Tuesday, March 17, 2020
Our Ancestors in the 1918 Spanish Influenza Pandemic
Nadene Goldfoot
War and Flu Pandemic
"On 22 May 1918, the epidemic was a headline in Madrid's ABC newspaper. The infectious disease most likely reached Spain from France, perhaps as the result of the heavy railroad traffic of Spanish and Portuguese migrant workers to and from France. ..Although a great deal of evidence indicates that the 1918 A(H1N1) influenza virus unlikely originated in and spread from Spain, the 1918–1919 influenza pandemic will always be known as the Spanish flu...It is likely that >260,000 Spaniards died of influenza; 75% of these persons died during the second period of the epidemic, and 45% died during October 1918 alone. "
"The 1918 influenza pandemic was an unusually deadly influenza pandemic, the first of the two pandemics involving H1N1 influenza virus, with the second being the swine flu in 2009. The Spanish flu infected 500 million people around the world, or about 27% of the world population of between 1.8 and 1.9 billion." That's 3 different flu attacks.
It is estimated that about 500 million people or one-third of the world’s population became infected with this virus. The number of deaths was estimated to be at least 50 million worldwide with about 675,000 occurring in the United States. (update)
What was bad was that World War I, also known as the First World War or the Great War, was a global war originating in Europe that lasted from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918. By 1918, the world was in a flu pandemic.
My father was 6 years old and my mother was 1 year old in 1914; both living in Portland, Oregon. My father, Meshke (Morris) had an immigrant mother that didn't speak, read or write English and his father-Nathan Goldfoot, had died in an accident in 1912. My mother had an immigrant mother and Yankee American father-Frank Hugh Robinson, who did.
"From January 1918 to December 1920, 50,000,000 people died." " By October 1918, the United States had been an active participant in World War I for more than a year. And while the declared enemy was overseas, there was a killer working stateside as well. Cities were gripped with fear: school was canceled; theaters, places of worship, and other places of “public amusement” had been shuttered. That month alone 195,000 Americans died, making it the deadliest month in American history; the killer was none other than influenza."Though the pandemic lasted just 15 months, 500 million people worldwide fell sick and it killed between 3-5% of the world’s population.
The major UK troop staging and hospital camp in Étaples in France has been theorized by researchers as being at the center of the Spanish flu. The research was published in 1999 by a British team, led by virologist John Oxford. In late 1917, military pathologists reported the onset of a new disease with high mortality that they later recognized as the flu. The overcrowded camp and hospital was an ideal site for the spreading of a respiratory virus. The hospital treated thousands of victims of chemical attacks, and other casualties of war, and 100,000 soldiers passed through the camp every day. It also was home to a piggery, and poultry was regularly brought in for food supplies from surrounding villages. Oxford and his team postulated that a significant precursor virus, harbored in birds, mutated and then migrated to pigs kept near the front.
This Spanish flu pandemic resulted in a higher than expected mortality rate for young adults. A 2007 analysis of medical journals from the period of the pandemic found that the viral infection was no more aggressive than previous influenza strains. Instead, malnourishment, overcrowded medical camps and hospitals, and poor hygiene promoted bacterial superinfection. This superinfection killed most of the victims, typically after a somewhat prolonged death bed.
The pandemic mostly killed young adults. In 1918–1919, 99% of pandemic influenza deaths in the U.S. occurred in people under 65, and nearly half in young adults 20 to 40 years old. In 1920, the mortality rate among people under 65 had decreased sixfold to half the mortality rate of people over 65, but still, 92% of deaths occurred in people under 65. This is unusual, since influenza is typically most deadly to weak individuals, such as infants under age two, adults over age 70, and the immunocompromised. In 1918, older adults may have had partial protection caused by exposure to the 1889–1890 flu pandemic, known as the "Russian flu".
In 2018, it was estimated the total to be about 17 million people worldwide, though this has been contested. With a world population of 1.8 to 1.9 billion, these estimates correspond to between 1 and 6 percent of the population.
This war led to the mobilization of more than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, making it one of the largest wars in history. It is also one of the deadliest conflicts in history, with an estimated nine million combatant and seven million civilian deaths as a direct result of the war, while resulting genocides and the resulting 1918 influenza pandemic caused another 50 to 100 million deaths worldwide.
Zlata came from Poland/Lithuania, and Nathan came from Lithuania. What was going on in Lithuania in 1889-1890?
In Lazdey Suwalki's summer of 1879, 200 houses burned down causing the owners to become homeless. In 1886 another fire caused 250 Jewish houses burned down again, and again in 1888 70 houses burned down. This time the old synagogue and the Beth-Midrash with all its books were destroyed, and a Jewish woman had died in the fire. Another large fire happened in 1910. All this destroyed the economic chances for the Jews who numbered 1500 in 1887. They had been using straw for roofs in the middle of the town which finally were prohibited.
Lazdey was sitting in the middle of a Jewish farm community until WWI. Many Jewish families had vegetable gardens behind their homes.
In 1915 the Germans occupied Zlata's town of Lazdijai, Suwalki that sat on the border between Poland and Lithuania. She had left sometime in 1900 as she married Nathan in Boise, Idaho in 1905 as she had been living near Council, Idaho in a little mining town. After the war by 1919, the Polish army had taken over in Lazdey but was expelled after several days. It remained inside the border of Lithuania while their district administrative center, Sejny, was included in Poland. Lithuania was independent from 1918 to 1940 with Germany's invasion in June 1941 causing the demolition of almost all the town.
The “Spanish” influenza pandemic of 1918–1920 took place in Poland in 3 epidemic waves. The peaks of morbidity and mortality occurred in the capital, Warsaw, in December 1918 and in December 1919 to January 1920. It is estimated that throughout the pandemic period of 1918–1920 in Poland, 200 000 to 300,000 people died.
Telz remembered their years of famine from 1869 to 1872. In 1870 their population was 6,481 people including 4,399 Jews making up 68% of the town's population. By 1897 it had dropped down to 51% in a town of 6,000 with only 3,088 Jews. The 1880's had been years of persecutions and pogroms against Jews in Ukraine and other places. All were taken into the army for a 6 year period. It became the years of immigration to Palestine and the USA. The Telz Jewish hospital was established.
In the middle of the Pandemic on February 16, 1918, Lithuania had become an independent state. The German army withdrew from the area and life in Telsiai (Telz) gradually returned to normal. The Jews numbered only half of their previous number before the war, started to reconstruct their businesses and their spiritual life. The first government census was in 1923 and there were then 4,691 people in Telz, including 1,545 Jews who made up 33% of their population.
https://www.newstimes.com/local/article/Great-flu-pandemic-leaves-its-mark-on-family-4227641.php
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320355717_The_Lethal_Spanish_Influenza_Pandemic_in_Poland
https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/47/5/668/296225
War and Flu Pandemic
 |
| Camp Funston's hospital unit with soldiers from Fort Riley, Kansas, one of the places in Kansas thought to have brought the virus here. |
"On 22 May 1918, the epidemic was a headline in Madrid's ABC newspaper. The infectious disease most likely reached Spain from France, perhaps as the result of the heavy railroad traffic of Spanish and Portuguese migrant workers to and from France. ..Although a great deal of evidence indicates that the 1918 A(H1N1) influenza virus unlikely originated in and spread from Spain, the 1918–1919 influenza pandemic will always be known as the Spanish flu...It is likely that >260,000 Spaniards died of influenza; 75% of these persons died during the second period of the epidemic, and 45% died during October 1918 alone. "
"The 1918 influenza pandemic was an unusually deadly influenza pandemic, the first of the two pandemics involving H1N1 influenza virus, with the second being the swine flu in 2009. The Spanish flu infected 500 million people around the world, or about 27% of the world population of between 1.8 and 1.9 billion." That's 3 different flu attacks.
It is estimated that about 500 million people or one-third of the world’s population became infected with this virus. The number of deaths was estimated to be at least 50 million worldwide with about 675,000 occurring in the United States. (update)
 |
| American army uniforms in WWI |
What was bad was that World War I, also known as the First World War or the Great War, was a global war originating in Europe that lasted from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918. By 1918, the world was in a flu pandemic.
 |
| Charles 6 and Morris 4 Goldfoot in 1912 just before WWI They only spoke Yiddish like their mother, Zlata Goldfoot nee Jermulowske. |
My father was 6 years old and my mother was 1 year old in 1914; both living in Portland, Oregon. My father, Meshke (Morris) had an immigrant mother that didn't speak, read or write English and his father-Nathan Goldfoot, had died in an accident in 1912. My mother had an immigrant mother and Yankee American father-Frank Hugh Robinson, who did.
"From January 1918 to December 1920, 50,000,000 people died." " By October 1918, the United States had been an active participant in World War I for more than a year. And while the declared enemy was overseas, there was a killer working stateside as well. Cities were gripped with fear: school was canceled; theaters, places of worship, and other places of “public amusement” had been shuttered. That month alone 195,000 Americans died, making it the deadliest month in American history; the killer was none other than influenza."Though the pandemic lasted just 15 months, 500 million people worldwide fell sick and it killed between 3-5% of the world’s population.
The major UK troop staging and hospital camp in Étaples in France has been theorized by researchers as being at the center of the Spanish flu. The research was published in 1999 by a British team, led by virologist John Oxford. In late 1917, military pathologists reported the onset of a new disease with high mortality that they later recognized as the flu. The overcrowded camp and hospital was an ideal site for the spreading of a respiratory virus. The hospital treated thousands of victims of chemical attacks, and other casualties of war, and 100,000 soldiers passed through the camp every day. It also was home to a piggery, and poultry was regularly brought in for food supplies from surrounding villages. Oxford and his team postulated that a significant precursor virus, harbored in birds, mutated and then migrated to pigs kept near the front.
This Spanish flu pandemic resulted in a higher than expected mortality rate for young adults. A 2007 analysis of medical journals from the period of the pandemic found that the viral infection was no more aggressive than previous influenza strains. Instead, malnourishment, overcrowded medical camps and hospitals, and poor hygiene promoted bacterial superinfection. This superinfection killed most of the victims, typically after a somewhat prolonged death bed.
The pandemic mostly killed young adults. In 1918–1919, 99% of pandemic influenza deaths in the U.S. occurred in people under 65, and nearly half in young adults 20 to 40 years old. In 1920, the mortality rate among people under 65 had decreased sixfold to half the mortality rate of people over 65, but still, 92% of deaths occurred in people under 65. This is unusual, since influenza is typically most deadly to weak individuals, such as infants under age two, adults over age 70, and the immunocompromised. In 1918, older adults may have had partial protection caused by exposure to the 1889–1890 flu pandemic, known as the "Russian flu".
In 2018, it was estimated the total to be about 17 million people worldwide, though this has been contested. With a world population of 1.8 to 1.9 billion, these estimates correspond to between 1 and 6 percent of the population.
This war led to the mobilization of more than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, making it one of the largest wars in history. It is also one of the deadliest conflicts in history, with an estimated nine million combatant and seven million civilian deaths as a direct result of the war, while resulting genocides and the resulting 1918 influenza pandemic caused another 50 to 100 million deaths worldwide.
Zlata came from Poland/Lithuania, and Nathan came from Lithuania. What was going on in Lithuania in 1889-1890?
In Lazdey Suwalki's summer of 1879, 200 houses burned down causing the owners to become homeless. In 1886 another fire caused 250 Jewish houses burned down again, and again in 1888 70 houses burned down. This time the old synagogue and the Beth-Midrash with all its books were destroyed, and a Jewish woman had died in the fire. Another large fire happened in 1910. All this destroyed the economic chances for the Jews who numbered 1500 in 1887. They had been using straw for roofs in the middle of the town which finally were prohibited.
Lazdey was sitting in the middle of a Jewish farm community until WWI. Many Jewish families had vegetable gardens behind their homes.
 |
| WWI German Uniforms |
In 1915 the Germans occupied Zlata's town of Lazdijai, Suwalki that sat on the border between Poland and Lithuania. She had left sometime in 1900 as she married Nathan in Boise, Idaho in 1905 as she had been living near Council, Idaho in a little mining town. After the war by 1919, the Polish army had taken over in Lazdey but was expelled after several days. It remained inside the border of Lithuania while their district administrative center, Sejny, was included in Poland. Lithuania was independent from 1918 to 1940 with Germany's invasion in June 1941 causing the demolition of almost all the town.
The “Spanish” influenza pandemic of 1918–1920 took place in Poland in 3 epidemic waves. The peaks of morbidity and mortality occurred in the capital, Warsaw, in December 1918 and in December 1919 to January 1920. It is estimated that throughout the pandemic period of 1918–1920 in Poland, 200 000 to 300,000 people died.
Telz remembered their years of famine from 1869 to 1872. In 1870 their population was 6,481 people including 4,399 Jews making up 68% of the town's population. By 1897 it had dropped down to 51% in a town of 6,000 with only 3,088 Jews. The 1880's had been years of persecutions and pogroms against Jews in Ukraine and other places. All were taken into the army for a 6 year period. It became the years of immigration to Palestine and the USA. The Telz Jewish hospital was established.
In the middle of the Pandemic on February 16, 1918, Lithuania had become an independent state. The German army withdrew from the area and life in Telsiai (Telz) gradually returned to normal. The Jews numbered only half of their previous number before the war, started to reconstruct their businesses and their spiritual life. The first government census was in 1923 and there were then 4,691 people in Telz, including 1,545 Jews who made up 33% of their population.
Pneumonia, an ailment caused by bacteria, and influenza, a viral illness, went hand-in-hand in 1918.Researchers with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases found the majority of deaths during the Great Pandemic were not caused by the influenza virus alone. Instead, they found most victims died from pneumonia after getting the flu. The influenza virus of those years destroyed the cells lining the bronchial tubes and in the lungs. The pneumonia bacteria flourished in that damaged tissue.
Resource:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu
https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/1918-pandemic-h1n1.html (update)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_Ihttps://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/1918-pandemic-h1n1.html (update)
https://www.newstimes.com/local/article/Great-flu-pandemic-leaves-its-mark-on-family-4227641.php
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320355717_The_Lethal_Spanish_Influenza_Pandemic_in_Poland
https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/47/5/668/296225
Labels: 1918 Pandemic, deaths, France, Lazdijai, Lithuanian independence, Pneumonia, Spain, Spanish Flu, Telz, WWI
Saturday, March 07, 2020
How Women of Israel Have Always Stood Out
Nadene Goldfoot
Who do children listen to? Their mothers. That's because they are the ones who deal with the children the most. Children listen to their mothers or get in trouble. If they were in deep trouble with Mom, Dad would hear about it and with him, they would be very sorry that they ever got in such trouble in the first place. A child shouldn't ever fear his mother as she's the source of loving us.
So it was long ago before the Israelites had a king. They had judges. The judges were made up of either men or women. Women were pretty much on equal footing because both sexes had important positions in the family as Moses had spelled life positions out.
Before the Israelites settled in Canaan at the end of the Exodus of 40 years from Egypt, the elders of each group or community or nuclear family acted as judges. Afterward, the soldier-leader, priest or prophet assumed in addition to his chief function that of Judge.
The leaders of Israel in the period from the death of Joshua until before the time of Eli and Samuel which was about from 1220 to 1050 BCE spoke of information found in THE BOOK JUDGES. There were 6 important ones: Othniel-1st judge in Israel and son of Kenar of tribe of Judah, led the army, saved them from king of Aram-Naharaim)or (Syria)- who had enslaved Israel for 8 years), Ehud-from tribe of Benjamin who saved Israel from oppression of Eglon, king of Moab; Deborah-see below, Gideon-judge for 40 years of tribe of Manasseh, had defeated Midianites by using volunteer Israelites; offered kingship but refused, saying G-d was king of Israel; Jephthah-was threatened and so defeated the Ammonites and also defeated his own Ephraimites who opposed his leadership, judge for 6 years, and Samson- from tribe of Dan, son of Manoah, a Nazirite, strong, fought Philistines as Israelites wanted freedom from their suzerainty, . Deborah was the one female. Six others were mentioned in passing: Shamgar, Tola, Jair, Ibzan, Elon and Abdon.
Deborah was one of the judges. who lived way back in about 1150 BCE. She was the nurse for Rebekah. She had such capabilities that she was deemed a prophet as well. She was married, being the wife of Lapidoth. When the 12 Israelite tribes were fighting against the Canaanite king Jabin of Hazor and Sisera, his ally and commander, she was the one who roused up her people to revolt. At that time their leader was Barak, son of Abinoam. Something worthwhile noting that was written down for posterity to remember this feat was THE SONG OF VICTORY which was attributed to Deborah. It is regarded as one of the oldest compositions preserved in Hebrew. This information is recorded and found in (Genesis 35:8, Prophets, Judges 5). It goes back to the days of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and Rebekah was the wife of Isaac, daughter of Bethuel and mother of Esau and Jacob, the twins who were so different from each other. Rebekah was noted for her kindness.
Deborah was one of few women who have ever attained the public dignity and supreme authority, and was the only woman in the Bible who was placed at the height of political power by the common consent of the people. She has been compared to Joan of Arc who rode in front of everyone and led them to victory. So did Deborah! Her faith in G-d was where her strength came from and it was contagious, going to Israel. She was the keeper of a new spiritual vision that lit up all of Israel.
Golda Meyerson Meir nee Mabovitch (b:3 May 1898-d: December 8, 1978 in Kiev, Ukraine, Russia,
daughter of Moshe and Bluma Mabovitch, when in 1905 a pogrom in their city killed 105, moved to USA as a child; In 1916-17, Golda Mabovitch attended Milwaukee Normal School (now the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee) over the objections of her parents, who wanted her to get married rather than pursue a profession. She did both, attaining a teaching certificate and marrying Morris Meyerson.
Moved to Palestine in 1921. Active in Labor Zionism,holding important posts. She took responsibility in the Histadrut and the Jewish Agency.
In 1948 when Israel was again born, she was the 1st Israel minister to the USSR. Being a member of Mapai of the Knesset since 1949, she was minister of labor in governments following then from 1949 to 1956, and foreign minister from 1956 to 1966. Then after that she was secretary of Mapai.
In 1969 she was chosen to succeed Levi Eshkol as Israel's Prime Minister.
In 1973 Israel was at war after being attack on October 6, Yom Kippur, the most holy and serious day of the year, and Golda was then the Prime Minister. Golda had worked for that position. She wasn't chosen because she was a female. It's because she worked the hardest and deserved the position. Even so, she got a lot of flack because of the war. Syrian forces had attacked from the north and Egypt attacked from the west. After three weeks, Israel was victorious and had gained more Arab land. Golda Meir formed a new coalition government.
She was re-elected at the end of 1973 but retired in 1974. She wrote MY LIFE, an excellent book which I have read. Her marriage suffered throughout the process and broke up. She was a chain smoker who went through many a tense moment. She was wise, and is known for her wisdom through her many sayings.
When peace comes we will perhaps in time be able to forgive the Arabs for killing our sons, but it will be harder for us to forgive them for having forced us to kill their sons.
Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us.
We don’t thrive on military acts. We do them because we have to, and thank God we are efficient.
We have always said that in our war with the Arabs we had a secret weapon — no alternative. The Egyptians could run to Egypt, the Syrians into Syria. The only place we could run was into the sea, and before we did that we might as well fight.
We hate war. We do not rejoice in victories. We rejoice when a new kind of cotton is grown, and when strawberries bloom in Israel.
There were no such thing as Palestinians. When was there an independent Palestinian people with a Palestinian state? It was either southern Syria before the First World War, and then it was a Palestine including Jordan. It was not as though there was a Palestinian people in Palestine considering itself as a Palestinian people and we came and threw them out and took their country away from them. They did not exist..
She was there. She knew.
Women are different from men for a purpose. They were not created to be men's competitors but men's partners. Each has separate duties. Women are complaining that they have had no female president as yet. They shouldn't have a female as president just because she is a female. They should have a female because she has more of what it takes to preside than any male candidate running against her. I don't even think Prime Minister was ever Golda's goal in life. She was the best, that's all.
In Golda's day, women were just beginning to take their place in the IDF. Today their role in the IDF takes on even more equal responsibility with the men.
Resource:
https://www.biography.com/political-figure/golda-meir
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Golda_Meir
https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium-mother-s-day-why-the-stereotype-jewish-mother-1.5359488
Book: All of the Women of the Bible, by Edith Deen: Texas newspaper woman
 |
| Woody Allen's rendition of the typical Jewish mother: and our stereotype has suffered, but we have been strong and caring mothers. Children usually listen to us. We're smart. We give excellent advice-usually. We're the nudges who are never quite satisfied but give our children the reasons for attaining the most of of their talents. At first in history, Judaism was traced through the father. Later, it was traced through the mother when mankind got a little smarter. We'll never forget our Leah, Rachel, Rebekah and Sarah, women in the Torah who were our examples. Sarah was the wife of Abraham; Rebekah the wife of Isaac and Rachel and Leah, sisters and the wives of Jacob. |
Who do children listen to? Their mothers. That's because they are the ones who deal with the children the most. Children listen to their mothers or get in trouble. If they were in deep trouble with Mom, Dad would hear about it and with him, they would be very sorry that they ever got in such trouble in the first place. A child shouldn't ever fear his mother as she's the source of loving us.
So it was long ago before the Israelites had a king. They had judges. The judges were made up of either men or women. Women were pretty much on equal footing because both sexes had important positions in the family as Moses had spelled life positions out.
Before the Israelites settled in Canaan at the end of the Exodus of 40 years from Egypt, the elders of each group or community or nuclear family acted as judges. Afterward, the soldier-leader, priest or prophet assumed in addition to his chief function that of Judge.
The leaders of Israel in the period from the death of Joshua until before the time of Eli and Samuel which was about from 1220 to 1050 BCE spoke of information found in THE BOOK JUDGES. There were 6 important ones: Othniel-1st judge in Israel and son of Kenar of tribe of Judah, led the army, saved them from king of Aram-Naharaim)or (Syria)- who had enslaved Israel for 8 years), Ehud-from tribe of Benjamin who saved Israel from oppression of Eglon, king of Moab; Deborah-see below, Gideon-judge for 40 years of tribe of Manasseh, had defeated Midianites by using volunteer Israelites; offered kingship but refused, saying G-d was king of Israel; Jephthah-was threatened and so defeated the Ammonites and also defeated his own Ephraimites who opposed his leadership, judge for 6 years, and Samson- from tribe of Dan, son of Manoah, a Nazirite, strong, fought Philistines as Israelites wanted freedom from their suzerainty, . Deborah was the one female. Six others were mentioned in passing: Shamgar, Tola, Jair, Ibzan, Elon and Abdon.
Deborah was one of the judges. who lived way back in about 1150 BCE. She was the nurse for Rebekah. She had such capabilities that she was deemed a prophet as well. She was married, being the wife of Lapidoth. When the 12 Israelite tribes were fighting against the Canaanite king Jabin of Hazor and Sisera, his ally and commander, she was the one who roused up her people to revolt. At that time their leader was Barak, son of Abinoam. Something worthwhile noting that was written down for posterity to remember this feat was THE SONG OF VICTORY which was attributed to Deborah. It is regarded as one of the oldest compositions preserved in Hebrew. This information is recorded and found in (Genesis 35:8, Prophets, Judges 5). It goes back to the days of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and Rebekah was the wife of Isaac, daughter of Bethuel and mother of Esau and Jacob, the twins who were so different from each other. Rebekah was noted for her kindness.
Deborah was one of few women who have ever attained the public dignity and supreme authority, and was the only woman in the Bible who was placed at the height of political power by the common consent of the people. She has been compared to Joan of Arc who rode in front of everyone and led them to victory. So did Deborah! Her faith in G-d was where her strength came from and it was contagious, going to Israel. She was the keeper of a new spiritual vision that lit up all of Israel.
 |
Golda Meyerson Meir nee Mabovitch (b:3 May 1898-d: December 8, 1978 in Kiev, Ukraine, Russia,
daughter of Moshe and Bluma Mabovitch, when in 1905 a pogrom in their city killed 105, moved to USA as a child; In 1916-17, Golda Mabovitch attended Milwaukee Normal School (now the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee) over the objections of her parents, who wanted her to get married rather than pursue a profession. She did both, attaining a teaching certificate and marrying Morris Meyerson.
Moved to Palestine in 1921. Active in Labor Zionism,holding important posts. She took responsibility in the Histadrut and the Jewish Agency.
In 1948 when Israel was again born, she was the 1st Israel minister to the USSR. Being a member of Mapai of the Knesset since 1949, she was minister of labor in governments following then from 1949 to 1956, and foreign minister from 1956 to 1966. Then after that she was secretary of Mapai.
In 1969 she was chosen to succeed Levi Eshkol as Israel's Prime Minister.
In 1973 Israel was at war after being attack on October 6, Yom Kippur, the most holy and serious day of the year, and Golda was then the Prime Minister. Golda had worked for that position. She wasn't chosen because she was a female. It's because she worked the hardest and deserved the position. Even so, she got a lot of flack because of the war. Syrian forces had attacked from the north and Egypt attacked from the west. After three weeks, Israel was victorious and had gained more Arab land. Golda Meir formed a new coalition government.
When peace comes we will perhaps in time be able to forgive the Arabs for killing our sons, but it will be harder for us to forgive them for having forced us to kill their sons.
Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us.
We don’t thrive on military acts. We do them because we have to, and thank God we are efficient.
 |
| Golda died from Leukemia in Jerusalem. |
We have always said that in our war with the Arabs we had a secret weapon — no alternative. The Egyptians could run to Egypt, the Syrians into Syria. The only place we could run was into the sea, and before we did that we might as well fight.
We hate war. We do not rejoice in victories. We rejoice when a new kind of cotton is grown, and when strawberries bloom in Israel.
There were no such thing as Palestinians. When was there an independent Palestinian people with a Palestinian state? It was either southern Syria before the First World War, and then it was a Palestine including Jordan. It was not as though there was a Palestinian people in Palestine considering itself as a Palestinian people and we came and threw them out and took their country away from them. They did not exist..
She was there. She knew.
Women are different from men for a purpose. They were not created to be men's competitors but men's partners. Each has separate duties. Women are complaining that they have had no female president as yet. They shouldn't have a female as president just because she is a female. They should have a female because she has more of what it takes to preside than any male candidate running against her. I don't even think Prime Minister was ever Golda's goal in life. She was the best, that's all.
 |
| Real IDF woman soldier in Israel- I bet she's another Ziva when in defense mode. |
 |
| Ziva David, a fictional star in NCIS, playing the part of an Israeli, is not Jewish but is a Chilean-born American actress, Cote de Pablo. Her role of a woman who can outbeat any man in defense moves is amazing! She promotes the capability of IDF men as being the best in defense. |
In Golda's day, women were just beginning to take their place in the IDF. Today their role in the IDF takes on even more equal responsibility with the men.
https://www.biography.com/political-figure/golda-meir
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Golda_Meir
https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium-mother-s-day-why-the-stereotype-jewish-mother-1.5359488
Book: All of the Women of the Bible, by Edith Deen: Texas newspaper woman
Labels: Deborah, Golda Meir, Jewish mother
Friday, March 06, 2020
Closeness in a Family Unsurpassed! Story of Judah's People
Nadene Goldfoot
weakened in Judah and so many were taken away to Babylonia that they couldn't return for 50 years until 538 BCE. Judah was weakened and people there were imported from other places as unwanted in those statehoods.
486-465 BCE: King Ahasuerus of Persia (may have been Xerxes, son of Darius I) had a Chief Minister named Haman who resented the independent attitude of the Queen Esther's Uncle, Mordecai, so much that he hated all Jews because of this, and set about and accomplished starting a Holocaust of killing all in the Empire. It was the first such annihilation attempt, but was stopped by the Queen. Haman was known to be descended from the Amalek King Agag, the meanest of people we met during the Exodus who had attacked us. Haman is known now to be the enemy of the Jews. We look at the name-Hitler and think the same thing today. Purim commemorates this event of being rescued by Queen Esther.
When Jews were expelled surely they gathered together as there is safety in numbers, and pitched their tents together, traveling to find somewhere to live.
 |
| Assyria and Babylonia 2nd millennium BCE Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, Nile River in Egypt Leaving Assyria in 1948 BCE Assyria came for us in 722-721 BCE Babylonia came for more of us in 597 BCE and again in 586 BCE. Babylonia took over Assyrian lands |
We started off as a family with Terah leading the way from the 2 rivers in the east, and we followed the sun that sets in the West and came to Canaan(was Syria in the 15th century to 13th Century BCE; in stricter sense applies to the coast of Eretz Yisrael).
We were not in a hurry, biding our time, and Abraham was born in Ur of the Chaldees where we lived among the Canaanite and Philistines. We wandered into Egypt and set up our tents in Hebron. The family fought to get Lot, Abraham's nephew, back to safety from the Elamites and the Shinarites. Ha- Shem promised we would get to a safe place in a vision and that our future children would inherit this safe place from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates River. We made a covenant with Ha Shem by offering up Isaac, Abraham's son, in a sacrifice that was stopped by Ha Shem just in time. Ha Shem was testing our loyalty. We will remain most loyal to the end of times.
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| Going along the Euphrates River |
We were not in a hurry, biding our time, and Abraham was born in Ur of the Chaldees where we lived among the Canaanite and Philistines. We wandered into Egypt and set up our tents in Hebron. The family fought to get Lot, Abraham's nephew, back to safety from the Elamites and the Shinarites. Ha- Shem promised we would get to a safe place in a vision and that our future children would inherit this safe place from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates River. We made a covenant with Ha Shem by offering up Isaac, Abraham's son, in a sacrifice that was stopped by Ha Shem just in time. Ha Shem was testing our loyalty. We will remain most loyal to the end of times.
Jacob, Abraham's grandson, married in Haran the daughters of his Uncle Laban, Rachel and Leah. He also took each of their handmaids and had 12 sons and a daughter with the 4 wives. They resettled in Canaan and he lost Joseph to Egypt.
A draught caused our family of 70 to move to Egypt as no food could be found, and we multiplied there until the Egyptians grew fearful of us and our numbers. From the time of entering Egypt till the time we left was 400 years. In that time we were slaves of the Egyptians. We built storage cities, and worked 7 days a week. When we left, we had multiplied to be 603,550 people of the 12 tribes of Rueben, Simeon, Judah, Issachar, Zebuun, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Ephraim, Manasseh, and Benjamin. Moses led us out at his old age of 80.
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| Joshua leading us into Canaan |
Our Exodus took us 40 years to return to Canaan (a land divided into small city-states) where we had lived before the draught from Egypt, and Moses at 120 died just outside of Canaan, not quite making it in with us. Our numbers now were counted in a 2nd census and were 601,730. We had lost 1,820 due to attacks, aging, sickness, etc. It was a long trek.
We needed a leader so one of us in a group were chosen as judges of our problems. Finally we needed something more as we continued to multiply and wanted a king like other peoples had, so Saul was selected by the 11th century BCE. from the tribe of Benjamin. David became a very special king to us by 1010 BCE and then his son, Solomon the Wise became the next special and unforgettable king from 961 to 920 BCE.
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| Assyrian leading Israelites |
| We lost our Israel and 27,290 of the best of men there in the North in 721 BCE to the Assyrians as we had weakened when Solomon died in 920 BCE and after 586 BCE we |
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| Judah taken away by Babylonian soldiers |
weakened in Judah and so many were taken away to Babylonia that they couldn't return for 50 years until 538 BCE. Judah was weakened and people there were imported from other places as unwanted in those statehoods.
486-465 BCE: King Ahasuerus of Persia (may have been Xerxes, son of Darius I) had a Chief Minister named Haman who resented the independent attitude of the Queen Esther's Uncle, Mordecai, so much that he hated all Jews because of this, and set about and accomplished starting a Holocaust of killing all in the Empire. It was the first such annihilation attempt, but was stopped by the Queen. Haman was known to be descended from the Amalek King Agag, the meanest of people we met during the Exodus who had attacked us. Haman is known now to be the enemy of the Jews. We look at the name-Hitler and think the same thing today. Purim commemorates this event of being rescued by Queen Esther.
When Jews were expelled surely they gathered together as there is safety in numbers, and pitched their tents together, traveling to find somewhere to live.
The Romans under Pompey came along in 63 BCE and occupied our land of Judah, and wanting our holy city of Jerusalem with our Temple. They could not convert us to their worship of many gods they said lived up high on Mt. Olympus, and so in anger and jealousy, burnt down what they coveted, but robbed the golden and silver out first in 70 CE. Many of us found were taken as slaves to Rome and spread out with their soldiers later. Some managed to get to Spain.
Jesus was born in Bethlehem and after his death when 37 years old, was worshipped as G-d's son, similar thinking to the Greeks and Romans who had such situations with some of their gods. Christianity was born with a Roman Emperor's mother, Helena. She even was able to get her son, Emperor Constantine, converted.
115 CE was the earliest expulsion of Jews from a country. It was Cyprus.
300s CE Conferences in Constantinople decided that Jews were competition in religion, and they wanted all to follow them in their new religion of Christianity (eastern Catholicism). Jews were now not only in trouble for not worshipping multiple gods like other people but were in trouble for not worshipping Jesus Christ either! Jews continued with their own religion, and were kept from taking in gentiles into Judaism by the Christians on pain of death. As Judaism grew with the natural growth of the Jewish population, Christianity grew by leaps and bounds. Soon half the world was Christianized.
527 Emperor Justinian of Byzantine issued anti-Jewish laws in his codes.
553 Emperor Justinian of Byzantine issued his decree interfering with the conduct of the synagogue services
632 Mohammad died, Islam was on the march.
614 Emperor Heraelius of Byzantine issued an edict ordering the conversion of the Jews. The practice of Judaim was formally forbidden by successive emperors:
640 Byzantine Empire (Eastern Roman Empire including Judea) forces Jews to convert
721
723 Emperor Leo of Byzantine: Judaism was forbidden
873-874 were three times that Jews were forcibly converted to Christianity in the Byzantine Empire. Emperor Basil I forbid Judaism to be practiced by anyone.
932-936 Emperor Romanus Lucapenus of Byzantine forbid Judaism to be practiced
1290-1655 Jews were expulsed from England for 400 years.
1306 Jews were expulsed from France
1349-1360 Jews were expulsed from Hungary
1421 Jews were expulsed from Austria
1453 Attenuated Byzantine Empire conquered by the Turks, Jews had remained though treated with contempt.
1492 180,000 Jews were expulsed from Spain in the Spanish Inquisition Law
saying that Jews either had to convert (eastern Catholicism) or leave the country. This evidently comes from the Pope who tainted the whole world with his law as Portugal, where many had fled to, also added this law to their books as well and Jews had to leave there, too within a few years. If they remained and it was known, they were slaughtered.
1495 Lithuania expelled Jews.
1497 Jews were expulsed from Sicily and Sardinia and Portugal
1502 Jews were expulsed from the Island of Rhodes, forcibly converted if they didn't leave, or taken into slavery.
1541 Jews were expelled from the Kingdom of Naples
1727 Jews were expelled from Russia
1747 Jews were expelled from Russia
1838 Meshed, Persia didn't allow Jews to leave. They just forcibly converted them to Islam.
1882-1890 750,000 Jews were again forced to leave Russia proper and were even told where to move to: The Pale of Settlement, still owned by Queen Catherine but now Russia was, cleared of Jews.
1891 Jews were expelled from Moscow and St. Petersburg
1917 End of WWI Jews in the Soviet Union denied the right of national identity, all religion ended; Atheistic country.
1939-1945 WWII's Holocaust: The murder of 6 million Jews who after 1939 were not allowed to leave if they could find a country to take them in. It was by the German Nazis and their European collaborators.
1941: Baghdad attacked their Jewish community and slaughtered 180.
1948 Israel was created with the USA President Harry Truman's recognition of it at the UN being first. All others followed.
1948: Mass expulsions and persecutions in Arab countries.
Those Jews remaining through all the times were from the southern part of Israel which had been mainly populated by the tribe of Judah and a smattering of Benjamin and a few others. This was Judah, called Judea by the Romans. We've been forced to stick together, and of course it was our preference, too. Having 10 men together made a group that could survive, and those 10 men were accountable in the synagogue, and were called a minyan, something expected and important to hold a service, as the orthodox do today.
Israel started in 1948 with some 600,000 and have bested themselves now with 6 million Jews and others to be over 7 million. We've been a close-knit group since the beginning of our time. Is it not surprising then that I have found 4th and 5th cousins living in the same vicinity as myself? One even married my 1st cousin and the other traveled to my city in Oregon all the way from England.
We've been scattered and we come back together in Israel. Today Israel is more of a melting pot than the USA is. This is a time that was prophecized.
Wherever we've been, we've been together in a group, held together, marrying with our own people. We've been tempted on our treks, but cajolled and reprimanded not to mix with idol-worshippers. We were a lone group, odd in worshipping one unseen G-d, Ha Shem (the name). The shunning of us kept us together.
Other people started looking odd to us even, and their ways of religion, in
biblical days.
We are finding through DNA testing that we have been intermarrying for several
thousand years, the same group of people found during the many generations, receiving some of the same genes. Therefore we do have many 4th and 5th cousins and beyond that. Judaism has been a family, and a religion. We find that Aaron and Moses's male line has been found by our scientists to be the "Cohen gene" of J, the gene also found in an abundance of Arabs; who the Torah already said were our cousins. It's great when we find evidence of something told to us in the Tanakh.
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| When Mesha, the Moabite King, sacrificed his son, his heir. |
Other people started looking odd to us even, and their ways of religion, in
biblical days.
We are finding through DNA testing that we have been intermarrying for several
thousand years, the same group of people found during the many generations, receiving some of the same genes. Therefore we do have many 4th and 5th cousins and beyond that. Judaism has been a family, and a religion. We find that Aaron and Moses's male line has been found by our scientists to be the "Cohen gene" of J, the gene also found in an abundance of Arabs; who the Torah already said were our cousins. It's great when we find evidence of something told to us in the Tanakh.
Resource:
Facts About Israel, 1973 ministry for foreign affairs, Jerusalem
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
The Stone Edition: Tanach-the Torah, etc. (Old Testament)
Labels: Assyria, Babylonia, Byzantine Emperors, ghettos, history of Jews, Jews, Spanish Inquisition, WWII
Thursday, March 05, 2020
Leader of Anti-Semites: Kazys Skirpa of Lithuania
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| Kazys Skirpa February 18, 1895-August 18, 1979 He died at age 84 in Washington, DC. USA. Kazys Škirpa was a Lithuanian military officer and diplomat. He is best known as the founder of the Lithuanian Activist Front (LAF) and his involvement in the attempt to establish Lithuanian independence in June 1941. His fault was to be an anti-Semite. |
Nathan Abraham Goldfus, born 1871 in Telsiai, Lithuania
may have encountered which led him to get out of Lithuania and immigrate to the USA. Kazys's parents were living in an anti-Semite era as well. Nathan was in Boise, Idaho in 1905 marrying my grandmother, Zlata Jermulowske of Lazdijai, Suwalki, Lithuania /Poland. Nathan had left Lithuania and had gone to Dublin, Ireland, then Canada and finally the USA.
1794 Lithuania was part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
1795 -After this year Lithuania became part of the Russian Empire
1914-1918 WWI: During World War I he was mobilized into the Russian army and tried to form Lithuanian detachments in Petrograd.
1917: Germany conceived the geopolitical strategy of Mitteleuropa, a regional network of puppet states that would serve as a buffer zone. The Germans allowed the organisation of the Vilnius Conference, hoping that it would proclaim that the Lithuanian nation wanted to detach itself from Russia and establish a "closer relationship" with Germany. In September 1917, the Conference elected a twenty-member Council of Lithuania and empowered it to negotiate Lithuanian independence with the Germans.
1918: Lithuania declared her independence: He returned and volunteered during the Lithuanian Wars of Independence. The Council was unable to form a government, police, or other state institutions due to the continued presence of German troops.
1920: A member of the Lithuanian Peasant Popular Union, he was elected to the Constituent Assembly of Lithuania. After that he decided to pursue a military education in Institute of Technology in Zurich, Higher Military School in Kaunas, and Royal Military Academy (Belgium).
1925: He graduated and worked as chief of the General Staff, but was forced to resign after the 1926 Lithuanian coup d'état,
1926: Lithuanian coup d'etat: (it is an illegal, unconstitutional seizure of power by a dictator, the military, or a political faction.) He refused and tried to gather a military force to protect the government.
1926-1927: When it was occupied by the Soviet Union under the terms of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. Following a brief occupation by Nazi Germany after the Nazis waged war on the Soviet Union, Lithuania was again absorbed into the Soviet Union for nearly 50 years.
1927-1930: Skirpa was later serving as a Lithuanian representative to Germany
1937: League of Nations representative from Lithuania
1938: representative to Poland,
1938-1941: representative to Germany; organizer of Lithuania’s anti-Soviet rebellion and Prime Minister of Lithuania’s Provisional Government in 1941
1940: He established the Lithuanian Activist Front in Berlin, an umbrella organization representing Lithuanian political parties, which expressed support for the Third Reich and incited violence against Lithuanian Jewry. He argued for ethnic cleansing-to get rid of the Jews.
1949: In 1949, he emigrated to the United States. He worked at the Library of Congress.
1975: In 1975 his memoir book about the 1941 independence movement was published.
1979: He died in Washington DC. Originally interred in Washington, D.C.,
1995: In June his remains were returned to Kaunas , where he was reburied in Petrašiūnai Cemetery. His re-burial was attended by then Lithuanian Defense Minister Linas Linkevičius.
1990–1991, Lithuania restored its sovereignty with the Act of the Re-Establishment of the State of Lithuania. Lithuania joined the NATO alliance in 2004 and the European Union as part of its enlargement in 2004.
2019: Vilnius City Council decided to rename Skirpa Street:
Jerusalem –
The Simon Wiesenthal Center today welcomed yesterday's decision by the
Vilnius (Vilna) city council to rename a small street in the center of the city
which had been named for controversial Lithuanian diplomat Kazys Škirpa, due
to his anti-Semitic opinions and actions. The motion passed by a vote of 21-16
and was harshly criticized by right-wing nationalists.
In a statement issued here today by its director of Eastern European affairs, Holocaust historian Dr. Efraim Zuroff, the Center praised the vote and expressed the hope that honors bestowed on other Lithuanians who played a role in the Holocaust would also be removed.
According to Zuroff:
"The decision is a very important first step in a process which we hope will
facilitate true reconciliation. Vilnius Mayor Remigijus Šumašius deserves credit for
his role and his explanation of the decision which emphasized Škirpa's call to
his countrymen to "get rid of the Jews and create an oppressive
atmosphere so that they wouldn't even think that they could have rights
in Lithuania."
One Lithuanian defended his ethnic cleansing idea: Škirpa and the
organization which he led can be criticized in that the organizational
activity of LAF-in-Berlin elevated antisemitism to a political level and that
could have encouraged a portion of Lithuania’s residents to get involved in the
Holocaust. On the other hand it must be noted that LAF-in-Berlin proposed to
solve “the Jewish problem” not by genocide but by the method of expulsion from Lithuania.
Truly, let's face it. That in itself is a death sentence. In the 30s and 40s, Jews were not accepted in any country because they were not Christians. They could hardly get into the USA and needed a sponsor to do so. Nazis were everywhere.
The idea of saying that there was no anti-Semitism in Lithuania is ludicrous. This is a good example of how a government does such a thing. Out of approximately 208,000–210,000 Jews, an estimated 190,000–195,000 were murdered before the end of World War II, most between June and December 1941.
Update: 3/6/2020
Reference:
http://www.wiesenthal.com/about/news/wiesenthal-center-welcomes-44.html
Update: 3/6/2020
Reference:
http://www.wiesenthal.com/about/news/wiesenthal-center-welcomes-44.html
Labels: anti-Semitism, death, ehtnic cleansing, Germany, Kazys Skirpa, Lithuania, WWII
