The Joint Distribution Committee, or Joint, renewed aid to the regional Jewish communities and Jews in trouble in Lithuania and the other Baltic states following independence.
This year, to mark the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Jewish American charity, the Panevėžys (Ponevezh) Jewish Community undertook a project which culminated in a public event on November 6, 2014. The goal of the project was to showcase the Joint’s charitable work in Panevėžys and Lithuania.
The event began on the sunny morning of November 6 at the city’s G. Petkevičaitė-Bitė Public Library. A large audience of esteemed guests took part in the conference staged by the Panevėžys Jewish Community. Community chair Gennadu Kofman opened the conference with a speech about the Joint’s unique and historical activities during and after World War II.
Many of the guests held important political posts and occupied important positions in Lithuanian society. Panevėžys mayor Vitalijus Satkevičius welcomed the attendants noting the importance of the project. Diana Varnaitė, director of Lithuania’s Cultural Heritage Department, spoke about Jewish life and emphasized the importance of the work being carried out by the Joint. Panevėžys bishop Lionginas Virbalas spoke in favor of the work the Joint had carried out providing, he said, the prerequisites for humanitarianism, goodness, empathy and repentance. Ronaldas Račinskas, executive secretary of Lithuania’s International Commission for the Assessment of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupational Regimes, spoke briefly and presented a certificate of gratitude to the Panevėžys Jewish Community for their sincere cooperation and partnership with schools in the Panevėžys municipality which host Tolerance Centers, which was an initiative of his commission.
Among the more eminent guests from abroad at the conference were Israel’s ambassador Hagit Ben-Yaakov, Joint representative in Lithuania Ariel Nadbornik and Lithuanian Chief Rabbi Haim Burshtein. Also in attendance were members of the Panevėžys city council, principals from local primary and secondary schools, students, and many others. Important contributors to the event included the senior museum specialist from the Panevėžys Regional History Museum, the director of the archives of the Panevėžys region, the head of the G. Petkevičaitė-Bitė Public Library, the director of the Panevėžys Gallery and many others, all in attendance.
Those who gave speeches included the aforementioned Gennady Kofman; senior museum specialist of the Panevėžys Regional History Museum Donatas Pilkauskas and Lithuanian Jewish Community Social Center director Simas Levinas. Audience members heard about the history of the establishment of the Joint and its achievements for Jews in Panevėžys, in Lithuania and around the world. Even today the Joint is the largest Jewish humanitarian organization in the world, operating in more than seventy countries. The Joint Distribution Committee draws upon a century of experience to fight Jewish poverty, thus safeguarding Jews against many different kinds of threats.
Guests were later treated to a photographic exhibit showing moments in the life of the work of the Joint in Lithuania. They also enjoyed a live concert and a luncheon. A small folio filled with copies of archival documents and photographs from the JDC archive was also distributed to guests.
Panevėžys Jewish Community chair Gennady Kofman made sure the people who had prepared and contributed to the project weren’t left out of the limelight at the event. He presented them all letters of gratitude and gifts for their resolute cooperation and tolerance.
The culmination of the event was the unveiling of a stele to commemorate 100 years of the Joint in Panevėžys and Lithuania. It was erected on the former Džonto street (i.e., Joint Street), now Zikaro street, but named after the Joint by the Panevėžys city council in 1923 for the JDC’s aid in constructing buildings for religious and educational institutions and for building new homes in the Jewish quarter.
Those who spoke at the unveiling of the attractive monument included Gennady Kofman, Chief Rabbi of Lithuania Haim Burshtein, Israeli ambassador to Lithuania and Latvia Hagit Ben-Yaakov, Panevėžys city council member Galina Kuzmienė and perhaps the two most important people participating in the project, Yuriy and Svetlana Grafman, who provided financial support. Tautvydas Anilionis, director of the Margarita Rimkevičaitė Technical School in Panevėžys, turned out with the freshman class to witness the ceremonial unveiling of the stele.
This event turned an important new page in history, showing the public the importance of the charitable work the Joint carries out, so that the current and future generations might have a better understanding of the contributions the Joint made to economic development after World War I and World War II. The folio distributed to guests by the Panevėžys Jewish Community, due to size constraints, was only able to tell briefly a small part, though important to Lithuanian Jews, of the JDC’s history.
