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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Event to Mark 80th Anniversary of Kinder Aktion in Šiauliai Ghetto

Event to Mark 80th Anniversary of Kinder Aktion in Šiauliai Ghetto

On November 5, 1943, the Kinder Aktion, one of the most brutal Holocaust crimes perpetrated in Lithuania, was carried out in the Šiauliai ghetto. The mass murder operation aimed at Jewish children took 725 of them and they were sent to Auschwitz in cattle cars where they were murdered. The Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Šiauliai City and Šiauliai Regional Jewish Communities invite you to remember and commemorate the victims of this crime.

The event begins at 12:00 noon on November 5 at the stone monument on the corner of Trakų and Ežero streets marking the location of one of the former gates to the ghetto. At 12:30 P.M. a procession leads from there to the Chaim Frankel villa. At 1:00 P.M. there will be a ceremony at the villa to remember the children murdered. The villa is located at Vilniaus street no. 74 in Šiauliai. This will include the opening of a joint exhibition by the Šiauliai City Jewish Community and Yad Vashem museum of photographs of the child victims of the Kinder Aktion.

Please note: Those wishing to attend the commemoration on November 5 are asked to register by sending an e-mail to info@lzb.lt.

We Stand with Israel Meeting in Šiauliai

We Stand with Israel Meeting in Šiauliai

Šiauliai Jewish Community chairman Sania Kerbelis said he was grateful so many people responded to the call to attend a gathering to show support for Israel on October 9, even though the meeting was only announced a few hours before it took place.

“We are all suffering, we all have relatives in Israel, many of us have relatives in the army who are engaged in combat. We are all worried about our loved ones and the cities are being shot up. The deaths are senseless. We are calling constantly and they keep trying to calm us down, but you know what is really going on. I was in Israel in May and we got caught in the fighting then, several hundred rockets were shot from Gaza. There were casualties but the [Iron] Dome protected many locations. But this time they also crossed the border, slaughtered people, slaughtered children. It associates in my mind that we’re preparing on November 5 to mark the Kinder Aktion. We keep saying ‘Never again.’ Usually other people, non-Jews, think subconsciously ‘never again’ [means ‘no more’] of something, but Jews subconsciously have it that after the Holocaust these kinds of things should be impossible in the civilized world now. Yet they are happening,” Sania Kerbelis said.

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Famous Russian/Soviet Blues Guitarist to Perform at LJC

Famous Russian/Soviet Blues Guitarist to Perform at LJC

Renowned blues and rock guitarist Yuri Naumov, originally from Sverdlovsk but transplanted to Novosibirsk and since 1990 based in the United States, will perform at the Jascha Heifetz Hall at the Lithuanian Jewish Community on October 21.

An accomplished song writer and composer, he gained fame in January of 1983 when he formed the band Prokhodnoy Dvor, which included Vladimir Zotov on drums and Oleg Kurokhtin on guitar. After the band issued a bootleg tape, they became popular in the USSR, and the KGB forced Naumov to leave Novosibirsk Medical University for “the promulgation of decadent Western values.” He initially sought refuge in Leningrad and Moscow. In 1990 Naumov moved to New York. Naumov plays a unique 9-string guitar custom-built for him by famous violin maker Sergei Nozdrin in the 1980s. He used to tour Russia once or twice a year.

Of Italian and Jewish origins, Naumov’s rock ballads have long been considered classics, including the Tale of Karl, King of Rock and Roll; Stanislov Theater and Starry Night. Many call him the greatest Soviet and greatest Russian bluesman ever.

Time: 6:00 P.M., Saturday, October 21
Location: Lithuanian Jewish Community, Pylimo street no. 4, Vilnius

Tickets available at www.bilietai.lt.

Guests from Kupiškis Join Sukkot Celebrations in Panevėžys

Guests from Kupiškis Join Sukkot Celebrations in Panevėžys

A delegation from the town of Kupiškis attended the Sukkot celebration by the Panevėžys Jewish Community and presented a new book and student art exhibit about the former Jewish community in the small town.

The local history book “Kupiškio žydų bendruomenės atspindžiai. Kupiškėnų atsiminimai apie žydų bendruomenė” [Reflections of the Kupiškis Jewish Community: Kupiškis Residents Recall the Jewish Community” was compiled by historian Aušra Jonušytė who also delivered an address at the Sukkot celebration about the former Kupiškis Jewish community and their fate. Book illustrators Augustė Žalkauskaitė, Nojus Pajarskas and Vytė Sabaliauskaitė spoke about their work on the book.

Kupiškis regional NGO coalition executive chairwoman Marytė Semaškienė and art school principal Daiva Šakickienė also spoke in Panevėžys. Šakickienė’s students from the Kupiškis Art School also presented an exhibit of their works of art revolving around the former Kupiškis Jewish community.

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Israel at War: Donate Now

Israel at War: Donate Now

Maccabi World Union Emergency Campaign

The Maccabi movement is asking for your help in supporting the Israeli communities affected by the horrible terror attacks on Southern Israel. We will make Kfar Maccabiah, the facilities of the movement home, available immediately to hundreds of citizens that currently await evacuation from the Gaza area.

We will:

-Accommodate 300 people from the affected areas.
-Accommodate 100 family members of injured soldiers & citizens who are hospitalized in Sheba Medical Center.
-Transform Kfar Maccabiah Basketball Hall into an overflow shelter for 200 evacuees.

Our estimated cost per day is $60,000 USD ($100 per person, per day). No gift is too small.

Any level of support will begin helping Israelis immediately.

Please give generously for those in real need.

Michael Siegal, president, MWU
Amir Peled, chairman, MWU
Amir Gissin, CEO, MWU

Donate here or visit the Maccabi World Union website here.

Condolences

We are sad to report the death of long-time member of the Švenčionys Jewish Community and teacher Galina Kozlova. She was born in 1938. The Švenčionys Jewish Community, its chairman Moishe Shapiro and the entire Lithuanian Jewish Community extend our condolences to her sons Aleksei and Boris, her grandchildren and her many friends and relatives.

Opposition Joins Chorus Calling for MP’s Removal

Opposition Joins Chorus Calling for MP’s Removal

In the on-going saga of the Lithuanian parliament’s attempt to remove MP Remigijus Žemaitaitis, opposition parties joined calls for his impeachment Tuesday following further statements by the MP on facebook. In May he made numerous statements against Israel and justifying violence against Jews.

“There are two ends to the stick, now the Israeli barbarians must suffer for murdering Palestinians,” Žemaitaitis wrote regarding Hamas’s attacks on Israel over the weekend. He said current events only confirm his earlier controversial statements on facebook, for which he is being currently being impeached.

Last week Žemaitaitis failed to appear on an internet conference held by the commission tasked with investigating him for possible impeachment. Žemaitaitis said he wasn’t obligated to appear and that the commission was formed in violation of statutory rules.

In Tuesday afternoon’s vote the Lithuanian parliament voted 88 in favor, 2 against and with two abstentions to continue the process by the impeachment commission for impeaching Žemaitaitis and removing him as a member of parliament.

Full story in Lithuanian here.

Condolences

Martynas Kuzmickas, an Israeli soldier, died Saturday during Hamas’s attack on Israel. He was born in Lithuania and moved to Israel in 1995 at the age of 17. Our deepest condolences to his sister Evelina and his many friends and family members.

Intellectual Heritage of Vilner Jews

Intellectual Heritage of Vilner Jews

The Lithuanian Academy of Sciences and the Israeli Academy of Sciences and Humanities invite you to attend an international conference called “The Intellectual Heritage of the Jews of Vilnius” on October 10 and 11 at the Lithuanian Academy located at Gedimino prospect no. 3 in Vilnius.

According to the Lithuanian Academy’s press release:

“Thanks to the support of the Research Council of Lithuania, we were able to invite such world-renowned experts in Jewish history and culture as Israel Bartal, David Fishman, David Roskies, Benjamin Brown, Alex Lubotzky, Marcin Wodzinski, Jon Seligman, Avner Holtzman, Tsvia Walden, Mordechai Zalkin and others.

“The conference will also feature presentations by prominent Lithuanian scholars: Giedrė Jankevičiūtė, Mindaugas Kvietkauskas, Lara Lempertienė, Jurgita Verbickienė and doctoral student Saulė Valiūnaitė.”

A program is available in English here.

For more information, visit the Lithuanian Academy’s website here.

Holocaust Monuments Vandalized in Palanga

Holocaust Monuments Vandalized in Palanga

Palanga Jewish Community chairman Vilius Gutmanas contacted the city mayor and police regarding the desecration of Holocaust monuments in the Lithuanian seaside resort town.

Lithuania marked both the 80th anniversary of the liquidation of the Vilnius ghetto and the Lithuanian Day of Remembrance of Jewish Victims of Genocide during the third week in September. On September 22 the Palanga Jewish Community, city representatives, teachers and students lit candles, placed stones inscribed with the names of victims and read passages from the history of the Jews of the city at a Holocaust monument there. The next day all the candles and stones had been removed.

“This came as an unpleasant surprise to me and visitors from Israel who had read about the event which took place the evening before,” chairman Gutmanas said.

He also surveyed markers and monuments in memory of the Jewish victims of the Holocaust in the area and discovered much damage, including a stele marking the mass murder and mass grave site of Jewish women and children from Palanga erected by British House of Lords member Greville Janner in the Kunigiškiai Forest, and the complete removal of a monument including its plinth on Vytauto street.

“This isn’t the work of some accidental passer-by. Someone really hates that Lithuania is commemorating Holocaust victims, that we are paying our respects to innocent citizens of our country who were brutally murdered, that we are telling young people the facts about this tragic period of history so they can learn from the mistakes of the past and not repeat them,” the chairman of the Palanga Jewish Community said.

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We Stand with Israel Gathering

We Stand with Israel Gathering

Hamas in Gaza has launched what they hope will spark a new, general Palestinian intifida against the state of Israel in the West Bank and Jerusalem as well. Over 300 Israelis including security forces but a majority of civilians have been killed inside Israel, about 1,600 people have been wounded  and around 52 soldiers and civilians have been taken prisoner and taken into Gaza, including at least one UK citizen. Palestinian sources claim over 750 hostages have been taken into Gaza from Israel. In Ashkelon near the border with Gaza a synagogue and hospital were struck by Palestinian rockets.

The invasion began on Saturday with thousands of rockets sent into Israel from Gaza, with a few volleys now coming from Hezbollah locations inside Lebanon targeting northern Israel. Israel responded with aerial bombardment of selected sites inside Gaza City. Hamas reported more than 256 dead and 1,700 wounded in the Gaza Strip.

Hamas claimed the sneak attack was in response to Israeli attacks and provocations at the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, a message which has resonated in the Islamic world with spontaneous pro-Palestinian protests erupting in Turkey, Iran and other countries. Military strategists say Israel is facing what is perhaps a three- or four-front war: Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon and a potential attempt by Syria to retake the Golan Heights. Israel’s prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu has declared a state of war against Hamas, and indicated it might be a long war. The Israeli defense minister said the coming hostilities will be ruthless and will degrade Hamas’s military capability forever.

We invite you to attend a gathering to show that we stand with Israel.

Time: 6:00 P.M. tomorrow, Monday, October 9
Location: Cathedral Square, Vilnius

There are some reports that extremists are planning attacks in Lithuania as well, so be careful and if you know anything about this, please report it to the police and the Lithuanian Jewish Community.

Simchat Torah at the Choral Synagogue

Simchat Torah at the Choral Synagogue

The Choral Synagogue in Vilnius will provide the following prayer services for Shmini Atzeret and Simchat Torah:

October 6

6:30 P.M. Kabalat Shabat and Hag Shmini

October 7

10:00 A.M. Shacharit
11:00 A.M. Megilat Kohelet (reading from the Book of Ecclesiastes)
12:00 noon Yizkor
7:40 Simchat Torah eve with hakafot dance/procession

October 8

10:00 A.M. Shacharit with hakafot
11:00 A.M. Torah reading

Jerusalem Ballet Comes to Lithuania

Jerusalem Ballet Comes to Lithuania

The Israeli ballet troupe Jerusalem Ballet will perform the world premiere of their “Memento: Franceska Mann’s Last Dance at Auschwitz” on November 26 in Vilnius. The performance is based on historical facts and inspired by the tragic story of Jewish ballerina Franceska Mann, who is said to have killed a Nazi guard during the Holocaust.

Time: 6:00 P.M., November 26
Location: Avia Solutions Group Arena, Vilnius

Tickets available here.

Please note: Lithuanian Jewish Community members and friends will receive a 20% discount on the ticket price. To obtain the discount code, fill out the form here.

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Discussion Club on Sukkot and Other Jewish Holidays: How Do They Compare with Lithuanian Holidays?

Discussion Club on Sukkot and Other Jewish Holidays: How Do They Compare with Lithuanian Holidays?

The 15th of Tishrei, which fell on Friday, September 29 this year, is when Sukkot, one of the more important Jewish holidays, begins. Jewish families pitch a tent or build a booth where every day, except on the Sabbath, they “dwell,” meaning they spend some time at the table inside, or spend the night in warmer climes. This is meant to remind us of the 40 years the Hebrew people dwelt in the desert following the exodus from Egypt living in tents.

The ŽydiškiPašnekesiai discussion club led by writer and journalist Arkadijus Vinokuras is inviting participants to come inside the traditional sukka this Wednesday, October 4, to talk about the Jewish holidays in the fall season.

“Sukkot is a week-long Jewish holiday which is celebrated five days after Yom Kippur. Sukkot celebrates the harvest and recalls God’s miraculous protection to the children of Israel after the exodus from Egypt. We celebrate Sukkot in a booth called a sukka decorated with vegetation and by handling the four species of vegetation,” Vinokuras said.

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Israel Urges Canada to Address WWII Nazi Immigration Policy towards Jews

Israel Urges Canada to Address WWII Nazi Immigration Policy towards Jews

Photo: Canada’s prime minister Justin Trudeau at Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, April 24, 2018. Photo credit: REUTERS/Chris Wattie

by Zvika Klein, October 3, 2023, Jerusalem Post

Israel’s envoy urges Canada to revisit WWII Nazi immigration and Jewish policy.

Resignation of Canada’s speaker of the House of Commons lower chamber is a “first step to acknowledging responsibility for this wrong,” Israel’s new special envoy for combating ant-Semitism, Michal Cotler-Wunsh, told the Jerusalem Post this week. She added that Canada needs to acknowledge its historic sin of not allowing enough Jews into the country during the Holocaust and immediately afterward while allowing Nazis to immigrate.

The speaker of Canada’s House of Commons lower chamber said last week that he would quit, a few days after he publicly praised a former Nazi soldier in Parliament in an incident that Russia said helped justify its war on Ukraine.

A week ago Anthony Rota told legislators he had made a mistake by inviting ex-soldier Yaroslav Hunka, 98, to attend a session in the House honoring Ukrainian president Vladimir Zelensky last Friday. Rota publicly recognized Hunka, calling him a hero.

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Sixth Annual Fun-Run Oversubscribed

Sixth Annual Fun-Run Oversubscribed

Photo: Semionas Finkelšteinas and Olga Bliumenzon greet the winners.

The Lithuanian Makabi Athletics Club’s 6th annual fun-run was held on September 24 and there were so many wanting to participate organizers had to shut down registration.

Makabi president Semionas Finkelšteinas and vice president Olga Bliumenzon greeted participants wishing them success on the track.

Over 120 runners ran 1.5 and 3 km courses in three age groups. All participants received Makabi t-shirts and participation medals, with special medals for first-, second- and third-place winners and a special gift to first-place champions.

The annual fun-run has become popular with students and their parents from the Sholem Aleichem ORT Gymnasium, accounting for 58 participants this year. Physical education teacher Vilija Taralienė and school principal Ruth Reches were there to cheer on their team.

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Victims of Holocaust Commemorated in Švenčionys

Victims of Holocaust Commemorated in Švenčionys

We commemorated the 80th anniversary of the mass murder of Jews in Švenčionys on Sunday. In October, 1943, the Švenčionys ghetto was liquidated and the last survivors of the 8,000 Jews who lived in the area before the war were killed.

Švenčionys Jewish Community chairman Moishe Shapiro organized the commemoration and invited LJC chairwoman Faina Kukliansky, Vilnius Jerusalem of Lithuania Jewish Community chairman Algirdas Malcas, Ukmergė Jewish Community chairman Artūras Taicas, Polish and German embassy representatives, district mayor Rimantas Klipčius, Vilnius Sholem Aleichem ORT Gymnasium principal Ruth Reches and a large contingent of students, among others, to light candles and lay wreaths at the Menorah statue in Švenčionys’s central park, marking the border of the ghetto there. Attendees also viewed an exhibit on Jewish history at the Nalšia Museum, then went to the mass murder site in Platumai village to commemorate the victims.

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Telzh Yeshiva Reopens to Public

Telzh Yeshiva Reopens to Public

The famous Telzh (Tels, Telšiai, Telz) Yeshiva, a cultural heritage site, has reopened with a new public use. Last week a branch of the Alka Museum opened its doors inside the yeshiva building. The new museum space housed in the Jewish school will feature and protect the Jewish material heritage there.

The Telzh Yeshiva exhibit there was set up based on the yizkor Sefer Ṭelz (Sefer Ṭelz (Liṭa): matsevet zikaron li-ḳehilah ḳedoshah) compiled by Yitzhak Alperowitz and published in Israel in 1984. In 2022 the books was translated into Lithuanian as “Telšiai. Atminties knyga” [Telzh: Book of Memory], opening the door for Lithuanian speakers to discover the traces of Jewish life in the small town and find out more about its history.

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