Lithuanian Jewish Community

Boots on the Water

by Geoff Vasil

The US is sending two contingents of US Marines numbering about 5,000 soldiers and from 1,000 to 3,000 troops from the US Army’s elite 82nd Airborne Division to the Persian Gulf, to arrive sometime in the next week or so. The marines and the paratroopers are specially trained for taking and holding beachheads and islands, and higher ground positions in the case of the paratroopers.

There’s little or no doubt what their mission will be: open the Strait of Hormuz.

So far no one has challenged Iran at the Strait. Raising on a busted flush yet again, the Islamic Republic is trying to spin their image as global boogey-man into strategic control of the chokehold and over the world economy. Iran is seeking to put the blame on Donald Trump for their attacks on commercial shipping. While it’s true that the world’s leading exporter of terrorism could have been expected to act badly and attack neutral shipping, blaming Trump is a media PR ploy aimed at putting public pressure on Trump to end hostilities. Trump didn’t set fire to the 20 or so ships attacked so far.

2026-03-262026-03-26

Dear Jewish Scientific Institute! Book Launch

The Judaica Research Center of the Lithuanian National Library is launching the book “Dear Jewish Scientific Institute!” April 7. The book is a collection of YIVO correspondence presented in Lithuanian (and presumably English judging from the cover) providing readers a look at the textual legacy of the YIVO and their fruitful work in pre-Holocaust Vilnius.

Judaica Research Center director and editor of the book Lara Lempertienė, historian Juozapas Paškauskas, Yiddish translator Aistė Puidokaitė, English translator Dalia Cidzikaitė and book designer Deimantė Rybakovienė will speak on a panel moderated by Jolanta Budriūnienė.

Time: 6:00 P.M., April 7
Place: Lithuanian National Library, Vilnius

2026-03-262026-03-26

Lithuania’s Jedwabne Moment

by Grant Gochin, March 25, 2026

In “The Impossibility of Ignorance” and “The Company He Kept,” I argued that Lithuania elevated Adolfas Ramanauskas-Vanagas into its head-of-state canon without producing the Holocaust-era due-diligence file that such elevation required, and that it did so from within a hero class already contaminated by exposed perpetrators, facilitators and state laundering. This article addresses the consequence. What does a democratic state do when a protected national myth collides with a morally devastating historical record?

Poland faced that question at Jedwabne. The reckoning was incomplete, contested, and politically painful. But the state still moved through investigation and presidential remorse. Jan Tomasz Gross’s Neighbors forced the issue into public view. The Institute of National Remembrance investigated. President Aleksander Kwaśniewski stood at the site in July, 2001, expressed “deepest remorse” and said the truth could not be denied. Poland did not silence the questioner. It investigated the question.

Lithuania has chosen the opposite order. It canonized first, insulated second, and prosecuted the question third.

2026-03-252026-03-25

Musical Seder April 4

The Lithuanian Jewish Community invites you to come celebrate Passover together, with a musical seder scheduled for April 4. Stay tuned for more information.

2026-03-25

Fayerlakh Concert

The Song Club at the Adomas Mickevičius Public Library in Vilnius is hosting a concert by the Jewish song and dance ensemble Fayerlakh at the end of March. Club members will receive instruction in singing Yiddish folk songs in Yiddish, with synchronous texts in Lithuanian and Yiddish, under the tutelage of Fayerlakh veterans. The event is free and open to the general public.

Time: 6:00 P.M., Monday, March 30
Place: Adomas Mickevičius Public Library, Trakų street no. 10, Vilnius

2026-03-252026-03-25

Modestas Saukaitis: Between Gold Dust and Fluxus

The Jonas Mekas Visual Arts Center in Vilnius is hosting an exhibit of works by the late Modestas Saukaitis. Saukaitis was an artist, art and book restorer and interior designer. He curated the first Fluxus exhibition in Lithuania with Gintaras Sodeika. Fluxus was an art movement started by Lithuanian-American artist, writer and filmmaker Jonas Mekas and was loosely associated with Guy de Bord’s Situationist International movement. Saukaitis passed away in 2024. He was deeply interested in Litvak history and his works on exhibit include a tribute to Righteous Gentile Ona Šimaitė and various takes on Jewish Vilna, with inscriptions in Hebrew and Greek characters, displayed in mirror-reverse for whatever reason. This exhibit is based on a previous exhibit of works by Saukaitis at the Shofar Gallery under the Jewish Culture and Information Center in Vilnius was based on texts by Abraham Sutzkever, the Yiddish poet and Litvak partisan (see below).

According to the host gallery, the exhibition features “verre églomisé works, assemblages, archival Fluxus material and video documentation as well as an overview of the artist’s work in interior design and restoration.” The exhibit opened March 6 and runs till May 23. The gallery is located at Malūnų street no. 8 in the Užupis neighborhood of Vilnius.

2026-03-242026-03-27

Šiauliai Jewish Community Marks Rescuers Day with Butterfly Project

The Šiauliai Regional Jewish Community in concert with the Gegužės and Saulėtekis schools in Šiauliai are engaged in a project called “Road of Holocaust Memory: Lives Which Speak” to teach students about the Holocaust and human rights using first-person testimonies.

As part of that project, local students discovered and memorialized the biographies of 36 children who died in the Holocaust in Šiauliai. The older students from the Saulėtekis high school taught the younger students from the Gegužės junior high school about the lives of the Jewish children who were murdered.

2026-03-24

Rescuers Day in Pasvalys

The Pasvalys Regional History Museum held a conference called “They Saved a World…” to mark Lithuania’s Day of Rescuers of Jews. Speakers included Arūnas Bubnys, Aušra Jonušytė, Gražvydas Balčiūnaitis and others. Pasvalys mayor Gintautas Gegužinskas and museum director Vitutė Povilionienė welcomed the audience, which included high school students, Panevėžys Jewish Community chairman Gennady Kofman and local residents.

2026-03-24

Kupiškis Museum Celebrates Rescuers Day

The Kupiškis Museum in Kupiškis, Lithuania, celebrated Lithuania’s Day of Rescuers of Jews on March 16. Eighth-graders from Kupiškis area schools presented texts and drawings on Jews in hiding, rescuing Jews, the Holocaust experience and the inner hope and strength which were needed to survive. The texts and drawings are to become part of a virtual exhibit at the museum later to mark Lithuania’s Day of Remembrance of Jewish Victims of Genocide on September 23.

2026-03-24

Sabbath Times

The Sabbath begins at 6:32 P.M. on Friday, March 20, and concludes at 7:28 P.M. on Saturday in the Vilnius region. Sabbath candles should be lit at 6:14 P.M. and completed before sunset at 6:32 P.M. Depending on your location and local customs, the spring equinox will be marked on Friday, Saturday or Sunday. Nowruz, or Persian New Year, happens on the spring equinox and is now celebrated in multiple countries on multiple dates.

2026-03-19

The Impossibility of Ignorance

by Grant Gochin, March 19, 2026

In 2018, while already a member of NATO and the European Union, Lithuania’s Parliament (Seimas) formally recognized Adolfas Ramanauskas-Vanagas as the head of the Lithuanian state for the period 1954 to 1957. Lithuania’s defense ministry then placed him in the Heads of State Pantheon and described him as a role model for the country’s officers and soldiers. That is not routine commemoration. It is state canonization inside alliances that define themselves by democracy, human rights, and the rule of law.

Once a state does that, the first question is not ceremonial. It is governmental. What public record did Lithuania produce before this elevation showing how Ramanauskas-Vanagas responded to the destruction of Jews in his environment in 1941? Where is the record that he protected Jews, objected to anti-Jewish violence, forbade participation, or punished those who took part? Lithuania’s own official biographies place him in Druskininkai in June 1941 as leader of a self-defense unit and then in Alytus as a teacher from 1941 to 1944. Lithuania has produced no public record of protective action by him toward Jews in that period.

That silence matters because Ramanauskas-Vanagas cannot be sealed off from a documented persecution zone. The Simon Wiesenthal Center warned the Seimas against honoring him. Evaldas Balčiūnas, drawing on archival material cited from the Lithuanian Special Archives and on the work of Arūnas Bubnys, pointed to a July 18, 1941 police report stating that 28 people had already been shot and to evidence that a 38-man partisan unit assisted in establishing the Druskininkai ghetto beginning on July 16. Even on the narrowest reading, this is not an evidentiary void. It is a documented zone of confinement, shooting, and anti-Jewish coercion. Lithuania elevated him anyway.

2026-03-192026-03-20

Faina Kukliansky Elected to General Assembly of European Council of Jewish Communities

Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky attended the sixth Summit or European Jewish Leaders in Athens over the weekend, representing Lithuanian Jews, where she was elected to the General Assembly of European Council of Jewish Communities.

The European Council of Jewish Communities holds the event. This time over 250 participants from more than 30 countries attended. They included community leaders, heads of institutions, cultural professionals and members of Jewish communities from around Europe. Israeli president Isaac Herzog and EC president Ursula von der Leyen greeted the gathering. The meeting focused on continuing Jewish life in Europe and served as an opportunity for Jewish leaders to exchange ideas and experience.

2026-03-18

Ponevezh Purim Celebration and International Women’s Day

The Panevėžys Jewish Community celebrates International Women’s Day each year. This year was no exception and a large contingent of women gathered March 8 for a celebration of the day and improving spring-like weather. The common table was laden with special treats including Purim pastry from the holiday a few days earlier. Since they coincided so closely this year, the Community celebrated both at once, starting with a reading of the Book of Esther.

2026-03-17

Shavl Celebrates Purim with the Musical “A Modern Story of Esther”

The Šiauliai Regional Jewish Community expanded Purim celebrations this year by inviting the general public from Šiauliai and elsewhere with a musical held at the Laptai Gallery of the Šiauliai Culture Center on March 3. The musical was called A Modern Story of Esther based on the text by Itzik Manger and composer Dov Seltzer. The performance space was packed by audience members. The musical itself is a modern version of the traditional purimshpil.

The play was preceded by a presentation by Community member and actress Jūratė Budriūnaitė-Kamrazer on the history, significance and traditions associated with this Jewish holiday.

Vytautas Magnus University Music Academy students performed in the musical, which was followed by traditional Purim treats including homentashn.

The Šiauliai Regional Jewish Community thanks musical director Audronė Eitmanavičiūtė, musical conductor Sabina Martinaitytė and their team of talent from Vytautas Magnus in Kaunas. They also thank the Laiptai Gallery for providing the space and making the event such a success.

2026-03-172026-03-17

Valentinas Kaplūnas and Co. to Perform at LJC

Photo by Virginija Valuckienė

Dear members,

The Lithuanian Jewish Community is pleased to invite you to a concert by cellist Valentinas Kaplūnas and friends. The program includes painting and literature as well as music.

Registration is required by sending an email to zanas@sc.lzb.lt.

Time: 2:00 P.M., Sunday, March 22
Place: Lithuanian Jewish Community, Vilnius

2026-03-17

Exhibit on Jewish Vilna

The Films & Coffee café at the corner of Šv. Mikalojaus and Pranciškonų streets in the Vilnius Old Town will host an exhibit by Gediminas Dubonikas and Vytautas Tinteris on the Litvak population of the Old Town before the Holocaust and when Jews were imprisoned in two ghettos there. The exhibit opens at 7:00 P.M. on March 25. Triteris said the exhibit is appropriate for children.

2026-03-17

Day of Rescuers of Jews in Kaunas

The Ninth Fort in Kaunas opened an exhibit called Rescuers on March 15. The opening coincided with Lithuania’s Day of Rescuers of Jews. The museum invited members of the Kaunas Jewish Community, families of rescuers of Jews and Righteous Gentiles and others.

Kaunas Jewish Community chairman Gercas Žakas, Palanga Jewish Community chairman Vilius Gutmanas, daughter and granddaughter of Righteous Gentiles Iga Makutėnienė, speaker of Lithuanian parliament Juozas Olekas and Darius Jakavičius, chairman of the Commission on Battles for Freedom and Historical Memory, participated, along with other family members of Righteous Gentiles.

A moment of silence was followed by a reading of the names of rescuers of Jews in the city and district of Kaunas. Students from the Naujalis music gymnasium performed. the Ninth Museum’s Vytautas Petrikėnas and Vytautas Švėgžda, the director of Multimediamark who organized the exhibit, presented it in more detail to the audience.

2026-03-17

Australian Football Pays Tribute to “Bondi Victims,” Omits All Mention of Jews

Photo: 7News Australia

The Australian Football League paid a pre-game tribute to the victims of the Bondi Beach massacre but removed all mention of Jews at the last minute.

AFL CEO Andrew Dillon claimed the change to the script was intended to be “more inclusive,” by excluding the fact almost all of those murdered by terrorists were Jews celebrating Hanukkah at the annual event on Australia’s iconic Bondi Beach last December. Apparently the AFL didn’t want to offend Islamic terrorists and extremists resident in Australia.

Dillon said he didn’t know who decided to remove “Jew” as an offensive word.

Now one of the teams in the match has ‘fessed up:

Swans Admit “Error of Judgment” in Bondi Tribute

Sydney has apologized for omitting a specific reference to the Jewish community in its pre-game tribute to victims of the Bondi terror attack

2026-03-162026-03-16

Remembering Righteous Gentiles in Panevėžys

The Panevėžys Regional History Museum hosted an event to mark Lithuania’s Day of Rescuers of Jews Sunday. Panevėžys Jewish Community chairman Gennady Kofman, son of Righteous Gentiles Vidmantas Markevičius and museum director Donatas Juzėnas spoke at the event.

The official Lithuanian commemorative day was first marked on March 15 in 2023. March 15 is the date Yad Vashem recognized Lithuanian librarian Ona Šimaitė for her work rescuing Jews from the Holocaust. Vidmantas Markevičius’s family rescued nine Jews in the Kupiškis region.

Viltis school students read the names of Jews rescued and their rescuers in the Panevėžys district.

The event featured a screening of the documentary film “Irena” about the late Irena Veisaitė. Veisaitė as a girl was rescued from the Holocaust by Stefanija Ladigienė.

2026-03-16

Israeli President Isaac Herzog Visits Lithuania

On the War in Israel and the Situation in Lithuania