by Grant Gochin

Fearing stigmatization and persecution, Lithuanian rescuers of Jews awarded the “Righteous among the Nations” designation, often hid it from their neighbors and family members for decades. Today, the Lithuanian Government honors these Rescuers on a national level (as they should have from the very beginning). Unfortunately, the Lithuanian honors are not sincere and are just another performance. Jewish people who were saved are reduced to vehicles for Lithuanian virtue signaling.

“Righteous Among Nations” Lithuanians comprised only 0.04% of the Lithuanian population. These genuine heroes are now used by the State as an alibi for anyone who is Lithuanian, i.e. the 0.04% are presented to the public as the stereotypical norm, while the 99.96% of Lithuanians who were not “Righteous Among Nations”, are negated or their deeds rewritten. This is clear Holocaust distortion.

Krikštaponis

The case of Juozas Krikštaponis is far more illustrative of Lithuania then, and now. Krikštaponis was a vicious, genocidal murderer. But, he “only” murdered Jews. So, for Lithuania this is not any impediment to national honors. Lithuania honors so many murderers of Jews, that it appears this could be a standard for national hero status.

The De-Sovietization Commission convened by the Lithuanian parliament has presented recommendations to the Center for the Study of the Genocide and Resistance of Residents of Lithuania (hereinafter Genocide Center) that the statue commemorating the partisan Juozas Krikštaponis in Ukmergė (Vilkomir) be removed. Unfortunately, instead of taking concrete actions to remove this statue commemorating a person responsible for the murder of thousands of Jews, the Genocide Center has sent a request to the Lithuanian Office of Prosecutor General to rescind this man’s status as a Lithuanian partisan fighter. This is clearly an attempt to prolong the process and to place responsibility on a different agency.

“Krikštaponis’s culpability in the Holocaust is not disputed. This is shown by the documents the Genocide Center has collected and in their own finding of history concerning him. Carrying out mass murder is a crime which is not annulled by other good deeds. In marking the 80th anniversary of the anti-Nazi resistance and liquidation of the Vilnius ghetto, this monument to Krikštaponis is an insult to the memory of all the victims and to their surviving family members,” Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman and attorney Faina Kukliansky said.

The Lithuanian Jewish Community calls upon the Genocide Center to take immediate action based on the recommendations by the De-Sovietization Commission to remove this statue to Krikštaponis from the city center of Ukmergė.

“This is the eighth act of vandalism in seven months. Although we’ve gone to all the authorities asking for protection for the memorial and the mass grave, this site continues to be vandalized,” Ukmergė Jewish Community chairman Artūras Taicas said.

Located just 4 kilometers outside Ukmergė (Vilkomir) the memorial in the Pivonija Forest marks the mass grave of 11,000 Jews murdered there.

Taicas said that his calls to police over earlier incidents went unheeded.

“Frankly, I don’t believe and I don’t believe in officials who think the desecration of graves is trivial,” Taicas added.

Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman brought up the issue at a meeting with Ukmergė mayor Darius Varnas in June.

“It’s difficult to believe the police with modern equipment for criminal investigations can’t track down the owners of four-wheel off-road vehicles who continually disturb this Jewish site of eternal rest. There really aren’t a lot of these vehicles around and it would be possible to check tire treads. Furthermore, mobile telephone records would show who was using them. There’s not just one or two solutions to this, there are many, so one begins to think this is being avoided intentionally,” Kukliansky commented.

The Lithuanian news site delfi.lt published an opinion piece on July 7 co-authored by Lithuanian MP and head of the Liberal Union Party Eugenijus Gentvilas and Marijus Gailius, the party’s press representative, outlining patterns they found leading to anti-Semitism on facebook among Lithuanians:

Disinformation Conglomerate: How Anti-Vaxers Become Anti-Semites

A strong wave of anti-Semitism has swept over the country over the last two months, whose dimensions and harm are comparable to what took place 20 years ago when publisher Vitas Tomkus published his series of articles in his newspaper Respublika called “They Rule the World” back in February of 2003. This time, though, the anti-Semitic attack is probably more dangerous, because it isn’t being sown by a single unethical writer, but by a large group of people, be they evil-minded or naïve, on the social networks. Furthermore the anti-Semitic campaign continues and there is no end in sight.

At the tip of the spear of the anti-Semitic narrative crafted and continuing to be promoted is member of parliament Remigijus Žemaitaitis. On May 9 he posted and later repeated a line of Lithuanian folk anti-Semitism. Since then the MP has posted more than 10 posts and entries disparaging the Holocaust and, without an history education, tendentiously “researching” the role play by people of Jewish ethnicity in the commission of crimes against the Lithuanian people. Historian Nerijus Šepetys provided a frank assessment of the politician’s version of history: “He will say anything at all and mixes it all up.” On July 4 the parliamentary faction leaders from the ruling coalition parties condemned Žemaitaitis’s “intentional and directed anti-Semitic attacks which trivialize the Holocaust, hatred sown for one ethnicity and provocation of public and national disorder.” They called for a procedure to be initiated to make an inquiry into the MP’s alleged breaking of his oath of office and his constitutional accountability.

Silvia Foti was present for a screening of the Holocaust documentary J’accuse at the Vilnius Jewish Public Library Monday. She’s featured in the film along with Litvak Grant Gochin. The film was shown with Lithuanian subtitles. It’s estimated around 20 to 25 people attended, mainly older people.

The Lithuanian Jewish Community is saddened by the recent anti=Semitic statements and posts made by member of the Lithuanian parliament Remigijus Žemaitaitis in some of the media, social networks and even at the Lithuanian parliament itself. It must be said that these sorts of expressions haven’t appeared in Lithuania in a very long time, and that the Jews who live in Lithuania, 80 years after the liquidation of the Vilnius ghetto, had hoped there would be no more such expressions. All the more so as the war continues in Ukraine and people who comprise an ethnic minority can be used by the aggressor as a tool for inciting social conflict and dividing society.

The Lithuanian Jewish Community believes this act by the member of parliament intentionally sows ethnic discord and is a distortion of historical memory as well as a continuation of the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion” promulgated by the security service of the Russian tsar over a century ago.

We feel ashamed of the county in which we live and which we love and respect. Its citizens cannot elect to parliament a member who can allow himself to descend to making the following statements:

“It seems that besides Putin another group of animals has appeared in the World: ISRAEL. One group razes schools with tanks, the other group uses tractors,” the politician wrote on his facebook page. “After these kinds of incidents, it’s no surprise why these sorts of statement arise: ‘A Jew climbed a ladder and fell down accidentally. Children, take a stick and beat that little Jew to death…'”