BELGRADE—The president of Serbia, Tomislav Nikolic, today awarded a Golden Medal for Merit to Dr. Efraim Zuroff, the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s chief Nazi hunter and its Director of East European Affairs, as part of the celebrations of Sretenje, the Serbian republic’s national day. The rationale for the award, which was granted to Dr. Zuroff for “exceptional achievements” included his “selfless dedication to defending the truth about the suffering of Jews, and also Serbs, Roma and other nations during World War II.”
Human Rights
Dr. Efraim Zuroff Awarded Gold Medal by Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic
Posted in Christian-Jewish Issues, Efraim Zuroff, Events, Human Rights, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Roma
Tagged Efraim Zuroff, Holocaust in Serbia, Simon Wiesenthal Center, Sretenje
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Kaunas, Lithuania: Run-Up to the February 16th 2017 Neo-Nazi March on Independence Day
Kaunas Mayor & City Council Deciding
whether to again allow neo-nazis sporting banners adulating Holocaust collaborators to take over the city center on Lithuania’s cherished February 16th Independence Day next week
PREVIOUS YEARS IN KAUNAS IN VILNIUS IN RIGA DH SECTION
Banner from last year’s takeover of central Kaunas on Feb. 16th: Same again?
From left: Adolfas Ramanauskas-Vanagas, Jonas Noreika, Povilas Plechavičius, Kazys Škirpa, Antanas Baltūsis-Žvejas, and Juozas Ambrazevičius-Brazaitis, under the banner translating “We know our nation’s heroes”.
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Dovid Katz, Human Rights, Israel, Kaunas, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Neo-Nazi & Fascist Marches, News & Views, Politics of Memory
Tagged February 16th Lithuanian Independence Day, human rights in Lithuania, Israeli ambassador in Vilnius, Israeli Embassy in Vilnius, Kaunas neo-Nazi marches
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CPJCE’S American Affiliate Calls 34,000 Petition Signers “Evil People”
PIRAMÓNT | PAPER TRAIL | OPPOSITION | CEMETERIES
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MONROE, NEW YORK—Ignoring the unanimous views of the world’s leading rabbinic authorities in opposition to the project to plonk a 34 million euro convention center in the heart of Vilna’s old Jewish cemetery, surrounded by thousands of graves on all four sides, “Admas Kodesh,” the American Satmar (Aaronites) affiliate of the London-based CPJCE issued a tweet today condemning as “evil people trying to undermine progress” the 34,000 people, including the chief rabbi of Lithuania, who signed Vilnius resident Ruta Bloshtein’s petition calling on the Lithuanian government to find an alternative venue for the convention center.
Posted in "Admas Kodesh", Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Politics of Memory
Tagged Admas Kodesh, CPJCE, Piramont Snipiskes cemetery, Rabbi Herschel Gluck, Rabbi Hershel Gluck
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Defending History’s 2017 People of the Year
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As 2017 gets underway, Defending History is proud to honor three Vilnius personalities, this year all from its Orthodox Jewish community, who have stood up for cherished principles against powerful forces. In all cases, the principles defended pertain also to human rights more generally. Their courage and determination can serve as an example to all who defend human rights and history even when it is inconvenient and draws the ire of power-invested institutions that are often associated with state-supported entities.
The three honorees are, in alphabetical order, Ruta Bloshtein, Rabbi Kalev Krelin, and Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky. On Facebook. See from previous years the Prophet Amos Human Rights Awards and the 2014 Person of the Year.
Posted in "Good Will Foundation" (Jewish Restitution in Lithuania), Bold Citizens Speak Out, Chabad in Vilnius, Defending History's Person of the Year, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Human Rights, Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Persons of the Year, Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky
Tagged Chabad Lithuania, Commission for the Preservation of the American Heritage Abroad., Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe, CPJCE (London), Good Will Foundation (Lithuania), Jacob Piliansky, Jewish Restitution (Lithuania), Jews in Lithuania, Leon Kaplan, Lithuanian Jewish, Lithuanian Jewish Community, Ms Ruta Bloshtein, Rabbi Chaim Burshtein, Rabbi Kalev Krelin, Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, USCPAHA, Vilnius Jewish cemetery
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Divide and Conquer?
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Iam very concerned about the situation for the last several years at our Lithuanian Jewish Community (LJC). More specifically, about the LJC’s chairperson, whose policies have brought about instability and disunity in the Jewish community. It is a sad paradox, that a non-religious person is responsible for the most acutely religious questions in our community. It is even more unacceptable that a secular person, drawn to mundane and material things, would deign to push around the rabbis in town as if they are pawns on the chess table. Such behavior is totally opposite to Jewish religious standards. Yet for external consumption it is called “a renaissance of religious Judaism.”
Posted in Chabad in Vilnius, Human Rights, Identity Theft of Litvak Heritage, Lithuania, Lithuania: Textbook Case of East European Restitution (for Lost Jewish Assets) Abused to Dismantle a Vibrant Jewish Community, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Ruta (Reyzke) Bloshtein
Tagged Faina Kukliansky, Jewish Community of Lithuania, Jewish religious life in Vilnius, Lithuanian Jewry, Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, Ruta Bloshtein
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Skaldymas ir valdymas
OPINION | VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | LITVAK AFFAIRS | HUMAN RIGHTS
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Ruta Bloshtein
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Noriu išreikšti susirūpinimą dėl padėties, kuri jau keletą metų klostosi Lietuvos žydų bendruomenėje. O būtent, dėl LŽB pirmininkės veiksmų, keliančių pavojų Lietuvos žydų gyvenimo vienovei ir darnai. Paradoksas ir liūdna ironija tame, kad žydų religinius klausimus sprendžia nereliginga moteris. Ir dar labiau nepriimtina, kad pasaulietė, siekdama savanaudiškų žemiškų tikslų, stumdo rabinus kaip šachmatų figūras. Tokia elgsena prieštarauja religinėms tradicijoms. Ir tai vadinama „judaizmo atgimimu“?
Posted in Human Rights, Identity Theft of Litvak Heritage, Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, Ruta (Reyzke) Bloshtein
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Leon Kaplan Comments on Eviction by Jewish Community Head of Rabbi Krinsky and his Fellow Worshippers
VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | HUMAN RIGHTS | OPINION
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by Leon Kaplan
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The following two comments appeared in Facebook on 1 November 2016 and on 3 November 2016, following publication of Dovid Katz’s 1 November article in Defending History. They have been slightly condensed and copy-edited here.
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1 November 2016:
It is time to stand up to this behavior. Does Madam Kukliansky think that in Ponar and the other 250 places of murder that Jews, our brothers and sisters, our children (kinderlakh) had been separated at the time of murder and thrown into a Chabad ditch and into a Misnagdim ditch? If this is a decision by Madam Kukliansky, to call the police or to lock out Krinsky from the building of the Jewish Community, then it is simply disgusting.
Posted in Chabad in Vilnius, Human Rights, Leon Kaplan, Lithuania, Lithuania: Textbook Case of East European Restitution (for Lost Jewish Assets) Abused to Dismantle a Vibrant Jewish Community, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, Opinion
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Friday, October 28th, in Vilnius
OPINION | VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | LITVAK AFFAIRS | HUMAN RIGHTS
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by Jacob Piliansky
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On Friday, October 28th 2016, at 5 PM, I approached the gates of our Choral Synagogue, at Pylimo Street 39, for the weekly Eve of Sabbath service. I saw that the gates were locked shut. Finally I noticed Kalman Krinsky, son of Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, the city’s Chabad rabbi for the past twenty-two years. Kalman told me in Yiddish (we speak Yiddish to each other) that the shul was closed and that the prayer service had been moved to the Jewish community’s building at Pylimo 4.
Posted in Chabad in Vilnius, Human Rights, Jacob Piliansky, Lithuania, Lithuania: Textbook Case of East European Restitution (for Lost Jewish Assets) Abused to Dismantle a Vibrant Jewish Community, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs
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Barring a Jew from Prayer Services is a Human Rights Issue
OPINION | VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | LITVAK AFFAIRS | HUMAN RIGHTS
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by Dovid Katz
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VILNIUS—Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, Vilnius’s Chabad rabbi, has served Jewish people here and the city’s diverse cultural mosaic for some twenty-two years. And sure, he has had his share of issues, run-ins and errors over the decades, just like everyone else in town. His numerous packed Jewish holiday celebrations have become part and parcel of the city’s remarkable twenty-first century Jewish footprint, most famously on Chanukah. But yet again, he was denied entry to the Jewish community building for daily prayer services this morning by the burly security guards at the official Jewish Community building, who seemed highly adept at avoiding frontal photography. Services were abruptly moved there on Friday evening because of a mysterious “plumbing problem” (heating, in some versions) at the city’s Choral Synagogue. Then, on Friday evening 28 October, police were called to evict from the makeshift prayer address Rabbi Krinsky and his children, pupils and co-worshippers (reports by R. Bloshtein, Z. Olickij, and J. Piliansky). A sad date in the modern history of Jewish Vilnius.
Posted in Chabad in Vilnius, Human Rights, Identity Theft of Litvak Heritage, Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, Opinion, Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, Rákishok (Rokiškis)
Tagged Chabad in Vilnius, Choral Synagogue in Vilnius, Vilnius rabbis
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When “Putin” Becomes an Excuse for Hitler-Glorification
OPINION
by Dovid Katz
This article appeared today in Jewish Currents:
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A recent Washington Post editorial rightfully takes Russia and China to task for persecuting those who dare challenge the state’s distortions of history. In the case of Russia, there is mention of the disgraceful prosecution of a citizen for pointing out that the September 1939 dismemberment of Poland was a joint venture of Germany and the USSR codified by the infamous Molotov-Ribbentrop pact. But wait a minute.
READ MORE
Posted in Celebrations of Fascism, Collaborators Glorified, Double Genocide: The New Form of Holocaust Revisionism & Denial, Dovid Katz, Estonia, Free Speech & Democracy, Human Rights, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory
Tagged Double Genocide, Freedom of Speech, Human Rights, Simon Wiesenthal Center
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Att. Mr. Mayor of Vilnius: Streets Named for Hitler’s Local Partners, and Plans for Congress Center on Top of Old Jewish Cemetery
Sept. 2016 Discourse over “Historic Soul” of Central Vilnius
Will Vilnius Mayor & Lithuania’s PM & President Issue Morally Clear Statements on Two Sites Visible from Grand Dukes’ Medieval Hill?
THERE ARE FIVE JEWISH FORMS OF THE FABLED CITY’S NAME: ווילנא, ווילנע, ווילנה, וילנה, ווילניוס
(1) Changing the name of a city center street that glorifies a Nazi collaborator who enthusiastically supported the removal of his country’s Jewish citizens?
Posted in Celebrations of Fascism, Collaborators Glorified, Debates on the Postwar "Forest Brothers", Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Human Rights, Kazys Škirpa, Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Vilnius Mayor Remigijus Šimašius
Tagged Kazys Škirpa, Old Jewish cemetery Vilnius, Piramont, Snipiskes cemetery
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Will the EU, the OSCE and the Council of Europe Ask Latvia to Revoke the 1998 Declaration?
OPINION | POLITICS OF MEMORY | GLORIFYING COLLABORATORS | LATVIA | ANNUAL WAFFEN SS MARCHES IN RIGA
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by Aleksandr Kuzmin (Riga)
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On 29 October 1998, a few weeks after the parliamentary elections, the outgoing Parliament of Latvia had adopted the Declaration on Latvian Legionnaires in the World War II. The vote was as follows: 50 ayes, 8 nays, 3 abstentions.
Aleksandr Kuzmin (Riga)
The text contains several questionable statements. Those include claiming that “The aim of soldiers who were drafted into the Legion or who joined it voluntary was to protect Latvia from the restoration of Stalin’s regime” and asking the government to “prevent insults against the honour and dignity of Latvian soldiers.” To make it clear — the ones whose reputation was intended to be defended were Nazi collaborators, voluntarily or not. And the intention was pretty obvious — as the rapporteur MP, Mr. Mauliņš, said before the vote, “this decision will be our position towards our soldiers who truly fought for the independence of Latvia”.
Posted in Aleksandr Kuzmin, Celebrations of Fascism, Collaborators Glorified, Double Genocide: The New Form of Holocaust Revisionism & Denial, History, Human Rights, Latvia, Litvak Affairs, Neo-Nazi & Fascist Marches, News & Views, Politics of Memory
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August and September 2016 Memorials for Destroyed Jewish Communities
Summer and Fall 2016: 75th Anniversary
of the Nazis’ annihilation, with vast local collaboration, of Lithuania’s Jews in the towns, villages, provinces; implementation of ghettoization and mass murder in the cities.
Perhaps among the simplest, most minimalist measures of a municipality’s sincerity (beyond PR bonanzas, photo-ops and legitimizations via useful foreigners): (a) Modest town-center information board on the origins, history, culture, contributions and (true) fate of the town’s Jewish citizens; (b) Rapid removal of any local shrines, street names, museum tributes etc. to the local collaborators and murderers. “You just can’t make heroes out of the killers and expect to cover it up with some annual PR event for the foreigners.”
Language and respect for the victims: In addition to Lithuanian and English, will new memorial texts (including those at forest mass graves and old cemeteries) continue to include Yiddish, the language of 100% of the murdered Jews in all these towns? For many years, Lithuania has had a uniquely admirable record in this regard.
Posted in Birzh (Biržai ), Commemorations for Destroyed Communities, Events, History, Human Rights, Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, Malát (Molėtai), Media Watch, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Šeduva (Sheduva, Shádeve, Shádov) and its "Museum of the Lost Shtetl", September 23rd Commemorations
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Some High Latvian Politicians Think the Waffen SS Fought for Freedom
OPINION | POLITICS OF MEMORY | GLORIFYING COLLABORATORS | LATVIA | ANNUAL WAFFEN SS MARCHES IN RIGA
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by Aleksandrs Feigmanis (Riga)
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Dr. Aleksandrs Feigmanis (Riga)
There are here in Latvia some high-ranking Latvian politicians who actually believe that the country’s Waffen SS fighters fought for freedom of their country. Every year on the 16th of March Latvian nationalists gather at the Freedom Monument in the heart of Riga, the nation’s capital, and in the cemetery at Lestene, a village some seventy-two kilometers from Riga, to remember and honor (honor!) the living and dead veterans of the Latvian Legion of the Waffen SS.
Established by order of Adolf Hitler on the 10th of February 1943, they fought for Nazi Germany against the Red Army on the Volkhov front near Leningrad, and later in Great River region, Kurzeme (Kurland), in Poland, Germany and elsewhere.
Although the alarming series of annual events commemorating and glorifying the Latvian SS Volunteer Legion events are now officially non-governmental, some MPs and even ministers do not hesitate to not only participate publicly, setting an example for the nation’s youth, but also to publicly refer to Waffen SS legionnaires as heroes and national freedom fighters. Had Hitler won the war, there would have been no Latvia left to become free in 1991. By swearing and oath to Adolf Hitler’s genocidal regime, and then in fact delaying the liberation of the concentration camps by the Allies, they were pawns of the Nazis who do not deserve to be glorified by a modern, democratic member of the European Union and NATO.
Posted in Aleksandrs Feigmanis, Bold Citizens Speak Out, Celebrations of Fascism, Collaborators Glorified, History, Human Rights, Latvia, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory
Tagged Aleksandrs Feigmanis, Holocaust in Latvia, Waffen SS
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Lithuanian State Bank and Major UK Firm Seem Deeply Involved in Vilnius Jewish Cemetery Scandal
PAPER TRAIL | REGISTRY OF OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER | DH SECTION
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VILNIUS—Turto Bankas, the state bank here whose main mission is to “organize and coordinate renewal of state-owned real estate,” has again revealed itself to be deeply involved in the international scandal of constructing a new National Congress Center in the heart of the old Vilna Jewish cemetery, whose graves date back to the fifteenth century and include some of the leading European Jewish scholars of the last millennium. The project continues to attract opposition from various parts of the world, including major Lithuania-descended rabbis internationally and some members of Lithuania’s small Jewish community. Moreover, Protestant and Catholic authors have pointed out that this would not likely be the fate of an analogous medieval vintage Christian cemetery.
Posted in Christian-Jewish Issues, CPJCE (London), Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Politics of Memory
Tagged Commission for Preservation of the Heritage, Eric J Rymer, Lesley Weiss, Piramont Snipiskes cemetery, The Right Solution (UK), Turto Bankas, US commission on heritage abroad, USCPAHA, Vilnius Jewish cemetery
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Wiesenthal Center Calls on Kaunas Mayor to End Abuse of “Seventh Fort”; Pressure Builds on Vilnius Mayor’s Jewish Politics
JERUSALEM—The Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Israel Office today issued a press release (text below), including a quote from its director, Dr. Efraim Zuroff, calling on Visvaldas Matijošaitis, the mayor of Kaunas (Kovno), Lithuania’s second city, to ban weddings and other celebrations from the now privatized parts of the historic Seventh Fort, where thousands of Kaunas Jews were humiliated, tortured and murdered starting with the first week of the Lithuanian Holocaust in late June 1941.
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Celebrations of Fascism, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Efraim Zuroff, Human Rights, Kaunas, Legacy of 23 June 1941, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Vilnius Mayor Remigijus Šimašius
Tagged Antisemitism in Lithuania, Cnaan Lipshiz, Efraim Zuroff, Holocaust in Kaunas, Holocaust in Lithuania, Kaunas, Remigijus Šimašius, Ruta Vanagaite, Sergey Kanovich, Seventh Fort in Kaunas, Simon Wiesenthal Center, Tamara Zieve, Visvaldas Matijošaitis
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Defending History Writer Evaldas Balčiūnas Is Found ‘Not Guilty’
22 July 2016 Defending History Eyewitness Report
VERDICT IN: EVALDAS BALČIŪNAS NOT GUILTY (AFTER 4 YEARS OF HARASSMENT AND A DOZEN 450 KM ROUND TRIPS FROM HOME — BUT COURT ALLOWS FAR RIGHT “PLAINTIFF” 20 DAYS TO APPEAL)
Posted in Evaldas Balčiūnas, Free Speech & Democracy, Human Rights, It Pays to Defend History: Success Over the Years..., Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Prosecutors & Police 'Investigate' DH Author Evaldas Balčiūnas, State Glorification of Holocaust Collaborator J. Noreika
Tagged Evaldas Balciunas, Free speech in Lithuania
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Defending History Responds to Vilnius Architects’ Three “Visualizations” for “Convention Center in the Jewish Cemetery”
Architects Publish Three Visualizations for National Convention Center Planned for Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery, Where Thousands Still Lie Buried
But critics warn that property magnates, politicians, and their foreign Jewish shmendriks will be haunted for generations by a rather different visualization…
Vulovak / DefendingHistory.com
Posted in Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, EU, Human Rights, Humor (Of Sorts), Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Politics of Memory
Tagged Christian-Jewish relations (Lithuania), Emanuelis Zingeris, Lithuanian-Jewish relations, Litvak news, Piramont, Snipiskes Jewish cemetery, Vilnius Jewish cemeteries, Vytautas Landsbergis
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Now We [Who Lie Buried in the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery], Know…
PAPER TRAIL | REGISTRY OF OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER | DH SECTION
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VILNIUS—The following is a reprint of the article published on 2 July 2016 in Yated Ne’eman, authored by the eminent scholar, Professor Bernard Fryshman. The title refers to the accompanying illustration which considers the views of the many thousands of Jews buried at Piramónt, Vilna’s old Jewish cemetery in the Šnipiškės (Shnípishok) district, in active use from the fifteenth to the nineteenth centuries. See also background to the article, PDF of the original article, the catalogue of international opposition, the paper trail, the DH section, and our editor’s summary of the issue published in December 2015 in The Times of Israel.
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Christian-Jewish Issues, CPJCE (London), Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Foreign Ministries: Holocaust Politics Abuse?, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Politics of Memory, Professor Bernard Fryshman, US State Dept Manipulated?, USCPAHA (US Commission for Preservation of the American Heritage Abroad)
Tagged Benzion Shalom Eliezer Freshwater
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