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Šiauliai Regional Jewish Community is an Active Community

Šiauliai Regional Jewish Community is an Active Community

September 23 is marked as the Day of Remembrance of the Lithuanian Jewish Victims of Genocide. On that day members of the Šiauliai Regional Jewish Community gathered in the Luponiai Forest near the village of Kužiai in the Šiauliai region where over 8,000 Jews were murdered. A moment of silence was observed in memory of the victims, flowers were placed on the monument and candles lit. Speakers recalled the events of history. From there members travelled to the Šiauliai ghetto to honor the victims there as well.

Community members also honored the victims at the Bubiai and Žagarė mass murder sites. Historical sources say two ghettos were established after the Germans entered Šiauliai. The prisoners there were murdered, some in the Luponiai Forest while others were sent to the Žagarė ghetto. Aleksandras Rabinovičius located the mass murder site in Luponiai Forest with the help of locals. The people of Šiauliai erected a commemorative obelisk and signs and built footpaths there.

On October 21 members of the Šiauliai Regional Jewish Community met Roma Mačienë, a pioneer in ecological bee-keeping. She related much new information to members about bees, bee species, that bees have five eyes and they also have a keen sense of smell. In the world of bees it’s important to have a good, strong family which is able to reproduce to insure the continuity of the line, the basis of all life. The bee-keeper called bee products a miracle of miracles. Members learned about honey but also pollen and other products produced by bees.

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Chess Tournament

A chess tournament will be held at the Lithuanian Jewish Community at 11:00 A.M. on Sunday, July 29. Tournament director: FIDE master Boris Rositsan. The tournament is open to the public. For more information and to register, call 8 655 43 556 or send an email to info@metbor.lt

Lithuanian Mini-Maccabiah Games Celebrate 100th Anniversary of Lithuania

Lithuanian Makabi Athletics Club held a mini-Maccabiah games event celebrating 100 years of Lithuanian independence Sunday at the Educology University in Vilnius. Athletes from Vilnius, Kaunas, Panevėžys, Šalčininkai, Lentvaris and Israeli exchange students from Kaunas competed. All participants received participation medals and the youngest contestant, Grytė Vaisbrodė, received a participation trophy. Best athletes in all team sports received personal trophies. Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky and Makabi vice president Daumantas Levas Todesas welcomed and congratulated athletes.

Competition was held in indoor football, 3-on-3 basketball, volley ball, table tennis (men’s and women’s), chess and badminton (men’s and women’s).

A luncheon was held following the competition.

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Chess Tournament to Celebrate Israel’s 70th Held at LJC

The Lithuanian Jewish Community hosted a chess match May 27 to mark the 70th anniversary of the founding of the state of Israel.

Lithuanian Independence Act signatory Česlovas Juršėnas, Lithuanian Chess Federation president Aleksandras Černovas, first leader of independent Lithuania Vytautas Landsbergis and economics minister Gediminas Miškinis greeted players.

LJC executive director Renaldas Vaisbrodas distributed copies of Yitzhak Rudashevski’s Vilnius ghetto diary as mementos and prizes to the winners. About 70 players in all age groups turned out for the event.

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Chess Tournament for Child Protection Day

A chess tournament to mark Child Protect Day (June 1) will be held at the Lithuanian Jewish Community on Sunday, June 3, at 11:00 A.M. FIDE master Boris Rositsan will lead the tournament. For more information or to register, contact info@metbor.lt or call 8 655 43 556.

Call to Members of Makabi Lithuanian Athletics Club

Dear Makabi members,

Makabi will hold a mini-Maccabiah Games to celebrate the centenary of Lithuanian independence at the Lithuanian Educology University in Vilnius from 11:00 A.M. to 3:00 P.M. on Sunday, June 17. Your hometown teams are invited to compete in the following events:

Indoor soccer (7 players and a trainer)
Three-on-three basketball (5 players and a trainer)
Volleyball (8 players and a trainer)
Table tennis (men and women)
Chess (men and women)
Badminton (men and women)

The schedule of matches will be determined when the exact number of teams and individual sports players is known.

Please send you application by email to makabilita.duskes@gmail.com by June 15.

For more information, call 8 698 19999

Michailas Duškesas, executive director

Litvak Scouting Revival

Before the Holocaust there were huge groups of Jewish boy and girl scouts throughout Lithuania. Some groups were religious, others Zionist, others secular. The one thing they all had in common was having fun outdoors, learning together the basic skills and fostering a shared Jewish identity.

Now there are plans to revive the Jewish scouting movement in Lithuania, which now has a mostly aging population of just under 3,500 Jews.

President of the International Forum of Jewish Scouts (IFJS) and member of the board of Éclaireuses éclaireurs israélites de France (EEIF) Alain Silberstein arrived in Vilnius to discuss French cooperation in the Litvak revival with Lithuanian Jewish Community leaders.

Parents of children aged 12 to 17 were invited to attend a discussion at the Lithuanian Jewish Community Wednesday. In an underwhleming show of support, several scouting-age Jewish girls, an interested member of the Jewish community in Vilnius and a handful of others came and heard a presentation by president Alain Silberstein and LJC executive director Renaldas Vaisbrodas.

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LJC Reporting Conference

The Lithuanian Jewish Community will hold its annual reporting conference May 28, 2018, during which annual financial and activity reports will be considered.

The conference is the highest governance body of the LJC convoked and organized once per year by the LJC board.

Under LJC rergulations only real members of the LJC participate at the conference, meaning association members which are corporate entities and whose activities are connected with Jewish culture, education, religion, tradition, learning, sports and so on. All the regional Jewish communities are LJC members.

The LJC was especially active in 2017 in the areas of social welfare, culture and Jewish heritage. We are happy that hundreds of Jewish senior citizens, community members in difficult financial situations and young families across Lithuania received home care services, aid in acquiring household and hygiene items, help in preparing for school and appropriate heating during winter. More than 400 people made use of aid provided by the Community for acquiring food and medicine.

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Chess Tournament

A chess tournament to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the founding of the state of Israel will be held at 3:00 P.M. on Sunday, May 27, at the Lithuanian Jewish Community. For more information and to register, write info@metbor.lt or call 8 655 43 556.

Notice Concerning Mini-Maccabiah Games

The Makabi Lithuanian Athletics Club is an associate member of the Lithuanian Jewish Community.

Following the statement by four regional Jewish communities (Klaipėda, Vilnius, Šiauliai and Ukmergė) expressing lack of confidence in the leadership of the LJC, which may be understood additionally as a lack of confidence in the leaders of the athletics club, we are compelled to state that the position of the aforementioned four LJC members does not reflect the opinion of the majority of LJC association members, of which there are 28.

In light of the situation which has arisen, it would not be appropriate to hold the Mini-Maccabiah Games in Klaipėda, because this could give the wrong impression to Lithuanian Jews and could be misinterpreted as some sort of support of the position adopted by the Klaipėda Jewish Community.

We will announce a new date and venue for the Mini-Maccabiah Games in the near future.

Semionas Finkelšteinas, president
Makabi Lithuanian Athletics Club

Chess Tournament

The Lithuanian Jewish Community will host a chess tournament dedicated to the memory of Benjamin Blumenfeld at 5:00 P.M. this Sunday, April 8. For more information write info@metfor.lt or call 8 655 43 556.

Makabi Swimming Competition in Kaunas

LSK “Makabi” plaukimo varžybos Kaune

The best swimming pool in Lithuania, the one at the sports and recreational facility Girstutis in Kaunas, hosted a swimming competition by the Makabi athletics club on March 18 with swimmers from Vilnius, Kaunas, Panevėžys and–for the first time–Šalčininkai, as well as Israeli foreign exchange students studying in Kaunas. Some swimmers from Vilnius were unable to attend because they were competing in the Lithuanian swimming championships at the same time. Male and female swimmers in five age-groups competed in 25-meter freestyle and 50-meter breast-stroke categories.

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Lithuanian Jewish Community Chairwoman Faina Kukliansky’s Appeal Regarding Legal Disputes within the Jewish Community

I would like to address our Community again:

• As you know, a group of people calling themselves “the Vilnius Jewish Community” initiated legal proceedings.

• We received no reply to our proposals, made directly and in written form, to give up these legal disputes. A decision was handed down in the Vilnius Jewish Community’s petition which will be appealed in the usual appeals process and we have complete confidence the decision will be annulled.

• In other legal proceedings, the court found the rules and regulations of the LJC were not legal, and the point allowing the formation of a representational quorum during elections was voided. The court again emphasized the rules and regulations must conform to the law: one member, one vote. This affects the regional communities, but moreover all of the associated members, and means that the LJC elections in 2017 were held in keeping with the law. This decision by the court is final and is not subject to appeal.

Again, every Lithuanian Jew may decide for him or herself what sort of community they want, but first, everyone must know the truth. Leaders and community members who await the end of the disputes so they can decide which side to support must wait a little longer. I feel this decision is a matter of conscience for each person to make on their own.

I ask those who are sowing division between Jews, engaging in provocations, filing complaints and spreading rumors and gossip to stop it, without regard to whatever posts they occupy. You are doing harm to the entire Lithuanian Jewish Community.

I invite all members of the community to come together and join forces for things that are important rather than engage in fruitless internal struggles. Our priority tasks are celebrating and passing on the distinct Litvak culture and historical memory of the history of Jews in Lithuania, and making life better for Jews here and now. We can only accomplish this by coming together.

Commemorative Chess Tournament

The Lithuanian Jewish Community will host a special chess tournament in honor of world champion Emanuel Lasker at 3:00 P.M., Sunday, January 21. FIDE master Boris Rositsan will direct the tournament. For more information, email info@metbor.lt or call +370 6 55 43 556.

Hanukkah at the Rožynas Pre-Gymnasium in Panevėžys

For more than 10 years now the Panevėžys Jewish Community has been doing educational work and participating at events held by the Rožynas Pre-Gymnasium’s Tolerance Center under director Genutė Žilytė.

Panevėžys Jewish Community chairman Gennady Kofman together with Žilytė, who is also an historian, told pupils the story of the Jewish struggle against the Greeks of Syria and the main points in that history. Steady work in education has borne good fruit in pupils’ understanding of Jewish history. The students asked many questions of all sorts, including for an explanation of the Lithuanian Jewish athletics club Makabi, and wondering what other Jewish organizations which existed before the war used the same name.

Students in the upper grades and their teachers made latkes for everyone. At the close of the event Rožynas Pre-Gymnasium principal Aida Adiklienė thanked everyone who participated, students, teachers and others, for their tolerance towards Jews.

Makabi Tennis Tourney

The now-traditional Makabi doubles tennis tournament took place November 12.

Three pairs tied and the final winners, Anatolijus Faktorovičius and son Norbertas Faktorovičius, were decided by number of games won. The family team took first place for the second time. Kęstutis, Faktorovičius’s other son, also took part in tournament successfully and demonstrated a great swing. Danielius Merkinas and Aleksandra Miller took second and Lorensas Baliukonis and Laima Urbšienė took third in fierce competition.

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Makabi Athletics Club Teaches Jews How to Shoot

The Lithuanian Makabi Athletics Club held a target-shooting contest at the GSKA gun club in Vilnius October 8 in three participation categories: men, women and young people. Contestants shot a pistol 25 times (including five practice shots) at concentric targets 20 meters away.

The Fish family won in all categories. The brothers Fish, Adomas and Nojus, took first and second place in the youth competition with 139 and 116 points, respectively. Their mother Kristina with 109 points beat out Laimina Gurvičienė with 55 points and Marina Balderman with 40 to take the women’s. Julius Fish won men’s with 132, followed closely by Algirdas Malcas with 122 and Boris Kirzner with 116 points.

All contestants won participation medals and the actual winners got handsome trophies. The event was organized by Artiomas Perepelica and refereed and supervised by Anatoly Kapustin and Aleksej Slyčkov.

Congratulations to all the contestants and organizers for a fine showing!

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Makabi Fun Run October 15

All Makabi members and supporters are invited to a Fun-Run this Sunday, October 15, at Vingio park in Vilnius.

We think everyone can run the 3 kilometer or 1.5 kilometer course and have a good time together. All funds received will be used to support and expand Makabi Club activities.

Registration:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1jtjruTVnoN22B7EWUF-W0qKusHSvlHemXMkVdgCuHEk/viewform?edit_requested=true

or by sending an e-mail to liovixasas@gmail.com

Program:

10:00 A.M. Opening
10:30 A.M. 1.5 km run
11:15 A.M. 3 km run
12:00 noon awards

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