Wooden Synagogue in Alanta Renovated
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LJC, International Comminission and Olga Lengyel Institute Holding Holocaust Seminars for Teachers
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LJC Chairwoman Faina Kukliansky Speaks at Commemoration of Grosse
Aktion in Kaunas
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Šiauliai Opens Righteous Gentile Square at the Intersection of Vilniaus and Ežero Streets at Former Ghetto Gates
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"Symphony from Jerusalem of the North” Mark Day of Lithuanian Jewish Victims of Genocide in Presidential Courtyard
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The renovated synagogue in Žiežmariai will become a new cultural center. The first synagogue in appeared sometime between 1690 and 1696. In the 19th century there three synagogues. Not surprising, since the majority of the population were Jewish. This synagogue which has survived and has now been renovated stands in the southern part of town between Vilniaus and Žalgirio streets, with the Strėva river flowing from southeastward from there.
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The Lithuanian Post Office has issued a stamp commemorating 300 years since the birth of the Vilna Gaon
The Lithuanian Post Office has issued a stamp commemorating 300 years since the birth of the Vilna Gaon
with a face value of 0.81 euros, enough to mail letters abroad.
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Lithuania Marks 300th Anniversary of Birth of Vilna Gaon, 2020 Named Year of the Gaon and Litvak History.
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Most important events at the Lithuanian Jewish Community in 2018
Most important events at the Lithuanian Jewish Community in 2018
Revival of Jewish Scouting in Lithuania: The first new Litvak scouting camping trip with children from Vilnius, Kaunas, Klaipėda, Panevėžys and Molėtai took place August 24 to 26.
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Jewish newspapers and advertisements from Vilnius in the period between the two world wars. Jews and other minorities were given equal rights in the reconstituted Lithuanian state. Yiddish thrived with many newspapers and books published in the language.
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Purim at the Choral Synagogue

Beginning at 6:30 P.M. on February 28 the Choral Synagogue in Vilnius will host a Purim celebration, including a reading of Megilat Ester, the Purim story, followed by a performance of classic Jewish and new Israeli songs by vocalist Yevgeni Valevich. A special program for children includes a magic show, clowns and lots of prizes. There will also be a contest for best Purim costume, and of course Purim treats for young and old.

Tickets are 5 euros (to be given to charity and can be bought starting February 19 either at the synagogue at Pylimo street no. 39 in Vilnius or from Liuba at the Lithuanian Jewish Community at Pylimo street no. 4 in Vilnius.

See you there!

Once There Lived Aizik Kanovich


Rokha (Rocha-Samuraj) and Dovid Kanovich, Solomon’s brothers Moshe-Yankel,
Aizik and Motl, sister Khava (from collections of Sergejus Kanovičius and Lisa
Abukrat-Kanovich)

by Sergejus Kanovičius

The sky was bright blue. “So clear, almost as clear as the water in the yard of our house in Jonava,” thought Aizik and closed his eyes again. A few soft snowflakes fell from the blue sky. It seemed you could count them. Like family members–snowflake Sara, snowflake Rosette, snowflake Joseph, and snowflake Bernard–one, two, three, four, counted Aizik with his eyes closed.

“Get a move on. Faster, come on, the train won’t wait for you.” One could hear the echo of insistent urging.

“Aizik, Aizik, get up, we’re almost there – one more step and we’re on the train. A little more and we’re home in Paris”, whispered Moris-Moisha Zuskind, bent over his friend, holding his hands under his armpits so they wouldn’t freeze.

In his mind, Aizik was traveling to his hometown, Jonava, and his native Žvejų street. Back to December of 1920 when he stepped over the threshold of his house and proudly announced:

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Lithuanian Jewish Community Booth at Vilnius Book Fair

Lietuvos žydų bendruomenės stendas Vilniaus Knygų mugėje

The Lithuanian Jewish Community has participated with its own booth at the Vilnius Book Fair for the first time, launching a Lithuanian translation of Yitzhak Rudashevski’s Vilnius ghetto diary. The booth featured other books about Jewish history and culture published with financial help from the Goodwill Foundation. Purim treats were also passed out. Visitors were interested in the publications, but also had plenty of questions about what the Community does and Jewish culture and traditions. They shared stories from their grandparents about the latter’s childhood spent in common with Jewish children.

Translators Mindaugas Kvietkauskas and Akvilė Grigoravičiūtė signed books.

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Tolerant Person of the Year and Donskis Prize Winner for 2017 Announced

According to the Lithuanian Government’s webpage, Marius Ivaškevičius was named Tolerant Person of the Year for 2017 at a ceremony at Vytautas Magnus University in Kaunas. Historian Saulius Sužiedėlis was award the Leonidas Donskis prize at the same ceremony Sunday.

Marius Ivaškevičius initiated a Holocaust memorial march in his native town of Molėtai in late August, 2016. Thousands travelled there to participate and the march is widely considered to have marked a sea-change in Lithuanian Holocaust awareness. Ivaškevičius’s appeal before the march called “I’m Not Jewish” remains the most-read item on www.lzb.lt/en in English translation.

Saulius Sužiedėlis is the Lithuanian-American professor of history who has written numerous works on the Holocaust in Lithuania, including what is still considered the definitive modern treatment, “The Persecution and Mass Murder of Lithuanian Jews during Summer and Fall of 1941,” co-authored with German historian Christoph Dieckmann. A recent interview called “Saulius Sužiedėlis Explains Why the Nazis Didn’t Need Gas Chambers in Lithuania” was extremely popular in the Lithuanian original posted at www.lzb.lt

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The Return of Samuel Bak

by Markas Petuchauskas

Now that some time has passed since the opening of the Samuel Bak museum, I would like to look back. To remember how this world-famous painter’s return to Lithuania began. To remember what I experienced. And these experiences date back to 1943.

Bak was probably never more open about himself than in the introduction to the Lithuanian translation of his book Painted in Words. He tells how Vilnius “tortured” him, how he sought to forget the city and was never able to do so. For more than half a century the artist placed a taboo on thoughts of Vilnius. On the city of his happy childhood and the land drenched in the blood of his family, where he would never set foot again.

I dare say one of the first unexpected reminders of Vilnius after sixty years was Pinkas. It is very nice that Bak was reminded of Pinkas in 1997 in the Lithuanian magazine Krantai (not speaking the language, the artist believed incorrectly this was a publication from the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture). The special third issue of the magazine, this was a publication by the Lithuanian Jewish Cultural Club which I founded in 1994. The magazine was set up at my initiative using club funds, and was intended to commemorate the Vilnius ghetto theater during International Art Days. Lithuanian National Museum employee Simona Likšienė wrote about the pinkas conserved at the museum in the magazine and included the title page.

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Classes Begin January 14 at Choral Synagogue

A series of six lessons kicks off at the Choral Synagogue in Vilnius beginning 4:30 P.M., Sunday, January 14, 2018. The six lessons will take place on consequetive Sundays at the same time and place. This is an opportunity to learn about the unique nature of Judaism. Discussions will be led by Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky in a language or languages appropriate to the audience. Both women and men are encouraged to attend. See you there!

Lithuanian Genocide Center Faces New Scrutiny

South African Litvak resident in the United States Grant Gochin, a member of the Lithuanian Jewish Community and a Lithuanian citizen, has scored a victory in his legal fight to make the Center for the Study of the Genocide and Resistance of Residents of Lithuania back down on their claims Jonas Noreika and Kazys Škirpa weren’t Holocaust criminals.

In a 22-page finding issued by the Office of Parliamentary Ombudsman in early February, the Genocide Center was determined to have violated Gochin’s right to good public administration for failing to answer the points he raised about the Center’s findings on Noreika and Škirpa’s role in the mass murder of Jews in Lithuania. Gochin’s right to a comprehensive answer enshrined in Lithuania law was also violated because the Center failed to use internationally established criteria on the crime of genocide and then claimed to the parliamentary ombudsman they had, although they failed to list these specific documents in their answer to Gochin. At issue was whether Noreika and Škirpa were guilty of genocide: the Center said they hadn’t participated directly in the shooting of Jews in Lithuania, while Gochin said they were guilty under internationally accepted definitions including the 1948 UN Convention to Prevent and Punish Genocide, the Nuremberg Trial Statutes and the work of the International Criminal Tribunal of the UN in Rwanda.

Ombudsman Augustinas Normantas also said the Center had refused the mediation of the Office of Ombudsman, hadn’t taken the ombudsman’s earlier recommendations into account and now had a pattern of complaints over the last three years by dissatisfied members of the public which the ombudsman has investigated. He noted the Center has a culture among its director and staff of not answering the public, although the Center’s main function as defined in the special law creating the agency is to serve the public and corporate entities by providing information.

The ombudsman warned in the finding that if the Center repeats this behavior, the Office of Ombudsman would ask the Center’s bosses–the parliament and office of prime minister–to investigate on-going failures to follow the law and the Lithuanian constitution.

Gochin’s blog has an English translation of the Lithuanian parliamentary ombudsman’s findings here.

Rudashevski Diary Presented to Lithuanian President at Vilnius Book Fair

Thursday, February 22, Vilnius–Lithuanian president Dalia Grybauskaitė opened the 19th annual Vilnius Book Fair. She said this year was special because the Republic of Lithuania is celebrating its 100th birthday, and that other states in the region represented at the fair are doing the same.

The book fair slogan this year was “I read Lithuania, I read the world.”

Grybauskaitė said: “If you can read and know Lithuania, that means you can read the world, too, and Lithuania as part of it.”

She was presented a copy of the Vilnius ghetto diary of Yitzhak Rudashevski in Lithuanian translation, to be officially launched at the book fair Sunday.

Rudashevski Diary at Vilnius Book Fair

A new Lithuanian translation of the diary by young Vilnius ghetto inmate and Holocaust victim Yitzhak Rudashevski will be presented to the public at the Vilnius Book Fair on February 25.

Faina Kukliansky, Dr. Mindaugas Kvietkauskas, Sigutė Chlebinskaitė, Fania Brancovskaja and Akvilė Grigoravičiūtė are to speak at the event at 11:00 A.M. in conference hall 1.2 at the Vilnius Book Fair. Sixteen-year-old violinist Ugnė Liepa Žuklytė will perform Anatolijus Šenderovas’s piece “Cantus in memoriam Jascha Heifetz” at the event.

The boy and his parents survived the liquidation of the Vilnius ghetto 75 years ago on September 23, 1943, but were arrested while in hiding, taken to Ponar and shot.

The Vilnius Book Fair is held annually at the Litexpo exhibition center at Laisvės prospect no. 5 in Vilnius.

For more information contact Monika Antanaitytė at + 37067240942

Jewish Attorneys Laid the Foundation of the State

As we mark the day of the restoration of the Lithuanian state and celebrate her 100th birthday, let’s also remember those who built this state, where the law is not just a paper concept but a category forming the foundation of the state and citizens and affecting our daily lives.

Jews comprised a large part of the community of Lithuanian attorneys. The majority of Jews had the experience of both being caretakers of the law and of having their legal rights taken away from them. The textbooks don’t talk about Jewish attorneys and it is only rare archival material which gives us a glimpse of their professional portraits. Very little is generally known about cases at the Lithuanian Special Archive which detail the fate of Vilnius attorneys arrested in 1939.

Full text in Lithuanian here.

Russian Films Screened at LJC

The Lithuanian Jewish Community is screening two films in Russian, on February 21 and 22. On February 21 “Romas, Tomas i Iosif” about Tomas Venclova and Yosif Brodski and on February 22 “Mne ne Strazhno” were shown with director Liliya Vyulina attending.

Today We Witness Lithuanian Freedom

The March 11th Hall of the Lithuanian parliament had an overflow audience Thursday during a ceremony to commemorate 100 years of Lithuanian independence. The commemoration began with the singing of the Lithuanian national anthem and a reading of the February 16, 1918, Act of Independence and the names of the signatories to that act.

Parliamentary speaker Viktoras Pranckietis delivered a keynote speech and said that we are all equal in the context of 100 years since the restoration of Lithuania.

“Today we all witness Lithuanian freedom. Each person gives rise to a small individual world, merging seamlessly into a community,” he said. The Lithuanian people have always fostered and defended their identity, he said, and noted the Order of Vytis was awarded to members of 15 different ethnic communities for fighting for Lithuanian independence. He said 100 years wasn’t a long time in the life of a nation which recently celebrated their millennium. “Many people and events went into the creation of Lithuania, including the heroic deeds of the grand dukes and of nameless citizens, unions and partitions, occupations and uprisings. The deeds in song of those who proclaimed freedom and the paths trodden by the book smugglers,” he said at the ceremony.

Pranckietis said although only 20 Lithuanians signed the Act of Independence, the entire nation saw Vilnius as their capital. He called for celebrating the present as well as the history of Lithuania.

Full story in Lithuanian here.

Lithuania We Built Together, an Exhibit on Lithuanian Minority Communities

The Lithuanian House of Ethnic Minorities presented a new exhibit February 15 called “We Built Lithuania Together,” an overview of ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities living in Lithuania, their history and famous figures from these communities.

The exhibit is the creation of students and teachers from the History Faculty of Vilnius University, the Lithuanian State Archive, the Vrublevskiai Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences and the Lithuanian National Martynas Mažvydas Library, with help from other museums, archives and libraries throughout Lithuania.

Following the launch, exhibit organizers planned to present it all over Lithuania at libraries, schools and exhibition spaces. The exhibit is in Lithuanian and English.

Lithuanian State Auditor Gives Goodwill Foundation Clean Bill of Health Again

The Lithuanian State Auditor again performed their annual audit of the Goodwill Foundation. The auditor found the Goodwill Foundation managed, used and disbursed funds from the state budget correctly in 2017.

The Goodwill Foundation also has an independent auditor who performs an annual audit. The independent auditor found the financial accounting for the foundation in 2017 was correct and showed the real financial picture and financial operations as of December 31, 2017, in line with Lithuanian Finance Ministry directive No. 1K-372 on bookkeeping at non-profit organizations.

Chwoles Exhibit at Tolerance Center

The Tolerance Center of the Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum opened an exhibit of artworks by Rafael Chwoles February 17 called “They Watch Us: Portraits of Vilnius Residents, 1945-1949.” The exhibit will run till March 27.

Rudashevski Diary Published in Lithuanian

Knygų mugėje – penkiolikmečio Vilniaus geto kalinio palikimas

The diary of Yitzchak Rudashevski written in the Vilnius ghetto and providing an eye-witness account by the young man has been translated into Lithuanian and is to be launched at the Vilnius Book Fair Sunday. Although Rudashevski was only 14 when he began the diary, many who have read the book in the original Yiddish, English and other languages say he displays both incredible talent as a writer and a wisdom beyond his years. He was murdered at Ponar in late 1943. The original diary is conserved by YIVO with copies made available to other institutions and archives.

The Lithuanian Jewish Community invites everyone to read and learn about the Rudashevski ghetto diary.

The book is to be launched at 11:00 A.M. on Sunday, February 25, 2018, in conference room 1.2 at the Vilnius Book Fair.

LJC chairwoman Faina Kukliansky, Yiddish translator Dr. Mindaugas Kvietkauskas, Sigutė Chlebinskaitė, Jewish partisan Fania Brancovskaja and Akvilė Grigoravičiūtė are to attend the launch.

Netanyahu Congratulates Lithuania on 100th Birthday

Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu sent a letter to Lithuanian prime minister Saulius Skvernelis, a greeting from him and the people of Israel congratulating Lithuania on the 100th anniversary of the establishment of the first Lithuanian Republic.

Netanyahu wished the people of Lithuania a memorable and happy holiday. He noted the close historical connections between the people of Lithuania and Israel and the importance of the Lithuanian Jewish community to the entire Jewish people and their religious and intellectual development. The Jewish people who lived in Lithuania earned great respect and included famous philosophers, writers and scholars.

The Israeli PM also noted the current Lithuanian Jewish community and Israeli citizens from Lithuania celebrate a spirit of solidarity and close cultural contacts between the two peoples. Netanyahu noted Israel appreciates highly Lithuania’s promises regarding Holocaust education and in fighting anti-Semitism. He called Lithuania one of Israel’s closest partners in Europe at the present time, and said Lithuania had contributed significantly to fostering constructive dialogue between Israel and the European Union.

Lithuania’s 100th Independence Day was also observed by the municipality of Tel Aviv where the municipal building was lit in the colors of the Lithuanian flag.

Sergejus Kanovičius Receives State Award

Lithuanian president Dalia Grybauskaitė awarded writer and founder of the Šeduva Jewish Memorial Fund Sergejus Kanovičius the state honor “For Merit to Lithuania” February 15. He received the award for his work to preserve the Lithuanian Jewish heritage. The bernardinai.lt website, where Kanovičius frequently contributes, published his acceptance speech:

I share, because I have received. That’s what my Parents taught me. That’s what my Parents learned from their Parents, my grandparents, to share what you get with others. Always, whether you have a lot or a little, and someone else has even less. I share because this is not all my doing. It probably isn’t even mine at all. It belongs to my Parents, to my entire family without whom I wouldn’t be able to work the work I do in Lithuania, it is my brother’s example to share, to support and help, and so it belongs to all of them.

What would I have been able to do for Lithuania alone? How would I have received this sort of award if not for the wonderful people who work with me? How would we be able to work without our hard-working patrons, without whose help we wouldn’t be able to make my vision and our mission happen?

I won’t lie, it’s very nice to be awarded. But it’s even nice to know this award doesn’t belong to me alone. It belongs to all of us. As it does to Lithuania, for whom we all must try to make a contribution, through work seen and unseen. Love and respect for our fellow man, respect for historical truth and justice, for commemorating the past. For commemorating that which has come down to us and must remain after us.

We have all done merit for Lithuania because we are her children. Let’s love her and be loved.

I sincerely believe this award, although it was given to me, really does belong to all of you.

My grandfather, may he rest in peace, the suit maker from Jonava, Shloime Kanovich, always used to ask any customer who came in, “Do you have material?” We have an abundance of material. What’s important is that we sew it together honestly.

Thank you, everyone. And as my Father wrote on a similar occasion and on completely justified grounds, thank you, Lithuania.