Yosef Kleinman became a surprise witness at the Eichmann trial, sharing a little-known piece of Holocaust history with captivated international listeners and making Kleinman a celebrity of sorts
Rabbi Gedaliah Anemer changed a shul with a thirty-five-man membership and an outside chance of survival into the thriving center that is the pride of Silver Spring, Maryland — with a flourishing yeshivah, yeshivah gedolah, and kollel. A year after his passing, the community of Silver Spring is just beginning to comprehend its loss
There are a few new shops on its only commercial block, and now two elementary schools for boys, but beneath it all, Gateshead clings tenaciously to the charter established when two men broke off from Newcastle to form what is now the only shtetl left in Europe.
Poland was closed in on all sides, and independent Lithuania had been seized by the Soviets. As Europe teetered on the brink of war and destruction, an unexpected rescue possibility developed for the Torah leaders who knew that while the Nazis would destroy their bodies, the Soviets would destroy their souls. They came from Kletzk, Baranovich, and Bialystok — scurrying for passage on the last ship out of Russia. Personal memories from a forgotten era.
“Every single chumrah that can possibly exist in industrial matzoh production, I have instituted in my bakery,” Rav Yoel Teitelbaum of Satmar once declared.
