BOLD CITIZENS | SAULIUS BERŽINIS | SHEDUVA | FILM
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THE INTRICATE SAGA IN THE BACKGROUND
Litvak Affairs
B’nai B’rith Australia & New Zealand Honors Filmmaker Saulius Beržinis, Bold Fighter for Historic Truth
Posted in Arts, Australia, Bold Citizens Speak Out, Film, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Saulius Beržinis
Tagged B'nai B'rith Australia, Benny Monheit, Holocaust in Lithuania, Museum of the Lost Shtetl, Petrified Time (film), Saulius Berzinis, Šeduva, Sheduva
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Kopa Studio II Issues Statement on Temporary Link for Free Online Viewing of Film on Sheduva Holocaust
FILM | SAULIUS BERŽINIS | LITHUANIA | LITVAK AFFAIRS | FREE SPEECH | MUSEUMS | SHEDUVA
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VILNIUS—Kopa Studio II in Vilnius, the continuation of the fabled Kopa Studio that for thirty years has provided the gold standard in historical truth on the Holocaust in Lithuania (and has had to be reconstituted after a campaign of embittered legal action from some “powerful forces”), released the following statement today:
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Dear Friends, Dear Enemies!
Today, 16 June 2023 at 12 noon Vilnius time, we have posted on Vimeo, until 22 June, an informal, non-commercial private share of the first version of Petrified Time, the documentary film on Sheduva (Šeduva) we were privileged to have worked on for years in partnership with the partnering museum.
For the link please apply to Kopa Studio II (at: berkopa@hotmail.com) or to Defending History (at: info@defendinghistory.com), or to Saulius Beržinis or Dovid Katz on their Facebook pages (via Messenger only, please). As ever, we will be grateful for your feedback on the first version of the film.
Saulius Beržinis, Sigitas Siudika
Kopa Studio II
Posted in Arts, Film, Free Speech & Democracy, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Museums, News & Views, Saulius Beržinis, Šeduva (Sheduva, Shádeve, Shádov) and its "Museum of the Lost Shtetl"
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Would Your Heritage Tour Group Coming to Vilnius Like to See an Informal Draft of the ‘Banned’ Film on the Holocaust in Sheduva?
OPINION | FILM | FREE SPEECH | BOLD CITIZENS | SAULIUS BERŽINIS | SHEDUVA | IT PAYS TO DEFEND HISTORY
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VILNIUS—The Defending History community here in Vilnius was proud today again to be a partner, with the non-profit Kopa Studio II and visiting cultural and academic groups, in helping organize informal, free, non-commercial, viewings of the film Petrified Time, which contains the “Satanic Verses of Sheduva” — the historically invaluable eyewitness testimony by the last witnesses to the Lithuanian Holocaust (themselves, now, a few years later, gone too). Filmed by award winning Lithuanian documentary film maker Saulius Beržinis the film is tied up in litigation launched by the “Museum of the Lost Shtetl” in Sheduva, and spearheaded by the museum’s executive director in Brussels, in a lawsuit conducted by a top Vilnius law firm, and ultimately paid for by a South African origin billionaire in Switzlerland. News and updates of the saga here.
What is success when defending history?
Defending History thinks it’s a major success when dozens, hundreds, and thousands of people are gradually being able to watch a film that very rich and powerful forces are effectively (not “officially”) seeking to ban. If your heritage, roots or Jewish-interest tour group is coming to Vilnius in the coming months and might be interested in a private, informal viewing of a draft first version only of a remarkable film effectively banned at present, please be in touch with Defending History (info@defendinghistory.com). To inquire about future online “viewing windows” please be in touch with Kopa Studio II (berkopa@hotmail.com).
Posted in Bold Citizens Speak Out, Film, Free Speech & Democracy, It Pays to Defend History: Success Over the Years..., Litvak Affairs, Museums, News & Views, Opinion, Saulius Beržinis, Šeduva (Sheduva, Shádeve, Shádov) and its "Museum of the Lost Shtetl"
Tagged Holocaust in Sheduva, Museum of the Lost Shtetl (Sheduva), Petrified Time, Saulius Berzinis
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New Public Model of 19th Century Vilna Features Czar’s Military Base, Omits Vilna Jewish Cemetery
OPINION | VILNIUS | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY | CEMETERIES | LITVAK AFFAIRS
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by Julius Norwilla (Vilnius)
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Model of 19th century Vilna: Russian citadel — there. Old Jewish cemetery — not there. Just empty moonscape.
VILNIUS—Last month, the major Baltic news service BNS reported that a dynamic new outdoor exhibition, called “Pavilion: Vilnius 200 Years Ago” would open at the National Museum of Lithuania. Indeed, a handsome new webpage on the museum’s website gives more detail.
A model (“maquette”) of the city two hundred years ago is now to be enjoyed at the foot of Gediminas’s Hill, in the square right in front of the museum. The scale model is based on Imperial Russia’s 1830s plans for the development of the city after the suppression of the 1830 uprising, known as the November Uprising.
But instead of the half-millennium old Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery (at Piramónt, in the district right across the river called Šnipiškės, Yiddish Shnípeshok), on the right bank of the Neris River (the Viliya), in front of Gediminas’s castle mount, there is a disproportionately large citadel. The huge cemetery and its numerous mini-housletsare not marked at all. The citadel of the imperial Russian army is the largest and perhaps the most prominent object in the entire layout.
Posted in Cemeteries and Mass Graves, Julius Norwilla, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Politics of Memory
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Time for France’s Embassy in Vilnius to Just Say ‘Non!’ to French Bookstore that Features Books Glorifying Lithuanian Holocaust Collaborators
[UPDATED 29 MAY]
OPINION | GLORIFICATION OF COLLABORATORS | FRANCE | THE ‘FRENCH BOOKSTORE’ IN VILNIUS
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by Dovid Katz
VILNIUS—The French bookstore located in the building housing the Institut français / French Cultural Center, all part of the French Embassy compound here in Lithuania’s capital, has for many years been featuring smack in the middle of its prominent show window at Didžioji St. No. 1 in Vilnius Old Town, in the row of books closest to the viewer outside, books in English or Lithuanian (nothing to do with France or French) that are dedicated to glorifying Holocaust collaborators who supported and enabled the genocide of 96.4% of Lithuanian Jewry.
Jump to author’s memoir
Whenever, over the years, this issue has been brought up to French Embassy diplomats, French Institute leadership, the answer has been the same, along the lines of “It is not our bookshop, it is a private French-themed bookshop that simply rents the space from us. We are not responsible. The French Embassy is not responsible, the French Institute is not responsible, the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs is not responsible.” Nevertheless, we would like to pay tribute to French diplomats who did make an effort over the years. On 7 May 2020, for example, the then ambassador, HE Claire Lignières-Counathe took action. She reported back: “The French book shop on Didžioji gatvė is not part of the French Institute. But we pointed out to the owner that to present this book in the shop window could hurt people. He agreed and removed the book from the shop window.”
One week later, the book was back. And that goes to the heart of how a far-right, Holocaust-revisionist, Hitler collaborator glorifying (hence ipso facto antisemitic) enterprise has been, as one midlevel French diplomat put it to us off the record, “making a monkey out of our embassy in the third decade of the twenty-first century.”
In the city’s everyday life, and all the more so for thousands of tourists from around the world, the details of ownership are unknown and of little interest. It is the universal public perception that comes into play when a French themed bookshop is housed in the building of the French Embassy compound in Vilnius, just to the right of the French Institute’s handsome blue sign.
Visitors to town can be forgiven for thinking the French bookshop is affiliated with the Institut français (blue sign at left). Photo: Defending History.
Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Foreign Ministries: Holocaust Politics Abuse?, France, French bookstore housed in Institut français & French Embassy compound in Vilnius, likes to feature (English) titles glorifying local Holocaust collaborators. What gives?, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory
Tagged Ambassador Claire Lignières-Counathe, Ambassador Francois Laumonier, France + Holocaust, French bookshop in Vilnius, French bookstore in Vilnius, French Embassy in Vilnius, French Institute in Vilnius, Institut francaise in Vilnius, LAF (Lithuanian Activist Front)
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Could the Israeli Foreign Ministry be More Sensitive to Yiddish Language, Literature and Culture in Eastern Europe? Latest from Vilnius
OPINION | YIDDISH AFFAIRS | LITVAK ISSUES | ISRAEL CHRONICLE | ISRAEL SECTION
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by Dovid Katz
VILNIUS—The lovely idea to name a square in modern Vilnius for the State of Israel is a fine gesture of friendship between the two countries and their foreign ministries. Today’s LRT report informs readers that Israel Square will adorn the neighborhood known as Naujamiestis (the New Town, or the New City).
There is a problem.
Posted in Israel, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Yiddish Affairs
Tagged Algirdo Street in Vilnius, Israel and Yiddish, Israel Square in Vilnius, Israeli Embassy in Vilnius, Naujamiestis, Vilnius names square for Israel, Yiddish in Vilnius
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Full English Translation of Lithuanian Parliament Member Žemaitaitis’s Antisemitic Post that Revives Holocaust Era Tropes for Modern Lithuania
ANTISEMITISM | HUMAN RIGHTS | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | LITHUANIA | LITVAK AFFAIRS
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JUMP TO TRANSLATION & SCREEN SHOT
VILNIUS—Instead of apologizing after unusually rapid responses by both the official Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Israeli Embassy in Vilnius, Lithuanian Parliament (Seimas) member Remigijus Žemaitaitis issued the following statement on Facebook on 8 May (English translation followed by screen shot of original from Facebook, taken 9 May at 14:30 from the 8 May FB post).
11 May update: Have any Lithuanian leaders, Western leaders, international Jewish organizations and human rights advocates, antisemitism watchdogs etc. yet publicly called for the immediate resignation of a parliamentarian in an EU/NATO national parliament whose published post (not “locker room talk”) revives local Hitler-era anti-Jewish hate speech equating Jews with Communism and Russian domination? “Wasting digital ink replying to the hater’s ‘arguments’ at Twitter and Bacebook is just not the same as a public statement calling for the hatemonger’s immediate resignation — as would be the case in any Western country. Lithuanian citizens deserve the same standard.”
12 May: Prime Minister Ingrida Sionyte boldly calls for impeachment inquiry. Can this rapidly be sharpened to a call for immediate resignation as in any other Western country?
As Defending History readers know from our antisemitism section, this is not the first time Middle Eastern and Israeli-Palestinian issues have been used by local bigots to smear Lithuania’s 700 year old Jewish community, of which over 96% were murdered in the Holocaust. But it is perhaps novel that the “triple whammy” of (1) antisemitism plus Middle Eastern issues have been added to (2) the Red Libel, the association made by Eastern European antisemitism, that the Jews in general were, are, and will always be associated above all with Communism; (3), a third implied pillar: the charge of disloyalty of the nation’s Jewish citizens (before the Holocaust a minority, now a tiny remnant under three thousand persons nationally).
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Christian-Jewish Issues, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views
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Lithuania’s Prime Minister Announces Members of New Commission on Fate of Hated Soviet Ruin in Heart of Vilna’s Old Jewish Cemetery
OPINION | HUMAN RIGHTS | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH ISSUES | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT | OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER
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VILNIUS—The office of the Lithuanian prime minister today released the list of members of its new commission (The Working Group) to advise on the future of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery. Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė was highly praised by Defending History for her bold and historic August 2021 cancellation of the “convention center in the Jewish cemetery” project that had been causing Lithuania’s stature so much unnecessary damage (see Šimonytė section). It had been supported by corrupt politicians, money-hungry builders and contractors, a corrupt group of London “grave sellers” (the CPJCE), and an array of “Useful Jewish Idiots” who have repeatedly betrayed the living remnants of Lithuanian Jewry over decades, via what some describe as an acquired addiction to honors, photo-ops, grants, junkets, medals, translations of their writings, and assorted other catnip products. One of them was even a JTS-based veteran of a 2007-2008 commission who helped provide “American Jewish cover” for the “two green buildings” (combined residence and business) on the cemetery site that are surrounded by graves on all four sides to this day (more exactly: he was brought in after construction of the first to help smooth the way for the second; he did utter some general sentiments of protest in a New York Yiddish newspaper but refused the editor’s permission for his piece to appear in the paper’s English supplement “because I’m going to be there soon in an important government group”).
Missing from the commission (the PM’s advisors really missed an opportunity here) are the three Lithuanian-citizen, Lithuania-resident heroes of the story who steadfast work over years saved their country from the future humiliation of an American president refusing to set foot in a “convention center in the Jewish cemetery” — Ruta Bloshtein (author of the international petition), Dr. Andrius Kulikauskas, and Julius Norwilla.
Posted in 2023-2024 'Working Group' on the Future of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery, Cemeteries and Mass Graves, Christian-Jewish Issues, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė
Tagged Andrius Kulikauskas, Chaim Burshtein, Jewish cemetery at Piramont (Snipiskes, Julius Norwilla (Norvila), Old Vilna (Vilnius) Jewish cemetery, Pinchos Fridberg, PM Ingrida Simonyte, Professor David Fishman, Rabbi Chaim Burshtein, Rabbi S. J. Feffer, Ruta Bloshtein, Snipiskes
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Please Email Lithuania’s Prime Minister to Do Away with the Soviet Building Desecrating Vilnius’s Oldest Jewish Cemetery
OPINION | HUMAN RIGHTS | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH ISSUES | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT | OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER
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by Andrius Kulikauskas
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In 2020, Lithuania’s Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė struck funding and thereby ended plans to convert the Vilnius Sports and Concert Palace into a congress center. The Soviets had desecrated the heart of Vilnius’s oldest Jewish cemetery at Piramónt (Šnipiškės) by constructing and utilizing this building there. 53,000 people signed Ruta Bloshtein’s petition asking Lithuania’s leaders not to desecrate it further. Many people from around the world wrote letters which convinced the Prime Minister to strike funding.
Posted in 2023-2024 'Working Group' on the Future of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery, Andrius Kulikauskas, Antisemitism & Bias, Cemeteries and Mass Graves, Christian-Jewish Issues, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė
Tagged Andrius Kulikauskas, Gerbkime kapines, Old Jewish cemetery in Vilnius (Vilna), Piramont (Snipiskes) Jewish cemetery, Rolandas Krisciunas
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But Who Will Now Tend to the Fate of the Vilnius Sports Palace?
OPINION | HUMAN RIGHTS | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH ISSUES | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT | OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER
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by Andrius Kulikauskas
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What is there now and what could be restored: Clockwise from top left: The Soviet eyesore today; three details from paintings by Alfred Holler (1888–1954) at the current exhibit ‘Outsiders Look at Vilnius’ at the National Art Gallery in Vilnius. Photos: Andrius Kulikauskas.
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Posted in 2023-2024 'Working Group' on the Future of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery, Andrius Kulikauskas, Antisemitism & Bias, Bold Citizens Speak Out, Cemeteries and Mass Graves, Christian-Jewish Issues, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Politics of Memory
Tagged Andrius Kulikauskas, Gerbkime kapines, Į laisvę, Laima Kalinauskienė, Lina Saulėnaitė-Višinskienė, Meir Zelmanovičius, Piramont Snipiskes Cemetery in Vilna, Rolandas Krisciunas, Sholem Zelmanovich, Sporto rumai, Turto Bankas, Vilnius Jewish cemetery Snipiskes, Vilnius Sports Palace
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Family of Master Vilna Yiddishist Zalmen Reyzen Welcomed to Vilnius
YIDDISH AFFAIRS | LITVAK AFFAIRS | EVENTS | MEMOIRS
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The following is a revised text of Dovid Katz’s post that appeared on his Facebook page today.
What a thrill to be able to welcome to my place in Vilna classics professor Ruth Reizin (Webb), granddaughter-in-law of the master Yiddishist scholar Zalmen Reyzen (1887-c.1941), and her daughter Rachel Reizin, the only direct descendant of Zalmen Reyzen. Alas, British journalist Paul Reizin (Ruth’s husband, Rachel’s dad), author of Happiness for Humans (2018) and Ask Me Anything (2020) passed away way before his time in 2021.
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Growing up in a Yiddishist home in New York, of course Zalmen Reyzen, author of the classic four-volume encyclopedia of Yiddish literature and so much more, was a beloved name. My father Menke Katz had been a close friend of Zalmen’s brother, the great Yiddish author Avrom Reyzen, in New York over many decades.
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Growing up in a Yiddishist home in New York, of course Zalmen Reyzen, author of the classic four-volume encyclopedia of Yiddish literature and so much more, was a beloved name. My father Menke Katz had been a close friend of Zalmen’s brother, the great Yiddish author Avrom Reyzen, in New York over many decades.
Posted in Dovid Katz, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Yiddish Affairs
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Lithuanian Holocaust Remembered in Wollongong, Australia
EVENTS | LITHUANIA | HISTORY | MUSEUMS
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by Michael Samaras
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SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA—More than 100 people attended the Wollongong Art Gallery to hear Professor Konrad Kwiet, resident historian at the Sydney Jewish Museum, deliver a public lecture on the Holocaust in Lithuania and the wartime role of Bronius ‘Bob’ Sredersas.
Wollongong Art Gallery audience listens to Professor Konrad Kwiet on the Lithuanian Holocaust. Photo: Michael Samaras.
Posted in Events, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Michael Samaras, Museums, News & Views, Politics of Memory
Tagged Bronius 'Bob' Sredersas, Holocaust in Kaunas, Holocaust in Lithuania, Michael Samaras, Professor Konrad Kwiet, Sydney Jewish Museum, Wollongong
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Garliava, Lithuania: On the Town’s Holocaust Mass Grave and its Old Jewish Cemetery
CEMETERIES AND MASS GRAVES | POLITICS OF MEMORY | LITVAK AFFAIRS
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by Julius Norwilla
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The Holocaust Mass Grave Site
The best way to reach the mass killing site in Garliava (Yiddish Gúdleve, Polish Godlewo), is to take a train from the central train station in Kaunas. It is just one stop. The railway runs south, through a picturesque valley of the languid river Jiesia. Garliava is a township historically in the Suwałki region. It is named after an ancient landlord and noble family Godlewski. It seems that twentieth century ethnic purity zealots renamed the township into Garliava to sever any obvious link to the personage commemorated by the town’s naming, thereby reducing the historical chronicle of the entire region to a narrow and assertively ethnonationalist narrative
When you step out of the old railway station in Garliava, the town itself is still one kilometer away. The train line and the station were built in 1862, and one can wonder, what the point was, with the then cutting-edge train technology of the time, to make a long detour around the town and build the station somewhere in the middle of the fields, or as one might put it, right in the middle of nowhere?
Posted in Cemeteries and Mass Graves, History, Julius Norwilla, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views
Tagged Garliava, Godlewo (Godlevo), Gúdleve (Lithuania), Holocaust in Lithuania, Holocaust mass graves in Lithuania, Julius Norwilla (Norvila)
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For Vilnius’s 700 Year Celebrations, Antisemitic ‘Artists’ Launch Vicious New Holocaust-‘Justifying’ Souvenir
ANTISEMITISM | 700 YEARS OF VILNIUS CELEBRATIONS | POLITICS OF MEMORY | DOUBLE GENOCIDE
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VILNIUS—This commemorative envelope was purchased this morning, on Easter Sunday, on Pilies gatve, Vilnius’s historic Castle Street that has become the city’s center for souvenir stalls and shops. It is an older antisemitic envelope design seen many times before, picturing the Jews of Kaunas allegedly welcoming the Soviet army into town during World War II (i.e. blaming the Jews for the 1940 Soviet occupation as excuse for the genocide — the Lithuanian Holocaust — that followed a year later, wiping out some 96.4% of Lithuanian Jewry, with thousands murdered in late June 1941 before the Germans even took over).
The caption “explains” (in Lithuanian) that “on June 15, 1940, numerous crowds of Kaunas Jews welcome the occupying Red Army (archive photo)”. No mention of the vastly larger numbers of Lithuanians, Poles and Russians who turned out. No mention that this canard continues to be used to “explain” the Lithuanian Holocaust. No mention of the failure of the nation’s army to defend the country or the president’s fleeing the country. But plenty of room to link (in English) the antisemitic canard to the current 700 year Vilnius anniversary festivities. Are Western tourists presumed to be idiots?
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Double Genocide, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Vilnius
Tagged 700 Year Vilnius celebration, Antisemitism in Lithuania, Lithuanian Holocaust, Pilies gatve (Vilnius)
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Blaming Inna Hecker Grade for Bashevis Singer’s Greater Success in English
OPINION | YIDDISH AFFAIRS | LITVAK AFFAIRS | MEDIA WATCH
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NOTE: As someone fortunate enough to have had some NYT letters published over the decades, I fully anticipated the non-publication of this one (9 March), and hope none will take amiss my publication of it here in the interests of putting out there a (not yet offered?) second opinion on a woman against whom I feel there has been some unwarranted invective. —DK
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Re “In the Papers of Yiddish Novelist Chaim Grade, Clues to His Lesser Fame” by Joseph Berger (March 6)
To the Editor:
The magnificent Yiddish author Chaim Grade well equals Isaac Bashevis Singer in talent and output, but it is wrong to blame his wife (or their marriage) for the failure of his work to attain equal status in English translation.
Grade’s profound preservation of the intricacies of pre-Holocaust East European Jewish civilization (with vast religious minutiae delightful to folks in the tribe) is just not in the genre of Singer’s stark, universalist, compelling plots that are moreover enriched by untrammelled sexuality and bespoke kabbalah.
Posted in Arts, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, News & Views, Opinion, Yiddish Affairs
Tagged Chaim Grade, Chaim Grade vs. Isaac Bashevis Singer, Grade-Singer competition, Inna Hecker Grade, Joseph Berger's article on Chaim Grade
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Photographic Memories of Roza Bieliauskienė (on her Shlóyshim)
OBITUARIES | LITVAK NEWS | ROZA BIELIAUSKIENĖ
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We mark the traditional conclusion of the thirty-day mourning period (standard Yiddish: shlóyshim, Lithuanian Yiddish shléyshim, Hebrew sheloshim) for Roza Bieliauskienė (1946-2023), founding curator of Lithuania’s Jewish museum, beloved researcher, art historian, guide, teacher, and translator, who has helped thousands of people from near and far with their Jewish culture research over the last 35 years. See Defending History’s obituaries by Dalija Epšteinaitė (Dalia Epstein) and by Dovid Katz; and DH’s video interview with Roza about her life recorded less than a year ago; DH’s Roza Bieliauskienė section.
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I: from Roza’s son Julius Bieliauskas:
Posted in Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Obituaries, Roza Bieliauskienė
Tagged Emanuelis Zingeris, Rachel Kostanian, Roza Bieliauskiene, Samuel Bak
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We Knew Roza
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in memory of
Roza Bieliauskienė (1946-2023)
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She died faster than a match burns out. Dumbfounded, we are trying to understand her place in our lives, and in Jewish culture, to which she devoted so much energy. The Jewish Museum in Lithuania has a long-suffering history. It burned, and was plundered, and ceased to exist, opened and closed many times… There were always experienced workers, Torah connoisseurs who knew Hebrew and, of course, Yiddish.
And suddenly, after World War II, only a few of these specialists remained alive. And in 1949 the museum, where writers, journalists and other cultural figures had already settled, the Soviet authorities again closed the museum and dispersed its collections, all that had miraculously survived during the war years, distributing it to various museums in Lithuania. Jewish culture was rapidly destroyed. Yiddish writers either went to camps, like all “rootless cosmopolitans,” or mastered some applied professions, while others began to write in Lithuanian. In a rare Jewish family did they continue to speak máme-loshn (Yiddish). Parents among themselves — yes, but with children in Russian or in Lithuanian.
Posted in Arts, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Museums, News & Views, Obituaries, Roza Bieliauskienė
Tagged Dalia Epstein, Dalija Epšteinaitė, Jews ih Lithuania, Roza Bieliauskiene, Vilna Gaon Jewish Museum in Vilnius
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Review of Michael Kretzmer’s Documentary Film “J’Accuse”
OPINION | FILM | ARTS | MEDIA | COLLABORATOR GLORIFICATION | J. NOREIKA
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by Dovid Katz
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Genuine heroes of this saga—both written out of the film
- At left: Evaldas Balčiūnas (who first called his nation’s attention (in Lithuanian) and the world’s (in English) to state-sponsored adulation of Lithuanian Holocaust perpetrator J. Noreika. That was a year after his classic essay “Why does the state commemorate murderers?” appeared in Defending History in 2011. Here pictured at Vilnius County Court after one of the hearings in the litany of kangaroo cases against him (Defending History was there at each hearing to support him). He is DH’s 2023 Person of the Year.
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- At right: Dr. Andrius Kulikauskas brought his self-crafted poster to a nationalist event on independence day in central Vilnius, with an image to show his people the kind of national hero Lithuania should be celebrating: the inspirational Holocaust-era rescuer Malvina Šokelytė Valeikienė (DH’s person of the year in 2018). The gentle, teetotaling mathematician and philosopher took this sign right into the heart of an alcohol-fueled ultranationalist demonstration, leaving observers of every persuasion in awe of his courage. Dr. Kulikauskas boldly led the effort to expose Noreika in Lithuania and is the de facto author of the primary documents underpinning the legal petitions to the state’s Genocide Center and its courts. A Lithuanian American born and raised in California, he and his family migrated to newly free Lithuania decades ago.
- See DH’s Evaldas Balčiūnas and Andrius Kulikauskas sections. A future film maker might even find an enchanting angle in the stark differences between the two Lithuanian heroes of this story. One is a devout Catholic, the other an atheist. One is an anarchist, the other a nationalist. One an urban family guy, the other a lone thinker and dreamer in a faraway wooden hut in the depths of the Lithuanian countryside.
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VILNIUS—Michael Kretzmer’s new documentary J’Accuse! provides a terrific extended interview with legendary truth-teller Silvia Foti. The film’s narration provides effective statements on ongoing East European state adulation of Nazi collaborators though focused on just one, Jonas Noreika of Lithuanian Holocaust infamy (who was the Chicago-born Foti’s grandfather).
Posted in Arts, Bold Citizens Speak Out, Collaborators Glorified, Dovid Katz, Film, History, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, Michael Kretzmer's Documentary Film "J'Accuse!" on the Lithuanian Holocaust, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, State Glorification of Holocaust Collaborator J. Noreika
Tagged Andrius Kulikauskas, Baltic Truth (Dudu Fisher), BBC's How the Holocaust Began, Danny Ben-Moshe, Efraim Zuroff, Evaldas Balciunas, Film J'accuse on Lithuanian Holocaust, Grant Arthur Gochin, Grant Gochin, Holocaust collaborators Glorified, Holocaust in Lithuania, Jonas Noreika, Malvina Šokelytė Valeikienė, Marc Radomsky, Michael Kretzmer, Michael Kretzmer's film J'Accuse, Review of film J'Accuse, Robyn Sassen, Roland Binet, Ruta Vanagaite, Silvia Foti, Simon Wiesenthal Center
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[LATEST UPDATE. PAGE PUBLISHED 18 DEC. 2013]
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Posted in Arts, Film, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, Michael Kretzmer's Documentary Film "J'Accuse!" on the Lithuanian Holocaust, Music, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory
Tagged Andrius Kulikauskas, Baltic Truth by A. Hramcovs & E.J. Levin, Dudu Fisher, Efraim Zuroff, Evaldas Balciunas, Film "J'Accuse", How the Holocaust Began, James Bulgin, Jonas Noreika, Lithuania film J'Accuse!, Michael Kretzmer J'Accuse!, Nazi monuments in Vilnius, Ruta Vanagaite, Silvia Foti, The Nazi's Granddaughter, Vilnius's 700th anniversary
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Roza Bieliauskienė (1946 – 2023): Cofounder of Lithuania’s Jewish Museum, Longtime Chief Curator, Educator, Specialist on Litvak Artists
ROZA BIELIAUSKIENE | OBITUARIES | MUSEUMS
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The following is a revised text of Dovid Katz’s obituary that appeared on his Facebook page today.
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Roza Bieliauskienė (1946-2023)
The world of Jewish Vilna and Litvaks everywhere mourn in deep sorrow the untimely sudden death of our dear Roza (Róze, Reyzl) Bieliauskienė, beloved scholar of Lithuanian Jewish art, long time historian, museum curator, educator, guide and a loyal friend unafraid of untoward local politics and its boycotts. Whether for an old friend or a foreigner she’d never seen before, Roza would rush to help anyone research anything if it was in the field of Lithuanian Jewish culture, history. Here is our 2 hour+ interview with her (entirely in Yiddish) from less than a year ago (recorded and posted in the Lithuanian Yiddish Video Archive (LYVA) thanks to the generosity of Remembering Litvaks Inc).
Posted in Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Museums, News & Views, Obituaries, Roza Bieliauskienė
Tagged Jews in Vilnius, Lithuania + Jews, Roza Bieliauskiene, Vilna Gaon Jewish State Museum of Lithuania, Yiddish in Vilnius, ראָזאַ ביעליאַוסקיענע
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