This is a letter from Lech Walesa to Marek Edelman dated April 17, 1988. When Poland first offered to recognize Solidarity as the official state union, one of their conditions was that they expel Marek Edelman from its Exec. Committee. Lech Walesa refused and instead wrote this letter to Marek on Passover 1988, the 45th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising.
Corky Hale, a Jewish jazz musician, who turns out tunes on the piano and harp, celebrated the release of her new CD, “Corky Hale and Friends – I’m Glad There Is You,” during a swingin’ soiree held at Bel Air’s Vibrato on Sept. 21.
The latest Gallup poll indicates that in September, President Obama’s approval rating held steady at 52 percent. He has dropped from the stratosphere into the rough-and-tumble territory of normal politics. Among Jews, his support level is still a healthy 64 percent. While Jews are still far more pro-Obama than whites in general (who are at 44 percent), Jewish backing of the president has declined from their 78 percent vote for him in November and their 83 percent approval rating in January.
Marek Edelman could be said to embody both Poland’s Holocaust history and its modern Jewish revival. The last surviving leader of Warsaw’s ghetto uprising, a man credited with “awakening” Poland’s postwar generation to its proud Jewish legacy, Edelman was a hero to Polish Jews and gentiles.
A special exhibit displaying memories from Lou Schotland’s life adorned the walls of Agoura Hills Senior Retreat last month when the 87-year-old retiree was honored as the assisted-living facility’s Citizen of the Month. Through photographs and letters, Schotland illustrated a life story that stretches from World War II-era Poland to Youngstown, Ohio.
More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.