IN MARCH 2019, US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, told the Christian Broadcasting Network he believed that God was acting through President Trump to protect the Jews of Israel. While Queen Esther had saved the Jewish people from certain Persian annihilation during Purim, today, Pompeo argued, President Trump was saving the Jews from the wrath of … Read more
“Israel can be a partner, a junior partner, but a perfect partner for China in the development of a variety of technologies that change the way we live, how long we live, how healthy we live − in every area.” So spoke Benjamin Netanyahu during a visit to China in March 2017. He then went … Read more
Review of The Room where it Happened: A White House Memoir by John Bolton Published by Simon and Schuster, pp. 577 price £25.00 John Bolton is the hawks’ hawk, a maximalist who takes no prisoners — someone who even worried Trump by his views. A neo-con veteran of the Reagan, Bush père and Dubya administrations, … Read more
Karl Marx: Philosophy and Revolution by Shlomo Avineri Published by Yale University Press 2019, pp.221 Why should Karl Marx be included in Yale’s excellent Jewish Lives series when the subject of this fascinating book never referred to his Jewish origins? Shlomo Avineri, the eminent Israeli intellectual and academic, has attempted to unravel Marx’s connection to … Read more
Searching for Socialism, by academics Leo Panitch and Colin Leys, traces the odyssey of Labour’s “Old Left” from the 1970s until the defeat of the far left in last year’s elec-tion. It looks at the political voyage of left-wing Brexiteers from Tony Benn to Jeremy Corbyn; and also indicates that the mindset of the far … Read more
One hundred years ago, Rabbi Harris Cohen ushered in the children attending the Stoke Newington Sunday morning cheder, called for quiet and told them: ‘‘Palestine is our land again. God’s promise to our fathers thousands of years ago is being fulfilled in our days!’’ The Supreme Council of the Principal Allied Powers had passed a … Read more
Review of Chris Millington’s A History of Fascism in France: From the First World War to the National Front published by Bloomsbury 2020, pp. 235 In 1995, President Jacques Chirac stated that France was responsible for the Vel’ d’Hiv round-up of Jews in 1942. In 2018, Marine Le Pen, president of the Front National, attributed … Read more
A State at Any Cost: The Life of David Ben-Gurion by Tom Segev Published by Head of Zeus 2019, pp.804 This is a long but inspiring account of the life and times of David Ben- Gurion. It is a “Jewish journey” like no other. Its dramatis personae cross the stage of Jew- ish history during … Read more
In September 1940, David Ben-Gurion undertook a hazardous voyage across the Atlantic on board the requisitioned Cunard cruiseliner, the Scythia, arriving in New York just before Yom Kippur. He had been in London since early May and observed first-hand the fall of France, the Battle of Britain and death and destruction during the Blitz. He was … Read more
Pope Francis’s announcement that the Vatican will open the archives on the life and times of his predecessor, Pius XII (1939-1958) – some 16 million pages – has answered the call of historians over many decades. The attitude of Pius towards Jews, anti-Semitism and Nazi atrocities has remained a matter of controversy for Jewish and … Read more