Rafael Medoff, PhD, is founding director of The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies and the author of more than 20 books about Jewish history and the Holocaust.
Rafael Medoff
By Rafael Medoff
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The Schmooze Joe Kubert, Comic Book Legend, Dies at 85
Iconic comic book artist and writer Joe Kubert spent most of his life drawing brawny super heroes, lionhearted jungle men and rampaging dinosaurs. But at age 75, Kubert began a journey back to his roots that led him to illustrate Warsaw Ghetto fighters, Holocaust survivors, and ethical mini-lessons for the Chabad-Lubavitch hasidic movement. Kubert, who…
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News Refugee to Rescuer, a Hanukkah Tale
Seventy-five years ago this month, 5-year-old Rudy Boschwitz, tightly gripping his mother’s hand, gingerly stepped down the gangplank of the S.S. Majestic and onto the dock at New York City. It was the third night of Hanukkah. After two years of wandering from country to country, the future United States senator and his family had…
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Opinion Retracing Zionist Steps in Benzion Netanyahu’s Manhattan
Seventy years ago, Benzion Netanyahu stood on the balcony of his small Manhattan apartment and wondered how his world had suddenly turned upside down. Then 31 years old, the Zionist activist had arrived from Jerusalem in the spring of 1940, brimming with optimism about his mission of mobilizing American support for creating a Jewish state…
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Opinion Actions Speak Louder Than (Even Ugly) Words
Newly released tapes of President Richard Nixon’s private conversations in 1973 include a remark that antisemitism will increase in the United States if American Jews “don’t start behaving.” As outrageous as that comment was, it should be kept in mind that Nixon was not the first American president to privately express antisemitic sentiments — nor…
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Opinion Morgenthaus vs. Genocide
Robert Morgenthau’s announcement that he will retire after more than three decades as Manhattan’s district attorney caps an impressive career in law enforcement. With his latest case, against banks illegally aiding the governments of Iran and Sudan, three generations of Morgenthaus have now confronted perpetrators of genocide — which is as tragic a commentary on…
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Opinion When Leonard Bernstein ‘Dug’ the Irgun
‘I dig absolutely.” Those three awkward words, spoken by Leonard Bernstein to a Black Panther spouting pseudo-Marxist rhetoric at a soiree in the Bernstein home in 1970, immortalized the stereotype of the guilt-ridden upper-class liberal embracing violent radicals. The composer found himself publicly mocked, first by William F. Buckley Jr. in a newspaper column titled…
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Opinion Create a Temporary Israeli Haven for Darfur Refugees
The Israeli government has announced that it will not admit any more refugees from the Darfur genocide, and has begun deporting to Egypt many of those who recently arrived. Do memories of the abandonment of Jews during the Holocaust obligate the Jewish state to shelter today’s refugees? Or is Israel, saddled with its own problems…
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Opinion Recognize Resurgence of Antisemitism in France
Physical attacks on Jews in France increased by 45% last year, and verbal attacks increased by 71%, according to a new report prepared by CRIF, the umbrella group of French Jewish organizations. That is bad enough news. But to make matters worse, the French ambassador to the United States has been quoted as claiming that…
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