Press

views updated May 23 2018

PRESS

This article is arranged according to the following outline:

Introduction
In Australia and New Zealand
In Belgium
In Canada
In Czechoslovakia
In England
    yiddish press
In France
In Germany and Austria
    between the two world wars
    after world war ii
    in vienna
In Holland
In Hungary
In India
In Italy
Ladino Press
    zionism
    in the u.s.
    israel
In Latin America
In the Middle East and North Africa
In Poland
    after world war ii
In Romania
In Russia
    in the u.s.s.r. (1917–1970)
In Scandinavia
In South Africa
In Switzerland
In the United States

Introduction

The first Jewish newspaper is generally considered to be the Gazeta de Amsterdam, which appeared in 1675. Holland had by then become an important Jewish center, having attracted many Spanish-Portuguese and Polish Jews seeking a refuge from persecution, and some years earlier *Manasseh Ben Israel had set up the first Hebrew *printing press there. The appearance of the Gazeta was no accident. It was issued by a Sephardi printer, was written in Judeo-Spanish or Ladino, the language of the exiles, and carried dispatches from other countries. The next notable publication, Dinstagishe un Fraytagishe Kurant in Yiddish, appeared twice a week and then once a week as the Dinstagishe Kurant in 1686 and 1687. The first Jewish periodical was Peri Eẓ Ḥayyim, also of Amsterdam, a monthly bulletin containing rabbinical decisions of the Sephardi community. It appeared from 1728 to 1761.

As Emancipation and Haskalah gained ground among European Jewry in the middle of the 18th century, Jewish journals appeared in Germany and other countries. Their numbers increased with the revival of Hebrew, the growth of Yiddish literature, and the continued flight of Jews from Eastern Europe. The rise of modern Zionism and the emergence of political parties among the Jews stimulated printing and publishing, and by 1882 Isidore Singer of Vienna, in the brochure Presse und Judenthum, was able to list 103 extant Jewish newspapers and journals. Thirty of them were in German, 19 in Hebrew (three of them appearing in Jerusalem), 15 in English, 14 in Yiddish, six in Ladino, five in French, and the rest in eight other languages.

The first successful Jewish newspaper in the modern sense was the *Allgemeine Zeitung des Judentums, launched in Leipzig in 1837 and surviving until 1922. The Jewish Chronicle, founded in London in 1841, was to prove even more successful and in 2006 has flourished as the oldest Jewish newspaper in the world. On Jan. 17, 1896, it published the first Zionist article by Theodor *Herzl. Herzl himself launched *Die Welt in 1897. These two weeklies published the latest Jewish and Zionist news and served as sources for other newspapers before the Zionist Organization established its own press bureau to supply the Jewish press with the latest news from Ereẓ Israel and the Diaspora. The first Jewish news agency was the Neue Juedische Korrespondenz, which was founded in Berlin in 1907 and served the Jewish press until shortly after the outbreak of World War i. In order to keep in touch under war conditions with communities in other parts of the world, some Jewish organizations established offices in neutral countries. The World Zionist Organization, with headquarters in Berlin, opened offices in Copenhagen where an information bulletin appeared under its auspices in English, French, and German, and reached (sometimes in reprint) the countries of both the Allied and Central powers. Another well-organized agency was the Juedische Presse Zentrale in Zurich. The main function of these agencies was to scan the world press for information of Jewish interest and pass it on to the newspapers. They were mostly short-lived; but the *Jewish Telegraphic Agency, established in The Hague in 1914 by Jacob *Landau and reestablished in London in 1919 by Landau and Meir *Grossman, proved more permanent. In 1922 its headquarters were transferred to New York. It had correspondents and bureaus in many countries, and it issued a Jewish Daily Bulletin in English and other languages; in 1962 it began a weekly bulletin, Community News.

Until World War ii, Europe had the largest number of Jewish periodicals. There were Yiddish dailies in Warsaw, Lvov, Cracow, Lodz, Bialystok, Vilna, Riga, Kovno, and other large East European towns, including Soviet Yiddish newspapers in Moscow, Kharkov, and Minsk. There were also Jewish Polish dailies, more than two dozen weeklies in Yiddish, Hebrew, and Polish, and nearly 100 monthlies. There were more than 100 Jewish German-language weeklies, fortnightlies, and monthlies in Germany and Austria. A Jewish German-language daily appeared in Vienna, 1919–27. The rise of Nazi power brought most of these papers to an end. When the Nazi forces overran any country, one of their first acts was to close down the Jewish publications. "Underground" newspapers also appeared in the ghettos, among the partisans in the forests, and even, if rarely, in the concentration camps.

In 1967 there were 580 Jewish newspapers and periodicals in the world, outside Israel: 178 in Europe, 245 in the U.S., 82 in Central and South America, 29 in Africa, 21 in Canada, 19 in Australia and New Zealand, several in Asia, and two in the Soviet Union. English was the language of the largest number (300), with Yiddish coming second (112). The position of the Yiddish language presented a paradox. Though Yiddish was regarded as generally losing ground, all the Jewish daily papers outside Israel, ten in number, were in Yiddish. Efforts to establish a Spanish Jewish daily in Argentina were without success, and an English Jewish daily in London proved unsuccessful. In 2006 there were around 50 weekly newspapers and a large number of bi-weekly and monthly publications in the U.S. There were 15 weekly Jewish newspapers in Europe, seven in Canada, three in Latin America, and two elsewhere in the world. In addition, there were many which appeared biweekly or monthly in different centers of Jewish population. The former Soviet Union saw a rebirth of the Jewish press with over 40 publications among the republics associated with the Federation of Jewish Communities.

[Lewis Sowden and

Josef Fraenkel /

Yoel Cohen (2nd ed.)]

In Australia and New Zealand

The Voice of Jacob, founded in Sydney in 1842, was the first Jewish newspaper in Australia, and before the end of the century several others, all in English, had run their brief careers and ceased publication. A few, however, became firmly established, notably the Australian Jewish Herald (1879), the Australian Jewish Times (1893), and Hebrew Standard (1894). There was no significant growth in the Jewish press until the middle decades of the 20th century, when the Jewish population rose from about 27,000 in 1938 to 67,000 in 1960. The Australian Jewish News, founded in Melbourne in 1933 as a bilingual English and Yiddish weekly, published a Sydney edition under the name of The Sydney Jewish News. In 1967 the two editions had a combined circulation of 20,000.

The Jewish press attained a high standard under the guidance of Newman Rosenthal, O. Rubinstein, and Reuben Havin, its leading editors during the 1930s and 1940s. They made it an important factor in molding opinion both in the Jewish community and among prominent non-Jews. Leading political figures gained their knowledge of Zionism, the Holocaust, and Israel from pages of the Australian Jewish Herald and the Australian Jewish News. This bore fruit in the pro-Jewish stand taken by Dr. C. Evatt of Australia, as chairman of the un Advisory Committee on Palestine in 1947. Within the community, the press exercised a strong influence on the development of representative bodies, particularly the state Boards of Deputies and the Executive Council of Australian Jewry. It also influenced the decision in favor of establishing the Melbourne day school, Mount Scopus College, and later the Jewish day-school movement generally.

The strong support which the Jewish press gave to Zionism influenced the outlook of the Jewish community, eventually winning over old-established families who had opposed political Zionism in the pre-State era. The pro-Israel opinion thus formed eventually led to the downfall of the Australian Jewish Herald and its Yiddish subsidiary, the Australian Jewish Post. In 1968 the Australian Jewish Herald, the oldest existing Jewish paper in Australia, published an article with an anti-Israel bias. During the controversy that followed, David Lederman, publisher of the Herald and the Post, also attacked the Victoria Jewish Board of Deputies. Pressure by the board and the immediate loss of popularity compelled both papers, with a total circulation of 12,500 weekly, to cease publication. Among the other publications which appeared in Australia were The Bridge, a literary quarterly, and Yiddish periodicals, Der Landsmann and Unzer Gedank.

In New Zealand, the Jewish Times, a monthly, appeared in Wellington in 1931, and was succeeded by the New Zealand Jewish Chronicle, a bimonthly, in 1944. A monthly, Hashofar, was founded in 1959.

[Lewis Sowden]

In Belgium

The small size of the Jewish community of Belgium for long limited the publication of Jewish periodicals. The first, Revue Orientale, edited from 1841 to 1846 by Eliakim *Carmoly, did not have enough local interest to last. No others were published until shortly before World War I, when several publications were sponsored by Jews of East European origin.

By 1959, however, no fewer than 225 Jewish periodicals had appeared in Belgium, reflecting the vitality of the community in the 20th century. Of these, 46 were in a mimeographed or lithographed form; 97 were in Yiddish, four in Hebrew, 80 in French, two in German, one in Russian, one in English, and 27 in more than one language. Four were published between 1900 and 1918, 137 from 1919 until the German occupation of Belgium in 1940, seven illegally during the German occupation of 1940–44, and 70 after the liberation of Belgium. Most of these were intended for the membership of an organization, rather than for the public at large.

In 1970 there were five Jewish journals in Belgium: the weekly Belgisch Israelietisch Weekblad, founded in 1954; the bimonthly Tribune Sioniste, founded in 1951 and having a circulation of 5,500; three monthlies, Centrale (circulation 8,000), Regards (Cahiers du Centre Communautaire Laic Juif), and Kehilatenou; and a quarterly, Central in Flemish and Yiddish.

In Canada

The earliest Jewish newspaper to appear in Canada was the Jewish Times, a weekly first, published in 1897. In 1909 its name was changed to Canadian Jewish Times, and in 1915 it merged with the weekly Canadian Jewish Chronicle of Montreal, which had been founded in 1914. The Chronicle amalgamated with the Canadian Jewish Review and appeared as the Canadian Jewish Chronicle Review from 1966 in both Toronto and Montreal, becoming a monthly in 1970. There was no Yiddish press until 1907, when Der Kanader Adler (The Canadian [Jewish] Eagle) began daily publication in Montreal. Other Yiddish newspapers, such as the Toronto-based daily Yiddisher Zhurnal (Hebrew Journal) established in 1911, emerged in the wake of increased immigration from Eastern Europe. After several false starts, a weekly Yiddish paper Dos Yiddishe Vort (The Jewish Word) started up in Winnipeg,

Driven by a strong political agenda, Canadian Jewish communists began publishing a Yiddish newspaper starting from the 1920s that went through several name changes emerging as the Vokhenblat after World War ii. A monthly Congress Bulletin, by the Canadian Jewish Congress from 1943 and the Canadian Zionist, in English and Hebrew, was published by the Zionist Organization beginning in 1931; the English/Yiddish The View-Dos Vort by the Canadian Labour Zionist movement beginning in 1940 and Orah of the Canadian Hadassah Organization. In addition a French monthly, Bulletin du Cercle Juif, was published by the Canadian Jewish Congress from 1954, and a quarterly in English and Spanish, Newsletter, founded by the International Council of Jewish Women, were both widely distributed.

[Lewis Sowden]

The Yiddish language press no longer existed in Canada in the 21st century, but the Anglo-Jewish press was alive and well. The Canadian Jewish News was by far the largest weekly Jewish newspaper in Canada with separate Toronto editions and Montreal editions. The Montreal edition offered readers some French articles. With a combined weekly subscriber count of about 41,000 households, the paper is read from coast to coast across Canada. It is privately-owned but effectively functions as the national community-based newspaper featuring diverse points of view on topics of Jewish interest, national and foreign. The weekly Jewish Independent, published between 1930 and 2005 as the Jewish Western Bulletin, serves the Jewish communities of British Columbia, especially Vancouver, and is largely circulated by mail. Serving Winnipeg and surrounding communities since 1925 is the weekly Jewish Post and News. Similarly The Jewish Free Press is an independent newspaper published in Calgary which addresses the interests of Jew in southern Alberta. The Jewish Tribune is published twice a month by B'nai B'rith Canada, and deals with local, national and international concerns. A left-leaning monthly magazine, Canadian Jewish Outlook, is currently published out of Vancouver, with the assistance of "collectives" in other communities. Increasingly, all these publications have online editions. Across Canada, many Jewish organizations, synagogue, Jewish campus groups and smaller communities also have their own newspapers or regular bulletins and there are several Jewish-community–focused radio and television programs broadcast in centers of heavier Canadian Jewish population.

[Richard Menkis and

Harold Troper (2nd ed.)]

In Czechoslovakia

Jewish journalists worked in papers of all political parties in Czechoslovakia. There were Conservatives like Josef Penížek, Liberals like Josef Kodícek, Karel Poláček, and Richard Weiner; Social Democrats like Gustav Winter; and Communists like Rudolf Slánský. There were also baptized Jewish editors on the Catholic press, among them Alfred Fuchs and Pavel Tigrid. Adolf Stránský founded the daily Lidové Noviny. The Prager Tagblatt had many Jews on its staff (Max *Brod among them) and a large Jewish readership.

The Jewish press itself was characterized by vehement public discussion between the Zionists and the organized assimilationist movement, which created its first paper, česko-židovské Listy, in 1894. In 1907 it amalgamated with a similar periodical published by Viktor Vohryzek and appeared then as a weekly under the name Rozvoj until 1939. The first Zionist organ was the German weekly for youth, Jung Juda, which was established in 1899 by Filip Lebenhart and survived until late in the 1930s. Another weekly, Selbstwehr, edited from 1918 by Felix *Weltsch, assisted later by Hans Lichtwitz (Uri Naor; d. 1988), became one of the outstanding Zionist periodicals in Europe, and from the 1920s issued a woman's supplement edited by Hanna Steiner. Another Zionist weekly, Juedische Volksstimme, edited by its founder Max Hickl and later by Hugo *Gold, appeared in Brno. The paper was established in 1901 and appeared until 1939.

The first Zionist organ in Czech, Židovské Listy pro čechy, Moravu a Slezsko, appeared in 1913, but was suspended during World War i and replaced in 1918 by the weekly Židovské zpravy, edited by Emil Waldstein, František Friedman, Gustav Fleischmann, Zdeněk Landes, and Viktor Fischl (Avigdor *Dagan). In Slovakia and Carpathorussia the Jewish press included Orthodox organs and papers in Hungarian and Yiddish. In Slovakia were the Zionist weekly Juedische Volkszeitung (with a Slovak supplement), edited by Oskar Neumann, and the Mizrachi organ Juedisches Familienblatt; in Carpathorussia the Zionist weekly Juedische Stimme, the Revisionist Zsidó Néplap, and the journal of the rabbi of Munkacz, Yidishe Tsaytung, had the largest circulation. Of the many other Jewish periodicals the following were notable: the historical review Zeitschrift fuer die Geschichte der Juden in Boehmen und Maehren (editor Hugo Gold); B'nai B'rith Blaetter (editor Friedrich Thieberger); the Revisionist Medina Iwrit-Judenstaat, edited by Oskar K. *Rabinowicz (1934–39); the *Po'alei Zion paper Der Neue Weg (editor Karl Baum); and the sports monthly Hagibor-Hamakabi. The Jewish youth and student movements also published periodicals of varying duration in the different languages of the country. The Juedische Revue was issued by emigrants from Germany in the late 1930s. Between 1945 and the Communist take-over in 1948, attempts were made to revive some Jewish periodicals, but eventually all that remained of the extensive Jewish press in Czechoslovakia was the organ of the Prague congregation; Věstník židovské náboženské obce v Praze, edited by R. Iltis (d. 1977), who also edited the almanac Zidovská ročenka.

[Avigdor Dagan]

In England

The Anglo-Jewish press had its beginnings in the first half of the 19th century. During the next 100 years and more, numerous publications appeared both in London and the provinces. Many of them were short-lived, but some had long and influential careers, and in 1968 the Jewish press in Britain comprised about 60 publications.

The first periodical was The Hebrew Intelligencer, printed and published by J. Wertheimer in London. Intended as a monthly, it first saw light in January 1823, but published only three issues. More successful was The Hebrew Review and Magazine of Rabbinical Literature, also a monthly, which lasted from 1834 to 1837, under the editorship of Morris Jacob *Raphall. Persecution of Jews abroad demonstrated the need for a channel of expression in England and brought about the first effective enterprise in Anglo-Jewish journalism. The Voice of Jacob, edited by Jacob *Franklin, was initiated in September 1841 as a fortnightly, and was followed two months later by the Jewish Chronicle. The two papers were in competition until 1848, when the Jewish Chronicle gained the field for itself and was destined to become the most long-lived of Jewish newspapers. Among other papers that appeared in the ensuing years were Sabbath Leaves (1845) sponsored by Haim *Guedalla; The Cup of Salvation (Liverpool, 1846–47); The Hebrew Observer (1853), which merged with the Jewish Chronicle in the following year; The Jewish Sabbath Journal (1855); and the Hebrew National (1867).

The first Jewish penny paper, The Jewish Record, was a weekly that ran for four years (from 1868). The Jewish World, established in 1873, was edited by the novelist S.L. *Bensusan in 1897, when its circulation rose to 2,000. In 1931 it was acquired by the Jewish Chronicle and was amalgamated with it in 1934. Other papers were The Jewish Times, a penny weekly of 1876; The Jewish Standard, also a penny (1888–91); and Jewish Society (1888–91), under the nominal editorship of Frank Danby (the novelist Julia *Frankau). Provincial Jewry had periodicals such as Jewish Topics (Cardiff, 1886), The Jewish Record (Manchester, 1887), and The South Wales Review (1904). A Hebrew weekly Ha-Yehudi appeared in London 1897–1913 issued by Isaac *Suwalski.

The period after World War i produced The Jewish Woman (1925–26); The Jewish Family (1927); The Jewish Graphic (1926–28); The Jewish Echo (Glasgow, 1928– ); The Jewish Gazette (Manchester, 1928– ); The Jewish Weekly (1932–36); World Jewry (1934–36); and The Jewish Guardian (1920–36), which was founded under the editorship of Laurie *Magnus by a group of anti-Zionists. In 1968 the Jewish press of Great Britain included a branch of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency; the Press Survey of the World Jewish Congress, founded in 1945; the Jewish World News Agency (Yiddish), founded in 1940; and the Jewish Chronicle Feature and News Service, founded in 1948. There were weeklies in Glasgow, Manchester, Leeds, and Newcastle. In London, another weekly, The Jewish Observer and Middle East Review, was founded in 1952, as a successor to the Zionist Review. The fortnightlies included the Mizrachi Jewish Review, the Po'alei Zion's Jewish Vanguard, and The Jewish Tribune in English and Yiddish. The others varied widely from monthly trade journals to learned quarterlies and annuals.

yiddish press

Attempts to establish Yiddish newspapers in England preceded the mass immigration from Eastern Europe in the 1880s. The Londoner Yiddish-Deitche Zeitung was started in 1867 and the socialist Londoner Israelit in 1878, but both were short-lived. Later enterprises were more successful. The weekly Peilisher Yidel (later Die Zukunft) was founded in 1884 and lasted for two years. As the immigrant communities increased in numbers in London, Leeds, and Manchester, they were served by dailies and weeklies, mostly socialist in outlooks – Der Arbeter, Arbeter Fraynd (1886–91), Germinal (anarchist fortnightly), Der Veker (anti-anarchist), Di Naye Velt (1900–01), and humorous periodicals such as Pipifax, Der Bluffer, and Der Ligner. It was not until the 20th century that Yiddish newspapers like the Advertiser and the Yidisher Telefon began to flourish. The Advertiser was absorbed by the Yidisher Zhurnal, founded in 1907, which was itself absorbed in 1914 by the Yiddisher Ekspres. The Ekspres began publication in Leeds in 1895 and became a London daily in 1899. The Yidisher Tageblat appeared from 1901 to 1910, and *Di Zeit, a daily founded in 1913, survived until 1950. A Yiddish fortnightly, Yidishe Shtime, founded in 1951, was edited in 1970 by I.A. Lisky. There was also a Yiddish literary journal Loshn un Lebn.

[Lewis Sowden]

In France

There was no Jewish press in France before the French Revolution. The first Jewish publication was the Caitung, a weekly in Alsatian Yiddish issued by a Metz printer for five months from November 1789. Several later journals were also short-lived, and it was not until the early 1840s that a monthly, Les Archives Israélites de France, showed any capacity for survival. It was founded by S. Cahen and advocated reform. This stimulated J. *Bloch to launch a rival conservative monthly, L'Univers Israélite, in 1844. For nearly 100 years both periodicals exercised considerable influence on Jewish life, Les Archives surviving until 1935 and L'Univers continuing as a weekly until 1940. This 100-year period, however, saw the birth and demise of more than 300 other publications. A total of 374 appeared from 1789 to 1940. Only 38 of these saw the light before 1881; the largest number, 203, came into being after 1923. Of the total, 134 were in French, 180 in Yiddish, and nine in Hebrew; 56 of them (21 in Yiddish) were Zionist, and 28 (all in Yiddish) were communist. Many of them were stable and influential. Two of them were Yiddish dailies. During World War ii a few underground papers were published in Yiddish and French. After the war, the Jewish press recovered its prewar character. In 1957 the illustrated L'Arche, edited by Joseph Samuel and published by the Fonds Social Juif Unifié, the leading Jewish welfare and fund-raising organization in France, began to appear. L'Arhe was intended to express the revival of French Jewry after World War ii by reflecting its religious, intellectual, and artistic life. In 1967 there were three Yiddish dailies, among them Unzer Vort (Po'alei Zion) and Unzer Shtime (*Bund), and a large number of weeklies and monthlies in French and Yiddish.

In Germany and Austria

Jewish periodicals appeared in Germany from the middle of the 18th century, when they became an expression of the era and its movements – Enlightenment, Reform, and Emancipation. One of them, the Dyhernfurther Privilegierte Zeitung, published in 1771–72 in the Lower Silesian town famous for its Hebrew printing presses, was a German-language journal written in Hebrew script. A few years later *Ha-Me'assef (Berlin, 1784–1811), was founded by Moses *Mendelssohn and used Hebrew as its medium. The first periodical intended for Jews published in the German language and script was Sulamith, which appeared in Dessau from 1806 to 1833. Apart from this, the only periodical before 1850 that lasted for any significant length of time was the Wissenschaftliche Zeitschrift fuer Juedische Theologie, which Abraham *Geiger edited in Frankfurt from 1835 to 1847. The longest-lived journal in German Jewish press history – 85 years – was the religiously liberal weekly Allgemeine Zeitung des Judentums, founded in 1837 by R. Ludwig Philippson of Magdeburg, and edited by him for 50 years.

Of the 75 Jewish newspapers and periodicals that came into existence during the 60 years before World War i, only 16 of those appearing at least once a month held out for more than 12 years. They were the following:

(1) the *Monatsschrift fuer Geschichte und Wissenschaft des Judentums (1851–1939);

(2) *Jeschurun (Frankfurt, 1854–70), founded by Samson Raphael *Hirsch;

(3) the Hebrew *Ha-Maggid (Lyck, 1857–92); (4) the Orthodox *Israelit (Mainz and Frankfurt, 1860–1938);

(5) the Juedische Zeitschrift fuer Wissenschaft und Leben (Breslau, 1862–75);

(6) the *Juedische Presse (Berlin, 1869–1923), edited by Hirsch *Hildesheimer;

(7) the Conservative Israelitische Wochenschrift fuer die religioesen und sozialen Interessen des Judenthums (Breslau and Magdeburg, 1870–94);

(8) the Monatsblaetter zur Belehrung ueber das Judentum (Frankfurt, 1881–1908);

(9) the liberal Allgemeine Israelitische Wochenschrift (Berlin, 1891–1906);

(10) Im deutschen Reich (Berlin, 1895–1921), the organ of the Central Union of German Citizens of Jewish Faith;

(11) the independent Juedisches Volksblatt (Breslau, 1896–1923);

(12) the Zionist *Juedische Rundschau (Berlin, 1896–1938, see below);

(13) the Mizrachi Israelitisches Familienblatt (Frankfurt, from 1900) called after 1920 Neue Juedische Presse;

(14) the arts periodical Ost und West (Berlin, 1901–22); (15) the Zeitschrift fuer Demographie und Statistik der Juden (Berlin, 1904–22);

(16) the Israelitisches Familienblatt (Hamburg, 1898–1938).

between the two world wars

The Jewish political press was at its most flourishing after World War I, when German Jewry enjoyed a cultural revival. This political press consisted mainly of weeklies, such as (1) the Zionist Juedische Rundschau; (2) the *C.V. Zeitung (Berlin, 1922–38) edited by Ludwig Hollaender, Alfred Weiner, Alfred Hirschberg, and others, founded in Berlin in 1922 as an outgrowth of the Central Union's monthly Im Deutschen Reich; (3) the Israelitisches Familienblatt, established in Hamburg in 1898 by Max and Leo Lessmann; (4) the *Israelit; and (5) Der Schild, founded in 1921 by the Jewish ex-servicemen's association.

Of more than three dozen community papers that appeared at various periods, most of them neutral in their handling of Jewish politics, the most prominent ones were those appearing in Berlin from 1911, Frankfurt from 1922, and Munich (serving the Bavarian region) from 1924. A considerable number of papers served the special interests of youth, women, teachers, cantors, social workers, and other groups. In addition to these, a large number of periodicals – published, practically without exception, in German – dealt with religious, scientific, and politico-cultural affairs. Among these was Der Morgen (Darmstadt, later Berlin, 1925–38), which had a "German-Jewish" or assimilationist policy. *Der Jude was the name given to a periodical published by Gabriel *Riesser during his campaign for Jewish Emancipation (Altona, 1832–35). The same name was used some 75 years later for another periodical, directed by Martin *Buber in Berlin from 1916 to 1924 and supporting Jewish nationalism. The title Zion was given first to a religious fortnightly (Berlin, 1833–35), then to a Reformist monthly (Frankfurt, 1840–43), later still to a Zionist monthly (Berlin, 1895–99), and finally to a Mizrachi periodical (Berlin, 1929). In this connection J. *Ettlinger's monthly Der Zionswaechter (Altona, 1845–55) should be mentioned.

Until Kristallnacht (Nov. 10, 1938), as a direct result of which the entire Jewish daily and periodical press of the Reich was wiped out, there were about 12 regular publications in Berlin and nearly three dozen more outside the capital. The Juedisches Nachrichtenblatt, established on the orders of the Nazi authorities shortly after the general ban on Jewish publications, first appeared on Nov. 23, 1938. It was restricted to announcements of official decrees, bulletins of the Nazi-enforced organization of the Jews in Germany (Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deutschland), and of the larger Jewish communities, and the issue of important notices about emigration and welfare matters. This paper, which had none of the characteristics of a Jewish publication, appeared until 1943.

after world war ii

The Jewish press revived in West Germany after World War ii was little more than a shadow of what had existed in pre-Nazi days. The first journal to appear, in 1946, was the Duesseldorf Mitteilungsblatt fuer die juedischen Gemeinden der Nordrheinprovinz. In the following year the Juedisches Gemeindeblatt fuer die britische Zone was published in the same city. The German journalist Karl Marx founded the popular Allgemeine Unabhaengige Juedische Wochenzeitung in 1946. In 1951 two pro-Israel weeklies were founded: the Muenchner Juedische Nachrichten and the Yiddish Naye Yidishe Tsaytung. By 1970 these three were the only three Jewish newspapers in the whole of the German Federal Republic, including West Berlin. Apart from occasional publications, a monthly bulletin published by the Juedischer Pressedienst of Duesseldorf (the jpd) has appeared from 1965. In the German Democratic Republic one newspaper, the Nachrichtenblatt, has been issued since 1961 by an editorial board divided between East Berlin, Dresden, Erfurt, and Schwerin, its full title being Nachrichtenblatt der juedischen Gemeinde von Gross-Berlin und des Verbandes der juedischen Gemeinden in der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik.

in vienna

The German language was also predominant in the Jewish papers of Austria, all of which were published in Vienna. The first weekly came into existence in the second half of the 19th century. It was the politically liberal Neuzeit (1861–1904), a paper well disposed to religious reform, founded by Leopold *Kompert and Simon Szánto and vigorously promoted by Adolf *Jellinek. The Oesterreichische Wochenschrift, founded in 1884 by R. Joseph Samuel *Bloch, several times a member of the Austrian parliament, lasted for 37 years. This was for a time the organ of the Vienna Jewish community, and as such it actively opposed both the antisemitic Christian Social movement and early Zionism. Die Wahrheit, the weekly organ of the Union of Austrian Jews, which first appeared in 1885, was emphatically assimilationist and anti-Zionist; its last editor was Oscar Hirschfeld. Die Welt (1897–1914), founded by Theodor Herzl, which appeared in Cologne and Berlin as well as in Vienna, was the weekly organ of the Austrian Zionist movement; in 1918–19 Robert *Weltsch edited the Zionist Juedische Zeitung (1907–21). He was also associated with the only Jewish daily ever to appear in Vienna, the Wiener Morgenzeitung (1919–27). The weekly Die Neue Welt (1928–38) was directed by Robert *Stricker, the founder of the Jewish People's Party. The weekly Juedische Presse (1915–34) represented the interests of the Agudat Israel; and the Juedische Welt, founded in 1929, was close to the Austrian Mizrachi movement. Die juedische Front (1931–38) was the organ of the Jewish ex-servicemen.

On Nov. 10, 1938, all Jewish newspapers and periodicals in Austria were forced to close down. A Vienna edition of the official Nazi Juedisches Nachrichtenblatt appeared from the end of 1938. After World War ii the Austrian Jewish press was confined to monthlies. By the end of the 1960s there were a half dozen in existence, the two leading ones being Neue Welt, founded in 1948 and directed by Georg Kuenstlinger (1892–1969), and Die Gemeinde, founded by the Vienna Jewish community in 1958 and edited by Wilhelm Krell.

[Ernst Gottfried Lowenthal]

In Holland

The Gazeta de Amsterdam, which was issued in 1675, is generally regarded as the first Jewish newspaper. It was printed by David de Castro Tartas, a Sephardi Jew, and though its contents were not specifically Jewish, its language, Judeo-Spanish, shows that it was intended for the Spanish-Portuguese or Marrano community. The first Yiddish paper was the Dinstagishe un Fraytagishe Kurant, which appeared first as a semi-weekly from Dec. 5, 1680, and then as a weekly, Dinstagishe Kurant, in 1686–87. It was issued by the Amsterdam Jewish printer Uri Phoebus Halevi. In 1797–98 the secession of a number of Amsterdam Jews from the alte kehile ("the old congregation") and their formation of the new congregation called Adath Yeshurun led to the publication of a polemical Yiddish weekly Diskursen fun di Naye Kehile, which appeared for 24 issues (November 1797–March 1798). Its rival, Diskursen fun di Alte Kehile, appeared for 13 issues.

During the next 50 years, several yearbooks or almanacs appeared for short periods, but there was no regular Jewish press until about 1850, when a number of Jewish weeklies made their appearance under various titles. The first was the Nederlands Israëlitisch Nieuws-en Advertentieblad (1849–50), started by A.M. Chumaceiro (1813–1883), who became chief rabbi of Curaçao in the Dutch West Indies in 1855. It then continued as Israëlitisch Weekblad, under a new editorial committee. The original editors established the Weekblad voor Israëlieten (1855–84), which was continued as Nieuwsblad voor Israëlieten (1884–94). As the Weekblad voor Israëlieten it defended Reform Judaism, while a rival Orthodox weekly, the Nieuw Israëlitisch Weekblad (niw) was started in 1865 "to advocate the real love of truth." Its founder and first editor was the bibliographer M.M. *Roest. During the last quarter of the 19th century, it was one of several Jewish weeklies in Holland and had a circulation of 3,000. By 1914 its circulation had risen to 13,000 and in 1935 to 15,000 among a Jewish population of about 120,000. Publication was interrupted by the Nazi occupation of Holland but was resumed in 1945, when its policy, formerly anti-Zionist, became pro-Israel, while its approach remained Orthodox. By 1970 it was the only Jewish weekly in Holland and had a circulation of about 4,500 among a Jewish population of about 20,000.

Contemporary with the niw until 1940 were the Weekblad voor Israëlietische Huisgezinnen (1870–1940), edited by the firm of Haagens in Rotterdam, and the Centraal Blad voor Israëlieten in Nederland (1885–1940), published by Van Creveld in Amsterdam. These three publications carried detailed reports of local Jewish events, and readers' letters, with foreign Jewish news usually in a subordinate place. Different was the approach of the weekly, later a bimonthly, De Joodse Wachter, established in 1905, which became the official publication of the Netherlands Zionist Federation. Its editors, always unpaid honorary officers of the federation, included Fritz (later Peretz) *Bernstein in the 1920s. From 1967 until 1969 it existed only as a one-page supplement to the niw, appearing once every two or three weeks, but has since become independent again as a monthly. Other Zionist periodicals were Tikvath Israel (1917–40), the official monthly of the Zionist Youth Federation; the Zionist youth leaders' Baderech (1925–38) which continued as Herutenu (1938–40); the woman's monthly Ha Ischa (1929–40), and Het beloofde Land (1922–40), later called Palestine, and issued by the Keren Hayesod. An important cultural journal, opening horizons far beyond the confines of Holland, was De Vrijdagavond (1924–32), established by Izak M. Prins, J.S. da Silva Rosa, librarian of Eẓ Ḥayyim, and Justus Tal, then chief rabbi of Utrecht.

By order of the Germans, most Jewish journals had to cease publication in October 1940. Only one Jewish weekly was allowed, Het Joodse Weekblad, which first appeared in August 1940 and which, from April 1941 until September 1943, was issued under the auspices of the Joodse Raad ("Jewish Council"). It published official announcements.

After the liberation of the southern part of the Netherlands in the autumn of 1944, Jews started publishing Le-Ezrath ha-Am. This periodical merged with niw in 1946. Postwar publications of a more than ephemeral nature include Habinjan (1947–1999), the monthly of the Portugees-Israëlitische Gemeente Amsterdam (the Sephardi Congregation of Amsterdam);Hakehilla (1955–1998), the monthly of the Joodse Gemeente Amsterdam (the Ashkenazi Jewish Community of Amsterdam); and Levend Joods Geloof (1955– ), the monthly of the Verbond van Liberaal-Religieuze Joden in Nederland (Union of Liberal Synagogues in the Netherlands). In 1998 Hakehilla merged with Hakehillot, the new monthly of the Nederlands-Israëlitisch Kerkgenootschap (Organization of Jewish Communities in the Netherlands). In 1999 Habinjan, too, merged with Hakehillot.

Studia Rosenthaliana (1966– ) is a scholarly journal, devoted to Dutch Jewish history and related subjects, published by the Bibliotheca Rosenthaliana of the Amsterdam University Library. Until 2002 it was published biannually, from 2002 onward annually.

Around 2000 several new publications came into being: the glossy quarterly Joods Journal (1997– ); Grine medine (2000– ), a literary quarterly about and partly in Yiddish; Orange Juice (2004), a bimonthly for young Jews. In 2000 the website Joods.nl started, which mainly publishes Jewish news from Dutch and foreign newspapers.

[Henriette Boas /

Hilde Pach (2nd ed.)]

In Hungary

The beginning of a Jewish press in Hungary dates back to the 1840s. A few issues of a Hungarian-language quarterly, Magyar Zsinagóga, appeared in Papa in 1846–47, and a German-language weekly, Der Ungarische Israelit, appeared in 1848. The first journal of any importance was Ben *Chananja, a German-language quarterly which had originated in Leipzig but from 1858 was published in Szeged, Hungary, by R. Leopold Loew, who used it in the struggle for Jewish Emancipation; in 1861 it became a weekly in reduced format. There had hitherto been little demand for Jewish newspapers in Hungary, where capable Jewish journalists usually found employment in the general press. But now the position underwent a change. Several short-lived papers appeared in the 1860s, and in 1869 a Yiddish paper, Pester Juedische Zeitung, was founded in Budapest. It appeared five times weekly and continued publication until 1887, when it was converted into a German-language weekly, Allgemeine Juedische Zeitung (in Hebrew characters), which lasted until 1919. More significant was the Hungarian-language weekly *Egyenlőség (1881–1938), which, during the *Tiszaeszlár blood libel case of 1882–83, appeared daily with reports of the proceedings. An important contemporary was the monthly *Magyar Zsidó Szemle ("Hungarian Jewish Review"), which was founded in 1884 and appeared until 1948. It was produced by members of the Budapest rabbinical seminary and also joined in the struggle for Jewish Emancipation and religious equality. The same personnel simultaneously published a review in Hebrew, which was at first entitled Ha-Zofeh le-Hokhmat Yisrael ("Judaic Studies Observer"), later Ha-Zofeh me-Erez Hagar ("Hungarian Observer"), and finally Ha-Soker ("The Observer"). This review provided a forum for Hebrew writers at a time when almost all Jewish publications in Central Europe were in German.

Between 1846 and World War I, many periodicals appeared for short periods, most of them weeklies and most of them in German or Hungarian. During the early years of Zionism, the authorities refused permission for the publication of a Zionist paper. This was largely the result of the attitude of Jewish organizations which were opposed to the development of Hungarian Zionism. The first Zionist weekly was the German-language Ungarlaendische Juedische Zeitung which appeared from 1908 to 1914. A Zionist periodical in Hungarian, Zsidó Néplap, appeared from 1903 to 1905 and reappeared in 1908 as Zsidó Élet ("Jewish Life"). In 1909 the Hungarian Zionist Federation founded its own organ, Zsidó Szemle ("Jewish Review"), which was banned in 1938. The poet J. *Patai published a literary monthly *Multés Jövő from 1912 to 1939 and opened its columns to Zionist discussion.

Between the two world wars, there were only about 12 effective weeklies and monthlies in Hungary. The Jewish press practically came to an end in 1938, after which time the Hungarian totalitarian regime (whether Nazi or Communist) authorized only one Jewish periodical. The periodical Új Élet ("New Life") was founded in November 1945 by the Central Board of Hungarian Jews, and from 1948 reflected the policies of the Communist rulers, giving no space to the subject of Israel. Its circulation in 1967 was 10,000.

[Baruch Yaron]

In India

The first Jewish periodicals of India were in Judeo-Arabic. Doresh Tov le-Ammo, edited by David ben-Ḥayyim had a short life around 1870 and was followed by the Calcutta weeklies, Mevasser; the Jewish Gazette (1873–77), edited by Ezekiel Solomon; and Maggid Meisharim (1889–1900) edited by Solomon Abed Twena. Bene Israel publications in Marathi begun appearing in the late 1870s. There was an almost continuous succession of periodicals, sometimes more than one at a time, in Marathi and English. These contributed substantially to the education of the community. The Bene Israelite appeared in English and Marathi (the mother tongue of the *Bene Israel) from 1896, and reported the rejection by the Bene Israel leaders in Bombay of Theodor Herzl's invitation to send two delegates to the First Zionist Congress in 1897. It gave as the main reason the community's support for the "*Protestrabbiner" of Germany and the extremely Orthodox section of Anglo-Jewry.

The first national periodical to appear in India was The Jewish Advocate, an independent monthly published by the Bombay Zionist Association from 1923 to 1951. Another Zionist paper, The Jewish Tribune, appeared in Bombay from 1933 to 1939. India and Israel was owned and edited from 1949 to 1953 by F.W. Pollack, who in 1952 became Israel trade commissioner and consul in Bombay. In 1968 there were three regular Jewish periodicals. The fortnightly News from Israel, founded in 1954 and published in Bombay by the Israel consulate, had a circulation of 2,000. The Maccabi monthly, founded in 1947, was published in both English and Marathi. Other organizations published house journals from time to time.

[Percy S. Gourgey]

In Italy

The Italian Jewish press dates from the middle of the 19th century. The first newspaper, La Rivista israelitica, edited by Cesare Rovighi, appeared in Parma in 1845 and continued until 1848. Jewish journalism in the 19th century gave rise to such short-lived publications as Leghorn's L'Israelita in 1866, and Pitigliano's Il romanziere israelitico in 1895. It also produced two important reviews, L'educatore israelita and Il Corriere israelitico. The first, founded in Vercelli in 1853 by the rabbis Giuseppe Levi (1814–1874) and Esdra Pontremoli (1818–1888), published articles on religious affairs and news from the Jewish communities abroad. Among its contributors were Elijah *Benamozegh, S.D. *Luzzatto, and Lelio della *Torre. In 1874 L'educatore israelita became Il Vessillo israelitico, which appeared at Casale Monferrato under the editorship of Flaminio *Servi and lasted until 1922. U Corriere israelitico, founded in Trieste by A.V. *Morpurgo in 1862 and later edited by A. Curiel and then by Dante *Lattes, was a publication sensitive to the pressing problems of Jewish life. This newspaper staunchly supported the Zionist movement when it came into being.

In 1901 the rabbinical college at Leghorn launched the short-lived review, L'Antologia ebraica. L'Idea sionista appeared in Modena from 1901 to 1910. In 1904 the journal Lux, edited by Arrigo Lattes and Alfredo *Toaff, appeared in Leghorn, but ceased publication after ten numbers. La Rivista israelitica, published in Florence from 1904 to 1915, was edited by the chief rabbi S.H. *Margulies and became a source of great interest for Italian studies. Umberto *Cassuto, P.H. *Chajes, Ismar *Elbogen, S. *Colombo, and E.S. *Artom were among the contributors. In 1910 Rabbi Margulies also founded La Settimana israelitica, a weekly in the style of the Florentine cultural weeklies, which appeared until 1915, edited by Alfonso *Pacifici, Carlo A. *Viterbo, Q. Sinigaglia, and G. *Ottolenghi. In 1916 the Corriere israelitico and La Settimana israelitica were amalgamated in Florence under the title Israel and was edited by Carlo A. Viterbo. Offshoots of Israel were Israel dei ragazzi (1919–39) and *La Rassegna mensile di Israel (from 1925).

Other publications with considerable circulation in 1970 were Bollettino della Comunità israelitica di Milano, founded in 1945 and edited by Raoul Elia; Shalom, a monthly of Roman Jewry since 1952; Ha-Tikvah, the monthly organ of the Federation of Jewish Youth (1953); Karnenu, the semimonthly publication of the Jewish National Fund (1948); and Hed ha-ḥinnukh, an educational monthly.

[Yoseph Colombo]

Ladino Press

One of the reasons for the growth of a Ladino press was the reluctance or inability of the exiles from Spain to learn the languages of the countries in which they found themselves. Before World War ii – during which the Sephardi communities of the Balkan countries were either entirely or partly destroyed – a considerable number of Sephardi Jews, mainly of the older generation and especially women, spoke Ladino. They had only an elementary knowledge of the local language – enough for local business and social intercourse with the surrounding population. There was, therefore, a growing need for some kind of Ladino reading material.

As mentioned above, the first Jewish newspaper appeared in 1675 in Amsterdam and it was Gazeta de Amsterdam, printed in Ladino. It lasted less than a year and had no Ladino successors until the beginning of the 19th century. The main reason for this delayed development of the Ladino press, in spite of its early start, is to be found in the social environment of the Ladino-speaking Jews, the bulk of whom lived in the countries of the Balkans and the Middle East. During the 18th century these countries were socially and culturally retarded, and their newspapers were neither many nor widespread. Like the population around them, the Jews, even the educated exiles from Spain among them, felt little need for the stimulus or enlightenment that newspapers could give. All this changed gradually in the 19th century and when in 1882 Isidore Singer of Vienna listed 103 extant Jewish newspapers, six of them were in Ladino.

Newspapers in Judeo-Spanish, transcribed in *Rashi type, had appeared in Jerusalem, Smyrna, Constantinople, Salonika, Belgrade, Paris, Cairo, and Vienna. One of them was the Smyrna journal, La Puerta del Oriente ("Gateway of the Orient"), which first appeared in 1846 under the Hebrew name Sha'arei Mizraḥ. Edited by Rafael Uziel, it contained material of general interest, commercial notices, and literary articles. It lasted just one year. El Luzero de la Paciencia ("The Light of Patience"), the first Judeo-Spanish newspaper to appear in Latin characters, was started in 1885 by Elia M. Crespin, in the Romanian city of Turnu Severin. It was a bimonthly and continued publication until 1889. The reason for publishing in Latin characters, according to the editor, was that the writing of Spanish had become greatly corrupted because Rashi often spelled words of different meaning in the same way. The corruption of Ladino by the violation of the rules of Spanish, from which it derived, was a subject often discussed in the Ladino press. Thus El Tiempo ("The Times") of June 28, 1907, ridiculed the Ladino used by a Bulgarian Ladino paper. El Tiempo, a literary, political, and financial paper, was first published in Constantinople in 1871 under the editorship of Isaac Carmona, and continued to appear until 1930. Its last editor was David *Fresco, one of the best-known Ladino writers of his time. Fresco was also the editor of El Sol ("The Sun") of Constantinople (1879), a scientific and literary bimonthly. It seems to have lasted for about two years. He also edited El Amigo de la Familia ("The Friend of the Family"), an illustrated periodical, which was published in Constantinople in 1889.

There were journals which were published partly in Ladino and partly in other languages. Salonik ("Salonika"), which appeared from 1869 to 1870, was published in Ladino, Turkish, Greek, and Bulgarian, the Bulgarian part being edited in Sofia. It seems to have been the official newspaper of the Turkish authorities in Salonika under the editorship of Rabbi Jacob Uziel. Djeridie y Lesan ("The Journal of the Language") appeared in Constantinople in 1899 in Ladino and Turkish. Its purpose was to make Turkish a living language among the Jews.

Ladino found considerable support among the Jewish socialists of the Balkans, who claimed that it was the language of the Sephardi masses and should be preserved and encouraged. They insisted, therefore, that it should be the medium of instruction in Jewish schools. A number of Ladino newspapers were exponents of the socialist idea. Among them the best known was Avante ("Forward"), which began publication in 1911 in Salonika under the name La Solidaridad Ouvradera ("Workers' Solidarity"). It may be said that the history of this journal, which began as a biweekly and during the Balkan Wars (1912–13) became a daily, is the history of socialism among the Jewish workers of Salonika. Its first editor was Abraham ben Aroya, who was succeeded by Alberto Arditi. In 1923 the paper became the mouthpiece of the Jewish Communists with its editor Jack Ventura, for some time one of the Communist representatives in the Greek Parliament. Avante ceased publication in 1935. El Azno ("The Donkey"), a satirical journal which appeared as a weekly for three months in 1923, was apparently designed to counter Avante when the latter became communistic. Another important Ladino journal published in Salonika was La Epoca, edited by Bezalel Sadi Halevi. It appeared from November 1875, first as a weekly, then twice a week, and finally as a daily, until 1912.

In Bulgaria, where a number of Ladino newspapers and periodicals appeared under the auspices of the community and the rabbinate (El Eco Judaico, La Luz) the best-known Zionist journal was El Judio ("The Jew"), whose editor was David Elnecave, one of the most prominent Zionist leaders in the Balkans. It first appeared in 1909 in Galata, and was later published in Varna and Sofia. It ceased publication in 1931, when Elnecave immigrated to Buenos Aires where he launched La Luz. On his death, the editorship was taken over by his son, Nissim.

zionism

With the rise of Zionism, Hebrew was revived as a spoken language among the Jews of the Balkans, and newspapers made their appearance in both Hebrew and Ladino. Yosef ha-Da'at or El Progresso, a bimonthly, was published in Adrianople in 1888 in Hebrew and Ladino under the editorship of Abraham *Danon. Devoted mainly to historical research among the Jews of Turkey, it was published for about a year. Another Adrianople periodical was Karmi Shelli ("My Vineyard"), a literary and national monthly (1881), published under the editorship of David Mitrani. Among the better-known Zionist Ladino journals was El Avenir ("The Future"), started in 1897. It existed for 20 years under the editorship of David Florentin. The organ of the Zionist Federation of Greece, the weekly La Esperansa ("The Hope"), appeared in Salonika from 1916 to 1920. A Zionist weekly which was predominantly French but also contained articles in Ladino was Lema'an Yisrael – Pro Israel, founded in Salonika in 1917 and edited from 1923 to 1929 by Abraham Recanati, who eventually settled in Israel.

A number of satirical Ladino journals also appeared. At the beginning of the 20th century, El Kirbatj – the Turkish word for "whip" that found its way into Ladino – appeared in Salonika as a "liberal, humorous, independent weekly journal" under the editorship of Moise Levy. It was followed in 1918 by El Nuevo Kirbatj ("The New Whip") under the editorship of Josef Karaso, which ceased publication in 1923.

Altogether, about 43 satirical and humorous journals were published among the Balkan communities at various times. Among them were El Burlon ("The Joker"), of Constantinople, edited by Nisim Behar; and La Gata ("The Cat"), a satirical journal established in Salonika in 1923 with M. Matarasco as editor.

At no time were the incentives for the creation or maintenance of Ladino newspapers in any sense great or compelling. The Sephardi Jews found themselves mostly in countries of little cultural development and they long retained the desire for knowledge inherited from Jewish life in Spain. This enabled them to resist for some time the primitive influences of their surroundings, to which in time, however, they succumbed. The intellectual classes of Sephardi Jews, educated in the cities of Central Europe, spoke the vernacular and other languages such as French and German. They, therefore, did not feel the need for Ladino newspapers. Finally, to most of the Sephardim in the Balkans the study of the Holy Scriptures, the Talmud and the Codes, and above all the daily recitals of prayers, were not merely religious duties: they also provided almost all their educational and cultural needs. The Bible, the prayer books, and certain rabbinical works were available in Spanish or Ladino. Textbooks were also available for the learning of Hebrew. Aspirations for a wider world outlook did not exist among the Sephardim, largely because the countries in which they lived were on the whole cut off from the mainstream of European intellectual life. There was, therefore, little scope for newspaper activity. According to Moshe David Gaon in his Ha-Ittonut be-Ladino (1965) there were 296 publications in Ladino between 1845 and World War ii, most of them in the Balkans and the Middle East, with Salonika as the greatest center. In 1968 there was hardly any regular Ladino press, except for two weeklies in Israel and one, partly in Ladino, in Turkey.

in the u.s.

Although Sephardim were the first Jews to settle in the New World and founded the first Jewish congregation there in 1654, Ladino newspapers did not appear in the United States until the beginning of the 20th century, when the second wave of Sephardi immigrants began to arrive, mainly from the Balkan countries. The daily La Aguila ("The Eagle") and the weekly La America appeared under the editorship of Moshe Gadol between 1911 and 1925. Moshe Gadol, a native of Bulgaria, and his partners Jacob Farhi, Asher Benveniste, Eliyahu Hananya, and Josef Abulafia, acquired their own printing press in New York. In 1926 El Luzero ("The Dawn"), an illustrated monthly, was launched by the Sephardic Publishing Company, its editors being Albert Levy and Moise Sulam. Only 12 issues appeared. The weekly La Vara ("The Stock") existed from 1928 until 1948, advertised as "the only Spanish Jewish newspaper in America"; the editors were the same as those of El Luzero. A weekly journal edited by Nisim and Alfred Mizrahi appeared from 1915 under the name El Progresso and later took the name La Boz del Pueblo ("The Voice of the People"). In 1919 it became La Epoca de New York but survived for only one more year.

For all practical purposes the Ladino press in the United States had come to an end by 1948. A new English-speaking generation was taking the place of the older people, and even when the young Sephardim knew Ladino, their use of it approximated to modern Spanish.

israel

Before World War ii there was a constant aliyah of Sephardim from the Balkan countries and the Middle East. Many of these immigrants had acquired a good knowledge of Hebrew in their native countries and when they settled in the Holy Land it required no special effort for them to use Hebrew in their daily life, while preserving Ladino in their family circles and among friends. For this reason there was a real need for Ladino papers, which were usually concerned with the preservation of Sephardi culture, customs, and literature. Ḥavaẓẓelet-Mevasseret Yerushalayim was published in 1870, its editor being Ezra Benveniste. During the year of its existence 25 issues appeared.

After the establishment of the State of Israel, a number of Ladino journals appeared, mostly sponsored by political parties. In 1968 there were two weeklies, El Tiempo (affiliated to Mapai) and La Verdad.

[Salomon Gaon]

In Latin America

The Jewish press plays an important part in the life of Latin American Jewry. Though it started almost exclusively in Yiddish, it had been going over to Spanish, although as late as 1970 Yiddish still held a predominant position. The first Jewish papers appeared in Argentina in 1898; one of them, Folks Shtime, lasted for 16 years. There were many other short-lived publications, but in 1914 the first daily, Di Yidishe Tsaytung, came into being, and was followed in 1918 by Di Prese. They continued to appear into the 1970s. Until the 1920s Di Prese was inclined toward the left, but both papers supported Zionism, and after the establishment of the State of Israel the ideological differences between them diminished. Although exercising political and social importance, neither paper ever achieved a circulation of more than 10,000. The only Jewish daily in Spanish, Amanecer, appeared in 1957. It was supported by most Jewish writers in the Spanish language, but lasted only until the following year.

Besides the Yiddish dailies, Argentine Jewry produced also a variety of weeklies and other publications. Their contents ranged from popular medicine to humor, literary criticism, and philosophical essays in quarterly reviews. Some of them, like Ilustrirte Literaishe Bleter, a monthly which started in 1953, and Davke, a philosophical quarterly founded in 1949, were in publication in 1970. Jewish weeklies and monthlies in Spanish, Juventud and Vida Nuestra, made their first appearance before or during World War I. The monthly Israel was established in 1917, serving especially Jews of Sephardi or Near Eastern origin, among whom it found lasting support. Other enduring weeklies were Mundo Israelita ("Israel World"), founded in 1923; La Luz, which started as a fortnightly in 1930; Davar, issued from 1945 by Sociedad Hebraica; and the literary quarterly Comentario, founded in 1953. Although closely identifying itself with Zionism and Israel, Argentine Jewry has produced few periodicals in Hebrew. Ha-Bimah ha-Ivrit ("Hebrew Forum"; 1921–30), Atidenu ("Our Future"; 1926), and Darom ("South"), founded 1938 and amalgamated with Zohar ("Window") in 1964, were the most important. Only the last mentioned survives. By 1970 the circulation of the popular press had declined considerably, but two dailies, about seven weeklies, 20 monthlies, and a dozen other periodicals, most of them representing political parties, were still flourishing in *Argentina.

In Brazil, Jewish newspapers date from the period of World War I. Subsequently there were Yiddish and Portuguese weeklies and biweeklies of varying duration. Attempts at establishing a Yiddish daily were only partly successful, but the others were more enduring. In 1970 Der Nayer Moment (Yiddish) appeared three times a week, the Yidishe Prese appeared as a weekly, and a paper in Portuguese appeared biweekly. São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro were the main centers of publication (see also *Brazil). There was practically no Jewish press in Mexico until the Meksikaner Yidish Lebn appeared in 1927. In 1970 Der Veg appeared weekly and Di Shtime (1939– ) biweekly, both in Yiddish. There was also a Zionist Spanish-language weekly, Prensa Israelita (1948), and several fortnightlies (see also *Mexico). A daily, Yidishe Tsaytung, appeared in Uruguay shortly after World War I, but was short-lived. The weekly Unzer Lebn was initiated in 1926, but a Jewish press was not firmly established in Uruguay until the daily Unzer Fraynd was launched in 1935. Haynt, a daily with Zionist affiliations, began publication in 1957. Several weeklies were also flourishing in 1970 (see also *Uruguay). Since the 1970s, however, Yiddish has almost disappeared from the print media in favor of Spanish.

In the years of Argentine dictatorship the weekly Nueva Presencia (1977) was founded, which started as a Spanish off-shoot of the Yiddish daily Di Prese. Under the editorship of Herman Schiller, it adopted an opposition stance against the repression in Argentina. This journal became one of the referents of the Argentinean Human Rights Movement, and Schiller, who participated in the organization of the Jewish Movement for Human Rights, was recognized as one of its leaders. Other new Jewish publications in Argentina were Comunidades (1980s), and La Voz Judía (1990s). In recent years there were also daily news publications on the Internet such as Iton Gadol and ShalomOnLine. In Brazil the Jewish written press lost much of its circulation and turned inward to the community. Most of the main organizations had their own newsletters. In Mexico, too, communities had their own bulletins, though here were some independent organs such as the Foro magazine available by subscription and Kesher with free distribution in all the communities.

In the Middle East and North Africa

Oriental Jewish newspapers emerged only during the first half of the 19th century, but they soon acquired importance among the communities they served. Some of them were published in two or more languages; Hebrew, which was rarely used, was sometimes employed not because there were many Hebrew readers, but with the aim of reviving the language. The Hebrew press in the Middle East was in fact preceded by Jewish papers in Ladino, from 1841, and papers in the colloquial Arabic of the Baghdadi Jewish dialect, such as Doresh Tov le-Ammo, from 1855. The first Hebrew paper to appear in Baghdad was Ha-Dover (1863), which was published by Moses Baruch Mizraḥi. At a rough estimate, the circulation of Jewish papers in the Middle East, even though these served communities beyond the city or land in which they appeared, never exceeded 5,000. Many papers were shortlived, surviving for no more than a year or two, with only a few appearing regularly for more than five years. Jewish papers appeared in Turkey, Tunisia, Algeria, Ereẓ Israel, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Persia. The languages used were literary Arabic, colloquial Arabic, Jewish dialects (i.e., local languages written in Hebrew characters), Hebrew, French, English, Ladino, Spanish, Turkish, and Persian.

In Turkey, only a few papers appeared in languages other than Ladino, such as Hebrew or French, and these had a Zionist orientation, first making their appearance after 1910. In North Africa, Egypt, and Lebanon many Jewish papers appeared in French, some examples being La Renaissance Juive (Cairo, 1912), the fortnightly L'Israélite algérien (Oran, 1900), and the religious Gazette de Jérusalem (Jerusalem, 1882). Another Jewish newspaper which had a long career was the Zionist weekly L'Aurore, founded by Lucien Sciuto in 1908. It appeared in Istanbul until 1919, but from 1924 to 1931 was published in Cairo. It then came under the control of Jacob Elmaleh, who, with the support of the B'nai B'rith, transformed it after the rise of Hitler into the organ of the League for War on antisemitism, based in Egypt.

Among the longer-lived Oriental Jewish newspapers was the weekly Israel, which first appeared in French, Hebrew, and Arabic (Cairo, 1920). Although the Hebrew section was soon dropped, the Arabic section survived with some interruption for 14 years. In 1939 the paper was amalgamated with La Tribune Juive, which had been established at Alexandria in 1936. In Tunisia most Jewish papers appeared in French (e.g., La Justice, 1917– ), and in Turkey a B'nai B'rith monthly, Ha-Menorah, appeared in Turkish and French. The English-language press was mainly confined to India (see above), but in Baghdad there was also the Iraq Times.

After the papers appearing in Hebrew, the largest number of Jewish newspapers appearing in Arab countries were published in Arabic. The origins of this press may be traced to Yaʿqūb *Ṣanūʿ, who issued an Egyptian Jewish paper in Arabic in the 1870s. These papers were both religious and secular and were irregular and short-lived. Most of them were ardent supporters of the Zionist cause and defended Zionism and the idea of a Jewish national home against the attacks of the general Arabic press. Papers that survived for some years included the monthly (later weekly) al-ʿĀʾila ("The Family"), founded by Esther *Moyal in 1898; the weekly, al-Miṣbāḥ (Baghdad, 1924–29); the literary and cultural weekly al-Ḥāṣid (Baghdad, 1924–39); the Lebanese ʾĀlam al-Isrāʾilī (L'Univers Israélite, Beirut, 1921–46); the Egyptian Karaite paper al-Ittiḥād al-Isrāʾīlī (Cairo, 1924–30); and al-Shams ("The Sun," Cairo, 1934–48), published in literary Arabic.

Christiane Souriau's research on the Tunisian and Algerian press brought to light a large number of Jewish papers that had appeared in colloquial Arabic and in Arabic characters from the year 1878, when the dual-language (Judeo-Arabic and French) al-ʿAmāla al-Tūnisiyya first appeared. From then until 1900, as many as 22 papers were established, most of them lasting no more than a year or two. The Zionist al-Bustān ("The Garden," 1888–97) was exceptional. During the years 1901–19, a further 37 Jewish newspapers and periodicals in colloquial Arabic were published in Tunisia, only two of which lasted for more than four years: al-Sabāh ("The Morning," 1904–29) and al-Sion ("The Voice of Zion," 1913–20). The number of papers declined from 1920, although the life-span of those that remained became longer, e.g., al-Najma ("The Star," 1920?–38). Souriau mentions 37 Jewish papers in colloquial Arabic appearing in Tunisia. After the establishment of the State of Israel, the Arabic Jewish press in the Arab lands ceased to exist. Instead, the number of papers appearing in Arabic in Israel increased as a result of the immigration of Jews from the Arab countries.

[Shmuel Moreh]

In Poland

For the period up to World War I, see below: In Russia. The great development of the Jewish press in Poland that took place in the years immediately after the war reflected the vigorous life of the Jewish population. More than 200 newspapers and periodicals appeared in the 1920s, and many of them were still flourishing when the Nazi armies overran Poland in September 1939. The papers represented all shades of opinion; most of them were in Yiddish, but a few were in Hebrew and some in Polish. During this period, about 20 daily papers appeared, three in Vilna – Letste Nayes (1915), which became Der Tog (in 1920), Avend-Kurier (from 1924, and Tsayt (1924); two in Bialystok – Dos Naye Lebn (1919), and Bialystoker Telegraf; three in Lodz – Lodzer Tageblat (1908, under J. Unger, having a circulation of 20,000); Dos Morgenblat from 1912, and Naye Folksblat (1923); in Lublin the Lubliner Tageblat (1918); and in Grodno, the Grodne Moment (1924). Lvov had two, one in Polish, Chwila (1919), and one in Yiddish, Der Morgen (1926); and Cracow had two, one in Polish, Nowy Dziennik (1918), first under Wilhelm Berkelhammer and from 1921 to 1924 under Isaac *Schwarzbart.

The others were published in Warsaw, where *Haynt and Der Moment had the largest circulations and were in close competition. Other Warsaw dailies were Der Yid (later, Dos Yidishe Vort, from 1917), Varshever Ekspres (1926), Naye Folkstzaytung (1926), and Unzer Ekspres (1927). The daily Nowy Czas (1929) was in Polish, as was the Zionist daily Nasz Pzeglad (1923). Besides these publications there were literary weeklies like Literarishe Bleter (Warsaw, from 1924), Kino-Teater-Radio (1926), Veltshpigl ("World Mirror," 1927), and the Yiddish pen Klub Nayes of Vilna (1928). The scientific Land un Lebn (1927) appeared monthly; a popular science fortnightly, Der Doktor, appeared in Warsaw from 1929; and another, Folksgesunt, in Vilna from 1923. A humorous weekly, Der Blufer, was prominent in Warsaw journalism from 1926. This body of newspapers and periodicals, employing thousands of people, was closed by the Germans in 1939, and its editors, contributors, and printers fled or perished as the Nazi terror fastened on the country.

[Artur Fiszer]

after world war ii

The first Jewish newspaper in postwar Poland, Dos Naye Lebn, appeared in Lodz on April 10, 1945. At first it was published weekly, then semiweekly and on March 1, 1947, at the conference of the Jewish regional committees, it was decided to make Dos Naye Lebn a daily paper and the official organ of the Central Committee of Polish Jews, which comprised all existing Jewish parties. Between 1945 and 1949 there were also weekly and semiweekly publications of various Jewish parties, e.g., the Arbeter Tsaytung of the Po'alei Zion, the Ihud of the Liberal Zionists, Di Folkshtime connected with the Communist Polish Labor Party (ppr), the "Głas Młodzíeży,"of the Ha-Shomer ha-Ẓa'ir, and Yidishe Shriftn, a publication of the Jewish Writers' Association. After the liquidation of the Jewish political parties in November 1949, most of the Jewish press was gradually closed down by the authorities (see *Poland). The literary monthly Di Yidishe Shriftn continued to be published by the Jewish Cultural Society as an organ of the Jewish writers, who elected its editorial board. Di Folkshtime alone remained as a newspaper appearing four times a week and serving officially as the Yiddish organ of the ruling party, controlled to a large degree by the Jewish Cultural Society. By 1968 Di Folkshtime became a weekly, publishing a Polish section once in two weeks, and Di Yidishe Shriftn ceased its publication after its 25th issue.

[David Sfard]

In Romania

The Jewish press in Romania developed with the social and intellectual life of the Romanian Jews. Two short-lived publications made their appearance in the middle of the 19th century and were followed in 1857 by the weekly Israelitul Român ("Romanian Israelite") of Bucharest and in 1874 by the review Revista Israelitaˇ of Jassy. In 1890 Moses *Schwarzfeld, publicist and historian, founded the weekly Egalitatea ("Equality"), which lasted until the rise of the Fascist regime. Other publications of that period were the weekly Ha-Yo'eẓ ("The Adviser"), which leaned toward the Ḥovevei Zion, appearing from 1876 to 1920, and the review Likht ("Light," 1914), both in Yiddish. In 1906, Horia *Carp founded the weekly Curierul Israelit ("Israelite Messenger"), which became the official organ of the group Uniunea Evreilor Paˇmânteni (Union of Native Jews; after 1918, Uniunea Evreilor Romani – Union of Romanian Jews) and continued until 1941.

After World War i most of the Jewish newspapers in Romania had Zionist leanings. Major influences in forming a Zionist outlook among the Jewish population were two weeklies: Maĥtuirea ("The Deliverance"), founded by A.L. *Zissu in 1922 and republished, after a long break, from 1945 to 1949; and Renaşterea Noastraˇ ("Our Revival"), founded by S. Stern, publicist and Zionist, in 1928. The weekly Viata Evreascaˇ ("Jewish Life," 1944–49) had a Zionist Socialist tendency. In addition to these weekly publications, there were literary and political reviews. The monthly Hasmonaea, founded in 1915, was the official organ of the association of Zionist students. The review Adam (1929–39) founded by I.O. Ludo, attracted to its pages Jewish writers in the Romanian language.

Except for a brief period in 1877, there was never a daily Jewish press in Romania because there was no autonomous national Jewish life. The information published by the Jewish weekly and monthly papers in Yiddish, German, and Romanian, was limited to Jewish international and local life. Political outlook was centered on events of specific Jewish interest, and the Jewish press had a rather polemic character. The weekly Zionist paper Renaşterea Noastraˇ resumed publication in 1944. Five more papers that appeared in 1945 were similarly oriented. In the years that followed, various attempts were made to maintain other Jewish papers, several in Yiddish and one in Hebrew, but by the end of 1953 all had ceased publication. From 1956 the Jewish population in Romania was served by a review published by the Jewish community in Bucharest, *Revista Cultului Mozaic ("The Mosaic Cult's Review"), edited by Moses *Rosen, the chief rabbi.

[Isac Bercovici]

In Russia

The history of the Jewish press in Russia before the Bolshevik Revolution falls into two periods: the mid-19th century to the 1905 Revolution – years during which severe restrictions and censorship were in force; and 1906 to 1917 – a period during which restrictions were partially relaxed. Jewish newspapers in czarist Russia appeared in four languages: Hebrew, Yiddish, Russian, and (in Warsaw) Polish. During the first period, the publication of Jewish periodicals was beset with obstacles. A license to publish was obtained only with great difficulty, and when granted, the official censor controlled the paper's contents. This situation accounted for the strange practice of publishing journals intended primarily for Russian Jews in places outside the country, mainly in Prussia and Austria. Even these newspapers had to pass the Warsaw censor, who deleted any item he did not approve. In spite of its distance from the centers of Jewish population, many newspapers were published in St. Petersburg because the censor there held more liberal attitudes.

Efforts at establishing a Jewish press in the early decades of the 19th century resulted in such short-lived publications as *Beobachter an der Weichsel, a Yiddish weekly issued in Warsaw in 1823, and Pirḥei Ẓafon, an annual that published two volumes in Vilna in the 1840s. The first enduring Hebrew periodical intended for Russian Jewry was Ha-Maggid, published from 1856 to 1891 in Lyck (later Elk), a Prussian border town. It contained news and essays, whose prominent tone was a moderate approach to the Haskalah. In 1860, Alexander *Zederbaum, who became a leading figure in the Jewish press, founded a Hebrew weekly, Ha-Meliẓ, which was published until 1871 in Odessa and then for another three years in St. Petersburg. Its stated purpose was to be "the mediator (ha-meliẓ) between the Jews and government and between faith and Haskalah." Zederbaum also published the first weekly in Yiddish, Kol Mevasser (1862–71), which grew to become very popular. In Vilna S.J. *Fuenn issued Ha-Karmel, intended mainly for local consumption, which ran as a weekly from 1860 to 1870 and as a monthly until 1880. In Warsaw, *Ha-Ẓefirah, edited by Ḥ.S. *Slonimski, began as a weekly in 1862 but was published for only six months. In Odessa, Russian-speaking members of the Jewish intelligentsia published Russian-language weeklies, such as Razsvet, renamed Sion (1860–61), and later Den (1869–71). These papers had the dual purpose of serving as a forum for the discussion of Jewish themes and for presenting Jewish problems to the general Russian public in order to combat antisemitism. In 1871 Zederbaum launched a Russian-language weekly in St. Petersburg, Vestnik russkikh yevreyev ("Russian Jewish Herald") which, however, was boycotted by the Jewish intelligentsia and ceased publication in 1873. The first Jewish weekly in Polish, Jutrzeńka, was published in Warsaw in 1861–63; it had a pronounced assimilationist tendency and was eventually replaced by Izraelita, which appeared from 1866 to 1906. A Hebrew monthly, Ha-Boker Or, was published by Abraham *Gottlober in Lemberg and later in Warsaw (1876–86). Eight volumes of a Russian annual, containing a variety of literary works and named Yevreyskaya Biblioteka, edited by Adolph *Landau, appeared in the period 1871–80.

Ha-Ẓefirah resumed publication in 1874, first in Berlin and from 1875 in Warsaw. In addition, Ha-Meliẓ was revived in 1878. The Balkan Wars of 1877–78, the pogroms of the early 1880s, and the anti-Jewish restrictions that followed aroused greater interest in newspapers among the Jewish public. In 1879 two Russian-language weeklies made their appearance in St. Petersburg: *Razsvet (1883), which pioneered in awaking the national consciousness of Russian Jewish youth, and Russkiy yevrey (1884). Another weekly, *Voskhod (1881–1906), edited by Adolph Landau until 1899, served as the major forum for Russian Jewish intellectuals. Because of the oppressive restrictions placed on them, Yiddish publications were constantly in difficulties, and only the indefatigable Zederbaum succeeded in issuing a Yiddish weekly in St. Petersburg, Yidishes Folksblat (1881–90). A revolutionary development in Hebrew journalism took place in 1886, when the first Hebrew daily, Ha-Yom, edited by Judah Leib *Kantor, made its appearance in St. Petersburg. Although its career was short (two years), Ha-Yom exerted a profound influence on the style employed by the Hebrew press, hastening the transition from florid phraseology to practical prose. The two competing weeklies, Ha-Meliẓ and Ha-Ẓefirah, were forced to become dailies. The spread of the *Ḥibbat Zion movement in the 1880s resulted in the publication of a considerable number of annuals which served as a forum for the movement's ideology. Among the annuals were Ha-Asif, edited by Nahum *Sokolow (1884–88, 1893); Keneset Yisrael, edited by Saul Phinehas *Rabbinowitz (Warsaw, 1886–88); and Ha-Pardes in Odessa (1892–96, three vols.). They were followed by Ha-Shilo'ah (1896–1905 in Berlin and Cracow, 1902–19 in Odessa, and until 1926 in Jerusalem). Under the editorship of *Ahad Ha-Am, and later J. Klausner, Ha-Shilo'ah became the leading Hebrew monthly, printing articles of a literary and general nature. Attempts which were made by D. Frischmann to publish the intellectual literary weekly Ha-Dor (1901, 1904) were unsuccessful as the readership required for this kind of publication was as yet too small.

The need for Yiddish reading matter was met by such annuals as Hoysfraynd, edited by Mordecai *Spector (Warsaw, 1888–96); Yidishe Folks-Bibliothek, edited by *Shalom Aleichem (Kiev, 1888–89); and Yidishe Bibliotek, edited by I.L. *Peretz (3 vols., Warsaw, 1891–95). A. Zionist weekly, Der Yid, directed at the educated reader, was published in Cracow from 1899 to 1902, and a popular weekly (vocalized for easy reading), Yidishe Folkstsaytung, also in Cracow (1902–03), had a women's supplement, Di Yidishe Froyen Velt. These weeklies paved the way for the first Yiddish daily to appear in Russia – Der Fraynd (1903–08 in St. Petersburg, 1909–13 in Warsaw), which gained immediate acceptance by the Jewish masses and had a circulation of tens of thousands.

In the beginning of the 20th century, the older Hebrew dailies ceased publication (Ha-Meliẓ in 1904 and Ha-Ẓefirah in 1906) and were replaced by more modern newspapers, Ha-Ẓofeh (Warsaw, 1903–05) and Ha-Zeman, the latter founded by Benzion *Katz (St. Petersburg, 1903–04; Vilna, 1905–15), which tried to keep pace with the general Russian press in reporting the latest news and commenting upon it. At the end of the 19th century, the Bund undertook the publication of underground newspapers such as Arbeter Shtime, Der Yidishe Arbeter, and Posledniye Izvestia, which were printed in the West and smuggled into Russia.

At the end of 1905 censorship was abolished and the press enjoyed a short period of freedom. It soon turned out, however, that the authorities still retained means of controlling the press by administrative measures, ranging from economic reprisals (such as prohibiting advertising, stopping the sale of single copies, closing down the printing press) to temporary or permanent suspension of publication. The immediate result of the short interval of freedom was the appearance of party newspapers. The Bund published Der Veker, and, when this was closed down, Folks Tsaytung and other newspapers. The Zionist Socialists issued Der Yidisher Proletarier, Der Nayer Veg, and Dos Vort. Another workers' party, the *Sejmists, sponsored the Folks Shtime. *Po'alei Zion had a Yiddish weekly, Der Proletarisher Gedank, and a Russian periodical, Yevreyskaya Rabochaya Khronika. All these party publications disappeared in 1907, when the revolutionary movement was suppressed. The Zionist press, nevertheless, continued to flourish. There were Zionist newspapers in Yiddish (Dos Yidishe Folk, Vilna, 1906–08); in Hebrew (Ha-Olam, Cologne, 1907; Vilna, 1908; Odessa, 1912–14), and in Russian. The first Zionist Russian-language monthly was Yevreyskaya Zhizn (1904–06), followed by Razsvet, which became the most popular Russian Jewish weekly with a circulation of tens of thousands. Attempts were made to revive the Hebrew press in Warsaw with the dailies Ha-Yom (1906–07) and Ha-Boker (1909). In 1910, Ha-Ẓefirah also reappeared as a daily, and, with the support of the Zionist Organization, attained a circulation of 15,000.

The most significant development of this period, however, was the growth of a popular Yiddish press centered in Warsaw. At the end of 1905, a Yiddish daily, Der Veg, edited by Zevi *Prylucki, was founded in the Polish capital and became the forerunner of the popular Yiddish press in Poland. It was succeeded by Haynt (1908–39) and Der Moment (1910–39), two Yiddish dailies which catered to popular taste and reduced the price of the papers. Along with the news and literary articles they printed sensational items and fostered the cheap novel. The papers enjoyed a circulation of many thousands and acquired great influence. Politically they supported Jewish nationalism and Zionism. Yiddish periodicals also appeared in the large provincial cities (Odessa, Lodz, Vilna, Kiev) but were of local character. An extreme Orthodox weekly, Ha-Modi'a, made its appearance in Poltava from 1909.

The non-Zionist Russian Jewish intelligentsia issued its own weeklies, such as Yevreyskiy Mir (1910–12) and Novy Voshkod (1910–17), both published in St. Petersburg. There were also magazines devoted to special subjects, such as the educational magazines Yevreyskaya Shkola (1904–05) and Vestnik, the latter founded in 1910 by the Society for the Spread of Enlightenment; Yevreyskiy Meditsinskiy Golos, a medical quarterly founded in Odessa in 1908; Perezhitoye, a history annual; Yevreyskaya Starina, a scientific quarterly (1909–30); and Vestnik Yevreyskoy Obshchini (1913–14), which dealt with community administration. There were children's magazines in Hebrew, Russian, and Yiddish (see *Children's Literature). In 1913 a literary magazine Di Yidishe Velt, edited by S. *Niger and maintaining high standards, was founded in Vilna.

The outbreak of World War i caused a crisis in the Jewish press: the price of paper and printing rose sharply, and military censorship restricted freedom of expression. The advance of the Central Powers into Poland and Lithuania also separated the masses of readers from the sources of their newspapers.

In July 1915 a government decree ordered all Hebrew and Yiddish journals to cease publication. Jewish papers in the Russian language, especially the Zionist-oriented Razsvet, did their best to fill the void. The ban was lifted with the outbreak of the February 1917 Revolution.

in the u.s.s.r. (1917–1970)

The February 1917 Revolution ushered in a short period of freedom of the press which lasted until the Bolshevik Revolution in October. Newspapers independent of the Communist Party continued to appear until September–October 1918 and in some regions (such as Ukraine and Belorussia) until Soviet rule was established there in 1920. This brief period proved to be the golden era of the Jewish press in the U.S.S.R. The leading newspapers were the Zionist Hebrew daily Ha-Am in Moscow (July 1917–June 1918), which had a circulation of 15,000 at its height, and the Zionist Yiddish daily Tagblat in Petrograd (May 1917–August 1918). Kiev had no less than four papers: the Bundist Folks Tsaytung (August 1917–May 1919), the United Socialists' Naye Tsayt (September 1917–May 1919), the Po'alei Zion's Dos Naye Lebn (December 1917–March 1919), and the Zionist Der Telegraf (November 1917–January 1918). Minsk had Der Yid (December 1917–July 1918) and Far'n Folk (September 1919–January 1920), which were both Zionist in outlook, and the Bundist Der Veker (first published in May 1917, and becoming a Communist paper in April 1921).

Hebrew periodicals were also revived after a two-year lapse. In Odessa, Ha-Shilo'ah resumed publication in June 1917 and continued until banned by the Soviet authorities in April 1919. In the same city, Barkai, the last of the Hebrew weeklies, appeared until the beginning of 1920. There were educational magazines such as Ha-Ginnah in Odessa, Ha-Moreh in Kiev, and Ha-Makkabbi, dealing with physical education. A children's magazine in Hebrew, Shetilim, was published in Petrograd. A number of annuals served as the forum literary and scientific work, such as Keneset, Massu'ot, and Erez in Odessa and Olamenu in Petrograd. Outstanding for size and quality was the quarterly Ha-Tekufah, the first three issues of which appeared in Moscow in 1918. Collections were devoted to history and ethnography: He-Avar (2 vols., Petrograd), Reshumot (1 vol., Odessa), and Sefatenu (Odessa). Publication of Hebrew periodicals ended with the ban on the use of Hebrew in the Soviet Union.

Before long, the Jewish press in the Russian language also ceased to exist. Raszvet was closed down in September 1918 and Khronika Yevreyskoy Zhizni in July 1919. In the period 1924–26, when *He-Ḥalutz was a legal organization, it published the central organ of the movement, He-Ḥalutz, in Moscow. The left Po'alei Zion was permitted to publish its central organ, Yevreyskaya Proletarskaya Mysl, until 1926 (with a Yiddish edition appearing until 1927). A group of writers and scholars, members of the long-established *Society for the Promotion of Culture and the Historical Ethnographical Society, published several collections of literary and historical pieces in the 1920s, including Yevreyskaya Starina (vols. 9–13, 1924–30), Yevreyskaya Letopis (4 vols., 1923–26), and Yevreyskaya Mysl (2 vols., 1922–26). One official publication in Russian, Tribuna (Moscow, 1927–37), the central organ of ozet (see *Yevsektsiya), was directed at the Jews.

When Yiddish was recognized as the national language of the Jews in the 1920s, the Yiddish press (like Yiddish literature and the Yiddish theater) became part of the official apparatus for mass propaganda and indoctrination. It was controlled by the authorities, but its writers and correspondents enjoyed the substantial material advantages accorded to all writers who were loyal supporters of the regime. A widespread network of newspapers, entirely dependent upon the regime for its existence and policy, was created. In the 1920s and 1930s, these newspapers had considerable achievements to their credit. There were three central dailies: in Moscow, Der Emes was first published in 1918 as Di Varhayt and ceased publication in 1938; in Kharkov, Der Shtern (1925–41); and in Minsk, Oktyaber (1925–41). In addition, there were numerous local papers, such as Der Odeser Arbeter (1927–37) and Proletarisher Fon (Kiev, 1928–35).

A newspaper, Biro-Bidzhaner Shtern, began to appear in *Birobidzhan in 1930; it continued into the 1970s, appearing three or four times weekly. Important literary periodicals included Prolet (1928–32), Farmest (1932–37), and Sovietish Literatur (1938–41), all published in Ukraine; Shtern (1925–41), in Belorussia; and a literary annual, Sovietish (12 vols., 1934–41). Specialized publications, such as Oyf dem Veg tsu der Nayer Shul (Moscow, 1924–28) and Ratebildung (Kharkov, 1928–37) dealt with educational problems. Children found reading matter in Oktyaber (Kiev, 1930–39), Zey Greyt (Kharkov-Kiev, Kiev, 1928–41), and Yunger Leninetz (Minsk, 1929–37). The Jewish scientific institutes in Minsk and Kiev published periodicals on scientific and literary subject and on the Yiddish language: Tsaytshrift (5 vols., Minsk, 1926–31); Oyf 'n Visnshaftlikn Front (Minsk, 1932–35); Lingvistisher Zamlbukh (3 vols., Minsk, 1933–36); Die Yidishe Shprakh (Kiev, 1927–30), and Oyf 'n Shprakh Front (Kiev, 1931–39).

In 1939–40, when eastern Poland and Lithuania were incorporated into the Soviet Union, local Yiddish newspapers were established to serve the Yiddish-speaking population in Vilna, Bialystok, Kovno, and Riga. With the Nazi occupation of large parts of the U.S.S.R. in the summer of 1941, the Yiddish press ceased publication. In 1942, to rally the Jews to the war against the Nazis, the Jewish *Anti-Fascist Committee established *Eynikeyt in Kuibyshev. After the war, the paper moved to Moscow and continued to appear there. In the immediate postwar period, several literary journals also made their appearance: Heymland (7 vols., Moscow, 1947–48), Der Shtern (7 vols., Kiev, 1947–48), and Biro-Bidzhan (3 vols., 1946–48).

In November 1948, all Yiddish literary publications and the entire Yiddish press in the Soviet Union were liquidated. The "thaw" that set in after Stalin's death brought no revival. In the summer of 1961, in response to pressure exerted by Jewish public opinion in the West, a bimonthly, *Sovetish Heymland, was founded, and subsequently published the works of the remaining Yiddish writers in the U.S.S.R. In 1965 Sovetish Heymland became a monthly publication, claiming a circulation of 25,000 in 1967.

[Yehuda Slutsky]

At the beginning of the 1980s the total legal Jewish press in the U.S.S.R. amounted to two publications in Yiddish: the Moscow Jewish monthly journal Sovetish Heymland and the Birobidzhan newspaper Birobidzhaner Shtern, plus an annual in the Judeo-Tat language, Vata Sovetimu. Furthermore, attempts in refusenik circles to establish illegal publications were strictly repressed and led to the gradual curtailment of all Jewish samizdat publishing. With the revival of Jewish community life in the former Soviet Union a flourishing Jewish press with over 40 periodical publications developed. The most influential and widely circulating Jewish newspaper in Russia was Mezhdunarodnaia evreiskaia gazeta ("The International Jewish Newspaper"), the successor of vesk (see above), which made efforts to mirror not only Russian-Jewish life, but also Jewish life in the entire area of the former Soviet Union. The paper was published in Moscow, twice a month, by Tankred Golenpolskii and Eliezer Feldman. The most popular Jewish newspaper in St. Petersburg was Narod moi – Ami, published by the Jewish Association of St. Petersburg, also twice a month. In the North Caucasian region, the most conspicuous newspaper was Vatan-Rodina ("The Homeland"), published twice a week by Mikhail Gavrielov in Derbent, Daghestan, in Judeo-Tat (the language of the Mountain Jews) and Russian. Among other relatively widely circulating newspapers were Tarbut ("Culture") (in Samara, former Kuibyshev), Stern-Zvezda ("The Star") (in Ekaterinburg, former Sverdlovsk), and from July 1993 on – Gazeta evreev Severnovo Kavkaza ("The Newspaper of the Jews in the North Caucasus") (Nalchik, Karbardino-Balkaria). The Birobidzhaner Shtern ("The Birobidzhan Star") continued to be published in Yiddish and Russian in the Jewish Autonomous Region. The magazine Sovietish Heimland from 1993 changed its title to Di Yiddishe Gass ("The Jewish Street") and continued to appear in Russian and Yiddish. Papers were published by Jewish organizations abroad, e.g., Rodnik ("The Spring," or "Source") (by the World Union of Progressive Judaism), Lekhaim ("To Life") (by the International Jewish Organization Habad-Lubavitch), and several papers – by the Jewish Agency. Jewish newspapers were also issued in Briansk, Novosibirsk, and Perm. Two academic Jewish journals, both supported by the jdc, were published: Vestnik Evreiskovo Universiteta v Moskve ("Herald of the Moscow Jewish University"), from 1992 on, and Vreiskaia Shkola ("Jewish School"), issued by the St. Petersburg University.

[Michael Beizer /

Daniel Romanowski (2nd ed.)]

In Scandinavia

Jewish newspapers in Sweden before World War ii included: the Yiddish fortnightly Volkshilf (1916–1923); and the monthly Israeliten, founded in 1914, as well as two monthlies, Judisk Tidskrift (1928– ) and Juediska Kroenika (1932– ). The Jewish community of Stockholm issued its own quarterly,Försammlingsblad, from 1941 under the editorship of David Kőpnivski. A later arrival was the Center Bladet, which was founded as a family journal in Stockholm in 1966. It appears about five times a year in Swedish, deals with Jewish communal life, youth clubs, and the problems of Israel, and reaches about 1,400 Jewish homes. Two Jewish publications existed in Norway before World War ii: the Zionist monthly Ha-Tikvah, founded in 1929, which did not survive the war, and the quarterly sjuf-Bladet of the Scandinavian Jewish Youth Organization. Founded in 1917, the organization revived its periodical after World War ii and issued it in Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish. The magazine also circulates among the Jewish communities of Finland, where a knowledge of Swedish is widespread. This magazine also supports the maintenance of Jewish tradition. In Finland, Den Finski Juden (1918) of Viborg was short-lived, but the Judisk Krönika, a monthly founded in Helsinki in 1923, had a longer career. The first attempt at publishing a Jewish journal in Denmark was made at the beginning of the 19th century. It was called Nordlyset and was an answer to current antisemitic literature. When the Jewish community achieved full civil rights in 1814, the publication was no longer considered necessary. In 1857 and 1865 new publishing attempts were made, but the Israelitisk Ugeblad for Norden and Israelitisk Tidende appeared only for a few issues. In 1907 two periodicals were started. The Zionist leader Louis Fraenkel was the editor of Jødisk Tidsskrift, a fortnightly of literary standard which survived for only a year and a half. The other was Mosaisk Samfund, which survived until the German occupation of Denmark in 1940. With the influx of immigrants from Eastern Europe, the need arose for a Yiddish press and in 1911 Dos Yidishe Vokhenblat appeared, edited by Joseph Litischevsky. The paper flourished until 1921. Other Yiddish papers were Di Yugendshtime and Yidishe Folkstsaytung, the latter as a daily from 1917 to 1925. From 1920 to 1923 the Scandinavian Jewish youth organization produced the Copenhagen Israeliten edited by Max Goldschmidt. In 1929 Goldschmidt founded Jødisk Familieblad which, after two changes of name (Jødisk Samfund and Jødisk Orientering), is now in its fifth decade. Among its editors was Chief Rabbi Marcus Melchior, and from 1947 it was edited by Torben Meyer. In 1947 the Zionist Federation issued Palestine Telegram Service as a weekly, which in 1950 turned into a periodical called Israel.

[Lewis Sowden]

In South Africa

The bulk of Jewish journalism in South Africa has been in English in the form of weeklies, which have enjoyed wide readership and considerable advertising support. The earliest attempts at establishing a Jewish press, however, were in Yiddish. They date from 1890 when N.D. Hoffman imported Hebrew type and started Der Afrikaner Israelit in Johannesburg; it lasted for six months. Since then there has been an almost continuous, if tenuous, line of Yiddish publications, including Der Kriegstaphet, a daily run by David Goldblatt in Cape Town from 1899. Hoffman also started a fortnightly Hebrew journal, Kinneret, which ran for 12 issues in 1905. The first Jewish newspaper in English was The South African Jewish Chronicle, started as a fortnightly in Cape Town by Lionel L. Goldsmid (1867–1952). The most prominent journals over the next century were the following: in English, The Zionist Record (1908–93), The South African Jewish Chronicle (1908–59, after which it was subsumed under the Zionist Record's name), The South African Jewish Times (1936–87), and Jewish Herald (1937–87) – the latter combined in 1987 to form the Herald Times (1987–94) and the South African Jewish Report (1998– ), all weeklies; Jewish Voice (1990–93), a monthly, and South African Jewish Times (1994–97), bi-monthly; Jewish Affairs (1941– ) and the Federation Chronicle, which was renamed Jewish Tradition in 1986 (1954– ), initially monthlies, but from 1988 quarterlies; in Afrikaans: Buurman (1970–85), monthly; in Yiddish, Afrikaner Yidishe Tsaytung (1930–83), a weekly; Dorem Afrike (1948–86), literary journal; and in Hebrew, Barkai (1932–78 bimonthly). All were published in Johannesburg.

[Lewis Sowden /

David Saks (2nd ed.)]

In Switzerland

Apart from a monthly periodical of the 1830s, the first attempt to establish a regular medium of Jewish news was made by Alexander *Kisch, who in 1878–80 issued in Zurich a German-language fortnightly Neue Israelitische Zeitung. The first journalistic effort to meet with any success was the Juedische Volkszeitung, later the Israelitisches Wochenblatt Zentralorgan fuer die Israeliten in der Schweiz, Baden und Elsass-Lothringen, which appeared from 1895 to 1898 under the editorship of H. Berliner.

The first newspaper to prove of enduring influence was the German-French Israelitisches Wochenblatt fuer die Schweiz/Revue Juive, which was founded in Zurich in 1901 by Martin Littman (d. 1925) and David Strauss (d. 1921). Ownership and editorship passed in 1916 to David Weinbaum and in 1921 to Erich-Marx Weinbaum, whose son, Manfred Marx, took over in 1966. Hans Klee directed the weekly from 1953 to his death in 1959, with Leon Wohlmann as main contributor for more than 20 years. Kurt Roschewski became editor in 1958. In its earlier years, the Israelitisches Wochenblatt was a journal on communal life that contained religious and other reading matter. Later it widened its field of interest and published reports on Zionism, Palestine, and world Jewry. After the creation of the State of Israel, the paper added comprehensive reports on events in Israel and acquired a wide readership in Switzerland, Alsace, and other German-speaking Jewish districts of Europe. A Zionist weekly, Juedische Pressezentrale, appeared from 1917 to 1940 in Zurich under the editorship of Oscar Gruen, and numbering Hermann Witzhum and Benjamin Segalowitz (d. 1970) among its contributors. The Zionist fortnightly Das Juedische Heim had a short career from 1927. In Basle the Juedische Rundschau-Maccabi, a Zionist weekly, appears from 1940 as an independent organ in German with Adrien Blum as editor. The establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 stimulated further enterprises. Das NeueIsrael was founded in June of that year as the monthly organ of the Swiss Zionist Organization, with the additional aim of furthering relations between Switzerland and Israel. Containing both German and French contributions, it has appeared under the editorship of Veit Wyler since its inception. Another monthly, Liaison, with Daniel Halperin, Emanuel Haymann and Michael Wyler as editors, was initiated in Geneva in 1967 as a magazine of news, politics, and the arts.

[Veit Wyler]

In the United States

The first English-language Jewish newspapers in America were published to counteract proselytizing by missionaries attempting to convert poor Jewish immigrants to Christianity. In 1820 Abraham Collins published Israel Vindicated, and three years later New York printer Solomon Henry Jackson started The Jew to discredit the propaganda in the newspaper Israel's Advocate. Jackson's masthead enunciated its purpose – "Being a Defender of Judaism against all the adversaries, and particularly against the insidious attacks of Israel's Advocate." When the offensive newspaper died in 1825, Jackson ceased publishing The Jew.

Jackson's endeavor was a precursor to the efforts of the Jewish press throughout the years – to protect and defend the Jewish community from outside attacks, to aid in the acculturation of immigrants, to inform its readers, and to enunciate the community's goals.

From 1843 until his death in 1868, Rabbi Isaac Leeser of Philadelphia covered news in the Jewish world in his monthly English-language newspaper The Occident and the American Jewish Advocate. Leeser helped lay the foundation for the Jewish Publication Society in 1845.

During the middle of the 19th century when thousands of Jews emigrated from Germany, Isidor Busch founded the short-lived, German-language weekly Israel's Herold in 1849. That year, Robert Lyon put out the Asmonean, the first English-language Jewish weekly that covered local, national and news from abroad.

Most Jews lived in eastern seaboard cities, and when the population migrated westward, newspapers were started in fledgling Jewish communities. In 1854, Rabbi Isaac Meyer *Wise sought to reach isolated Jews living west of the Allegheny River, and began the English-language weekly The Israelite in Cincinnati, Ohio, which became The*American Israelite after 1874 – a newspaper still published weekly in 2006. Wise's newspaper fought "against errors, superstition, prejudice, arrogance, hypocrisy and bigotry." To reach Jews unable to read English, Wise published the eight-page weekly in German *Die Deborah from 1885 until the end of the 19th century.

German and German–English-language Jewish newspapers were also launched in Milwaukee, St. Louis, and Memphis. When the Gold Rush lured Jews to California, San Francisco became the home of a German and English language weekly The Hebrew Observer (1855–88), The Gleaner (1856), The Jewish Times and Observer (1858) and The Pacific Messenger (1860).

In 1870, J.K. Buchner introduced his sporadically published Yiddishe Zeitung ("Jewish Times"), America's first Yiddish newspaper that covered politics, history, science, and the arts. In 1872, pioneer Yiddish journalist. Kasriel Hersch Sarasohn founded the New Yorker Yiddische Zeitung, offered the weekly Judische Gazetten ("Jewish Gazette") from 1874 to 1885, and attempted two Yiddish dailies that failed to survive. The rise of the Yiddish press paralleled the influx of Eastern European Jews to America from the 1870s into the 20th century who feared pogroms and sought a better life – and most were Yiddish speakers. Some of the first Yiddish papers were a combination of Hebrew and Yiddish, but by 1874 they settled on Yiddish. The Yiddish press, written in the immigrants' language, exerted influence and helped them to acculturate to a new and far different world. They found news from abroad, editorials and essays – and sought stimulation and escape after a hard day's work reading the serials, novels, featured stories and verse by Yiddish writers. Rabbi Wise maintained a great disdain for the Yiddish-language press.

Between 1871 and 1931, about 125 Hebrew periodicals were published in America, and were mainly weeklies and monthlies with small circulations, operated by one person. The first American Hebrew weekly Ha-Ẓofeh ("The Observer in a New Land") appeared in New York from 1871 to 1876, and Sarasohn's weekly Ha-Ivri ("The Hebrew") lasted from 1891 to 1898. Few Hebrew periodicals survived beyond a few issues since American Jews could neither understand Hebrew nor had any real interest in it.

In 1885 Sarasohn published the politically and religiously conservative Judisches Tageblatt ("Jewish Daily News"), the first Yiddish daily to survive. The Tageblatt introduced an English page in 1897, and by 1900, its circulation stood at 100,000. In 1905 a new daily emerged, Warheit ("The Truth") that was absorbed by the Tageblatt in 1919.

Some Jewish immigrants sought more liberal newspapers that reinforced their beliefs and turned to the socialist weekly New York Yiddish Folk Zeitung (1885–89), the Arbeiter Zeitung ("Worker's Press," 1890), and the Yiddish Socialist Labor daily Abendblatt ("Evening Paper") which lasted from 1894 to 1902.

In 1886, Abraham *Cahan edited Naye Tsayt (New Times), the first radical weekly, and in 1897 became the inaugurating editor of the Yiddish-language Forverts (The Jewish Daily Forward). He departed within a few months after a dispute with radical socialists at the newspaper, and when he returned five years later, he received full editorial control and ran the Forward until his death in 1951. Circulation grew from 6,000 in 1903 to a peak of 250,000 in 1929 when it was the most widely read Yiddish newspaper in America. In 1906, Cahan introduced Bintel Brief – "a little bundle of letters" – which encouraged immigrant readers to write in, tell of their problems, and seek help. The Forward encouraged humanism and morality, translated European classics, published articles on American Jewish history, and helped immigrants to assimilate. Cahan brought in distinguished authors includingSholem *Asch and I.J. *Singer. His brother Isaac Bashevis *Singer was on staff from the 1930s into the 1960s, as was Elie *Wiesel in the 1950s, and both won Nobel Prizes.

Jacob Saphirstein published the afternoon Abendpost (1899–1903), and in 1901 started Der Morgen Zhurnal (The Jewish Morning Journal), which was Orthodox, pro-Zionist, and Republican. Foreign correspondents cabled news in from Russia, Poland and the Balkans. The Yiddish press offered readers a mix of ideological, political, business, trade and women's publications. After immigrants settled in other cities, attempts made to establish Yiddish dailies there failed when they were unable to compete with the New York City newspapers trucked in every day.

Some Americanized Jews strongly opposed the use of Yiddish among newcomers, and believed that writers should use either correct German or good English. Many readers deserted the Yiddish press and gravitated toward English-language newspapers, as did their children.

To reach readers seeking local news, Jewish city newspapers began around 1900 including the Jewish Exponent in Philadelphia (1887), the Jewish news weekly of Northern California and New York's Jewish Week, and Boston's Jewish Advocate (1902). Each of these were still being published in the 21st century and offered an online version for their readers.

A limited number of Zionist periodicals appeared including the English-language cultural and literary magazine Maccabean, started in 1901. In 1900, the Labor Zionists introduced an irregularly published weekly Der Yiddisher Kemfer ("Jewish Warrior"), which was still being printed in the 21st century, as was the Woman's Labor Zionist magazine Na'amat Woman which began in 1925. In 1908, the weekly Dos Yidushe Folk ("The Jewish People") came into being, and eventually the Yiddish press realized that they could not avoid coverage of the Zionist movement. Der Morgen Zhurnal and the more liberal Der Tog supported Zionism while the Forverts railed against compromising socialism. After Hitler and the Holocaust, its editor Abraham Cahan became a fervent supporter of Israel.

English-language Jewish magazines opened a new venue in 1886 with B'nai B'rith's Menorah which became the International Jewish Monthly. In 1896 The Jewish Veteran was introduced, and in 1914, Hadassah was produced by the Women's Zionist Organization of America. All three ushered in the millennium, with the latter's circulation at 272,000.

By the early 1900s, there were periodicals for every taste, ideology, trade, and purpose. In 1906, newspaper baron William Randolph Hearst published a Yiddish daily expressly aimed at New York City's 600,000 Jews when he campaigned for governor. After his defeat, Hearst immediately closed the paper.

In 1909, editor Moses Ha-Kohen *Goldman introduced the first Hebrew daily Ha-Yom (The Day) in New York, but the paper soon failed financially. Ha-Doar (The Post) was started by Histraduth Ivrith and directed by Hebraist Max Lipson. It lasted as a Hebrew daily for eight months in 1921 and 1922, continued as weekly through 1992, became a monthly, and was a quarterly when it succumbed in 2004. (See also *Newspapers, Hebrew.)

The Yiddish press was more radical and outspoken than the conservative and traditional Hebrew press, which was unable to survive. Publishing was a business and Hebrew periodical editors were not business people. In 1914, Der Tog (The Day) was founded by a group led by Rabbi Judah L. *Magnes. It was a non-partisan, liberal publication of high literary and journalistic standards whose masthead read "The newspaper for the Yiddish intelligentsia." That year, there were ten Yiddish dailies with a combined circulation of over 750,000. Der Tog's peak circulation was 81,000 in 1916 and it merged with Der Morgen Zhurnal in 1953 and ceased publishing in 1973.

By 1921 there were five Yiddish daily newspapers in New York, three in Chicago, and one each in Philadelphia, Cleveland, Milwaukee, and Los Angeles. Their heyday ended when the Immigration Act of 1924 severely restricted immigration from Europe, and Yiddish press circulation began its decline.

Concurrently, from the 1920s into the 1940s there was the rise of English-language magazines and Jewish city newspapers. In 1943, Phillip *Slomovitz, the first editor of the Detroit Jewish News (1942) founded the American Association of English-Jewish Newspapers – now known as the American Jewish Press Association. Slomovitz, a well-respected leader, called the Jewish press "the guardian over the public welfare of our people… the historian of Israel and the watchman of our freedoms."

At the outset of the 21st century, there were 104 English-language–Jewish newspapers being published in 36 states and the District of Columbia. Most appeared either weekly (49), twice monthly (23), or monthly (22), with 49 connected to a Jewish Federation. Independent newspapers also covered local activities and some provided in-depth reporting of issues of concern to American Jews.

The Jewish Telegraphic Agency (jta) provided national and international news concerning Israel to more than 100 newspapers in North America and around the world. The jta, founded in 1917, and headquartered in New York, had bureaus in Washington and Israel and correspondents in North and South America, Europe, Africa, and Australia.

More than 50 Jewish magazines were aimed at the gamut of religious, organizational, ideological, and scholarly audiences. Three religious magazines were quarterlies; Humanistic Judaism, Reform Judaism with a circulation of more than 300,000, and Jewish Action published by the Orthodox Union. United Synagogue Review went to 250,000 Conservative readers twice a year. Tradition is published by the Rabbinical Council of America and Conservative Judaism by the Rabbinical Assembly. Commentary founded in 1945 was sponsored by the American Jewish Committee, while Congress Monthly (1933) and Judaism (1952) came from the American Jewish Congress. The independent magazine Tikkun (1986) presented a radically progressive perspective.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center's Response (1979) attacked antisemitism and went to its 250,000 members. In 1980, The National Yiddish Book Center, began publishing Pakn Treger (Book Peddler) which looked at contemporary Jewish life and its Yiddish roots. Three years later, the Yiddish-language Forward became a weekly, and in 1990, an English-language weekly version began and circulation grew to 25,000. A Russian-language edition was inaugurated in 1995 to reach new immigrants, but after losing money it was sold in 2004.

The Forward went online in 1998 followed by the Forverts, which tried to reach a younger, worldwide audience of Yiddish speakers. An online Jewish audience was also sought by Jewish city newspapers and organizational, political and religious periodicals. There was a host of Jewish bloggers (Web Loggers) who expressed their personal views on a variety of subjects that included dating, converting to Judaism, politics, and religion, with one site devoted to Orthodox Jewish female bloggers.

During the early years of the 21st century, new niche publications tried to capture younger Jewish audiences – Heeb was a generation X magazine and New Voices was aimed at college students.

They joined a plethora of publications that offered readers a choice of venues printed in English, Russian, German, and Yiddish, with 11 Yiddish periodicals in New York alone. The Jewish press had reached back to its 19th century roots to satisfy the needs of an eclectic and diverse Jewish readership.

[Harvey Leonard Gotliffe (2nd ed.)]

bibliography:

J. Fraenkel, Jewish Press of the World (1967); Itonut Yehudit she-haytah (1973). Canada: L. Lakson, in: Yidisher Almanak (1923), 262–4; A. Rhinewine, Der Yid in Kanade (1925), 210–20; L. Levendel, A Century of the Canadian Jewish Press, 1880s–1980s (1990). Belgium: Z. Szajkowski, in: Studies in Bibliography and Booklore, 4 (1959/60), 103–22. Czechoslovakia: O. Donath, Židé a żidovství v české literatuře 19. a 20. století, 2 vols. (1923–30); M. Enten, Zsidó sajtó jelene Csehszlovákiában (1933); A. Dagan, in: Jews of Czechoslovakia, 1 (1968), 523–31. England: C. Roth, Jewish Chronicle 1841–1941 (1949); V.D. Lipman, Social History of the Jews in England 1850–1950 (1954), 131. France: Z. Szajkowski, in: E. Tcherikower (ed.), Yidn in Frankraykh, 1 (1942), 236–308. Germany and Austria: jl, 4 (1930), 1102–10, iv–vi; xxii–xxiv; M.T. Edelheim-Muehsam, in: ylbi, 1 (1956), 163–76; Juedische Presse im 19 Jahrhundert; Aus dem Internationalen Zeitungsmuseum der Stadt Aachen (1967), 7–86. Holland: I. Lipschits, Honderd jaar N.I.W. 1865–1965 (1966); Catalogue: De Joodse Pers in de Nederlanden en in Duitsland, 1674–1940 (1969; also in German). Hungary: Z. Spirn, in: Zukunft, 28 (1923), 309–12 (Yid.); N. Katzburg, in: Aresheth, 1 (1958), 279–98; S. Scheiber, in: ks, 32 (1956/57), 481–94; N. Ben-Menahem, Mi-Sifrut Yisrael be-Ungaryah (1958), 224–35, 379. Italy: E. Zolli, in: Ost und West, 6 (1906), 823–8; idem, Il giornalismo israelitico in Italia (1924); A. Milano, in: rmi, 12 nos. 7–9 (1938), 96–136. Ladino Press: M.D. Gaon, Ha-Ittonut be-Ladino (1965). Middle East and North Africa: C. Souriau, in: Annuaire de L'Afrique du Nord, 6 (1967); A. Yaari, Ha-Defus ha-Ivri be-Arzot ha-Mizrah, 2 vols. (1936–40); Y. Ben-Hananya, in: Al-Yawn (June 13, 1958); idem, in: Yad la-Kore, 4 (1956/57), 14–21, 119–28; S. Moreh, in: Middle Eastern Studies, 3 (1966/67), 283–94; A. Ben-Jacob, Yehudei Bavel (1965), index s.v.Ittonim. Russia: A. Kirzhnitz, Di Yidishe Prese in Rotnfar-band 1917–1927 (1928); idem, Di Yidishe Prese in der Gevezener Rusisher Imperiyeh 1823–1916 (1930); Fun Noentn Over, 2 (1959): S.L. Citron, Di Geshikhte fun der Yidisher Prese 1863–1889 (1923); J. Slutzky, in: He-Avar, 11 (1964), 37–52; idem, Ha-Ittonut ha-Yehudit-Russit ba-Me'ah ha-19 (1970). U.S.S.R.; Ch. Shmeruk (ed.), Pirsumim Yehudiyyim bi-Verit ha-Mo'azot 1917–1960 (1961); M. Altschuler (ed.), Pirsumim Rusiyyim bi-Verit ha-Mo'azot Al Yehudim ve-Yahadut 1917–1967 (1970; bibl. in Russian; introd. in Eng. and Heb.). South Africa: J.A. Poliva, A Short History of the Jewish Press and Literature of South Africa (1961). United States. Anglo-Jewish Press: C. Angoff, in: Jewish Spectator (Nov. 1957), 24–26; J. Neusner, in: Congress Bi-Weekly, 29 no. 5 (1962), 9–11; National Jewish Monthly, 61 (1946), 94–95, 108f.; B. Postal, in: Dimensions in American Judaism, 4 (Fall, 1969), 30. German Jewish Press: R. Glanz, German Jew in America; an Annotated Bibliography… (1969). Yiddish Press: H. Hapgood, Spirit of the Ghetto (1902), ed. by H. Golden (1965), 176–98; M. Rischin, Promised City: New York's Jews 1870–1914 (1962), 115–27; R. Sanders, Downtown Jews: Portraits of an Immigrant Generation (1969), index, s.v.Yiddish newspapers; M. Soltes, Yiddish Press – An Americanizing Agency (1950); J.L. Teller, Strangers and Natives (1968), 27–36; J. Shatzky (ed.), Zaml-Bukh tsu der Geshikhte fun der Yidisher Prese in Amerike (1934), esp. 13–21; idem, in: Algemeyne Entsiklopedye: Yidn, 3 (1942), 256–75; M. Starkmann, in: J. Shatzky (ed.), Zamlbukh Likhvod dem Tsvey Hundert un Fuftsiksten Yovel fun der Yidisher Prese (1937), 11535; idem, in: Zukunft, 67 (1962), 471–80 (Yid.); idem, in: S. Rawidowicz (ed.), Pinkas Chicago (1952), 69–78 (Yid.). add. bibliography: L. Levendel, A Century of the Canadian Jewish Press: 1880s-1980 (1989). C.A. Madison, Jewish Publishing in America (1976); J.R. Marcus, United States Jewry 1776–1985, 4 vols. (1993); D. Singer and L. Grossman (eds.), American Jewish Year Book 2004 (2004).

press

views updated May 14 2018

press1 / pres/ • v. 1. move or cause to move into a position of contact with something by exerting continuous physical force: [tr.] he pressed his face to the glass | [intr.] her body pressed against his. ∎  [tr.] exert continuous physical force on (something), typically in order to operate a device or machine: he pressed a button and the doors slid open. ∎  [tr.] squeeze (someone's arm or hand) as a sign of affection. ∎  [intr.] move in a specified direction by pushing: the mob was still pressing forward. ∎ fig. (of an enemy or opponent) attack persistently and fiercely: [intr.] their enemies pressed in on all sides | [tr.] two assailants were pressing Agrippa. ∎  [intr.] (press on/ahead) fig. continue in one's action: he stubbornly pressed on with his work. ∎  [tr.] Weightlifting raise (a specified weight) by first lifting it to shoulder height and then gradually pushing it upward above the head.2. [tr.] apply pressure to (something) to flatten, shape, or smooth it, typically by ironing: she pressed her nicest blouse | [as adj.] (pressed) immaculately pressed trousers. ∎  apply pressure to (a flower or leaf) between sheets of paper in order to dry and preserve it. ∎  extract (juice or oil) by crushing or squeezing fruit, vegetables, etc.: [as adj.] (pressed) freshly pressed grape juice. ∎  squeeze or crush (fruit, vegetables, etc.) to extract the juice or oil. ∎  manufacture (something, esp. a phonograph record) by molding under pressure.3. [tr.] forcefully put forward (an opinion, claim, or course of action): Rose did not press the point. ∎  make strong efforts to persuade or force (someone) to do or provide something: when I pressed him for precise figures, he evaded the subject| the marketing directors were pressed to justify their expenditure | [intr.] they continued to press for changes in legislation. ∎  (press something on/upon) insist that (someone) accept an offer or gift: he pressed dinner invitations on her. ∎  [intr.] (of something, esp. time) be in short supply and so demand immediate action. ∎  (be pressed) have barely enough of something, esp. time: I'm very pressed for time. ∎  (be pressed to do something) have difficulty doing or achieving something: they may be hard pressed to keep their promise.• n. 1. a device for applying pressure to something in order to flatten or shape it or to extract juice or oil: a flower press a wine press. ∎  a machine that applies pressure to a workpiece by means of a tool, in order to punch shapes.2. a printing press. ∎  [often in names] a business that prints or publishes books: the Clarendon Press. ∎  the process of printing: the book is ready to go to press.3. (the press) [treated as sing. or pl.] newspapers or journalists viewed collectively: the press was notified| [as adj.] press coverage. ∎  coverage in newspapers and magazines: there's no point in demonstrating if you don't get any press | [in sing.] the mayor has had a bad press for years. 4. an act of pressing something: the system summons medical help at the press of a button. ∎  [in sing.] a closely packed crowd or mass of people or things: among the press of cars he saw a taxi. ∎  Weightlifting an act of raising a weight to shoulder height and then gradually pushing it above the head. ∎  Basketball any of various forms of close guarding by the defending team.PHRASES: press chargessee charge.press something homesee home.press (the) flesh inf. (of a celebrity or politician) greet people by shaking hands.press2 • v. [tr.] (press someone/something into) put (someone or something) to a specified use, esp. as a temporary or makeshift measure: many of these stones have been pressed into service as gateposts. ∎ hist. force (a man) to enlist in the army or navy.• n. hist. a forcible enlistment of men, esp. for the navy.

press

views updated May 18 2018

press2 force (a man) into the navy or army, impress. XVI. alt., under the infl. of PRESS1, of † prest (XVI), f. † prest sb. loan, impost payment in advance, earnest-money paid to a recruit on enlistment XV, enlistment XVI. — OF. prest (mod. prêt) loan, advance pay for soldiers, f. prester (mod. prêter) afford, lend:— L. præstāre furnish, medL. lend, rel. to præstō at hand, within reach.
Hence press sb. (hist.) impressing of men for service XVI; whence p.-gang XVII.

press

views updated May 21 2018

press1
A. crowd, throng XIII;

B. instrument used to compress XIV; machine for imposing the impression of type on paper, etc.; place for printing XVI; matter printed (letter-p.) XVIII.

C. large cupboard XIV. — (O)F. presse, f. presser — L. pressāre, f. press-, pp. stem of premere press.
So press vb. bear down upon or against with force; crowd, push forward XIV; urge XVI. — (O)F. — L. pressure weight of pain, grief, etc. XIV; action of moral or mental force; action of pressing XVII. — L. pressūra.

Press

views updated May 14 2018

Press

a crush of people, 1400; the newspapers; journalists collectively ; as much sail as the wind will allow on a ship; urgency; a large cupboard, closet, or container.

Examples : press of books, 1709; of canvas; of colthes, 1440; of engagements; of people, 1400; a great press was at the procession, 1400; of sail, 1860; of suspects.

press

views updated May 29 2018

press See newspaper

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