“Is this the birthday house?”
“He got up, put on his black vest and jacket, adjusted his gold-rimmed spectacles and his black hat, and stepped into the courtyard. There before Weingarten stood a middle-aged British major wearing the yellow-and-red insignia of the Suffolk Regiment. From his right hand dangled a bar of rusted iron almost a foot long. With a solemn gesture he offered it to the elderly rabbi. It was a key, the key to Zion Gate, one of the seven gates of the Old City of Jerusalem.
‘From the year 70 A.D. until today,” he said, “a key to the gates of Jerusalem has never been in Jewish hands. This is the first time in eighteen centuries that your people have been so privileged.’
Weingarten extended a trembling hand to accept the key. Jewish legend held that on the night the Roman Emperor Titus destroyed the Temple, its despairing priests had thrown the keys of Jerusalem to heaven crying ‘God, henceforth be Thou the guardian of the keys.’ Now the improbable agent of their return to Jewish hands stood to attention and saluted.”
Larry Collins
& Dominique Lapierre
“First they came for the Socialists,
and I did not speak out
because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me,
and there was no one left
to speak for me.”
“I know of only one duty, and that is to love.”
“In his darkest hour, he gave the press its finest hour.”
“The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.”
“One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.”
“I hope I shall possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain what I consider the most enviable of all titles, the character of an honest man.”
“There is nothing to writing Gellhorn; all you do is sit down at your typewriter and bleed.”