Jan. 17, 1945:
Raoul Wallenberg, the Swedish diplomat instrumental in saving approximately 100,000 Hungarian Jews from the Nazis, disappeared in Budapest under mysterious circumstances two days after the city was liberated.
Jan. 18, 1943:
The Germans began their second deportation of Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto, which led to the first instance of armed resistance. The deportation was halted within a few days, and the Nazis retreated, only to return three months later, at which time the Warsaw uprising started in earnest.
Jan. 19, 1942:
Solomon Wiener and Michael Podchlebnik, two Jewish prisoners in Chelmno, Poland, became the first men to escape from any Nazi death camp and create the world’s first eyewitness account of the Third Reich’s mass murder of Jews.
Tevet 20, 4966 (1204):
Yahrzeit (anniversary of death) of Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon (Rambam; also known as Maimonides), Talmudist, codifier, physician, and philosopher, widely regarded as the most influential Jewish thinker of the Middle Ages.
Born in Córdoba, Spain, he fled to Cairo after his city’s capture by Al Mohadan fanatics. In Cairo, in addition to leading the Jewish community, he was a top physician who served in the court of the sultan of Egypt. His magnum opus is Mishneh Torah, a comprehensive 14-volume code of Jewish law that has since been the subject of more than 300 commentaries. In addition, he wrote Guide for the Perplexed, which explains Jewish theology in light of Aristotelian philosophy and science. The Rambam is buried in Israel in Tiberias.
Tevet 21:
Hebrew Language Day: Every year on the Hebrew birthday of Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, the extraordinary story of the revival of the Hebrew language, unparalleled in history, is celebrated in schools, in the IDF, and in cooperation with the Zionist Organization in the Diaspora.
A language with roots dating back more than 3,000 years, Hebrew was brought back to life by Ben-Yehuda after centuries during which it effectively lay dormant. It is now flourishing, with more than nine million Hebrew speakers worldwide.
Jan. 22, 1991:
An Iraqi Scud missile, one of 39 fired at Israel during the Gulf War, landed in Ramat Gan, killing three, wounding 96, and damaging 20 apartment buildings. It was feared that Iraq would fire missiles filled with chemical weapons, so the Israeli government issued gas masks to its citizens.
Israel was restrained by America from retaliating due to their concern that it would jeopardize the anti-Iraq coalition, including Arabs. Instead, America provided two batteries of Patriot air-defense missiles. Fortunately, the Scud missiles targeting Israel were relatively ineffective.
Jan. 23, 1918:
Birthday of Gertrude Elion, American biochemist who received the 1987 Nobel Prize in Medicine for creating a drug with the remarkable success rate of curing 80% of all childhood leukemia patients. In addition, she helped develop drugs to prevent kidney rejection and to treat anemia, hepatitis, gout, herpes, malaria, and shingles. She also helped create the first licensed US drug to combat AIDS.
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