Humans of Judaism

Shabbat Shalom in memory of Holocaust survivor Margaret Newman. She was born Margaret Kaufman in 1923 in Satu Mare, Romania. The Kaufman family remained in Satu Mare until 1944, when they were forced into the Satu Mare ghetto before being put on a train to Auschwitz-Birkenau.…

85 years ago, in July and August of 1940, Chiune Sugihara, known as the “Japanese Schindler,” risked his job and reputation to save thousands of Jewish lives during the Holocaust. Born in 1900 in Japan, Sugihara later served as a diplomat at the Japanese consulate in Kaunas,…

Over the years on Humans of Judaism, I’ve written countless obituaries, but this is one I never wanted to write. Goodbye, my dear friend Laura.   Condolences: Laura Ben-David, beloved wife, mother, grandmother, daughter, sister and friend. Laura was born and raised in the U.S.…

Please help me wish Captain Uri Bar-Lev a happy 94th birthday! Captain Bar-Lev is a hero and retired El Al pilot who made aviation history as the only pilot to successfully thwart an in-air hijacking.   In 1948, as a teenage pilot during Israel’s War of Independence, Captain…

This is a photo of the Kutz family before October 7. They were found huddled together in their home's bomb shelter. None of them survived. We will never forget.

Did you know that during WWII, doctors at an Italian hospital invented a fake deadly disease to fool the Nazis and save Jewish lives? It was called Syndrome K (Il Morbo di K), described as highly contagious and fatal, but it was completely made up.   Fatebenefratelli Hospital…

This week in Israel, Yarden Bibas held a newly dedicated Torah with an orange cover, honoring the memory of his late wife, Shiri, and sons, Ariel and Kfir. 🧡 May their memories be a blessing.

This is the story of Irena Sendler, a Polish social worker, nurse and humanitarian who defied the Nazis and secretly saved 2,500 children from the Warsaw Ghetto.   Irena Sendler was born in 1910 to a Polish Catholic family. She was 29 years old when WWII broke out and worked for…

George Washington visited the Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island, on August 18, 1790. Built in 1763, it remains the oldest standing synagogue building in the United States. Following his visit, Washington responded to the Newport Jewish community with a historic letter…

Here is a picture of Am Yisrael Chai. While rockets fall across Israel during Operation Rising Lion, babies born in the sheltered maternity suites at Shaare Zedek Hospital wear onesies that read in Hebrew: "My mother is a lioness." Source: @shaarezedekjm

Naama Levy was only 19 years old when she was taken hostage by Hamas terrorists on October 7. She marked her 20th birthday in captivity in Gaza, where she was held for 477 days. Yesterday, she celebrated her 21st birthday in Israel, surrounded by former hostages Emily Damari,…

Michel Bacos was the captain of Air France Flight 139, which was hijacked and rerouted to Entebbe on June 27, 1976. On board were 240 passengers and 12 crew members when the flight took off from Tel Aviv. The hijackers released the non-Jewish hostages and offered to free Bacos…

He spent 584 days in Hamas captivity. This afternoon in New Jersey, Edan Alexander returned to his hometown of Tenafly, where the entire community lined the streets to welcome him back. #BringThemAllHome 🎗️🇮🇱 Video: @lisanschechter

Here is a picture of survival. This is Eli Sharabi, holding a Torah, just months after surviving 491 days in captivity. He was abducted from Kibbutz Be’eri on October 7, when Hamas terrorists took him hostage and brought him to Gaza. When he was finally released this past…

This is an appreciation post for Daniel Gold, the inventor of Israel’s life-saving Iron Dome. Thank you!!

Anne Frank was born 96 years ago on June 12, 1929. On her 13th birthday in 1942, she received her diary that would become one of the most widely read testimonies of the Holocaust.

“The word ‘Jew’ was written on the first page of my passport. People suggested I change my nationality. But I refused. My father, Moshe, was killed by the Nazis. My mother, Chaya, died shortly after from a heart attack. I was only four years old. And I had to be adopted. My…

“This is my father, Marc Mordechai Peretz z”l. He was murdered trying to save me from the massacre at the Nova festival. When the rockets started, he got in the car and drove toward me alone. He ran over two terrorists, broke through police checkpoints, and kept going until He…

On June 6, 1944, a synagogue on West 23rd Street in New York City held 24-hour special services on D-Day to pray for the Allied troops as they landed on the beaches of Normandy.

Jewish firefighter Michael Farca heroically saved a Torah from a burning building on Long Island yesterday. With more than 60 firefighters on the scene, Michael realized that part of the building belonged to the Chabad of Greenvale. As the fire tore through the building, he went…