Holocaust – Page 6 – Lithuanian Jewish Community

Evening to Commemorate Israel Elyashev in Kaunas

The Kaunas Jewish Community invites you to an evening commemorating literary critic and writer Israel (Isidore) Elyashev.

Bal-Makhshoves as he was also known, “man of thoughts,” used that nom-de-plume in his Jewish writing at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.

The commemoration will be held in the former Jewish cafeteria near Elyashev’s home where he died 100 years ago on January 13, 1924. Speakers will touch upon his friendship with the painter Marc Chagall, Jewish life in Kaunas, Elyashev’s home street now known as Daukšos gatvė but formerly called Yatkever or Butcher’s street with five synagogues located along it, about the return of “evacuated” Jewish exiles in 1921 and about the shared and separate Lithuanian and Jewish cultural legacy in Lithuania’s interwar provisional capital Kaunas.

Speakers will also detail his family, including his sister Ester Veisbart who was an art critic, teacher and Lithuania’s first female doctor of philosophy who died in the Kaunas ghetto; the rest of his family who were killed in the Kaunas and Vilnius ghettos and Soviet labor camps and the members of his family to made it to Palestine and lived.

2024-01-112024-01-22

Harvard President Claudine Gay Resigns amid Plagiarism Claims, Backlash from Anti-Semitism Testimony

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.–Harvard College president Claudine Gay resigned Tuesday amid plagiarism accusations and criticism over testimony at a congressional hearing where she was unable to say unequivocally that calls on campus for the genocide of Jews would violate the school’s conduct policy.

Gay is the second Ivy League president to resign in the past month following congressional testimony. Liz Magill, president of the University of Pennsylvania, resigned December 9.

Gay, Harvard’s first black president, announced her departure just months into her tenure in a letter to the Harvard community, thus becoming the shortest presidency in the history of Harvard College.

Following the congressional hearing, Gay’s academic career came under intense scrutiny by critics who unearthed numerous and extensive instances of plagiarism in her 1997 doctoral dissertation. The Harvard Corporation, Harvard’s governing board, initially rallied behind Gay, saying a review of her scholarly work turned up “a few instances of inadequate citation” but no evidence of research misconduct. Critics posted long passages of verbatim copy/pastes of unattributed works from other authors from Gay’s academic papers and alleged dissertation.

Gay’s public troubles began when she gave testimony in the House of Representatives about Harvard’s bullying, harassment and code-of-conduct rules. Asked whether calling for the genocide of Jews violated Harvard’s rules by representative Elise Stefanik, a Republic from New York state, Gay equivocated and claimed it was a free speech issue which depending on the context–if it became conduct instead of speech–could be a violation of the rules. The public was quick to respond with an internet meme of a book purportedly authored by Gay called “Mein Context,” a reference to Hitler’s “Mein Kampf.” Gay has not been a champion of free speech on campus in the past, approving bans of conservative speakers.

Full story here.

2024-01-052024-01-05

Condolences

With deep sadness we report the death of Svetlana Plenkivskaja on January 1. She was born in 1943 and was a client of the Saul Kagan Welfare Center and a member of the Union of Former Concentration Camp and Ghetto Prisoners.. Our sincere condolences to her sister, son and many friends and relatives. Rest in peace, Svetlana.

2024-01-032024-01-03

Art Exhibit in Inspired by Abraham Sutzkever

The Shofar Gallery of the Jewish Culture Information Center in Vilnius is hosting an exhibit of works by art and book restorer and artist Modestas Saukaitis inspired by Abraham Sutzkever’s poetry. Saukaitis’s works on exhibit are verre églomisé, an ancient technique which uses white gold painted on glass to produce an extraordinary effect.

The exhibit runs till December 23 and is open to the public during the gallery’s working hours, from noon to 6:00 P.M. on weekdays and from noon till 4:00 P.M. on Saturday. The gallery is located at Mėsinių street no. 3A in the Vilnius Old Town.

For more information, see here.

2023-12-21

Tomas Venclova Wins Lithuanian Writers Union Prize

The Lithuanian Writers Union announced they were awarding their bi-annual prize to writer and thinker Tomas Venclova for his latest book of poetry entitled “Už Onos ir Bernardinų” [Behind/Beyond the Church of St. Anne and the Church of the Bernardines (aka Franciscans)]. The book was published by the Apostrofa publishing house and contains 31 poems Venclova wrote over the past seven years.

The Lithuanian Writers Union awards their prize to one author every two years in recognition of high literary value. They will present the prize to Venclova on January 6 at Union headquarters in Vilnius.

2023-12-152023-12-15

Anniversary of Escape from Ninth Fort

On December 25, 1943, 64 prisoners at the Ninth Fort in Kaunas pulled off a daring escape. The Jews and Soviet POWs were the crew selected by the Nazis to exhume and burn corpses.

The Ninth Fort Museum in Kaunas has set up a special exhibit to mark the 80th anniversary of the escape featuring the testimonies of survivors.

Ya’arit Glezer’s father Pinia Krakinovski was one of the escapees and she came from Israel to speak at the opening of the new exhibition. Yakov Faitelson also spoke through an audio recording–his father Aleks was one of the escapees–as did Medel Deich’s son Grisha Deich. Israeli ambassador to Lithuania Hadas Wittenberg-Silverstein attended the event and spoke to the audience about the importance of history in the context of current events.

2023-12-152023-12-15

Strashun Street Library Space to House New Museum

Lithuanian construction company Infes reported they concluded a contract with the Vilna Gaon Jewish History Museum for help creating a museum inside the Vilnius ghetto library space located on Žemaitijos street, formerly Strashun street, where library director Herman Kruk wrote most of his Vilnius ghetto diary and where the FPO, the Vilnius ghetto partisan fighters force, had a shooting range in the basement.

Infes said they would undertake capital renovation of the building and do other construction there. According to their press release, the museum will teach visitors about the Vilnius ghetto and the Holocaust in Lithuania and will feature unique items from the Vilna Gaon Museum’s collections.

2023-12-142023-12-14

Lost World Photo Exhibit

December 13 the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture opened an exhibit of 15 specially selected photographs of the former Jewish quarter and Great Synagogue by pre-war photographer Jan Bulhak as part of closing ceremonies in the celebration of Vilnius’s 700th birthday, the newspaper Lietuvos Rytas reports on its website lrytas.lt

Culture minister Simonas Kairys, former culture minister Arūnas Gelūnas who now directs the Lithuanian National Art Museum which selected the photographs for the exhibit, Israeli ambassador to Lithuania Hadas Wittenberg-Silverstein, Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky and others attended the opening. Boris Kizner provided Jewish airs on violin.

Gelūnas told Lietuvos Rytas television only two of the fifteen photographs contain human beings because the photographer thought empty streets and vacant sidewalks showed off the architecture better and presented a more romantic picture of the city.

“In a way he was prophetic in this: after World War II all these streets were emptied of people,” Gelūnas noted. He added the lessons of history haven’t been learned, anti-Semitism is alive and well in the world and people still cling to authoritarianism.

2023-12-142023-12-14

Polish MP Extinguishes Menorah Calling Jews “Satanic Cult”

MP in Polish Sejm tore fire extinguisher from wall at Hanukkah event in parliament

A far-right Polish politician has been filmed attacking a menorah during a Hanukkah ceremony. Polish MP Grzegorz Braun used a fire extinguisher to douse a hanukiya during a candle-lighting ceremony in the Polish parliament on December 12.

In videos shared on Twitter, the politician can be seen in the parliament lobby tearing a red extinguisher from the wall and marching over to the large hanukiya, where he douses it in white powder.

After extinguishing the candles, Braun blasted a nearby woman who had attempted to stand in his way with the spray from the fire extinguisher. Those around him could be heard saying: “You should be ashamed.”

Braun responded: “Those who take part in acts of the satanic cult should be ashamed.”

Braun is the leader of the monarchist Confederation of the Polish Crown party. He has opposed NATO expansion into the Ukraine. According to wikipedia: “Braun’s activities have been characterized by a series of anti-Semitic incidents and pro-Russian stances. In 2023 he disrupted a Holocaust lecture, destroyed equipment and made derogatory comments about Jews.”

Parliamentary speaker Szymon Holownia denounced the incident and told reporters “this never should have happened.” The speaker ordered Braun to leave the event and said he would call for the incident to be investigated. Parliamentary proceedings were suspended.

Article here.

2023-12-132023-12-13

Maria Krupoves Lecture and Concert

Eastern European folklore and folk-song expert and performer Maria Krupoves-Berg will present a lecture and concert at the Lithuanian National Library’s Hall of Statehood at 6:00 P.M. on December 14. The event is free and open to the public.

The event called “The Sounds of Eastern European Jewish History and Music” sponsored by the National Library’s Judaica Studies Center will talk about and demonstrate genres of Yiddish song and how some songs became a kind of national anthem, accompanying Ashkenazi and especially Litvaks at crucial points in history, reflecting yidishe neshama, Jewish identity. Krupoves will perform with Boris Kizner on violin. The scheduled duration is one and a half hours.

2023-12-07

Concert in Remembrance of Grigoriy Kanovitch

The Šalom, Akmenė! project with the Vilna Gaon Jewish History Museum are holding a concert to remember the late novelist Grigoriy Kanovitch. It is to include students from art schools in the Akmenė and Joniškis regions and students from the Song Cathedral of the Music Academy of Vytautas Magnus University. The program includes songs in Yiddish.

Time: 3:00 P.M., Sunday, December 3
Place: Tolerance Center of the Vilna Gaon Museum, Naugarduko street no. 10, Vilnius

The concert is free and open to the public.

2023-12-01

Condolences

With deep sadness we report the death of Henry Kissinger. He was born May 27, 1933, to a German Jewish family and went on to serve as secretary of state and national security advisor under US presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, and remained the main voice of American foreign policy under president Jimmy Carter. He was the architect of US foreign policy who engineered the withdrawal of US troops from South Viet Nam “with dignity” (for which he was jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1973), Nixon’s overture to Red China, NATO’s peacekeeping mission in Yugoslavia–calling for the “Finlandization” of the constituent break-away republics–and of policy surrounding the dismantling of the Soviet Union and the emergent Russian Federation. An outstanding proponent of the State of Israel, although he refused to take up the cause of Soviet refuseniks as antithetical to US interests–and he seemed to have a personal antipathy towards Soviet Jews–, in more recent times he was an outspoken proponent for peace in the Ukraine, calling upon NATO to take Russia’s security concerns seriously and for the parties involved to develop a real post-Cold War security architecture for Europe which would take Russia’s legitimate security interests into account. He died aged 100. Our deepest condolences to his many friends and family members.

2023-11-302023-11-30

Eightieth Anniversary of Liquidation and Uprising of Vilnius Ghetto: International Conference “Ideologies of Hate and Hope in Modern Jewish History”

You’re invited to the final event in our commemoration of the 80th anniversary of liquidation of the Vilnius ghetto this year, the international conference “Ideologies of Hate and Hope in Modern Jewish History” in Constitution Hall in Building 1 at the Lithuanian parliament on Tuesday, November 28, 2023.

Participants must register by internet before 3:00 P.M. on Monday, November 27, here: https://bit.ly/40NAUZ3

The conference will be conducted in Lithuanian and English with translations. It is being held through the efforts of the Polish Jewish History Institute, YIVO and the Lithuanian Jewish Community. It will be streamed on the LJC’s facebook page.

Program:

2023-11-222023-11-23

Standing with Israel in Pakruojis

The Pakruojis wooden synagogue hosted an event yesterday to support Israel, organized by the Šiauliai Jewish Religious Community.

Before the Holocaust the wooden synagogue–one of only a handful still standing in Europe–was the center of Jewish life and religion.

The one-day photography exhibit there was actually two related exhibits: 22 photographs out of the 724 victims to mark the 80th anniversary of the Kinder Aktion or children’s mass murder operation in the Šiauliai ghetto collected and arranged by the Yad Vashem Holocaust Authority in Israel and the Šiauliai Jewish Religious Community, and pictures of the 242 hostages taken by Hamas in the Gaza Strip, including babies, children, adolescents, adults and the elderly.

2023-11-212024-02-26

Darna Festival a Success

Thank you to all the participants and attendees for making this year’s Darna Festival to celebrate the International Day of Tolerance a success.

Some snapshots from the festival:

2023-11-202024-01-15

Pakruojis Wooden Synagogue Hosts Photo Exhibit on Kinder Aktion and Hamas Hostages

The Šiauliai Jewish Community is holding a half-day photography exhibit at the wooden synagogue in Pakruojis on November 20 detailing the painful past of the Jewish people and current events.

The first part of the exhibit is a joint project between the Šiauliai Religious Jewish Community and Yad Vashem in Jerusalem to mark the 80th anniversary of the Kinder Aktion or children’s mass murder operation at the Šiauliai ghetto. It only contains a small number of photographs of victims conserved by the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial.

The second section features the 240 people taken hostage by Hamas and held in the Gaza Strip, including fathers, mothers, children, teenagers, the elderly and the disabled.

Time: 11:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M., Monday, November 20
Place: Pakruojis synagogue, Kranto street no. 8, Pakruojis, Lithuania

2023-11-202023-11-21