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How Yiddish and Savta Sarah shaped my Jewish journey
I first fell in love with Jewish languages as a Fulbright fellow at Tel Aviv University.
I was fascinated by the many languages that had converged in Israel: Hebrew, Arabic, Yiddish, Darija, Russian, Amharic and Ladino. I learned about different communities’ language and history, which built meaningful connections with the people who brought them to life in the present.
Learning Yiddish felt especially profound: the knowledge that it had once been the most widely spoken Jewish language in the world, and that millions of its speakers had been killed in the Holocaust.
I was a Roman Catholic from Texas. Moving to Israel was my first sustained exposure to Jewish life, and I was welcomed into it with a warmth that felt both casual and profound — Shabbat dinners, holiday tables and conversations that stretched late into the night.
About a year into my time there, I met my now-husband, Sagi. Through him, I met his grandmother, Sarah. He called her Savta Sarah (savta is Hebrew for grandmother), so I did too.
On Shabbat afternoons, we’d visit her home. She spoke Yiddish, Polish, Russian and by that time, primarily Hebrew – always with a Yiddish inflection – and little English. My Hebrew was still rudimentary. But I knew German, which is still intelligible to a Yiddish speaker. This became our shared language.
Savta Sarah taught me words like nudnik, mentsh, takhles, shtinker, meshugas, fargin — and pointed out how Yiddish lived on in Israeli slang over the decades. Yiddish, she told me, was a language of cynicism and humor, a way of making life’s tsuris bearable.
Sarah taught me how Yiddish articulated a sense of resilience through cynicism, poking fun at everything in life from the tragic to the banal – for example – “Ikh vil dos nisht haltn, efsher vet emitser dos ganvenen” (“I don’t want to keep this, but hopefully someone will steal it”) can be used when you’ve been given something you don’t want, but feel too guilty about throwing it away.
I also loved “der mentsh trakht, un got lakht” (Man supposes but God disposes)” – used when bad things happen, to remind the hearer, mostly with humor, of the futility of mortality, but it can also refer to a sense of faith, despite the circumstances.
Cynicism was how people survived. This mentality existed alongside warmth in a culture rich with hospitality that always made sure to pause on weddings, bris-milah, holidays and Shabbos to celebrate life.
Sarah embodied that sensibility: perceptive and generous, yet direct and unsentimental. She was also the single Holocaust survivor of her immediate family.
Her memories occasionally surfaced without warning. We would be talking about something mundane, and suddenly she would shift into the past.
Sarah was born in the 1930s near today’s Polish-Ukrainian border. Her mother was murdered by the Nazis in a mass execution of Jewish women and children. Sarah, my mother-in-law told me, survived by luck.
Afterwards, during the chaos of a violent attack on the forced labor camp, Sarah was separated from her father, who was killed. She hid in snowy fields for days, later being taken back to the camp. There she reunited with cousins who smuggled her scraps of food. She was still a child.
After the camp was liberated by the Allied Forces, Sarah was sent to a refugee camp in Cyprus. A first attempt by Jews to escape to British Mandatory Palestine failed when the government turned back ships carrying Jewish refugees. Sarah considered joining an aunt in Venezuela, ultimately trying again to land in eretz-yisroel, at last immigrating in 1947, a year before Israeli independence. She built a life — marrying, raising children, and lovingly witnessing her grandchildren reach adulthood.
I never asked her about the Shoah, but her memories emerged in fragments during our visits. Once, Sarah recalled guarding a loaf of bread in her bed in the camp, only to wake and find it stolen. She told it plainly, without visible emotion. And yet, she joked often and radiated pride in the family she had helped rebuild.
Over time, my relationship with Savta Sarah became part of my own spiritual journey. What began as curiosity about Judaism deepened into a desire to convert. After years of learning, I entered a Modern Orthodox conversion program called “Project Ruth” and will soon immerse in the mikveh to complete the process.
There isn’t just one reason for that decision. But Savta Sarah, a very secular woman, is part of it — not because she argued for faith, but because she embodied a form of Jewish resilience and continuity through her stories and through the Yiddish she taught me. From her, I learned what it meant not just to inherit a tradition, but to participate in rebuilding it.
I have always been a spiritual person who has felt close to God, and feel drawn to Judaism’s daily prayers and the intimacy of putting on tefillin. I was drawn far less to kosher laws. But when I think of Jewish history and my journey that has led me into the Jewish people, stories woven together like the braids of a havdalah candle, it makes sense to be observant. I’m not doing it just for myself, but also as a way of honoring past generations and paving the way for future generations.
When Sagi and I left Israel in 2022, we visited Sarah one last time. By then, she understood we were a couple as two men, though we’d never needed to formally explain.
As we were leaving, she pressed several crisp hundred-dollar bills into Sagi’s hand, smiling mischievously. “This is for both of you,” she said. Then, more seriously: “Look out for each other, that’s all you have in this world.”
Savta Sarah died a few years later. Since then, I’ve continued learning Yiddish, slowly and informally. Language and memory have become central to how I understand my place in the Jewish story.
A century ago, Yiddish speakers in Eastern Europe could not have imagined who might one day take up their language. As fewer native speakers remain, the future of Yiddish may depend, in part, on unexpected inheritors.
And for me, that is an incredible honor.
The post How Yiddish and Savta Sarah shaped my Jewish journey appeared first on The Forward.
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Report: US, Israel Preparing for Resumptions of Strikes Against Iran
US President Donald Trump speaks during an event to sign a memorandum in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, DC, US, May 5, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Evan Vucci
i24 News – The United States and Israel are engaged in intense preparations — the largest since the cease-fire took effect — for the possible resumption of attacks against Iran as early as next week, the New York Times reported Saturday citing two Middle East officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Meanwhile, the Israeli Mako News reported Israeli official sources as saying that US President Donald Trump is expected to convene his closest team of advisors in the next 24 hours to make a final decision on the Iran matter. Israel estimates that a decision on military action may be made very soon, the report added.
According to NYT, should Trump decide to resume military strikes, options include more aggressive raids targeting Iranian military and infrastructure targets, US officials said.
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Trump Says Xi Agrees Iran Must Open Strait, But No Sign China Will Weigh In
US President Donald Trump participates in events at the Great Hall of the People and does a greeting with the President of the People’s Republic of China Xi Jinping May 14, 2026, in Beijing China during a trip focused on trade, regional security, and strengthening bilateral ties between the world’s two largest economies. Photo: Kenny Holston/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
US President Donald Trump said Chinese President Xi Jinping had agreed Tehran must reopen the Strait of Hormuz, though China gave no indication it would weigh in.
Flying back from Beijing on Friday after two days of talks with Xi, Trump said he was considering whether to lift US sanctions on Chinese oil companies buying Iranian oil. China is the biggest buyer of Iranian oil.
“I’m not asking for any favors because when you ask for favors, you have to do favors in return,” Trump said when asked by a reporter on Air Force One whether Xi had made a firm commitment to put pressure on the Iranians to reopen the strait.
Xi did not comment on his discussions with Trump about Iran, although China’s foreign ministry criticized the war, calling it a conflict “which should never have happened, has no reason to continue.”
‘WE WANT THE STRAITS OPEN’
Iran has effectively shut the strait, which carried one-fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas supply before the US and Israel launched attacks on February 28. The disruption to shipping has caused the biggest oil supply crisis in history, pushing up oil prices.
Ebrahim Azizi, who heads the Iranian parliament’s national security committee, said on Saturday that Tehran had prepared a mechanism to manage traffic through the strait along a designated route that would be unveiled soon.
Azizi said only commercial vessels and parties cooperating with Iran would benefit, and that fees would be collected for specialized services provided under the mechanism.
Thousands of Iranians were killed in the US and Israeli airstrikes. Thousands more have been killed in Lebanon in fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed group Hezbollah, though Israel and Lebanon agreed on Friday to a 45-day extension of a ceasefire that has tamped down the conflict there.
The US paused its attacks last month but began a port blockade. As of Saturday, 78 commercial ships had been redirected and four disabled to ensure compliance with the blockade, the US military said.
Tehran, which carried out strikes against Israel, US bases and Gulf states after the war began, has said it will not unblock the strait until the US ends its blockade. Trump has threatened to resume attacks if Iran does not agree to a deal.
“We don’t want them to have a nuclear weapon, we want the straits open,” Trump said in Beijing, alongside Xi.
Iran, which has long denied it intends to build a nuclear weapon, has refused to end nuclear research or relinquish its hidden stockpile of enriched uranium.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said Tehran had received messages from the US indicating Washington was willing to continue talks.
Pakistan has been mediating between Washington and Tehran. Iranian news agency Nournews said Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni had held “detailed” discussions with his visiting Pakistani counterpart on Iran-Pakistan relations and the prospects for resuming peace talks, but gave no details.
TRUMP LOSING PATIENCE
Trump, who told Fox News’ “Hannity” program in an interview aired on Thursday that he was losing patience with Iran, said Tehran “should make a deal.”
Oil prices rose around 3 percent to around $109 a barrel on Friday [O/R] on concerns about a lack of progress in resolving the conflict.
Talks on ending the war, which has become a liability for Trump ahead of US congressional elections in November, have been on hold since last week when Iran and the US each rejected the other’s most recent proposals.
Araqchi said on Friday that Iran would welcome Chinese input, adding that Tehran was trying to give diplomacy a chance but did not trust the US, which has curtailed previous rounds of talks by launching air strikes.
When the US and Israel launched their attacks on Iran at the end of February, they said one of their aims was to weaken the authorities so Iranians could topple the government.
There has been little sign of organized dissent in Iran during the war, and rights groups say the government has cracked down heavily on its opponents.
Iran’s judiciary said on Saturday that 39 people had been executed for collaborating with Israeli or US spy agencies, or taking part in “terror” or armed unrest, since the war started, the judiciary’s news agency Mizan reported.
It said 36 “medium-level” dissidents had received long prison sentences.
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Tens of Thousands March in London in Separate Immigration, Pro‑Palestinian Protests
Protesters take part in a “Unite the Kingdom” rally organised by British anti-immigration activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, also known as Tommy Robinson, in London, Britain, May 16, 2026. REUTERS/Hannah McKay
Tens of thousands of people marched through central London on Saturday in two separate protests – one against high levels of immigration and another in support of Palestinians.
Police deployed 4,000 officers, including reinforcements from outside the capital, and pledged “the most assertive possible use of our powers” in what they called their biggest public order operation in years.
By 1200 GMT, shortly after both marches started, police said they had made 11 arrests for a range of offenses. They had earlier forecast turnout of at least 80,000.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Friday accused organizers of the Unite the Kingdom march of “peddling hate and division, plain and simple.”
The march was organized by anti-Islam activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, known as Tommy Robinson. The government barred 11 people it described as “foreign far-right agitators” from entering Britain to address the protest.
A previous protest led by Robinson in September drew around 150,000 people, police said, and featured a video address by US tech billionaire Elon Musk. More than 20 people were arrested, and police are still seeking more than 50 suspects.
MARCHERS WAVE BRITISH AND ENGLISH FLAGS
On Saturday, Robinson supporters gathered in central London, waving mainly British and English flags.
“I think that too much migration – not migration, but too much migration – is causing a lot of problems, upsetting a delicate balance here,” said Allison Parr, who also criticized net-zero environmental policies.
Annual net migration approached 900,000 in 2022 and 2023, but fell back to around 200,000 last year after tighter work visa rules.
Concern over immigration – including the arrival of asylum seekers on small boats – has weighed on Starmer’s popularity and boosted the right-wing Reform UK party, whose leader Nigel Farage has distanced himself from Robinson.
Some protesters chanted abuse about Starmer.
Robinson, who has convictions for assault, stalking and other offenses, urged supporters this week to act peacefully in what he billed as “the greatest patriotic display the world has ever seen.”
Earlier this year, he traveled to the US, where he met a State Department official and addressed supporters about what he called “the dangers of Islam” and “the Islamification of Great Britain.”
Census data showed 6.5 percent of people in England and Wales identified as Muslim in 2021, up from 4.9 percent in 2011.
PRO-PALESTINIAN PROTESTERS MARK NAKBA DAY
Nearby, pro-Palestinian demonstrators held a march to mark Nakba Day, commemorating Palestinians’ loss of land in the 1948 war that followed the creation of Israel. “Nakba” means catastrophe in Arabic.
The march also drew those opposing the Unite the Kingdom rally, alongside predominantly Palestinian flags.
London has recently seen a spate of arson attacks on Jewish sites, and two Jewish men were stabbed last month in an incident being treated as terrorism.
Police said repeated large pro-Palestinian marches – 33 since the Hamas-led attack on Israel in October 2023 – had left many Jewish people feeling too intimidated to enter central London.
While protesters held a range of views, police said they routinely made arrests for racially and religiously aggravated public order offenses, inciting racial hatred or supporting proscribed organizations.
The government said police would arrest protesters who chanted “globalize the intifada,” a reference to Palestinian uprisings against Israel that many British Jews view as inciting antisemitism.
Some protesters on Saturday chanted “Death to the IDF”, referring to the Israeli army – language that police said had previously been a reason for arrests when aimed at Jewish people.