Did “Double Genocide” from the “Prague Declaration” Land Under the Radar in the United States Congress?
PAIN IS EXACERBATED AS PLOY COINCIDES WITH 70TH ANNIVERSARY OF D DAY EVENTS
- By stealth out of the East?
Litvak Affairs
“Double Genocide” Snuck into Congress?
Posted in 70 Years Declaration, Double Genocide: The New Form of Holocaust Revisionism & Denial, History, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Politics of Memory, United States, US State Dept Manipulated?, Yitzhak Arad
Tagged 70th Anniversary of D-Day, Abraham Cooper, D-Day + Baltic countries, Efraim Zuroff, Holocaust + US Congress, Holocaust revisionism + Congress, Holocaust Survivors in 2014, Jewish issues + US Congress, Lithuanian Embassy in Washington DC, Seventy Years Declaration, Yehuda Bauer, Yitzhak Arad
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Statement of Staff Writer Evaldas Balčiūnas on Summons from Police
My name is Evaldas Balčiūnas and I write for Defending History, in addition to various Lithuanian web journals. On May 14, 2014, I was contacted by local Lithuanian police investigator Reda Šimkutė by telephone at a number which is not registered in my name. She said she needed to “carry out inquiries” about me.
I asked her what the nature of the matter was. She refused to answer, so I suggested she follow normal procedure and send me what they call “an invitation” (in other words a summons) to come to an interrogation at the police department.
Posted in Bold Citizens Speak Out, EU, Evaldas Balčiūnas, Free Speech & Democracy, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Prosecutors & Police 'Investigate' DH Author Evaldas Balčiūnas, State Glorification of Holocaust Collaborator J. Noreika
Tagged Evaldas Balciunas, Free speech in Lithuania, Holocaust revisionism in Lithuania, human rights in Lithuania
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DH Staff Writer Evaldas Balčiūnas is Investigated by Lithuanian Police
Summons Issued
Statement by Evaldas Balčiūnas; DH section on Free Speech
He is author of a series of bold articles about state sanitization and glorification of Holocaust perpetrators and collaborators
Newest investigation follows recent police and prosecutorial harassment of Giedrius Grabauskas and Saulius Beržinis
Posted in Bold Citizens Speak Out, EU, Evaldas Balčiūnas, Free Speech & Democracy, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Prosecutors & Police 'Investigate' DH Author Evaldas Balčiūnas, State Glorification of Holocaust Collaborator J. Noreika
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A Jewish Tragedy (Flute and Composition)
M U S I C
by Roland Binet (Braine-l’Alleud, Belgium)
Starting in 2009, after my first visit in Riga, I became interested in the fate of the Jews in the Baltic States during the war. I returned several times to Latvia and also visited Estonia and Lithuania. In 2013 while in Riga, I went to see the Rumbula Memorial to see for myself what that well-known and fateful place looked like. That year in Vilnius, I visited the Ponár (Paneriai) memorial site, another of those well-known fateful places.
Posted in Arts, Latvia, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Music, News & Views, Roland Binet
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The Stones Tell Me. After All, They Lived Here.
O P I N I O N
by Genrich Agranovski
Genrich Agranovski is co-author (with Irina Guzenberg) of Vilnius: Sites of Jewish Memory as well as other works on Jewish Vilna. This comment was translated from the Russian by Ludmila Makedonskaya. See also DH’s section on old Jewish cemeteries and mass graves.
At the beginning of the 1990s a commission tentatively called “Memorial” was founded at the Jewish Community of Lithuania. Its aims included collecting information about the mass murder and burial sites of the World war II period, Jewish cemeteries, as well as other issues connected with the memory of the perished. The commission was headed by Joseph Levinson. Being a member of the commission, I was in charge of collecting information on Jewish cemeteries in Vilnius. There had been two large Jewish cemeteries in Vilnius before the war: the “old one,” founded, according to Vilna Jewish lore, at the end of the fifteenth century and used till 1830, and Zarechenskoye [“beyond the river”; in Yiddish Zarétshe] (Antokolskoye), which was used from 1828 up to June 1941. The latter was the biggest in the city. According to the Jewish ethnographer Solomon Shik, seventy thousand people had been buried there by 1937. In Soviet times both cemeteries were destroyed and the gravestones were used for construction purposes.
Posted in Bold Citizens Speak Out, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Genrich Agranovski, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Reformed Evangelical Church (Vilnius)
Tagged Genrich Agranovski, Jewish cemeteries in Vilnius, matseyves (matsevot) in Lithuania
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Latvian School Features “Judenfrei” Sign
The entrance to a nursery school in Latvia owned by a traditionalist lawmaker featured a German-language sign advertising the establishment as being “Jew-free.”
The posting of the sign, which reads “Judenfrei,” was revealed Monday by the Latvian daily Vesti Segodniya. The paper published a photo of the sign on the fence of the Pucite (“Owlet”) private school.
According to the Coordinating Forum for Countering Antisemitism, the establishment is owned by Imants Paradnieks, an ultranationalist Latvian lawmaker.
On Tuesday, Twitter users confronted him to ask whether the sign was genuine or just “a provocation.” He provided no reply, but wrote: “The Kremlin is full of jackals.”
The Riga-based school has a history of Nazi sympathies. In 2012, Pucite hosted two men dressed in Waffen SS uniforms, who held what they defined as “a lesson of patriotic upbringing” for the school’s early childhood program. A video of the lesson, which was uploaded to the nursery school’s website, showed two men encouraging 3-year-old children to play with World War II-era weapons.
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Celebrations of Fascism, Human Rights, Latvia, Litvak Affairs, News & Views
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Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Statement on the Death of Lithuanian Jewish Community Leader Dr. Shimon Alperovich
JERUSALEM—The Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Israel Office issued this statement today in the wake of the passing of Dr. Shimon Alperovich, the former Chairman of the Lithuanian Jewish community (PDF here):
Wiesenthal Center Mourns the Passing Today of Courageous Leader of Lithuanian Jewish Community
“It is with great sorrow that we learned of the passing last night of Dr. Shimon Alperovich, the venerable leader for many years of the Lithuanian Jewish community. Dr. Alperovich displayed great courage and fortitude in leading the renewed Lithuanian Jewish community and fought bravely against the ongoing efforts to minimize local participation in Nazi crimes and the promotion of the canard of equivalency between Nazi and Communist atrocities.
Posted in Efraim Zuroff, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Obituaries, Shimon Alperovich (1928 – 2014)
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Footprints of Adolfas Ramanauskas-Vanagas in the Mass Murder of the Jews of Druskininkai
O P I N I O N
by Evaldas Balčiūnas
Adolfas Ramanauskas Vanagas was a well-known post-war partisan commander. Here’s what the Center for the Study of the Genocide of the Residents of Lithuania has to say about him on their website:
Posted in Bold Citizens Speak Out, Collaborators Glorified, Debates on Adolfas Ramanauskas (Vanagas), Debates on the Postwar "Forest Brothers", Dr. Arūnas Bubnys and State Holocaust Revisionism in Lithuania, Evaldas Balčiūnas, History, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, New Britain, Connecticut: Plans to Glorify Alleged Nazi Collaborator?, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Vilnius's Genocide Center and the Genocide Museum it Manages
Tagged Adolfas Ramanauskas Vanagas, Arunas Bubnys, Evaldas Balciunas, Genocide Center Vilnius, Nazi collaborators glorified, Ramanauskas + Druskininkai Ghetto, Ramanauskas + Holocaust, Ruta Vanagaite
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Beloved Leader of Lithuanian Jewry, Simon Alperovich, Dies at 85
Dr. Shimon Alperovich
(Simonas Alperavičius)
11 Oct. 1928 — 27 March 2014
ד″ר שמעון אַלפּעראָוויטש ז″ל
Posted in Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Obituaries, Shimon Alperovich (1928 – 2014)
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Yivo Conference: Unresolved History
O P I N I O N
by Geoff Vasil
This comment on the event “Unresolved History: Jews and Lithuanians After the Holocaust,” held February 14, 2014 in New York City is based on the videotape of the event that Yivo has posted on its website. Readers may also wish to see Olga Zabludoff’s articles before and after the event, and the comments accruing during last month’s discussion in New York’s Algemeiner.Com. Geoff Vasil has covered a number of state-sponsored Holocaust events over the years, including one featuring some of the same participants last summer in Vilnius. Defending History’s openly critical views of the “red-brown commission” are available in the section dedicated to various of the debates in recent years. The commission’s own website is here.
On February 14, 2014, a small panel spoke at YIVO world headquarters in NYC. There weren’t many people in the audience, to judge from the crowd sounds, and at least one panelist wasn’t there. It had been delayed a day earlier when a massive ice storm hit the city and temperatures plummeted. Tomas Venclova wasn’t able to make it because of the weather and poor health.
Posted in Events, Geoff Vasil, Identity Theft of Litvak Heritage, In the Era of Yivo's 100th, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Politics of Memory, The Great SLS About-Face
Tagged Geoff Vasil, Jonathan Brent, Yivo Lithuania
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2014 Baltic Marching Season Concluded
Interface of Pro-Fascist Marches, Holocaust Revisionism, and Contemporary Racism
EFRAIM ZUROFF IN THE HUFFINGTON POST, JERUSALEM POST AND TABLET
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Celebrations of Fascism, Collaborators Glorified, EU, Latvia, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Neo-Nazi & Fascist Marches, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Riga's Waffen SS Marches, Vilnius
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Summary Coverage of March 16th 2014 Waffen SS Event in Riga
Over 1500 March in Central Riga’s Annual March 16th Waffen SS Fest
MEDIA LINKS
Liberty Monument and the heart of Riga are again gifted to the glorifiers of Hitler’s Waffen SS in Latvia.
Continue reading
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Celebrations of Fascism, Collaborators Glorified, Events, Human Rights, Latvia, Litvak Affairs, Neo-Nazi & Fascist Marches, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Riga's Waffen SS Marches
Tagged Latvian Legionnaires march, Waffen SS march in Riga (2014)
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For Seventh Year Running, Neo-Nazis and Ultranationalists Given Center of Vilnius on Independence Day
O P I N I O N / E Y E W I T N E S S R E P O R T
by Dovid Katz
Lithuania’s March 11th independence day is celebrated by the free world, not least by those who remember the incredible news that spread around the globe in March 1990, when Lithuania’s parliament (Seimas) voted 124 to zero to break away from the Soviet Union. The courage of the parliamentarians from a broad spectrum of parties and movements was stark; the country was still occupied by ominous Soviet forces (and blood would be spilled by Soviet forces’ violence less than a year later, in January 1991). The March 11th celebration has been anchored over the years by a record of achievement that includes the transition to democracy, the joining of the European Union and NATO, and the rapid integration with Western society, economy and mores.
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Celebrations of Fascism, Dovid Katz, Events, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Neo-Nazi & Fascist Marches, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Swastikas in Lithuania, Vilnius
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Run-up to the March 11th 2014 Neo-Nazi / Ultranationalist March in Central Vilnius
Vilnius, Tuesday March 11th 2014:
Neo-Nazis Announce March Through Old Town and City Center to Nation’s Parliament
Efraim Zuroff Will Lead Silent, Peaceful Remembrance as Protest
Colleagues of all backgrounds are invited to meet Dr. Zuroff, Holocaust historian, Nazi-hunter, author, director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Israel office. He will lead a silent, peaceful remembrance of the annihilated Jewish citizens of Vilnius and Lithuania, in protest against the neo-Nazi marchers and the continued granting of city center venues on independence day. Meeting on Tuesday, 11 March 2014, 3 PM at Old Town Hall (Rotušė) Square. First meeting at edge of square, on the corner of Stiklių and Didžioji outside Amatininkai Café, monitoring the march (itself scheduled for 4 PM) to its conclusion on Gedimino near the Seimas (parliament).
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, EU, Events, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Neo-Nazi & Fascist Marches, News & Views, Swastikas in Lithuania, United Nations, Vilnius
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Olga Zabludoff’s Comment on a February 2014 Yivo Symposium
The following 7 March 2014 comment by Olga Zabludoff on the video posted of the 14 February 2014 event at Yivo appears in the Comments section for her earlier article in the Algemeiner Journal, where readers can follow the entire discussion.
Many thanks to Yivo for posting the video of the discussion “Unresolved History: Jews and Lithuanians after the Holocaust.” In my opinion, the champion panelist was Leonidas Donskis who opened his heart with conviction and courage. As a Jewish Lithuanian his understanding of and sympathy for both Jews and Lithuanians have generated wise insights and pervasive truths. Among his magnitude of analytical comments to be applauded, Donskis explained that the Far Right in Lithuania has managed to get close to the center of power where they have been “mainstreamed” rather than marginalized. He also reflected on how difficult it is for Lithuanians who have decided to tell the truth. As a nation “we lack the political courage,” he remarked.
Posted in "Jewish" Events as Cover?, "Red-Brown Commission", Events, In the Era of Yivo's 100th, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Olga Zabludoff, Opinion, Politics of Memory, The Great SLS About-Face, United States
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Out On Ellis Street in San Francisco
O P I N I O N
Members of the US-based “Litvak SIG” (both those on the free lists, and those who paid their $36 a year dues for full membership), have been informed of the following event and the book it features, coming up this Thursday evening in San Francisco. (When Messiah will come, the subscribers to both “SIG” sections will learn about the existence of Defending History, too and its modest, but free, Litvak interest sections. We must have patience.)
Posted in "Jewish" Events as Cover?, Books, Events, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, United States
Tagged 1835 Ellis Street, Allan Nadler, Cassedy, Efraim Zuroff, Ellen Cassedy, Ellis Street, Jewish Community Library, Litvak SIG, Olga Zabludoff, San Francisco, We are Here. Memories of the Lithuanian Holocaust
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Exhibit Honoring Jewish World War II Veterans Disappears Into Vilnius Thin Air
O P I N I O N
Cover of the brochure distributed at the 2000 launch of the “permanent exhibit”
by Dovid Katz
VILNIUS—Three Vilnius-based members of the Defending History team visited the Pylimo Street section of the Vilna Gaon Jewish State Museum of Lithuania this week, and asked to be shown the famous and widely admired exhibit honoring the Jewish veterans of the war against Hitler in Lithuania. The exhibit, titled Lithuania’s Jews in the Struggle Against Nazism, was opened in a spirit of unity, reconciliation and mutual respect, some fourteen years ago (PDF of the report in the Spring 2000 English edition of the Jewish community’s then quadrilingual newspaper, Jerusalem of Lithuania, which was edited by Milan Chersonski from 1999 until 2011; JPEG; reduced image below). Its primary creators are Joseph Levinson and Rachel Kostanian, both major leaders of The Green House, Lithuania’s one public venue that provides an unvarnished history of the Lithuanian Holocaust.
Posted in Arts, Dovid Katz, Exotic Jewish Tourism, History, Human Rights, Joseph Levinson, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Museums, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Rachel Kostanian, The Green House
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Pinchos Fridberg Interviews Pinchos Fridberg
Posted in "Red-Brown Commission", Bold Citizens Speak Out, In Russian, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Pinchos Fridberg, Politics of Memory
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Lithuanian-Jewish Affairs: Three Events
(Reposted from today’s Jerusalem Post)
O P I N I O N
by Efraim Zuroff
Three events took place this weekend which reflect the ambiguities of contemporary Jewish life in the Baltics and particularly in Lithuania, the largest of the three new democracies. In reverse order, on Sunday, ultra-nationalist groups staged an Independence Day march, which included anti-Semitic themes, in Kaunas (Kovno), Lithuania’s interwar capital and the country’s second largest city.Continue reading
Posted in "Jewish" Events as Cover?, Double Games, Double Genocide: The New Form of Holocaust Revisionism & Denial, Efraim Zuroff, EU, Events, Identity Theft of Litvak Heritage, In the Era of Yivo's 100th, Kaunas, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory
Tagged Double Genocide, Efraim Zuroff, Holocaust in Lithuania, Holocaust Revisionism, Juozas Ambrazevicius Brazaitis, LAF (Lithuanian Activist Front), Lithuanian Embassy in London
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Wiesenthal Center Statement on Kaunas Protest Against Neo-Nazi Extravaganza in City Center
JERUSALEM—The following statement was issued today by the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Israel office.
WIESENTHAL CENTER ISRAEL DIRECTOR LEADS PROTEST AGAINST EXTREME RIGHT INDEPENDENCE DAY MARCH
16 February 2014 KAUNAS, LITHUANIA—The Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Israel Director and chief Nazi hunter Dr. Efraim Zuroff yesterday afternoon led a protest against an ultra-nationalist neo-Nazi march in honor of Lithuanian Independence Day, held here, in Lithuania’s inter-war capital, whose large and important Jewish community was virtually totally annihilated during the Holocaust by the Nazis, with highly significant participation of Lithuanian volunteer collaborators.
Posted in Celebrations of Fascism, Collaborators Glorified, Efraim Zuroff, EU, Events, Kaunas, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views
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