Sample Sources
The sources below are those contained in our three curated collections—covering themes of Passover, Gender Roles, and Holocaust Resistance. They represent a fraction of the thousands of sources that will be available when the full site launches in 2024.
We Polish Jews
“All right,” someone will say, “granted you are a Pole. But in that case, why ‘we jews’?” To which I answer: because of blood “Then racialism again?” No, not racialism at all. Quite the contrary.
Th…
The Escape
All that had happened to him lay behind him like a yawning abyss. There was a strange excitement for him in his adjustment, an intoxication beyond fear. His movements were untrammeled, and as a result…
We Left Slowly
We left slowly. The night was pale.
In the distance the lights flickered.
And you were all loveliness like your two eyes
With tears cupped in them.
The jackal howled as you went to the vineyard
You…
My Little Sister
My sister sits happy
at her bridegroom’s table. She does not cry.
My sister will do no such thing:
what would people say!
My sister sits happy
at her bridegroom’s table. Her heart is awake.
The…
Solo Arak
Black ants crawl over nicotine-stained fingertips
dipping a mint leaf into the glass.
The alcohol dismantles Abd al-Wahab’s
“Cleopatra.”
Now all is clear
solo violin
solo flute
solo oud
we’re…
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,
Whereas…
De Gaulle, Israel, and the Jews
No Jew, whether a believer or an unbeliever, Zionist or anti-Zionist, can be objective when what is at stake is Israel and the two and a half million Jews who built a State in a land equally Holy for…
I, the Polish Jew
I have the good luck to be a Polish Jew.
If I were a Greek Jew, a Dutch Jew, a Turkish Jew, or some other kind of Jew, I would be miserable. Who would pay any attention to me and who would be…
Thieves in the Night
But the distant lulls were merely the frame of the picture; the feast for Joseph’s eyes was the green Valley of Jezreel itself, the cradle of the Communes. Twenty years ago a desolate marsh cursed…
Night and Hope
Looking at her, the coat and everything else seemed to him to be as clear and clean as the sky.
He had to step across the old man’s mattress.
He knew he would speak to him.
“Look after Anne’s things,”…
The Commanding Voice of Auschwitz
What does the Voice of Auschwitz command?
Jews are forbidden to hand Hitler posthumous victories. They are commanded to survive as Jews, lest the Jewish people perish. They are commanded to remember…