As seen today, universities are not always centers for higher learning, but can serve as breeding grounds to mainstream extremist ideologies.
This day (May 10) in 1933, at 34 university tows across Germany, students and professors gathered for a spectacle.
They built massive bonfires and burned more than 25,000 books in a single night.
This was not random vandalism. It was a coordinated purge of “un-German” thought - you know, whatever went against “the narrative.”
Works by Albert Einstein, Sigmund Freud, Franz Kafka, Thomas Mann, and countless Jewish and liberal authors were condemned as “Jewish intellectualism” and “cultural Bolshevism.”
Einstein — then safely in California — was specifically targeted. The Nazis seized his property, put a price on his head, stripped him of his academic posts, and publicly burned his books. He never set foot in Germany again.
The message was crystal clear: certain ideas were no longer permitted. Universities became instruments of ideological enforcement. If this description is making you uncomfortable, you’re on the right track.
The extremism that eventually led to the Holocaust didn’t start with gas chambers.
It began with students and professors publicly shutting down speech that went against the new orthodoxy.
Fast forward to today.
Since October 7, 2023, we have watched elite American and Western universities become breeding grounds for the same kind of ideological intolerance and open Jew-hatred. Jewish students have been harassed, assaulted, and forced to hide their identities. “Globalize the Intifada” and “from the river to the sea” have become mainstream chants on campuses that once prided themselves on enlightenment.
The parallels are chilling.
When universities stop being forums for open debate and instead enforce ideological purity — when certain perspectives (especially Jewish and pro-Israel ones) are shouted down, censored, or declared illegitimate — they create the perfect intellectual soil for dangerous extremism to take root and flourish.
The book burners of 1933 didn’t think they were the bad guys. They believed they were on the side of "justice and progress" too.
The lesson of May 10, 1933, is not ancient history.
This year marks the 120th anniversary of the birth of Irma Lauscherová. We were, therefore, delighted that her daughter, RNDr. Michaela Vidl
A tree planted outside the Museum in NYC, with roots to Terezin (Theresienstadt) concentration camp, branches out to a better future.
15,000 children were deported to a camp at Theresienstadt in the Czech Republic. Fewer than 200 survived. (A historical marker located in P
There are many stories from Terezin about the remarkable educators and youth leaders who dedicated themselves to helping children in the cam
There are many stories from Terezin about the remarkable educators and youth leaders who dedicated themselves to helping children in the camp. One of these individuals was a woman named Irma Lauscher (Lauscherova in Czech), a teacher who secured a most precious gift for the children of Terezin.
Irma Lauscher’s Life Before Terezin
Irma was born in the Czech town of Heřmanův Městec in 1904, and moved to Prague with her family as a young teenager. After completing secondary school she attended Charles University in Prague, where she studied education, psychology, German and
French, ultimately graduating with a teaching degree. Irma then began working as a teacher and also joined a local Jewish youth movement called Techelet Lavan.
In 1932, Irma married Jiří Lauscher, who was also a member of Techelet Lavan. Both Irma and Jiří were staunch Zionists who longed to emigrate to the territory then known as Mandatory Palestine. However, not wanting to leave Irma’s widowed mother behind, they delayed their plans and remained in Prague. Their daughter Míchaela was born in 1936, and soon after Irma returned to teaching at an organization called the Jewish Religious Community (JRC).
She also taught at a Jewish school in Prague until the Nazis closed the school in 1942. Even after the Nazis forbade Jewish children to go to school, Irma continued to teach small groups of children in secret, usually in the apartments of local Jewish families. Some of Irma’s former students remembered her as a strict teacher with high standards, though also very fair, committed, and quick to assist her students. These qualities made her a highly respected teacher and would later prove invaluable to the children she taught at Terezin.
A Teacher in Terezin
Irma, Jiří, and Míchaela arrived in Terezin in December 1942, where Irma resumed her work as a teacher. In early 1943, Irma and some other prisoners formed a council of educators, who were determined to provide an education for children in Terezin. Irma began holding secret classes in which she taught children about Jewish history and traditions. One of these traditions was the holiday of Tu B’Shevat, also known as the “New Year of the Trees”. In modern times, many Jewish communities commemorate the holiday by planting trees.
Determined to uphold this tradition, even in Terezin, Irma took matters into her own hands. She took an immense risk and bribed one of the camp’s Czech guards to smuggle a small sapling into Terezin. The guard managed to secure a sapling from a silver maple tree, tucked it in his boot, and safely delivered it to Irma.
Soon after, when no Nazi soliders were around, Irma and her young students gathered in front of a large building in the center of town and planted the tiny sapling. Once planted, the children watered the tree with their own rations. At the end of the ceremony, a rabbi said a special blessing over the children and the tree, praying that they would one day be free to plant trees in Czechoslovakia, the land of Israel, and all over the world.
As the weeks passed, the children continued to nurture the tree using their own precious water rations. Against all odds, the fragile young tree survived the war, but tragically most of the children who planted and cared for the tree were deported and died in the gas chambers of Auschwitz.
Life After Liberation
By a miracle, Irma, Jiří, and Míchaela were all spared from the transports and remained in Terezin until the camp was liberated in May 1945. After liberation, they returned to Prague and began to rebuild their lives. Irma and her daughter both spent time in a sanatorium, and Irma decided not to return to school due to ongoing health problems. Instead, she found work as a private teacher, while Jiří obtained a job at the Israeli Embassy in Prague.
Life in post-war Czechoslovakia became increasingly difficult for Irma and her family after the Communist takeover in 1948. The Communist government continued to spread
anti-Semitic propaganda, which was one of the main reasons why Irma, Jiří, and
Míchaela attempted to flee the country several times. On their final attempt in 1953, the entire family was arrested and sent to prison.
After their release, Irma and her husband returned to their previous jobs, and Irma also wrote articles for the Gazette of Jewish Religious Communities. In the 1960s, they began working with a German volunteer organization called AktionSühnezeichen (Action Reconciliation for Peace) to educate young people about the Holocaust and the Terezin ghetto. As part of their work, they returned to Terezin many times over the years in spite of the trauma their whole family endured there.
Irma and the Terezin Children’s Tree
During these trips to Terezin, Irma would return to visit her tree, which thrived and over the years grew into a towering silver maple tree, nearly 60 feet in height. A teacher to the very end, Irma dedicated the rest of her life to educating young people about Terezin, until she passed away in June 1985 at the age of 81.
As for the Children’s Tree, it survived until 2003, when it was destroyed in a flood. But the tree lives on, for over the years, the tree produced many saplings which were planted in Israel and in the United States. Young silver maples took root in Jerusalem, San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia, and most recently, outside the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City. Several Terezin survivors and descendents of survivors attended the ceremony in New York City, including Holocaust survivor Fred Terna, who helped to water the tree as a child in Terezin.
Although the original Children’s Tree is no longer standing, its descendants grow tall in many different cities, where they stand as living memorials to the children of Terezin.
More than 36,500 Iranians were killed by security forces during the January 8-9 crackdown on nationwide protests, making it the deadliest tw
Oh sorry apparently 30,000 is a low and outdated estimate! The most recent estimate is that 36,500 people were killed in just TWO DAYS! And many thousands more on the days before and after January 8th and 9th!
I'm going to queue this every day for the next month. The fact that people are barely paying attention to this at all is... I don't even know what to say, I really don't.
Necdet Kent was a Turkish diplomat who saved dozens of Jews during the Holocaust, at great risk to himself.
Born in Istanbul in 1911, Necdet was educated in the United States and attended law school at NYU. He returned to Turkey and entered the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1937. He was appointed vice consul to Greece, and then transferred to German-occupied France in 1941.
In 1943, Necdet heard that the Germans had loaded 80 Turkish Jews living in Marseilles onto a cattle car for transportation to a concentration camp. Necdet hurried to the Gestapo commander and demanded that the Jews be freed, since they were Turkish citizens and Turkey was neutral. The officer refused, saying the people didn’t count as citizens of any place because they were just Jews.
Desperate, Necdet and his assistant boarded the train themselves. The Gestapo officer told them to get off, but Necdet adamantly refused, saying “As the representative of a government that rejects such treatment for religious beliefs, I cannot consider leaving them here.”
Finally, not knowing what else to do, the Gestapo let everybody off the train. “I would never forget,” Necdet later said, “those embraces around our necks and hands … the expressions of gratitude in the eyes of the people we rescued … the inner peace I felt when I reached my bed towards morning.”
Necdet reached out to the community of Turkish Jews in France and supplied them with false Turkish identity documents, allowing them to escape the Nazi death camps.
Necdet heard that the Gestapo were stripping men and boys on the street to see if they were circumcised and therefore Jewish. Necdet informed the German officers that circumcision didn’t necessarily mean somebody was Jewish; he was Muslim and circumcised and offered to take his clothes off to prove it.
After the war, Necdet continued his career in the Turkish foreign service. He served as ambassador to the US, Thailand, India, Sweden and Poland. In 2001, shortly before he died, Necdet was honored by Israeli Holocaust Museum Yad Vashem as “Rightous Among the Nations.”
For sticking his neck out – and more! – to save Turkish Jews in France, we honor Necdet Kent as this week’s Thursday Hero at Accidental Talmudist.
When Israel arrested the Nazi mass murderer Adolf Eichmann in 1960, the Jewish state was condemned by almost the entire world, including the US, the UK, France, and the Soviet Union.
Even though these four nations had executed hundreds of Nazis who weren’t exactly read their Miranda rights, the UN passed Resolution 138 condemning Israel and warning that Eichmann’s arrest “undermined international peace.”
No mention was made of how governments that had harbored Nazis affected world peace. Argentinian politicians who shamelessly sheltered Nazis compared Israel to “regimes universally condemned,” which triggered violent attacks by Argentinian civilians against the country’s Jewish community.
You know, because they’re not antisemites, just antizionists.
Major newspapers joined the chorus of condemnation. The New York Post and the Washington Post attacked Israel’s actions; The Times accused Israel of “inverse racism,” while the Christian Science Monitor compared Israel’s willingness to pursue Jew-killers abroad to the actions of Nazi Germany. You know, because hanging one Nazi after a lengthy trial is literally genocide.
The whole world turned on Israel for putting on trial a Nazi war criminal who had been willfully protected by a sovereign state that then responded by inciting pogroms against its local Jews.
Israel can literally fight Nazis and still be condemned by the entire world.
That’s not all.
After the Entebbe raid, during which Israel rescued 102 hostages kidnapped by Marxist-Islamist terrorists, the Security Council met to condemn Israel for “wanton aggression.” UN Secretary General Kurt Waldheim told the Security Council the raid was “a serious violation of the sovereignty of a Member State of the UN.” Interestingly, he had nothing to say about the fact this member state colluded with terrorists against Israel.
Or that it was ruled by an insane cannibal.
Now they’re making movies about both these stories and celebrate them as great triumphs of the human spirit. They’ve been cleansed and universalized by corporate greed. Halleluiah!
So don’t be disheartened by all the noise you’re hearing from the UN, the media and the vile maggots we mistakenly call professors, journalists and actors. There’s nothing wrong with you, they’re just evil.
However, their noise is soon forgotten. Even by them. Just remember: whatever noise they make, there’s only one appropriate reply.
Just want to make sure people are aware that the artist is on ArtStation and many of these, including the longing stare at witch one, are in fact for sale as prints for highly reasonable prices - the cheapest option being an 8 by 12 art poster for 18 US dollars (plus shipping).
I’ve seen a lot of people saying they’re finally taking their yellow ribbon pins off in celebration, but please don’t yet - the families of those who have not yet returned to be buried are asking us not to forget them. the clock in Hostage Square is still counting the days for them.
I will not stop, not until every hostage, living or fallen, is home in Israel. I ask the world to do the same.
Rotem Cooper, whose father Amiram's body has not been returned, calls on mediators to put pressure on Hamas to release the remaining bodies.
Hamas released the remaining 20 living hostages to Israel on Monday, Oct. 13, marking a major shift towards peace in the region after over t
details on the returning hostages from media reports so far:
hamas have attempted to fatten the hostages over the last few days, despite israel's request not to do so as to prevent refeeding syndrome (which can be deadly)
none of the hostages require emergency care, but physical recovery might be very long for some of them
avinatan or was held completely alone (without any other hostages) the whole 2 years in captivity. due to his isolation, he knows very little of what happened since 7/10. he was kept in terrible conditions and was starved by his captors. he's very weak and thin, and lost 30-40% of his body weight.
elkana bohbot saw his family fight for him in protests and on the media when he was allowed to watch tv. he was held exclusively in tunnels for the whole two years, and lost his sense of time. most of the time he was in chains. one time, when he realized it's his wedding day, he begged his captors to let him wash himself as celebration, which they eventually relented to. he's suffering from stomach pains due to recent overfeeding, as well as pains in his arms, legs, and lower back
matan angrest underwent horrible torture in the first months of captivity, and was kept alone for a long time, and wasn't allowed to even relieve himself for days on end. he made up his mind to never surrender to his captors and the thought of his family kept him going. he's suffering from damaged sight, partial memory loss, flashbacks, and sometimes consciousness loss. his hand and fingers were injured and severely burnt, and were treated without anesthetics, which only worsened his situation.
evyatar david is very thin and weak. he was starved even after his famous "grave digging" video and underwent physical and psychological abuse, which was harder for him than the lack of food and water. he was overfed near his release, but realized what was happening and tried to ration his portions.
alon ohel suffers from shrapnel wounds in his torso, and headaches. his wounded eye is undergoing tests to see if his sight can be saved. there's a piano in his hospital room, and he's already played it. when it was announced that idf intended to recapture gaza city, hamas deliberately transferred alon into the city.
gali and ziv berman were disconnected from the outer world for long stretches of time. they were held separately, but in the same general area. they were often starved, but there were times when more food was given to them. some of their captors spoke hebrew with them (unlike the other hostages, who learned arabic in captivity).
ariel cunio was kept alone for two years, which resulted in much uncertainty for his wellbeing. david cunio was kept with eitan horn and nimrod cohen, in several tunnels (except for the short time he was allowed to stay with yarden bibas, per yarden's request, after the murders of his wife and kids). for a long time, david didn't know if his twin brother, eitan, survived 7/10 - the last text he got from eitan was "i'm burning" (his house was set aflame).
omri miran counted the days in captivity and the number of places he was held in (23), so he always knew what date it was. he was held both in tunnels and above ground. he would play cards with his captors and cooked for them - they loved his cooking. once when a deal fell through, his captors were pissed at hamas for not taking israel's offer.
maxim herkin lost 30kg off his weight and suffers from injuries and issues with his jaw.
arab leaders told arabs to leave israel temporarily while they cleansed the land of jews
arabs left in mass numbers because they don’t want to be included in the slaughter of jews
arab leaders tried to kill the jews by starting a war
the jews had the audacity to not only survive, but actually win lol
the jews didn’t want to be neighbors with the people that WILLINGLY left so they wouldn’t be affected by the slaughter of the jews, so they didn’t offer the arabs that left israeli citizenship
