JACOB JR. - BENLEUMI NEWS יעקב ג 'וניור. הבינלאומי חדשות

Thursday, Kislev 14, 5776. November 26, 2015. Shalom! World. Once's the site of the city's 13th century defensive fortifications,  the moats were filled, the walls razed and the towers demolished - with the notable exceptions of the grand Florianska Gate and impenetrable Barbican - during Austrian occupation in the first half of the 19th century. While today it's easy to regret the shortsighted destruction of Krakow's medieval city walls, we can thank the Austrians for replacing them with this lovely green strollway encircling the centre of the Old Town.  Known as the 'lungs of the city', the Planty is one of Krakow's  lost unique and charming features - three kilometres of public parks and gardens filled with trees, flowers, benches and historic monuments. Walking its circuit would take over an hour, but represents a great way to see the city. A popular place for street musicians to perform, drunks to drink (note that drinking in publi...

Jeudi, Kislev 7, 5776. Novembre 19, 2015. Shalom! Monde. C'est en 1686 que Francesco Procopio dei Coltelli, gentilhomme de Palerme, installa rue des Fossés Saint-Germain (aujourd'hui rue de L'Ancienne Comédie) son débit de café. L'excellence des boissons et des sorbets qu'il y offrait à consommer, le cadre agréable et le voisinage de L'Ancienne Comédie Française firent que son établissement devint très rapidement le lieu de réunion des  beaux esprits.  Le premier café littéraire du monde était né et durant plus de deux siècles, tout ce qui portait un nom, ou qui espérait en porter un, dans le monde des lettres, des arts et de la politique, fréquenta le Café Le Procope. De La Fontaine, en passant par Voltaire, Rousseau, Beaumarchais, Balzac, Hugo, Verlaine et tant d'autres, la liste des "habitués" du Procope est celle-là même des grands noms de la littérature française.  Au 18ème siècle, les idées libérales y prirent leur ...

Wednesday, Cheshvan 29, 5776. November 11, 2015. Shalom! World. The Mausoleum Remains and bones of the murdered were found in many places on the grounds following the liquidation of the camp. In May 1947, volunteers raised a kurhan mound from the human remains. Young people, soldiers, factory workers and social organizations joined in, and Stefan Wyszynski, bishop of Lublin at the time, urged the faithful to help. Over the course of several months, 1,300 cubic meters of earth mixed with remains were collected. The mound functioned as commemoration of the victims of the camp until the end of the 1960s. At that time, the remains were deposited below the dome of the newly constructed Mausoleum, where they rest to this day.  The Monument to Struggle and Martyrdom In response to requests from former prisioners, who regarded the existing forms of commemoration too modest, an "open competition for a monument honoring the victims of the death camp at...

Tuesday, Cheshvan 21, 5776. November 3, 2015. Shalom! World. Konzentrationslager Lublin, popularly called Majdanek, functioned from October 1941 to July 1944. Originally it was supposed to be the source of free workforce which was going to be used while building the SS district in Lublin and realizing the economic enterprises aimed at germanization of the town and region. However, in practice Majdanek combined a range of functions. It was a death camp for the Jews, concentration camp for prisioners of various nacionalities, penalty and transit camp for the rural populationof Lubelskie region, camp for Soviet prisioners of warr, as well as an execution site for people arrested outside the  camp by German police authorities (so-called death transports). Majdanek, situated in the south-east outskirts of Lublin, occupied the area of 270 hectares. It consisted of three sectors: the SS segment, the administration section and prisioner area, which was made up of five fields...