Past Events
September 5, 2024
When Alexander the Great Did NOT Visit Jerusalem: the Revolt of the Jerusalem Street in 169-67 BCE
Rabbi Benjamin Scolnic
Part of the Repercussions of Violence under Alexander and the Successors: 9th Annual Alexander the Great Symposium
May 9, 2024
2024 Sokolof Lecture: The Israel-Hamas War and the Contest of Wills: Public Opinion vs International Law
Featuring John Spencer, Modern War Institute, West Point Military Academy
April 5, 2024
Pushkin's Jewish Femmes Fatales: Demonic Sexuality and Extraordinary Freedom
Elena Petrova, PhD Student in Slavic Languages, University of Southern California
April 4, 2024
Conjuring Literary Jewish Witches: The Cauldron of Antisemitism in 19th c. Russia
Elena Petrova, PhD Student in Slavic Languages, University of Southern California
Feb. 22, 2024
Shared Society in a Time of War: Interreligious Voices from Israel
Dr. Jeannette Gabriel, Schwalb Center Director
September 21, 2023
The Plight of Jewish Deserted Wives
Dr. Haim Sperber, Visiting Israeli Scholar from Western Galilee College
April 20, 2023
Performance at Jewell Jazz Club
UNO Jazz Students and Internal Compass Jazz College students from Israel performed together
April 20, 2023
UNO Passover Seder
Sept. 18, 2022
Maxwell Street Klezmer Band Performance
Part of the Midwest Jewish Studies Association Conference.
May 12, 2022
Trapped in Rome Without a Home: The Plight of Post-Chernobyl Jewish Refugees
Alla Shapiro , M.D., Ph.D.
April 5, 2022
Jewish Histories of Iran
Dr. Lior Sternfeld, an Associate Professor of History and Jewish Studies at Penn State University
March 29, 2022
Student Presentation: Saving the Holy Middle Ground: Reimagining the Future of Conservative Judaism
Tristan Newman, a senior at UNO in Religious Studies and History
March 20, 2022
Chernobyl Responder, Jewish Refugee, Radiation Expert Dr. Alla Shapiro
Alla Shapiro, M.D., Ph.D.
March 10, 2022
Behind the Scenes of This Immortal Life Also
Nancy Shank, Playwright, and Timothy Scholl, Director/Producer discuss the process of creating a new play about celebrated theologian and pacifist Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Bonhoeffer is drawn into a web of lies and deceit as a double agent in World War II Germany. He struggles to live with integrity while fighting against National Socialism in a landscape of secrets, broken promises, fierce love, and dangerous alliances.
March 1, 2022
Welcoming the Immigrants: Refugee Resettlement in Jewish Iowa
February 22, 2022
2022 Ruth and Phil Sokolof Lecture: Three Modern Blood Libels About Israel: Vaccines, Evictions, and Apartheid
Prof. Eugene Kontorovich, Antonin Scalia School of Law, and Director, Center for International Law in the Middle East at George Mason University.
September 19, 2021
The Stony Ground Bore Fruit – Stories of Jewish Homesteaders and Descendants
Rebecca E. Bender, discussed her book, Still (North Dakota State University Press), a biography/memoir that she coauthored with her father Kenneth M. Bender about two family generations who were Jewish farming homesteaders near Ashley, North Dakota.
June 2, 2021
Ilana Masad Author Talk: On Writing & Nuance
A conversation with Ilana Masad is a queer Israeli-American writer of fiction, nonfiction, and criticism.
April 29, 2021
What's Jewish About the Jewish State? Examining Israel’s Fierce Debate on the Nation-State Law
The 2021 Sokolof Lecture was presented by Simon Rabinovitch, Ph.D., Associate Professor in History at Northeastern University. Dr. Rabinovitch examined and analyzed the impact of Israel’s 2018 Nation-State Law. The passage of the law sparked protests from Israel’s Druze population and raised questions about balancing minority rights and national self-determination.
April 28, 2021
Religious Freedom and the Jews: Collective Rights and Modern States
Dr. Simon Rabinovitch, Associate Professor in History and Jewish Studies at Northeastern University, joined ‘Breadbreakers’ to present a lecture on his forthcoming book that compares legal cases in Europe, North America, Africa, and Israel where civil courts have decided on matters of Jewish law and communal identity.
April 22, 2021
Forgotten Histories of Jewish Women in Iowa: Community Discussion
Dr. Jeannette Gabriel, Director, Schwalb Center for Israel & Jewish Studies, led a discussion on the connections between family collections and broader Jewish and American history, examining Jewish women's lives from complex perspectives, and placing family collections in archives.
March 30, 2021
More Than Housewives: The Forgotten Lives of Iowa's Jewish Women
Dr. Jeannette Gabriel examined why Jewish women's contributions have been neglected in Iowa history and discuss The Jewish Women in Iowa Collection at the Iowa Women's Archives - University of Iowa. The discussion was moderated by Karen Michaeli from the Jewish Federation of the Corridor (Iowa).
February 17, 2021
German, Jew, Muslim, Gay: The Life and Times of Hugo Marcus
Professor Marc David Baer, International History, London School of Economics and Political Science, spoke about his new publication that was released in April 2020 with the Religion, Culture, and Public Life series, Columbia University Press.
January 7, 2021
Zionism for Generation Z: Drawing from Jewish Ethics
Tristan Newman, a Religious Studies major, gave a presentation as his final project for the History of Zionism course. The primary focus of his study was on the development of Zionist ideas prior to 1903 and how those ideas impacted the development of the State of Israel.
October 14, 2020
Rescue the Surviving Souls: The Great Jewish Refugee Crisis of the 17th Century
Professor Adam Teller, History and Judaic Studies, Brown University, spoke about his new book as part of the Schwalb Center's series on new research on Jewish Migratory Studies.
September 15, 2020
From Jerusalem to Omaha: Michael Staenberg's Vision for a Jewish Future
Michael Staenberg, president of The Staenberg Group (TSG), joined The Schwalb Center for Israel and Jewish Studies for a discussion of the vision that drives his philanthropy work.
April 23, 2020
A Conversation with Unorthodox
This discussion featured the Director of Unorthodox, Maria Schrader, and Actor, Eli Rosen. This event was offered as part of the Schwalb Center's 10th Anniversary programming.
March 5, 2020
Israeli Elections X3: What Happens Next?
On March 2, 2020, Israelis went to the polls for the third time in a year in an attempt to form a new governing coalition. This discussion about the results of this election and what it means for democracy in Israel was conducted by Dr. Steve Caplan is a Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (UNMC), Dr. Curtis Hutt is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies (UNO), and moderated by Dr. Jeannette Gabriel.
February 2020
Islam, Authoritarianism, and Underdevelopment: A Global and Historical Comparison
Ahmet Kuru, Ph.D., professor of political science and the former director of the Center for Islamic and Arabic Studies at San Diego State University, discussed his new book.
January 25, 2020
Working an Archive: Rescuing Jews and their Past
Rebecca Erbelding and Ron Coleman, historians and archivists of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, discuss their work.
November 14-16, 2019
21st Annual Batchelder Conference For Archaeology and Biblical Studies
Speakers included Dr. Shimon Gibson UNC Charlotte Mount Zion Archaeological Project (Jerusalem), Dr. Menahem Mor, Haifa University, Bar Kochba Revolt (132-135 CE), and Dr. Eric Cline, George Washington University, Digging up Armageddon (Megiddo).
October 27-28, 2019
Jews and Gender: Tradition and Change
The 32nd Annual Symposium on Jewish Civilization; keynote by Gail S. Labovitz, Ph.D., American Jewish University
"Poskot in the Palace of Torah: A Preliminary Study of Orthodox Feminism and Halachic Process."
September 26, 2019
Bak In Conversation
September 24, 2019
Are Reparations Possible? Lessons to the United States from South Africa 25 Years After Apartheid
Presented by the Honorable Richard Goldstone and Prof. Lewis Gordon. Goldstone is a former judge in South Africa and former Chief Prosecutor of the United Nations' International Criminal Tribunals. Gordon is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Connecticut and an internationally-renowed scholar.
April 4, 2019
That Obnoxious Order: Ulysses S. Grant and the Jews— Ruth and Phil Sokolof Lecture
January 20, 2019
Left vs. Right: The Battle for Israel's Soul
A conversation on Israel hosted by Jonathan Tobin and J.J. Goldberg.
March 1, 2018
"Humans of Tel Aviv" | A Photo Exhibition
A one-day exhibit documenting the lives of the Tel Aviv residents that photographer Erez Kaganovitz met on the street.
October 28-29, 2018
31st Annual Symposium on Jewish Civilization — Authority and Dissent in Jewish Life
December 13, 2018
Collecting Unfinished Stories: African-American & Jewish Collaboration and Conflict
Students contextualized the oral histories within broader themes surrounding African-American and Jewish collaboration and conflict.
February 20, 2017
Virtual World Project: Exploring the Ancient World with Virtual Reality
Dr. Nicolae Roddy and Dr. Ronald Simkins from the Theology Department at Creighton to present the website and resource, Virtual World Project, which provides interactive virtual tours of the ancient world (Israel & Jordan). The tours allow visitors of the site to “wander” through various archaeological sites.
March 2, 2017
The Politics of Memory: Muslim Perception of Jews in Post-colonial Morocco
Dr. Aomar Boum of UCLA presented the keynote lecture at the Missouri Valley History Conference.
April 11, 2017
Dramatic Reading of The Whipping Man
A dramatic reading of The Whipping Man, by the Performing Arts Collective. Immediately following, Slavery Then & Now: Passover Reflections will be presented by Jane Gordon, Ph.D, University of Connecticut.
April 27, 2017
2021 Sokolof Lecture — Russia & Israel: New Emerging Powers in the Middle East
Presented by Jonathan Adelman, a professor at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver.
March 3, 2016
The Crescent on the Temple
A lecture by well-known art historian and filmmaker Dr. Pamela Berger on her latest book.
October 27, 2016
"The Settlers" Screening and Director Discussion
Panelists for the post-show discussion include Dotan; Bill Blizek, UNO professor of Philosophy and Religion; and Rabbi Sholmo Abramovich, visiting scholar at Beth Israel Synagogue. Curtis Hutt, assistant professor of Religious Studies, moderated the event.