Vol. LXXXV No. 25 Omaha, NE
Celebrating 85 Years of Service to Nebraska and Western Iowa
Local Scholar Teaches About the Holocaust in Films at Temple Israel by CLAUDIA SHERMAN Temple Israel Communications Coordinator As scholars, historians, Jews, and millions of other people of conscience continue to struggle with the enormity of the horrors of the Holocaust, filmmakers also wrestle with the meaning of the Jewish genocide of the twentieth century. By exposing atrocities perpetrated on the inhabitants of ghettoes and the inmates of death camps, films retell the stories of survivors while trying to contemplate the German mindset. “As someone who grew up in Israel and as an historian, I’m interested in the subject of the Holocaust,” commented Dr. Moshe Gershovich who will facilitate “Memory, Image and Meanings: the Holocaust in Films” on Sundays, March 12, 19, April 2 and 30, at Temple Israel. “I think it’s essential for any human being (not just Jews) to learn about this horrific event and draw from it meaningful conclusions. That’s why I’m teaching a course on the Holocaust at UNO and why I’m giving this lecture series at Temple Israel,” said Dr. Gershovich, professor of Modern Middle Eastern and European History at the University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO). The four-session film class begins with Dr. Gershovich discussing Claude Lantzmann’s 1985 documentary, Shoah on March 12, 3-4:30 p.m., Dr. Gershovich will show clips from the nine-hour film that intersperses images from the sites of ghettoes and concentration camps as they looked in the 1970s with interviews of survivors, former camp guards, Polish bystanders, and historians. The next two classes, on March 19 and April 2, will begin with a screening of the films from 1-3 p.m. followed by discussion from 3-4 p.m. On April 30, the screening will begin at 12:15 p.m. Attendance at the screenings, which is optional, is meant to ensure a fresh perspective for the discusDr. Moshe Gershovich sion. On March 19, the 2001 film, Conspiracy, an HBO docudrama will depict the Wannasee Conference that took place in January 1942, in which a select group of Nazi officials formulated the “Final Solution of the Jewish Question.” “The film provides fresh insight into the ‘banality of evil’ debate, sparked by the early 1960s trial of Adolph Eichmann,” said Dr. Gershovich. Europa Europa (1990) and The Pianist (2002) will be the final two films. Dramatizations of actual survival stories, based on the autobiographies of Shlomo Perel and Wladyslaw Szpilman, respectively, the films can be used to discuss issues related to the fine line separating fact and fiction, explained Dr. Gershovich. Each film can also illuminate different aspects of the Holocaust, such as “race classes” in Nazi education and the daily routine of life at the Warsaw Ghetto, he added. Dr. Gershovich is a graduate of Tel Aviv University and Harvard and was a senior Fulbright scholar. He has been at UNO since 2001. “This class,” he says “provides me with a way to thank Rabbi Aryeh Azriel and Program Director Rosie Zweiback and to repay the Temple congregation that provided me with a new sense of belonging.” Cost to register is $20 for Temple members and $25 for others. E-mail rzweiback@templeisraelomaha.com or call Zweiback at 556.6536 to register. This adult learning is provided by Temple Israel’s Hermene Zweiback Center for Lifelong Jewish Learning.
Inside Opinion Page see page 8
3 Adar, 5766 March 3, 2006
UJC Names Alperson to Lead National Campaign by CAROL KATZMAN Editor of the Jewish Press Joel Alperson, right, who just returned from Ethiopia and Israel as Chairman of United Jewish Communities’ a Leadership Mission, was named National Chairman of the 2007 Federation Campaign. Alperson is a member of UJC’s Prime Minister’s Council and has served as chairman of Midwest Regional Major Gifts and Financial Resource Development, and as co-chairman of the National Young Leadership Cabinet. He is President of Omaha Fixture International and a past Chairman of Omaha’s Federation Campaign. “I am honored to accept the important position of national campaign chairman,” Alperson said, and added he is “excited to have been given the opportunity to represent the success and promise of the campaign. It continues to inspire all generations of North American Jewry to support our life-saving humanitarian initiatives all over the world.” Alperson, an Omaha native, willtake on this new national role in July.
THE FALASH MURA’S FATE
Fleeing Famine and Fighting: How Ethiopians Got to Israel by URIEL HEILMAN Thousands more remained SHIRE, Ethiopia (JTA)--Until the late stranded in Communist 1970s, very few Ethiopian Jews had ever Ethiopia. wandered beyond the borders of their For those left behind, life country and made it to Israel. was harsh. During But in 1979, an insurgency in northern Mengistu’s 17-year reign, Ethiopia opened an exit route to Sudan, Ethiopian city streets were and thousands of Ethiopian Jews--who left riddled with corpses as a called themselves Beta Israel but were warning against opposing known to outsiders as Falasha--began fleethe government, bereaved ing the famine and war of northern parents were forced to pay Ethiopia on a journey they hoped would for the bullets that killed end in Jerusalem. their sons, and suspected Along with thousands of other political opponents were Ethiopians fleeing their country, which at imprisoned and tortured. the time was ruled by Communist dictator The Jews suffered no more Mengistu Haile Mariam, the Jews settled than ordinary Ethiopians, in refugee camps in Sudan and waited for but anyone who was susMossad operatives to take them out. pected of trying to flee to Zion was tortured, imprisFor the first few years, those who were taken to Israel left in one of three ways. oned and often killed. Some were given forged documents and In the early 1990s, the tide turned in the war between the put onto planes in Khartoum bound for Tigrean People’s Athens. Once in Europe, they then were This villager and many others in his remote vil- rebel quietly put onto planes to Israel. Others lage in Ethiopia’s Gojam province are among Liberation Front (TPLF) and were moved from their Sudanese refugee thousands that might stake a claim to Falash the government, known as camps at night to Port Sudan, where Mura status but have yet to contact the Israeli the Derg, and in May 1991 Credit: Uriel Heilman/JTA rebel forces surrounded the Israeli naval commandos put them onto government. clandestine naval vessels and then transferred them onto Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. Israel, which had clandestine ties with Mengistu’s ships headed for Israel. A few were airlifted directly to Israel from the Sudanese desert on illicit flights. regime, feared that the TPLF’s anti-Zionist rhetoric and A famine in Ethiopia in 1984 lent great urgency to the hostility toward Mengistu could lead to massacres of the effort to rescue Ethiopia’s Jews, many of whom were Jews when the rebels took Addis, and quickly put dying of starvation and disease in refugee camps in together a plan to rescue the country’s remaining Jews. Sudan while they waited to be taken to Israel. Israel pressed the United States to persuade the rebels to In the covert maneuver Operation Moses, Israel began hold their positions on the hilltops around Addis for 36 airlifting large numbers of Ethiopian Jews from Sudan’s hours while Israel airlifted more than 14,000 Jews out of desert beginning in November 1984. Leaks about the the country. operation and growing risks forced its early end in The fall of Addis came just hours after the completion January 1985, after more than 8,000 Jews had been of Operation Solomon, on May 24, 1991. Continued on page 11 brought to Israel in the space of just six weeks.
This Week: Teen Age Features Teens of B’nai Jeshurun: Page 7 Sharon’s Illness Has Hadassah Hospital in Limelight: Page 3
Recipes for Purim Are Way to Man’s Heart: Pages 4-5
Next Week: Home & Garden Special Issue
Op-Ed: History More Potent Than Weapon: Page 9
Omaha Native Returns for Barn Girl Art Show: Page 12