Learning, History, Culture

Five EU Countries Who Shouldn’t Be Throwing Stones

Five EU Countries Who Shouldn’t Be Throwing Stones

Efraim Zuroff

Accusing Russia of rewriting the Holocaust for its current propaganda is fair, but not when you’ve always whitewashed the Holocaust for your own purposes

Several days ago I was shocked to learn that five heads of state from Lithuania, Romania, Estonia, Latvia and Poland, all post-Communist Eastern European countries, had recently beseeched the leaders of the European Union to step up efforts to “preserve historical memory.” It was addressed to the European Council president, European Commission president and the Czech prime minister, whose country currently holds the rotating EU presidency.

For the past three decades since their transition to democracy, these countries have excelled in grossly distorting their own respective histories of the Holocaust. Yet the quintet of leaders now maintains that the Kremlin “is seeking to rewrite history and use it to justify its aggression against sovereign states.” Thus they urge the bodies of the EU to take a leadership role in “preserving historical memory and preventing the Russian regime from manipulating historical facts.” They contend that this concern “is particularly relevant in light of Russia’s intensive use of history for propaganda purposes in the context of the war in Ukraine.”

Full editorial here.

Condolences

Izraela Blataitė, honorary citizen of Šarnelė, Lithuania, has passed away in Israel. We extend our heartfelt condolences to her family and loved ones.

Genocide Center Sets Up Information Stand at Mass Murder Site Near Trakai

Genocide Center Sets Up Information Stand at Mass Murder Site Near Trakai

The controversial Lithuanian Genocide Center erected an information stand about the mass murder of the Jews of Trakai next to the mass murder site in the Varnikai village in the Trakai district on August 4, 2022.

The stand was erected at the request of directorate of the Trakai National Historical Park.

It contains information including 297 names of those murdered at the site on September 30, 1941. The Genocide Center claims the actual number of those murdered at the site on that day was 1,446, a figure likely taken from the Jäger report.

The stand says the Ypatingasis unit (still notorious in its original Lithuanian form in Holocaust testimonies in numerous languages, literally “the special unit,” or Sonderkommando in German) under the command of SS officer Martin Weiss and Vilnius Ypatingasis commander Balys Norvaiša murdered more than a thousand Jews from Trakai and surrounding towns and then got drunk and sang songs at a local cafeteria.

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Tisha b’Av on Saturday

Tisha b’Av on Saturday

Tisha b’Av, the 9th day of the month of Av on the Hebrew calendar, falls on Saturday, July 6 this year.

Tisha b’Av commemorates the destruction of the First Temple of Solomon ca. 587 BCE and the Second Temple in 70 CE in Jerusalem and is traditionally a day of fasting and mourning. Observance includes five prohibitions, the main one being a 25-hour fast. The Book of Lamentations is read in the synagogue followed by the recitation of kinnos, liturgical dirges for the Temple and Jerusalem. Since the day has become associated with other major Jewish tragedies, some kinnos recall other events, including the murder of the Ten Martyrs in ancient Rome, pogroms against medieval Jewish communities and the Holocaust.

According to tradition, the sin of the Ten Spies is the real origin of Tisha B’Av. In the Book of Numbers, 13:1-33 when the Israelites accepted their false report of the Promised Land, they wept, thinking God could no help them. The night the people wept and wailed was the ninth day of Av, which then became a day of weeping and misfortune for all time, according to tradition, following which the Jews were made to wander the desert for 40 years.

Roma Holocaust Memorial Day Marked in Lithuania

Roma Holocaust Memorial Day Marked in Lithuania

Around 4,300 people of Roma and Sinti ethnicity were murdered at the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp complex on the night of August 2, 1944. In 2015 the EU parliament resolved to make this day the Roma Holocaust Memorial Day in memory of the approximately 500,000 Roma and Sinti murdered in Europe.

World War II and its genocide of the Roma did great harm to the Roma living in Lithuania and left agony in its wake for the Roma community. In 1942 Nazi-occupied Lithuania undertook mass arrests of Roma, and the arrestees were taken to concentration and labor camps in France and Germany. About 1,000 Roma were deported from Lithuania, most of whom returned to Lithuania after the war. Roma were murdered in Lithuania. The majority were shot in Pravieniškės, but they were also murdered en masse outside Švenčionys in the Šalčininkai region in southeast Lithuania. Near Vilnius in the Kirtimai village a caravan of Roma was liquidated, although the exact number murdered is not known. About 500 Roma were murdered during the Nazi occupation of Lithuania, about one in three. The Nazis murdered Roma families they encountered travelling, but didn’t report how many they killed, so the figure of 500 could be significantly larger.

The Roma Community Center marks August 2 annually. Below is the story told by Anastazija Jablonskienė-Bagdonavičiūtė’s daughter Elžbieta. She was the only survivor from her family, she was away when the Nazis came for them. She hid during the war and survived. Anastazija had 18 children.

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Arkadijus Vinokuras’s Discussion Club on Wins at World Maccabiah Games

Arkadijus Vinokuras’s Discussion Club on Wins at World Maccabiah Games

The #ŽydiškiPašnekesiai discussion club moderated by Arkadijus Vinokuras will meet on August 10 to discuss the recent victories by Lithuanian Makabi Athletic Club athletes at the World Maccabiah Games in Israel.

The Lithuanian team made one of its best showings ever, winning 6 medals last month.

The club was active in interwar Lithuania from 1920 to 1940. It was originally founded in 1916. In 1926 the club had 83 branches throughout Lithuania, encompassing 4,000 members. It published a newspaper twice per month and had its own sports stadium. The club was reconstituted on January 8, 1989, at a general meeting at the calculator and business machine factory in Vilnius.

Speakers will include Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky, Lithuanian Makabi Athletics Club president Semionas Finkelšteinas, table-tennis medal winner many times over Rafael Gimelštein and others.

The panel discussion will be held in Lithuanian at the Bagel Shop Café at 5:00 P.M. on August 10.

Video from Opening of Exhibit of Interwar Litvak Photographers Mausha Levi and Shimon Bayer

Video from Opening of Exhibit of Interwar Litvak Photographers Mausha Levi and Shimon Bayer

The Maironis Museum of Lithuanian Literature and Faina Borovsky organized an exhibit of the photography of interwar Litvak photographers Mausha Levi and Shimon Bayer which opened July 28 at the museum located at the Old Town Square, Rotušės aikštė no. 13, in Kaunas. The exhibit is part of the Kaunas, Capital of European Culture 2022 program. The video below shows the opening of the exhibit, visited by both Gercas Žakas, chairman of the Kaunas Jewish Community, and Robert Gilchrist, US ambassador to Lithuania.

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Litvak Descendant Jenny Kagan Comes Back to Kaunas: How Can You Live Here When You Know Any Passerby Might Have Beaten Your Father to Death?

Litvak Descendant Jenny Kagan Comes Back to Kaunas: How Can You Live Here When You Know Any Passerby Might Have Beaten Your Father to Death?

Lithuanian state radio and television has published an interview with Jenny Kagan:

As Margarita Štromaitė, born in Kaunas, wrote in her memoirs, her future husband she met in the ghetto, Juozas Kagan and his mother Mira were rescued by Vytautas Rinkevičius’s family: “Regardless of the deadly danger, which threatened his entire family, he set up a hiding place for us in the attic of the forge. It was where the straw was, separated by an imaginary wall.” Twenty years after the Holocaust Margarita met her only surviving relative, her brother Aleksandras Štromas. In 1965 she and Joseph had a daughter, Eugenia. Or Jenny.

Jenny Kagan will be in Kaunas beginning August 4 for the exhibit “From Darkness” which is part of the Kaunas Capital of European Culture 2022 program, which will present her family history in subtle artistic techniques including text and audio, revealing previously unknown pages from the story of Kaunas.

This is also the story of the humanness and light we require to survive as a civilization. The exhibit will be held at Gimnazijos street no. 4 in Kaunas as part of the Histories Festival of the Kaunas Capital of European Culture 2022 program.

Full interview in Lithuanian here.

Panevėžys Jewish Community Celebrates 30th Birthday

Panevėžys Jewish Community Celebrates 30th Birthday

On July 24 members, partners and friends of the Panevėžys Jewish Community gathered to celebrate the organization’s 30th birthday. Chairman Gennady Kofman thanked active members of the community in carrying on Jewish tradition and preserving Jewish heritage and gave special thanks to supporters and partners for their contribution in expanding the Community’s activities.

Community members recalled how the Community was formed and paid respects to its first chairman, the journalist Anatolijus Fainblumas, and others. Sincere words of gratitude went to Righteous Gentile Jonas Markevičius’s son Vidmantas and daughter Janina, who have helped promote the Community as well in the local community. Thanks were given to executive board members Jurijus Grafman and his wife Svetlana. Deep gratitude was expressed for the Lithuanian Jewish Community and its chairwoman Faina Kukliansky.

Chairman Kofman told the 30-year story of the Community. On July 8, 1991, the Panevėžys Jewish Community was officially reconstituted and articles of incorporation filed at the Panevėžys municipality. Goals and duties were set then: “To develop the national consciousness of members, to raise the level of culture and spirituality, to conduct our activities based on exemplary behavior and sincerity, to cooperate with all sorts of democratic organizations and religious confessions,” etc.

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Emannuel Levinas’s Grandson Thinks This Time Best since World War II

Emannuel Levinas’s Grandson Thinks This Time Best since World War II

Although the war in the Ukraine continues, David Hansel, the grandson of French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas with Lithuanian roots, currently visiting Kaunas, thinks things have never been so peaceful as now. He rejects claims of genocide in the Ukraine by either side in the conflict. In an interview with Lithuanian state radio and television, he shared his ideas about the country of Lithuania, where his family members were murdered in the Holocaust. He attended a five-day series of events about his grandfather held in Kaunas by the Emmanuel Levinas Center of the Lithuanian Health Sciences University and by other faculties at that university and a French organization. Although he says he isn’t a philosopher, he felt the duty to protect his grandfather’s legacy. He said he is a practicing Jew, but that it’s based on what he learned from his grandfather.

Full interview in Lithuanian here.

Thank You to Faina Kukliansky

Dear chairwoman,

I am sincerely grateful to be part of the program “Support for Rescuers of Jews during World War II.” I would like to give a big thank you to senior coordinator Ema Jakobienė, social programs department director Michail Segal and to your entire wonderful collective, thanks to whom I am receiving material and financial support.

My parents, Stasė and Pranas Karalevičiai, rescued 19 citizens of Jewish ethnicity during the war. As a six-year-old I also contributed to this honorable activity to the extent that I could. I was awarded the Life-Saver’s Cross which was presented by president Valdas Adamkus.

Respectfully,

Elena Čepanonienė
Semeliškės, Lithuania

Limmud in the Woods 2022

Limmud in the Woods 2022

The annual international Limmud conference will be held August 19 and 20 in the woods of south Estonia. To register, go to the Limmud page here. For more information, check out Limmud’s facebook page here.

Lithuanian Makabi Athletes Happy with Showing at World Maccabiah Games

Lithuanian Makabi Athletes Happy with Showing at World Maccabiah Games

from lrytas.lt

Athletes from the Lithuanian Makabi Athletics Club have concluded competition at the 21st World Maccabiah Games in Israel which ran from July 12 to July 26 with around 10,000 athletes from over 60 countries. Lithuanian Makabi athletes won 6 medals, making these games among the most successful since Lithuanian Makabi was reconstituted. Table tennis player Gerda Šišanovaitė won a gold medal in singles competition and Ignas Šišanovas took silver also in singles matches. Swimmer Michailas Trusovas is coming home with silver in 50-meter freestyle competition. The youngest member of the delegation, 13-year-old Eduardas Šeras, won silver in heated chess matches in the 16- to 18-year-old category.

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Condolences

With deep sadness we report Jakovas Mendelevskis passed away at the age of 91 on July 26. He had been deported from Lithuania by the Soviets and was a member of the minyan at the Choral Synagogue in Vilnius.

Lithuanian Makabi Athletes Earn Medals at World Maccabiah

Lithuanian Makabi Athletes Earn Medals at World Maccabiah

Congratulations to Rafael Gimelstein who took silver in tennis competitions at the World Maccabiah Games taking place in Israel, and to his proud mother Faina Kukliansky. Congratulations also to Alan Rinkevič who won silver in fencing on the international team along with athletes from France and Sweden, and a hearty congratulations to all our other Lithuanian Makabi athletes and trainers who are making such an excellent showing in so many sports.

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Condolences

Jelena Levina passed away July 19 at the age of 94. She was born in 1927. She was a long-standing member and volunteer. She will be missed by all of us.

Happy Birthday to Gennady Kofman

Happy Birthday to Gennady Kofman

The entire Lithuanian Jewish Community wishes Panevėžys Jewish Community chairman Gennady Kofman a terrific milestone birthday. He has done so much to collect and share information about the city’s once numerous Jewish community, and always finds the time and energy to meet and help travellers looking for their roots and to teach school children and the wider community about the Holocaust. Mazl tov. Bis 120!

Condolences

Richard Freund passed away in Charlottesville, Virginia, on July 14 due to complications involving a bone-marrow transplant he received 18 years ago. He was 67. Freund was a frequent visitor to Vilnius and a friend of the Lithuanian Jewish Community. Besides annual summer digs at the Great Synagogue site in Vilnius, revealing many new facts and the existence of surviving elements and a few surprises at that site, he also headed the non-invasive investigation of the escape tunnel dug by the brenner kommando at Ponar, Jews who were forced to exhume corpses, burn the flesh and crush the bones, who themselves were slated for death upon completion of their task aimed at hiding Holocaust crimes. The rediscovery of the tunnel was featured in an hour-long documentary by NOVA on the American public television network PBS. Freund also led the effort to map the lost Jewish shtetl of Rumshishok (Rumšiškės) just outside Kaunas flooded in the post-war period to create a hydroelectric generation station, and worked on a number of other Jewish sites in Lithuania. He also used non-invasive techniques to investigate the Warsaw ghetto in 2021.

Freund always found the time in the middle of his work to explain his finds to interested on-lookers, and presented his findings to the Lithuanian Jewish Community in a series of presentations in Vilnius.

We mourn his loss and extend our deepest condolences to his widow Eliane, his three children Eli, Ethan, and Yoni and his many other family members and friends at the University of Hartford and around the world.