Lithuanian Jewish Community

Lithuanian President Meets with LCJ, Maltese Charitable Organization Head to Discuss Aid to Righteous Gentiles

April 6, 2016

Wednesday, April 6, Vilnius. President of the Republic of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaitė met with the initiators of a unique project to aid rescuers of Jews during the Holocaust in Lithuania and Germany. The unusual project for Lithuanian Jewish rescuers carried out in two countries was the initiative of the Order of Malta and the Lithuanian Jewish Community.

The goal of the project was to help people living in Lithuania who saved Jews during World War II. Lithuanian president Dalia Grybauskaitė and German Federal Republic president Joachim Glauck supported the initiative.

“Even during the darkest hours of our history, Righteous Gentiles demonstrated humanity. Lithuania and Germany together remember their bravery and sacrifice, and we will always be grateful for the heroism and nobility of the Righteous Gentiles. This project brings together people and countries and forms a bridge between the past and the future, denying victory to apathy,” the president of Lithuania said.

2016-04-06

Israeli Supreme Court Says State Should Recognize Orthodox Conversion

TEL AVIV (JTA)–Israel’s Supreme Court ruled that the state must recognize Orthodox conversions performed in Israel outside the authority of the Chief Rabbinate. The ruling Thursday means any non-citizen who converts in a private Israeli Orthodox conversion court can gain Israeli citizenship under the country’s Law of Return. Previously, converts who converted abroad could only gain Israeli citizenship if they lived in a Diaspora Jewish community. Some 150 citizens who have converted in private Israeli Orthodox conversion courts will now be seen as Jewish by the state.

The court rejected the state’s claim that only Chief Rabbinate conversions are legitimate within Israel. Because of the Jewish community’s multifaceted nature, the court ruled, any conversion performed by any Orthodox community, whether in Israel or abroad, are recognized as valid.

“The Jewish nation is indeed one nation, but it is spread out across the world and is composed of communities, layers and sub-layers,” the court’s decision read. Recognizing only the Chief Rabbinate “does not attribute weight to the existing range of Jewish communities–and that is unacceptable.”

Full story here.

2016-04-05

Thank You

The Kaunas Jewish Community expresses their heart-felt thanks for the timely ordering and delivery of matzo for the community. Our gratitude to Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky, Social Center director Simas Levinas, accountant Asta Rainytė, program coordinators Michailis Segalis, Ema Jakobienė, Rašelė Šeraitėi, project leader Lauras Sabonis, administrator Rokas Dobrovolskas and Indrė Rutkauskaitė.

Holiday greetings to all!

2016-04-01

Challa at the Bagel Shop Café

The Bagel Shop Café has begun making challa bread for Sabbath the way it should be. Besides bagels, visitors can now purchase authentic challa bread, not too sweet but very delicious. A good Sabbath to all.

2016-04-01

Amercian Virtuosi to Play Panevėžys

The Panevėžys Musical Theater
Nepriklausomybės [Independence] square No. 8
5:30 P.M., April 20, 2016

Concert

Music: The Best Bridge between All Nations

The American Virtuosi ensemble:

Emmanuel Borowsky on violin, Frances Borowsky on cello, Elizabeth Borowsky on piano, Charles Borowsky on harmonica and voice.

Jerusalem of Lithuania ensemble musicians to perform at the concert:

Boris Traub on violin, Henrikas Marcinkus on alto violin and Valentinas Kaplūnas on cello.

Program:

Day One: Faustas Latėnas – Borisas Traubas. “Jerusalem of Lithuania,” musical score for Grigorijus Kanovičius’s drama “Nusišypsok mums, Viešpatie!” [“Smile upon us, O Lord!”]. Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis (1875-1911) – Five pieces (an adaptation by Boris Traub). Luigi Boccerini, quintet, “Musica notturna delle strade di Madrid” [“Night Music of the Streets of Madrid”].

Day Two: Max Bruch, Scottish Fantasy, op. 46, parts 2 and 3. Francis Poulenc, Sonata for cello, FP 143, parts 2 and 3. “Music from around the World” medley by the American Virtuosi.

Lithuanian concerts by the American Virtuosi supported by:

2016-03-31

Israeli Food Industry Reps to Visit Lithuania

Next week a delegation of representatives of the Israeli food industry are to visit Lithuania. About 20 people from 13 Israeli companies are scheduled to come to look for partners. They are reportedly looking for ecological and vegetarian products, products with a long shelf-life and items which might be new to their national market. The public organization Versli Lietuva is to organize meetings with about 50 Lithuanian companies. The Israeli delegation will also attend a business forum along with representatives of the Israeli embassy to assess the results of cooperation between the two countries so far and to talk about the future. Israeli ambassador to Lithuania Amir Maimon said the visit demonstrates the desire by both countries to increase trade and business ties.

In the past Lithuanian food producers have visited fairs in Israel and more and more Lithuanian businesses are getting kosher food certificates. Almost 40 percent of Lithuanian exports to Israel are food products, mainly milk products, and agricultural production. One hot Lithuanian export item has been cheese for about 20 years now. Non-food exports include pharmaceuticals and furniture.

The most promising Lithuanian exports to Israel include biotech, IT services, chemicals, furniture, food, timber and tourism. The Lithuanian company Altechna exports lasers to Israel and biotech firm ProBioSanus has entered the Israeli market as well.

2016-03-31

Our Deepest Condolences

Girsh Vainer, member of the Lithuanian Jewish Community’s Social Club, passed away March 29. Our deepest condolences to his family and friends.

December 6, 1946—March 29, 2016

2016-03-31

LJC and Rositsan and Maccabi Elite Checkers and Chess Club Chess Championship

The Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Rositsan and Maccabi Elite Checkers and Chess Club invite you to a chess championship open to the public at 11:00 A.M. on April 3.

At 11:00 A.M. on April 10 there will be a chess tournament dedicated to the memory of chess master Donatas Lapienis.

Both events are to take place at the Lithuanian Jewish Community, Pylimo No. 4, Vilnius.

Boris Rositsan, FIDE master, will direct both competitions.

For more information and to register, contact:

info@metbor.lt
telephone +3706 5543556

2016-03-31

Lox on Bagels: An Answer to Eggs Benedict?

A Bit about Bagels

The history of the bagel is surrounded by myth and legend but seems to begin in the 12th century. One version has it that a Church ban on commercial Jewish bakeries was responsible for its appearance. In 1264 Polish grand duke Bolesław the Pious issued his Statute of Kalisz or Charter for Jews of Grand Poland which allowed Jews to freely by, sell and touch bread in common with Christians. In response a group of Polish bishops forbade Christians from buying any food at all from Jews, as it were anathema. As Moses ben Israel Isserles put it in the 16th century” “it is preferable to live on dry bread and in peace in Poland” than to remain in better conditions in lands more dangerous for Jews. At some point Jews were allowed to work with bread which was boiled, and they created the bagel to comply with his ruling, according to this version. In 1610 the first mention appears of the word “bagel” in Yiddish in the written sources, in regulations issued by the Jewish council of Kraków, which stated that bagels were to be given as a gift to women in childbirth.

Whatever the case, the bagel was popular among Jews in Eastern Europe, and came with them to America in the 19th and 20th centuries.

2016-03-31

Lithuanian Psychologist: Three Years Ago I Believed the Double Genocide Theory

Rasa Bieliauskaitė, photo: Ugnius Babinskas

Three Years Ago I Believed the Double Genocide Theory
by Geoff Vasil

So said Rasa Bieliauskaitė, a psychologist specializing in trauma therapy, at what was, for Lithuania, a remarkable meeting of the minds recently.

The Vilnius Jewish Public Library hosted a panel discussion featuring historians and psychologists on the topic of the Holocaust and collective memory.

In their introductory statements several of the speakers, including Bieliauskaitė, mentioned Rūta Vanagaitė’s new book about the Lithuanian Holocaust, and the unexpected popularity of that book became the backdrop for much of the conversation which lasted several hours and which became a much larger discussion when distinguished members of the audience chimed in towards the end.

2016-03-30

Is Turkey Planning to Destabilize Lebanon?

by colonel (retired) Dr. Jacques Neriah
March 27, 2016

Institute for Contemporary Affairs
Founded jointly with the Wechsler Family Foundation

Vol. 16, No. 6
March 27, 2016

Interviewed by Lenny Ben-David, Director of Publications

• The Turkish leadership saw the uprising in Syria and Egypt as an opportunity to replace regimes opposed to Turkey’s policies in the Middle East. Turkey looked at two targets: Egypt and Syria. In both countries, the Islamic opposition was headed by the Muslim Brotherhood, natural allies of Turkish president Erdogan.

• Turkey viewed developments in Syria as an opportunity to intervene and topple the Alawite regime. Turkish military intelligence was instructed to assist rebel factions opposed to the Assad regime almost from the very first days of the civil war in Syria.

• Testimony in Turkish courts alleges that rocket parts, ammunition and semi-finished mortar shells taken from Turkish intelligence depots were carried in trucks accompanied by state officials to parts of Syria under hardline Islamist rebel control.

• Turkey may have chosen to take advantage of the already boiling situation in Lebanon between Hizbullah and its Sunni opponents and try to provoke a renewed civil war in Lebanon.

• Greek authorities intercepted a ship recently, loaded with a Turkish shipment of weapons, supposedly destined for Muslim radicals in the northern part of Lebanon.

2016-03-30

Lithuanian Prime Minister Thanks Fayerlakh Ensemble

To the Vilnius Cultural Center Jewish song and dance ensemble

Fayerlakh

Dear guardians of ethnic tradition,

There is no doubt the identity of a people resides in the depths of their folklore where a unique world of music beckons to us and symbolic meanings cavort. For many a year now the Fayerlakh ensemble in their concerts have brought lovers of folklore together and have popularized Yiddish culture wonderfully.

Inventive musicians, great singers and expressive dancers have come together nicely under the Fayerlakh flag. And so your concerts are dominated by a sense of beauty and cohesion. Your playful appearances are eagerly awaited by many admirers around the world.

You are probably the only ensemble in Europe who so creatively, cleverly and tightly present your own musical sources and roots.

I sincerely congratulate the entire Fayerlakh collective on the beautiful 45th anniversary of your establishment.

Let your music ring out widely across the nations for many centuries. Celebrate and preserve your foundational values. I wish you great success, creative talent and many happy meetings with the real lovers of folklore on all continents.

Algirdas Butkevičius
March 22, 2016
Vilnius

2016-03-29

A Letter of Thanks to the Fayerlakh Ensemble from the Lithuanian Jewish Community

Celebrating their 45th anniversary, the Jewish song and dance ensemble Fayerlakh provided a real celebration for the people of Vilnius with their performance, and a packed hall of spectators applauded, swayed to the beat and tapped their feet because the musicians enchanted them and warmed everyone’s hearts. The Lithuanian Jewish Community is grateful to and proud of the Vilnius Cultural Center Jewish song and dance ensemble Fayarlakh, whose name is Yiddish for “little flames.”

Let the creative fire of this ensemble led by Larisa Vyšniauskienė continue to burn, reminding everyone of the rich culture of the Litvaks. It is extremely important to our community that the ensemble with Yiddish songs and dances which over many years has achieved a highly professional level has preserved our dear Jewish cultural legacy. Thank you, our thanks to the ensemble and their director, to the wonderful performers, for the program The Shtetl Once Upon a Time, which is now being offered to audiences in Lithuania and abroad. The program is about the small town, or shtetl in Yiddish, where until the Holocaust Jewish people and people of other ethnicities lived together in harmony. The mood of the concert is one of happy songs, dances, music which gives rise to good emotions, nostalgic and exciting, in everyone’s hearts. We appreciate that the ensemble celebrates the Yiddish language and that Jewish works in this language are performed in concert. It fills us with gladness to see all the ensemble’s groups, from children to senior citizens, on stage. Our sincerest gratitude to all of you.

Faina Kukliansky, chairwoman
Lithuanian Jewish Community

2016-03-29

Purim at the Gesher Club

The Gesher Club of the Lithuanian Jewish Community celebrated Purim March 25 at the Natali Restaurant in Vilnius. Since carnival costumes are a usual part of Purim, all participants were required to come in costume or at least partially dressed in costumes. LJC program coordinator Žana Skudovičienė took care of those who for one or another reason were unable or did not have time to get ready for the holiday. She let them chose a mask or costume accessory provided by Fayerlakh ensemble director Larisa Vyšniauskienė for the occasion.

2016-03-29

Kaunas Jewish Community Marks 72nd Anniversary of Children’s Aktion

On March 25, 2016, members of the Kaunas Jewish Community marked the 72nd anniversary of the Children’s Aktion (mass murder operation) in the Kaunas ghetto. The operation to kill all the children living in the ghetto and the elderly unfit for use as labor resulted in the murder of about 1,700 people. Children under 12 were torn from their mothers’ arms, thrown in trucks and driven away to be murdered. Other parents came back from forced labor to find their children missing. Tobijas Jafetas has spoken about his own rescue many times before, and this year was joined by Kaunas ghetto inmate Juozas Vocelka.

2016-03-29

Old Prescriptions from the Interwar Period Recall the Kukliansky Pharmacy in Veisiejai

Danutė Selčinskaja, director of the Rescuers and Commemoration Department of the Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum, has sent us an image of a new item worthy of display at a museum: prescriptions from the Kukliansky Pharmacy which operated in the period between the wars. This pharmacy, the only one in Veisiejai, Lithuania, operated right up until the Holocaust. The pharmacists managed to escape and were rescued by people from Sventijanskas. At the present time there is a Veisiejai Regional History Museum operating in Veisiejai. Museum director Regina Kaveckienė scanned two new items, prescriptions, which were brought to the museum by a relative of an elderly female pharmacist from the town who is no longer alive.

Danutė Selčinskaja sent the regional history museum the Vilna Gaon museum’s mobile exhibit “The Rescued Child Tells the Story…” which she created. This includes a film about the rescue of the Kukliansky family. The regional history museum shows the film to students every year. A young woman from the Kapčiamiestis School Museum who lives with her parents in Sventijanskas said everyone there had already seen the film, which is being passed around as a DVD from person to person, and it has caused a great deal of excitement there. The people understand what happened and recognize the people and places portrayed in the film.

2016-03-29

When Will Our Mayors Take Down Monuments to Holocaust Perpetrators?

Marius Lukošiūnas

More than 25 years ago I spoke on C-SPAN about the pogrom the Soviet troops had prepared after the 1991 putsch before quitting the Lithuanian Television and Radio building.

Live, I explained to Americans our path to independence and showed images and montages of our ravaged television studios. Studio guests and callers were angered by this pogrom.

Just as the show was ending, an elderly woman called and asked why the Lithuanian government was rehabilitating Holocaust perpetrators. I replied I believed that was a mistake which would be corrected. I assured her they would receive neither forgiveness nor honor in independent Lithuania.

Full story in Lithuanian here.

2016-03-29

Belgium Can’t Deal with Terror Threat, Rabbi Warns

Rabbi Menachem Hadad speaking on Israeli radio said Belgium lacks capacity for fighting terrorism while other Western European states are wrestling with their own growing jihad movements.

The well-known Brussels rabbi said: “The unexpected appearance of terrorists at the airport demonstrates Belgium is unable to deal with terror threats.” He said Belgian government institutions “do not understand security issues.” Rabbi Hadad, the head of the Shomrei Had Orthodox community in Brussels, made a number of observations and criticisms on IDF radio about the current situation and expressed real concern that Belgium lacks the ability to fight terrorism. He said the soldiers sent to guard the synagogue and the city’s Chabad community building following the murder of four Jews at the Jewish Museum in Brussels in 2014 had told him they lacked firearms and ammunition for many months while they supposedly stood guard. “It was just for show. This isn’t realistic,” he said.

Hadad leveled the criticisms after examining reports about the inactivity demonstrated by Belgian government institutions when it comes to security issues. Worse, Belgium earlier received warnings from Turkey about one of the suspected attackers in the March 22 bombings. Belgium’s ministers of the interior and justice attempted to resign Thursday but their request was turned down by the prime minister. There are also a number of odd laws and a constitutional ban on ethnic profiling which exacerbate an already poor situation, he said.

2016-03-29

Israeli President Isaac Herzog Visits Lithuania

On the War in Israel and the Situation in Lithuania