Latest news with #JewishHolocaust
Yahoo
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
A photographer spotlighted Holocaust survivors by pairing them with celebrities in moving portraits
Photographer Bryce Thompson paired Holocaust survivors with celebrities in intimate portraits. The "Borrowed Spotlight" project aims to leverage celebrities' fame to amplify survivors' stories. Celebrity participants included Cindy Crawford, Barbara Corcoran, Sheryl Sandberg, and Billy Porter. Fashion photographer Bryce Thompson has worked with supermodels and shot numerous magazine covers and ad campaigns. For his latest photo series, he trained his camera on a different subject: aging Holocaust survivors. The "Borrowed Spotlight" project pairs celebrities and business leaders with Jewish survivors of the Holocaust, capturing heartfelt moments of connection and amplifying their testimonies to combat antisemitism and all forms of hate. Famous participants who lent their public platforms to the project include "Shark Tank" star and real estate mogul Barbara Corcoran, former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg, supermodel Cindy Crawford, and actors Jennifer Garner, Billy Porter, and David Schwimmer. The photos are on display for a limited time at Detour Gallery in New York City, but are also available as a coffee table book. Proceeds from the book and print sales benefit Holocaust education and resources for survivors. Take a look at photos from "Borrowed Spotlight." Fashion photographer Bryan Thompson took intimate portraits of celebrities meeting Holocaust survivors for a project entitled "Borrowed Spotlight." Thompson didn't introduce the celebrities and survivors before the photo shoot so that he could photograph their first moments meeting each other. "This initiative paired celebrities and notable individuals from diverse industries with survivors not just to spread the message but to engage directly — listening, questioning, and sharing in these profound experiences," he wrote in the coffee table book's introduction. The project aims to leverage celebrities' fame to amplify the stories of aging Holocaust survivors. Around 220,850 Jewish Holocaust survivors are still alive today, and most are over 85 years old, according to the 2025 Global Demographic Report on Jewish Holocaust survivors published by the Claims Conference. Photos from "Borrowed Spotlight" will be on display at Detour Gallery in New York City through April 27. A full list of the exhibition hours can be found on Borrowed Spotlight's official website. The "Borrowed Spotlight" coffee table book retails for $360, with the proceeds going to Holocaust education programs. Proceeds from a private auction of prints from the series will also be donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and SelfHelp, an organization that provides trauma-informed care to Holocaust survivors in New York. Cindy Crawford wrote the foreword to the photo book and posed with 98-year-old Ella Mandel. Crawford wrote that meeting Mandel, who was 13 years old when German forces invaded Poland in 1939, was "profoundly inspiring." "She shared the heartbreaking losses she endured: her sister, her father, her mother, and another sister — all gone. She was the only survivor in her family," Crawford wrote. "She told me how, at her lowest point, her friend's brother told her, 'No more death. We're getting married.' They did, and they built a life together in the United States." Thompson photographed tears streaming down Kat Graham's face as she listened to Yetta Kane's story. Kane's blonde hair and blue eyes, which the Nazis viewed as traits of a superior race, allowed her to work as a courier for Jewish resistance groups known as partisans when she was 8 years old. "We're here to tell the story," Kane told Graham, an actor best known for her role on "The Vampire Diaries." "That's what's important." Scooter Braun sat down for a conversation with Joseph Alexander, 103, whose number tattoo from a concentration camp was visible on his arm. Born in 1922, Alexander endured the Warsaw Ghetto and 12 concentration camps, including Auschwitz and Dachau, before he was liberated in 1945. He was the only surviving member of his family out of his parents and five siblings. Alexander visited Dachau in 2023 to mark the 78th anniversary of the liberation of the camp. "I want to be in this shape at 103," Braun said as he sat with Alexander. Former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg shared a tender moment with George Elbaum. Elbaum's mother helped him evade Nazi persecution by paying Catholic families to take him in and conceal his Jewish identity. "It's an amazing thing to go through what you've been through, or to see life and be able to be an optimist," Sandberg told Elbaum. "It is the only way I survived it," he said. Tova Friedman told Barbara Corcoran that she survived Auschwitz at age 6 because a gas chamber malfunctioned. "We, the survivors, have an obligation not only to remember those that were slaughtered so ruthlessly, but also to warn and teach that hate begets hate and killing more killing," Friedman said. Thompson photographed Billy Porter with Bella Rosenberg, who was one of only 140 Jews to survive from her Polish hometown of 20,000. Porter, a Broadway star, wrote on Instagram that Rosenberg's story "is a powerful reminder of what can happen when hate goes unchecked and why we must remain vigilant in protecting the most vulnerable in our society." "If you don't tell your story, people won't know," 95-year-old Gabriella Karin told Jennifer Garner. A 25-year-old lawyer hid Karin and her family for nine months in his one-bedroom apartment across the street from a Nazi outpost. Thompson hopes that the photo series helps combat modern antisemitism and all forms of prejudice and hate. "These survivors stand as living testaments, urging us never to forget that empathy and action are often the difference between life and oblivion," Thompson wrote. Read the original article on Business Insider
American Press
23-04-2025
- Business
- American Press
Jim Beam column:Governor has his billionaire
Jeffrey Yass is Louisiana Republican Gov. Jeff Landry's billionaire.(Photo courtesy of Louisiana's Republican Gov. Jeff Landry continues to blame philanthropist and billionaire George Soros for the defeat of Amendment 2 on March 29 that killed a rewrite of the finance article of the state constitution. Soros is often a scapegoat for Republican conservatives, even when he isn't involved. Landry now has his own billionaire helping him promote school choice, but he isn't complaining. His spokesperson didn't respond to a request from The Advocate for a comment on his supporter. Jeffrey Steven Yass is the American billionaire businessman who helps fund Club for Growth, an organization that is helping Landry by financing an advertisement promoting school choice. Before getting into that story, here is more news on those billionaires: Real Clear Politics in January said, 'A Jewish Holocaust survivor, Soros fled communism in Hungary and immigrated to the United States, finding success on Wall Street as a hedge fund magnate.' One report said Soros influenced the fall of communism in Eastern Europe in the late 1980s and early 1990s. He has funded some worthwhile causes and does support progressive and liberal issues. Between 1979 and 2017, Soros donated more than $12 billion to reduce poverty and increase transparency and on scholarships and universities around the world. Yass has a net worth of $59 billion, according to Forbes. He is the richest man in Pennsylvania and the 25th wealthiest person in the world. He is a registered Libertarian who gives money to conservative super political action committees. Both Yass and his wife are supporters of school choice and have donated tens of millions of dollars to the cause. And that brings us back to the Club for Growth's advertisement. The club bought airtime on television channels across the state, including those in New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Lafayette, Shreveport and Lake Charles, according to a filing with the Federal Communications Commission. The ad that started running Sunday targets Louisiana legislators who have challenged Landry's school choice plan called LA GATOR. It urges Louisiana voters to contact their state representatives and demand that they 'fully fund' the scholarship program. Landry has proposed putting $93.5 million into the program next school year. However, some top state lawmakers, including Senate President Cameron Henry, R-Metairie, want to spend about half that much. While the ad displays phone numbers for the Louisiana House and Senate, a voice-over says, 'Tell them, 'Don't shortchange our kids,'' Club for Growth says it has funded campaigns in 10 other states promoting programs similar to Louisiana's. The Advocate said the club spent millions in Texas to unseat Republican lawmakers who were opposed to school vouchers, helping clear the way for that state's Legislature to pass a major voucher bill. David McIntosh, president of Club for Growth, in a statement last year said, 'Make no mistake — if you call yourself a Republican and oppose school freedom, you should expect to lose your next primary.' The ad calls Louisiana's new voucher-like program 'Landry's education freedom plan.' The newspaper said a Club for Growth spokesperson said they spent 'six figures' on the ad and for outreach to residents digitally and over the phone. The spokesperson wouldn't say whether the group coordinated with Landry's office, which didn't respond to a request for comment. That is pretty much the Landry administration's method of operation when it comes to commenting on almost anything. The Advocate said Club for Growth, which promotes free enterprise and limited government, describes itself and its political arms as 'the largest and most successful conservative political giving group.' In 2023, the club endorsed Landry in his bid to become governor, citing his support for 'school choice voucher programs.' It spent nearly $16 million during state elections in Texas and Tennessee last year to defeat Republicans it says opposed school vouchers. McIntosh, the club's president, said, 'The school freedom revolution is just beginning.' Landry hasn't provided any proof that Soros was a major player in the defeat of Amendment 2. It had numerous opponents because it was so complicated and wide-ranging. The governor forgets that what Yass is doing is what Soros often does and it is typical politics and it isn't illegal. If those who have wealth want to use it to promote various causes, that is their prerogative. Unfortunately, this nation's and state laws and court rulings have allowed unlimited and extremely large political contributions possible. Jim Beam, the retired editor of the American Press, has covered people and politics for more than six decades. Contact him at 337-515-8871 or Reply Forward Add reaction
Yahoo
25-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Contributor: The culture of shhh — what my Nazi legacy taught me about silence
Oskar Jakob, 94, is a Jewish Holocaust survivor who once assembled V-1 flying bombs in a subterranean concentration camp, and I'm the granddaughter of the engineer who developed those secret Nazi super weapons. Despite or perhaps because of our respective histories, we've worked to become friends. And while I've known Oskar for a few years, it's only recently, as neo-Nazis flew swastika flags in Cincinnati and Columbus, Ohio, that I felt the need to use my own ancestry to fight this brand of hate. The white supremacist demonstrations in Ohio weren't one-offs. Last fall, another black-clad group, their faces covered, did the same just three miles from Oskar's St. Louis home. 'America for the White Man,' declared the banner they hung from an overpass on Interstate 64. Oskar's son snapped a picture as he drove by and sent it to me along with three angry-face emojis. These incidents made me angry too, but also profoundly uncomfortable. What is the proper response when thugs perpetuate the hateful rhetoric of a political party to which your grandfather once belonged? And what could be more uncomfortable than the weight of the history between Oskar and me? Read more: Contributor: Putin's diaspora will echo 1939's, but going in the opposite direction In 1945, after 40 of Oskar Jakob's family members died at Auschwitz, the SS imprisoned him at the Mittelbau-Dora camp in Nordhausen, Germany. Deep in the tunnels of this former gypsum mine, 14-year-old Oskar was forced to rivet sheet metal used to make Vergeltungswaffe Einz: Vengeance Weapon #1. This was the world's first cruise missile and my grandfather Robert Lusser headed the Luftwaffe project to create it. I met Oskar eight decades later when I flew to St. Louis to interview him for a podcast I host about my German history. I'd been wanting to speak with a survivor for years, but it wasn't easy to connect because each Holocaust group I asked for help declined. Putting a relative of the Nazi engineer who created weapons of mass destruction in touch with a slave laborer who assembled them in conditions so horrific that 20,000 prisoners died was a nonstarter. But finally, I found Oskar, and on a warm spring afternoon, I found myself sitting in his neat dining room, listening to him tell of a night when guards caught a group of prisoners resting. 'They hung 70 people simultaneously, and we were forced to march by the dead bodies and everybody had to punch them with their fist,' he said. I stared out at the bright, Midwestern afternoon, longing to feel the sun on my face. Read more: After 80 years, not many Auschwitz survivors are left. One man makes telling the stories his mission 'I feel very much like I want to tell you that I'm so sorry,' I said instead, not exactly sure on whose behalf I was apologizing. My own? My family's? All of humanity? 'I appreciate that,' Oskar said, his face folded neatly, like an old map. 'Up 'til today I have never heard from a German that they are sorry for what I went through.' Technically, I'm not German. My grandfather immigrated to the United States in 1948, recruited to build bombs for America. I had ignored my controversial German legacy for most of my life. After all, no one really wants to ask the question: Was Grandpa an ideological Nazi? Our family lore emphasized the genius engineer theme and disregarded the fact that Robert Lusser joined the Nazi party in 1937 to advance his career. Read more: Auschwitz was liberated 80 years ago. The spotlight is on survivors as their numbers dwindle A decade later, the Office of Strategic Services, precursor to the CIA, cleared my grandfather of any crimes, in part because it benefited America's Cold War cause to have him on our weapons team. Investigators categorized him as Mitläufer — a 'fellow traveler' — someone who benefited from Hitler's regime while not actively participating in its atrocities. My grandfather stood silent in the face of evil because that was the beneficial, easier choice. Just as many Germans ignored the rise of National Socialism in the 1920s and '30s, too many Americans are ignoring what's happening here a century later. "Antisemitic incidents in the U.S. rose 140% from 2022 to 2023,' Oren Segal of the Anti-Defamation League's Center on Extremism told me. 'We documented over 10,000 incidents between the Oct. 7th, 2023, attack on Israel and its anniversary in 2024.' Read more: Contributor: As a Holocaust survivor, the most important thing I can do is share my story After wrestling with generational guilt, which feels like a curse handed down through time, and questioning my responsibility as an American personally connected to Nazi history, I made a decision. When swastika flags fly in America and white supremacists shout 'Heil Hitler!' and racial slurs, when a presidential surrogate offers a Nazi-style salute and makes common cause with Germany's neo-Nazi-adjacent political party, the AfD, I will not be a fellow traveler. Or a bystander. My first social media post using my family history as a cautionary tale was viewed almost 2 million times and drew thousands of comments, some full of hate and ridicule. It makes me anxious to put myself in the public eye, but it's no underground death camp, without sunlight, escape or hope. When Oskar and I spoke last May at the Kaplan Feldman Holocaust Museum in St. Louis, it was standing room only. 'Suzanne Rico is a descendant of a Nazi engineer,' said the master of ceremonies. Oskar nodded his white-haired head as 300 people waited to hear what I had to say. I said that history's most terrifying ghosts are coming back to life. If you don't believe me, look closely at photos taken on an Ohio street or a Missouri interstate. Pay attention to the covered faces of cowards trying to intimidate through fear. And then ask yourself: What uncomfortable legacy might we leave our children and grandchildren if we stay silent this time around? Suzanne Rico is an award-winning television and print journalist. She hosts the podcast "The Man Who Calculated Death." @suzannerico on all platforms If it's in the news right now, the L.A. Times' Opinion section covers it. Sign up for our weekly opinion newsletter. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
25-03-2025
- Politics
- Los Angeles Times
The culture of shhh — what my Nazi legacy taught me about silence
Oskar Jakob, 94, is a Jewish Holocaust survivor who once assembled V-1 flying bombs in a subterranean concentration camp, and I'm the granddaughter of the engineer who developed those secret Nazi super weapons. Despite or perhaps because of our respective histories, we've worked to become friends. And while I've known Oskar for a few years, it's only recently, as neo-Nazis flew swastika flags in Cincinnati and Columbus, Ohio, that I felt the need to use my own ancestry to fight this brand of hate. The white supremacist demonstrations in Ohio weren't one-offs. Last fall, another black-clad group, their faces covered, did the same just three miles from Oskar's St. Louis home. 'America for the White Man,' declared the banner they hung from an overpass on Interstate 64. Oskar's son snapped a picture as he drove by and sent it to me along with three angry-face emojis. These incidents made me angry too, but also profoundly uncomfortable. What is the proper response when thugs perpetuate the hateful rhetoric of a political party to which your grandfather once belonged? And what could be more uncomfortable than the weight of the history between Oskar and me? In 1945, after 40 of Oskar Jakob's family members died at Auschwitz, the SS imprisoned him at the Mittelbau-Dora camp in Nordhausen, Germany. Deep in the tunnels of this former gypsum mine, 14-year-old Oskar was forced to rivet sheet metal used to make Vergeltungswaffe Einz: Vengeance Weapon #1. This was the world's first cruise missile and my grandfather Robert Lusser headed the Luftwaffe project to create it. I met Oskar eight decades later when I flew to St. Louis to interview him for a podcast I host about my German history. I'd been wanting to speak with a survivor for years, but it wasn't easy to connect because each Holocaust group I asked for help declined. Putting a relative of the Nazi engineer who created weapons of mass destruction in touch with a slave laborer who assembled them in conditions so horrific that 20,000 prisoners died was a nonstarter. But finally, I found Oskar, and on a warm spring afternoon, I found myself sitting in his neat dining room, listening to him tell of a night when guards caught a group of prisoners resting. 'They hung 70 people simultaneously, and we were forced to march by the dead bodies and everybody had to punch them with their fist,' he said. I stared out at the bright, Midwestern afternoon, longing to feel the sun on my face. 'I feel very much like I want to tell you that I'm so sorry,' I said instead, not exactly sure on whose behalf I was apologizing. My own? My family's? All of humanity? 'I appreciate that,' Oskar said, his face folded neatly, like an old map. 'Up 'til today I have never heard from a German that they are sorry for what I went through.' Technically, I'm not German. My grandfather immigrated to the United States in 1948, recruited to build bombs for America. I had ignored my controversial German legacy for most of my life. After all, no one really wants to ask the question: Was Grandpa an ideological Nazi? Our family lore emphasized the genius engineer theme and disregarded the fact that Robert Lusser joined the Nazi party in 1937 to advance his career. A decade later, the Office of Strategic Services, precursor to the CIA, cleared my grandfather of any crimes, in part because it benefited America's Cold War cause to have him on our weapons team. Investigators categorized him as Mitläufer — a 'fellow traveler' — someone who benefited from Hitler's regime while not actively participating in its atrocities. My grandfather stood silent in the face of evil because that was the beneficial, easier choice. Just as many Germans ignored the rise of National Socialism in the 1920s and '30s, too many Americans are ignoring what's happening here a century later. 'Antisemitic incidents in the U.S. rose 140% from 2022 to 2023,' Oren Segal of the Anti-Defamation League's Center on Extremism told me. 'We documented over 10,000 incidents between the Oct. 7th, 2023, attack on Israel and its anniversary in 2024.' After wrestling with generational guilt, which feels like a curse handed down through time, and questioning my responsibility as an American personally connected to Nazi history, I made a decision. When swastika flags fly in America and white supremacists shout 'Heil Hitler!' and racial slurs, when a presidential surrogate offers a Nazi-style salute and makes common cause with Germany's neo-Nazi-adjacent political party, the AfD, I will not be a fellow traveler. Or a bystander. My first social media post using my family history as a cautionary tale was viewed almost 2 million times and drew thousands of comments, some full of hate and ridicule. It makes me anxious to put myself in the public eye, but it's no underground death camp, without sunlight, escape or hope. When Oskar and I spoke last May at the Kaplan Feldman Holocaust Museum in St. Louis, it was standing room only. 'Suzanne Rico is a descendant of a Nazi engineer,' said the master of ceremonies. Oskar nodded his white-haired head as 300 people waited to hear what I had to say. I said that history's most terrifying ghosts are coming back to life. If you don't believe me, look closely at photos taken on an Ohio street or a Missouri interstate. Pay attention to the covered faces of cowards trying to intimidate through fear. And then ask yourself: What uncomfortable legacy might we leave our children and grandchildren if we stay silent this time around? Suzanne Rico is an award-winning television and print journalist. She hosts the podcast 'The Man Who Calculated Death.' @suzannerico on all platforms
Telegraph
04-03-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
Actor who played Dodi Fayed in The Crown to be interviewed by police over Gaza rally
In a statement on his Instagram, Abdalla said he had received a letter from Scotland Yard summoning him to attend 'a formal interview' in relation to his attendance at the protest. He said: 'It remains to be seen if this will result in charges. The right to protest is under attack in this country and it requires us all to defend it.' He said there had been an 'alarming rise in attempts to censor voices that stand up for Palestine'. The actor added: 'The days of silencing after intimidation are gone. The stakes are too high… momentum is on the side of justice and shared humanity.' Abdalla has been one of Hollywood's most outspoken actors on the Gaza conflict, having publicly called for a permanent ceasefire. He also signed the Artists for Palestine UK open letter to the BBC, which criticised the broadcaster's decision to remove a Gaza documentary from iPlayer after it emerged that the boy narrating the programme was the son of a senior Hamas official. The PSC said it 'condemned' the Met's issuing of letters to protesters, the recipients of which included Stephen Kapos, an 87-year-old Jewish Holocaust survivor. 'Massive overreach of police powers' The group said: 'What is claimed by the police as justification for this massive overreach of their powers is a complete misrepresentation of what took place, not just on the day but beforehand. 'We will not be cowed by these attacks on our rights. 'We demand that the Metropolitan Police halt any prosecutions or proceedings against those involved in this entirely peaceful protest.' It comes after Jeremy Corbyn, the former Labour leader, and John McDonnell, the former shadow chancellor, were also interviewed under caution for their attendance at the rally. Protesters were arrested after allegedly breaching conditions that had been imposed on the gathering by the Met. Thousands of supporters of the PSC had been planning to march past the BBC in protest of the corporation's coverage of the Israel-Gaza conflict. But police refused to allow the march amid concerns that it would pass close to a synagogue on the Sabbath. A static rally in Whitehall was therefore agreed instead of a march, although dozens were arrested in Trafalgar Square for allegedly breaching those conditions. The Met confirmed that 21 protesters have so far been charged with breaching the conditions in place. A force spokesman said: 'As part of our ongoing investigation into alleged breaches of Public Order Act conditions on Saturday Jan 18 we have invited a further eight people to be interviewed under caution at a police station.'
