News – Page 14 – Lithuanian Jewish Community

European Day of Jewish Culture 2024

This year’s topic is family.

The Lithuanian Jewish Community is celebrating the European Day of Jewish Culture this Sunday, September 1, with a full day’s program of events, lessons, workshops, discussions and exhibits. All events are free and open to the public, but registration is required for most of the events below.

Here’s the program:

11:00 A.M.-12:30 P.M. First Hebrew lesson for the whole family with Ruth Reches at the Choral Synagogue in Vilnius. Ruth will soon be forming new classes for studying Hebrew. Register here: https://bit.ly/4g5jZbW

2024-08-29

Nazi Propagandist Leni Riefenstahl Had Polish Jews “Removed” from Set in 1939

Film suggests Nazis’ lead propagandist had role in 1939 massacre

Letter in Leni Riefenstahl archive appears to claim her set instructions led to deaths of Polish Jews, says director

A new documentary on the Nazis’ favorite film-maker and lead propagandist Leni Riefenstahl suggests she was a direct witness to murderous crimes of the Third Reich she later claimed to have known nothing about and might even have contributed to one atrocity herself.

The film Riefenstahl which premieres at the Venice film festival at the end of August also claims the propagandist admired the party and its henchmen until her death at 101 in 2003, a sentiment which ran counter to her insistence she was not signed up to the Nazi cause.

Written and directed by Andres Veiel, the documentary is the first to have had full access to Riefenstahl’s estate. It gives fresh details about claims that the film-maker was witness to one of the first massacres of Polish Jews while briefly working as a war reporter.

Riefenstahl followed Adolf Hitler to Poland at the start of the second world war in September of 1939 and saw the atrocity take place in Końskie, a town in south-central Poland.

2024-08-292024-08-30

Jonas Šliūpas Museum in Palanga to Host Street Play and Discussion on Yiddish Humor

The Jonas Šliūpas Museum and the Palanga Jewish Community invites you to a day of Jewish culture this Sunday with circus and drama director, street-theater creator and comedian Adrian Schvarzstein from Argentina and Lithuania’s historical dance expert and choreographer Jūrate Širvytė who will present the street-play Arrived.

Arrived was born in Sri Lanka in 2015 and was first performed in Lithuania in 2017 under the title Malina.

Actor and comedian Schvarzstein will follow the play up with a discussion on Yiddish humor at the Jonas Šliūpas Museum. In between the play and the discussion the Palanga Jewish Community and the Bella Toscana bakery are promising to provide Jewish culinary heritage treats to attendees. All events are free.

Time: 2:00 P.M. to 3:30 P.M., September 1.
Location: The street-play begins at the Ramybė Café at Vytauto street no. 54, followed by Litvak treats in the courtyard of the Jonas Šliūpas Museum at Vytauto street no. 23a and the discussion at that same location in Palanga.

2024-08-29

Righteous Gentiles Exhibit in Šiauliai

The Šiauliai District Jewish Community invites you to an exhibit featuring Righteous Gentiles who rescued Jews from the Holocaust in Lithuania. Called “Righteous Gentiles: Not Afraid to Die, They Became Immortal,” the exhibit opens at 6:00 P.M. on September 3 in the courtyard of the Šiauliai Jewish Community located at Višinskio street no.24 in Šiauliai.

The exhibit will cover the life and times of forty Righteous Gentiles in Lithuania who went against society at the time and risked everything, including the lives of their families, to do the right thing.

On September 9 the exhibit moves indoors at the Šiauliai Jewish Community and will run till September 30, with viewing hours from 9:00 A.M. to 1:00 P.M. Those wishing to make an appointment or seeking more information may call +370 685 47619.

2024-08-29

Man Arrested over Islamic Attack on French Synagogue

The iinister says officers came under fire during operation; images show suspect wearing Palestinian flag as he set fire to police cars, synagogue doors; 2 associates also detained

LA GRANDE MOTTE, France (AFP)–Police arrested a man suspected of setting fires and causing an explosion at a synagogue in southern France on Saturday in what officials suspect was a terror attack, the country’s interior minister said.

“The suspected perpetrator of the criminal fires at the synagogue has been detained,” interior minister Gerald Darmanin said on X, adding that officers who made the arrest came under fire.

2024-08-29

Chaim Frenkel Soccer Cup Coming

The annual Chaim Frenkel Soccer Cup tournament is coming up at the city stadium in Šiauliai on September 8. As usual the cup is being held by the Šiauliai District Soccer Federation, the Šiauliai city municipality, the Šiauliai Football Academy and the Lithuanian Makabi Athletics Club. Stay tuned for more information.

2024-08-27

European Day of Jewish Culture Coming September 1

The European Day of Jewish Culture celebrated on the first Sunday in September falls on September 1 this year. This year’s celebration will feature Yiddish and Hebrew lessons at the Choral Synagogue in Vilnius and a walking tour of Jewish Vilna with guide Viljamas Žitkauskas. The students from Sholem Aleichem ORT Gymnasium are planning performances and the Lithuanian Makabi Athletics Club is also sponsoring activities.

Jewish song and dance ensemble Fayerlakh will hold a concert and Raimondas Savickas is planning an open-air art workshop. Julija Patashnik will conduct an Israeli dance class, celebrated author and animator Ilja Bereznickas’s books and animated films will be featured and the Bagel Shop Café will provide the culinary education component.

An exhibit by Litvak artist Theo Tobiasse will open at the LJC in Vilnius, cantor Shmuel Yatom will perform a blessing of families and stand-up comedian Žilvinas Kerbelis is to perform. The Cvi Park Israeli street food kiosk space will host a concert including violinist Dalia Dėdinskaitė, Glebas Pyšniakas on cello, tenor Rafailas Karpis, Tadas Motiečius on accordion and others.

Stay tuned for more details and registration information.

2024-08-27

Lithuanian Jewish Community Statement on Genocide Center’s Newest Report on Kazys Škirpa

The Lithuanian Jewish Community representing 32 Lithuanian and foreign Jewish organizations categorically rejects the latest report and conclusion by the Center for the Study of the Genocide and Resistance of Residents of Lithuania regarding Kazys Škirpa.

We note that a ban on propagating totalitarian and authoritarian regimes and their ideologies has been in force in Lithuania since May of 2023. Under this law symbols of totalitarianism and authoritarianism–statues, street names, names of squares and other of other public locations–cannot be instituted, and those which are currently in existence must be removed from public space. The LJC is convinced Kazys Škirpa, whose publicly-made anti-Semitic statements and incitement to get rid of Jews gave rise to a wave of violence with such tragic results, should not be honored. Statues and commemorative plaques in his honor are a gigantic insult to the memory and relatives of the hundreds of thousands of Lithuanian Jews murdered in the Holocaust. All the more so bearing in mind that until now Lithuania has not established a national memorial commemorating the more than 200,000 victims of the Holocaust, our fellow citizens. Neither is there any monument paying honor to the heroism of Lithuania’s rescuers of Jews who risked their own lived and those of their families.

The International Commission to Assess the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupational Regimes in Lithuania set up by the president of Lithuania has recognized the activities of the Lithuanian Activist Front and the Lithuanian Provisional Government, both led by Škirpa, as anti-Semitic. Chairman of the Commission’s Nazi Crimes Subcommittee Millersville University professor Saulius Sužiedelis stated: ” This is a statue to a man who led an organization which promoted violence against Lithuanian citizens of other ethnicity and which incited anti-Semitism. This is not a subjective judgment or interpretation, all of these statements are founded on historical facts, sources and documents.”

2024-08-262024-11-11

Sabbath Times

The Sabbath begins at 8:14 P.M. on Friday, August 23, and concludes at 9:28 P.M. on Saturday in the Vilnius region.

2024-08-22

New York Times Reporter Implicated in Hit-List Targeting Australian Jews

Natasha Frost admits she shared private chats from a post-October 7 WhatsApp group with 1 person, and says she didn’t intend what followed; 600 members used the chat to talk about surging anti-Semitism in Australia

The New York Times said Friday it had taken “appropriate action” against its reporter after it came to light Melbourne-based Natasha Fronst had leaked private details from a WhatsApp group in which some 600 Australian Jewish creative workers had sought support amid surging anti-Semitism.

Natasha Frost told the Wall Street Journal she had shared the information with one person outside the group and had not intended for it to be widely disseminated.

Frost, whose New York Times bio page still says she writes for the newspaper’s Europe Morning Briefing newsletter, downloaded some 900 pages of WhatsApp messages from the group earlier this year, according to a WSJ report last week.

2024-08-222024-08-22

German Court Upholds Conviction of 99-Year-Old Nazi Concentration Camp Secretary

BERLIN–Germany’s highest court has upheld the guilty verdict of a 99-year-old woman convicted as an accessory to mass murder at a Nazi concentration camp.

German Jewish leaders applauded the decision announced Tuesday by the Federal Court of Justice in Karlsruhe.

“It is not about putting her behind bars for the rest of her life,” said Josef Schuster, president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany. “It is about a perpetrator having to answer for her actions and acknowledge what happened and what she was involved in.”

Irmgard Furchner was secretary to Paul-Werner Hoppe, the SS commander of the Nazi German concentration camp Stutthof outside Danzig, now Gdansk in Poland. She was convicted in 2022 as accessory to more than 10,000 murders which were committed there during her employment from June 1, 1943, to April 1, 1945. She was also convicted of attempted murder in five cases. Dozens of survivors testified at the trial.

The judges agreed that Furchner through her work knowingly supported the murder of 10,505 prisoners by gassing, by terrible living conditions in the camp, by transfer to the Auschwitz death camp and by forced death marches at the end of the war.

Full article here.

2024-08-222024-08-22

Fun Run Again

Lithuanian Makabi Athletics Club’s Fun Run is back, this year starting at 11:00 A.M. on September 15 from the stage at Vingis Park in Vilnius. Runners and joggers will have to choose between a 1.5 kilometer and 3 kilometer course.

Prior registration is required. Register here: https://forms.gle/nXE2KMDX9FR5d2k79

There is a fee for contestants, but every participant will receive a special Fun Run t-shirt.

For more information and payment schedules, contact coordinator Daniel Dubrovinas by telephone at +370 68783005 or by email at info.maccabilt@gmail.com. For additional information, you can also click here.

2024-08-22

Concert to Commemorate 80th Anniversary of Liquidation of Kaunas Ghetto

The Lithuanian Jewish Community invites you to attend a concert to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the destruction of the Kaunas ghetto at 6:00 P.M. on Monday, September 26 at the Kaunas State Philharmonic. Entrance is free.

2024-08-222024-08-30

Geršonas Taicas: Researching My Family’s Genealogy Grew into a Passionate Hobby

interviewed by Katrina Zeiter

On the topic of Litvak history and personalities, one of the Community’s most active members, Geršonas Taicas, always provides interesting facts and facts unknown even to seasoned researchers. Celebrating his 75th birthday this year, his greatest passion is genealogy. Like a fish in its natural element, he dives into the archives, discovering incredible connections which force us to consider history from another perspective, and also helping Litvak descendants scattered around the world find their family roots. A Litvak himself, he can speak for hours on the notable chef and cooking author Fania Lewando, the crooner Daniel Dolskis and former British prime minister Boris Johnson, but in this interview we spoke about the genealogist’s own story which serves as a mirror of a period in Lithuanian Jewish life which fewer and fewer now remember.

What are your first childhood memories?

I was born in Ukmergė [Vilkomir] in 1949 to a family who had been incarcerated as “enemies of the people” at a gulag in Krasnoyarsk in Siberia. My father Alter was an accountant and my mother Masha was a teacher.

2024-08-222024-08-22

Happy Birthday

A very happy birthday to Semionas Filnkelšteinas, the soul, founder and former chairman of the Lithuanian Makabi Athletics Club as well as member of the executive board of the Lithuanian Jewish Community. We wish you excellent health, time for yourself, the love of those around you and many more years to come. Mazl tov. Bis 120!

2024-08-202024-08-20

Arie Ben-Ari Grodzensky Visits Panevėžys Jewish Community

Association of Lithuanian Jews in Israel chairman Arie Ben-Ari Grodzensky visited the Panevėžys Jewish Community last week where he learned about Community activities, met members and viewed archival documents. He noted progress in conserving and commemorating the Litvak heritage in Panevėžys.

Grodzensky was born and raised in Lithuania and also serves on the executive boards of the Goodwill Foundation and the Lithuanian Jewish Community.

2024-08-19

Sabbath Times

The Sabbath begins at 8:30 P.M. on Friday, August 16, and concludes at 9:47 P.M. on Saturday in the Vilnius region.

2024-08-16