From Hitler’s Beer Hall to the National Library in Jerusalem

In the immediate aftermath of the Holocaust, a large number of Jewish books were discovered by the Jewish Brigade in a famous Munich beer hall considered to be the cradle of Nazism. How did the books end up there? And after they were discovered, where did some of them disappear to?

Daniel Lipson | 18.12.24

The Jewish Brigade in Italy. This item is part of the Archive Network Israel project and is made available thanks to the collaborative efforts of the Oded Yarkoni Archives of Petah Tikva, the Ministry of Jerusalem Affairs and Heritage, and the National Library of Israel.

Italy, March 1945. Following a training period and many delays, thousands of soldiers from the Jewish Brigade finally arrived in northern Italy. They managed to take part in the fight against the Nazis for several weeks before World War II came to an end. Their next mission was no less important. From combat, they transitioned into carrying out rescue operations.

The Brigade (officially the Jewish Infantry Brigade Group) established its base in Tarvisio, located in the tri-border region of Italy, Austria, and Yugoslavia. Very quickly, Jewish survivors of the Holocaust began streaming into the area, having heard that there were Jewish soldiers stationed there who could help them. During June and July 1945, the Brigade soldiers worked tirelessly to help their fellow Jews and facilitate their immigration to the Land of Israel. The “Center for Europe” initiative was established, under which the Brigade units operated to rescue the remnants of European Jewry. In the Tarvisio camp, the “House for Olim” was founded to provide refugees with clothing, food, rest, encouragement, and guidance [Olim – Hebrew for Jewish immigrants to the Land of Israel]. From there, with the help of Jewish Brigade drivers, the refugees were transported to training centers in Italy and to ports where they could board Jewish immigrant ships bound for what was still Mandatory Palestine at the time.

Screenshot 2024 11 28 172627 — Soldiers of the Jewish Brigade in a group photo taken during training, Fiuggi, Italy, 1944. This item is part of the Archive Network Israel project and is made available thanks to the collaborative efforts of Yad Yitzhak Ben-Zvi, the Ministry of Jerusalem Affairs and Heritage, and the National Library of Israel.

The Jewish Brigade didn’t wait for the refugees to come to them. Several delegations from the “Center for Europe” set out across liberated Europe searching for additional survivors, to help them and guide them to Italy. The first delegation embarked on June 20, 1945, for a 10-day journey during which Brigade representatives visited Bavaria and Salzburg. They went to the displaced persons camps and spoke with the Jewish residents about Zionism and immigration to the Land of Israel.

The delegation participated in a large Zionist assembly in Munich, where a survivors’ committee was established to raise awareness about aid for displaced Jews and immigration to Mandatory Palestine. Stages were constructed, flags of the Zionist movement were flown, and the pictures of the founders of Zionism were hung with slogans such as “If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem” and “If You Will It, It Is No Dream.” The Jewish audience drank it all in and listened attentively to the organizers. The many Holocaust survivors marveled at the sight of Jewish soldiers, but also expressed frustration that help had not come sooner.

The Jewish Brigade organized another assembly towards the end of July in the hospital of St. Ottilien Archabbey near Munich. The Brigade’s vehicles gathered about 100 Jewish representatives from dozens of displaced persons camps across Germany and Austria. There were also U.S. Army chaplain rabbis and Zionist representatives from the Land of Israel. Some of the speakers had harsh words about the policies of the occupying armies and their poor treatment of the survivors, who were destitute and battered. Representatives of the camps described the conditions in these facilities, and the assembly concluded with the singing of Hatikvah. After the assembly, the delegation traveled to Munich and stopped at what was known as “Hitler’s Beer Hall.”

What was the delegation looking for in Hitler’s beer hall?

The large and famous beer hall known as Bürgerbräukeller was one of a great many beer halls in the city of Munich. Some of these establishments could host thousands of people and served as meeting places for discussions, events, or political and social debates.

On the night of November 8, 1923, Adolf Hitler and his associates stormed into the Bürgerbräukeller, where the leaders of the Bavarian government were gathered. Hitler fired a shot into the air to silence the crowd, stood on a chair, and declared a “national revolution,” hoping that Munich would serve as a launching point for a swift takeover of all of Germany. From the beer hall, Hitler and his followers—accompanied by about 2,000 supporters and SA members (Nazi stormtroopers)—marched toward the Bavarian Ministry of Defense. In the ensuing gunfight with soldiers, 16 Nazis were killed. Two days after the failed coup attempt, Hitler was captured. He was tried and imprisoned in Landsberg Prison alongside other associates. During his months in prison, he devoted some of his time to writing his book Mein Kampf.

Hitler, Maurice, Kriebel, Hess, Weber, Prison De Landsberg En 1924 — Hitler and his associates in Landsberg “Prison,” 1924

“Scattered on the floor”

The beer hall became a highly symbolic place for the Nazis, and they held annual ceremonies there to commemorate the historic event known as the “Beer Hall Putsch.” During one of these events in 1939, there was an assassination attempt on Hitler. The would-be assassin planted explosives in a column near where Hitler was standing and delivering a speech. Hitler survived because he left the beer hall earlier than scheduled. However, the explosion caused significant damage, and the hall was no longer used afterward.

Nsdap Versammlung Im Brgerbrהukeller, Mnchen — The beer hall during a Nazi Party event.

The delegation of the Jewish Brigade along with the other conference participants made their way to this location, the cradle of Nazism, in July 1945. They concluded their visit with a written declaration:

“We, the survivors of the masses of European Jewry, who were exterminated as a people, whose sons and daughters fought the enemy in the forests of Europe, in the bunkers of the ghettos, in the underground movements, within the ranks of the Allied forces, the Jewish Infantry Brigade Group, and the armed service units of the Land of Israel, raise our voices as a nation and demand the immediate establishment of a Jewish state in the Land of Israel, the recognition of the Jewish People as an equal member among all the Allied nations, and its inclusion in the Peace Conference” (from The Book of the Jewish Brigade, page 384).

The document, written in Yiddish, was signed by some of those present at the beer hall in Munich.

Upon leaving the beer hall, the soldiers of the delegation held up the flag of the Zionist movement before the entrance gate. However, they did not leave empty-handed.

בית הבירה — Soldiers of the Jewish Brigade by the entrance to the beer hall (from Aharon Hoter-Yishai’s book *The Brigade and the* She’erit Haplita [surviving remnant]).

One of the participants of the conference that ended in the beer hall was Rabbi Ya’akov Lipschitz, the chaplain rabbi of the Jewish Brigade, who described the event in his book The Book of the Jewish Brigade, which he wrote after the war. In a letter from July 9, 1945, which is preserved in the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People at the National Library of Israel, Rabbi Lipschitz wrote to the president of the Hebrew University Judah Magnes about books that he found “scattered on the floor of Hitler’s beer hall in Munich.” Most of these books apparently belonged to the Ezra Judaic Library in the city of Kraków. In his letter, Rabbi Lipschitz listed several items he collected from the beer hall and sent to the Jewish National and University Library in Jerusalem (which later became the National Library of Israel). He wrote:

“Our brothers and sisters in Jerusalem will study these books and fondly remember the 18,000 pure souls of the Kraków community who were annihilated by the Nazi murderers.”

ליפשיץ — Rabbi Lipschitz’s letter to Magnes

The reply from Magnes to Rabbi Lipschitz emphasizes the importance of the books that were found in the beer hall and asks the rabbi and the soldiers of the Jewish Brigade to continue with their attempts to locate books, manuscripts, archives, documents, and any other sacred objects that survived the war.

מגנס — The reply from Magnes to Lipschitz

The first book listed by Rabbi Lipschitz is a Talmud – the tractates of Shabbat and Eruvin in one volume – printed in Vienna in 1806–1807. This book is indeed now part of the National Library’s collection, and in the dedication on the cover page, Rabbi Lipschitz recounts the story of how it was discovered:

“I found this book on the 17th of Tammuz, 5705, lying on the floor of Hitler’s beer hall in Munich, looted by the Nazis from the Jewish community in Kraków. Dedicated to the National and University Library in Jerusalem, as the property of the Jewish People.

Dr. Yaakov Lipschitz, Rabbi of the Jewish Brigade, Tarvisio, 28th of Tammuz, 5705”

20241111 130852 — Inside cover of the Talmud that was found in the beer hall and sent to the National Library of Israel

“Found in the office of that wicked one”

Many years passed, and in 2023, I was contacted by Yad Vashem regarding a donation that President Isaac Herzog decided to make to the organization. The item in question was a Talmud, the tractate of Pesachim, also printed in Vienna in the same year and by the same printer (Anton von Schmid). This book, too, was found in the same beer hall during the same gathering in July 1945. However, the person who retrieved this Talmud volume was Eliyahu Dobkin, a leader of the Jewish Agency who was present at the event.

Dobkin reported on the gathering during a meeting with David Ben-Gurion and Chaim Weizmann in London.

He took the Talmud from the beer hall and presented it to Rabbi Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog, who at the time was the Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Mandatory Palestine. The Talmud remained in the family collection until the current president, Rabbi Herzog’s grandson, expressed his wish to entrust it to Yad Vashem. The inside cover of this Talmud does not have a dedication like the one in the National Library, but has a note handwritten by Rabbi Herzog:

“This book was found in the office of that wicked one—may his name and memory be erased… It was given to me by Mr. Dobkin… Two books were found there, this one and a copy of the Yad HaChazakah (the Mishneh Torah) by Rambam, of blessed memory, which was given to Dr. Chaim Weizmann, of blessed memory.”

The team at Yad Vashem tried to locate the Mishneh Torah in the Chaim Weizmann Archive, but their search yielded no results. Yad Vashem staff also visited us at the National Library to examine the book preserved here, which was also rescued from the beer hall, and to compare it with the volume in their possession.

The Talmud that President Herzog donated is currently displayed at the Holocaust History Museum at Yad Vashem.

פסחים יד ושם — The Talmud at Yad Vashem (photo from the Yad Vashem website)

The Talmud that the Herzog family entrusted to Yad Vashem reignited my curiosity about the Jewish books collected and rescued from Hitler’s beer hall. I tried to locate the other items that Rabbi Lipschitz sent to us at the National Library, according to his letter. I found several copies of the mentioned books, but none bore the stamps of the Ezra Library or had any identifying marks that could definitively link them to the items that were sent. The list also included pieces of parchment taken from a Torah scroll (containing everything from the Bereishit portion to the Vayetzei portion). The Library holds many parchment fragments of partial Torah scrolls, but we found none matching the description in the letter.

I then searched the bibliographic journal Kiryat Sefer, published by the National Library of Israel. In 1945, it mentions donations arriving from around the world, but unfortunately, there was no reference to a donation by Rabbi Lipschitz and the Jewish Brigade—not for the Torah scroll nor for the other books. Honestly, this is somewhat surprising, given that the journal lists various donations that seem far less remarkable. I tried checking the Library’s manuscript registration records. I did find that in 1945, “pages from a Torah manuscript on parchment” were received. For a moment, I was excited to see that the pages had been sent from Munich, but my enthusiasm quickly faded. The pages were found in Berlin and merely shipped from Munich. Moreover, these were handwritten pages of a Book of Torah, not fragments of a Torah scroll.

It is possible that the scroll fragments from the beer hall never made it to the Library or were sent elsewhere.

This dead end led me to a more fundamental question: How did books from the Ezra Library in Kraków even end up in Hitler’s beer hall in Munich?

To the best of our knowledge, there is no documentation of this transfer. While it is true that the Germans looted millions of books from libraries across Europe, many of them Jewish, these books were typically sent to organized and recognized research institutions in Berlin, Frankfurt, and other locations—not to destroyed beer halls. The National Library brought hundreds of thousands of books that had been stolen to Israel, tens of thousands of which are now part of our collection.

So, what do we know about the books from the Ezra Library? The Ezra Library was established in Kraków in 1899 and served the Jewish community until the Nazis occupied the city and shut down its educational and cultural institutions. With its 6,000 books, it was considered the largest public Jewish library in Kraków.

The Nazis burned numerous libraries, including those belonging to schools and synagogues. However, some of the larger collections were preserved and transferred to the Staatsbibliothek, the State Library that was opened in Kraków in April 1941 as part of an effort to bring German culture and education to the occupied territories. Most of the Jewish books from the Ezra Library were moved to the Oriental Studies Department of this library. While 2,100 books from the Ezra Library were lost in the early stages of the war, 65% survived and were transferred after the war to the Old Synagogue in Kraków.

11112024 004 — Stamp of the Ezra Library in Kraków

What about the 2,100 lost books from the Ezra Library? It is assumed that they were stolen or destroyed. Here are some attempts to explain their disappearance:

In October 1939, Professor Peter Paulsen from the University of Berlin arrived in Poland. Over several months, he and his team looted works of art from Polish cities and sent them to Germany. He also stole books and sent them to the library of the Reich Main Security Office – the SS office that managed all internal security matters. This vast library was situated in Berlin, so even if books from the Ezra Library were taken this way, they were likely not sent to Munich. Another academic institution that stole books from Jewish libraries was the Institute for the Study of the History of the New Germany in Berlin. This institution’s department for “Research on the Jewish Question” operated in Munich. However, that still doesn’t explain whether this institution received books from Kraków, and if so, how they got there and why they would have been sent to the beer hall.

We may never know.

One of the people who was at that same event in the beer hall was Aharon Hoter-Yishai, an officer in the Jewish Brigade. In his book, The Brigade and the She’erit Haplita [surviving remnant], he writes:

“…In the basement, they discovered piles of holy books, edition upon edition, bound in beautiful, expensive leather. There was such a quantity that, in my estimation, it would have required two or three train cars and several trucks to collect them [the books].”

Hoter-Yishai suggested that the looted books might have been used for an exhibition and served as a sort of record of Nazi activity and Hitler’s extensive efforts “to make Europe Judenrein (free of Jews).”

Today, the Talmud in the Library’s collection, along with the additional copy at Yad Vashem, tells an entirely different story. Instead of being desecrated on the floor of a Nazi landmark in Munich, the books serve as an eternal testimony in Israeli institutions in Jerusalem.

Another Trial: A Kafkaesque Love Triangle

Despite his romantic and tortured image, Franz Kafka’s attitude towards women had its darker aspects. Who would have guessed that the tangled romantic triangle between Kafka, his fiancée Felice Bauer and her good friend Grete Bloch would produce one of the greatest literary classics of all time?

Judith Kagan | 27.11.24

Franz Kafka Jewish Authors

Franz Kafka and Felice Bauer, 1917. Mondadori Portfolio, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Four years ago, a new trend took TikTok by storm, with young women developing an obsession with a desirable bachelor by the name of Franz (Amshel) Kafka. The #Kafka hashtag received over 140 million views, and female TikTokers filmed themselves reading selected passages from Letters to Milena, the collection of correspondence written by Kafka to his muse, Milena Jesenská. Praise was lavished on the iconic author for his good looks and poetic writing style, and his written expressions of love were soon setting the bar for young women on TikTok, who declared that they would settle for nothing less in their future partners.

But what the Kafka fangirls missed was that the writer’s relationships with women had less positive aspects as well. In today’s terms, one could even argue that he was a bit of a “douche” or a “gaslighter.” These tangled relationships did not lead to a happy marriage or to a settled family life, but they did result in one of humanity’s greatest literary classics.

But the story I’m about to tell isn’t just juicy gossip concerning this tortured author. Who knew that the hurt feelings of a single man would lead to the creation of one of the greatest novels of the 20^th century, one which ostensibly has nothing to do with romantic relationships?

מרב סלומון, מתוך תערוכת אומנים ישראלים יוצרים בעקבות קפקא — By Merav Salomon, from the “Kafka: Metamorphosis of an Author” exhibition at the National Library of Israel

Kafka met Felice Bauer at the home of his good friend Max Brod in 1912 and was immediately impressed by her as a talented businesswoman and even a Zionist – a trait he found endearing, to his surprise. Bauer was an independent and modern woman by the standards of the time, the daughter of a German Jewish family who worked as a clerk in Berlin. He wrote to her five weeks after their first meeting and presented himself as the man who had been seated across from her at a table in Brod’s apartment and who had handed her a series of photographs to examine:

“and who finally, with the very hand now striking the keys, held your hand, the one which confirmed a promise to accompany him next year to Palestine”

(From a letter by Kafka to Felice Bauer, appearing in Kafka’s Other Trial by Elias Canetti)

Kafka was a man who fell in love via the written word, and indeed, his relationship with Felice was characterized by intense, powerful writing – more than 700 pages spread over the course of 500 letters.

They corresponded for years, yet only the letters that reached her have survived to this day. Even his marriage proposal was put in writing, included as a mere side issue in a letter that mainly discussed his manuscript of The Stoker. But as was his wont – the moment Felice said “yes,” Kafka began to panic at the very thought of settling down with a woman. In the following letters, he presented legal arguments that essentially attacked himself, artfully edited and arranged in a manner that clearly disclosed his own professional experience as a lawyer. He explained why she should reconsider marrying him – due to his own great concern for her:

“Haven’t I for months now been squirming before you like something poisonous? Am I not here one moment, there the next? Are you not beginning to feel sick at the sight of me? Can you not see by now that if disaster – yours, your disaster, Felice – is to be averted, I have to remain locked up within myself?”

(From a letter by Kafka to Felice Bauer, appearing in Kafka’s Other Trial by Elias Canetti)

Felice used the only weapon at her disposal in response – silence. She ceased responding to his letters, and if she did reply – she did so with a succinctness which tortured him. After months of sparse communication, Kafka told her that he had fled to Vienna. There, he participated in the Zionist Congress taking place at the time, but due to his bitter mood, his impression of the event was entirely negative.

Felice continued her stubborn silence, but since she heard nothing from Kafka, she sent her good friend Grete Bloch and asked her to mediate between them. Had she known the consequences of putting her friend in Kafka’s sights, she probably would have done anything to reverse that decision.

כרטיס הביקור של פרנץ קפקא — Franz Kafka’s calling card

Very little is known of Grete Bloch. Like Felice, she was also Jewish, a businesswoman and a practical type. Kafka’s quotes of her letters imply that her writing was efficient rather than literary, though she also tended to open up emotionally and share her experiences and inner world freely with the author.

The two often corresponded regarding Felice, discussing her deficiencies – such as dental treatments which left her with mostly golden teeth. Despite this occupation with Felice’s less attractive sides, Kafka finally returned and asked Felice once again to marry him, as a result of his correspondence with Bloch.

Yet despite the renewed engagement between Kafka and Felice, he continued to correspond with her good friend, sharing his continued fears regarding his upcoming marriage to Felice.

“Our relationship, which for me at least holds delightful and altogether indispensable possibilities, is in no way changed by my engagement or my marriage”

(From a letter by Kafka to Grete Bloch, appearing in Kafka’s Other Trial by Elias Canetti)

Although we know little about Bloch, we do know one thing for certain – she was a good and faithful friend to Felice. Bloch therefore took care to inform Felice that her fiancé was again becoming fickle and getting cold feet regarding their engagement. She also let Felice know that Kafka was corresponding with her (Grete) with the same passion and emotional warmth he’d expressed when writing to his betrothed.

אחד מרישומיו הידועים ביותר של קפקא מתוך המחברת המכונה המחברת השחורה — One of Kafka’s own drawings, appearing in what’s known as the “The Black Notebook”, the National Library of Israel

The High Court of Love

This strange love triangle reached a crescendo in a particularly charged meeting that included all three parties. Kafka was invited to a hotel in Berlin, and there in the lobby, he was put on trial for his duplicitous behavior with Bloch and Bauer. The prosecution was represented by Felice and her sister Erna, while Kafka was defended by his good friend, writer Ernst Weiss, who never liked Felice. Grete Bloch served as the judge, while also bringing forth his letters and marking all his dismissive statements towards Felice in red.

Kafka did not even try to defend himself on this occasion, and it is no wonder that this improvised trial terminated the engagement.

“He felt attacked,” said Stefan Litt, curator of the Humanities Collection at the National Library of Israel, “he felt that he was being unjustly tried, and that he was being accused without even understanding the charge.”

The sense of persecution and the “romantic trial” – in which Kafka’s loves served as accusers, judges, and executors – greatly influenced Kafka. As part of his effort to process and respond to what happened, he began to write one of the most important works in the western canon – The Trial.

מכתב של קפקא לגרטה בלוך, חברתה הטובה של פליצה באואר — A letter by Kafka to Grete Bloch, Felice Bauer’s friend, the National Library of Israel

All’s Fair in Love and War

The Trial tells the story of Josef K., a senior bank clerk who is accused one fine day of a crime he did not commit. Except that the investigators don’t investigate him, and the judges and surrounding officials aren’t even willing to tell him what he’s being charged with, instead making his life miserable with a row of damning accusations, charges, and legal proceedings. Josef feels powerless to halt the wheels of justice which are slowly but thoroughly grinding both him and – justice itself – into dust.

Alongside the many deep readings of Kafka’s story, which was previously thought to be primarily an indictment of modern bureaucracy, there is also the interpretation which establishes it as the way he experienced the “court” formed by the two women in his life, who put him “on trial” when they chose to support each other against him.

In real life, despite the traumatic encounter which led to the writing of the book, Kafka and Felice Bauer continued to correspond and even became engaged again after the dust had settled. Kafka intended to marry her – until he learned he was sick with tuberculosis. This bitter news greatly affected him emotionally and he had difficulty imagining a future, so he called off the engagement, thus ending his relationship with Bauer.

Other women over the years had an influence on Kafka’s writing and work, the most famous of which were Milena Jesenská – a Czech journalist and intellectual who also translated Kafka’s works into Czech from their original German – and Dora Diamant. Diamant met Kafka towards the end of his life, when he was 40 and she was 25. Originally from a family of Ger Hasids, she was the only woman he lived with in his adult life and she was the one who cared for him during his final years.

The Court Adjourns

Most of Kafka’s relatives and the women in his life were murdered in the Holocaust. Felice Bauer was an exception, having immigrated to the United States before the war. Like the good businesswoman she was, she sold the letters Kafka sent her, which were then collected into a volume. Bauer ultimately married to another man, one who did not panic at the very thought of being in the presence of a woman, and ultimately passed away in the 1960s in the United States.

You must be asking yourselves: What about Grete Bloch? As already noted, we know very little about her and her fate aside from the fact she perished in the Holocaust. But there are unconfirmed rumors about her and Kafka continuing their relationship, even after he ended things with Felice Bauer. Bloch gave birth to a child, and never said anything about the identity of the father. Some tried to claim that Kafka may have been the father, but the child died at the age of five, and documentation of him has not survived.

For his part, Kafka married neither Bauer nor Bloch. It’s really no wonder that the Kafka-Bauer-Bloch love triangle did not result in any sort of stable or normal relationship, and instead brought The Trial into the world. Kafka’s story would likely not have seen the light of day were it not for the tension and difficulty he experienced when confronted by two friends, bound by a sense of sisterhood, who stood together against him in the moment of truth.

One of the many letters Kafka wrote to Bloch will be displayed in the “Kafka: Metamorphosis of an Author” exhibition, which will open on December 4, 2024 at the National Library of Israel. In the exhibition, rare items such as Kafka’s will, letters in his handwriting, and even draft pages of The Castle that were left out of the published book will be on display, as well as items which tell the complicated story of Kafka and the women in his life. The exhibition marks the 100^th anniversary of Kafka’s passing.

Hannah Kritzman: The Storyteller of Kibbutz Be’eri

At age 15, Hannah Kritzman ran away from home to Kibbutz Be'eri, where she became a beloved preschool teacher and founded the local children's library. 73 years later, on October 7, after spending hours hiding with her caregiver in her safe room, Hannah was shot by a Hamas terrorist, just as the two were being rescued. The memoir she completed shortly before her death offers us a glimpse of what a wonderful woman she was.

Yael Ingel | 27.11.24

Gaza Border Region Lives Lost: The Works of the October 7 Fallen – A Special Project

A few months after Hannaleh Kritzman, the legendary storyteller of Kibbutz Be’eri, wrote down her life story and celebrated its publication, her family had to add the following preface to it:

Hannaleh Kritzman was shot in Kibbutz Be’eri by Hamas terrorists on the awful Saturday of October 7, 2023. She died from her severe wounds on October 21, 2023. She was 88 years old at the time of her murder.

***

88-year-old Hannah, or “Hannaleh”, Kritzman was one of the oldest victims of that fateful day in October 2023. Her family took some comfort in the knowledge that Hannah had lived a full life. A few months earlier, they had managed to publish an autobiographical memoir celebrating her life. “The Story of the Storyteller” was its title. “I’m so glad we managed to finish the project while she was still alive,” says her son, Tzafrir Keren. “She was happy and proud of it. We organized a special celebration for the entire family, where she handed out a copy with a dedication to each of her children and grandchildren.”

עמוד ראשון — *Sipurah shel Mesaperet HaSipurim* – “The Story of the Storyteller” – Hannah Kritzman’s book, Ot Vaod Publishing

The book, written at the initiative of her children and recounting the story of her life, is a memento of the special woman she was, who so loved books and stories. They suggested to their parents that both of them should write down their life stories for future generations. Their father refused, but Hannaleh threw herself into the process. For several months, she sat in the living room of her home in Kibbutz Be’eri, working with the author, Eli Khalifa, as the two wove her life story together.

חנוכת הספר כל המשפחה המורחבת — The book launch event for Hannaleh’s book with the entire extended family, March 2022. From a private album

***

Running Away to a Kibbutz? – “Over my dead body!”

Hannaleh spent her early years of her life in a place that was very different from the place where it ended. She was the eldest of five siblings, born to a low-income family in the Florentin neighborhood of Tel Aviv. The family of seven shared their modest two-room apartment with another family. She inherited her love of stories from her parents, who would tell their children stories while they huddled together on the one bed in their apartment. But Hannah didn’t really have time to enjoy a good book back then. As a teenager, she had to attend evening classes so she could help support the family financially. At meetings of her youth movement, HaNoar HaOved VeHaLomed (“The Working and Studying Youth”), she heard about Ben-Gurion’s call to settle the southern Negev region and about a new kibbutz named Be’eri that was about to be built there.

מתוך הספר שלה 3 — Hannah with her bicycle, from her book, page 39

“Over my dead body” was her father’s response when Hannah told him she wanted to settle the wilderness, and what’s more, with such a disreputable institution as a kibbutz. “If you go, you won’t have anywhere to return to,” her parents desperately threatened, afraid of losing their eldest child. The year was 1950, and they didn’t really understand what a kibbutz was. The rumors they had heard (“They share everything there; even the children!”) only made matters worse.

מתוך הספר שלה 2 — The Gottesdiener family, from her book, page 33.

But Hannah didn’t give up. With youthful determination, she ran away from home, caught a bus to Kibbutz Sa’ad, which was a few kilometers north of Be’eri, and walked the rest of the way on foot, with two boys who were the same age as her, carrying rifles they had received because there were known to be “fedayeen” militants roaming the area. The warm welcome she received from the founders of Be’eri, who were sitting and singing around the bonfire, was the moment Hannaleh fell in love with the kibbutz—a love that never faded.

All contact between Hannaleh and her family in Tel Aviv was severed for months, but it felt like an eternity. Longing for her parents and siblings tore at the heart of the young pioneer. Eventually, her mother went to consult with the neighborhood rabbi, who said, “If she went to a kibbutz in the Negev, she has done a great mitzvah, for we are commanded to settle the land.” The rabbi’s response softened the father’s heart. He relented and they reconciled. Before he passed away at a ripe old age, almost like an apology to his daughter, the father asked to be buried in the kibbutz, a request that was honored.

Initially, Hannaleh worked in the vegetable garden, but she did not excel as a farmer. As one of the kibbutz members told her: “Whether you work or not — it makes no difference.” She was deeply offended, but her anger only fueled her determination to prove herself. She decided to specialize as a dairy farmer and spent time working in the dairy, enduring the long milking hours at strange times of day and night, as an equal among equals. Together with all the young members of the kibbutz, Hannaleh joined the IDF’s Nahal program, which combined military service with community building and agriculture. Once she married, she finally found her calling. The young girl who had attended evening classes became a preschool teacher, helping to raise and nurture generations of kibbutz children.

מתוך הספר שלה 9 — Tziki and Hannaleh on their wedding day, with Hannaleh’s parents, Hadassah and Simcha, from her book, page 68.

***

Generations of children in Be’eri were raised by Hannaleh Kritzman. Although she never formally studied education, her well-developed and nurturing educational approach came naturally to her. She was drawn to this work, never leaving it until her retirement.

“What was unique about her education was that she never gave up on any child,” says her son. “At that time, they didn’t know about attention disorders, but she understood it intuitively: when a child couldn’t sit still and wanted to go out and chase birds, she’d go out with him to search for them.” Hannaleh understood the children. She knew how to engage, connect, and show that together they could achieve more. She always walked alongside the children she taught, with them, not against them—never through yelling, never through force. “Even with the grandchildren, for example, if they needed to go take a shower in the evening, she’d never fight, force, or bribe them. She knew how to create a situation where the child himself wanted to get in the shower, through play or speaking with them at eye level, and there was always her tempting promise: ‘If you shower quickly, we’ll have time to read a story.’”

מתוך הספר שלה 12 — Hannaleh reading a book to the children of the kibbutz, from a private album

When Yotam Keren, one of her grandchildren, decided to specialize in pediatric medicine, she offered her assistance: Before his residency began, she’d go with him and his fellow future doctors and teach them how to approach children in a way that wouldn’t scare them. It was clear to her that she had something to teach them.

“These are experiences that children never forget”

Books were an educational tool that Hannaleh used in a particularly clever way. “When a child would disrupt the class while she was about to read a book, she would say to him, ‘Come, you have a special job to do. Hold the book for me and turn the pages when it’s time.’ She captivated everyone, even the other teachers!” said her son, Tzafrir.

Hannaleh’s deep love for books accompanied her throughout her time as a preschool teacher, but she sought other ways to bring children closer to the world of reading.

When she had the idea of establishing a children’s library in Be’eri, she envisioned it as a place where families could come together and have bonding experiences. The library was located in an old building that had previously housed the elementary school’s science lab, and Hannaleh organized it into a warm and inviting atmosphere, with colorful rugs and cushions. She would open it in the afternoons and hold storytelling sessions for the children. “She didn’t just read aloud: She used sound and motion and involved the listeners by asking questions,” her son recounts.

She planned events and meetings with authors at the local library, and the library became a vibrant cultural center. Later, after serving as an exceptionally successful cultural coordinator in the kibbutz, she was appointed the cultural director of the entire Kibbutz Movement, where she mentored cultural coordinators in many other kibbutzim.

Even after she retired from teaching, Hannaleh continued visiting the preschools in Be’eri, where her presence was welcomed by both the children and the adults. Even at the age of 80, she volunteered two or three times a week to read stories to the children, who would immediately gather around her in a circle. “She never just ‘read a story’.” her son says. “When she read Yael’s House [a classic Israeli children’s book about a young girl who chooses a wooden box as her new home], she brought a large cardboard box and let all the children take turns sitting inside it. When she read A Tale of Five Balloons, she took them outside to blow up balloons together. These are experiences children never forget.”

It wasn’t just children who fell under her spell. While retired, she traveled twice a week to the nearby town of Sderot, to a club run by the Enosh Association, where she volunteered to read stories to people with disabilities, who eagerly awaited her visits every time. “She always said she felt she received more from them than she gave them, and she never gave it up, even when she was ill,” her son Tzafrir shared.

An Unfathomable Disaster

On October 7, Hannaleh was at home with her husband Tziki, and their Filipina caregiver, Abigail Rivero. When the first sirens went off, she and the caregiver immediately entered the safe room, while Tziki, refusing to panic, insisted on staying in his armchair in the living room to watch TV.

That morning, Tzafrir watched in horror as his father sat in the living room, with the sounds of fierce battles raging throughout the kibbutz in the background. He watched the events unfold live, through cameras that the children had installed in their elderly parents’ home, mainly out of concern about potential falls or health emergencies. At some point, the cameras stopped working. Tzafrir was powerless: “I felt terror combined with an immense sense of relief – whatever happened to my parents, for better or for worse, I wouldn’t see it live.” All three survived the long hours of that awful day. The terrorists massacred people in the neighboring homes but, for whatever reason, happened to leave their home alone.

מתוך הספר שלה 14 — Hannaleh and Tziki, from a private album

Just before morning on Sunday, a group of reservists came to rescue them and help them evacuate. The elderly couple drove in a golf cart toward the exit from the kibbutz, with soldiers walking alongside to guard them, when a terrorist who had remained in the kibbutz fired at them from a rooftop a few meters away. Hannaleh was shot in the stomach.

Kritzman was shot while she was being rescued from her home in Kibbutz Be’eri and was taken to Meir Hospital, where she lay unconscious for two weeks, sedated and on a ventilator. Her tenth great-grandchild was born a few days later, in the same hospital. Hannaleh never got to meet the baby, and she died from her wounds on October 21, 2023.

After about 20 minutes of fighting, the rescue unit managed to get the couple to a gathering point at the entrance to the kibbutz, where Hannaleh was boarded onto a helicopter that took her to the hospital. Her injury was severe, and would have been so even for a young person. Since it wasn’t possible to bury anyone in Be’eri due to the ongoing fighting in the area, the victims of Be’eri were buried in temporary graves around the country. Hannaleh was initially buried in Kibbutz Einat, and then in the summer of 2024, she was taken to her final resting place in her beloved kibbutz. The Be’eri families had to bury their loved ones a second time, a permanent, final burial, which was no simple matter and took a significant emotional toll—eulogies were written and read once more. Perhaps the only comfort was in the traditional social gathering at the kibbutz members’ club after each funeral. Hannaleh was buried next to her parents, and with her favorite book, Children’s Island by the Jewish author Mira Lobe, at her request.

Whatsapp Image 2024 10 14 At 12.23.49 — Hannaleh’s grave at Kibbutz Be’eri, alongside the graves of her parents, Simcha and Hadassah Gottesdiener. Photo by Tzafrir Keren

“Our disaster pales in comparison,” says Tzafrir. “The disaster that took place at Kibbutz Be’eri as a whole is unfathomable—children, entire families were murdered. I lost so much more than just my mother. Adi Dagan, my best friend since preschool, who I spent all my childhood with, was murdered. I had just been texting with him that morning and promised him that the army was on the way. He replied, ‘There’s no one here’.”

Channaleh’s grandson Omer Keren wrote in her memory: “Grandma Hannah was the most optimistic person in the world. When her angelic Filipina caregiver, who bravely protected her for 20 hours in the small safe room, came to say goodbye at the hospital, she burst into tears: ‘Who will tell me to wake up tomorrow morning with a new song in my heart?’ That’s my grandmother. A woman of words, for whom words are too small. This is not the ending she deserves. She never told anyone a story with a sad ending, and her story can’t be like that either.

Grandma used to say that the only remedy is to smile, to keep creating, to love, to build something new. Just like the huge, united family she created is her truest revenge against the Nazis who destroyed her parents’ families. To return to Be’eri and rebuild it just like the paradise she built herself.”

The library building in Be’eri was severely damaged during the murderous attack in October 2023. While writing this article, I received moving news from Aliza Gad, the Kibbutz Be’eri member who replaced Hannaleh as the library director: The library building will not be demolished but will be renovated and reopened in the future.

***

At the beginning of her book, Hannaleh wrote a general dedication to her readers:

“A person leaves home with a suitcase. Inside, they place love, caring, sensitivity to others, compassion, and curiosity, and then each time, they can open it to learn how to give from it to others. But when the suitcase from home is empty, they cannot develop or give to their surroundings. Therefore, as parents, we must equip our children with a suitcase full of good things.”

“After a person has gone, what remains of them? Not their possessions, not their money, but their story, whether they wrote it or told it. And now I present my story to you.”

Did He Write It or Not? The Mystery of the Torah Scroll Attributed to the Ran

This centuries-old Torah scroll underwent many travails, changing not only its geographical location multiple times but also its identity and history. “Everything depends on luck, even a Torah scroll in the Holy Ark,” says the Zohar. It seems this Torah scroll did not have the best of luck.

Daniel Lipson | 21.11.24

Deciphering Jewish Manuscripts Jewish Manuscripts Manuscripts Moroccan Jewry Sephardic Jewry סודות כתבי היד העבריים

The Torah scroll once attributed to the Ran, the National Library of Israel, the Ktiv Project

One day in 1978, a centuries-old Torah scroll was discovered deep inside the National Library of Israel, practically by coincidence. The scroll, written on dark parchment, also had a silver plate, which was apparently discovered beforehand, with an etched explanation of the scroll’s origins. The scroll’s height was almost half a meter, and it was written in early Sephardic script. The scroll had not been cataloged nor did it appear in our records of manuscripts. In short, a mystery (patience, we’ve only just begun and from here onwards things will only get weirder). No-one knew how it ended up in the collection, but the experts at the National Library immediately identified what this Torah scroll was.

Some 40 years earlier, on the eve of Passover in 1936, the Haaretz newspaper published a fascinating article on a unique Torah scroll that had been discovered. The article was written by Rabbi Baruch Toledano, a scholar and author who once discovered a copy of the famous Commentary on the Mishnah in Maimonides’ own handwriting (sections of which are preserved at the National Library).

According to the article, the scroll was written by none other than Rabeinu Nissim Ben Reuven of Gerona (Girona) (1290-1376), known as “The Ran”, an important commentator and religious jurist in 14^th century Spain. After the Jewish expulsion from Spain, one of the exiles – a respected elder – brought the scroll from Spain to a small Jewish community based in Brazil. There, a Shadar – an emissary of the Jewish community in the Land of Israel – acquired the scroll in the early 20^th century. This emissary, Chacham Yahya Dahan from the northern city of Tiberias, brought the scroll to the Holy Land.

Antique Torah scrolls are spread throughout the world, but there is usually no evidence of their scribe. This one, however, had clear signs pointing to the author. One of the most prominent is the colophon (a portion of text describing the time and circumstances of its writing) written on the other side of the Torah scroll’s parchment, at its very beginning.

Adding a theoretical portion to a kosher Torah scroll is considered an unconventional and religiously very problematic action. Still, the colophon is there, prominently displayed, telling the scroll’s tale in Sephardic script written in brown ink. The colophon’s author, according to its text, is Rav Reuven, the son of the Ran. He describes the troubles which befell the Jews of Spain during the Christian pogroms of 1391, writing that he managed to flee with his father’s scroll:

“For three months, the fire of conflagration spread in the holy communities of the children of Israel, in the exile of Spain… the kingdoms of Castile, Toledo, Seville, Majorca, Cordoba, Valencia, Barcelona, Aragon, Granada… a blow of sword, killing and death, religious destruction, captivity … and we were sold as slaves and handmaidens to the Yishmaelites… the seekers of blood carried out their plot… and I saved all the scrolls of our holy Torah and with them this book that belonged to my father and mentor… and our heart is filled with terror and fear and our lives are torn for there is no faith as to our end…”

20240925 085213 — The colophon at the beginning of the Torah scroll, on its back

Rabbi Toledano didn’t suffice with the testament of the colophon as evidence of the scribe’s identity, and he presented additional proof in his article in Haaretz: the form of the some of the Hebrew qof (kuf – ק) letters in the scroll. Here’s what Rabbi Simeon Ben Zemah Dura (1361-1444) said on the matter in his responsa:

“I also heard that the Rabbi R. Nissim Gerondi ob”m who was in Barcelona and who was the Rabbi of my rabbis ob”m that he wrote a Torah scroll for himself and the legs of the [letter] qof would be stuck to their roof.” (Shut Tashbetz, 1.51)

And indeed, the Torah scroll in question often had the qof, which is usually made up of two separate parts, connected in a way reminiscent of the letter chet – ח, with a long left leg.

Remember the silver plate that came with the scroll? The form of the letters and the menorah etched on it indicate that the plate was not made in the Ran’s time and was actually a copy, yet the text of the plate explicitly attests that the Ran wrote the scroll himself and donated it to the synagogue:

“This holy Torah scroll, I wrote for myself and my merit, Nissim son of my master, my father, teacher, and Rabbi Reuven Girondi, may his creator preserve him and keep him alive. I gave on condition to the synagogue of Kohelet Yaakov to the holy congregation in Barcelona…”

The 1936 newspaper article was not the only appearance of the Torah scroll in question. Scholar and historian Shmuel Kraus mentions it in his book Korot Batei Hatfilah Beyisrael [The History of Jewish Prayer Houses, published in 1955 after his death]. Kraus saw the scroll when he visited Tiberias in 1934. He describes the scroll as being made of the skin of a red deer and being difficult to read. The scroll’s author asked Kraus to help him sell it, but Kraus didn’t succeed in brokering a transaction. A few years later, another attempt was made to sell the scroll in Jerusalem.

The last testament to the scroll’s existence before its disappearance appears in the book Tzidkat Hatzadik [The Righteousness of the Tzadik] by Rabbi Aryeh Leib Friedman, who wrote that in the summer of 1952, he travelled to the Chacham Yahya Dahan (the emissary we mentioned earlier) in Tiberias and saw the Ran’s Torah scroll there.

Doubts begin to emerge

The enthusiasm which accompanied the important and accidental discovery at the National Library was quickly dampened by scholars who had questions about the source of the Torah scroll and its ostensible author. Despite the careful argument made by Rabbi Toledano in 1936, doubters did not lack alternative explanations. For instance, it was known that the lettering styles in Jewish holy books differed among Ashkenazic and Sephardic Jews and depended on the period in which they were written. Indeed, some of the letters in the Torah scroll in question were different than those used in the time and place in which the Ran lived.

Shlomo Zucker of the National Library’s manuscript department noted another strange fact: In the Torah scroll in question, the song of Haazinu contained 70 lines, yet in the Ran’s time it was customary to use 67 lines, in accordance with a ruling by Maimonides.

האזינו — *Haazinu* in 70 lines instead of the 67 used during the Ran’s lifetime

Doubts also arose as to the colophon. It turned out that its description of the 1391 pogroms was chronologically inaccurate. It also contained words that were relatively modern compared to the Ran’s time, and it also contained acronyms unknown from other sources. Furthermore, acronyms were marked with quotation marks, as is done today in Hebrew, even though in the Ran’s time – and later – they were marked by periods.

Another problem with the colophon’s history is that it mentioned the city of Granada in southern Spain as one of the cities attacked by Christian pogroms – except that in that year, Granada was still in Muslim hands. A slightly different spelling of Granada was etched into the silver plate, a text supposedly written by the Ran:

“This Torah scroll I wrote for myself and for my merit … Nissim son of my master, father, teacher and Rabbi Reuven Grinodi.

For scholars, the great contradiction here is that the Ran, like Maimonides, Rabeinu Yonah, and others, lived in the city of Girona in northeast Spain and not Granada/Grinoda/Grinodi in its south. In his article, Rabbi Toledano tried to explain this contradiction by suggesting that perhaps the Ran was indeed from Granada and not from Girona as originally thought, but this explanation was rejected by other scholars.

ספרד — Map of Spain, Abraham Ortelius, Amsterdam 1586. National Library of Israel collections

Despite the multiple questions surrounding the origin of the Torah scroll, the National Library accepted the source’s own testimony in the colophon and silver plate and presented the scroll as having been the Ran’s own creation. In 1992, to mark 500 years since the Spanish Expulsion and 100 years since the founding of the National Library, the Library put on a special exhibit of “Books [and manuscripts] from Spain.” The exhibit’s catalog shows the scroll under the heading “Torah scroll written by Rabbi Nissim Ben Reuven Girondi (the Ran) for himself” and notes that the scroll was acquired by the Library. No further details were provided. Eight years later, to mark the 75^th anniversary of Hebrew University, the scroll was once again put on display and presented in the printed catalog.

And the results are in…

Yet the doubts persisted. In 2012, a sample of the scroll’s parchment was sent to a lab at the Weizmann Institute to conduct a carbon-14 test on it. Since this test is used to date archaeological findings containing organic material, a parchment made of animal skin is very appropriate for such a test.

The results showed, by a probability of 86%, that the Torah scroll is dated to the time period of 1470-1680 – at least 100 years after the Ran’s death. Put another way: the scroll may be old, but the colophon and the plate are false and attest to a forgery. It could be that the forgery was committed to increase the value of the scroll. In an effort to explain the errors in the descriptions, scholars believe the forger who added the colophon and created the silver plate inscription was not very familiar with Spain’s geography and confused Girona and Granada. In his book Chazon Tverimun, which discusses the counterfeiting industry in Tiberias, Moshe Hillel describes the history of the forgery of this Torah scroll and thus explains all the doubts raised concerning it.

בראשית — The first verses of the Torah scroll attributed to the Ran

So where did it come from?

If it wasn’t owned or written by the Ran in Spain, then where is this scroll from and whose was it?

According to Moshe Hillel, the Torah scroll appears to have come from Morocco. The Moroccan Jewish community was in possession of antique Torah scrolls, some of them were even made before the expulsion from Spain, which Jews fleeing the Inquisition brought with them. In 1810-1910, some Moroccan Jews immigrated to Brazil, bringing along with them a number of Torah scrolls and settling in the region of the Amazon.

The emissary from Tiberias, Yahya Dahan, may have come to Brazil and returned with an old Torah scroll. But since the attribution to the Ran is false, it is also possible that the scroll never even passed through Brazil but rather arrived directly from Morocco to the Land of Israel, after which a whole story was stitched together to make its provenance sound greater than it was.

Others believe that the scroll may have originated in the Land of Israel or even Turkey.

20240925 085409 — The portion of *Bereshit* in the Torah scroll attributed to the Ran

If the Torah scroll had indeed been written by an important Torah scholar such as the Ran, we could have learned much from it on the customs of writing holy Hebrew texts in Medieval Spain. And indeed, Rabbis and scholars tried to do just that in a number of articles. While the scroll does seem to be quite old, it is unfortunately not “old enough,” and what we can learn from its writing is unrelated to the Ran or to the Jews of Spain. The scroll certainly served some Jewish community for many years, and perhaps we do need to remember it – as a historic document of the lives of Sephardic Jews is some other location.

The Zohar, in relation to the Torah portion of Naso, says “Everything depends on luck, even a Torah scroll in the Holy Ark.” So yes, even Torah scrolls need a little luck. There are Torah scrolls that sit unused in the ark of a synagogue for a whole year and are only brought out to be danced with on the festival of Simchat Torah. Other scrolls, the luckier ones, have the privilege of being used several times a week.

This famous Torah scroll that was once attributed to the Ran has experienced varying luck over the centuries. Once a holy relic associated with one of the great leaders and sages of 14^th century Jewry, it is today linked to fraud and deceit. And perhaps here we have a final stroke of good fortune: Despite its dubious reputation, instead of being buried or hidden away like other Torah scrolls with problematic histories, it is preserved, maintained, and sometimes even put on display at the National Library of Israel.