Emilie Rosenfeld and Carli Price with author Yardena Schwartz. Credit: Andrew Holmes

By Allison Teegardin 

On November 13, 120 people attended Shalom Austin Women’s Philanthropy Book Lovers Breakfast featuring award winning journalist and best-selling author Yardena Schwartz. In her book, Ghosts of a Holy War, Schwartz tells the story about what was discovered in a box of century-old letters found in the attic of a family in Memphis, Tennessee. The letters not only teach about David Shainberg , the young man who wrote them while living in the holy city of Hebron in British Mandate Palestine, but also about the massacre that took his life in 1929.

During the conversation as attendees enjoyed a bagel breakfast donated by Rosen’s Bagels, event co-chairs Carli Price and Emilie Rosenfeld spoke with Schwartz about her research and her book.”History matters, especially in the face of disinformation and propaganda campaigns that we are facing to a degree that many of us did not think we would see in our lifetimes,” Price said. “Your book, and your words remind us of where we come from. We are ancient people who come from Judea, the very setting of your book. Knowing our history, and reflecting and thinking back on it empowers us to understand the truth of who we are, and to be able to speak up.

“At a gathering memorial for David Shainberg that took place in his hometown of Memphis, TN in 1929, it was said, ‘The history of the Jews is written in blood and punctuated with tears.’ Today, on day 769 since October 7, and all that we have been through the past two years, the past 100 years, and the past 3,000 years, we want to leave off with the eternal hope that is and always has been the rallying cry of the Jewish people.”

At the conclusion of the event, Rabbi Neil F. Blumofe of Congregation Agudas Achim led the group in the singing of the Israeli National Anthem, Hatikvah.