A replica of Warsaw’s Great Synagogue was unveiled Friday on the site where it was torn down by Nazis 70 years ago. The miniature reproduction is a 1:10 scale mock up made of plywood, featuring the original synagogue’s columns, towers and detailing. The Great Synagogue was demolished after SS General Juergen Stroop ordered it blown up in 1943. Friday’s ceremony took place exactly 70 years and one day after that order. "Looking at the replica, Jurgen Stroop must be turning in his grave," …More

After a ban, Poland may be set to reinstate kosher slaughter. [Times of Israel] Unseen Amy Winehouse photos go on display at London Jewish Museum. [Londonist] Bulgaria's Ataka party is following neo-Nazi lines. [Arutz Sheva] Palestine has chosen a new president--on TV. [Ynet] Ultra-Orthodox Jewish men are breaking the fashion mold. [Forward] The Vatican plans a Torah art exhibit in Venice. [Forward] In praise of dairy restaurants...and blintzes. [Tablet] Gazans like KFC so much, they're smuggling it …More

Construction workers near the sole surviving synagogue in Oswiecim turned up a postcard that sheds light on prewar Jewish life in the Polish town. Oswiecim, the site of the Nazi death camp Auschwitz, had a majority Jewish population before World War II. The postcard, stained and crumpled, came to light this week during construction work to shore up a retaining wall of the Chevra Lomdei Mishnayot synagogue. A lawyer in Paris named Georges Lewinsky sent the postcard on July 17, 1935 to a Jewish client in Oswiecim …More

In Warsaw, sirens wailed and church bells rang to mark the 70th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, a valiant but failed revolt by Jewish fighters against the Nazi occupiers who already had deported hundreds of thousands of Jews to the Treblinka extermination camp. An official commemoration, held last Friday in a plaza between the monument honoring the ghetto heroes and the new Museum of the History of Polish Jews, was attended by Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski and Prime Minister Donald Tusk, as …More

Residents across Poland came together today to mark the 70th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Sirens and church bells rung out in Warsaw, as state ceremonies hosted by Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski commemorated history’s largest example of Nazi resistance. The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising was a month-long rebellion led by thousands of Jews living within the notorious Warsaw Ghetto. On April 19, 1943, erev Pesach, the Jewish residents stood together with smuggled firearms and handmade grenades, …More

Warsaw’s Museum of the History of Polish Jews opened today, on the 70th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. With approximately 90 percent of Poland’s Jews killed in the Holocaust and ongoing uprisings of anti-Semitism, Poland is one of the last European countries affected by the Holocaust to build a Jewish museum. Finalized almost seven decades after World War II ended, the museum has been in the works for nearly 20 years and has seen $100 million put into its construction. Chief Rabbi of …More

On April 18, 1945, factory owner Oskar Schindler wrote what was arguably the most important list of his life. The German entrepreneur was known for his business savvy and persuasive tongue, skills he put to the test in convincing Nazi authorities to resist deportation of more than 1,200 Jews, individuals who would go down in history as the “Schindlerjuden.” Schindler was born April 28, 1908, into a Roman Catholic family. As a schoolboy he worked in sales after his studies, showing an early aptitude …More

Top US officials who deal with the Holocaust will represent the United States at the 70th anniversary commemoration of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. President Obama appointed the delegation, which will be led by Stephen Mull, the US ambassador to Poland, on Tuesday for the commemoration to be held three days later. The delegation includes Douglas Davidson, the State Department's special envoy for Holocaust issues; Lesley Weiss, the chairwoman of the US Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad, …More

The Polish Jewish Museum has finally opened. [Forward] How "Hatikvah" became a national anthem. [Times of Israel] Pro-Palestinians attack an Israeli opera singer in South Africa. [Times of Israel] A look at the IDF Air Show in pictures. [Arutz Sheva] Eighty new immigrants join the IDF. [Ynet] The mystery of the "Jew in a bag" is solved. [Ynet] …More

Prosecutors in Lublin said they have no legal basis for prosecuting a Swedish artist who admitted to stealing ashes of Holocaust victims who died in Poland. An investigation into the actions of Carl Michael von Hausswolff, who allegedly used human ashes stolen from former death Nazi death camp Majdanek, was suspended by prosecutors in Lublin because the theft occurred in 1989 and the Polish statute of limitations on such a crime is five years. The case is "beyond the jurisdiction of the Polish justice system," a …More

A battle between Germany and Poland heated up this week, as a popular Polish magazine ran a cover image of German Chancellor Angela Merkel dressed as a concentration camp prisoner. Conservative weekly Uwazam Rze ran the photo Tuesday with a headline reading, “Falsification of History: How the Germans Are Turning Themselves into Victims of the Second World War.” The debate started with a three-part miniseries produced by a state-run German television station in March. The series was wildly popular in …More

By Lt. Col. Avital Leibovich In 2004, I joined the Witnesses in Uniform delegation of 180 IDF officers to Poland. We had the chance to visit some of the major sites of Holocaust memory, including Auschwitz-Birkenau. We also saw the Lodz ghetto--the place where my father was imprisoned during the war. Every participant on the trip had to spend some time preparing beforehand. I thought that this might be an opportunity to sit down with my father and have him share his experiences with me. He had never spoken about …More