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N.Y. yeshiva founder succumbs to cancer

Rabbi Shmuel Berenbaum, a Talmudic scholar who led a yeshiva in Brooklyn for more than 50 years after fleeing Nazi-occupied Poland and briefly taking refuge in Shanghai, has died. He was 87.

Berenbaum died Jan. 6 after a long struggle with cancer, said Rabbi Pinchos Hecht, executive director of the 1,200-member Mir Yeshiva. Another branch of the yeshiva is in Jerusalem, with an estimated 4,000 students.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg issued a statement praising Berenbaum, noting that he built the Jewish academy “into one of the largest centers for Torah study in the world.” — ap

Israel military leader dies

Moshe Levi, Israel’s 12th army chief of staff, who oversaw the establishment of an Israeli buffer zone in southern Lebanon in the mid-1980s, died Jan. 8 after suffering a stroke. He was 71.

Levi was affectionately known in Israel as “Moshe and a Half” thanks to his 6-foot-6 frame. His soft-spoken nature and steely reserve also earned him a lasting reputation in a society accustomed to its smug, outspoken military brass.

His four years as chief of staff were squeezed between the conclusion of the first Lebanon war and the outbreak of the first armed Palestinian uprising. — ap