishkan T’filah,” and I come to the readings before the Mourner’s Kaddish, I encounter Hannah’s poem, “Yesh Kochavim”: “There are stars up above, so far away we only see their light long, long after the star itself is gone.” That is Hannah Senesh — a star that fell to earth long before its time, but whose light still illuminates the world.
This is Hannah Senesh’s moment. It comes at a time that calls for models of Jewish strength, compassion and integrity. The play and Century’s book answer that call — not with nostalgia but with renewal. They remind us that, even when surrounded by darkness, the match still burns, and the stars still shine.
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The post Hannah Senesh’s example of Jewish pride and sacrifice gains renewed attention in our anxious era appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Michigan Democrats await Senate winner in party’s biggest test yet on Israel
The Democratic primary for the open Senate seat in Michigan appeared too close to call Tuesday night, with Dr. Abdul El-Sayed and Rep. Haley Stevens locked in a tight race that had become a proxy fight over the Gaza war and a referendum on Israel supporters’ influence in Democratic politics.
According to unofficial results, El-Sayed, a physician and the son of Egyptian immigrants, held a narrow lead over opponent Rep. Haley Stevens, the establishment favorite — 49.9% vs. 46.3% — with 65% of the vote counted for the seat being vacated by Sen. Gary Peters.
The Michigan contest is AIPAC’s largest investment this election cycle. Its super PAC, United Democracy Project, spent more than $30 million on ads attacking El-Sayed and promoting Stevens, according to recent FEC filings. AIPAC also raised several million dollars for Stevens’ own campaign through its donors’ portal.
If El-Sayed prevails, it would deliver a blow to the establishment and to the U.S.-Israel fundraising group, AIPAC, its biggest setback since it started its direct political spending in 2021 and after years of helping defeat progressive critics of Israel who challenged congressional incumbents. The brand has become increasingly controversial among Democratic voters in the wake of the Gaza war. Congressional candidates, including some Jewish Democrats, have promised not to take contributions from AIPAC.
Supporters of El-Sayed remained optimistic that the candidate’s upset victory would be proof positive that the future of the Democratic Party lies in candidates who support cutting off U.S. aid to Israel and characterize Israel’s conduct in Gaza as genocide.
Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, the progressive insurgent’s most prominent backer, said on CNN the race reflected a broader shift in Democratic politics. “What we are seeing, no matter what happens tonight in Michigan — and I hope very much that El-Sayed wins — is: you’re seeing the transformation of the Democratic Party, and what the debate within the Democratic Party is about,” he said. Sanders added that the campaign showed that progressive candidates are challenging the party establishment not only on ideology, but also on how campaigns are run.
Winning the primary may be the easier test. Michigan remains one of the nation’s top battleground states, and a close finish would suggest ongoing divisions within the Democratic coalition. El-Sayed will have to carry moderate Democrats who backed Stevens, while taking on former Republican Rep. Mike Rogers in a race that could help determine control of the Senate. Recent polls found Rogers leading El-Sayed by single digits.
How we got here
The Michigan race became a culmination of several political currents that have been building for years.
It reflected lingering anger among Americans over the Gaza war, Democratic criticism of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, frustration among progressives over AIPAC’s support for some Republicans who challenged the 2020 election results, and the growing influence of the Democratic Socialists of America, accelerated by the political rise of Zohran Mamdani in the New York City mayoral race last year.
Michigan, home to one of the country’s largest Arab-American communities and the birthplace of the “uncommitted” movement to protest the Biden administration’s handling of the Gaza war in the 2024 presidential primary, made it a natural testing ground for progressive forces.
El-Sayed highlighted the Gaza war and AIPAC’s involvement in Democratic primaries when he launched his campaign in April 2025 — months before AIPAC spent a dollar. He advocated for ending unconditional military aid to Israel and framed his candidacy as a fight against outside influence. Notably, El-Sayed supported the “uncommitted” movement, though he later endorsed Kamala Harris after Biden dropped out.
According to data compiled by Milan Singh, a fellow at The Argument, a liberal opinion-focused media publication, insurgent progressive candidates for Congress mentioned Israel in 48% of their fundraising emails.
With most major primaries already decided, this race became the biggest Democratic showdown yet over Israel.
Jewish divide
Jewish voters make up just 1.4% of the electorate in Michigan. But the community had become deeply invested in the race — with Jews both in fierce opposition to El-Sayed and fiery support.
For many Jews, El-Sayed’s questioning of whether Israel should exist as a Jewish state and his decision to campaign alongside controversial Twitch streamer Hasan Piker, who has been accused of antisemitic rhetoric, were cause for alarm. El-Sayed also came under fire for calling the Israeli government “evil” like Hamas.
Rep. Hillary Scholten, a second-term Michigan Democrat, said on CNN Tuesday night that El-Sayed reinforced concerns some voters had about him by campaigning again with Piker in the final days before the primary. “Elections are about choices,” she said. “What is the message that you want to send to your voters?”
At the same time, El-Sayed courted Jewish voters. He attended a Passover seder at Congregation T’chiyah, a progressive Reconstructionist synagogue outside Detroit. Many of its congregants volunteered for El-Sayed’s campaign with a group dubbed “Jews for Abdul.”
Jewish former Michigan congressman Andy Levin — who lost his House election against Stevens in 2022 after AIPAC poured millions into defeating him — endorsed El-Sayed.
In the final days of the campaign, Stevens had sharpened her concerns about El-Sayed, accusing him of blaming “all of your problems on Jewish Americans.”
El-Sayed rejected accusations of antisemitism and argued that his critics conflate the Israeli government with the Jewish people.
“I love and revere Judaism and the Jewish people,” he said.
The post Michigan Democrats await Senate winner in party’s biggest test yet on Israel appeared first on The Forward.
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The real Jewish story of Ceuta, Spain’s migrant-magnet neighbor to Morocco
For all of us who don’t know much about geography, international political crises are always welcome. Since the start of Trump 2.0, we have been discovering places we never knew existed, but now present existential threats. From straits — think Hormuz and Bab al-Mandab — to islands — whether Greenland or Heard and McDonald — we now have, along with higher gas and food prices, a better appreciation of our world.
Late last week, yet another obscure part of the globe was suddenly brought, this time without our president’s assistance, to the attention of western media: Ceuta. A city of approximately 83,000 inhabitants, Ceuta is ensconced on a peninsula which, though attached to the Moroccan coastline, is nevertheless under Spanish rule, even while it enjoys a significant amount of autonomy.
As we now know, Ceuta was also the magnet that, starting on July 30, drew about 72,000 young Moroccans who sought, mostly by swimming, to reach its beaches and, from there, perhaps reach Europe. That nearly 100 young men and women drowned in the effort — one that moreover proved naught for those who reached Ceuta as nearly all of them were obliged to return to Morocco — adds a heartrending chapter to the complex history of a city where tragedy has long mixed with comity.
Founded two millennia earlier by the Phoenicians, Ceuta was successively ruled by the Romans, Ottomans, Portuguese and Spaniards. In 1492, when the kingdom expelled its Jewish population, a few thousand crossed the Strait of Gibraltar to Ceuta, where they managed to avoid the bloody reach of the Inquisition. Yet they were not the first Jews to make their home on this tip of North Africa; as early as the 11th century, the Spanish-Jewish poet Abraham Ibn Ezra refers to the Jews of Ceuta in one of his poems. For the next few centuries, the small community lived in relative peace alongside its Christian and Muslim neighbors, a continuation, argues the historian Veronica Viviana Reyes, of the medieval “al-Andalus,” that brilliant and brief moment of cultural convergence between the three “peoples of the Book.”
Come the mid-20th century, the steadily dwindling Jewish community received reinforcements with the arrival of a few hundred Sephardic Jews who left their native Morocco in the wake of its independence from France. Earlier that century, several hundred Indians, mostly Sindhi, who were subjects under the British Raj also arrived in Ceuta, drawn by the city’s busy trading and commercial opportunities. Though the statistics are approximate — Spain does not require citizens to list their religion — about 58% of Ceuta’s population is Christian, 40% is Muslim, and the remaining couple of percentage points comprise its Jewish and Hindi communities. [ As a result, this ancient city attached by a thread of rock and soil to North Africa has accomplished a remarkable feat: the braiding of four distinct faith communities into what the locals call convivencia, or peaceful coexistence.
Yet, as last week’s event revealed, convivencia is a fragile thing. The influx of Moroccan youths on the beaches and streets of Ceuta, though over as quickly as it began, has become the gift that does not stop giving for the extreme-right media and politicians in countries bordering Spain. Marine Le Pen, leader of France’s ethno-nationalist party the National Rally, demanded that the French government “reinforce its border controls.”
Not to be outdone, her second-in-command, Jordan Bardella, warned that these “invaders will soon be on our streets.” Going a step further, the extreme-right prime minister of Italy, Giorgia Meloni, called for Spain’s suspension from the Schengen Accord—the guarantee of free movement of citizens across the borders of European Union nations — and resurrected immigration controls for Spanish citizens, although Spain does not share a border with Italy. (This geographical fact did not deter Mette Fredricksen, the prime minister of distant Denmark, from voicing her support for Meloni.)
Inevitably, the old chestnut of a Jewish conspiracy has also been resurrected. Public figures, ranging from antisemitic fantasist Candace Owens, through the former director of Human Rights Watch, Kenneth Roth, to the Spanish actor Javier Bardem, have posted or reposted wink-wink, nudge-nudge claims that Israel orchestrated the mad rush of Moroccans towards Ceuta. The reason cited for this nefarious feat is Benjamin Netanyahu’s desire to embarrass the Spanish prime minister, Pedro Sanchez, who has been one of the harshest European critics of the war in Gaza and a proponent of a more liberal immigration policy than his European peers. The Moroccan government’s irritation over Spain’s support of Algerian claims to the western Sahara makes this baseless claim seem more reasonable.
The political and rhetorical theatrics have little to do with reality. Europe is not being overrun by what Marion Maréchal, a politician to the right of her aunt Marine Le Pen, described as a “veritable invasion” by “hordes of young Moroccans.” Or, for that matter, what her Spanish homologue, Santiago Abascal, the leader of the extreme-right party Vox, insisted was “an act of war” against Spain and, by extension, Europe.
This frenzied response deliberately ignores the fact that not a single Moroccan migrant entered Spain — a strait, after all, runs between Spain and Ceuta — and have nearly all been returned by Spanish soldiers and police to Morocco. Tellingly, residents of Ceuta have also used the word “invasion,” but with greater nuance. As a journalist for Le Monde reported, none of the locals she interviewed described the Moroccans as enemies. Though frightened by the sudden and massive influx, they also understood the migrants were not seeking “to rob them,” but instead to find a better future. Besides, as one Ceutan, Rachel Gomes, observed, she has Muslim in-laws. “This does not make for problems. Four cultures exist here — Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, and Christian — that live together remarkably well.” If only a similar convivencia reigned among the members of the European Union.
The post The real Jewish story of Ceuta, Spain’s migrant-magnet neighbor to Morocco appeared first on The Forward.
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Ad for Republican Colorado governor candidate depicts Jewish opponent with horns
An attack ad on the Jewish Democratic candidate for governor of Colorado has depicted him with red horns, drawing condemnation from the state Democratic party — and the apparent approval of the Republican nominee.
Invoking an ancient antisemitic canard that Jews have horns, the ad, created in support of Republican nominee Victor Marx and circulating on various social media platforms, called the Democratic nominee and Colorado’s current Attorney General Phil Weiser “the next threat to Colorado.”
The Colorado Democratic Party said on Facebook that the graphic was “antisemitic and disgusting” and called on Marx to disavow it.
Instead, Marx engaged with a post on X accompanied by the image, calling on Republicans to stop attacking each other, “unite, stay focused, and win.”
Throughout his campaign, controversy has followed Marx, a minister and author who some have categorized as a Christian fundamentalist. Others have called him a fabulist. On the campaign trail, Marx has claimed to be the first American into Gaza during the war with Israel, boasted about performing exorcisms by phone and said his stepfather forced him to kill a man at the age of 7.
A fellow Republican party member also formally accused him of accepting unlimited campaign contributions through his online merchandise store.
The Marx campaign did not respond to an inquiry by the Forward.
Weiser, who attends a Conservative synagogue in Denver, defeated U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet for the Democratic nomination in July. He also did not respond to an inquiry.
Polls show Weiser with a sizable lead over Marx. The Colorado governor’s seat has been held by a Democrat since 2008, and term-limited incumbent Gov. Jared Polis is also Jewish.
The post Ad for Republican Colorado governor candidate depicts Jewish opponent with horns appeared first on The Forward.
