Announcements

Scratch an Historical Lithuanian Town, You Might Get a Shtetl

The Lithuanian Cultural Heritage Department announced they are already planning for this year’s European Day of Jewish Culture and have selected a theme, “The Diaspora and Heritage: The Shtetl.” They characterized the choice as an intentional, mature and topical one for a country where the formerly large Jewish ethnic and religious minority thrived until the 1940s in shtetls.

They explained the word “shtetl” means small town in Yiddish. “When the Jerusalem Temple was destroyed in 70 C.E., Jews spread throughout the world, starting a new stage in the existence of the people, life in the Diaspora. Jews who settled in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania from the latter half of the 14th century and their descendants are called Litvaks. They are a branch of the Ashkenazi, Jews fleeing persecution in the German lands in the Middle Ages,” the department noted in a press release.

They continue: “It’s possible the origins of the shtetls reach back to the 18th century, but one shouldn’t get the mistaken impression that every historical Lithuanian Grand Duchy or Lithuanian town may be called a shtetl. Not so! Only a town where Litvaks comprised up to half, and often more, of the population and where the spirit of Litvak enterprise and intellectual ferment was felt can be called a shtetl without reservations.”

Read more

Vilna Gaon Museum Offers Free Tours, 2 Films and Discussion for Holocaust Day

du draugai

To mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum in Vilnius is screening two biographical films and opening a new exhibit about a remarkable friendship between a Pole and Hungarian which ended up saving thousands of lives. The events are open to the public at the museum’s Tolerance Center located at Naugarduko street no. 10/2, Vilnius.

On January 26 the museum debuts its exhibition called Sławik and Antall: The Great Rescuers. Heroes of Three Nations: Poles, Hungarians and Jews and screens the film Life on the Edge. Henryk Sławik, József Antall’s Senior (2014) with the film’s director Grzegorz Łubczyk participating. The film is being shown in cooperation with the embassies of Poland and Hungary and the Polish Institute in Vilnius.

The museum will offer a different take on the Holocaust on January 31, with the discussion at the Tolerance Center at 5:30 P.M. called “The Banality of Evil” with museum director and writer Markas Zingeris and historian Nerijus Šepetys. The discussion is to be followed by a screening of the biographical film Hannah Arendt, to be shown in cooperation with the German embassy to Lithuania. The film is about Arendt who wrote about the Eichmann trial in Jerusalem for the New Yorker magazine and in her own book. Arendt’s ideas about what she called the banality of the evil at work among up-and-coming young Nazi professionals has been met with both criticism and acclaim since she wrote her groundbreaking work.

On January 27, the 72nd anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the Holocaust Exhibit of the Vilna Gaon Jewish State Museum at Pamėnkalnio street no. 12, Vilnius, will offer to the public free guided tours in English or Lithuanian.

Kvietimas_EN

We Remember

weremember_website_banner3

Bendruomene We remember

Jewish Community members including a number of Holocaust survivors

16113910_1393314054034017_8722848022136507426_n (1)

As International Holocaust Remembrance Day on January 27 draws near, the World Jewish Congress is inviting everyone to join the global campaign We Remember. Please try to make sure your Community and its leaders visit schools, churches, synagogues, youth organizations and other institutions to deliver the message. Ask your friends, students and teachers who consent to be photographed to hold homemade We Remember signs as their portraits are taken and sent directly to facebook, twitter and/or instagram, and send a link to weremember@wjc.org

Why now?

In 2017 we have to remember the Holocaust.

Because so many more of the survivors are leaving us…

Because Holocaust denial is not getting weaker,

Because genocide is still happening…

And because it is so important to educate the coming generations.

Together, we want to remind the world about all that happened.

R.Rivlin We rememberReuven Rivlin, president of Israel

Radio Documentary: Lost Traces of Vilkaviškis

„Radijo dokumentika”: dingusio Vilkaviškio pėdsakais
Vilkaviškis synagogue

lrtradijas

The Lithuanian National Radio program Radijo Dokumentika aired the episode on at 11:05 A.M. on January 22. It is to be rebroadcast at 9:00 A.M. on January 24 just after the morning news program Ryto Garsai.

Feiga Koganskienė, who lived in the town in the Suvalkija region right up till World War II, says: “Vilkaviškis is only the name Vilkaviškis, it has nothing in common with the former Vilkaviškis.” When she returned to her home town after the war, the woman did not recognize it, and found none of her Jewish family or friends.

Vilkavišio ž buvusi gimnazija

The modern Vilkaviškis Jewish Gymnasium between
the wars, now the city municipal building.

Before the war Vilkaviškis was one of the most ethnically and culturally diverse towns in the region, but now it’s perhaps the most Lithuanian town in the entire country. Today only a handful of people remember Vilkaviškis in the interwar period, and even fewer are prepared to look into the town’s Jewish history. In the Lost Traces of Vilkaviškis episode, Radijo Dokumentika reporters walk with residents for whom the Vilkaviškis of that time is not just a collection of faded facts from history.

Holocaust Remembrance Day with Dr. Antony Polonsky

You’re invited to a public meeting and discussion with Dr. Antony Polonsky (the Albert Abramson professor of Holocaust Studies at Brandeis and the chief historian of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw) called The History of the Jews in Lithuania, Poland and Russia at 6:00 P.M. on Thursday, January 26, in the Jascha Heifetz Hall on the third floor of the Lithuanian Jewish Community (Pylimo street no. 4, Vilnius).

Moderator: professor Šarūnas Liekis.

Polonsky-2017-Web-EN-001

Statement in the December 2016 Newsletter of the Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe

We feel it is important in this context to emphasize the major transformation that we have recently experienced in our work after so many years of campaigning and taking action to protect Jewish graves in Europe. This fundamental change is reflected in our experiences in Lithuania over the past month (as described at length in this issue). It is impossible to describe within the limits of this publication the range of difficulties, obstructions, obstinacy and deception which was faced by our representatives in earlier years when attempting to protect Jewish graves in Lithuania. Not only was there no sympathy and understanding for our efforts to save Jewish cemeteries and graves, but our representations were often faced with ridicule. Even after being convinced of our genuine concern for these matters, our appeals were not taken seriously and all kinds of ploys and untruths were used to avoid taking meaningful action. But fortunately, times have changed. Not only does the current Lithuanian Government central leadership treat the CPJCE and its requests with seriousness and respect, but even the government departments dealing with economy, transport, interior affairs etc, all show deep consideration for Jewish cemetery protection. During the past month, the CPJCE office received an appeal for assistance from the Lithuanian authorities regarding a proposed widening of a railway track, which may possibly have encroached on the area of a Jewish mass-grave. They assured the CPJCE that they did not want to disturb the burial site and requested the CPJCE to come and establish the exact location of the grave in order to ensure that it is not affected in any way.

Lithuanian National Radio and Television Hosts Exhibit on Righteous Gentiles

LRT atidaroma paroda, skirta Pasaulio Teisuoliams

An exhibit of photographs of upstanding and courageous Lithuanian Righteous Gentiles who rescued Jews from the Nazis, performing the highest service to their nation, will open at the Lithuanian National Radio and Television Gallery at Konarskio street no. 49 in Vilnius at 3:00 P.M. on Thursday, January 19. The Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial authority and museum in Israel bestows the title Righteous among the Nations, or Righteous Gentile, on citizens of other countries who rescued Holocaust victims. This exhibition was shown earlier at the Lithuanian parliament. As readers will recall, the Lithuanian Jewish Community’s annual calendar features Lithuanian Righteous Gentiles this year as well, with a photograph of Lithuanian president Kazys Grinius and wife Kristina on the cover.

Writer Icchokas Meras, the winner of the Lithuanian National Prize for Art and Culture who was saved from the Holocaust by Lithuanians, wrote about the rescuers: “They were the blooms of the morality of the nation, the spiritual giants of the nation, no matter whether they were educated or simple people, whether they were illiterate, clergy who carried with them the true love of one’s neighbor or simple peasants broadcasting seed to the ground by hand. They, intentionally or unintentionally, opposed the destroying power of the Nazis and its tool: those who murdered. We should remember and honor their heroism based on conscience, goodness, love of one’s neighbor and simply human pity.”

Panevėžys Jewish Community to Mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day

Dovydo žvaigždė

January 27 marks the day in 1945 when the victims of the Auschwitz death camp were liberated. Auschwitz was the largest concentration camp set up by Nazi Germany where about 1.5 million people were murdered, including children, and approximately 1 million of the victims were Jews, according to the best estimates.

The Panevėžys Jewish Community will observe International Holocaust Remembrance Day on January 26 at the “Sad Jewish Mother” statue on Memory Square at Vasario 16 street next to the Vyturis Pre-Gymnasium.

Program:

2:00 P.M. Assembly, wreath-laying ceremony, speeches;

2:45 P.M. Wreath-laying ceremony at the statue “Ghetto Gate” (at the intersection of Klaipėdos and Krekenavos streets);

3:00 P.M. Forum dedicated to International Holocaust Remembrance Day at the Panevėžys Jewish Community (Ramygalos street no. 18). Documentary film about the Holocaust.

Let’s remember the heroic rescuers.

Event supporters:

LZB _LOGO2GVF_logo-01

Lithuanian Jewish Community Position on Reconstruction of the Vilnius Palace of Concerts and Sports and Its Use as a Conference Center

In light of the recent intensification of statements in the media on the alleged danger now threatening the conservation of the Šnipiškės Jewish graveyard in Vilnius (hereinafter Cemetery), the Lithuanian Jewish (Litvak) Community (hereinafter LJC) feel it our duty yet again to present the main facts in the case and the LJC’s well-founded position based on those facts regarding the issue of the reconstruction of the Vilnius Palace of Concerts and Sports (hereinafter Sports Palace) and its adaptation as a conference center.

1. To date no work for the reconstruction of the Sports Palace has been carried out, and therefore no possibly negative impact on the graveyard which was destroyed in the 1950s is being effected at the current time. The remains of the Vilna Gaon were removed to the Vilnius Jewish cemetery located on Sudervės street long ago and his headstone is located there.

False statements and rumors have been circulating for some time, so again it is necessary to explain the headstones in the Cemetery were destroyed long ago and the Sports Palace was constructed there back in the Soviet era. At the current time only pre-planning proposals have been drawn up, which could serve later as the basis for a detailed technical project for the renovation and adaptation of the Sports Palace which will be carefully examined and assessed by competent institutions.

2. The Cemetery is entered on the Registry of Cultural Treasures and has been declared a state-protected site, meaning any construction or reconstruction work in the area of the graves or in the buffer zone around it, and any plans for this sort of work, are carefully assessed and strictly controlled under the provisions of the law of the Republic of Lithuania on protection of real estate heritage and the specific requirements of a special protection plan for this Cemetery.

3. This special protection plan for the Cemetery was prepared under the requirements and principles contained in a protocol agreement signed on August 26, 2009, by the leaders of the LJC, the Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe and the Cultural Heritage Department under the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture. All these institutions share responsibility for keeping the agreement and ensuring sufficient authority for doing so.

4. The protocol agreement of August 26, 2009, resolves that:

4.1. Earth-moving work is forbidden in the Cemetery;

4.2. Three additional possible buffer-function zones are defined; the Sports Palace falls into zone A where earth-moving work is proscribed except in cases involving engineering construction (utility pipeline, transportation and communication infrastructure) and/or work to maintain the Vilnius Sports Palace. Jobs involving the movement of earth require consent by the LJC and must be accomplished in the smallest scope possible. All work involving the movement of ground must be done under the supervision of an archaeologist and an authorized LJC delegate. To insure adherence to this requirement, the LJC makes all decisions regarding the conservation of the Cemetery and plans for the reconstruction of Sports Palace only with the knowledge and consent of the Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe.

5. The Vilnius Sports Palace was constructed in 1973. The building and the Cemetery upon which it was built have been listed on the Registry and are protected as a cultural treasure since 2006.

6. According to the original construction documents presented to the LJC, the foundation of the Sports Palace extends 7.37 meters underground, so most likely all burials there were destroyed during building construction. Therefore pre-planning proposals for reconstruction of the Sports Palace are based on the assumption burials do not remain under the building. Despite the low likelihood there are still graves under the building, in the event of actual reconstruction of the Sports Palace the LJC will demand earth-moving work be of minimal scope and conducted under the supervision of representatives of the Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe.

Therefore, bearing in mind that:

1) existing burials were destroyed during construction of the Vilnius Sports Palace;

2) currently not a single headstone remains at the Cemetery (the last monuments were torn down back in 1955), the Cemetery territory is in disrepair, and there are no signs in the huge territory of the Cemetery testifying to its history except for a symbolic statue and an information plaque set up a few years ago;

3) the Sports Palace building along with the Cemetery surrounding it are listed on the Registry of Cultural Treasures and it cannot be torn down, but in its current state cannot either be used and requires renovation;

4) the abandoned Vilnius Sports Palace is in a state of ruin and is unbefitting the city center and the Cemetery, and stands as a horrid symbol recalling the Soviet era when the headstones of the Cemetery were destroyed and the human remains there disturbed;

The Government of the Republic of Lithuania have the right to do as they please with the property in their possession, and certainly the right to merely consider the reconstruction of the Vilnius Sports Palace, adapting it for one or another use, and the LJC has no legal foundation or rational arguments for quelling these activities. Instead of engaging in unconstructive criticism, the LJC is undertaking all measures to insure these plans and their possible realization do not violate Jewish law and tradition, and believes the Government of Lithuania, as a responsible institution with a vested interest in maintaining its reputation, will also exhaust all efforts so that the project is carried out to the highest standards of transparency, quality and respect for heritage. If the project is carried out appropriately, the LJC would achieve our goal of preserving the Cemetery:

1) establishing in city planning and physically demarcating the limits of the Cemetery;

2) renovating the territory of the Cemetery and setting up walking paths there in line with Jewish law and tradition;

3) erecting a commemorative composition including the names of the people buried in the Cemetery;

4) installing necessary educational and information material on site.

Ping-Pong Training

The Lithuanian Jewish Community
and the Naujų Žvaidždžių Club
invite you to play ping-pong

Everyone is invited to attend the ping-pong practice sessions,
to improve their skills and to compete.

This is for people of all ages and all or no skill level,
with professional tables and equipment (no need to bring anything),
freestyle games among friends and family for fun

The practice sessions will be held

in the ping-pong room at at the S. Daukantas Pre-Gymnasium, Naugarduko street no. 7, Vilnius
from 5:00 P.M. to 8:00 P.M. on weekdays and from 12 noon to 2:00 P.M. on Saturday

Cost:

for adults: 3 euros for 2 hours
for students: first session free (with discounts for those who wish to continue)

Everyone is welcome to attend the first introductory practice session free of charge.

For more information, call +370 613 75124 or email stalotenisoklubas@gmail.com

Hen Alon, director
Naujų Žvaidždžių Club
Lithuanian youth team coach

Sholem Aleichem Reunion

Šolomo Aleichemo g-ja kviečia abiturientus į susitikimą

The Vilnius Sholem Aleichem ORT Gymnasium invites former students to its annual reunion to be held at 6:30 P.M. on February 3.

See you there!

Ponar Oratorio to Premiere at National Philharmonic

The premiere of Ponar Oratorio is to open at 6:00 P.M. on January 25, 2017, at the Lithuanian National Philharmonic in Vilnius. The new musical work was composed by Max Fedorov. The author of the libretto is Edward Trusewicz. Different parts of the oratorio are to be performed by Maciej Nerkowski, the Podlasie Opera and Philharmonic Choir and the Kaunas Symphony Orchestra. Martynas Staškus is to conduct.

“The motif of the oratorio is about the confession of a man who took the lives of many people at the Ponar forest. The executioner has kept silent for many years but has finally decided to show his blood-stained hands,” premiere producer Edward Trusewicz said.

The oratorio is to be performed in Polish with a running text translation in Lithuanian and English during the performance.

Reservations and tickets available here.

On the Position of Director General Siaurusevičius and Lithuanian National Radio and Television

lzb.lt

Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky believes, as does the entire Lithuanian Jewish community, the position taken by Lithuanian Radio and Television director general Audrius Siaurusevičius and by the national broadcaster LRT in response to gestures depicting Hitler made by actress Asta Baukutė on the LRT television program “Atspėk dainą” is the right one and expresses the state’s position regarding its Jewish citizens. “I have to say Lithuanian National Radio and Television have demonstrated consistently and professionally their view on the centuries-long history of the Jews of Lithuania and have raised ‘uncomfortable’ Holocaust issues, something which even officials responsible for education haven’t done for many years. Also, LRT radio journalists are currently doing programs about painful historical events which to the present time influence life in the small towns after the destruction of the shtetls. I give them my gratitude for the work they’re doing and ask them to continue the radio series. No one should be afraid to say the word ‘Jew,’ but it’s important to understand and never forget what happened and how their Lithuanian fellow countrymen acted during the Holocaust, and why the Litvak community is so small today, and sensitive to all signs of anti-Semitism and Naziism,” chairwoman Kukliansky stated.

Lithuanian National Radio: Slobodka

lrtradijas

The Lithuanian National Radio and Television radio program Radijo dokumentika [Radio Documentary] for Sunday, January 8, rebroadcast Tuesday, January 10 after the morning news program at 9:00 A.M. The small area at the confluence of the Neris and Nemunas Rivers created by the Radziwiłłs in the 17th century, Slabada, a “serfdom-free zone,” was originally smaller and is called a village in the documentation, but by the second half of the 18th century the shtetl was a competitor in arts and crafts and trade with the city of Kaunas across the rivers. Industry developed quickly in the 20th century. Slobodka, as it came to be called, was the home to the world-famous Slobodka Yeshiva. Known in Lithuanian as Vilijampolė, the city on the Viliya River [a synonym for the Neris], the district became part of the city of Kaunas before World War II.

This is the eighth episode in a series dedicated to the Jewish shtetls of Lithuania in Lithuanian National Radio and Television’s retrospective on the forgotten past of the Jews of Lithuania.

LJC Birthdays in January

Happy birthday to all members of the communities celebrating their birthdays in January!

Vilnius Jewish Community

Nina Dubrovskaja (January 22)
Ninel Efros (January 15)
Malka Fišer (January 9)
Borisas Kacas (January 5)
Galina Matskevitch (January 19)
Judif Rozina (January 8)
Ilana Rozentalienė (January 16)
Mira Bloch (January 15)
Ela Kruglova (January 12)
Zinaida Vinickaja (January 12)
Zofija Tunkel (1942 01 10)
Jurij Riabov (January 13)
Jakovas Bumšteinas (January 26)
Polina Kurbanova (January 5)
Michail Safjan (January 26)
Dina Ščerbinkina (January 23)

Kaunas Jewish Community

Civa Čereškienė (January 13)

Panevėžys Jewish Community

Valentina Darinceva (January 28)

Call for Information about Jews Murdered near Švenčionėliai, Lithuania, in 1941

svencionys1

Please contact Moshe Shapiro at moisa50@mail.ru if you have any information.

No one who witnessed or lost relatives to the tragic events in the Švenčionys region in October of 1941 will ever forget.

All Jews living in the Švenčionys region, including doctors, bankers, rabbis and any number of other professionals, were locked up in a ghetto and then shot that fall after the Nazis occupied New Švenčionys (that’s what it was officially called in the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic) in October, 1941.

A site for the mass murder of Jews in the Švenčionys region was selected in a pine forest in the village of Platumai near the town of Švenčionėliai across the Žeimena River. The remains of military barracks still stood there. Local police received secret orders in August of 1941 for sending all Jews to Švenčionėliai and stealing their property. Jews held in the barracks for a week suffered hunger and cold besides the looming uncertainty over their future. The barracks were surrounded by a fence and the area around that had land mines.

In October the local district police chief delivered the order by the German regime to shoot all the Jews of Švenčionys and the 22 surrounding towns and villages. About 8,000 Jews were murdered in cold blood at the execution site in October. Locals were shocked.

A memorial first erected in 1961 to the murdered Jews hasn’t been repaired in more than a decade. After standing there for two decades it needed repairs in 1984 and was reconstructed by the architect Astutė Bučinskaitė then. It was again reconstructed in 1993. The centerpiece is a granite slab with the names of the shtetls. The last major refurbishment was in 2002 when benches were installed and gravel brought in.

The Švenčionys Regional Jewish Community wants to fix up the memorial and better commemorate the victims.

The project will cost about 6,200 euros. The Ethnic Minorities Department under the Lithuanian Government will provide partial funding, and the Švenčionys regional administration will also make a financial contribution, totaling 20 percent of total costs or 1,200 euros.

The project will learn the names of victims and compile a comprehensive list, and the new memorial will include an information board. Although some names are known from the Lithuanian archives and from the book in Hebrew and Yiddish called the Book of Memory of the Twenty-Three Jewish Communities of Švenčionys Region published in Tel Aviv in 1965, there are still real difficulties in learning the specific identities of those who were murdered and buried across the river from Švenčionėliai.

Švenčionys Regional Jewish Community chairman Moshe Shapiro is highly cognizant and appreciative of the grave responsibility posed by this important project, and is asking those who survived the Holocaust from the smaller towns in the Švenčionys region, their children, grand-children and relatives, wherever they might live now, to share any information they might have, including stories and the names and surnames of the victims.

Please contact Moshe Shapiro at moisa50@mail.ru if you have any information.

svencionys3

Nominate an Outstanding Foundation Professional for the 2017 JJ Greenberg Award!

jfn-h-350

jfunders.org

December 26, 2016

Hi Friend,

I wanted to remind you that we’re still collecting nominations for the JJ Greenberg Memorial Award (see the previous email below for more details.) Believe it or not, it’s almost the new year and after that there will only be two weeks until the deadline. Don’t leave it until the last minute!

Watch some of the past acceptance speeches for this award, and I know you’ll agree that it’s quite an honor for the recipient, and an important way for the Jewish philanthropic field to identify and promote excellence and commitment. Nominate someone now!

Call me if you have questions: 212-726-0177, x205.

Warmly,
Merav

Read more

Rome Remembrance Run, January 22, 2017

To: All WJC Affiliated Communities & Organizations

From: Robert Singer, WJC CEO & EVP

Re: Rome Remembrance Run – 22 January 2017

Dear Friends,

I am delighted to share with you a wonderful initiative of the Union of Jewish Communities of Italy: the ‘Run for Remembrance’, which will be held in Rome as part of the International Holocaust Commemoration Day activities, on 22 January 2017.

The Run for Remembrance will consist of two separate races, one of 10 KM and one of 3.6 KM, and each of the runs will stop at places of historical significance along the way and pay tribute to the victims of Nazism.

WJC is very pleased to be supporting this initiative of the Italian community and we are inviting our member communities to send some participants to join in the run.

Attached is the Flyer for the event (click to download): please share this with members of your community.

Read more