“GOOD WILL FOUNDATION” | GWF’s CAMPAIGN AGAINST VILNIUS’S ONE RESIDENT RABBI | US & ISRAELI MEMBERS OF THE BOARD PROVIDING LEGITIMIZATION [ARCHIVED] | LITHUANIAN JEWISH COMMUNITY ISSUES | TEXTBOOK CASE OF FAILURE OF RESTITUTION FOR VALUE OF PREWAR JEWISH RELIGIOUS PROPERTIES | STOLEN ELECTION SAGA | AJC MISADVENTURES IN LITHUANIA | CHABAD IN LITHUANIA | LITVAK AFFAIRS
◊
VILNIUS—The following statement was circulated via email today by the office of Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, who has been a full-time resident rabbi in Vilnius for thirty-two years. It comes in the wake of the shocking violent attacked against him, perpetrated on 14 September at the gates of the city’s one functioning synagogue, The Choral Synagogue at Pylimo Street 39, where he has been the only officiating rabbi for years. The security guard who attacked him, in the view of witnesses who photographed the incident and then issued written statements, is an employee of the Good Will Foundation (GWF).
The GWF is the Lithuanian quango that in the view of many has helped unravel a vibrant Jewish life by recasting the long successful Lithuanian Jewish Commnity as an ersatz “Jewish (Litvak) Community of Lithuania” that has spent much of the more than 80 euros allocated by the government, in two tranches, both comprising restitution funds for pre-Holocaust Jewish religious property, on projects allegedly benefiting a small circle of family and friends, and sparing no finances to defame and delegitimize the country’s remaining Jewish leaders. Targets of the campaign have included Ruta Bloshtein, Rabbi Chaim Burshtein, and Simon Gurevich (Simonas Gurevicius). But none of those instances compares with the repeated use of security guards and the police to harass the city’s one resident rabbi, whose work over three decades in the framework of Chabad has provided traditional Jewish education, regular prayer services, holiday celebrations, support for the poor, and individual needs spanning the spectrum from circumcision ceremeonies to ritual cleansing of the deceased before burial.
Defending History reported on the Sept. 14th attack on Rabbi Krinsky in real time updates throughout the day, including photographs and two witness statements. A criminal complaint was filed with the police on 18 September and is being investigated. Defending History also published an editorial on the matter, and a challenge to one of Vilnius’s English media outlets for failing to even seek out a side of the story other than the state-sponsored official community’s statement, widely reposted by the local media.
The following is an unedited posting of today’s email from Rabbi Krinsky, followed by earlier correspondence in the same chain.
◊
Dear All,
Below is a copy of the Lithuanian Jewish Community’s Facebook post on Monday, September 14, 2026, (regarding the physical assault against me by a synagogue guard employed and paid by the Lithuanian Jewish Community), followed by my response:
INCIDENT AT VILNIUS CHORAL SYNAGOGUE
This morning, a serious incident occurred at the Vilnius Choral Synagogue involving Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky and a synagogue security guard.
During the Jewish high holiday period, the synagogue is open for prayer and religious services only and does not receive tourists. A notice to this effect had been posted at the synagogue entrance, and clear instructions had been given to the security personnel.
The decision to restrict access to the synagogue during the Jewish holiday period was taken against a serious security background. The community received a security alert from the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) concerning a person active in neo-Nazi online groups who had made explicit threats to burn down a synagogue and kill Jews and who indicated that he had access to a firearm. The alert, dated August 28, 2026, also noted references to Lithuania, including statements referring to Vilnius. The information was provided to the community as a potential security threat.
We understand that Rabbi Krinsky attempted to bring a group of visitors onto the synagogue premises despite the clearly stated security restrictions. Chassidie Chabad Lubavitch is an independent organization operating in Lithuania. It is separate from the Lithuanian Jewish Community (LJC) and is not a member organization of the LJC.
A confrontation ensued which became physical. Rabbi Krinsky, one of the visitors, and the security guard stated that they were assaulted.
LJC deeply regrets that this incident occurred. Security access restrictions must be enforced appropriately and professionally, while at the same time ensuring the safety and security of the synagogue and everyone present.
The LJC will cooperate fully with the relevant authorities, and will undertake its own review of the incident, including a full review of all CCTV footage, statements of all involved and other evidence in order to understand what happened and to prevent such occurrences arising in the future. A review of security protocols [in consultation with the European Jewish Congress] will take place.
The LJC is committed to the safety and security of the Jewish community and to allowing Jews in Lithuania to express and practice their Judaism as desired.
Here is my response to the above Facebook post:
For brevity, I will provide only the essential background to what really happened.
To describe the violent physical attack against me by a synagogue guard and employee of the Lithuanian Jewish Community as merely an “incident” between him and me is like describing a case of child abuse as an “incident” between the perpetrator and the child – as though both parties somehow share responsibility.
What actually happened:
According to eyewitness accounts (included in my previous email, copied below), shortly after 10:00 a.m. on Monday, September 14, I was leaving the synagogue when I saw several tourists across the street. They asked whether they could enter the synagogue, and I made a gesture indicating that they could try.
They crossed the street. As I was holding the gate open to the synagogue courtyard, the guard suddenly rushed out and began physically pushing the tourists back out.
When I asked him what he was doing, he turned on me and savagely attacked me. He physically accosted me, punched me, threw me to the ground, kicked me, and scratched my neck.
This was not an “incident.” I was physically assaulted.
The supposed security threat:
The reference in the Lithuanian Jewish Community’s Facebook post to an “alert” supposedly dated August 28 is another obvious misrepresentation of the facts.
We were informed approximately two months earlier that there might be a threat against the synagogue. As a result, the synagogue was closed for one weekend. That occurred at the end of June – not at the end of August.
This distinction matters because the supposed security justification now being invoked has nothing to do with what happened to me on September 14th.
How control of the synagogue guards was established:
By way of background, the synagogue – which is an independent legal entity from the organization known as the Lithuanian Jewish Community -originally hired and paid its own security guards, with the guards’ costs funded through money received from the restitution-funded Good Will Foundation.
In order to establish control over the synagogue, Faina Kukliansky removed the Good Will Foundation funding from the synagogue through which the guards had been paid and placed the guards under the direct control of the Lithuanian Jewish Community – that is, under her control.
This gave her the ability to shut the synagogue at will, as has happened when holiday celebrations that we had organized in the synagogue for many years were prevented.
The guard who violently assaulted me was a new employee who had been working at the synagogue for only the past few months.
From the beginning of his employment, he has repeatedly done everything in his power to provoke us, apparently with the intention of creating an excuse for Faina Kukliansky to bar us from entering the synagogue.
He has even physically accosted my children while they were praying in the synagogue, when no one else was present. He put on his body camera and then physically hauled them from the synagogue premises.
Obviously, the intention was to provoke a forceful reaction from them, while simultaneously creating video evidence that could then be used as an excuse to bar us from the synagogue. These provocation totally failed.
The real issue has nothing to do with “security”:
In short, the entire security justification – and the invocation of supposed Neo-Nazi threats – is total hogwash. It has absolutely nothing to do with the attack upon me.
The real background is much deeper.
For 12 years, since the inception of the institution known as the Good Will Foundation, we have been asking for basic fairness and transparency regarding the restitution funds. The Good Will Foundation has discriminated against our singular and widespread Jewish religious activity throughout Lithuania, refusing to fund the multifaceted work we carry out on behalf of Lithuanian Jewry.
Since the restitution fund was established, we have repeatedly requested a full allocation list showing every allocation made from these restitution funds.
Those requests have been ignored.
For 12 years.
In 2016, the Lithuanian Jewish Community, using restitution funds, hired guards who pushed me and physically prevented me from entering the synagogue because of the “crime” of publicly calling out the Good Will Foundation and the Lithuanian Jewish Community for refusing to provide the full details of allocations made from the restitution funds.
That is a total misuse and abuse of what the restitution funds – given in lieu of the return of communal religious property belonging to the Jewish community pre World War II – and ultimately the memory of those murdered in the Holocaust – is supposed to represent.
Fast-forward to today:
Over the past several months, I have again been continually demanding fairness, transparency, and actual Good Will from those controlling the restitution funds known as the Good Will Foundation.
Again, the response has been complete silence.
So let us be clear:
The attack on me had absolutely nothing to do with security.
It is part of a much larger pattern involving the misuse and abuse of restitution funds and the use of institutional power against those who continue to demand transparency and proper stewardship of those funds.
The attack was the direct result of my continuing to speak loudly and publicly about the need for true stewardship of the memory of the Holocaust victims, rather than the continued underhanded misuse of their legacy by the Lithuanian Jewish Community and the so-called Good Will Foundation.
Actions speak louder than words.
The Lithuanian Jewish Community’s Facebook post ends, rather laughably, by stating that the organization is committed to securing the Jewish community and allowing Jews to practice Judaism safely.
One can say whatever one likes.
Actions speak far louder than words.
The leadership of the Good Will Foundation needs to answer for the misuse and abuse of these restitution funds – particularly their use against our activities on behalf of the Jews of Lithuania.
They need to cease and desist.
And those who have demonstrated no moral commitment to using these funds in a manner worthy of the people whose property and memory they represent should relinquish their positions of control over these funds.
These are not ordinary charitable funds.
They are restitution funds connected to the legacy of a Jewish community that was destroyed.
The least we can demand is that they be administered with honesty, transparency, fairness, and genuine respect for the memory of those whose lives and property were taken from them.
In Closing:
Did anyone from the GWF or WJRO condemn the attack against me?
Did anyone demand that Faina Kukliansky release the synagogue security footage showing what actually happened?
Why the continued silence – not only about the attack, but also about my legitimate questions and repeated requests for transparency?
And if the GWF and WJRO will not even address these basic questions, how can they possibly be considered suitable stewards of restitution funds?
With wishes for a happy Sukkos,
Rabbi Sholom Krinsky
On Tue, Sep 15, 2026 at 2:48 AM Rabbi Sholom B. Krinsky <rabbikrinsky@gmail.com> wrote:
בס”ד
To: Colleagues and Friends, and Members of the Good Will Foundation Board and Leaders of the Organizations Represented on the WJRO,
Dear Colleagues and Friends, and Members of the Good Will Foundation Board and Leaders of the Organizations Represented on the WJRO,
Today (Monday, September 14th) I was physically assaulted – violently thrown to the ground, punched and kicked, and, according to an eyewitness, strangled – not by an antisemite on the streets of Vilna, G-d forbid – but by a security guard at Vilna’s only synagogue, whose services are paid for with Good Will Foundation (GWF) Holocaust restitution funds.
Below is a link to a picture of the attack, followed by reports from two eyewitnesses:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/ FrfYqqKdWAj8n2hB6
Here is the first of the two firsthand accounts by visitors who witnessed this attack:
We, Lily and Yehoshua Raveh, are a married couple and tourists from Israel.
On September 14 at approximately 10:00 a.m., while visiting the area of the Choral Synagogue, we witnessed a serious assault against the Chief Rabbi of the synagogue, Rabbi Sholom Krinsky, by a violent man who emerged from the synagogue building in an attempt to force the rabbi away and prevent us from entering the building accompanied by him.
The rabbi came out to meet us, accompanied by a young man who was with him. The assailant violently pushed the rabbi and punched him repeatedly in the back and abdomen, causing him to fall to the ground. During the assault, the rabbi’s head struck both the wall and the pavement.
I was also assaulted when I attempted to leave the area. The same assailant violently pushed me toward the gate, causing injuries to my neck and the fingers of my right hand. I would like to emphasize that I am 79 years old, disabled, and have significant difficulty walking.
Another Israeli tourist couple was also present and witnessed the incident.
Words cannot adequately express the shock and distress we experienced. The violence and brutality displayed by the assailant brought back painful memories of the horrific accounts we heard from our relatives who survived the Holocaust, who described the involvement and participation of Lithuanians in the destruction of the Jewish community.
We firmly believe that this incident must not be ignored or met with silence. Such violence against an elderly, disabled woman and against a rabbi is completely unacceptable. We believe that criminal proceedings should be initiated against the assailant and that the facts of what occurred should be made known publicly.
We hope that the appropriate authorities will investigate this serious incident thoroughly and take all necessary legal measures.
Here is the second eyewitness account:
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/C742LrAiqOI
There is a long and troubling history of attacks, physical intimidation, and obstruction directed against our work and my wife and I personally. Since the inception of restitution in Lithuania, I have been physically pushed and prevented from entering the synagogue, while our twelve-grade Jewish day school, countrywide holiday programs, soup kitchen, and other work have likewise been sabotaged and undermined.
These incidents have always directly followed our efforts to demand transparency and accountability regarding Holocaust restitution funds in Lithuania. The accompanying links from 2016 document just a few occasions when physical force was used against me at the Synagogue, again, exactly at a time when we were pressing for Good Will foundation transparency and fairness:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/ 91yjjsVB1LqmNVkf9
https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipP72JL2nL_KXf5dobpZQwEVrG8EBWyuF5cedoX2xhvO7eSqTjBISWH7ZOZZTqfR4Q?key=Smd2eGkwaURxUzR3Zk1qRmpDSXp2alJPcnh6SC1R
The same thing happened today, after hundreds of Jews joined the Rosh Hashanah Services yesterday and on the eve of the holiday, in a truly beautifully celebrated holiday. The attack against me was completely unprovoked (I was simply holding the gate to the Synagogue’s yard open for tourists when attacked.
Only the letters I have written over these past months demanding fairness and transparency from GWF (recent examples below), together with the success of the Rosh Hashanah services we led in the Synagogue over the holiday, could conceivably have been misconstrued, based on past experiences, as provocative.
The Questions That Must Be Asked
So I ask each of you:
1. Does it not concern you that the GWF, with WJRO backing, continues to resist providing a complete public accounting of every restitution allocation since 2014, despite repeated requests for this information?
2. Does it not concern you that Chabad, despite more than 32 years of continuous Jewish religious, educational, and communal work throughout Lithuania, has received no GWF funding whatsoever, while other organizations with little to no Jewish constituency, have received substantial allocations? Does this not raise serious questions about discriminatory funding practices, as well as the Foundation’s governance and representativeness?
3. Does it not concern you that those involved in controlling the allocation of restitution funds are also connected to organizations receiving those funds, while there has been virtually no independent public examination of these relationships or potential conflicts of interest?
4. Does it not concern you that repeated incidents involving obstruction of our work – including physical intimidation, closure of the synagogue for our public Pesach Seder and other holiday events, and removal of our property – have generated so little response from those responsible for oversight?
Why, then, are these questions not being investigated publicly, persistently, and independently?
If these questions do not concern you, then sadly, it is difficult to see how you can claim to care about the martyrs of the Holocaust or genuinely honor their memory. Their memory demands more than words – it demands that we confront injustice, insist on accountability, and ensure that the Jewish life they were murdered for is not undermined today.
How much longer can this be allowed to get out of control before action is finally taken?
Gmar Chatima Tova,
Rabbi Sholom Krinsky
———- Forwarded message ———
From: Rabbi Sholom B. Krinsky <rabbikrinsky@gmail. com>
Date: Fri, Sep 11, 2026 at 12:12 AM
Subject: The Silence Is Reaching a Crescendo – We can – and MUST do better!
To: <gtaylor@wjro.org.il>, Faina Kukliansky <fainakukliansky@gmail.com>, Andrew Baker <bakera@ajc.org>, <deutcht@ajc.org>, נחליאל דיסון <ndison@wjro.org.il>, Herbert Block <herblock@gmail.com>
בס”ד
To: Members of the Good Will Foundation Board and Leaders of the Organizations Represented on the WJRO
Dear Members of the Good Will Foundation Board and Leaders of the Organizations Represented on the WJRO,
Why the continued silence?
My recent letter, copied below, has yet again been met with complete silence from those to whom it was addressed.
Is it because a full accounting would expose serious questions about the misuse and misallocation of restitution funds?
Instead, the campaign to try to cover up legitimate concerns, by slyly dismissing them as “Jewish infighting” continues unabated.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
This is about a profoundly one-sided abuse of power, a lack of transparency, and the use of restitution funds to undermine good Jewish work.
Need it be said, yet again?
Chabad Lithuania has received not a single euro of GWF funding since 2014, nor do we have any representation on the GWF Board – despite more than three decades of rebuilding Torah-true Jewish life throughout Lithuania.
Yet the sacrifices required to sustain this work without being bankrolled by GWF funding are deliberately portrayed as evidence of financial impropriety, rather than being recognized and respected for what they truly are: a profound commitment to rebuilding Jewish life.
Many Chabad Shluchim struggle financially, sometimes even to put bread on their tables, yet continue steadfastly because they refuse to abandon their sacred responsibility to Torah and the Jewish people. To portray the sacrifices of those who have spent decades rebuilding Jewish life as financial failure is not merely misleading. It is a painful distortion of the very devotion that kept Jewish life alive.
Quite frankly, it is lowly and despicable.
We Can — and Must — Do Better!
We must never forget the sacred souls of our brothers and sisters murdered in the Holocaust – lives brutally cut short, families torn apart, children who never had the chance to grow up, and voices forever silenced.
Their blood cries out from the earth – not for vengeance, but for us to remember, to truly care, and to ensure that Jewish life in this land continues to flourish in their memory and in their merit.
As we stand on the eve of 5787, we can—and we must—do better. We owe it to those who were lost, to the Jews of Lithuania today, and to the generations yet to come.
Let us find the courage to make immediate and meaningful change.
May their memory inspire us to build a Jewish future worthy of the lives they never had the chance to live.
The sacred memory of Lithuania’s Holocaust martyrs calls upon us to do nothing less.
May you each be blessed with a wonderful New Year, in the best of health, with the Almighty’s special protection for Israel and our brethren throughout the world.
Rabbi Sholom Krinsky
P.S. For full disclosure, we did in fact receive a response to the letter, copied below. However, it offered general niceties, rather than addressing the substantive questions I raised.
The recent visitor sent to Lithuania by the WJRO wrote:
“I do believe I was sent because the people here are in fact invested in Lithuania and want to move their involvement forward for the benefit of the holy work of supporting Lithuanian Jewry.”
He subsequently wrote:
“Let me suggest that you and Ms. Kukliansky come to New York and we all sit down to discuss possible ways to try to move forward together.”
I welcome any sincere desire to move forward. But the substantial issues raised below remain unanswered, continuing a long-standing pattern of ignoring objective questions of accountability.
Once again, some matters are matters of record:
Chabad Lithuania has no representation on the GWF Board, despite more than three decades of rebuilding Jewish religious, educational, and communal life.
We have faced repeated obstacles, funded with GWF monies, for years.
Despite requests spanning more than a decade, no full accounting of all GWF allocations has been publicized.
Meanwhile, our school faced a more than €10,000 shortfall simply to begin the educational year, while we are preparing Tishrei programming in five Lithuanian cities, with zero GWF funding.
At the same time, according to the GWF’s 2025 general overview of allocations, below, €500,000 went to a restaurant and €124,860 to four communities with only a handful of Jews between them – allocations that, as detailed previously, strengthen the local GWF co-chair’s undemocratic control of the Lithuanian Jewish Community, and thereby, GWF funding.
Do these priorities truly serve Lithuanian Jewry and honor the sacred responsibility attached to these funds?
The Lubavitcher Rebbe, of righteous memory, taught us to seek the good in every Jew. Especially in Elul, I welcome sincere goodwill. But goodwill must be demonstrated through transparency, accountability, and concrete action – not platitudes alone.
These funds were provided in memory of Lithuania’s murdered Jews and carry a profound responsibility to strengthen Jewish life and preserve their legacy.
(Even basic matters remain unresolved. The wine, grape juice, tables, matzah, and other supplies brought to Vilna’s only active synagogue for the 2025 communal Pesach seders and subsequently taken without authorization have still not been returned. Every request for their return has been ignored, despite their need for the upcoming holidays).
After years of raising these concerns, WJRO and GWF representatives continue to leave all of these substantive questions unanswered. If there is truly a commitment to Lithuanian Jewry, it is time to demonstrate it through transparency, accountability, meaningful change, and concrete action – not simply words.
For Lithuanian Jewry today, and in sacred memory of those who were lost.
Undoubtedly, the courage to make the necessary changes now will bring the Almighty’s special blessing upon us all in 5787.
———- Forwarded message ———
From: Rabbi Sholom B. Krinsky <rabbikrinsky@gmail. com>
Date: Sun, Aug 23, 2026 at 9:22 PM
Subject: Demand for Immediate Funding
To: Faina Kukliansky <fainakukliansky@gmail.com>, <deutcht@ajc.org>, נחליאל דיסון <ndison@wjro.org.il>, Herbert Block <herblock@gmail.com>, <gtaylor@wjro.org.il>, <arie.bucheister@claimscon.org >, <mWeitzman@wjro.org.il>
בס”ד
To: Members of the Good Will Foundation Board and Leaders of the Organizations Represented on the WJRO
Dear Members of the Good Will Foundation Board and Leaders of the Organizations Represented on the WJRO,
The Talmud teaches that silence is a sign of agreement. For months, neither the GWF Board nor the WJRO has responded to my letters, in which I have repeatedly urged meaningful changes in the operation and transparency of the Lithuanian Jewish restitution foundation known as the Good Will Foundation (GWF).
For some 12 years, the restitution system in Lithuania has been administered in ways deeply troubling and offensive to the memory of the Lithuanian Jewish martyrs of the Holocaust, particularly to the detriment of our work throughout Lithuania since 1994.
We did not wait for restitution funds before beginning our exhaustive work throughout Lithuania, nor did we build activities and institutions simply to qualify for funding. We came to Lithuania to rebuild Jewish life destroyed by the Nazis and suppressed by the Soviets, despite very limited local funding. (Chabad Headquarters does not fund Chabad centers worldwide; each center raises its own support).
For more than three decades, we have continued this work, often with substantial deficits, because we regard teaching Torah and reconnecting Lithuanian Jews with their heritage as a sacred mission of Jewish spiritual survival, (even more vital than fighting anti-semitism).
The damage caused by actions against our work has been enormous – not only the tens of thousands of euros spent responding to attacks supported or financed through GWF funds, but, more importantly, the loss of Jewish opportunities. Dozens of children were influenced to leave the only Lithuanian school teaching Torah daily. Constant disparagement and obstruction forced us to spend resources protecting our work rather than expanding it.
Meanwhile, individuals and institutions aligned with the leadership of the Jewish Community of Lithuania with WJRO support have continued receiving GWF resources, raising serious questions about whether these allocations truly reflect the needs and wishes of the martyrs whose memory these funds are meant to honor. How many opportunities to establish institutions, strengthen Jewish education, and reconnect Jews with their heritage have been lost because of these decisions?
The first wrong to be addressed is the discrimination against those actually rebuilding Jewish life – the work that would bring comfort to the souls of the martyrs.
As a first step toward correcting this long-standing inequity, the GWF must immediately designate €10 million for rebuilding and strengthening Jewish life throughout Lithuania, entrusted to those who have faithfully carried out this work since 1994.
These funds should come from the substantial amounts being reserved annually for future use, all while our urgent needs were neglected.
We are now in Elul, a month of introspection, accountability, and repentance. The time for meaningful action is now. This ten million euro immediate funding would be a tangible first step toward ensuring that these sacred restitution funds are finally used in a manner worthy of the memory of those whose lives and communities were destroyed.
Ksiva v’chasima tova, may you be written and sealed for a good year,
Rabbi Sholom Krinsky