Heritage – Page 2 – Lithuanian Jewish Community

Stahlhammer Klezmer Concert

The Embassy of the Kingdom of Sweden in Vilnius and the Lithuanian Jewish Community invite you to a concert of klezmer music by the Stahlhammer Klezmer ensemble February 21.

The trio will perform enchanting klezmer and tango music. It was founded by violinist Semmy Stahlhammer from the Stockholm Royal Opera and a teacher at the Stockholm Royal Music College who usually performs solo violin concerts. Accordion player Miriam Oldenburg specializes in klezmer and cabaret music and toured Europe with Cirque du Soleil in 2012. Cellist Atida Munthe Stahlhammer teaches cello and also performs with the Yidishe Kapelye group and founder of the Stahlheimer quartet and the Brunneby Music Festival held in the summer in Herrgård.

Time: 6:00 P.M., Wednesday, February 21
Place: Lithuanian Jewish Community, Vilnius

Please register here: https://forms.gle/ffRY9GSgzgt3ZmNU7

2024-02-052024-02-05

Kaddish in Ponar

Choral Synagogue cantor Shmuel Yaatom performed kaddish at the Ponar mass murder site outside Vilnius on International Holocaust Day last week.

Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman thanked the Israeli embassy and chargé d’affaires Erez Golan, Švenčionys Jewish Community chairman Moshe Shapiro, young people from the Sholem Aleichem school and all members of the community who turned out to pay their respects to the victims of the Holocaust at Ponar and who came to pay their respects to those who rescued Jews at the monument dedicated to their memory in Vilnius.

2024-01-31

Situation of Lithuanian Jewish Community Presented in Brussels

Last week the European Commission convened the fifth meeting in Brussels of a working group dedicated to combating anti-Semitism and fostering Jewish life in the European Union with Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman and attorney Faina Kukliansky representing Litvaks.

It was the first meeting of the working group since Hamas’s attacks on Israelis on October 7.

The first day of meetings discussed attacks on Jewish communities in the EU and measures taken at the national and European level to address the largest wave of anti-Semitism in Europe since the Holocaust. European Commission vice president Margaritis Schinas responsible for propagating the European way of life began the meeting by reiterating the EC’s resolute pledge to insure the continuation and thriving of Jewish life in the EU.

2024-01-312024-02-13

#WeRemember

The Lithuanian Jewish Community invites all members of the public to mark International Holocaust Day on January 27 by taking part in the global We Remember campaign to keep alive the memory of the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust.

Every year the LJC addresses the Lithuanian municipalities and educational institutions requesting they join the We Remember campaign by visiting mass murder sites, maintaining grave sites, relaying the testimonies of eyewitnesses to the Holocaust and telling the horrific story which had such tragic consequences for Lithuania, Europe and the world.

On Thursday, January 25, everyone is invited to visit the mass murder site in their location to honor the victims. In Vilnius the LJC will ferry those interested by bus to the Ponar Memorial Complex where a commemoration will take place and kaddish will be performed.

The bus will leave from Pylimo street no. 4 at 11:30 A.M. sharp Thursday morning to arrive by 12 noon at Ponar. From the parking lot in Ponar a procession will make its way into the memorial complex. Later we will visit the monument to Righteous Gentiles on Maironio street in Vilnius. Register by sending an email to info@lzb.lt.

If you are unable to attend, you can still participate in the We Remember campaign:

1. Write “We Remember” on a piece of paper, card or cardboard;
2. Take a photograph of yourself or your group holding the inscription;
3. Post on social media with the hash-tag #WeRemember;
4. Send a copy to info@lzb.lt

#WeRemember

2024-01-262024-01-26

Vilna Gaon Museum Marks International Holocaust Day at Vilnius Ghetto Battle Site

Photo: Yekhiel Ilya Sheinboim, right, from Yad Vashem.

The Vilna Gaon Jewish History Museum is marking International Holocaust Day Sunday, January 28 in front of the apartment building on the former Strashun street inside the Vilnius ghetto, now Žemaitijos street no. 8, where the only street battle inside the ghetto between ghetto partisans versus Estonian Waffen-SS with German forces broke out during the two-week-long liquidation of the ghetto. This is where the Nazis blew up one building and barricaded streets, and Jewish partisan leader Yekhiel Ilya Sheinboim fired on the enemy from a balcony before being felled by a volley from up the street. Yekhiel was originally from Odessa and formed an underground resistance group in the Vilnius ghetto independent of the FPO, first merging with Borka Friedman’s Struggle Group to form the Yekhiel Struggle Group, and then merging with the FPO in May of 1943.

The ceremony will take place at 3:30 P.M. at Žemaitijos street no. 8, followed by a concert at the Tolerance Center at Naugarduko street no. 10 called “Windows Open to the Sun” at 5:00 P.M.

2024-01-262024-01-26

Abisl Yidishe Vilne

The Adomas Mickevičius Public Library in Vilnius is opening an exhibit of photography called Abisl Yidishe Vilne or A Bit of Jewish Vilnius with an opening ceremony at 5:30 P.M. on Tuesday, April 2. The exhibit is to feature the works of Aleksandra Jacovskytė, Daumantas Levas Todesas, Eugenijus Bunka and others. The exhibit will run till April 20, 2024. The library is located at Trakų street no. 10 in Vilnius.

2024-01-24

International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust in Panevėžys

The Panevėžys Jewish Community invites you to remember the victims of the Holocaust at a special event to mark International Holocaust Day, January 27. The event in Panevėžys is being held the day before on January 26 starting with a public gathering at ~1:00 P.M. in front of the Sad Jewish Mother monument on Memory Square in the northern Lithuanian city.

Program:

1:00 P.M. opening ceremony and wreath-laying ceremony at Sad Jewish Mother monument, presentations including from Panevėžys city mayor Rytis Račkausas, Panevėžys regional administration mayor Antanas Pocius, students and honored guests.

2:00 P.M. back at Panevėžys Jewish Community headquarters, a conference with Panevėžys Jewish Community members and partners and screenings of Holocaust films.

Please signal your intent to attend by calling+370 61120882 or +370 61017608 or by emailing genakofman@yahoo.com.

2024-01-232024-01-24

Full House for Elyashev Evening of Remembrance in Kaunas

An evening to remember the Jewish writer and first Yiddish literary critic Israel Isidor Elyashev packed the house at the Art and Museum Department of the Vincas Kudirka Public Library in Kaunas last Monday, January 15.

The Kaunas Jewish Community organized the event and Kaunas Jewish Community chairman Gercas Žakas spoke about the man and his legacy, along with others.

2024-01-222024-01-22

Litvak Identity Museum Opening

Yesterday evening the Litvak Culture and Identity Museum opened next door to the Lithuanian Jewish Community in Vilnius.

LJC chairwoman Faina Kukliansky spoke at the opening ceremony, saying the long-awaited exhibits would finally be made public and should be very interesting. She said the history of the Litvaks didn’t begin and end with the Holocaust, that we have a rich history which hasn’t gone away and that the new museum will offer the public a view of that history.

“We are neighbors, the Lithuanian Jewish Community is based right here, on the other side of the wall, in the same building, the former Tarbut gymnasium. We are alive and are celebrating our Jewish identity, and everyone who learns something here at the museum, we invite them to stop by the Community as well, to try our bagels, listen to music and participate in our events. Food, culture and other Community activities of which we are proud–these are all part of the Litvak identity,” Kukliansky said.

Israeli ambassador to Lithuania Hadas Wittenberg-Silverstein also spoke at the opening.

2024-01-192024-01-19

Vilna Gaon Museum Opens New Litvak Culture and Identity Museum

Photo by I. Gelūnas

The Vilna Gaon Jewish History Museum reopens its branch in the former Tarbut Gymnasium at Pylimo street no. 4a Thursday, January 18, following reconstruction and the installation of a new Litvak Culture and Identity exhibit.

The space used to house the museum’s History Department and Gallery of Righteous Gentiles, and has been undergoing renovation for several years. The third floor will now house a permanent exhibit on the life and work of Rafael Chwoles, the Litvak artist. Other exhibits feature Litvaks who found fame and achievement around the world in various fields of endeavor. The space includes four storeys accessible by stairs.

The Vilna Gaon Jewish History Museum includes consists of several sub-museums and spaces including the Tolerance Center, the Holocaust Museum, an information space at the Ponar Memorial Complex outside Vilnius and soon an exhibit inside the former Jewish ghetto library in the Vilnius Old Town.

Full story in Lithuanian here.

2024-01-182024-01-18

Evening to Commemorate Israel Elyashev in Kaunas

The Kaunas Jewish Community invites you to an evening commemorating literary critic and writer Israel (Isidore) Elyashev.

Bal-Makhshoves as he was also known, “man of thoughts,” used that nom-de-plume in his Jewish writing at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.

The commemoration will be held in the former Jewish cafeteria near Elyashev’s home where he died 100 years ago on January 13, 1924. Speakers will touch upon his friendship with the painter Marc Chagall, Jewish life in Kaunas, Elyashev’s home street now known as Daukšos gatvė but formerly called Yatkever or Butcher’s street with five synagogues located along it, about the return of “evacuated” Jewish exiles in 1921 and about the shared and separate Lithuanian and Jewish cultural legacy in Lithuania’s interwar provisional capital Kaunas.

Speakers will also detail his family, including his sister Ester Veisbart who was an art critic, teacher and Lithuania’s first female doctor of philosophy who died in the Kaunas ghetto; the rest of his family who were killed in the Kaunas and Vilnius ghettos and Soviet labor camps and the members of his family to made it to Palestine and lived.

2024-01-112024-01-22

Art Exhibit in Inspired by Abraham Sutzkever

The Shofar Gallery of the Jewish Culture Information Center in Vilnius is hosting an exhibit of works by art and book restorer and artist Modestas Saukaitis inspired by Abraham Sutzkever’s poetry. Saukaitis’s works on exhibit are verre églomisé, an ancient technique which uses white gold painted on glass to produce an extraordinary effect.

The exhibit runs till December 23 and is open to the public during the gallery’s working hours, from noon to 6:00 P.M. on weekdays and from noon till 4:00 P.M. on Saturday. The gallery is located at Mėsinių street no. 3A in the Vilnius Old Town.

For more information, see here.

2023-12-21

Anniversary of Escape from Ninth Fort

On December 25, 1943, 64 prisoners at the Ninth Fort in Kaunas pulled off a daring escape. The Jews and Soviet POWs were the crew selected by the Nazis to exhume and burn corpses.

The Ninth Fort Museum in Kaunas has set up a special exhibit to mark the 80th anniversary of the escape featuring the testimonies of survivors.

Ya’arit Glezer’s father Pinia Krakinovski was one of the escapees and she came from Israel to speak at the opening of the new exhibition. Yakov Faitelson also spoke through an audio recording–his father Aleks was one of the escapees–as did Medel Deich’s son Grisha Deich. Israeli ambassador to Lithuania Hadas Wittenberg-Silverstein attended the event and spoke to the audience about the importance of history in the context of current events.

2023-12-152023-12-15

Strashun Street Library Space to House New Museum

Lithuanian construction company Infes reported they concluded a contract with the Vilna Gaon Jewish History Museum for help creating a museum inside the Vilnius ghetto library space located on Žemaitijos street, formerly Strashun street, where library director Herman Kruk wrote most of his Vilnius ghetto diary and where the FPO, the Vilnius ghetto partisan fighters force, had a shooting range in the basement.

Infes said they would undertake capital renovation of the building and do other construction there. According to their press release, the museum will teach visitors about the Vilnius ghetto and the Holocaust in Lithuania and will feature unique items from the Vilna Gaon Museum’s collections.

2023-12-142023-12-14

Lost World Photo Exhibit

December 13 the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture opened an exhibit of 15 specially selected photographs of the former Jewish quarter and Great Synagogue by pre-war photographer Jan Bulhak as part of closing ceremonies in the celebration of Vilnius’s 700th birthday, the newspaper Lietuvos Rytas reports on its website lrytas.lt

Culture minister Simonas Kairys, former culture minister Arūnas Gelūnas who now directs the Lithuanian National Art Museum which selected the photographs for the exhibit, Israeli ambassador to Lithuania Hadas Wittenberg-Silverstein, Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky and others attended the opening. Boris Kizner provided Jewish airs on violin.

Gelūnas told Lietuvos Rytas television only two of the fifteen photographs contain human beings because the photographer thought empty streets and vacant sidewalks showed off the architecture better and presented a more romantic picture of the city.

“In a way he was prophetic in this: after World War II all these streets were emptied of people,” Gelūnas noted. He added the lessons of history haven’t been learned, anti-Semitism is alive and well in the world and people still cling to authoritarianism.

2023-12-142023-12-14

In Every Generation: Vancouver Remembers 1985 Firebombing of Synagogue

Photo: This menorah survived a firebomb attack at Vancouver’s Temple Sholom in 1985. (CBC)

A menorah has become a symbol of hope after surviving a 1985 firebombing at a Vancouver synagogue

The old Temple Sholom was destroyed during an arson attack in 1985, but a menorah withstood the blaze

A menorah is one of the last remaining vestiges of a Vancouver synagogue that was ravaged by a firebomb in 1985.

In the pre-dawn hours of January 25, 1985, a Molotov cocktail was hurled through a first-floor window into Temple Sholom, which at the time was located on West 10th Avenue.

While no one was hurt in the bombing, it destroyed much of the building. The arsonist was never apprehended.

2023-12-12

Lecture: The Miracle of Hanukkah

You’re invited to a lecture by Natalja Cheifec called The Miracle of Hanukkah this Wednesday at 5:30 P.M. via the zoom internet platform. You’ll learn:

-about Hanukkah as a holiday preserving tradition
-what the Most High does during Hanukkah
-why Jews gaze at candle flames during Hanukkah
-about Hanukkah doughnuts and Hanukkah gelt

2023-12-12

Concert in Remembrance of Grigoriy Kanovitch

The Šalom, Akmenė! project with the Vilna Gaon Jewish History Museum are holding a concert to remember the late novelist Grigoriy Kanovitch. It is to include students from art schools in the Akmenė and Joniškis regions and students from the Song Cathedral of the Music Academy of Vytautas Magnus University. The program includes songs in Yiddish.

Time: 3:00 P.M., Sunday, December 3
Place: Tolerance Center of the Vilna Gaon Museum, Naugarduko street no. 10, Vilnius

The concert is free and open to the public.

2023-12-01

Eightieth Anniversary of Liquidation and Uprising of Vilnius Ghetto: International Conference “Ideologies of Hate and Hope in Modern Jewish History”

You’re invited to the final event in our commemoration of the 80th anniversary of liquidation of the Vilnius ghetto this year, the international conference “Ideologies of Hate and Hope in Modern Jewish History” in Constitution Hall in Building 1 at the Lithuanian parliament on Tuesday, November 28, 2023.

Participants must register by internet before 3:00 P.M. on Monday, November 27, here: https://bit.ly/40NAUZ3

The conference will be conducted in Lithuanian and English with translations. It is being held through the efforts of the Polish Jewish History Institute, YIVO and the Lithuanian Jewish Community. It will be streamed on the LJC’s facebook page.

Program:

2023-11-222023-11-23

Scout Hike

Scouts and parents are invited to a fall hike Sunday, November 26. The hike is a free event and open to all children and their parents. Please register by internet before midnight, November 24, by clicking here: https://forms.gle/fbDdB1HDhBUQKw976

For more information, contact hike leader Adelina Kofman by telephone at 860581922 or write skautai@lzb.lt.

2023-11-222023-11-22