The Ilan Club of the Lithuanian Jewish Community invites children to attend a creative workshop to celebrate the holiday of Purim. The children will listen to and themselves tell the miraculous Purim story and make colorful masks for the Purim carnival. The workshop will begin at 2:00 P.M. on Sunday, March 1, at the Ilan Club at Pylimo street no. 4 in Vilnius. Please call 860246656 or write sofja@lzb.lt for more information.
To the honorable Lithuanian Ambassador to Israel Mrs. Lina Antanavičienė
12 Aba Hillel Silver Street, 17th Floor
Ramat Gan 5250606
Re: Republic of Lithuania Independence celebration
Dear Ambassador Antanvicienė,
Thank you for the ”save the date” to the Lithuania Independence Day celebration to be held on March 16, 2020. Unfortunately, we shall not attend. The Association of Lithuanian Jews in Israel made a decision within its board of directors meeting of February 20, 2020, not to participate in the festivities until we have a sound solution to the proposed resolution to the Seimas by Mr. Gumuliauskas to absolve Lithuania and Lithuanians of their active participation in the Holocaust and in the murder of Jews during the period of World War II.
We have cooperated fully with the restored Independent Republic of Lithuania regimes in combating anti-Semitism and promoting historical recognition of that dark period of World War II between the years 1941-1945.
An autobiography in Lithuanian by noted Lithuanian attorney Samuelis Kukliansky who miraculously survived the Holocaust is available at the Vilnius Book Fair. His story is about maintaining human dignity and keeping alive that core of humanity in every person. The book “Samuelis Kuklianskis- teisininkas” [Samuelis Kuklianskis, Attorney] is for sale at the Vilnius Book Fair at the Adrena booth, booth no. 5D01, in hall 5.
This year’s annual Vilnius Book Fair will feature some interesting presentations involving Jewish topics.
At 3:00 P.M. on Thursday, February 20, Moi Ver’s “Ghetto Lane in Wilna” album will be presented by Dr. Mindaugas Kvietkauskas, Lolita Jablonskienė, Nissan N. Perez, Yossi Raviv and Sigutė Chlebinskaitė in Hall 3. The discussion will be held in Lithuanian and English.
At 12 noon on Friday, February 21, Matilda Olkinaitė’s book “Atrakintas dienoraštis” will be presented by editor Dr. Mindaugas Kvietkauskas with Dr. Irena Veisaitė, Laima Vincė and Neringa Danienė participating.
At 6:00 P.M. on Friday, February 21, Dr. Lara Lempertienė, Dr. Mindaugas Kvietkauskas and Rimantas will present “Dešimt eilėraščių/Ten Poems,” a selection of poems by Abraham Sutzkever, at the Writers’ Corner.
At 3:00 P.M. on Saturday, February 22, the book “Žydų kultūra paveikslėlių knygose: Karaliaus Motiejuko karalystė (pagal Januszą Korzcaką)” will be presented by Anna Czerwińska and Iwona Chmielewska at conference hall 5.3. The discussion will be held in Polish and English.
The Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Rikudei Am Israeli dance club invite everyone to a dance workshop from 11:00 A.M. to 1:00 P.M. every Sunday at the LJC, Pylimo streeet no. 4, Vilnius. The cost is 5 euros per session, or 16 euros in advance for 4 sessions. For more information and to register, call 8 659 55 965 or email karina.semionova@gmail.com
The Lithuanian Jewish Community invites you to remember the victims on the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust with a special ceremony at 1:00 P.M. on Monday, January 27, 2020, on the third floor of the LJC in Vilnius. The program includes lighting candles, the opening of Lev Saksonov’s Holocaust exhibit and an opportunity to speak with living witnesses of the Holocaust and relatives of rescuers.
Lithuanian president Gitanas Nausėda has decided not attend a Holocaust commemoration at Yad Vashem outside Jerusalem, but will commemorate Holocaust victims at a ceremony next Monday at Auschwitz on the anniversary of the concentration camp’s liberation by the Red Army, the President’s Office announced Tuesday. The announcement caused surprise because as of Monday the president’s trip to Israel was still on.
Nausėda apparently made the decision in following Poland’s example. Polish president Andzrej Duda declined an invitation to the event scheduled for January 23, saying Russian president Vladimir Putin was being allowed to speak and he wasn’t. Auschwitz is in Poland.
Full story in Lithuanian here.
In two months the Lithuanian parliament will recess. Prior to that MP Arūnas Gumuliauskas, chair of the parliament’s Commission on the Fight for Freedom and Historical Memory, will propose a parliamentary resolution declaring Lithuania has no responsibility for the murders and extermination of Lithuanian Jews during World War II because it was occupied by the Soviets and then by Nazi Germany. His resolution is to absolve Lithuania from the horrors of the Holocaust because it was occupied by Russia and Germany!
Member of parliament Gumuliauskas is not clearly anti-Semitic (compared to those living in Lithuania), he is a professor of history. His primary research during the Soviet era showed positive impact of the Communist Party on the Lithuanian theater. Apparently in 1987 he didn’t think that three years hence everything would be turned upside down. Instead of praising Communism a change had to be made: to stand out and to pave his way to the parliament, Jews can always be accused of something. Anti-Semitism has always been popular in Lithuania at all times. In 2016 the learned professor was elected to parliament. At the end of this year there will be another parliamentary election and an opportunity for him to stand out by proposing a parliamentary resolution which releases Lithuania and Lithuanians of involvement in the Holocaust, for the murder of 95% of Jewish citizens of Lithuania who had lived as good neighbors with Lithuanians for over 400 years.
Press release, lrytas.lt
Representatives and technical coordinators from Lithuania’s Turto Bankas, which administers and maintains real estate belonging to the state, the Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe have arrived at joint solutions for renovating Vilnius’s Palace of Sports as a conference and cultural venue and preserving the territory of the old Šnipiškės Jewish cemetery which surrounds the building.
The reached basic agreement on solutions for reconstruction and maintaining the cemetery territory.
The decisions made regarding the technical project are based on a protocol signed by Lithuanian Government and the Lithuanian Jewish Community in 2009 on heritage protection for the site and a buffer zone and on reconstructing the former sports arena for conferences and other cultural events. The Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe approved the protocol in 2016.
Dear reader,
I was going to tell you about the importance of being #JewishandProud in the face of rising anti-Semitism.
I was going to try to string together some eloquent words about our responsibilities to our fellow Jews.
I was going to tell you that #JewishandProud is already being used around the world in 28 countries and counting; that it has attracted support and pledges of participation from Hollywood stars, to members of Congress, to British lords.
Find out how you can participate at AJC.org/JewishandProud.
The Lithuanian parliament is hosting a photo exhibit called “Brave Jews of the Battle for Lithuanian Freedom” in its exihibt space from January 2 to 15. The photo exhibit chronicles Lithuanian Jewish veterans who fought for Lithuanian independence in the run-up to the first republic in 1919, including a large number of officers, recipients of military awards and those who laid down their lives for the new state.
The Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Vytis Support Fund organized the photo exhibit. It was inspired by a similar exhibit at Yad Vashem on Austrian Jewish military heroes.
The Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Salvija kindergarten are holding a Hanukkah celebration for the youngest members of the community at 5:00 P.M. on Thursday, December 19 at the Lithuanian Jewish Community. The Fayerlakh ensemble and children from Salvija will perform and there will be Hanukkah games, doughnuts and gifts. To find out more or to register, call 8 678 81 514.
The Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Vilnius Jewish Religious Community invite you to attend the lighting of the second light on the menorah in Kudirka Square in Vilnius at 5:30 P.M. on December 23, followed by a service at the Choral Synagogue at 6:30. The Rakija Klezmer Orchestra will perform.
Come meet writer, yoga teacher and Community member Eva Tombak at 6:00 P.M. on Tuesday, December 17, at the LJC in Vilnius.
The Lithuanian translation of Israeli writer and Israeli ambassador to Lithuania Yossi Avni-Levy’s book Love Peddlers will take place at the Lithuanian National Library in Vilnius at 6:00 P.M. on December 18. The book-launch event will be moderated by Litvak writer Markas Zingeris. Promotional materials for the event say it will be held in English.
The publishing house of Vilnius University has published a new book called “Nesuk į kelią iš takelio. Lietuvos žydų religinės ir filosofinės minties paveldo trajektorijomis” [Don’t Quit the Path for the Road: Along the Trajectories of the Litvak Religious and Philosophical Thought Heritage]. The Lithuanian-language book contains extracts from the texts of the Vilna Gaon, Chaim of Volozhin, Grozdinsky, Israel Salanter and Emmanuel Levinas with commentaries.
Dr. Aušra Pažėraitė has written a bit about her book especially for the www.lzb.lt website:
“It has long been my dream to write a book talking about, examining and interpreting the heritage of Litvak religious and philosophical thinking. … [Among others,] another problem which arose was the time-period and the range of what Litvak means. I mean the problem of geographical boundaries in which we can look for the Litvak heritage, which has changed drastically over history, and it happens that the same historical figures are assigned to Lithuania’s, Poland’s and Russia’s legacy… So I chose a narrower problem, the Litvak-ness which is associated with religious tradition, historically connected with the Vilna Gaon and his circle of followers. So this allowed for choosing a specific perspective which would allow me to connect schools of thought otherwise hard to reconcile: the Western understanding of religion which is still forming in the modern period, which seems to so many people self-evident… i.e., between the written sacred texts and the oral texts, the traditional of passing traditions on orally. …”
The book is available at the Vilnius University bookstore, at the Versmė chain of bookshops and on the internet sites patogupirkti.lt, knygos.lt and humanitas.lt
The Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Ilan Club for children aged 7 to 12 invite children to come watch the Nutcracker ballet for Hanukkah at noon on December 15 at the Opera and Ballet Theater in Vilnius. Tickets cost 10 euros. Register and pay before December 12, please, by contacting Sofja at sofja@lzb.lt or by calling 8 601 46656.
Press Release (updated)
Regional Consultation about Restitution of Holocaust Era Assets
Next week regional consultation regarding restitution of Holocaust era assets will be held in Vilnius. The experiences of returning assets of European countries will be reviewed and well-known historians will present their research about what happened in Lithuanian during WWII.
The conference is dedicated to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Terezin declaration. In 2009 47 countries, Lithuania among them, has signed the document in Prague and announced a program of activities directed at securing assistance, compensation and commemoration of Nazi victims’ memory. It is noteworthy the countries stressed the importance of ensuring communal and private property restitution.
“Noting the importance of restituting communal and individual immovable property that belonged to the victims of the Holocaust (Shoah) and other victims of Nazi persecution, the Participating States urge that every effort be made to rectify the consequences of wrongful property seizures, such as confiscations, forced sales and sales under duress of property, which were part of the persecution of these innocent people and groups, the vast majority of whom died heirless,” the Terezin declaration says.
Historians Arūnas Bubnys and Ilja Lempertas will launch Bubnys’s new Lithuanian book on the mass murder of Jews at Ponar at the Vilnius Jewish Public Library located at Gedimino prospect no. 24 in Vilnius at 6:00 P.M. on November 28. The event will be in Lithuanian.