Wooden Synagogue in Alanta Renovated
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Lithuanian Jewish Community Statement on Genocide Center’s Newest Report on Kazys Škirpa
Marking January 13, Defenders of Freedom Day, at Lithuanian Parliament
Chaim Grade: Facts of a Life
Photo: Jung-Vilne literary group: Chaim Grade is standing in the top row to the left, the poets Shmerke Kaczerginski and Abraham Sutzkever are seated in the middle. YIVO archives
by Susanne Klingenstein and Yehudah DovBer Zirkind, In Geveb, December 15, 2021
INTRODUCTION
When on May 2, 2010, Inna Hecker Grade passed away at the age of eighty-five, a sigh of relief, unkind and hard-edged, coursed through some corners of the Yiddish literary world and a small circle of scholars and archivists tensed with expectation. For twenty-eight years, since the passing of her husband Chaim Grade on June 26, 1982, the literary legacy of one the most important Yiddish prose-stylists and documentary storytellers to emerge from the ashes of Vilna, had lain concealed in the couple’s Bronx apartment, guarded by his angry widow who deemed the world unworthy of her husband’s genius. After a brief foray into the publishing world, she had withdrawn into a tomb filled with her husband’s treasures.
The sepulchral metaphor was first used by Ralph Speken, the psychiatrist who had taken care of Inna Grade during the last months of her life. On the eve of breaking the seal, Speken pleaded: “They should take over that apartment as if they were taking over King Tut’s tomb.” Scholars and readers expected the discovery of manuscripts in drawers and closets that would speedily be published, perhaps in critical editions, and bring Grade back to literary life. No new work, no critical edition or biography has yet appeared.
Remembering Documentary Photographer, Author, Screenwriter Alter-Sholem Kacyzne
Photo: Alter Kacyzne. “Green Fields” theater still. ca. 1921. Museum of the City of New York.
text by Yitskhok Niborski, translated from Yiddish by Yankl Salant
Kacyzne, Alter-Sholem (May 31, 1885-July 7, 1941)
(1885–1941), Yiddish writer and critic; photographer. Born in Vilna to a working-class family, Alter-Sholem Kacyzne (Yid., Katsizne) attended heder and also a Russian-language Jewish elementary school. At 14, after his father’s death, he stopped his formal studies. Kacyzne was an autodidact and remained an avid reader not only of literature in Russian, Yiddish, and Hebrew, but also of Polish, German and French works. For about 11 years he lived in Ekaterinoslav where he learned to be a photographer and was married.
In 1909, Kacyzne first published two Russian stories in the periodical Evreiski mir (Jewish World), edited by S. An-ski. In 1910, attracted by the work and reputation of Y. L. Peretz, Kacyzne settled in Warsaw, where he opened a photography studio. He grew very close to Peretz, who became a literary mentor, but did not begin publishing in Yiddish until after Peretz’s death in 1915. Kacyzne’s first Yiddish texts appeared in collections in Vilna and Kiev. In 1919 and 1920 his first two books were published in Warsaw, the dramatic poems Der gayst der meylekh (The Spirit, the King) and Prometeus (Prometheus). He was also a consistent contributor to (and sometimes co-founder and co-editor of) a series of literary periodicals, most of them short-lived, in Warsaw and Vilna, in which he published novellas and stories that in 1922 appeared in book form as Arabeskn (Arabesques).
News and Views from the Kaunas Jewish Community on the Levinas Center
Kaunas Jewish Community chairman Gercas Žakas shared his impressions on facebook after visiting the Emmanuel Levinas Center opening ceremony:
“It was endlessly pleasant to receive an invitation from professor Rimantas Benetis, rector of the Lithuanian Health Medicine University, to meet at the recently-opened Emmanuel Levinas Center. We had a nice and warm conversation in which we discussed the Center’s mission, planned activities and opportunities for cooperation. I thank Center directors Ingrida Krasauskienė and Julija Vasilenko who conducted a tour of the impressive space of the Center with its extraordinary aura and possessing materializing visions of the future. I hope that the Center will be more than just an institution researching and promoting the philosophical, intellectual and cultural inheritance of the famous philosopher Emmanuel Levinas (1906-1995) born in Kaunas, as its articles of incorporation state, but also that it will become a new venue in Kaunas for memorable and meaningful meetings and events. And I also hope ties of partnership and cooperation will join the Levinas Center and the Kaunas Jewish Community, inspiring us to carry out numerous projects.”
Taiwan Ups Lithuanian Investment Fund by $1 Billion
Photo: Taiwan National Development Council Minister Kung Ming-hsin poses during an interview with Reuters in Taipei.
Taiwan will launch a $1 billion credit program to help fund joint projects between Lithuanian and Taiwanese companies in six business categories, a Taiwanese government minister said on Tuesday.
Lithuania is under pressure from China, which claims democratically-ruled Taiwan as its own territory, to reverse a decision last year to allow the island to open a de facto embassy in Vilnius under its own name.
China has downgraded diplomatic ties with Vilnius and is pressuring companies such as German car parts giant Continental to stop using Lithuanian-made components. It has also blocked Lithuanian cargos from entering China. Taiwan last week announced plans to set up a separate $200 million fund to invest in Lithuanian industries and boost bilateral trade as it tries to fend off China’s diplomatic pressure on the Baltic state.
“The investment and credit funds will help us strengthen the cooperation,” Taiwan’s National Development Council minister Kung Ming-hsin told an online news conference.
YIVO Director Thanks LJC on Milestone Achievement
Dear Faina,
Today YIVO announces the completion of the Vilna Collection Project–4.1 million pages of documents and books online for people around the world–and you have been such a tremendous part of it. You introduced me to so many people, helped shepherd our grant through the Goodwill Foundation and advised on so many things. Thank you. This project truly opens new doorways for millions of people around the world. Without your support and enthusiasm I am not sure we would have been successful. I hope that when I am in Vilnius … we will be able to celebrate together.
Here is a link to the website: https://vilnacollections.yivo.org/
With my warmest good wishes for a healthy, happy, peaceful New Year,
Jonathan
Jonathan Brent
Executive Director/CEO
The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research
Kabbalat Shabat
A Kabbalat Shabat ceremony will be held to usher in the Sabbath under the tenets of progressive Judaism at the Lithuanian Jewish Community in Vilnius at 6:00 P.M. on January 14, followed by a glass of wine and challa bread. To register, write Viljamas at viljamas@lzb.lt or call 8 672 50699.
Israel Advancing UN General Assembly Resolution Aimed at Combating Holocaust Denial
Times of Israel
Envoy confident measure will pass overwhelmingly later this month; it won’t have enforcement mechanism, but Erdan says effects of new international standard will be significant
Israel will bring a resolution aimed at combating Holocaust denial for a vote before the United Nations General Assembly later this month, Ambassador Gilad Erdan announced on Wednesday.
The resolution will provide a specific classification for Holocaust denial, using the working definition put together by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance. It will provide actions expected of signatory countries in order to address the phenomenon, and will demand social media networks remove posts that fall under the IHRA definition, Erdan said in a briefing with reporters.
Discussion on Jewish Contributions to Lithuanian Statehood
Arkadijus Vinokuras will moderate a discussion on Jewish contributions to Lithuanian statehood from 1918 to 1940 and from 1988 to 2022 as part of the #ŽydiškiPašnekesiai series of talks at the Bagel Shop Café in the Lithuanian Jewish Community in Vilnius at 5:00 P.M. on January 12. This is the eve of January 13, an important date in modern Lithuania’s history, the morning on which Soviet tanks attacked and killed citizens defending the Vilnius television tower in 1991. Participants are to include father of Lithuanian independence Vytautas Landsbergis, Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky and Lithuanian MP and signatory to the 1990 Independence Act Emanuelis Zingeris, among others.
Musical accompaniment is to be provided by Vytas Mikeliūnas on violin and Darius Mažintas on piano performing Lithuanian and Jewish songs. The discussion will be held in Lithuanian. Those wishing to attend may come in person or watch the live-feed on the LJC facebook page.
Emmanuel Levinas’s Son Cries Foul over Use of Father’s Name
Valdemaras Šukšta, LRT.lt
Michael Levinas, the son of Litvak French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas, isn’t happy a center was named after his father in Kaunas. He said his objections because of the Holocaust weren’t taken into consideration. The Levinas Center is part of the Lithuanian Health Sciences University who claim Levinas’s daughter and grandson liked the idea.
Michael Levinas explained his position on the internet page of the French newspaper Le Figaro in late December. His main objection was the anti-Semitism and crimes against humanity aimed at Jews in the Holocaust in Lithuania. He pointed out the center is located near the apartment where his father lived, and where his father’s family was abducted and taken to the Ninth Fort where they were subjected to the depredations of the Nazis and Lithuanians.
The younger Levinas recalled he had received a letter from then-rector of the Lithuanian Health Sciences University Remigijus Žaliūnas in 2019 in which Žaliūnas is alleged to have said his wishes would not be taken into consideration and there would be no further discussion of the matter. Levinas said his father repeated vowed never to visit Lithuania again and not to have anything to do with the country.
Joint Lithuanian-YIVO Digitization Project Complete
New York-based YIVO has announced the completion of a joint project to digitize the Edward Blank collection in what is known as the Edward Blank Vilna On-Line Collections Project. The historic initiative took seven years and $7 million to complete. The goal was to sort, conserve and digitize pre-war collections from the YIVO library and archives, and to make them available to everyone online.
The project was carried in concert with the Lithuanian Central State Archive, the Martynas Mažvydas Lithuanian National Library and the Vrublevskiai Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences.
Ruth Levine, the director of the board of YIVO, called the completion of the project a new phase in the modern history of the YIVO institute and part of their main mission. She said heroes and martyrs gave their lives to preserve the books and documents in the collection, and expressed gratitude to the Lithuanian partners in the project.
Launch of New Book of Stories about Jewish Vilnius
The Vilnius Jewish Public Library will hold the launch of the new book Чаепитие с попугаем [Tea with Parrots] at 6:00 P.M. on Thursday, January 20. The book was published by the Lithuanian publishing house Kitos Knygos.
This is the author Chona Leibovičius’s first book of short stories, where he tells in his own voice the story of an entire generation of Vilna Jews, many of whom are no longer with us and many others having left to live around the world. The time-period is from the 1950s to the 1980s when the old city was undergoing serious changes, when new suburbs were being built by the Soviets and outside powers were tearing apart the fabric of the city undergoing rapid demographic change.
The author and others will be at the book launch. Others include Donatas Valančiauskas who is the director of Lithuanian state television’s Jewish affairs program Menora and Kitos Knygos author and representative Darius Pocevičius. The library is located in the courtyard at Gedimino prospect no. 24 in Vilnius.
More about the book in Lithuanian and Russian here.
Sabbath Times
The Sabbath begins at 3:52 P.M. on Friday, January 7, and concludes at 5:17 P.M. on Saturday in the Vilnius region.
Name Changes but Fate Remains the Same
by Lina Dranseikaitė
The century-old red-brick synagogue standing on M. Valančiaus street in almost the exact center of the city of Panevėžys from now on will be known by its true name, the Torah Association.
Panevėžys Jewish Community chairman Gennady Kofman said historical justice has been restored. But even with the restoration of historical justice, this decaying heritage site in the historical part of the city might completely vanish over the coming decades.
Although Lithuania’s state Property Bank attempted to sell the synagogue two years ago, no takers have appeared. Panevėžys Jewish Community chairman Gennady Kofman says he isn’t even considering that Jews might buy the red-brick synagogue since this building is supposed to belong to Jews already.
Full text in Lithuanian here.
Lithuanian Culture Minister and Israeli Ambassador Sign Agreement on Film Production
On January 7 new opportunities opened for Lithuanian filmmakers: Lithuanian culture minister Simonas Kairys and Israeli ambassador to Lithuania Yossef Avni-Levy signed a governmental understanding on joint production of films by the two countries.
Minister Kairys said: “Until now Lithuania hasn’t had a single joint film production with Israel. This agreement between the Governments of the two countries, clearing defining bilateral cooperation in the field of film production, presents greater opportunities for Lithuania and Israeli filmmakers, including attracting additional financing. All of this will allow for greater Lithuanian competitiveness in the international arena in making films.”
The agreement between the Lithuanian and Israeli Governments provides more favorable conditions for filmmakers from both countries to receive state support. It also expands opportunities for cooperation, providing a foundation for the wider presentation of films.
Full text in Lithuanian here.
Taiwan to Establish $200 Million Lithuanian Investment Fund
Tensions between China and Lithuania soared after Taiwan was allowed to open a de facto embassy in Vilnius. Now Taiwan wants to help offset the financial cost that comes with angering Beijing.
Taiwan said Wednesday it will create a $200 million (€176 million) fund to invest in Lithuania weeks after the self-ruled island claimed by China opened a representative office, a de facto embassy, in Vilnius. China views Taiwan as part of its own territory, and is putting immense pressure on foreign nations not to deal directly with the government in Taipei.
The announcement comes after Lithuanian president Gitanas Nauseda called the decision to permit Taiwan’s representative office in Vilnius “a mistake.”
On Wednesday Lithuanian foreign minister Gabrielius Landsbergis rejected the president’s characterization of that decision.
What is the purpose of Taiwan’s investment fund?
Israeli-American Civic Action Network Looks at 2022
ICAN chairman and CEO Dillon L. Hosier writes:
Today, as we start a new week at the beginning of a brand new year, I wanted to take a moment to thank you for making 2021 an exceptional success at ICAN.
I’d also like to share with you a look ahead as we prepare to take ICAN, our community of activists, and our pro-Israel agenda to the next level in 2022 and beyond.
In 2021, thanks to activists like you, ICAN grew significantly and overperformed by every measure:
Sabbath Times
The Sabbath begins at 3:44 P.M. on Friday, December 31, and concludes at 5:08 P.M. on Saturday, January 1, in the Vilnius region.
May You Live Long and Be Prosecuted
Efraim Zuroff
At 100, Herbert Wahler has outlived other Germans listed as members of the genocidal Einsatzgruppe C. His age should not shield him from accountability.
This past Friday [December 10, 2021], Herbert Wahler celebrated his 100th birthday. Quite an achievement for a German who spent a significant part of World War II serving on the Eastern front in Ukraine. Yet upon closer examination of Wahler’s service record, it’s not that surprising, since, for a significant part of the conflict, Wahler was not dodging bullets shot at him by Red Army soldiers, but rather contributing to the efforts of Einsatzgruppe C to mass murder innocent Jews and other “enemies of the Reich.”
Einsatzgruppe C was one of the four special killing squads, labeled A, B, C, and D, the Nazis sent in June of 1941, along with the Wehrmacht troops invading the Soviet Union in Operation Barbarossa, to begin the mass murder of Jews, even before the formal decree of the Final Solution was officially adopted at the Wannsee Conference on January 20, 1942. They spread out over the entire territory, with A responsible for the former Baltic countries of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia; B in charge in Belarus; C was active in central Ukraine and D in southern Ukraine. Over the course of 1941-1943 these units which numbered approximately 3,000 men with assistance from members of the Wehrmacht, German police units, and local collaborators, were responsible for the mass murder by shooting of approximately 2 million people, including 1.3 million Jews.
Condolences
We are sad to report long-time member of the Panevėžys Jewish Community Dina Marijampolskienė passed away December 23 at the age of 92 following a long battle with illness. Our deepest condolences to her son Boris and daughter Ana and her other family members and friends.
Those wishing to bid their final farewells may do so from 4:00 P.M. on December 27 to 11:30 A.M. on December 28 at the Grauduva Funderal Home located at Basanavičiaus street no. 75 next to the Ramygala cemetery in Panevėžys, after which the coffin will be taken for burial.