History events
1876 — (4th of Shevat 5636) It was reported today that a Jewish synagogue has been opened in Toronto, Canada
1892 — (1th of Shevat 5652) The SS Massilia arrived in New York with “250 Russian Jews among her steerage passengers.” After having been expelled from Russia they sailed to Palestine where the Ottoman authorities issued orders banning them from landing at Jaffa. A Jewish society then paid for their passage to America
1899 — (19th of Shevat 5659) “The Jews in Palestine” published today provides a summary of the report submitted in December of 1898 by U.S. Consul General B. Bie Randal in which he said that “960 families, numbering 5,000 souls inhabit 22 Jewish colonies in Palestine which have been founded and subsidized by Baron Edmond de Rothschild, representing the Alliance Israelite Universelle..”
1920 — (10th of Shevat 5680) In Giessen, medical students “unanimously demand” “the expulsion of all Jews” from the local university
1930 — (1th of Shevat 5690) Simcha Hinkas, a Jewish policeman, went on trial in Tel Aviv. He is accused of leading a crowd of Jews who reportedly killed five adults and wounded two children in an Arab family on August 25, 1929 during the Arab Uprising. According to the government, while Hinkas was on duty at a crossroad on Herzl Street during the Arab riots he saw a truck filled with Jews fired on by Arabs who killed four and wounded five. Hinkas allegedly went back to his barracks, got his rifle and led a Jewish mob in an attack on an Arab house. A government witness identified the bullets in the dead Arabs as having come from a government issued rifle, but could not tie them to the gun belonging to Hinkas. Two Arabs later identified Hinkas from a group of 13 Constables, but other Arabs identified different Constables. Alfred Riggs, assistant superintendent of the police “declared that Hinkas was one of the mildest and best of the police” but, “for reasons of his own,” the British police official seemed certain that the Jewish policeman was guilty
1933 — (3th of Shevat 5693) Youth Aliyah opens its offices in Berlin. The previous year Recha Freier, a rabbi’s wife decided it would be a good idea to send young people from Germany to Kibbutzim. She founded the Juedische Jugendhilfe organization to help facilitate the work. That same year it became a department of the World Zionist Organization under Henrietta Szold. Five thousand adolescents were rescued before the war and another 15,000 after the war
1938 — (28th of Shevat 5698) The Palestine Post reported that a Jewish constable, Mordechai Schwartz, who was charged with the premeditated murder of Police Constable Mustapha Khoury, was sentenced to death. The court refused to accept evidence that the previous murder by Arabs of two Jews in Karkur had influenced Schwartz to an immediate act of reprisal. Schwartz continued to claim his innocence
1943 — (24th of Shevat, 5703) In Letychiv, Ukraine, German Gestapo commences mass shootings of Jews from Letychiv Ghetto. 200 surviving Jews from Letychiv slave labor camp were ordered to undress and were shot with machine-gun into a ravine. Some 7,000 Jews were murdered in Letychiv
1944 — (5th of Shevat 5704) Seven hundred Jews are deported from Milan, Italy, to Auschwitz
1953 — (14th of Shevat 5713) The Jerusalem Post reported from Bonn that the West German Chancellor, Konrad Adenauer, assured Israel that his country would pay the first installment of 47 million marks of the German-Israeli Reparation Agreement within the next two months; that IDF patrols had beaten back two attacks by Jordanian marauders at two points along the armistice lines, inflicting heavy casualties. Jordan falsely claimed that a number of Israeli soldiers were killed in both encounters. Both sides complained to the UN Israeli-Jordanian Mixed Armistice Commission; that traces of copper were found near Jenin
People
1817 — (13th of Shevat 5577) Rabbi Yom Tov Netel, author of Tehor Ra’ayonim passed away
1900 — (30th of Shevat 5660) Birthdate of Russian composer Isaak Iosifovich Dunayevsky