Opinion
Protected: New Documentary on Holocaust Perpetrator Glorification in Eastern Europe: ‘No Secret Monuments’
Posted in Arts, Film, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Roland Binet
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Finally, View that ‘a Cemetery is a Cemetery’ Makes it into Lithuanian Media as Debate Sharpens on Fate of Vilnius’s Old Jewish Cemetery
Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky
The following is Defending History’s translation into Lithuanian of Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky’s statement of 11 March 2026, Lithuania’s Independence Day. The original English appeared the same day in DH, and on 17 March it was published in The Times of Israel. See also Professor Sid Leiman’s response from New York. For some weeks, there was no mention of it in Lithuanian language media, a priori rather curious given the rabbi’s thirty-two years of resident service in the Lithuanian capital. But by mid April there were cracks in the efforts to keep from Lithuanian language readership the very existence of the opinion that it is in Lithuania’s interest to honor, not humiliate, the five hundred year Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery, not to reconstruct a Soviet ruin where throngs would cheer, drink and flush lavatories surrounded by thousands of extant graves of fellow citizens of Vilna. Would this even be contemplated if it were about a half-millennium old cemetery that was the resting place of the great scholars of the ethnic and religious majority?
The ice started to break with veteran journalist Arvydas Jockus’s article in Alfa.lt (16 April), a survey of views that exposed the misimpression that the state-financed official “Lithuanian Jewish Community” is somehow representative of Jewish views (whether local or international). Then, the Vilnius-area Vilniaus kraštas published a translation, on 22 April, albeit with a classic “biased headline” implying that the “purpose of the Jews” is to take away the Soviet Sports Palace. This was somewhat rectified by the publication of a Lithuanian translation with the correct author’s title, carried as a press release by BNS (Baltic News Service) and by Elta.lt, among others, on 24 April. Since 2015, Defending History has offered a section in Lithuanian on these issues.
Posted in Christian-Jewish Issues, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Vilniaus senosios žydų (Piramonto) kapinės Šnipiškėse
Tagged Arvydas Jockus, Piramont Shnipishok cemetery, Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, Snipiskes Jewish cemetery, Vilnius Jewish cemetery
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Welcoming New Director of Lithuania’s State Jewish Museum
OPINION | MUSEUMS | VILNIUS | LITVAK AFFAIRS
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OPINION
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VILNIUS—For several decades, the Defending History community has been providing commentary on Jewish and history related museums in Lithuania and the wider region, primarily in our Museums section, initiated nearly eighteen years ago. Here in Vilnius, we have endeavored to give voice to sectors of modern Jewish (and sometimes non-Jewish) life whose views have had no other channel, especially since the closure, over a decade and a half ago, of the Jewish community’s long-beloved quadrilingual Jewish newspaper, Jerusalem of Lithuania, that was home to open and vigorous debate for decades, under the inspired editorship of the late Milan Chersonski. Ultimately, it was replaced by a PR type website dedicated to one view only, that of the tiny clique in control of the tens of millions of euros in restitution funding that has excluded the interests of today’s Jewish community, and its healthy diversity of views.
Posted in Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Museums, News & Views, Opinion, Vilnius
Tagged Emanuelis Zingeris, Jewish partisan fort (Lithuania), Jewish State Museum of Lithuania, Milan Chersonski, Sergejus Kanovicius, Sergey Kanovich, The Green House (Vilnius), Vilna Gaon Museum of Jewish History
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President’s Office, Vilnius Municipality, and Ersatz Jewish Community Leader in Yet Another ‘Agreement’ to Effectively Destroy the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery
OPINION | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT: THE SAGE OF 2015-2025 | EARLIER OPPOSITION | 2023-2024 “WORKING GROUP” ON VILNA CEMETERY | LIST OF MEMBERS | MOUNTING OPPOSITION TO NEW “MUSEUM PROJECT” | USCPAHA (UNITED STATES COMMISSION FOR THE PRESERVATION OF AMERICA’S HERITAGE ABROAD) | THE CPJCE (COMMITTEE FOR THE PRESERVATION OF JEWISH CEMETERIES IN EUROPE) | THE AJC (AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE) | THE CER (CONFERENCE OF EUROPEAN RABBIS) | THE GWF (GOOD WILL FOUNDATION) | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | HUMAN RIGHTS
VILNIUS—Today’s mainstream media reports in Lrt.lt and in m.diena.lt, among others, reported on yet another “agreement” about the fate of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt in the historic Shnípishok district (today’s thriving Šnipiškės), this time between the president’s office and the municipality and the allegedly “rigged election” leader of the state-sponsored, restitution-fueled ersatz official Jewish community. Aside from a brief oblique mention at the end of the m.diena.lt report, there were no mentions of the vast international (and local bona fide Jewish and rabbinic) opposition to the half-millennium old cemetery being turned into anything other than a cemetery.
Posted in Christian-Jewish Issues, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Politics of Memory
Tagged Old Vilna Jewish cemetery (Snipiskes, Piramont (Shnipishok, Snipiskes (Shnipishok) Jewish Cemetery, Snipiskes cemetery
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Rabbi Elchonon Baron: Yom HaShoah Letter on Planned Desecration of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery by State Authorities
OPINION | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT: THE SAGE OF 2015-2025 | EARLIER OPPOSITION | 2023-2024 “WORKING GROUP” ON VILNA CEMETERY | LIST OF MEMBERS | MOUNTING OPPOSITION TO NEW “MUSEUM PROJECT” | USCPAHA (UNITED STATES COMMISSION FOR THE PRESERVATION OF AMERICA’S HERITAGE ABROAD) | THE CPJCE (COMMITTEE FOR THE PRESERVATION OF JEWISH CEMETERIES IN EUROPE) | THE AJC (AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE) | THE CER (CONFERENCE OF EUROPEAN RABBIS) | THE GWF (GOOD WILL FOUNDATION) | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | HUMAN RIGHTS
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Open Letter on Yom Hashoah
by Rabbi Elchonon Baron
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When violent antisemitism is once again rearing its ugly head across Europe, in vile response to the one and only Jewish state facing attempted annihilation on multiple fronts, I am dismayed to see the official organs of the Lithuanian government again assailing the integrity of the sacred Shnipishok cemetery in Vilna, and promoting renewed desecration to the hallowed CURRENT resting place of tens of thousands of our forefathers. Articles in major Lithuanian media outlets earlier today, including those in Lrt.lt and in m.diena.lt.
Rabbi Elchonon Baron answers questions from Lithuanian media during a recent Vilnius Jewish Community protest calling for restoration of the 500 year old sacred Jewish burial site in Vilnius.
This week, I noted with satisfaction that New York City recently designated an historic Lithuanian building with protected landmark status. New York’s Lithuanian population in 1904 (near its peak) was around 15,000, or less than half a percent. Many Lithuanian landmarks there are thankfully protected and preserved, as befitting a free and democratic society. There is an online list.
Posted in Christian-Jewish Issues, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Rabbi Elchonon Baron, USCPAHA (US Commission for Preservation of the American Heritage Abroad), Vilnius
Tagged Old Jewish Cemetery at Piramont (Shnipishok), Rabbi Elchonon Baron, Snipiskes Jewish cemetery, Sporto rumai, Vilnius
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DH’s Social Media Response to Petition from 53 Elites Calling for ‘Convention Center in the Middle of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery’
OPINION | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT: 2015-2025 | EARLIER OPPOSITION | 2023-2024 “WORKING GROUP” ON VILNA CEMETERY | LIST OF MEMBERS | MOUNTING OPPOSITION TO NEW “MUSEUM PROJECT” | USCPAHA (UNITED STATES COMMISSION FOR THE PRESERVATION OF AMERICA’S HERITAGE ABROAD) | THE CPJCE (COMMITTEE FOR THE PRESERVATION OF JEWISH CEMETERIES IN EUROPE) | THE AJC (AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE) | THE CER (CONFERENCE OF EUROPEAN RABBIS) | THE GWF (GOOD WILL FOUNDATION) | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | HUMAN RIGHTS
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VILNIUS—The following is the text of Dovid Katz’s post on Facebook today in response to the call by 53 signatories of Lithuania’s declaration of independence for proceeding with a convention center in the heart of the Old Vilna Jewish cemetery:
https://defendinghistory.com/53-signatories-of-lithuanias-declaration-of-independence-call-on-president-and-pm-to-proceed-with-a-national-conference-center-surrounded-by-thousands-of-jewish-graves/122914
As Jewish people here in Vilnius, and around the world, were preparing for the first Passover seyder last week, certain powerful forces here arranged for a demand by 53 signatories of Lithuania’s declaration of independence to the president and prime minister to ignore protests from around the world and proceed with the erection of a national convention center in the heart of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery, where many thousands still lie buried, including some of the major Litvak scholars of the last half-millennium.
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Christian-Jewish Issues, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Politics of Memory, Vilnius
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Ruta Bloshtein Asks: ‘Dear Mr. Yatom (Yusem): Did This Defamatory Circular Really Come from You?’
OPINION | VILNIUS | LITVAK AFFAIRS | STOLEN-DEMOCRACY OFFICIAL COMMUNITY | CHABAD IN VILNIUS
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by Ruta Bloshtein
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As a member of the very small religiously observant (Orthodox) Jewish community of Vilnius, and as someone born here in Vilnius, I at times feel it important to speak out publicly on current issues of Jewish life. I am writing this open letter first and foremost to express my public question as to whether a shameful document very widely circulated for several months now, purporting to come from the office of the official Head of the “Vilnius Jewish Religious Community” was indeed written by or approved by the personage whose name appears on top: Mr. Shmuel Yatom (whom I recall previously using the spelling Yusem), the official head of this “Vilnius Religious Jewish Community” that is financed by the restitution-fueled official so-called “Jewish (Litvak) Community of Lithuania” which has done so much damage to genuine Jewish life here in Vilnius, not least by dismantling its longtime democratic structure.
Could this libelous screed really have originated from the office of Mr. Yatom (Yusem), official head of the “religious community”?
Posted in A Stolen Election and a Small Jewish Community's Protest, Chabad in Vilnius, 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, Opinion, Ruta (Reyzke) Bloshtein, Vilnius
Tagged Lithuanian Jewish (Litvak) Community, Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, Ruta Bloshtein, Shmuel Yatom, Vilnius Religious Jewish Community, Vilnius synagogue
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Professor Sid Leiman: ‘Superb Declaration by Vinius’s Devoted Rabbi, Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky’
OPINION | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT: 2015-2025 | EARLIER OPPOSITION | 2023-2024 “WORKING GROUP” ON VILNA CEMETERY | LIST OF MEMBERS | MOUNTING OPPOSITION TO NEW “MUSEUM PROJECT” | USCPAHA (UNITED STATES COMMISSION FOR THE PRESERVATION OF AMERICA’S HERITAGE ABROAD) | THE CPJCE (COMMITTEE FOR THE PRESERVATION OF JEWISH CEMETERIES IN EUROPE) | THE AJC (AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE) | THE CER (CONFERENCE OF EUROPEAN RABBIS) | THE GWF (GOOD WILL FOUNDATION) | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | HUMAN RIGHTS
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Professor Sid Leiman, the Distinguished Professor of Jewish History and Literature at Touro University’s Graduate School of Jewish Studies, reacted today to Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky’s declaration on the fate of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery in the following letter to the editor. See also Prof. Leiman’s earlier publications in Defending History.
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Superb declaration by Vilnius’s devoted Rabbi, Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, of why Vilna’s Old Jewish Cemetery needs to be preserved and restored, and not buried under a Sports Stadium, or a Convention Center, or a Museum of any kind — whether Lithuanian or Jewish.
Posted in Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Politics of Memory, Sid (Shnayer) Leiman
Tagged Jewish cemetery Piramont in Vilna, Jewish cemetery Snipiskes, Old Vilnius Jewish cemetery, Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, Shnayer Leiman, Sid Leiman
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Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky Issues Powerful Statement on Fate of Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery on Occasion of Lithuania’s Independence Day
OPINION | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT: 2015-2025 | EARLIER OPPOSITION | 2023-2024 “WORKING GROUP” ON VILNA CEMETERY | LIST OF MEMBERS | MOUNTING OPPOSITION TO NEW “MUSEUM PROJECT” | USCPAHA (UNITED STATES COMMISSION FOR THE PRESERVATION OF AMERICA’S HERITAGE ABROAD) | THE CPJCE (COMMITTEE FOR THE PRESERVATION OF JEWISH CEMETERIES IN EUROPE) | THE AJC (AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE) | THE CER (CONFERENCE OF EUROPEAN RABBIS) | THE GWF (GOOD WILL FOUNDATION) | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | HUMAN RIGHTS
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Undoing a Soviet Wrong: Preserving the Šnipiškės Jewish Cemetery
by Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky
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March 11, 2026
Thirty-six years ago today, Lithuania captured the world’s attention. In the face of the Soviet Union—an empire that former U.S. President Ronald Reagan famously called the “evil empire” for its ruthless disregard for morality and human dignity—the people of this small nation chose courage over fear, leading to the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Vilnius’s Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky, the city’s only resident rabbi for 32 years
In January 1991, unarmed citizens stood before Soviet tanks in the center of Vilnius. Some gave their lives for freedom, facing unimaginable danger for the cause of dignity and self-determination. They did not know how the story would end—but they knew they could no longer live under the degrading brutality and soulless power of the Soviet system. They stood up—and they prevailed.
History has shown again and again that empires ultimately collapse when they lose their moral and spiritual compass. When conscience disappears, even the largest armies and the most formidable arsenals eventually become irrelevant.
Today, Lithuania stands proud as a democratic, forward-looking European nation. Yet it now faces a profound moral question: how should it treat the historic Šnipiškės Jewish Cemetery, a sacred site scarred by the callousness of the Soviet regime?
Posted in Chabad in Vilnius, Christian-Jewish Issues, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Politics of Memory
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Paupys, Paupers, and Depauperates
OPINION | MEMOIRS | LITVAK AFFAIRS | LITHUANIA | POLITICS OF MEMORY
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by Harry Gorfine
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“Pakelk galva pakelk galva! Paupių piliečiai”
Emigrating from Czarist Vilna to Petticoat Lane – escaping pogroms to reside near Jack the Ripper
From the Ripper to the high seas, heading for the Land Downunder
Returning to Lita – a vicarious journey of ancestral discovery and historical revelation
Posted in Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Memoirs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Vilnius
Tagged Harry Gorfine, Holocaust in Lithuania, Jack the Ripper, Jewish cemetery at Snipiskes (Shnipishok), Jewish immigrants in Victorian London, Vilnius Old Jewish Cemetery
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Meir Bulka: Let’s have Scientific Ground Radar to Document Extant Burials in Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery
OPINION | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT: 2015-2025 | EARLIER OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER | 2023-2024 “WORKING GROUP” ON VILNA CEMETERY | LIST OF MEMBERS | MOUNTING OPPOSITION TO THE NEW “MUSEUM PROJECT” | THE USCPAHA (UNITED STATES COMMISSION FOR THE PRESERVATION OF AMERICA’S HERITAGE ABROAD) | THE CPJCE (COMMITTEE FOR THE PRESERVATION OF JEWISH CEMETERIES IN EUROPE) | THE AJC (AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE) | THE CER (CONFERENCE OF EUROPEAN RABBIS) | THE GWF (GOOD WILL FOUNDATION) | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | HUMAN RIGHTS | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS
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by Meir Bulka (Ramat Gan, Israel & Lublin, Poland)
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For many years, I have followed with deep concern the situation of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramont (Shnípishok, today’s Šnipiškės), located beneath all around the ruin of the Soviet-era Sports Palace. The site, historically known as the major Jewish cemetery in the lands of the Grad Duchy of Lithuania, remains a place of great religious and cultural significance for the Jewish people and for the history of Vilnius itself. Last summer’s announcement confirming intentions to turn it into a national conference center is alarming to good-willed Jews and non-Jews alike. The feelings were reinforced by last week’s event promoting the desecration, an event for some reason held at Lithuania’s National Academy of Sciences.
Posted in Christian-Jewish Issues, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Meir Bulka, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion
Tagged Culture Minister of Lithuania, Holocaust in Lithuania, Jewish Cemetery Piramont and Snipiskes, Jewish cemetery Vilnius, Meir Bulka
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International Opposition to ‘New’ Proposals for Conference-Memorial Complex, with Seating Capacity for Thousands — in the Middle of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery
[last update]
Videos Online:
Rabbi Elchonon Baron’s one-minute bombshell at the Jan. 2026 conference-center rally at the Academy of Sciences in central Vilnius. How did the audience react? Video.
Rabbi Baron at the July 2024 Vilnius Jewish Community protest demonstration.
Rabbi S. J. Feffer in English (May 2024). Supplement.
Ecstasy on Jewish graves: Pro conference-center demonstrations shout nationalist slogans right on top of vast area with intact Jewish cemetery graves.
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Written statements:
Posted in 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, Politics of Memory
Tagged American Jewish Committee (AJC), Conference of European Rabbis (CER), Good Will Foundation (GWF), human rights & cemeteries, Jewish cemetery at Piramont (Snipiskes/Shnipishok), Lithuanian Jewish Community (LJC), Old Vilnius (Vilna) Jewish cemetery
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Lithuanian Artist’s Cartoons Illustrate Two Possible Fates for Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery
OPINION | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT: 2015-2025 | EARLIER OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER | 2023-2024 “WORKING GROUP” ON VILNA CEMETERY | LIST OF MEMBERS | MOUNTING OPPOSITION TO THE NEW “MUSEUM PROJECT” | THE USCPAHA (UNITED STATES COMMISSION FOR THE PRESERVATION OF AMERICA’S HERITAGE ABROAD) | THE CPJCE (COMMITTEE FOR THE PRESERVATION OF JEWISH CEMETERIES IN EUROPE) | THE AJC (AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE) | THE CER (CONFERENCE OF EUROPEAN RABBIS) | THE GWF (GOOD WILL FOUNDATION) | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | HUMAN RIGHTS | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS
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I: City in Love with Its Grand Duchy Heritage, Multicultural Values and Harmony of its Peoples
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II: City Intent on Obliterating and Humiliating its Jewish Heritage for Benefit of Some Greedy Business Interests
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UPDATES
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I
What did the Grand Dukes of Lithuania see looking down from Gediminas’s Hill?
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Posted in Christian-Jewish Issues, 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), Opinion, Politics of Memory
Tagged Old Vilnius Jewish cemetery, Vilnius Jewish cemetery at Snipiskes (Piramont)
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Lithuanian Academy of Sciences Offers Premises for 14 Jan. Rally Set on Permanent Desecration of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery
OPINION | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT: 2015-2025 | EARLIER OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER | 2023-2024 “WORKING GROUP” ON VILNA CEMETERY | LIST OF MEMBERS | MOUNTING OPPOSITION TO THE NEW “MUSEUM PROJECT” | THE USCPAHA (UNITED STATES COMMISSION FOR THE PRESERVATION OF AMERICA’S HERITAGE ABROAD) | THE CPJCE (COMMITTEE FOR THE PRESERVATION OF JEWISH CEMETERIES IN EUROPE) | THE AJC (AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE) | THE CER (CONFERENCE OF EUROPEAN RABBIS) | THE GWF (GOOD WILL FOUNDATION) | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | HUMAN RIGHTS | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS
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Top: The “convention center in the Jewish cemetery” project slated for approval by the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences on Jan. 14th includes an annex (right of image) built right on top of Jewish graves going back half a millennium. Bottom: Alternative narrative of this choice of venue for a new national convention center.
Posted in 2023-2024 'Working Group' on the Future of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery, Conference of European Rabbis (CER), CPJCE (London), Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Politics of Memory, USCPAHA (US Commission for Preservation of the American Heritage Abroad)
Tagged Conference of European Rabbis (CER), CPJCE, Good Will Foundation (Vilnius), Jewish cemeteries in Europe, Shnipishok - Piramont Jewish cemetery, Snipiskes Jewish cemetery, USCPAHA
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A Smaller 2025 Vilnius Yivo Exhibit: Unmentionable by Conference Leaders, and NY’s ‘Forverts’?
OPINION | LITVAK AFFAIRS | YIVO | YIDDISH AFFAIRS
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Introduction (in Yiddish, Lithuanian, and English) to the exhibit honoring Yivo’s centennial at Vilnius’s Jewish Cultural and Information Center in the heart of the city’s Old Town
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by Dovid Katz
It is heartwarming to see the widespread celebration of Yivo’s centenary this year, which is ipso facto a celebration of sophisticated Yiddish language culture in all its many branches. May the year’s events lead to ever more inspiring projects, particularly those that in the spirit of the Vilna Yivo will be carried out in Yiddish, strengthening living Yiddish as a vibrant means of communication, including the higher registers of scholarship and literature, for the generations to come, in accordance with Yivo’s raison d’etre. Although a researcher and teacher with a lifelong affiliation with Yivo and all that it means, I fully, to be honest, expected — as a critic of the present Yivo leadership’s participation in Holocaust obfuscation projects by a certain powerful establishment in Lithuania — to be excluded (not informed, not invited to submit a paper topic) by the recent Yivo conference in Vilnius and its eminent local partners.
Posted in In the Era of Yivo's 100th, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Yiddish Affairs
Tagged Forverts, Jerusalem of Lithuania, Leyzer Ran, Milan Chersonski, Pinchos Fridberg, Professor Faye Ran, Yiddish Forward, Yivo centennial, Yivo conference (Vilnius)
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The Prague Declaration and the Double Genocide Theory
PRAGUE DECLARATION | DOUBLE GENOCIDE | HISTORY | LITHUANIA
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OPINION
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by Roland Binet (De Panne, Belgium)
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In his book Crisis, War and the Holocaust in Lithuania, which I recently reviewed on these pages, historian Saulius Sužiedėlis virulently attacked those who in the past had opposed the Prague Declaration of 2008. When I read the list of signatories to the Prague Declaration signed in 2008, it makes me think of prisoners or detainees becoming free after having spent 45 years between four closed walls.
Getting free in the outside world and knowing next to nothing that has happened in the world at large during their detention. Most of these signatories, people of esteem, some of them heroes in their fight against Communist yoke, have suffered greatly and they yearn for recognition as victims of totalitarian crimes. But the only tangible contemporary phenomenon with some kind of kindred inhuman similitude they want to equate it with is — the Holocaust. So, oblivious to the manifold scourges the twentieth century has known worldwide, they signed on to the conclusion that “both the Nazi and Communist totalitarian regimes should be considered to be the main disasters, which blighted the 20th century” and “recognition of Communism as an integral and common part of Europe’s common history.” The declaration contains the word “same” five times, in support of the declaration’s underlying thesis that Nazi and Soviet crimes are absolutely — the same.
Is it possible to be so self-centered on one’s suffering as to become blind to history?
Posted in Double Genocide: The New Form of Holocaust Revisionism & Denial, History, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Prague "Platform", Roland Binet
Tagged Double Genocide, Prague Declaration (2008), Roland Binet
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Kęstutis Budrys, Lithuania’s Foreign Minister, Offers Groundbreaking, Cutting-Edge Analysis of Nation’s Lingering Holocaust (and Jewish) Issues
LITHUANIA | ANTISEMITISM & BIAS | ŽEMAITAITIS AFFAIR | OPINION
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OPINION
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VILNIUS—The following is a transcript (in English translation) of an excerpt from the October 15, 2025 interview with Lithuania’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Kęstutis Budrys (Social Democratic Party) on one of the most popular Lithuanian news sites, 15min, that appeared under the title “Kęstutis Budrys’ Interview with 15min: on Libel against Tsikhanouskaya and the Stain of Antisemitism.”
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Legacy of 23 June 1941, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, ministries, News & Views, Opinion, Žemaitaitis Affair
Tagged Antisemitism in Lithuania, Arūnas Gelūnas, Holocaust in Lithuania, June 1941, Kęstutis Budrys, Lithuanian foreign minister, Remigijus Žemaitaitis
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Rabbi Elchonon Baron Warns Lithuanian Gov. that ‘Blessings’ Will Not Come to the Country from Construction of Conference Center in Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery
OPINION | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY AT PIRAMÓNT: 2015-2025 | EARLIER OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER | 2023-2024 “WORKING GROUP” ON VILNA CEMETERY | LIST OF MEMBERS | MOUNTING OPPOSITION TO THE NEW “MUSEUM PROJECT” | THE USCPAHA | THE CPJCE | THE AJC | THE CER | CEMETERIES & MASS GRAVES | HUMAN RIGHTS | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS
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Rabbi Elchonon Baron speaking to Lithuanian media at the Vilnius Jewish Community’s protest at the cemetery last year. DH Photo: William Adan Pahl.
VILNIUS—Rapidly following upon the announcement today by Lithuania’s prime minister that he is ordering revival of the project to remodel a hated Soviet ruin in the heart of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery into a new national conference center, the office of Rabbi Elchonon Baron, president of JHL (Jewish Heritage in Lita), released his letter to the prime minister in both Lithuanian and English. They appear just below in PDF format.
During a protest at the cemetery coordinated with the Vilnius Jewish Community last summer, Rabbi Baron gave a powerful interview to Lithuania media (video), which was however not included in the evening news coverage (see report). Defending History’s reaction to the prime minister’s statement appeared earlier today.
Posted in Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Documents, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion, Politics of Memory, Rabbi Elchonon Baron, Vilnius
Tagged Piramont cemetery Vilnius, Rabbi Elchonon Baron, Vilnius Jewish cemetery Snipiskes
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