Photo: Jason Francisco Photo: Jason Francisco Volume 22, No. 2 Gazeta Summer 2015 A quarterly publication of the American Association for Polish-Jewish Studies and Taube Foundation for Jewish Life & Culture Editorial & Design: Fay Bussgang, Julian Bussgang, Shana Penn, Vera Hannush, Alice Lawrence, Aleksandra Makuch, LaserCom Design. Front and Back Cover Photos: Jason Francisco TABLE OF CONTENTS Message from Irene Pipes ............................................................................................... 1 Message from Tad Taube and Shana Penn ................................................................... 2 HISTORY & CULTURE Jewish Heritage in Lviv Today–A Brief Survey By Jason Francisco ............................................................................................................. 3 Discovering the History of a Lost World By Dr. Tomasz Cebulski ....................................................................................................... 6 EDUCATION My Mi Dor Le Dor Experience By Klaudia Siczek ................................................................................................................ 9 Hillel Professionals Explore Poland’s Jewish Revival, Contemplate Student Encounters By Lisa Kassow ................................................................................................................. 12 New Notions of “Polonia”: Polish- and Jewish-American Students Dialogue with Polish Foreign Ministry on Taube Study Tour ........................................................ 15 How to Teach a 1,000-Year History?: Holocaust Educators Study Poland’s Jewish Past & Present By Rabbi Batshir Torchio ................................................................................................... 16 MILESTONES Krzysztof Czyżewski Receives 2015 Irena Sendler Memorial Award from Taube Philanthropies ....................................................................................................... 18 25 Years of the Jewish Culture Festival in Kraków By Janusz Makuch and Robert Gądek .............................................................................. 20 Galicia Jewish Museum Is Expanding By Jakub Nowakowski ....................................................................................................... 22 Polish Foreign Ministry Honors Three American “Ex-Pats” ......................................... 23 GAZETA SUMMER 2015 n iii IN THE NEWS Polish Pension By Julian and Fay Bussgang ............................................................................................. 24 Petition to the German Government for Cemetery Restoration By Vera Hannush ............................................................................................................... 24 CONFERENCES & SCHOLARSHIP POLIN Museum Announces GEOP Research Fellowship Program .......................... 25 “From Abraham ibn Yakub to 6 Anielewicz Street” By Dr. Antony Polonsky ..................................................................................................... 27 “From Galicia to New York: Salo W. Baron and His Legacy” By Dr. Antony Polonsky ..................................................................................................... 29 Polish Jewish Studies Initiative: July 2015 Update By Dr. Jessie Labov ........................................................................................................... 32 FILMS “The Touch of an Angel” (Dotknięcie Anioła) By Marek T. Pawlowski ...................................................................................................... 34 BOOKS Joshua Zimmerman, The Polish Underground and the Jews, 1939-1945 Reviewed by Julian and Fay Bussgang ............................................................................. 36 Recommended Reading ................................................................................................ 37 OBITUARIES Theodore Bikel: May 2, 1924-July 20, 2015 By Tad Taube .................................................................................................................... 38 Władysław Bartoszewski: February 19, 1922-April 24, 2015 By Dr. Antony Polonsky ..................................................................................................... 40 Dr. Ezra Mendelsohn: October 26, 1940-May 13, 2015 By Dr. Antony Polonsky ..................................................................................................... 42 Dr. Jan Kulczyk: June 24, 1950-July 29, 2015 ............................................................. 44 iv n GAZETA VOLUME 22, NO. 2 President of the American Association Message from for Polish-Jewish Studies Irene Pipes Founder of Gazeta Dear Members and Friends: We have a couple of exciting recent events to report on. The Institute of Jewish Studies in London hosted a conference on June 2 about “Warsaw, the Jewish Metropolis” in honor of the 75th birthday of Antony Polonsky, our esteemed editor of the POLIN series. The conference convened specialists on this topic from several countries and moved the topic forward in ways that will be apparent to all when the studies are soon published. Speaking of publications, I am pleased to announce that Volume 28 of Polin will soon appear and will deal with a novel topic: Although Jewish life in Poland is commonly associated with the Irene Pipes Hebrew and Yiddish languages, modern research shows that, for almost two and a half centuries, Polish also played an important role. This means Jews were not as isolated as had been thought but had more interactions with the people and culture around them. In the new volume of Polin, scholars engage in a first investigation of this topic, focusing on the interwar years but also looking at what came before and after. The studies include discussions of Haim Hahman Bialik’s poetry translated into Polish, the influence of Polish writers on Sholem Asch’s early plays, and mutual perceptions of Poles and Jews in the work of S. Y. Agnon. We hope that these path-breaking articles will appeal to any one interested in literature, in Poland, and in Polish, Yiddish, and Hebrew creativity. Irene Pipes President aapjstudies.org GAZETA SUMMER 2015 n 1 Message from Chairman and Executive Director Tad Taube and of the Taube Foundation for Jewish Life & Culture Shana Penn e are proud to partner with the American Association for Polish-Jewish Studies (AAPJS) in the production of the Wquarterly publication Gazeta, now in its second online edition. We are also pleased to collaborate with AAPJS’ Vice President, Dr. Antony Polonsky, in his capacity as Chief Historian of the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, on a global initiative to further the study and proliferation of Polish Jewish history and culture. The Global Education Outreach Program (GEOP) establishes academic partnerships between the POLIN Museum, the Emanuel Ringelblum Jewish Historical Institute, and universities and research institutions in Poland, North America, Europe, Israel, and Russia. The GEOP will provide new, much-needed opportunities in research and collaboration on an Tad Taube international scale (see p. 25). We are also involved in the Polish Jewish Studies Initiative to broaden and diversify the academic curricula within accredited Polish Studies programs to be inclusive of Poland’s multi-ethnic history (see p. 32). These programs and many more activities featured in this issue of Gazeta aim to support a new generation of scholars and cultural caretakers and creators. We hope that Gazeta continues to be a major forum for conversation and dissemination across generations. Best regards, Tad Taube and Shana Penn Chairman and Executive Director Shana Penn 2 n GAZETA VOLUME 22, NO. 2 HISTORY & CULTURE Jewish Heritage in Lviv Today–A Brief Survey By Jason Francisco, Associate Professor, Film and Media Studies, Emory University ews were among the first rights in the city, occupying is home to some 1,200 Jews. residents of the city known a quarter just adjacent to To speak of the Jews in Lviv Jtoday as Lviv, Ukraine–– the city hall. In subsequent today is to speak of both a known in Polish as Lwów, in centuries, the Jewish legacy and an enigma. It is Russian as Lvov, in German community grew steadily, its to speak of an annihilated as Lemberg, and in Yiddish population reaching 110,000 world that can be traced but as Lemberik. From the city’s by the eve of the Second not quite followed, whose founding in the mid-thirteenth World War, making the city relics can be found but century, Jews provided capital a major center of Jewish not wholly grasped. Five and crucial international life in Eastern Europe. The Jewish locations can be trade links, and within a Holocaust decimated Jewish called emblematic of this century were granted equal life in the city, which today predicament. n 1. GOLDEN ROSE AND INNER CITY JEWISH QUARTER The inner city Jewish quarter was both an integral component of the multicultural city and for centuries an insular unit in the specifically Jewish world of the city. It contained synagogues, ritual bathhouses, kosher slaughterhouses, hospitals, schools, and communal offices. The accompanying photograph [Figure 1 and cover photograph] was made in this inner city Jewish quarter, in an eighteenth- century building with a view onto the site of the Figure 1: View of the Golden Rose from the former Kehilla House famous Golden Rose Synagogue. Small, nested in in the inner city Jewish quarter, Lviv, 2014 a courtyard without a street entrance of its own, square in plan and with