Jewish Cemetery Preserved by Christians and Jews

Newport, Rhode Island, had once been home to a thriving  Colonial Jewish community — also the home of Touro Synagogue, the nation’s oldest surviving Jewish house of worship. But after the Revolutionary War and the city’s economic decline, that community largely faded. Yet the cemetery and the synagogue building remained.

            The Jewish burial ground dated to 1677. In 1822, Abraham Touro left money for the upkeep of the cemetery, the synagogue (built in 1763), and the street on which they stood. Newport’s Town Council was authorized to use the interest for repairs.

            When Henry Wadsworth Longfellow visited Newport’s Jewish cemetery in 1854, he wrote of the graves as “silent beside the never-silent waves.” He noticed, too, what endured there: “Gone are the living, but the dead remain,” he observed, “and they are not neglected.”

            Newport’s preservation of Jewish sacred space was shared. Jews endowed these places and returned to bury their dead there. Christian officials repaired, protected, and publicly honored them. In this way, a Jewish inheritance was carried forward until communal life returned.

            In 1883, Touro Synagogue was rededicated, and a new Jewish community was established in Newport. Yet, even in the years when the congregation was gone, the dead were not abandoned.

                                                                                                               —Austin Albanese/The Forward

Dinah Slepovitch. Photo by Zisl Slepovitch

By Jennifer A. Stern

In summer 2020, when the world was in lockdown, I couldn’t stop watching a video that featured two young children — Dinah Slepovitch and Pinya Minkin — singing a Yiddish folk song about eating potatoes every day. The song felt a lot like life during COVID-19, even as it evoked what poor Eastern European Jews often ate in the past. I was enchanted.

The Yiddish language was still relatively new for me then, and I had no idea that Dinah — at the grand age of 7 — was already an experienced singer of Yiddish songs. At age 4, she performed at the Workers Circle Hanukkah concert in New York. She sings entirely from memory in perfect Yiddish and her father — klezmer musician, composer and Jewish music scholar Zisl Slepovitch — accompanies her on the keyboard or piano. Dinah and her father have made about 20 videos together over the past several years, showcasing a variety of Yiddish songs.

In 2025, 12-year-old Dinah gave the world premiere of “Afn taykhl sholem” (“By the river of peace”), composed by her father with words from a Yiddish poem by Boris Sandler. Father and daughter performed the song together at a gala in honor of Sandler’s 75th birthday. Dinah also debuted as a soloist with the National Yiddish Theater-Folksbiene during its Hanukkah program at Hebrew Union College. And she appeared in new videos of Yiddish songs, including the bittersweet “Zol shoyn kumen di geule” (“May the Redemption Come Soon”), composed after the Holocaust with words by the poet Shmerke Kaczerginski.

I recently spoke with Dinah and her father about the role of Yiddish songs in her life.

How did Dinah begin singing songs in Yiddish?

Zisl Slepovitch: I’ve been singing Yiddish songs to her since she was born. She naturally started imitating me, the way little kids do. We mostly speak Russian at home, because my wife and I grew up in Belarus. Of course Dinah speaks English at school, and English and Russian with her friends.

But Yiddish and Yiddish songs are part of our family life, and she soaked them up from her daily environment. She hasn’t been exposed to Yiddish in a systematic way, so she can’t converse yet like she does in Russian or English. But it’s clear how easily and naturally she sings in Yiddish.

Dinah, how do you learn all these Yiddish songs by heart? What’s your process?

Dinah Slepovitch: When we pick a new song to learn, my father sings it to me as many times as I need. I have a pretty good memory, so I start to remember the melody right away. Then we go over the words, translating them into Russian and sometimes into English. We also talk about what the song means, the kinds of emotions that it describes. Because I know so many Yiddish songs by now, a lot of the words are already familiar — more and more words over time.

What are your favorite Yiddish songs?

Dinah Slepovitch: “Shnirele Perele” is special to me, because I sang it in the first video that my dad and I made during COVID-19. And of course the song about potatoes is close to my heart, since that video was really popular and helped a lot of Yiddish fans get through COVID. I also love “Arum dem fayer” (“Around the Fire”). When I sing it, I’m calm and connected to the people singing with me.

What kind of reaction have you gotten to your videos?

Zisl Slepovitch: We’ve gotten a very positive reaction. I travel around the world because of my music work, and I hear from many musicians and Yiddish enthusiasts in other countries that they’ve watched the videos, often with their children. Yiddish teachers and teachers of Jewish music show them to their classes. It’s inspiring for students to see a child who loves Yiddish and sings it so comfortably.

Dinah, how do you feel when you sing for a live audience, especially in a big theater or auditorium?

Dinah Slepovitch: Nervous. But my mom helps me a lot. She’s my biggest cheerleader, and she’s always there with me backstage when I’m getting ready to perform. She helps me to calm down. Once I go out on the stage and start singing, I feel very happy.

Will you keep singing Yiddish songs for live audiences and making videos?

Dinah Slepovitch: Yes. As I learn more Yiddish, I’ll be able to sing more kinds of songs. I sing with the New York chapter of the National Children’s Chorus, which helps with singing technique. We sing in English, Spanish, Japanese, Hebrew, Hawaiian, Mandarin, Latin. The conductors help us pronounce the words correctly. I love singing in all kinds of languages. But Yiddish songs will always be special for me, because Yiddish is such a big part of my life.

[Click here for a performance. Click “skip” to avoid the ads]

Afn taykhl Sholem – Dinah Slepovitch -Boris Sandler / Zisl …

The corridors of Limerick’s Istabraq Hall rang out with the sounds of Hebrew prayer on a recent Shabbat to celebrate the gift of four Torah scrolls, which will serve the Irish Jewish communities outside of Dublin. The scrolls, gifted by Congregation Temple Emanu-El in Haverhill, MA, have their own extensive history: three were scribed in Eastern Europe before the Holocaust, and the fourth in Israel in the 1950s. The Temple is merging with another congregation, and is passing its scrolls to others.                                               Photo by Jewish World

On March 11, permanent street markers were installed in the Scheunenviertel (Barn Quarter) to mark the approximately 50 years when Yiddish was the main language there.

At the end of the 19th century, many Eastern European Jews, planning to emigrate to North America, got stuck in Berlin, trying to collect enough money or get papers for their ship journey. As a result, the area, and especially the Grenadierstrafe, became a bustling Jewish street, with many informal prayer spaces, kosher butchers and bakeries and Jewish bookstores.

The new street name signs appear in Yiddish script with explanations and QR codes. The project was initiated by the artist Sebestyén Fiumei.

On March 12, a shooting and vehicle-ramming attack occurred at Temple Israel, a Reform synagogue in West Bloomfield Township, Michigan. A male suspect rammed his pickup truck into the front entrance of the synagogue, drove through the doors and down the hall, and reportedly opened fire. Police said that the suspect was killed in an exchange of fire with armed security personnel.

The vehicle caught fire, possibly from something flammable inside. One security guard was struck and injured by the vehicle; at least 30 law enforcement officers were transported to area hospitals and treated for smoke inhalation. No synagogue members were injured. Michigan State Police warned of an active shooter, and nearby residents and schools sheltered-in-place.

 The body of Master Sgt. Ran Gvili, the last Israeli still unaccounted for after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, was returned from Gaza, ending more than two years of waiting. Gvili, a 24-year-old police officer killed while defending Kibbutz Alumum, was brought home for burial 843 days after he was taken captive.

“The first to go, the last to leave,” his mother posted on Facebook. “Our hero.”

Israel is now expected to reopen the Rafah crossing, Gaza’s border with Egypt and its key outlet to the outside world, the next phase of the ceasefire.

A banner of Ran Gvili is seen at Hostage Square in Tel Aviv.

Photo Jack Guez/AFP Getty I Images.

Hundreds of mourners attended the funeral of Ran Gvili.                                     Kobi Wolf/Getty Images photo