Micrography, the use of miniature writing to draw shapes and pictures, has been a Jewish art form for over a millennium. Traditionally, the letters spell out biblical verses and form images of biblical scenes or religious objects. But Louis Rotblat, a Polish-born Jew who made his way first to England and later to New York, used micrography to draw portraits, including of two of the greatest figures of the American Yiddish theater: the playwrights Abraham Goldfaden and Jacob Gordin. David Mazower writes:

[Rotblat] had a genius for creating micrographs—minutely detailed compositions made up of thousands of tiny letters that appear whole from a distance but fracture and dissolve when viewed close up.

This unique form of Jewish folk art has a long history . . . and is still being practiced today. A micrographic artist needs the compositional skills of an architectural draughtsman, the fearlessness of a tattooist, and the flowing hand of an artist. Plus the fluency and stamina of the sofer, the Torah scribe, the occupation that many micrographers followed.

Rotblat created his first known micrographic portrait in London in 1897. It paid tribute to . . . Abraham Goldfaden, the founding father of the Yiddish stage. The Goldfaden micrograph . . . uses thousands of words from the text of the biblical operetta Shulamis, one of the most popular of all Goldfaden plays. In similar vein, his 1909 portrait of Jacob Gordin was also minutely detailed and was based on the text of a hugely popular play. This time it was Gordon’s Mirele Efros, also known as The Jewish Queen Lear.

The former Israeli chief justice Aharon Barak recently warned that the country could be headed toward civil war due to Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to fire the head of the Shin Bet, and the opposition thereto. To Amichai Attali, such comments are both “out of touch with reality” and irresponsible—as are those of Barak’s political opponents:

Yes, there is tension and stress, but there is also the unique Israeli sense of solidarity. Who exactly would fight in this so-called civil war? Try finding a single battalion or military unit willing to go out and kill their own brothers and sisters—you won’t. They don’t exist. About 7 percent of the population represents the extremes of the political spectrum, making the most noise. But if we don’t come to our senses, that number might grow.

And what about you, leader of [the leftwing party] The Democrats and former deputy IDF chief, Yair Golan? You wrote that the soldiers fighting Hamas in Gaza are pawns in Netanyahu’s political survival game. Really? Is that what the tens of thousands of soldiers on the front lines need to hear? Or their mothers back home? Do you honestly believe Netanyahu would sacrifice hostages just to stay in power? Is that what the families of those hostages need right now?

Israeli democracy will not collapse if Netanyahu fires the head of the Shin Bet—so long as it’s done legally. Nor will it fall because demonstrators fill the streets to protest. They are not destroying democracy, nor are they terrorists working for Hamas.