During the first half of the 20th century, American Jews became eager consumers of cantorial music. This was also a time of increased interaction between Jews and African Americans—by the 1920s Harlem had become home to the world’s second-largest concentration of Jews—and the proliferation of black synagogues. Perhaps one result of these trends, writes Henry Sapoznik, was the phenomenon of the black cantor:

That we even know anything about the diversity of black cantors in the 1920s is thanks to journalist and essayist Sh. Rubinzohn of Di Yiddishe Togblatt (the “Jewish Daily News”). . . . In his June 28th, 1920 column, entitled Mendel, der Shvartser Khazn (Mendel the Black Cantor) Rubinzohn tells of arriving in his office to find a young black man waiting to speak to him. He introduced himself as Mendel, a press agent for Kessler’s Theater—a popular Yiddish stage on the Lower East Side—and was looking for a plug in Rubinzohn’s column for their new show which featured Mendel’s specialty: Yiddish songs and cantorial prayers.

Asked for a demonstration, Mendel launched into the industrial-strength Yiddish showstopper, “A Khazndl af Shabes” (“A Cantor on the Sabbath”) a demanding pyrotechnical mix of ornate cantorial melismata and snappy barn-burning theatricality.

“He sings with a real Jewish turn,” Rubinzohn marveled, “with a real Jewish moan and sigh.” . . . Rubinzohn [also] commented on Mendel’s reyner yidish (literate Yiddish), about his birth in Barbados, his coming to America around 1910, and his eventual migration to the Yiddish theater.

A few months later, Rubinzohn profiled one Dovid Ha-Kohen, from the Ethiopian city of Massawa:

[Ha-Kohen] claimed to know 29 languages and who, in a wide-ranging conversation which toggled effortlessly between Yiddish and Hebrew, offered a whirlwind narrative about being educated in Paris and Palestine, studying under a cantor in Russia as a meshoyrer (an apprentice cantor), marrying a Jewish woman in Pinsk and fathering two children, doing translation work for the U.S. Army and coming to the United States to become a cantor.

Rubinzohn was curious: what did his parents say about his marriage? They were horrified and [said] that it was a “shande” (disgrace.)

Between December 27 and January 6, terrorists in Gaza fired rockets at Israel almost every night. On Monday, one rocket struck a home in the much-bombarded town of Sderot, although no one was injured. The rocket fire had largely halted last spring, and for some time barrages were often the result of Israeli forces closing in a Hamas unit or munitions depot. But the truth—which gives credence to Ran Baratz’s argument in his January essay that the IDF is struggling to accomplish its mission—is that Hamas has been able to rebuild. Yoni Ben Menachem writes that the jihadist group has been “producing hundreds of new rockets using lathes smuggled into tunnels that remain operational in Gaza.” Moreover, it has been replenishing its ranks:

According to Israeli security officials, Hamas has recruited approximately 4,000 new fighters over the past month. This rapid expansion bolsters its fighting capabilities and complicates Israel’s efforts to apply military pressure on Hamas to expedite a hostage deal. Hamas’s military recovery has allowed it to prolong its war of attrition against the IDF and adopt tougher stances in hostage negotiations. The funds for this recruitment effort are reportedly from the sale of humanitarian-aid packages, which Hamas forcibly seizes and resells in Gaza’s markets.

In fact, Ben Menachem writes, Hamas’s rocket fire is part of the same strategy:

By firing rockets, Hamas seeks to demonstrate its resilience and operational capability despite the IDF’s prolonged offensive. This message is aimed at both Gaza’s residents and the Israeli public, underscoring that Hamas remains a significant force even after enduring heavy losses [and] that Israel cannot easily occupy this region, currently a focal point of IDF operations.