In a find that local Jewish groups have described as highly significant, Greek police said Thursday that hundreds of marble headstones and other fragments from Jewish graves destroyed during the Nazi occupation in World War II have been recovered.
Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/lost-jewish-tombstones-found-greece-181312769.html
The Jewish Cemetery at Newport
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
How strange it seems! These Hebrews in their graves,
Close by the street of this fair seaport town,
Silent beside the never-silent waves,
At rest in all this moving up and down!
The trees are white with dust, that o'er their sleep
Wave their broad curtains in the south-wind's breath,
While underneath these leafy tents they keep
The long, mysterious Exodus of Death.
And these sepulchral stones, so old and brown,
That pave with level flags their burial-place,
Seem like the tablets of the Law, thrown down
And broken by Moses at the mountain's base.
Continue reading: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/173900
In the first link, I couldn't help but noticing that the head of the Jewish community in Salonica is named David Saltiel.
ReplyDeleteThis name is very "Davidic dynasty" sounding. Of course, the first name David is, but the last name "Saltiel" likely comes from She'altiel, the father of Zerubavel and the son of King Yechonia.
See Shealtiel.com where this family name is known to have a tradition to be from Malchut Beit David.
I find it, therefore, very ironic that someone from Malchut Beit David is the head of the Jewish community in Greece. Maybe it is to atone for the Hashmona'im usurping the leadership during Galut Yavan.