Today, the Wiener Library in London is known to historians, researchers, and genealogists as a valuable source of rare books and archival materials, particularly pertaining to the experiences of German and British Jews during the Holocaust. Robert Philpot tells the story of its origins:

Eighty-five years ago this year, Alfred Wiener, a German Jew decorated with the Iron Cross in World War I, fled his homeland and established the Jewish Central Information Office in Amsterdam. Its purpose was to alert the world to the dangers posed by Germany’s new rulers. . . . [H]e had been aware, and trying to warn his fellow countrymen, of the growing menace posed by the German far right for almost the entire period of the Weimar Republic. . . . To inform and document his work, Wiener collected pamphlets, books, leaflets, newspapers, and posters charting the Nazis’ rise and their hatred of Jews. . . .

In the late summer of 1939 Wiener departed Amsterdam for Britain, where on the ill-fated date of September 1, 1939, he reopened the Jewish Central Information Office in London’s Marylebone [neighborhood] as Germany invaded Poland. Scrambling to [gain information] about the leaders, military commanders, and institutions of the country with which Britain was now at war, the BBC and such government departments as the Ministry of Information paid Wiener to access the resources of what they began informally to call “the library.” . . .

[Beyond this, there] is the critical role played by the library in adding to, and helping to shape, early postwar thinking about, and studies of, Nazi ideology, anti-Semitism, and the Holocaust. Gerald Reitlinger’s classic 1953 study of the Holocaust, The Final Solution, [the first English-language history of the subject], was, for instance, mainly researched at the library. It also supported Lionel Kochan’s 1957 book, Pogrom: November 10 1938, the first detailed analysis of Kristallnacht. . . .

Crucially, the library also began to assemble and publish eyewitness accounts of the Nazis’ war on the Jews almost as soon as Hitler was dead. . . . It [also] provided documentation to the prosecutors at Nuremberg that was available nowhere else. . . . Nearly fifteen years later, it performed the same function at the trial of Adolf Eichmann.

Last week, the Lebanese parliament chose Joseph Aoun to be the country’s next president, filling a position that has been vacant since 2022. Aoun, currently commander of the military—and reportedly supported by the U.S. and Saudi Arabia—edged out Suleiman Frangiyeh, Hizballah’s preferred candidate. But while Aoun’s victory is a step in the right direction, David Daoud sounds a cautionary note:

Lebanon’s president lacks the constitutional authority to order Hizballah’s disarmament, and Aoun was elected as another “consensus president” with Hizballah’s votes. They wouldn’t vote for a man who would set in motion a process leading to their disarmament.

Habib Malik agrees that hoping for too much to come out of the election could constitute “daydreaming,” but he nonetheless believes the Lebanese have a chance to win their country back from Hizballah and, ultimately, make peace with Israel:

Lebanon’s 2019 economic collapse and the 2020 massive explosion at the Beirut Port were perpetrated by the ruling mafia, protected ever since by Hizballah. [But] Lebanon’s anti-Iran/Hizballah communities constitute a reliable partner for both the U.S. and Israel. The Lebanese are desperate to be rid of Iranian influence in order to pursue regional peace and prosperity with their neighbors. Suddenly, a unique opportunity for peace breaking out between Israel and Lebanon could be upon us, particularly given President Trump’s recent reelection with a landslide mandate. It was under Trump’s first term that the Abraham Accords came into being and so under his second term they could certainly be expanded.

As matters stand, Lebanon has very few major contentious issues with Israel. The precisely targeted and methodical nature of Israel’s war in Lebanon against Hizballah and what has unfolded in Syria make this outcome a far more attainable goal.