I found the article by Raanan Rein in the March, 2024 issue of The Volunteer to be interesting and insightful. But there was just this one phrase that raised the hackles on this Palestinian Jew’s head: “Jewish Palestine.” No such place existed. Rather, there was a place called Palestine, a multicultural home to Jews,...
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Posted in Letters | Comments Off on Letters to the Editors: On Jewish Palestine
Dear Friends, As human rights and academic freedom are under threat throughout the world, it was gratifying to hear former winners of the ALBA/Puffin Award speak to each other and to the attentive audience gathered in New York City this past May 4 for this year’s award ceremony. Kate Doyle, the investigative journalist who...
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Posted in Letters | Comments Off on Letter from ALBA: Forging a Community of Human Rights Activists
If we have learned one thing from political and judicial developments over the past couple of years, it’s that we cannot trust that the basic rights that past generations fought so hard to conquer are, and will remain, secure.
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Posted in Letters | Comments Off on Letter from ALBA: Fighting For Our Rights
Dear Friends, ALBA connects generations. We see this in our Watt essay contest, which showcases the passionate fascination with which high schoolers, undergrads, and graduate students engage with the legacy of the International Brigades. We see it in the touching video testimonies that grandchildren of vets have been sending us in response to our...
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Posted in Letters | Comments Off on Letter from ALBA: Goosebump Moments
To the Editors: I was so pleased to see Bruce Barthol on the cover of The Volunteer. I would see him at events in Rohnert Park at the home of Corine Thornton, who died just before her 100th birthday. The memorial lunch was the last time I saw Bruce. Then, at the opening of...
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Posted in Letters | Comments Off on Letter to the Editors
Dear Friends, The three threads running through this issue are directly linked to ALBA’s mission and history. The first thread underscores how important it is to identify fascism wherever it shows up—and to face it head-on. We don’t have to explain to you why that is particularly important today. “We can no longer teach...
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Posted in News, Letters | Comments Off on Letter from ALBA: Antifascism, Education, and Labor
One of the winners of ALBA’s 2022 George Watt Award, Maza Reyes, chose as his subject “Bernard Knox: Soldier and Scholar.” Another renowned historian, Peter Stansky, took the opportunity to contact Maza Reyes and added some personal touches to Knox’s biography.
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Posted in Letters | Comments Off on Letter: Stansky on Bernard Knox
To the Editors: I’ve just read Nevine Abraham’s article about the Palestinian volunteer Ali Abd el-Khaleq in your last number (“Liberating Palestine in Spain”). I’m very happy you touched this topic and raised a bit of light into this little-know participation. Thanks. But I’m sorry to say there are some important mistakes in the...
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Posted in Letters | Comments Off on Palestinian Volunteers: An Exchange
To the Editors: Wonderful to see a photo of Irving Fajans and to read about him (“The Working Class Legacy of the Lincoln Brigade”, March 2023). He was a marvelous human being. In 1963, I hired him to be an instructor in production at the Film School, School of Visual Arts in New York...
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Posted in Letters | Comments Off on Letter to the Editor: Irving Fajans
The present is confusing because we don’t know what the future will look like. Still, some things are crystal clear.
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Posted in News, Letters | Comments Off on Letter from ALBA: On Confusion and Clarity