JNS.org - When Rosalyn Gold-Onwude was a college student at Stanford University, she participated on Birthright Israel. Several years later,...
The National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene explained that shortly after the November 2020 presidential election, Fishman was researching songwriter Irving Berlin, a Jewish immigrant to the US whose first languages were Yiddish and Russian. Born Israel Berlin, he penned “God Bless America” in 1918 for a musical revue while serving in the US Army, but ultimately set the song aside. Then, in 1938, with the rise of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and fascism, he revisited and revised the song — and released it as a prayer for the country. “God Bless America” was first heard on an Armistice Day, broadcast in 1938 and sung by Kate Smith.