Matt Lebovic

Hitler receives a Volkswagen for his 50th birthday. (Public domain)

June 25, 2022, 1:20 pm

Nazi past of top German business families is ‘hiding in plain sight,’ says author

In ‘Nazi Billionaires,’ journalist David de Jong investigates six uber-wealthy German families that colluded with National Socialism and ‘went free with their fortunes intact’

By Matt Lebovic

Participants in Canada Israel Experience's LGBTQ Birthright Israel trip in Tel Aviv during Pride (courtesy)

June 5, 2022, 4:29 am

Double mitzva? Birthright’s gay participants embrace Jewish, queer identities

Once jokingly dubbed ‘Jewish baby-makers,’ Birthright Israel trips have evolved to ‘respect diversity’ among young Jews, say staff and participants

By Matt Lebovic

Pope Pius XII appears behind microphones during a radio broadcast from the Vatican in November 1947. The Pope commended the American people for their efforts to save food for war-torn Europe. (AP Photo/Luigi Felici)

June 3, 2022, 6:43 pm

Pope Pius XII was not ‘neutral’ on Holocaust, fumes Pulitzer-winning historian

Aghast at continued apologia for Pope Pius XII, historian David Kertzer reveals archival finds about the Vatican’s stance on Jewish genocide

By Matt Lebovic

Interviewees from 'If You Heard What I Heard.' (Courtesy)

April 28, 2022, 1:16 am

‘3Gs,’ grandkids of Holocaust survivors, retell grandparents’ stories as own legacy

First-of-its-kind project, ‘If You Hear What I Heard,’ films members of the third generation post-World War II who give testimonies in an ongoing docu-series

By Matt Lebovic

Jewish youth collect books in the Kaunas Ghetto, 1942 (Yad Vashem)

April 5, 2022, 5:01 am

How 80 years ago, Jewish teens rescued the Kaunas Ghetto’s holy books

In the Nazis’ Feb. 1942 ‘Books Aktion,’ Jews were ordered to hand over all books. Now, the history of resistance efforts that saved countless works is in danger of being forgotten

By Matt Lebovic

Jewish refugees in 'Displaced Persons' camp in Germany after World War II. (Public domain)

March 26, 2022, 9:01 am

Amid today’s refugee crisis, author reflects on post-WWII abhorrence for Jewish DPs

Unlike the ‘outpouring of aid and invitations to resettle’ Ukrainian refugees, historian David Nasaw’s new book charts duel-loyalty paranoia, use of Jews as pawns in the Cold War

By Matt Lebovic

Henry and Charlotte Birnbaum after the war (Yad Vashem)

January 27, 2022, 10:33 am

Exhibit on false identities shows terror of Jews who hid from Nazis in plain sight

Online exhibition by Yad Vashem, open from January 27, highlights the accounts of 14 survivors who forged papers, pretending to be non-Jewish to survive the genocide

By Matt Lebovic

Holocaust diarist Anne Frank (Anne Frank Fonds)

January 20, 2022, 2:26 pm

Historians bash ‘rubbish’ findings of investigation into Anne Frank betrayal

A six-year probe by dozens of experts is detailed in a new book that accuses fellow Jews of revealing her hideout to the Nazis. The only problem, scholars say: Lack of evidence

By Matt Lebovic

'The Hidden Nazi,' by Dean Reuter. (courtesy)

January 15, 2022, 3:11 am

How Nazi Germany’s ‘most diabolical’ SS officer evaded postwar justice

In ‘The Hidden Nazi,’ author Dean Reuter asks whether SS general Hans Kammler, who oversaw the construction of death camps, exchanged V-2 rocket secrets for freedom

By Matt Lebovic

Romanian gendarmes and local collaborators deport Jews from Bricevas in 1941, with rabbi Dov Beri Yechiel at the head (public domain)

January 1, 2022, 12:35 pm

Romania’s ‘homegrown’ Holocaust: 80 years since forgotten Bogdanovka massacre

In the final days of 1941, Romanian authorities massacred 40,000 Jews in a chapter of the genocide in which 420,000 Jews were killed in ‘broad daylight’ with collaborators’ help

By Matt Lebovic

Jewish children deported from Lodz ghetto to Chelmno death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland (public domain)

December 13, 2021, 4:14 am

80 years ago this month, Nazis invented ‘industrial murder’ at quiet Chelmno

In a small Polish village outside Lodz, German SS leaders discovered how to bring the Jewish genocide ‘to scale’ and hide evidence of their crimes by cremating the human remains

By Matt Lebovic

December 1, 2021, 4:19 am

Ignored by the UN, Mizrahi Jews survived pogroms and expulsions, too

Persecution of Middle Eastern Jewry ‘has been denied for a lengthy period,’ according to historians advocating for ‘more inclusive’ Jewish memory

By Matt Lebovic

'Lucky Jew Doll' figurines purchased in the Polish cities of Krakow, Warsaw, and Zamosc. (Matt Lebovic/The Times of Israel)

November 24, 2021, 1:23 am

Why ‘Lucky Jew’ dolls are more popular than actual Jews in Poland

Going against long-held Polish tradition, Krakow’s municipality will slowly phase out the souvenir caricatures after acknowledging the trinkets are antisemitic

By Matt Lebovic

Herschel Grynszpan after being arrested on Nov. 7, 1938, in Paris (public domain)

November 11, 2021, 4:31 am

Kristallnacht assassin Herschel Grynszpan: Heroic ‘boy avenger’ or psychopath?

83 years after the teenager murdered a German diplomat in Paris, ostensibly giving the Nazis a pretext to spark the pogroms, his reputation has started to improve

By Matt Lebovic

After the Kristallnacht pogrom in Linz, Austria, Jewish women are made to wear signs saying, 'I am not part of the national community,' while being humiliated on stage in public (public domain)

November 9, 2021, 11:42 pm

Once lost to history, Kristallnacht testimonies describe pogrom’s aftermath

Compiled by a Harvard sociologist but not published until 2012, essays in the collection ‘Night of Broken Glass’ take readers beyond ravaged storefronts and burning synagogues

By Matt Lebovic