Reflections
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The Kehillah of Minsk
Motty Meringer 08/12/2009 11:58The city of Minsk, the capital of Belarus (White Russia), was established some nine hundred years ago. Over the years, many different states controlled the city. A beautiful and thriving Jewish community existed there, which produced many great rabbanim and gedolei Torah.
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The Ancient Community of Bratislava – Pressburg
Motty Meringer 06/12/2009 10:56‘Spiritual capital of Hungary’: the beautiful city of Bratislava, better known by its name ‘Pressburg’. In this ancient Jewish community many renowned Torah personalities lived and lead their people, and its famous Yeshiva drew thousands of students from all corners of Europe
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The Jews of Persia – Iran
Motty Meringer 03/12/2009 15:14The origins of Iranian-Persian Jewry are rooted deep in the past, going back to the time of the exile of the Ten Tribes during the Bayis Rishon period. From then and until the present day, the Jewish community of Iran has been a continual presence in that country, numbering at the peak of its prosperity close to a quarter of a million souls.
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Yeshivat Porat Yosef
Motty Meringer 26/11/2009 13:13The flagship yeshivah of the Sephardi Torah world is the Porat Yosef Yeshivah, located in the holy city of Yerushalayim. Former talmidim of the yeshivah today number among the most respected rabbanim and poskim around the world.
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The Bostoner Chassidus
Motty Meringer 25/11/2009 11:06The Bostoner chassidus is a relatively young dynasty in comparison to those of other chassidic courts – yet even during the short period of its existence, the Admorim of Boston have succeeded in making remarkable achievements in Yiddishkeit in the United States of America.
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The Jews of Algeria
Motty Meringer 18/11/2009 13:26he Jewish community of Algeria was a glorious kehillah with roots extending back to ancient times, more than two thousand years ago. In the modern era, the Jews of Algeria mostly emigrated to France rather than ascending to Eretz Yisrael – however, in more recent times, many of them have relocated from France and have finally returned to the land of their Forefathers.
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The Jews of Alexandria
Motty Meringer 08/11/2009 10:47One of the most glorious kehillos during the period of the second Beis haMikdash was the Jewish community of Alexandria in Egypt. Chazal say about the beis knesses of this kehillah that a person who never saw this building, never saw the glory of the Jewish people in his lifetime.
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Yeshivas ‘Shaar haTorah – Grodno’
Motty Meringer 27/10/2009 10:32Yeshivas ‘Shaar haTorah’ existed in the city Grodno for a relatively short period of twenty years, but in that time succeeded in leaving its indelible mark on the Yeshiva world. The methods of Torah study used in Grodno have been adopted in many of the Litvishe Yeshivos of today
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The Jews of Buchara
Motti Meringer 03/10/2009 21:25One of the glorious Jewish communities of the diaspora was that of Buchara – and many Jews even today continue to live in the Caucasus region, although most have ascended to Eretz Yisrael or have immigrated to the United States, where they have established thriving communities which perpetuate the customs of their ancestors.
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The Jewish community of Salonika
Motty Meringer 18/09/2009 10:00The city of Salonika is one of the major and most ancient cities in Greece. It is a port city, situated on the coast of the Aegean Sea, and is one of the most important ports in Greece and indeed in the whole of Europe. For many years the city had a distinctly Jewish feel to it, in the merit of the glorious Jewish community residing there, whose roots stretched back over two millennia.
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