DOCUMENTS | VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | HUMAN RIGHTS | CEMETERIES | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY | OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER PROJECT | PETITION
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“The rights of minority cemeteries to be left in peace are human rights”
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Two Visualizations of a Convention Center in the Middle of Vilna’s Old Jewish Cemetery
Posted in Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok)
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Once Again, Sophomoric and Substandard Journalism at the Yiddish Forward
OPINION | YIDDISH AFFAIRS | VILNIUS YIDDISH INSTITUTE (VYI) | “YIDDISH” AS COVER FOR HOLOCAUST REVISIONISM IN EASTERN EUROPE | MEDIA WATCH
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by Dovid Katz
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Over many years, the jaundiced personal attacks by the Yiddish Forward (Forverts) on colleagues in the field of Yiddish who may hold different opinions, or are just not part of the “Yugntruf” or “Sovetish Heimland” cliques that took over the paper at the turn of the century, have been a cause for concern. For that matter, not the only cause for concern at the many millions of dollars squandered that could have built a genuine revival of Yiddish-in-Yiddish culture among younger generations worldwide that has instead gone on these two clubs and their very specific agendas. I have myself over the years been the object of a number of attacks, for the most part published without the name of the author, in the worst traditions of a yellow press. On one occasion, back in 2011, when “Mr. Jacob London of Oxford” wrote about the Vilnius-based issues of Yiddish studies in the city and its abuse by far-right elements intent on rewriting history in the spirit of East European ultranationalism, we responded on these pages with a piece entitled “Has the Forward Association Abandoned Elementary Ethics?” that was, naturally, signed by its author.
Posted in "Jewish" Events as Cover?, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, News & Views, Opinion, Vilnius Yiddish Institute, Yiddish Affairs
Tagged Sore-Rokhl Schaechter, Yiddish forverts
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Jewish Gravestone Steps of Reformed Evangelical Church in Central Vilnius Finally Removed
CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | ANTISEMITISM | CEMETERIES | HUMAN RIGHTS
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One of the stones with visible Jewish lettering stepped on for decades during its stint as a step at the front entrance of the Reformed Evangelical Church on central Vilnius’s Pylimo Street. Photo: DefendingHistory.com.
VILNIUS—More than five years after Defending History’s September 2013 article (“Where You Have to Step on Old Jewish Gravestones to go to Church”), almost four years after Julius Norwilla’s May 2015 impassioned plea (“A Protestant Pastor in Vilnius Speaks Out About Church Steps Still Made of Pilfered Jewish Gravestones”), and almost five since Genrich Agranovski’s 2014 survey (“The Stones Tell Me. After All, They Lived Here”) of Jewish gravestones pilfered for public space in Vilnius, the steps were finally removed last week in the face of mounting international pressure.
See Defending History reports over the years on the Jewish gravestones at the Reformed Evangelical Church in Vilnius
Posted in Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Human Rights, It Pays to Defend History: Success Over the Years..., Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Reformed Evangelical Church (Vilnius)
Tagged Jewish cemeteries in Europe, Jewish cemetery in Liithuania, Jewish cemetery in Vilnius, Jewish gravestonees as steps, Jewish gravestones as paving stones, Reformed Evangelical Church (Vilnius)
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Noreika Trial Adjourned to March 5th after State-Sponsored “Genocide Center” Tells Panel of Judges it Needs Time to Study the Papers (that it has been familiar with for decades)
OPINION | VILNIUS GENOCIDE CENTER | VILNIUS GENOCIDE MUSEUM | GLORIFICATION OF COLLABORATORS | ACADEMIC BACKGROUND
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Defending History was there. See Background and DH’s take on the trial.
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THE PLAINTIFFS’ TABLE: Dr. Andrius Kulikauskas, longtime contributing writer at DH (left) represented absent American plaintiff Grant Gochin at the hearing on state honors for Holocaust collaborator J. Noreika, whose case was first brought to the English speaking world in 2012 by Evaldas Balčiūnas, who was also in attendance. At right is attorney Rokas Rudzinskas. PHOTO © Defending History 2019.
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VILNIUS—As the long-awaited trial opened this morning, the Genocide Center’s official and two lawyers explained to the three-judge panel that they need a lot of time to study so many documents, including some less-than-perfect printouts, hence an adjournment would be required. The next hearing was set for 5 March. In fact, the Genocide Center has for many years been familiar with the documents demonstrating Jonas Noreika’s brutal Holocaust collaboration (and has for years tried to say that they prove “only” ethnic cleansing, expulsion, isolation and ghettoization, humiliation, and plunder of all the region’s citizens who were Jewish).
Just seven people came to observe (three of them from DH’s team, nobody from abroad). There was no local media coverage as of now. US, UK, Israeli embassies sent no observers. Efforts to “muzzle the whole thing” seem to have been effective.
Update of 19 Jan: media blackout at the national and local level here has continued unbroken as of today (except for “Putin-propagandist” pseudo-media)
Posted in Collaborators Glorified, History, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, State Glorification of Holocaust Collaborator J. Noreika, Vilnius's Genocide Center and the Genocide Museum it Manages
Tagged Genocide Center Vilnius, Grant Gochin, Holocaust in Lithuania, Holocaust trial in Vilnius, Jonas Noreika, Silvia Foti
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Lithuanian Defense Ministry’s “PR” Includes Disparagement of Rimvydas Valatka and Evaldas Balčiūnas over their Opposition to State Glorification of a Holocaust Collaborator
OPINION | FREE SPEECH AND DEMOCRACY | MEDIA WATCH | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED
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by Andrius Kulikauskas
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Editor’s note: The following Letter to Colleagues shared by Dr. Kulikauskas is followed by his own follow-up letter in Lithuanian to the office to which he was directed.
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Dear Colleagues,
A colleague alerts us to the following anonymous presentation by the Lithuanian National Defense Ministry’s Strategic Communications Department and Public Relations’ Planning and Analysis Division on “The War for Hearts and Minds”, “Karas dėl širdžių ir protų”
This Department
Posted in Andrius Kulikauskas, Collaborators Glorified, Free Speech & Democracy, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, State Glorification of Holocaust Collaborator J. Noreika
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Holocaust History Trial Slated for 15 January in Vilnius
[LAST UPDATE]
OPINION | VILNIUS GENOCIDE CENTER | VILNIUS GENOCIDE MUSEUM | GLORIFICATION OF COLLABORATORS | ACADEMIC BACKGROUND
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As trials of alleged criminals come to an end, is the era of ‘history on trial’ getting underway?
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OUR TAKE
Holocaust perpetrator: glorified in marble on the central boulevard of an EU capital?
On January 15th, 2019, at 10 AM, a momentous historic court case will unfold in Vilnius, Lithuania, scheduled to start at the Vilnius Regional Administrative Court at Žygimantų 2 in the heart of the capital. Challenged by a call for removal of Holocaust collaborator Jonas Noreika from the pantheon of national heroes (including street names, memorials and an inscribed stone block on the capital’s central boulevard), the state-sponsored “Genocide Center”, a bastion of far-right extremism that, in the opinion of many, does grave damage to the image of modern democratic Lithuania, will be defending Noreika using the hard-earned tax euros of the nation’s noble citizens. See the remarkable 2018 Salon magazine essay by Noreika’s granddaughter, American author and educator Silvia Foti; DH report by Dr. Andrius Kulikauskas on the action brought by Grant Gochin. Documents include the original query (15 June), Genocide Center’s response (19 July), Mr. Gochin’s legal complaint (10 August) and the Genocide Center’s response (1 Oct.).
Posted in Bold Citizens Speak Out, Collaborators Glorified, History, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Politics of Memory, State Glorification of Holocaust Collaborator J. Noreika, Vilnius's Genocide Center and the Genocide Museum it Manages
Tagged Andrius Kulikauskas, Commission for Evaluation of Crimes of Nazi and Soviet Occupational Regimes, Dovid Katz, Evaldas Balciunas, Genocide Center Vilnius, Genocide Museum Vilnius, Grant Gochin, Holocaust in Lithuania, Holocaust trials, Jonas Noreika, Lithuaniua's "Historical Commission", Noreika trial, Silvia Foti, Silvia Foti + Lithuania, Silvia Foti + Noreika, Vilnius trial on Noreika and Holocaust
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My Seven Long Years with Jonas Noreika (“General Storm”)
OPINION | GLORIFICATION OF COLLABORATORS | POLITICS OF MEMORY
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by Evaldas Balčiūnas
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Editor’s note: Seven years ago, journalist, researcher and ethicist Evaldas Balčiūnas, who was born, raised and continues to live in Lithuania, began his remarkable series of articles on state “heroes” who were alleged Holocaust collaborators (or perpetrators) with his 2012 essay on Jonas Noreika (“General Storm”), published in Lithuanian and the same year, in English in Defending History. As a result, Mr. Balčiūnas (bal-CHOO-nass) was subjected to years of legal harassment and persecution by prosecutors, police, and assorted far-right “plaintiffs” (please scroll down to 22 May 2014 in the Balčiūnas section to follow the saga). The Defending History community is proud to have stood by Evaldas at each of the kangaroo trial hearings in Vilnius, and is delighted that all these years later, talented American campaigners with wherewithal have taken up the cause to major good effect, and have now brought the Noreika matter to the Vilnius courts (see report on 15th January hearing). We hope that our American friends and colleagues will see their way clear to fully crediting Evaldas Balčiūnas’s work (and noting its consequences for him) on the various new websites and blogs established, including, for starters, the excellent online Captain Jonas Noreika Museum.
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The first time I heard of Jonas Noreika was back in 1993. I was chatting with Petras Dargis in the editorial room of the newspaper where I worked, here in Šiauliai, northwestern Lithuania, when a man of short stature came in. He started to scold one of the reporters for his article on Jonas Noreika. These were the times — right after the Soviet system’s collapse — when various colleagues and friends were going through the deepest corners of their memory, looking for all sorts of bits and pieces of their past struggles and sufferings.
This was particularly the case when that which was perceived by some as “their battles” or perhaps even their “glorious episodes” amounted to extraordinary suffering for others. First, Noreika’s comrades came to the editorial office and told of glorious episodes of the (so-called) Uprising of June 1941, incarceration in Stutthof, and the post-war legend of General Vėtra (Noreika’s famous nom-de-guerre which translates: General Storm). The journalist published the story, referring to respectable historical sources.
Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Evaldas Balčiūnas, Free Speech & Democracy, History, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Memoirs, News & Views, Prosecutors & Police 'Investigate' DH Author Evaldas Balčiūnas, State Glorification of Holocaust Collaborator J. Noreika
Tagged Evaldas Balciunas, Genocide Center Vilnius, glorification of Holocaust collaborators, Grant Gochin, Holocaust in Lithuania, Jonas Noreika, Silvia Foti
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Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery: Geotechnical Expert Group’s Press Release of Sept. 2008 is “Back in Circulation”
DOCUMENTS | VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | HUMAN RIGHTS | CEMETERIES | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY | OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER PROJECT | PETITION
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VILNIUS—At the request of Defending History staff, several news outlets here have located and released the original 3 September 2008 press release issued by Arieh Klein, head of the Experts Group appointed to conduct geophysical and other surveys of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in today’s Šnipiškės district of Vilnius, Lithuania’s capital) to determine the boundaries of the extant cemetery underground. This was always a public document intended for the media, marked as a “press release” in accompanying emails. It is available as PDF.
The document reveals that both “new green buildings” (the King Mindaugas Buildings) that were featured in this century’s first major dispute over this cemetery, are within the boundaries of the cemetery, as are, naturally, the banks, chic cafes and restaurants, apartments and other amenities and offices on the premises.
But to this day, the buildings’ operators dismiss the geotechnical findings as “slander”. Something to remember when you next visit this part of Vilnius!
It is separately documented that truckloads of earth were clandestinely removed (and their location never disclosed), and that the builders’ and their government associates’ “bags of tricks” back then included setting up international committees with prestigious “Useful Jewish Idiots” — or UJIs — as local Jews refer informally to foreign Jewish dignitaries and professors who become part of the PR machine that is alleged to cover and deflect from various aspects of the Jewish news here. The full text of the press release follows.
Posted in Christian-Jewish Issues, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Documents, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok)
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Democratically Elected Leadership of Vilnius Jewish Community Shows Consistent Moral Clarity on Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery’s Fate
OPINION | VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | HUMAN RIGHTS | CEMETERIES | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY | OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER PROJECT | PETITION
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VILNIUS—During the fiascos of recent formal visits to Lithuania by the chairperson of the US taxpayer-funded “Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad” (known for short as “USCPAHA”), a ubiquitous feature was the seemingly unending stream of photo-ops with leaders of the “official” state-sponsored Jewish community which has quite naturally supported government plans for a convention center and annex to be situated in the heart of the old Vilna Jewish cemetery. What many foreign visitors do not understand is that this enterprise does not have democratically legitimate leadership. In the middle of the last leadership election, in spring 2017, the chairperson changed the rules to disenfranchise the three thousand Jewish citizens of Lithuania in favor of a “new system” whereby “associations alone” would vote, these being the chairperson’s own board of associates. When the Vilnius Jewish Community held a very public and democratic vote, the state-sponsored official community echoed antisemitic tropes that the current Jews are some kind of Russians who say they are Jews. In November of 2018, the courts ruled her election illegal, a remarkable public demonstration followed last spring, but then, after an array of legal ruses, some quite amusing, the appeals court last month legalized her election. But not-illlegal is not moral, and being “not illegal” is a rather poor standard for Jewish and democratic legitimacy in the small and fragile post-Holocaust space. More and more people are calling for a simple solution: new and fair elections under the aegis of an outside ombudsman or polling organization, in which every Lithuanian Jewish citizen has one vote.
Posted in Bold Citizens Speak Out, 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, Simon Gurevich (Simonas Gurevičius), USCPAHA (US Commission for Preservation of the American Heritage Abroad)
Tagged Commission for Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad, Jewish cemetery Piramont, Jewish cemetery Snipiskes, Simonas Gurevicius, USCPAHA, Vilnius Jewish cemetery, Vilnius Jewish community
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Incredibly, US Taxpayer-Funded Commission is HURTING instead of HELPING the Cause!
CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | HUMAN RIGHTS | CEMETERIES | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY | OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER PROJECT | PETITION
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by Ruta Bloshtein
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The following is the text of the petition update posted by Ms. Bloshtein on 4 January 2019 at the Change.org site of her petition to save the old Vilna Jewish cemetery, which has exceeded the 45,000 signature mark.
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My Dear Friends,
Thanks to all of you who signed our petition, there have been various delays in the onset of works to erect a national convention center and large new annex on the site of a Soviet ruin that is right in the middle of our sacred Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery, where the B’er Hagola Reb Moshe Rivkes; the Chayei Adam Reb Avrom Dantsig; Reb Menachem-Manes Chayes; Reb Boruch Romm, Reb Avrom the son of the Gaon of Vilna; Reb Yitzchok the father of Chaim of Volozhin lie buried, alongside many other thousands of Jewish citizens of Vilna (today’s Vilnius, capital of Lithuania) whose families duly paid for their plots in perpetuity. This would never happen if it were a Christian or Lithuanian national cemetery where nationally beloved figures found what was meant to be their place of rest.
Now, unfortunately, imminent danger lurks again, as the government’s own bank has just announced that building is again soon scheduled to start.
We must therefore redouble our polite and civil protests to ensure that this does not happen, that the government finds ANOTHER place for its new national convention center (that will be a pride, not a “shande” for our country), and that the cemetery can be lovingly restored as has been done in other European cities. I am sorry to report that in recent times one of the main obstacles has been the (US taxpayer funded!) “United States Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad” (known as “USCPAHA” for short) that exists to preserve endangered cemeteries, not to collude with foreign governments and their agents to help with excuses and cover-ups to destroy them!
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), Ruta (Reyzke) Bloshtein, United States, USCPAHA (US Commission for Preservation of the American Heritage Abroad)
Tagged Jewish cemetery Snipiskes (Piramont), Paul Packer, US Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad, USCPAHA, Vilna Jewish cemetery, Vilnius Jewish cemetery
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Connecting the Dots: Reflections on a Visit to Plungyán and Ríteve
MEMOIRS
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by Denis Daneman
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Preamble
Time to — Go to the Pale
Reflections
Where to Now?
Concluding Thoughts
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This is part of a “reflection” that has been more than 65 years in the making. My earliest memories are of being surrounded by a warm and caring rather secular Jewish family in Johannesburg, South Africa, that all seemed to have hailed from a tiny place called Plungyán, in Lithuania, which made us all “Litvaks”. Only more recently did I learn that this pertained not only to my mother’s side of the family. My father’s side came from Riga in Latvia, also Litvaks, fortunately. Both families left The Pale of Settlement in the time-frame 1890-1906, eventually finding their way to Heilbron in the Orange Free State in the case of my Mom’s family, and Ceres in the Cape of Good Hope for my Dad’s. Both of these were to become part of the Union of South Africa in 1910.
I grew up believing that the most important people in my world came from The Pale, most specifically this tiny dot on the map called Plungyán, that they migrated to South Africa where they settled, proliferated, bickered, were educated and prospered. Then, after two or three generations, many, if not most left South Africa, perhaps the biggest group to Israel in the 1950’s and 60’s, some to Australia, the UK and USA, and the Daneman clan to Canada.
Posted in Commemorations for Destroyed Communities, Memoirs, News & Views, Plungyán (Plungė), South Africa
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Jonas Paulavičius (1898–1952) is Defending History’s 2019 Person of the Year
OPINION
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VILNIUS—Even as various government bodies in Eastern Europe name years (and for that matter streets and lecture halls and squares) for Holocaust collaborators or, on occasion, “just” leaders of fascist militias during the Holocaust (sometimes also for export to America), Defending History continues, in the spirit of our 2018 decision, to continue to honor East European patriots who fought for their country’s independence and then went on, over two decades later, during the Holocaust, to just do the right thing and save Jewish neighbors threatened with certain murder by reason of their birth, and with the support of the then “nationalist forces” in partnership with the Nazis. For all of 2018, Malvina Šokelytė Valeikienė (1898-1981) was our Person of the Year.
Read Danutė Selčinskaja’s article on the life and works of Jonas Paulavičius
Posted in Defending History's Person of the Year, It Pays to Defend History: Success Over the Years..., Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views
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Jonas Paulavičius: Volunteered a Century Ago for Lithuania’s War of Independence, Went on to Save 16 People During the Holocaust
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by Danutė Selčinskaja
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Jonas Paulavičius (1898-1952)
During the Nazi occupation years, when humanity was being trampled, and marauding and murder were rampant, when all effort was put toward turning the inhabitants of occupied lands into obedient and unfeeling creatures, meeting a dedicated person who dared to resist the spreading hatred seemed like a miracle to the unjustly persecuted. Jonas Paulavičius, indomitable enemy of the Nazi regime and veteran volunteer of the Lithuanian Wars of Independence, went on to become such a miracle to twelve Kaunas Jews, two Russian POWs, and two persecuted Lithuanians. Jonas made a decision: the only way to resist the terror of the Nazis and their helpers was to save at least several Jews who were suffering at the hands of the Nazis and whose lives were at risk.
Jonas Paulavičius was born in 1898 to a family of poor peasants. He learned the trade of the carpenter in his teenage years and could earn a living by himself, thus becoming self-sufficient and independent at a young age. After Lithuania declared independence in 1918, it soon became clear that, without a military of its own, Lithuanian statehood was doomed. During the period of its initial formation and the first stage of battles against the Bolsheviks, the Lithuanian military was comprised of 3,000 volunteers who responded to the December 27, 1918, call issued by the Government: Lithuania is in Danger. Jonas Paulavičius was among the brave men who volunteered immediately to fight for the freedom of Lithuania.
Posted in Bold Citizens Speak Out, Danutė Selčinskaja, Defending History's Person of the Year, History, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Politics of Memory
Tagged Danute Selčinskaja, DefendingHistory.com Person of the Year, Holocaust Rescuers in Lithuania, Jonas Paulavicius, Righteous Gentiles in Lithuania
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Israel’s Interior Minister Protests Desecration of Old Vilnius Jewish Cemetery
OPINION | ISRAEL CHRONICLE | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | HUMAN RIGHTS | CEMETERIES | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY | OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER PROJECT | PETITION
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JERUSALEM—In a letter dated today, and released to the media, Israel’s Minister of the Interior Rabbi Aryeh Machluf Deri appealed to the director of the Foreign Ministry to take serious action concerning the threat of desecration to the old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in today’s Šnipiškės section of modern Vilnius).
The letter calls for the Foreign Ministry’s “immediate intervention” and cites the pain that would be caused to world Jewry by pursuit of the current project planned for the site.
Posted in Christian-Jewish Issues, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Human Rights, Israel, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Opinion
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New York Daily News Covers Struggle to Preserve the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery
CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | HUMAN RIGHTS | CEMETERIES | OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY | OPPOSITION TO CONVENTION CENTER PROJECT | PETITION
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NEW YORK CITY—The Sunday edition of New York’s Daily News today published a report by its crime reporter Reuven Blau on efforts to save the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery by persuading authorities to move their planned new national convention center to another venue so that the cemetery, dating to the 15th century and containing the remains of thousands of Vilna Jews over the centuries, might be lovingly restored. The article appears on the newspaper’s website, but is not accessible in various European and other countries. For readers’ convenience, a PDF follows (and can be accessed here). The focus of the article is Mr. Dov (Berel) Fried of New York, a Talmudic scholar in the grand Litvak tradition who is one of the central figures in the international coalition that has emerged to save the cemetery.
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)
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Vulovak’s Latest Caricature in His Series on ‘The Convention Center in the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery’
OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY | CEMETERIES | HUMAN RIGHTS | ARTS | HUMOR (OF SORTS)
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אויך מיר אַ קאָנווענשאָן צענטער!
Oykh mir a konvenshon tsenter!
Don’t Lithuania’s citizens deserve a sparkling new convention center where they will be welcomed by leaders of the arts, entertainment, industry and statecraft, not by the ghosts of the thousands of Vilna Jewish citizens who lie buried on all four sides, in the city’s Old Jewish Cemetery, where their families purchased their burial plots in perpetuity?
by VULOVAK for Defending History
Posted in Arts, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Human Rights, Humor (Of Sorts), Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery at Piramónt (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok), Politics of Memory
Tagged Vilnius Jewish cemetery Snipiskes (Piramont)
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Award-Winning Film on the Story of Defending History in Vilnius Now Available Free Online
DANNY BEN-MOSHE | ARTS | FILM | DOUBLE GENOCIDE | LITHUANIA
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Prof. Danny Ben-Moshe
MELBOURNE—The documentary film, Rewriting History, produced by Danny Ben-Moshe and Marc Radomsky in 2012, was widely acknowledged by its many reviewers to contribute an important body of knowledge and debate on the ways the history of the Holocaust is being rewritten in Eastern Europe, with ample presentations from champions of both sides of each argument. Although the debate has unquestionably moved on over the last seven years — and Defending History has been one of the key addresses in that debate — the fundamental questions have remained burning issues at the onset of 2019 too. In addition to co-producing the film, Professor Ben-Moshe has also penned some of the most powerful op-eds on these subjects over the years (see his DH section; the film’s 2013 American tour).
As a gesture on the eve of the major Holocaust history trial scheduled to open in Vilnius on 15 January 2019, the film’s producer, Identity Films, based here in Melbourne, has decided to make the film available online gratis for the first time, for a period extending to the end of January. It is available at: https://vimeo.com/307585015.
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Posted in Film, News & Views
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The Yiddish Conundrum: A Cautionary Tale for Language Revivalism
YIDDISH PROJECTS | YIDDISH AFFAIRS
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by Dovid Katz
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This paper appeared this month as: Dovid Katz, “The Yiddish Conundrum: A Cautionary Tale for Language Revivalism” in: G. Hogan-Brun and B. O’Rourke (eds), The Palgrave Handbook of Minority Languages and Communities (Palgrave Macmillan: London 2019), pp. 553-587.
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For those who cherish the goal of preserving small, endangered languages, some developments (and lessons) from the case of Yiddish might be illuminating, though not in the sense of some straightforward measure of ‘success’ or ‘failure’. There is no consensus on the interpretation of the current curious — and contentious — situation. If the issues raised might serve as a point of departure for debate on its implications for other languages, particularly the potential damage from exaggeratedly purist ‘corpus planning movements’ as well as potentially associated ‘linguistic disrespect’ toward the majority of the living speakers of the ‘language to be saved’, then this paper’s modest goal will have been realized. Moreover, the perils of a sociolinguistic theory overapplied by a coterie with access to funding, infrastructure and public relations need to be studied.[1]
Ultimately, the backdrop for study of the current situation is the pre-Holocaust status quo ante of a population of Yiddish speakers for which estimates have been in the range of ten to thirteen million native speakers.[2]
Nowadays, on the one hand, millions of dollars a year are spent on ‘saving Yiddish’ among ‘modern Jews’ (secular and ‘modern religious’), interested non-Jews. People may be academically, culturally, literarily, musically, sentimentally, ideologically, and otherwise attracted. The number of Yiddish speaking families these efforts have generated is in dispute, but it is under a dozen. A high proportion of those hail from a postwar movement of normativist language revision, on the Ausbau model of Heinz Kloss. This conscious process has taken their variety ever further from native Yiddish speech of any naturally occurring variety while retaining a steadfast, profound commitment to actually using the language in daily life. Lavish subsidies provide for a newspaper, magazines, myriad programs and a few large architectural edifices dedicated, one way or another, to ‘saving Yiddish’. In academia, endowments have provided a number of positions that are ironically known in the field as ‘poetry fellowships’ in so far as their incumbents may try to be ‘Yiddish writers’ while under no pressure to produce successful doctoral programs that would be generating new generations of scholar specialists who can themselves write and teach in the language (say for advanced courses). In the case of some Yiddish chairs, the elderly East European born donor ‘had the chutzpah to go ahead and die’, leaving his or her children amenable to a program’s ‘rapid enhancement’ via conversion from the low-student-number (‘failing’) Yiddish to the ‘higher student takeup’ (‘winning’) menu of ‘Judaic Studies’ or ‘comparative Jewish literature’ courses.[3] Much of the current ‘language movement’ is focused on ‘Yiddish products’ in English (and other national languages) about Yiddish that have engendered fundraising campaigns for buildings and centers, without seriously attempting to produce new speakers, let alone writers. This has been made possible by what I have called massive American-style PR driven ‘delinguification’ of Yiddish (Katz, 2015: 279-290). The satire, ‘A conference of Yiddish savers’ by Miriam Hoffman, the last major actual Yiddish author born in Eastern Europe before the war, now based in Coral Springs, Florida, continues to delight readers from all sides of the argument (Hoffman 1994). Note that none of this is to suggest that any of these efforts are ‘wasted’.
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Posted in Dovid Katz, Yiddish Affairs
Tagged 'Saving Yiddish', Ausbua theory in sociolinguistics, Dovid Katz, Future of Yiddish, Miriam Hoffman, Yiddish descriptivism, Yiddish normativism, Yiddish purism, Yugntruf Yiddish
Comments Off on The Yiddish Conundrum: A Cautionary Tale for Language Revivalism
OLDER FRONT PAGE POSTS
29 December 2015
TALI FARKASH IN YNET:
Israeli Holocaust Researchers Concerned by Politicians’ Cave-in to East European “Holocaust Tricks”
INCLUDING REDEFINITION OF GENOCIDE; GLORIFICATION OF HOLOCAUST PERPETRATORS AS “FREEDOM FIGHTERS”; AND CAMPAIGN OF REPUTATION DESTRUCTION AGAINST HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS WHO JOINED THE ANTI-NAZI RESISTANCE
SEE ISRAEL ISSUES PAGE
And will Israel ask, howsoever gently, for public apologies for the three Israeli citizens defamed for history by Lithuania’s prosecutors? All three are heroes of the anti-Nazi resistance in the forests of Lithuania, and two are heroes of Israel’s 1948 War of Independence. Yitzhak Arad (who has spoken out in Defending History) is still defamed on prosecutors’ website [as PDF] and by a “Human Rights [!] Association”. Hopes rising for 2016 that the Israeli Embassy in Vilnius will rapidly obtain public apologies to the Israeli citizens Yitzhak Arad, Rachel Margolis (1921-2015) and Joseph Melamed.
Suspense growing on whether Vilnius’s Israeli Embassy will provide cover for the renewed international meeting of the long-dormant “Red Brown Commission” that is scheduled for 17-19 March 2016. Will Yad Vashem legitimize the event? Israeli Holocaust survivors begged Yad Vashem to keep its distance. Commission members include the Genocide Center veteran who launched the campaign of defamation against Yitzhak Arad. Dr. Arad’s analysis of the commission and its policies. The commission’s concept of Holocaust studies…
2009 speech of the late Ambassador of Israel to Lithuania & Latvia HE Chen Ivri Apter. Back then it was clear that Israel could build terrific relations without betraying Israeli citizens, Holocaust survivors, history of the Holocaust, or the integrity of Jewish cemeteries in post-Holocaust Europe.
In September 2015, during his trip to Israel, the Lithuanian prime minister reported back home with triumph that Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is quite happy with plans for a $25,000,000 national conference center in the middle of the old (15th century origin) Piramónt (Šnipiškės) Jewish cemetery in Vilnius. But did the Israeli PM really reject out-of-hand the growing international Jewish (and non-Jewish) chorus of condemnation for a plan to have convention revelers clap, cheer, sing, drink in bars and use toilets surrounded by thousands of Jewish graves including some of the foremost Jewish scholars of the last millennium? Where his own ancestors are buried? Perhaps there has been some misunderstanding. Background on the cemetery’s history and implications of the case for all Europe, and on the current project.
SEVEN SOLUTIONS TO LITHUANIAN-JEWISH ISSUES
ISRAEL ISSUES PAGE ISRAEL SECTION DH BY COUNTRY
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24 December 2015
Vilma Fiokla Kiurė Calls on Police and Politicians Alike to Take Racism Seriously
More from Vilma Fiokla Kiurė on Roma, Human Rights, and Antisemitism
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18 December 2015
Most Lithuanian Citizens Not Aware that State-Sponsored “Genocide Center” (GC) is the only (?) Gov. Body in the EU in the Business of Glorifying Holocaust Collaborators
Defending History led the way in 2010 with page and section exposing the GC (which runs the city-center “Genocide Museum”)
NEW: ANDRIUS KULIKAUSKAS REPLIES TO GENOCIDE CENTER’S NEW ATTEMPT TO “FIX” HOLOCAUST RECORD OF KAZYS ŠKIRPA
Kristina Apanavičiūtė Sulikienė Asks Why State Body Distorts History; Appeal by Sergejus Kanovičius
GRANT ARTHUR GOCHIN, SIMON WIESENTHAL CENTER, JEWISH STUDENT UNION, AND JEWISH COMMUNITY LEADER RESPOND TO GC’S RECENT EFFORTS TO “FIX” HOLOCAUST RECORD OF JONAS NOREIKA.
VILNIUS STILL BOASTS STREET NAMES AND SHRINES HONORING HOLOCAUST PERPETRATORS. WILL THE NEW MAYOR CHANGE THINGS?
Genocide Center veteran who launched the campaign against Holocaust survivors is now a member of the state’s “Red-Brown Commission”
DEFENDING HISTORY WRITER EVALDAS BALČIŪNAS (WHO ALERTED ENGLISH SPEAKING WORLD TO NOREIKA MONUMENTS IN 2012) IS REPEATEDLY LUGGED INTO COURT FOR HIS ARTICLES PROTESTING GLORIFICATION OF HOLOCAUST PERPETRATORS AND NEO-NAZI MARCHES. COME SUPPORT HIM AT THE NEXT HEARING: THURSDAY 21 JANUARY 2016 AT VILNIUS COUNTY COURT (LAISVĖS PROSPEKTAS 79A, ROOM 019) AT 1:30 PM (13:30)
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December 2015
Defending Holocaust History Against the New Revisionism:
Reviews of Timothy Snyder’s Black Earth by
Michael Pinto-Duschinsky; Richard J. Evans (2); Tina Jennings; Walter Laqueur
RELATED: RESPECTFULLY DISAGREEING WITH PROF. SNYDER
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9 December 2015
Neo-Nazis Target Defending History Authors who Attended Private Vilnius Hanukkah Party; Will Police Investigate?
Assault follows publication of Kristina Apanavičiūtė Sulikienė’s new critique of the Genocide Center, published in DH; Neo-Nazi blogger “Zeppelinus”, Lithuania’s top online purveyor of racism, misogyny, homophobia and antisemitism, is alleged to be a high official in the Economy Ministry
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Meanwhile, “Genocide Center” Turns to Antisemitic Slurs in Reply to Critics of its Sanitization of Holocaust Perpetrators
Grant Arthur Gochin in VilNews.com ◊ Defending History section on the Genocide Center (plus page) ◊ 2015 debate over J. Noreika ◊ One of many perpetrators glorified by state agencies (plus section) ◊ Hopes rising that Yad Vashem will finally sever ties with “Red-Brown Commission” where its presence legitimizes the G-Center ◊ Lithuania issues facing Israel today (Israel page) ◊ Last Litvak Holocaust survivors begged Yad Vashem not to renew the legitimizing alliance…
Defending History’s Evaldas Balčiūnas (who in 2012 launched the international discussion on the state honors for Noreika) continues to be lugged into court on a regular basis in malicious time-wasting actions apparently intended to deter other dissenters on the policy of glorifying collaborators. More below. Section on free speech and democracy. Indirect consequences of the 2010 “double genocide” law.
ALSO: A SECOND CASE PURSUED OVER “DEFAMATION” OF ANOTHER ALLEGED COLLABORATOR; KRISTINA SULIKIENE COMMENTS.
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COME AND SUPPORT EVALDAS BALČIŪNAS THURSDAY 21 JANUARY 2016 AT VILNIUS COUNTY COURT (LAISVĖS PROSPEKTAS 79A, ROOM 019) AT 1:30 PM (13:30)
Left to right: Evaldas Balčiūnas, Milan Chersonski and Darius Pocevičius on Monday 30 Nov. 2015 after another “totally time-wasting” hearing in the case against Balčiūnas and Pocevičius for their articles condemning fascism and the adulation of Holocaust collaborators. A more substantial hearing is now promised for Thursday 10 December, 3:30 PM (15:30), as ever at Vilnius District Court at Laisves prospektas 79a. Hopefully at long last human rights and free speech advocates, and opponents of Holocaust falsification will come to monitor. They are still looking for a pro bono human rights lawyer. For background (for English readers) please see Evaldas’s articles (and the legal harassment he has been enduring) by scrolling to the end and surveying chronologically (upwards) his articles exposing the glorification of Holocaust collaborators.
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16 November 2015
Vilma Fiokla Kiurė Appeals for Gov. Action on Roma in Lithuania
“It just can’t be left to the local NGOs!”
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November 2015
LIVING YIDDISH CULTURE IN VILNIUS
The Vilna Yiddish Literary Reading Circle, in its 17th year, meets weekly in termtime at the Jewish Cultural and Information Center on Mėsinių Street (Yátkever gas) in the Old Town. Everybody welcome! Admission free.
Hanukkah in Vilnius: Dovid Katz in the Lithuania Tribune
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2 November 2015
Vytautas Landsbergis, Hero of Lithuanian Independence, Shocks Many with “Defense” of Holocaust Perpetrator Jonas Noreika
Icon of freedom struggle now attacks journalist Rimvydas Valatka (who supported a petition last summer for removal of a Vilnius shrine to the Nazi collaborator) and Defending History regular Evaldas Balčiūnas (for asking why Lithuania honors such Nazist figures). Balčiūnas’s rapid reply. Earlier DH appraisal of Landsbergis’s 21st century positions.
BACKGROUND TO THE DEBATE
IN DRAMATIC REVERSAL ON GENOCIDE CENTER, LITHUANIAN JEWISH COMMUNITY CHAIRPERSON FAINA KUKLIANSKY BLASTS CENTER FOR WHITEWASHING THE HOLOCAUST COLLABORATOR. IN A HISTORIC STATEMENT (BRINGING HER INTO BROAD AGREEMENT WITH DH’S LONGSTANDING CRITIQUE) SHE ASKS WHAT KIND OF “HOLOCAUST EDUCATION” CAN PROCEED IN SUCH A CONTEXT. JEWISH STUDENT LEADER AMIT BELAITĖ SPEAKS OUT WITH SINGULAR COURAGE.
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NEW IN NOVEMBER 2015:
QUESTION IN UK PARLIAMENT ON PLANNED CONVENTION CENTER IN THE OLD VILNIUS JEWISH CEMETERY
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OUR REPLY TO THE MAYOR OF VILNIUS ON A BIZARRE OLYMPICS OF BARBARISM
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21 October 2015
Defending the History Brings Results
I
EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS STRIKES DOWN A BALTIC “DOUBLE GENOCIDE” LAW
LEGAL JUDGMENT, OVERTURNING LITHUANIAN CONVICTION OF A POSTWAR SOVIET CRIMINAL OF “GENOCIDE” IS MAJOR BLOW TO EAST EUROPEAN FAR-RIGHT “PRAGUE DECLARATION” PRINCIPLE OF “EQUALITY” OF NAZI AND SOVIET CRIMES.
DOUBLE GENOCIDE MOVEMENT’S “HIGHER PURPOSES” IN MUCH OF EASTERN EUROPE INCLUDE DOWNGRADE OF THE HOLOCAUST AND GLORIFICATION OF LOCAL HOLOCAUST PERPETRATORS (SAMPLE STREET NAMES / PUBLIC SHRINES).
ABUSE OF HOLOCAUST EDUCATION BY DOUBLE GENOCIDE PRACTITIONERS REMAINS A CONCERN IN EASTERN EUROPE. REPORT IN THE JERUSALEM POST.
II
European Union Says NO to Support for “Convention Center in the Jewish Cemetery”
Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission:
“Contrary to reports in some Lithuanian newspapers and international media, the planned renovation project at the Vilnius Snipisek cemetery is not supported by European Union funds”
INTERNATIONAL OPPOSITION MOUNTING
III
Vilnius Municipality Inaugurates Ona Shimaite Street, Named for Famed Holocaust Rescuer, in the Old City
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October 2015
DEFENDING HISTORY WAS THERE SO YOU CAN READ EYEWITNESS REPORTS AND OPINIONS RIGHT HERE
Reports from: Butrimánts (Butrimonys); Rákishok (Rokiškis); Shádov (Šeduva); Šiauliai (Shavl); and Svintsyán (Švenčionys); in Kaunas for Chiune Sugihara; remembering Lietukis Garage
And in Vilnius: Ponár memorial ceremony; launch of the new Ona Shimaite Street; Yivo 90th anniversary conference; conference on antisemitism (plus: reply to neo-Nazis’ reaction to our report); Ruta Vanagaite’s conference on Holocaust issues; Rothschild Conference on Jewish Cemeteries: preview and postview (but no eyewitness report — DH not allowed in to “sealed” event)
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29 October 2015
Triumphant Press Release on Conclusion of Rothschild’s Jewish Cemeteries Conference Whitewashes Lithuanian Gov. Plan to Desecrate Old Jewish Cemetery with $25,000,000 Convention Center
KAUNAS RELIGIOUS COMMUNITY ISSUES PROTEST
UPDATE: ROTHSCHILD FOUNDATION ASPECTS (DH SECTION)
One-Sided Conference had Nobody to Represent Second Opinion; Massive International Opposition Remained Terra Incognita to Delegates
Conference press release invokes summaries of views of major foreign heritage specialists who took part in the conference. But their own statements awaited. Click here for a directory of opponents, including Holocaust survivors, heritage specialists and others in Vilnius whom delegates would have enjoyed hearing out.
The official conference summary wholly omits what is actually planned for the site: a $25,000,000 convention center where tens of thousands will cheer, clap, drink at bars and use toilets surrounded by thousands of Jewish graves spanning half a millennium (not the treatment given to Lithuanian Christian cemeteries where thousands of great scholars are buried). It is potentially the worst state-sponsored cemetery desecration in recent history. Observations of chief rabbi, EU president, protestant pastor, Vilna Holocaust survivor, Jewish resident, Kaunas synagogue, Litvak rabbis’ groups, and groups representing thousands of others.
What the chief rabbi said, and why he was recently dismissed. Why did the conference not hear from him too (even by skype)? Old Vilna humor returns with a vengeance as authorities look for a new chief rabbi who needs to have a most unusual qualification for the job. More here.
OPPOSITION PAPER TRAIL HIGH INTRIGUE DH SECTION EU ASPECTS
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22 October 2015
Lithuania’s President Dalia Grybauskaitė Completes Official Visit to Israel
LITHUANIA TRIBUNE / DELFI; JERUSALEM POST
Hopes Dashed She Would Announce Cancellation of “Vilnius Convention Center in the Old Jewish Cemetery” and Promise to Remove Public Memorials for Holocaust Collaborators
Leading international NGO dedicated to Jewish cemetery preservation appealed directly to Lithuania’s president after her moving visit to Yad Vashem (in Matzav.com)
President intimated to questioner that neo-Nazi marches in major cities don’t use Nazi symbols. Is the swastika (legalized in Lithuania in 2010) a Nazi symbol? See eyewitness reports and photos of recent years’ marches. But does the president sing a different tune to local journalists?
ISRAELI HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS AND THEIR FAMILIES HOPED ISRAEL WOULD POLITELY BRING UP THE URGENT NEED FOR APOLOGIES TO DEFAMED SURVIVORS AND PARTISAN HEROES, INCLUDING THREE OF ITS OWN CITIZENS: YITZHAK ARAD; JOSEPH MELAMED; AND RACHEL MARGOLIS (1921-2015)
SEVEN AREAS OF LITHUANIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS REQUIRING OPEN DISCUSSION, NOT SWEEPING UNDER THE CARPET
SHE BROUGHT ALONG ECONOMY MINISTER: DID ANY JOURNALIST ASK HIM IF COUNTRY’S TOP ANTISEMITIC, RACIST, HOMOPHOBIC BLOG-ARTIST IS STILL HIGH OFFICIAL AT THE MINISTRY? (SAMPLES)
EDITOR’S COMMENT ON EVE OF PRESIDENT’S VISIT
ISRAEL ISSUES PAGE ISRAEL SECTION DH BY COUNTRY
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October 2015
FALLOUT CONTINUES FROM 30 SEPTEMBER ANTISEMITISM CONFERENCE IN VILNIUS
Jerusalem Post. Vilhjálmur Örn Vilhjálmsson. Defending History’s preview and eyewitness report / op-ed (Russian translation). Vilma Fiokla Kiurė’s op-ed.
Neo-Nazi Blogger “Zeppelinus” reacts to DH report. Who is he? Seems he hasn’t liked our editor for a while now. But is the nation’s major purveyor of racist, antisemitic, misogynist, and homophobic hate really a high official at the Ministry of the Economy?
SAMPLES OF HIS “ART”… MORE SAMPLES…
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October 2015
Chaim Bargman, Noted Jewish History Guide from Kaunas, is Prevented by Police from Attending Holocaust Commemoration Ceremony
INCIDENT OCCURRED AT UKMERGĖ (VÍLKOMIR), WHERE BARGMAN AND COMPANION WERE HEADING FOR COMMEMORATION AT FOREST MASS GRAVE FOR UP TO TEN THOUSAND JEWS OF THE REGION SLAUGHTERED IN 1941. DISTURBINGLY, THE TOWN CONTINUES TO DEDICATE A SQUARE TO THE MEMORY OF A NOTORIOUS HOLOCAUST PERPETRATOR.
Our Report Video of Bargman’s Statement Julia Rets’s Report (in Russian)
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2 October 2015
Litvaks Everywhere Mark the Gaon of Vilna’s 218th Yórtsayt
Eylióhu ben Shlèyme-Zálmen (Elijah ben Shlomo Zalman, 1720−1797)
19 Tíshrey 5776 / 2 October 2015; Some background reading
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1 October 2015
Vilnius Conference on “Antisemitism, Radicalization and Violent Extremism” Includes Nothing on Current Issues of Antisemitism in Lithuania or Discussion of Solutions
YET ANOTHER EEA SPONSORED “JEWISH LITHUANIA” EVENT WITHOUT A SINGLE LITHUANIAN BORN JEW IN ATTENDANCE
Jerusalem Post
Vilhjálmur Örn Vilhjálmsson
Defending History’s Preview and Eyewitness Report; Vilma Fiokla Kiurė’s Report
Neo-Nazi Blogger “Zeppelinus” reacts to DH report. Who is he? Seems he hasn’t liked our editor for quite some time… DH’s reply
One of the keynote morning speakers (amateur video) at the 30 Sept. conference, known for his documentary films that ignore the alleged Holocaust atrocities of “heroes” as well as for his incessant Israel-baiting (and of late association with far-right antisemitic Ukrainian nationalists), proposes solving Mideast issues and local antisemitism at once by “bringing the Palestinians to Vilnius, Jerusalem of the North” [!]. Israeli ambassador boldly calls him out (see from timecode 13:17) for “rewriting history” of Israel’s struggles. The organizer, the “Human Rights Monitoring Institute” has record of ignoring antisemitism and failing to even mildly protest neo-Nazi marches in city centers on independence days or the abuse of prosecutorial power to harass Lithuanian truth-tellers about the Holocaust and local antisemitism.
CONFERENCE FEATURED EXCELLENT PRESENTATIONS ON HISTORY OF THE HOLOCAUST IN GENERAL, ANTISEMITISM IN GENERAL, AND ISSUES OF ISLAMIST RADICALIZATION IN WESTERN EUROPE. DANGERS OF THE FAR RIGHT DISCUSSED BY SPEAKERS FROM HUNGARY AND NORWAY, IGNORED OR PLASTERED OVER FOR LITHUANIA.
SEE HUMAN RIGHTS SECTIONS
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22 September 2015
Vilnius Mayor Unveils Street Name for City’s Beloved Holocaust Rescuer, Ona Šimaitė
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22 September 2015
Ponár (Paneriai) Commemoration on Lithuania’s Annual Holocaust Day is Dejudaicized Even More in “Nationalist Takeover of Litvak Heritage”: No Rabbi, No Cantor, No Kaddish
But ethnic Lithuanian costume and song are featured at the mass grave of Vilna Jewry. Honor guard with bayoneted rifles was a questionable touch.
There were well-received speeches by (among others) Jewish community chairperson Faina Kukliansky; MP Emanuelis Zingeris; survivor and partisan hero Fania Yocheles Brantsovsky; and president of Beit Vilna in Tel Aviv, Mickey Kantor. There was a well-organized laying of stones by schoolchildren at the main monument.
The Israeli ambassador’s speech was considered a disappointment by some survivors in attendance. There was no mention of the recent death of Dr. Rachel Margolis (1921-2015), an Israeli-Lithuanian citizen, and Vilna Ghetto and anti-Nazi partisan hero. She discovered and published Kazimierz Sakowicz’s long lost eyewitness diary revealing the gruesome truth about Ponár. She dreamt of one last trip to her native Vilna but was intimidated by the prosecutors’ campaign of defamation against her and other Jewish partisan heroes. It was a sharp and painful contrast with the stirring and unforgettable words of the late Israeli ambassador to the Baltics, Chen Ivri Apter. Margolis’s life was considered worthy of note by, among many others, Lithuania’s late president, Algirdas Brazauskas, former UK prime minister Gordon Brown, the ADL’s Abraham Foxman, the late Sir Martin Gilbert, a British House of Lords member, and five members of the US Congress.
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20 September 2015
ON-SITE REPORT ON YIVO CONFERENCE IN VILNIUS
Sept-Oct 2015
The Old Jewish Cemetery Gets Pretty Lively in Vilnius
“Only conventions here, with bars, entertainment and toilets. But no concerts allowed! The Jewish graves all around make a cool backdrop for our 2018 national centennial holiday!”
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Prime Minister, Assuring that Convention-Center-on-the-Jewish-Cemetery Will Feature “Conventions, Not Concerts” Wants Project to Mark Centennial of Nation’s Independence
RECENT REPORTS IN JERUSALEM POST, JTA, TIMES OF ISRAEL, i24
MAJOR NEW ESSAY BY PROFESSOR SIDNEY LEIMAN
INTERNATIONAL OPPOSITION COMES FROM TOP LITVAK RABBIS, JEWISH LEADERS AND VILNIUS RESIDENTS AND SCIONS, INCLUDING HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR, ORTHODOX KASHRUTH SPECIALIST, URBAN PLANNING PROFESSOR, VILNA GAON SPECIALIST, CHIEF RABBI (THEREAFTER SACKED FOR HIS VIEWS) AND PROTESTANT PASTOR
PAPER TRAIL ♦ OPPOSITION TO DATE ♦ HIGH INTRIGUE ♦ DH SECTION ♦ WIKILEAKS ON EARLIER PAYMENTS TO THE ONE GROUP OF “AGREEABLE” HASIDIC RABBIS IN LONDON, THEMSELVES ROUNDLY OVERRULED BY THE CHIEF SATMAR COURT IN NEW YORK CITY AND THE CRC
WASHINGTON DC: WHERE IS THE “US COMMISSION FOR PRESERVING AMERICA’S HERITAGE ABROAD”?
Jewish Circles in Vilnius Enjoy Wry Moment of Rarefied Litvak Humor
IS THE COMMITTEE CHOOSING THE NEW CHIEF RABBI REALLY BOUND TO ENSURE HE WILL BE “GOVERNMENT MAN” AND SUPPORT A $25,000,000 CONVENTION CENTER IN THE MIDDLE OF THE CITY’S OLD JEWISH CEMETERY? DE-LEGITIMIZED FROM DAY ONE?
LAST CHIEF RABBI KICKED OUT OVER THE ISSUE
INTERNATIONAL OPPOSITION ♦ PAPER TRAIL ♦ HIGH INTRIGUE ♦ RECENT REPORTS IN THE JERUSALEM POST, JTA AND TIMES OF ISRAEL
Professor Sid Leiman explains Jewish law on cemeteries and gives sweeping history of Vilna’s Old Jewish Cemetery and the repeated attempts to abuse its land. He is author of the classic study on who is buried in the Gaon of Vina’s mausoleum and is a world expert on Vilna’s Jewish heritage who has generously assisted projects in Lithuania’s Jewish community for decades.
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15 September 2015
Israel Faced Some Delicate Post-Holocaust Issues During Lithuanian PM’s September Visit
Efraim Zuroff asked in the Jerusalem Post that the Baltic state’s campaign to revise Holocaust history — and its plans to plonk a convention center in the middle of Vilna’s old Jewish cemetery — be on the table; Zuroff’s post-visit article in i24
INTERNATIONAL OPPOSITION TO “CONVENTION CENTER IN THE JEWISH CEMETERY”
PAPER TRAIL
ISRAEL PAGE
ISRAEL SECTION
7 SOLUTIONS
AFTER MEETING NETANYAHU, PRIME MINISTER BUTKEVICIUS GLOATS TO MEDIA THAT ISRAEL DOESN’T OBJECT TO THE “GRAVEYARD CONVENTION CENTER” DESPITE INTERNATIONAL OPPOSITION; JTA REPORT; IN THE JERUSALEM POST
CAMPAIGN AGAINST JEWISH PARTISANS NOT EVEN MENTIONED? Does Israel betray its own citizens by not asking apologies for the World War II heroes Yitzhak Arad, (the late) Rachel Margolis and Joseph Melamed? Arad and Melamed are heroes of Israel’s 1948 war of independence. Will there now be a public apology on the prosecutors’ page that still defames him [as PDF] and from the “Human Rights Association”? Apologies to Israeli citizens Rachel Margolis and Joseph Melamed? The 2009 Leivick House (Tel Aviv) speech of the late Ambassador Chen Ivri Apter. What does Dr. Arad think?
BUT PM DECRIED “DOUBLE GENOCIDE” IN PUBLIC (JP REPORT). HE WILL HOPEFULLY FOLLOW UP AT HOME ON STREET NAMES AND PUBLIC HONORS FOR HOLOCAUST PERPETRATORS [CURRENT DEBATE]; OVERDUE APOLOGIES TO JEWISH PARTISANS; RAPID REFORM OR ABOLITION OF GENOCIDE CENTER AND RED-BROWN COMMISSION — AND REPUDIATION OF THE PRAGUE DECLARATION. NEO-NAZI PARADES ON INDEPENDENCE DAYS?
RECENT MEDIA: Slate. The Forward. Jerusalem Post. JTA. Times of Israel.
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MEMORIES AND TRIBUTES ON FACEBOOK
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6 September 2015
At Long Last, Rokiškis (Yiddish: Rákishok; Rákeshik), Town in Northeastern Lithuania, Erects Memorial to Aspect of Its Jewish Past
Mayor unveils trilingual plaque for three (destroyed) synagogues. Before the war, they were painted in the colors of the Lithuanian flag to express civic loyalty
BUT TOWN’S CENTRAL SQUARE STILL FEATURES AN “INTERWAR SWASTIKA”
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4 September 2015
Lithuanian Postal Service Honors Sugihara and Zwartendijk on 75th Anniversary of “Visas for Life”
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1 September 2015
OPPOSITION TO PLANNED $25,000,000 VILNIUS “GRAVEYARD CONVENTION CENTER” MOUNTS BY THE DAY
Latest in JTA: in the Jerusalem Post: first, second, third article; in Defending History; Everywhere; A Tale of High Intrigue. But anonymous editorial on Jewish community [!?] website makes fun of those who believe cemetery’s sanctity is violated by a $25,000,000 convention center with further plans for circuses and hotels, claiming that a “garbage dump”, “drugs” and “graffiti” [?!] are the only alternatives… Why was chief rabbi fired? Are the names Soloveitchik, Kotler, Feinstein, Kamenetzkty still dear to Litvaks? Motke Chabad on criteria for new chief rabbi…
“It’s because of the Holocaust that the thousands of deceased — spanning 500 years of Vilna Jewish history — who lie in the old Jewish cemetery at Piramónt (Šnipiškės) in today’s Vilnius have no descendants to stand up for the integrity of their final resting place. The cheers, hoorahs, drinks and washrooms at conventions — all surrounded by graves — would be a blister on the city’s reputation for the next century. It sure wouldn’t happen at a Christian cemetery. Is this what the mayor wants to be remembered for? Fight this one for our beautiful city Vilnius!”
INTERNATIONAL PAPER TRAIL
NEW DH SECTION
BUT GROUP OF NON-LITVAK ULTRA-ORTHODOX LONDON RABBIS issues a 1 Sept. Hebrew proclamation supporting CPJCE, signed by Rabbis E. Schlesinger; A.D. Dunner; Z. Feldman; J. Padwa; B. Bloom; E. Shechter; S. Lew; J.B. Wosner; M.C.E. Padwa. Did they understand what they were signing? Have they seen the unanimous judgments of rabbis internationally? Do they really feel comfortable blessing a convention center surrounded by thousands of Vilna Jewish graves in the face of the judgments issued by top Litvak Rabbis Feinstein, Kotler, Kamenetsky and Soloveitchik (and remarkably, by the highest Satmar hasidic court too)? Would they wish to know about a Vilna Holocaust survivor’s view, or that of an Orthodox woman, both lifetime members of the Jewish community in Vilnius?
DEMANDS FOR TRANSPARENCY: In 2009, the CPJCE demanded US $100,000 (in supervision fees) for some “beautification” and “exploratory digging” on the old Vilna cemetery. What are their fees this time around, for supervising a $25,000,000 convention center?
A TALE OF HIGH INTRIGUE. CHRONOLOGY OF MISADVENTURES.
APPEALS TO THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION
“US COMMISSION FOR PRESERVATION OF AMERICA’S HERITAGE ABROAD” MAINTAINS A DISCONCERTING SILENCE (AFTER DOCUMENTED CONFLICTS OF INTEREST) AS LITHUANIAN GOVERNMENT’S STALWARTS CLAIM TO AGAIN MANIPULATE IT (WITH DISINFORMATION?). ONE COMMISSION MEMBER JOINS DELEGATION TO NY CONSULATE TO “THANK” GOV. FOR “SAVING THE CEMETERY”. MEANWHILE, JERUSALEM POST EXPOSES PAYMENTS TO RABBIS WHO APPROVE BUILDING ON VILNA’S OLD JEWISH CEMETERY. FOLLOWED BY EXPOSURE OF “MONEY FOR GRAVES” BY JTA.
WHAT ARE THE VIEWS OF THE NEW “HERITAGE COMMISSION”? (ENG); WHAT ARE THE VIEWS OF “THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION”?
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Litvak Rabbis Visit Vilnius to Plea for Cancellation of Plan to Put New Convention Center in City’s Old Jewish Cemetery
They are received by deputy chancellor, mayor of Vilnius, head of Jewish Community
MEDIA: BNS’S “MISLEADING” REPORT ON THE RABBIS’ ACTUAL MESSAGE (BNS’S CORRECTED VERSION); THE RABBIS’ OWN PRESS RELEASE; REPORT IN HAPÉLES; JERUSALEM POST; THE YESHIVA WORLD.
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At the meeting with Vilnius Mayor Remigijus Šimašius (right to left): Rabbi David Niederman (Central Rabbinical Congress of the USA and Canada); Rabbi Osher Kalmanowitz (dean of Mir Yeshiva, Brooklyn, N.Y.); Rabbi Avrohom Yaffe Schlesinger (chief rabbi of the Orthodox community in Geneva, Switzlerand); Rabbi Malkiel Kotler (dean of Beth Medrash Govoha, Lakewood, N.J.).
At the old Soviet Sports Palace on the old cemetery (left to right): Rabbi Osher Kalmanowitz, Rabbi Schlesinger, Dr. Schaps, Rabbi David Niederman, Rabbi Chizki Kalmanowitz (Asra Kadisha, Jerusalem).
Litvak-Hasidic Solidarity: Judgment by Satmar Rabbinical Court in Brooklyn (with Rebbe’s Signature) is Released for Publication after Top Litvak Rabbis in the United States (including Feinstein and Kotler) and in Israel (with Soloveitchik and Landa) Issue their Own Condemnation of Lithuanian Government’s Plan for $25,000,000 Convention Center Surrounded by Thousands of Vilna Jewish Graves
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Chief Rabbi of Lithuania Chaim Burshtein is Dismissed Following Opposition to Government’s Convention-Center Plans for Old Jewish Cemetery
JERUSALEM POST JTA BNS COMMUNITY’S WEBSITE DEFENDING HISTORY RABBI’S STATEMENT
NEO-NAZI ACTIVIST “ZEPPELINUS” URGES HEAD OF JEWISH COMMUNITY TO FOLLOW SUIT WITH EXPULSION OF DH EDITOR; HIS EARLIER PRODUCTIONS; IDENTITY; RACIST HATE CAMPAIGN; EARLIER IN 2015
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THE EU DIMENSION:
European Union Spokesperson Explains that Millions in EU “Structural Funds” for “Convention Center in the Jewish Cemetery” may be Decided by Lithuania’s Finance Ministry
CEMETERY BLUES:
TALE OF HIGH INTRIGUE. THE PAPER TRAIL. THE NEW DH SECTION. THE MOUNTING INTERNATIONAL OPPOSITION.
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Grant Arthur Gochin in the Jerusalem Post on Memorials for Holocaust Perpetrator J. Noreika in Central Vilnius
Who was Noreika? Street Names for Nazis? Reburials? More Honors?
Holocaust perpetrator as national hero?
Liberal Lithuanian intellectuals petitioning city’s mayor for removal of shrines. But nationalist media considers the very discussion to be “a Russian plot”. Focus of debate is an obscure plaque but main Noreika shrine in the capital is towering engraved stone (above) on the “Genocide Museum” on Gedimino Boulevard, a stone’s throw from parliament.
Meanwhile, Kristina Apanavičiūtė Sulikienė reports on her efforts with mayor of Kaunas on street names for another killer. See also the Evaldas Balčiūnas section.
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6 July 2015
ROKHL MARGOLIS
Vilna, 28 October 1921 — Rehovot, 6 July 2015
צו די שלשים: ד″ר רחל מאַרגאָליס (מַרְגָלִית) ז″ל
Yiddishists in Vilnius Remember Dr. Rachel Margolis
A Yiddish appreciation from 2008: Part 1 & Part 2
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Summer 2015
≡≡ NEWS ≡≡
Daniel Brook in Slate on “Double Genocide: Lithuania Wants to Erase History of Nazi Collaboration — by Accusing Jewish Partisans who Fought the Germans of War Crimes” [PS: State Red-Brown Commission’s Stand on the Holocaust Recently Reaffirmed]
Also: Jonathan Paul Katz in the Forward
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Will Belgrade Court Rehabilitate Yugoslav Nazi Collaborator?
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Defending History Calls for Removal of Street Names and Public Shrines to Nazi Collaborators in the Baltics
Also: Sergey Kanovich in i24 on Lithuania’s Real and False Heroes
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Czech MEP Invites Pro-Nazi Ukrainian Leader to the European Parliament
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Does the New York Times Cover for East European Holocaust Revisionism?
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Ruta Bloshtein of Vilnius Calls Convention Center Project in City’s Old Jewish Cemetery “Barbaric”
Also: Vilna Holocaust Survivor Prof. Pinchos Fridberg in The Times of Israel; Ken Slade’s Poem: The “Former” Grave-Place
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June 2015
Some “Jewish Decisions” Face Vilnius’s New Mayor:
♦ Will he remove street names, plaques and memorials for Nazi collaborators and Holocaust perpetrators? BACKGROUND
♦ What does he think of some parliamentarians’ efforts to make the former “Jerusalem of Lithuania” host to June 23rd 2016 75th anniversary celebrations of the effective onset of the Lithuanian Holocaust?
♦ Is the middle of the old Jewish cemetery really the right place for the new $25,000,000 convention center? BACKGROUND
♦ Past encounters with Jewish and Holocaust issues (from his days as justice minister)
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Spring 2015
Trix & Treats for Londoners in Vilnius?
Why did Lithuania’s Prime Minister Entertain Non-Litvak (“Galitsyáner”) Rabbis from London to “Permit” a $25,000,000 Convention Center Project in the Heart of the old Vilna Jewish Cemetery?
All three Vilnius rabbis were excluded from the conversation. And — an international (secular) “Heritage Commission” was set up to save Jewish cemeteries…
Above: Prime Minister of Lithuania Algirdas Butkevičius welcomes London-based rabbis from CPJCE who “permitted” a $25,000,000 convention center project for the middle of the old Vilna Jewish cemetery. Below: Government’s top Jewish affairs maestro Lina Saulėnaitė entertains the delegation. PM is 3rd from left. A 2009 document refers to these rabbis being paid $100,000 for “supervising” some “beautification” and “exploratory digging” but what are they being paid this time, for “supervising” construction of the convention and entertainment center?
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NEW DH SECTION ON THE OLD VILNA CEMETERY
BACKGROUND PAPER TRAIL MORE BELOW
SECRET 2009 DEAL? SECRET PAYMENTS? SECRET 2015 PP?
Who opposes the convention center project and why?
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“In my view, it is a bad idea for our old cemetery to be the foundation for a convention center where people will be cheering, dancing, jumping, singing, and drinking in the convention center’s bars.”
— Professor Pinchos Fridberg (Vilnius Holocaust Survivor)
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“Would these building projects be pursued if the cemeteries in question were the resting places of Catholics, Protestant Christians, or other non-Jewish people?”
— Pastor Michael Maass (Director of the Lithuanian Branch of the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem)
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Spring 2015
Inspiring Voices of Courage from Lithuania
Vytenis Povilas Andriukaitis ♦ Evaldas Balčiūnas ♦ Saulius Beržinis ♦ Milan Chersonski ♦ Algis Davidavičius ♦ Leonidas Donskis ♦ Pinchos Fridberg ♦ Vilma Fiokla Kiurė ♦ Rachel Kostanian ♦ Faina Kukliansky ♦ Andrius Kulikauskas ♦ Michael & Fausta Maass ♦ Julius Norwilla ♦ Rūta Vanagaitė ♦ Geoff Vasil ♦ Tomas Venclova ♦ Lina Žigelytė
AND MANY MORE
Visit our AUTHORS page
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June-July 20152015
Do EU/NATO Countries in Eastern Europe Really Want to Celebrate Anniversaries of Outbreak of the Holocaust?
23 June 2016: Lithuanian Parliament Publishes MP’s Proposal for Celebrating the 75th Anniversary of the Onset of the Lithuanian Holocaust as Supposed Glorious Uprising against the Soviets (who were running from the Nazis’ Barbarossa invasion, not from the Jew-killers)
♦ Last time around (70th anniversary in 2011) ♦ Jewish community’s reaction ♦ Leonidas Donskis’s reaction ♦ Reburial of the “hero” in 2012 ♦ Revival of the old Liekis proposals? ♦ All to be covered by PR Judaic-Yiddish jamborees? ♦ This year’s official initiative comes from the Homeland Union Conservatives
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July 2015
רחל מאַרגאָליס (מַרְגָלִית) ז″ל
Rachel Margolis
Vilna, 28 October 1921 — Rehovot, 6 July 2015
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About Rachel Margolis: Shimon Alperovich, Algirdas Brazauskas, Gordon Brown, Abraham Foxman, Steinar Gil, Martin Gilbert, Chen Ivri Apter, Dovid Katz (Y), Francois Laumonier, NCSJ, Geoff Vasil. UK House of Lords, 5 US Congressmen, 9 Western ambassadors in Vilnius.
Left her safe haven with righteous Christians to join her family in the Vilna Ghetto. Joined the Jewish underground anti-Nazi resistance. Witness to creation of the Yiddish partisan hymn.
Escaped to join the partisans and fought valiantly against the Nazis in the forests of Lithuania. The only one in her family to survive the Holocaust.
Volunteered for the short-lived Jewish museum after the war.
Dedicated half a century to Biology, as PhD and professor, at Vilnius University.
Helped establish the Green House Holocaust museum in Vilnius. Rediscovered, deciphered and published Kazimierz Sakowicz’s diary of Ponár. Author of a remarkable memoir. Beloved guide, lecturer and teacher on Jewish Vilna and the Holocaust. A beloved lecturer at the Vilnius Summer Program in Yiddish untl prosecutors’ threats prevented her coming in 2008 and beyond. Will there be a session honoring her at this summer’s program? Will students be told about her accomplishments?
Target of a campaign of defamation by Vilnius prosecutors, the “Lithuanian Human Rights Association” and other far-right Holocaust-revisionist elites. In 2009, she was excluded from the Jerusalem Book Fair, and betrayed by Indiana University’s Bloomington-Borns Yiddish program at a Jerusalem conference exposed as sham by Prof. Dov Levin. In 2011, Yivo shunned her at its Vilna Ghetto memorial events, preferring to honor the then antisemitic foreign minister of Lithuania.
At 90, she was afraid to return to her beloved Vilna for one last visit she yearned for. The Lithuanian government refused to reach out to her, its ambassadors in Israel would not acknowledge her, while prosecutors repeated threats of kangaroo “war crimes investigation” (most recently for the record in the 2012 documentary “Rewriting History“).
The government of Lithuania forfeited a precious chance to cap the 700 year Jewish history in the country on a more noble note than police coming to look for Dr. Rachel Margolis in Vilnius…
Rachel Margolis (second from right) honored at Tel Aviv’s Leivick House in June 2009. From left to right: Dalia and Ambassador Chen Ivri Apter; Prof. Dov Levin; Prof. Israel Bartal; Prof. Dovid Katz; Leivick House director Daniel Galay.
VIDEO INTERVIEW WITH RACHEL MARGOLIS: 1 and 2
MORE INFORMATION AND TRIBUTES:
RACHEL MARGOLIS FACT SHEET ♦ FORMER UK PRIME MINISTER GORDON BROWN ♦ 5 MEMBERS OF THE US CONGRESS ♦ ACADEMIC STUDIES PRESS ♦ KEENE STATE COLLEGE ♦ SMITHSONIAN MAGAZINE ♦ LORD JANNER OF BRAUNSTONE ♦ LATE LITHUANIAN PRIME MINISTER ALGIRDAS BRAZAUSKAS ♦ ISRAELI AMBASSADOR CHEN IVRI APTER ♦ ADL DIRECTOR ABRAHAM FOXMAN ♦ NCSJ ♦ METRO WEST HOLOCAUST COUNCIL ♦ LEIVICK HOUSE TEL AVIV ♦ JEWISH CHRONICLE ♦ ALGEMEINER JOURNAL (& 2) ♦ RACHEL MARGOLIS.COM
OCTOBER 2012 UPDATE: VIDEO RELEASED OF THE LATE AMBASSADOR CHEN IVRI APTER’S 2009 SPEECH AT LEIVICK HOUSE, TEL AVIV
Coverage in Defending History:
OVERVIEWS HERE & HERE; 7 MAY 2008; 19 JUNE 2009; 28 OCTOBER 2009; 27 JANUARY 2010; 28 OCTOBER 2010; 3 JANUARY 2011; 5 MAY 2011; 28 AUGUST 2011; 23 SEPTEMBER 2011.
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Spring 2015
Protests Mount over $25,000,000 Convention Center Project in Heart of the Old Vilna Jewish Cemetery
Protestant Pastor Asks if Such a Fate Would be In Store for a Christian Cemetery? Second Pastor Calls on Vilnius Mayor to Act
Discrimination Also Noted by Central Rabbinical Congress of the United States and Canada
NEW DH SECTION ON THE OLD VILNA JEWISH CEMETERY
A NEST OF HIGH STATE INTRIGUE?
THE PAPER TRAIL TO DATE
ONE YEAR AGO THE U.S. CONGRESS PASSED LEGISLATION PROTECTING FOREIGN CEMETERIES OF MINORITIES UNDER THE INTERNATIONAL RELIGIOUS FREEDOM ACT
BUT HAS THE U.S. COMMISSION TO PROTECT HERITAGE ABROAD NOW BEEN COMPROMISED IN THE VILNIUS CEMETERY FRACAS?
Jewish Protests Mount: Chief Rabbi of Lithuania; Holocaust Survivor in Vilnius; Vilna Gaon Synagogue in Tel Aviv; Litvak Heads of Yeshivas in Israel; Dr. Bernard Fryshman (CAPJC); Simon Wiesenthal Center.
דער אַלטער ווילנער בית⸗עולם אויף פּיראַמאָנט, נעבעך
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Rabbi Shmuel Jacob Feffer, President of World HaGró (Gaon of Vilna) Center, Coeditor of 70 Gaon Books, Issues Rabbinic Judgment on Convention Center Plans
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Vilnius Holocaust Survivor and Protestant Pastor Speak Out
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June 2015
Yet Another Book that Whitewashes the Latvian Holocaust’s Local Perpetrators
REPORT BY ROLAND BINET
Ukrainian Ultranationalists’ Poster with Swastikas & Other Hitlerist Icons in Weston-on-Trent in Derbyshire, England
REPORT BY J. NORTH
SEE ALSO: UKRAINE UPDATES BELOW; MEDIA TRACKER; DH SECTION
Why is the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra Afraid to Tell its Audience About the Nazi Career of its Featured Composer?
REPORT BY RONALD C. KENT
Vilnius: Right-Wing Parliamentarians Try Again to Make June 23rd — Onset of the Lithuanian Holocaust by Local “Patriots” — Into National Day of Celebration
June 23rd 2016 will mark the 75th anniversary of the outbreak of the Holocaust in dozens of Lithuanian towns. The Soviet army was fleeing Hitler’s invasion of 22 June 1941 (the largest invasion in human history), not the LAF murderers, but some nationalists, antisemites, Double Genociders and far-right revisionists want to turn Holocaust perpetrators into “anti-Soviet rebels.” See details from the last time around, the 70th anniversary of 2011. Defending History was there to cover it all: The events, the LAF’s intentions, the Jewish Community’s response, the government attempts to play double games. See also Brandišauskas’s classic critique of an earlier attempt by Liekis to turn the reign of Hitlerist terror into a glorious chapter of modern history.
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Spring 2015
A Regional Problem?
Some East European Elites Seem to Need to Honor Holocaust Collaborators (while wooing the West as well)
Croatia • Hungary • Latvia • Lithuania • Ukraine
MICHAEL SHAFIR’S NEW PAPER ON HOLOCAUST DEFLECTION AND OBFUSCATION
Come and Check Out Defending History BY COUNTRY
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8 May 2015
Lithuania’s President and Entourage Lay Wreaths at Ponár on May 8th…
VIDEO
Dovid Katz in Times of Israel (11 May)
Efraim Zuroff in i24 (12 May)
“Equally” at Monuments for Jewish, Lithuanian and Polish Victims, but Skipping the Stone Commemorating the 7,514 Red Army Prisoners of Various Nationalities Starved and Murdered at the Site.
NO WREATHS HERE. Presidential wreaths for all but this one: modest plaque in memory of 7,514 Red Army prisoners-of-war, of various nationalities, starved and murdered.
The Lithuanian monument bewreathed on May 8th is not for Lithuanian civilians or anti-Nazis, but for a group of volunteers for pro-Nazi service who were then shot for alleged desertion. The one Jewish MP paid tribute there as well.
May 8th (Western Europe) and May 9th (Eastern Europe) Commemorate the Allied Victory over Hitler in Europe. But the government’s commemoration activities offered zero mention of the sacrifices of the forces that defeated Hitler and brought an end to the genocide at Ponár.
ANOTHER SHOCK FOR VETERANS AND SURVIVORS, AND FOR OBSERVERS OF THE CAMPAIGN TO USURP THE MASS MURDER SITE OF VILNA JEWRY — AND THE HOLOCAUST — FOR CURRENT POLITICAL ENDS
But no government officials turned up at the later event commemorating Jewish partisans and war veterans at the Jewish cemetery
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May 2015
Lithuanian Government’s New Jewish Heritage Commission Completes First Meeting
Sincere Efforts on Preserving Cemeteries and Mass Graves Reported; Real Progress Seen in Central Government Efforts to Overcome Local Resistance
But Painful Issues Ignored Include the Sinking Last Jewish Partisan Fort where Vilna Ghetto Survivors Defied the Nazis and their Collaborators; Humiliated Gravestones in Church Steps and School’s Garden Walls; State’s Memorials for Holocaust Collaborators
In Response to Several Commissioners’ Requests, Defending History Published List of Twelve Urgent Material Heritage Issues
Rumors in Vilnius on “PR Commission Replacement”: Defending History Campaign Challenging Red-Brown Commission Resulted in New, Commission “Replacing It” as Public Face of Gov.-Jewish Affairs; Red-Brown Commission’s Website Dark Since April 17th, as Latest Slur on Holocaust Survivors Appears on Youtube
Press Release Mentions Politically Explosive Foreigners’ Demands for Changes in Citizenship and Private Property Restitution Laws
4 May 2015
On Eve of Commission Meeting, Protestant Clergyman Called for Rapid and Dignified Removal of Church Steps Made of Looted Jewish Gravestones at Central Vilnius Church (Pylimo St. 18); Commission Silent on Issue
Where the way into church is to trample on looted gravestones…
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3 May 2015
Rūta Vanagaitė, Lithuanian Author and Cultural Icon, Publishes Bold Article on History Education and Popular Antisemitism
Article followed her April 17 conference; Then, Vanagaitė teamed up with Jewish community’s Simon Gurevich to debate opponents on Lithuanian TV’s “The Naked Truth” on May 4. One of them was J. Panka, leader of annual neo-Nazi march in Kaunas that flaunts banner of a major Nazi collaborator.
Rūta Vanagaitė and Simon Gurevich on Lithuanian television’s “The Naked Truth” on May 4th.
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22 April 2015
Moment of Truth at Ponár
German Film Makers Release Clip from New Documentary:
Vilnius “Red-Brown Commission” Boss on Beloved Vilna Ghetto Survivor Fania Yocheles Brantsovsky, in Interview at Mass Murder Site Ponár (Paneriai)
ALSO MENTIONS IN BRIEF SOME CORE PRINCIPLES OF “DOUBLE GENOCIDE” AND HIS SEARCH FOR “ALL KINDS OF PERPETRATORS”
REACTION:
Efraim Zuroff says: “Do your country a favor and resign!”
Commission — officially “The International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupation Regimes” — is a Lithuanian government sponsored unit with a record of irksome conflict.
Brantsovsky (Brancovskaja), who turns 93 next month, lost her entire family in the Holocaust. She is one of a number of Jewish partisan heroes publicly defamed by Lithuanian prosecutors for years. No charges were ever filed against any, and “investigations” were dropped in the face of international reaction. But in the absence of written apologies, defamation continues apace into the history books.
Other Holocaust survivors defamed include: Dr. Yitzhak Arad, Professor Pinchos Fridberg, Dr. Rachel Margolis, Attorney Joseph Melamed.
BUT IN SHOCK TO YIDDISH AND HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR CIRCLES, DIRECTOR OF N.Y. YIVO, FOUNDED IN VILNA 90 YEARS AGO, REMAINS A MEMBER OF THE COMMISSION, AND DEFENDS IT IN JEWISH MEDIA. OTHER FOREIGN JEWISH MEMBERS JOINED UP, AT TIMES UNDER POLITICAL PRESSURE. SOME HAVE RECEIVED PRESTIGIOUS AWARDS. A VILNA HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR APPEALED TO YIVO’S DIRECTOR IN VILNA YIDDISH (AUDIO).
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April 2015
Legacy of Rūta Vanagaitė’s April 2015 Conference at Vilnius City Hall
Tomas Venclova addresses conference at Vilnius City Hall on 17 April 2015. Photo: Julius Norwilla.
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CONFERENCE PAPERS, VIDEOS, PHOTOS AND MEDIA COVERAGE
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9 April 2015
Joseph Levinson, 98,
Dies in Vilnius
JOSEPH LEVINSON (1917-2015)
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20 March 2015
Attempts to “Fix” Holocaust History with Far Right’s “Double Genocide” Politics?
Vilnius Holocaust survivor Prof. Pinchos Fridberg dares challenge the state-sponsored “red-brown commission” that supports the Prague Declaration. His audio recording in Vilna Yiddish of an open letter to director of Yivo in NY. Text of full correspondence in English [DH] (+reprint [OLC]), Russian [Mi Zdes] (+ reprints in Shofar & Obzor), Yiddish [Forverts].
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European taxpayers’ money squandered by traveling exhibits to downgrade the Holocaust by mix-n-match with Soviet crimes? Geoff Vasil reviews exhibit.
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While a real Holocaust exhibit in Paris, for UNESCO, is vetoed by Latvia? Latest from Paris.
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Free thought in East European academia: Dissenters to “Double Genocide” dismissed, then accused of being non-academics? Coming soon: Prof. Michael Shafir’s “Deflection and Obfuscation.” Also: Times of Israel report.
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16 March 2015
In the East of EU-NATO-Land: Again, Latvian Authorities Grant Riga Old Town and its “Liberty Monument” on March 16th to 1500 Worshippers of Hitler’s Waffen SS Latvian Divisions
All Waffen SS members swore an oath to Adolf Hitler, some were recycled Holocaust killers. Lithuania’s far-right leaders J. Panka and R. Čekutis, fresh from neo-Nazi march in Vilnius, were on hand as honored guests; British neo-Nazis came for the event. For the second year in a row, the prime minister forbade ministers from attending. The antisemite who went around seeking Jewish observers to “enlighten” them (video).
Top left: Sea of flowers placed at Liberty Monument to honor Waffen SS. Top right: throng marches through historic old town. Bottom from left: heavy police presence; an antisemitic poster distributed by one of the event’s supporters.
Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Dr. Efraim Zuroff leads a silent, peaceful protest of Just 2 (SWC and Defending History)
But his words at event are reported around the globe (including ABC News, Arutz Sheva, London Daily Mail, Der Spiegel, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Yahoo News). SWC’s statement. Photo gallery by Delfi.lv.
Dr. Zuroff’s one-month odyssey took him to all four far-right or pro-Nazi events in the Baltics: Kaunas Feb 16, Tallinn Feb 24, Vilnius March 11, and Riga March 16.
Top: Dr. Efraim Zuroff is besieged by a throng of media. Bottom: He and Dovid Katz made for an on-site protest of just 2; Famous Latvian Jewish tour guide and genealogist Alex Feigmanis makes an appearance too.
Separate protest by “Latvia Without Nazism” was allowed after event’s conclusion, with members carrying symbolic fumigation gear to Liberty Monument after Waffen SS admirers’ departure. Monica Lowenberg’s international petition reaches 6700 mark.
Once the main event was over and the “Waffen SSers” had left, a small contingent from “Latvia Without Nazism” (affiliated with the controversial “World Without Nazism”) was allowed to protest. Led by the ever colorful Joe Koren (top), the group dressed as fumigation & disinfection specialists, with full gear and uniforms, to symbolically clear away the pro-Nazi residue of the marchers.
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ARCHIVES OF MONITORS: NEO-NAZI MARCHES IN THE REGION, 2008 to 2015
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12 March 2015
Latest Poster from “Zeppelinus” Who is Alleged to be High Official at Lithuania’s Economy Ministry
NEWEST EFFORT MOCKS LOVE OF COUNTRY BY ROMA, LEFTISTS, JEWS, BLACKS, POLES AND LGBT. SELECTION OF EARLIER PRODUCTIONS HERE. “FULL DISCLOSURE” — HE HAS ALSO DEDICATED MONTAGES TO DH EDITOR.
“Lithuania for Everyone. But where, then, is the country of the Lithuanians?” The signs read “I am Lithuania” with symbols interpolated, based on the actual sign (center) carried by head of the Union of Jewish Students at last Wednesday’s neo-Nazi march in central Vilnius.
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Will the “Human Rights Monitoring Institute” maintain its usual silence? Where are The Bagels?
The poster’s theme, mocking the inclusivist “Lithuania for Everybody [visiems]” (the common reply to the neo-Nazis’ “Lithuania for Lithuanians” [Lietuviams]) is taken from the courageous anti-Nazi demonstration by the head of the Union of Jewish Students in Lithuania at the city-center neo-Nazi event allowed by authorities on the nation’s independence day. See next story.
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11 March 2015
1,500 Neo-Nazis and Far-Right Extremists Again Given Vilnius’s Main Boulevard on Nation’s March 11th Independence Day; They Parade from Cathedral Square to Nation’s Parliament with Fascist Symbols and Chants of “Lietuva Lietuviams” (Lithuania for [Pure] Lithuanians)
STATEMENTS FROM PRECEDING DAYS; FOLLOWING THE EVENT: JEWISH COMMUNITY OF LITHUANIA’S STATEMENT AND REPORT; SIMON WIESENTHAL CENTER; GEOFF VASIL IN DH
Section of the march gets underway at Vilnius’s Cathedral Square on the March 11th independence day event organized by neo-Nazi and far-right elements with state acquiescence.
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Flag with Swastika Hoisted Outside Nation’s Parliament for Over an Hour
Photo: Geoff Vasil
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For First Time, Leaders of Jewish Community, Including Chairperson Faina Kukliansky, and Jewish Student Union Come Out to Monitor and Protest the Vilnius March; Community Issues Statement; But No Sign of “Human Rights Monitoring Institute” or Bagels.
Amit Belaitė, president of Jewish Students’ Union boldly approaches far-right figure Ričardas Čekutis with sign that reads (in Lithuanian): “I am [star-of-david] Lithuania”. For years, Mr. Čekutis was a high official of the Genocide Center. Photo: DefendingHistory.com.
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Continuing to flank the fascist spokesman (right), Ms. Belaitė is supported by Simas Levinas (left), head of the Jewish Religious Community of Lithuania. Photo: DefendingHistory.com.
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Wiesenthal Center’s Dr. Efraim Zuroff Leads Group of Seven Protesters in Partnership with Defending History; Part of Zuroff’s One Month Odyssey to All Four Baltic Neo-Nazi Events; SWC Statement; Photo galleries by Julius Norwilla and by Bill Pahl.
Left to right: Julius Norwilla, Markus Pollak, Dovid Katz, Simas Levinas, Pinchos Fridberg, Efraim Zuroff, Milan Chersonski. For a dozen years (1999-2011), Mr. Chersonski edited the Jewish community’s quadrilingual newspaper, Jerusalem of Lithuania. Photo: DefendingHistory.com.
Three Down, One to Go, in Efraim Zuroff’s Odyssey to the Baltic Month of Neo-Nazi Marches: (1) Kaunas, 16 February: MONITORED; (2) Tallinn, 24 February: MONITORED; (3) Vilnius, 11 March: THE MAYOR? HUMAN RIGHTS MONITORS? (4) Riga, 16 March: PETITION.
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Once again, thousands of fascists march past the “Jewish Public Library” and once again, not one member of staff came out to politely protest the glorification of fascism in a city whose 60,000 Jews were massacred. Photo: DefendingHistory.com.
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Right-wing party politician Emanuelis Zingeris unexpectedly bumps into the SWC / Defending History crowd near the march. He was warm and chatty, but when invited to be photographed together with our team, says “Bye” and heads down Gedimino Boulevard via express. Photos: DefendingHistory.com. However, thanks to Julius Norwilla’s camera, the image of a cetain threesome was captured. SEE ALSO: Geoff Vasil’s take on the encounter.
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Scenes from the day….
Photomontage by DefendingHistory.com
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From the monitors…
Photomontage by DefendingHistory.com
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16 February 2015
Wiesenthal Center – Defending History Team of 12 Monitors & Protests Kaunas Independence Day Neo-Nazi March
Lithuanian Jewish Community Issues Statement on Feb. 20th
MARCH FEATURED LONG SERIES OF FASCIST-STYLE TAUNTS OF LIETUVA LIETUVIAMS (“LITHUANIA FOR [ETHNIC] LITHUANIANS”) ALONG WITH SWASTIKAS, OTHERFASCIST SYMBOLS AND A HUGE BANNER OF THE 1941 NAZI PUPPET PM WHO COLLABORATEDIN THE DESTRUCTION OF HIS CITY’S CITIZENS WHO WERE JEWISH. MAYOR’S OFFICE GAVE PERMITS FOR CITY CENTER TRAVESTY ON NATION’S INDEPENDENCE DAY.
ZERO PUBLIC REACTION FROM GOV. OFFICIALS OR DOMESTIC HUMAN RIGHTS ORGANIZATIONS. THE WIESENTHAL CENTER, DEFENDING HISTORY AND THE COUNTRY’S JEWISH COMMUNITY TO DATE THE ONLY PUBLIC VOICES.
Monitoring team was a project of the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Israel office in partnership with the Vilnius-based Defending History team.
Dozen protesters (vs. a march of up to 500) included five members of Lithuanian Jewish community (in private capacity), but no sign of any Bagels or other funded antisemitism (or human rights) monitors.
AFTER THE EVENT: JTA; Newsru.com; 15min.lt; Alfa.lt; Balsas.lt; Delfi.lt; Enlacejudío.com; EuropaUniversal; Faktai.lt; FB; Forward; ICEJ; Info.smi; Interfax; International Business Times; Israel Nachrichten; Jerusalem Post; JP (2); Jewish Community of Lithuania; Kauno diena; Lrt.lt; Lrytas.lt; Obzor; Newsru.co.il; News02elf; Radiojai.com.ar; RT; Shalom Life; Simon Wiesenthal Center; Strategic Culture Foundation; Times of Israel (French edition); Vilniaus diena; Ztis.cz.
RUN-UP TO THE EVENT: i24; Defending History (+ DH correspondence with mayor’s office; + SWC’s letter to the mayor).
PHOTO COLLECTIONS: Julius Norwilla; 15min.lt; Delfi.lt; Facebook; Kauno diena; Lrytas.lt; Vilniaus diena.
VIDEOS: Lrytas.tv; Lrt.lt.
NEO-NAZI & FAR-RIGHT REACTION: DavidDuke.com; Daily Slave.com; LDiena.lt; LtNacionalistas; Nationalist Youth Union; J. Panka; Stormfront; Vyrud.livejournal; Zeppelinus 1 + Zeppelinus 2 + Zeppelinus 3. But who is Zeppelinus?
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Images from the neo-Nazi march in the center of Kaunas on 6 February 2015
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10 February 2015
Baltic Nazi-Glorifying Marching Season Underway
COME JOIN US IN KAUNAS, MONDAY 16 FEB. at 1 PM (1300), AT RAMYBĖS PARK, TO MONITOR, SILENTLY PROTEST, & REMEMBER THE CITY’S MORE THAN 30,000 MURDERED JEWISH CITIZENS.
WIESENTHAL CENTER’S EFRAIM ZUROFF FLYING IN TO MONITOR EVENT AND LEAD PEACEFUL PROTEST; HIS LETTER TO KAUNAS MAYOR; OBZOR; DELFI.LT; KAUNO DIENA; ALKAS.LT
DH’S CORRESPONDENCE WITH KAUNAS MAYOR’S OFFICE. FOR THE RECORD:ISRAELI HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS’ LETTER OF 2013.
Presidents, Mayors, Cardinals, Professors, Editors —
“A splendid opportunity for Baltic leaders to just speak up”
Update: Efraim Zuroff’s op-ed on all four marches calls on Brussels to take a stand
CITY-CENTER NEO-NAZI MARCHES THAT GLORIFY WARTIME HITLER COLLABORATORS NOW SCHEDULED FOR ALL THREE BALTIC STATES; ESTONIAN & LITHUANIAN EVENTS ARE ON NATIONS’ INDEPENDENCE DAY HOLIDAYS
ESTONIA: TALLINN, FEBRUARY 24TH
LATVIA: RIGA, MARCH 16TH
LITHUANIA: KAUNAS, FEB. 16TH AND VILNIUS, MARCH 11TH
Eyewitness accounts of previous years’ marches
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3 February 2015
Sir Martin Gilbert
25 October 1936 — 3 February 2015
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MAGNIFICENT HISTORIAN AND AUTHOR, DEAR FRIEND, LOYAL AND UNDAUNTED CHAMPION OF HISTORIC TRUTH
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Sir Martin Gilbert in Vilnius in 2009. Photo: DefendingHistory.com
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January 2015
Poetry Section is Launched with Work of Ken Slade (Kęstutis Sladkevičius) and Aleksandras Bosas
SEE ALSO PAGE AND SECTION HONORING LITHUANIAN CITIZENS WHO STAND UP AGAINST HOLOCAUST DENIAL / OBFUSCATION, RACISM AND ANTISEMITISM. PROPHET AMOS AWARDS.
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27 January 2015
Historians Cite
2015 Relevance of the Seventy Years Declaration
◊
AUSCHWITZ LIBERATION 70TH ANNIVERSARY: Efraim Zuroff, Joshua Tartakovsky, and Pinchos Fridberg argue that Russia’s president should have been there. Dovid Katz calls for “Double Genocide” to be refuted head-on. Channel 4’s report.
———
DR. ZUROFF’S ARTICLE IN (THE ORIGINAL) ENGLISH, GERMAN, AND RUSSIAN. PROF. FRIDBERG’S IN ENGLISH, GERMAN, AND (THE ORIGINAL) RUSSIAN.
EYEWITNESS REPORT ON THREE REMEMBRANCE DAY EVENTS IN VILNIUS; ON THE THIRD EVENT FEATURING GENOCIDE CENTER OFFICIAL; JERUSALEM POST & MAKOR RISHON REPORTS ON EFRAIM ZUROFF’S STATEMENT, NOW POSTED ON WIESENTHAL CENTER SITE. RESPONSE BY LITHUANIAN JEWISH COMMUNITY. COMMENT BY COMMUNITY’S CHAIRPERSON FAINA KUKLIANSKY.
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23 January 2015
Roundup
Croatia: Zuroff on church’s latest honors for Nazi collaborators; on the need for Brussels to respond to the latest events
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Lithuania: Will officials speak out against planned neo-Nazi and collaborator-glorifying events in Kaunas (Feb 16th) and Vilnius (March 11th)? After deputy foreign minister goes to Brussels to “fight antisemitism” Efraim Zuroff tweets, challenging him to denounce both neo-Nazi marches back home. Also: Melee on launch of Holocaust museum project miles from the city center
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Latvia: Will the government stop gifting the capital’s center for the March 16th celebrations of the country’s Waffen SS?
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USA: What happened to Rep. John Conyers’ amendment to the military appropriations bill? The incredible UN vote. Triumphant American tour of a documentary that glorifies a Nazi collaborator’s postwar activity without mentioning the “slight problem of 1941”…
Heat of Debate: Dan Lazare’s critique of Timothy Snyder’s alleged rubbishing of the anti-Nazi partisan resistance crops up in the “New Republic” fallout. Did the US State Dept. (via Vilnius embassy) pour money into SLS to influence the Holocaust history debates? On Poland & Ukraine: Gebert (2) and Katz in Jewish Review of Books. Have the Tides Foundation & George Soros been manipulated to support “rigged Holocaust discussions”?
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In DH: Genrich Agranovski, Evaldas Balčiūnas, Roland Binet, Frank Brendle, Milan Chersonski, Pinchos Fridberg, Sebastian Hager, Peter Jukes, Vilma Fiokla Kiurė, Jacob Piliansky, Tomas Venclova
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News & Views. Human Rights. Opinion. Books. Poetry. Museums. Media. More.
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21 January 2015
Freedom of Expression in France & at UNESCO
JTA: Latvia Vetoes UNESCO Holocaust Exhibit in Paris
Simon Wiesenthal Center critiques the Latvian Government’s sabotage of exhibition that was supposed to open this week in the French capital
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8 January 2015
President of the Czech Republic Breaks EU’s Wall of Silence on Ukrainian Gov’s Worship of Nazi-Era Fascists
Milos Zeman, president of the Czech Republic
“Unfortunately, I cannot congratulate Ukraine on such national heroes.”
— Milos Zeman, President of the Czech Republic
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More on Ukraine: Kiev center is scene of worshipful Bandera march on new year’s day; Jerusalem Post reports. Then, Ukrainian PM Arseniy Yatsenyuk explained that the “USSR invaded Germany and Ukraine” in World War II. Bryan Macdonald reports. William Blum in Foreign Policy Journal on US policy being “dumb and dumber”…
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1 January 2015
New Book
Poses Question for US and EU Foreign Policy. Should the West not demand, as matter of ethics, values and history, the abandonment of allies’ state glorification of major Holocaust collaborators?
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22 November 2014
A Historic Low for US (and Canadian) Foreign Policy?
UN Resolution for “Combating Glorification of Nazism” Passes in General Assembly Committee (115 for, 3 against, with 55 abstentions)
Resolution, offered by Russia, seen as inherently flawed by Putinist machinations, Russia-Ukraine crisis & East-West feuding; EU abstains, as Baltic nationalists gloat (Delfi.lt)
STILL A SHOCK that three member states voted against: Ukraine, USA, Canada. Ukraine’s government recently made “heroes” of Nazi collaborators; catalogue of the last year.
The State Department’s idea of American moral leadership?
Text of the Resolution
Are unchecked Neo-Con politics behind the failure to Just Say No to the adulation of Nazi collaborators?
Media: Margaret Besheer in Voice of America; Joseph Brean in Canada’s National Post; Ken Hanly in Digital Journal; Dovid Katz in The Times of Israel; Ryan Maloney in Huffington Post; John Meinhold in In Serbia News; Jim Miles in CounterPunch; Boruch Shubert in JP Updates; Sam Sokol in the Jerusalem Post.
THE INCREDIBLE DOCUMENT
The Real Question: Should the US, UK, Canada, the EU and the rest of the free world not sponsor their own resolution combating the glorification of Nazism which is a real problem in the eastern EU and Ukraine?
TIME FOR THE UN TO LOOK AT THE SEVENTY YEARS DECLARATION?
Related: Why did US Congressman John Conyers’ amendment restricting aid to pro-Nazi groups in Ukraine fail to pass? Max Blumenthal’s (unproven) allegations.
Glorification of Nazism section; Street names and gloried reburial in Lithuania; Issues in Croatia, Czech Rep, Estonia, Germany, Hungary, Lithuania, Latvia, Russia, Ukraine
Meanwhile, a citizen of Lithuania speaks out on memorials for Nazi collaborators and state-sanctioned parades that glorify Hitler collaborators on nation’s independence day
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20 November 2014
The Face of Roma in Vilnius
Does a Program of “Integration” Undermine the Roma Community in Lithuania’s Capital?
SPECIAL REPORT BY VILMA FIOKLA KIURĖ
Ruth Barnett (London) Responds
Related Defending History sections: Roma, Human Rights, Opinion
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Autumn 2014
Seventy Years Declaration (SYD) Relaunched for 2015
PROF. DANNY BEN-MOSHE LAUNCHES DECLARATION’S NEW WEBSITE ◊ RELAUNCH FOR JANUARY 2015 HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL DAY ON 70th ANNIVERSARY OF LIBERATION OF AUSCHWITZ ◊ NEED UNDERLINED BY THE BALTIC-NATIONALIST INSPIRED RESOLUTION SLIPPED INTO THE US CONGRESS LAST JUNE
SYD IN 15 LANGUAGES
Reports in JWire; JDU; SYD’s history in DH (a minister’s Hitler-Stalin moustache pronouncement; Vytenis Andriukaitis’s reply; Denis MacShane); Early media; in the film Rewriting History; In Dan Stone’s new book on postwar Europe; Facebook.
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October 2015
Defending History Brings Results…
For First Time, NY Yivo to Honor (on Dec. 17) a Holocaust Resistance Hero Defamed by Lithuania’s Prosecutors
Event is for NY Yivo fundraising, but no Yiddish text included
HOPES RISE FOR LITHUANIAN GOVERNMENT PUBLIC APOLOGY TO DR. YITZHAK ARAD, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR, HERO OF THE ANTI-NAZI RESISTANCE AND ISRAEL’S WAR OF INDEPENDENCE, MAJOR HOLOCAUST SCHOLAR AND FORMER DIRECTOR OF YAD VASHEM
Dr. Arad is a victim of a state-sponsored campaign of defamation. When forced by international outcry to abandon their “pre-trial investigation,” prosecutors published a further defamatory page on their own website. It’s still there!
Defamation remains widespread on Wikipedia, on the web, in “academic” books, and by the “Lithuanian Human Rights [!] Association” (LHRA). Public apology in writing seen as only remedy.
What does Yitzhak Arad think about the “red-brown commission” and the Prague Declaration?
Hopes rising Yivo director will quit the “red-brown commission” which Yitzhak Arad exposed in Defending History as a major engine of the Double Genocide movement in Europe and beyond. Yivo membership in the Commission is seen as a betrayal of Holocaust survivors and support for Prague Declaration (which is publicly supported by the commission). See Seventy Years Declaration for response.
WHEN WILL DR. RACHEL MARGOLIS BE HONORED?
צי האָט דער איצטיקער ניו⸗יאָרקער ייוואָ אינגאַנצן אַרויסגעוואָרפן יידיש פון דער היינטצייטיקער טעטיקייט? וואָס וואָלטן דערויף געזאָגט דינה אַבראַמאָוויטש, אוריאל וויינרייך, מאַקס וויינרייך, יודל מאַרק, חנה מלאָטעק, שלמה נאָבל, נחום סטוטשקאָוו, אברהם סוצקעווער, נח פּרילוצקי, זעליג⸗הירש קלמנאָוויטש, זלמן רייזען, צמח שאַבאַד, מרדכי שעכטער?
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Five Holocaust survivors, and the year the campaign against each was launched by government units in Lithuania. From left to right: Dr. Yitzhak Arad, Dr. Rachel Margolis, Ms. Fania Brantsovsky, attorney Joseph Melamed, and physicist Professor Pinchos Fridberg. Many bold Lithuanian citizens have stood up to state-sponsored efforts to obfuscate the Holocaust via revisionist historiography.
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August 2015
Latvian for “Springtime for Hitler”?
Riga Jewish Heritage Guide Aleks Feigmanis and Wiesenthal Center’s Efraim Zuroff Blast New Musical that Glorifies a Holocaust Perpetrator; Associated Press Reports
THE SHOW’S NATIONAL TOUR STARTED ON OCTOBER 11
MORE
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NEW YORK, 19 October 2014
“Klinghoffer” — A Dangerous Pattern of Abuse of Drama to Downgrade Murder and Genocide?
Glorification of the local perpetrators of the Holocaust is a problem in many of the pro-Western countries of Eastern Europe
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KIEV, 14 October 2014
Ukrainian Parliament’s Debate on Glorifying World War II Hitlerist Nationalists Ends in Disarray
But “Centrist” President Poroshenko Proclaims Day of Fascist Group’s Founding as National Holiday
Mainstream Western Media Mostly Ignores the News (but see: Sunday Times)
In a September tweet, Ukraine’s president said UPA fighters were an “example of heroism.” It was a prelude to the scheduled Oct. 14th debate in parliament on declaring Hitler’s executioners in Ukraine to be “freedom fighters.” When violence broke out on the 14th outside the national parliament, the Western media, including the BBC, whitewashed the Hitler-era Holocaust perpetrators being glorified by Ukraine’s nationalist leaders.
But the UPA, OUN and the Banderists were pro-Nazi, racist, antisemitic militias infamous for mass murders of civilians during the Holocaust. See: Yad Vashem. Yitzhak Arad. John-Paul Himka. Grzegorz Rossolinski-Liebe. Per Anders Rudling.
Presumably, nobody forced Ukraine’s president in 2014 to tweet on “that matter of history” from over 70 years ago? He came out with even worse at a press conference, before going on to proclaim a national independence holiday based on the fascist UPA’s sacred date.
RELATED COVERAGE: Foreign Policy, Guardian, International Business Times, London Jewish Chronicle, The Nation (II), NBC News, Telegraph, The Hill, Washington Post, ZDF
BACKGROUND HERE
DELRAY, FLORIDA, October 2014
Screening of Bloom’s “Defending Holocaust History” Elicits Spirited Discussion
Now Available on YouTube
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VILNIUS, 16 May 2014
Seven Lithuanian Champions of Human Rights Awarded First Annual
James Tissot’s The Prophet Amos (around 1888)
PROPHET AMOS AWARD FOR COURAGE FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
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October 2014
Daniel Lazare Deconstructs Timothy Snyder’s Trashing of Anti-Nazi World War II Partisans, and New Role as Point Man for (East European) Far Right and (US) Neo-Cons
PLUS: CAN YOU RESPECTFULLY DISAGREE WITH A PROFESSOR FROM YALE?
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6 September 2014
Five Years
Five years have elapsed since this journal was founded on 6 Sept. 2009, in memory of Professor Meir Shub (1924-2009). Outside coverage includes David Hirsch in Engage and Jonathan Freedland in the Guardian (2009); Avi Friedman in Mishpacha, Ricky Ben-David in the Jerusalem Post, Mark Ames in The Nation, and Wendy Robbins on BBC World Service (2010); Cindy Mindell in the Jewish Ledger and Peter Jukes in Motley Moose (2011); Danny Ben-Moshe in his film Rewriting History (2012); Bernard Dichek in Jerusalem Report (2013); Richard Bloom in his film Defending Holocaust History (2014). CONTINUE READING
PLEASE DONATE TO HELP DEFENDING HISTORY CONTINUE TO DEFEND HISTORY — AND TO PAY OUR AUTHORS IN EASTERN EUROPE FOR THEIR WORK…
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2 September 2014
The Defending History Community Celebrates the 77th Birthday of
Vilnius author (in Russian), editor (in English, Lithuanian, Russian, Yiddish), historian (European), theatre director (Yiddish) and tireless, fearless (global) intellectual champion in the struggle against the far right’s Holocaust revisionism, racism and antisemitism
MILAN CHERSONSKI
77
A pillar of strength in the Jewish Community of Lithuania and far beyond
Selections from his years as editor of the quadrilingual Jerusalem of Lithuania. Chersonski section in Defending History. Film tribute. Facebook.
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LONDON, 26 August 2014
Ernst Lowenberg (1922—2014)
Ernst Josef Lowenberg
(28 December 1922 — 26 August 2014)
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In his final months, London Holocaust survivor Ernst Lowenberg, a native of Halle am Saale in Germany, wrote to UK prime minister David Cameron asking the government to take a stand on East European Holocaust revisionism.
In 2012, on the eve of his ninetieth birthday, he led a peaceful, dignified, friendly picket-line outside the Lithuanian Embassy in London and handed the consul a petition.
He is pictured above at the prime minister’s Holocaust Commission consultation event held in London on 5 May 2014.
Funeral service Tuesday, 2 Sept. 2014 at 2 PM at West Chapel, Hoop Lane, Golders Green, London NW11
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Summer 2014
Seventy Years Declaration Now Open to Public
Text ◊ 15 European languages ◊ History ◊ Origins ◊ As Counter Prague 2008
———
Summer 2014
ISSUES IN THE NEWS
(I) Freedom of Speech
Estonia ♦ Hungary ♦ Latvia ♦ Lithuania (Balčiūnas; Beržinis; Butkus; Dyukov; Fridberg; Grabauskas; Melamed)
COMING SOON: Review of the Lithuanian edition of a book on the Holocaust that got its author banned from attending the book launch event
(II) Glorifying Nazi Collaborators
Croatia ♦ Estonia ♦ Hungary ♦ Latvia ♦ Lithuania ♦ Ukraine
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August 2014
Ukrainian Government’s Use of Neo-Nazi Paramilitaries is Reported by London’s Daily Telegraph
———
“But Kiev’s use of volunteer paramilitaries […] should send a shiver down Europe’s spine. Recently formed battalions such as Donbas, Dnipro and Azov, with several thousand men under their command, are officially under the control of the interior ministry but their financing is murky, their training inadequate and their ideology often alarming. The Azov men use the neo-Nazi Wolfsangel (Wolf’s Hook) symbol on their banner and members of the battalion are openly white supremacists, or antisemites.” — Tom Parfitt in the Daily Telegraph.
Azov Unit fighting for Ukraine’s government. Photo: Tom Parfitt (Telegraph)
BUT USE OF PRO-HITLER ELEMENTS BY WASHINGTON’S ALLY GETS ONE SENTENCE AT END OF NEW YORK TIMES REPORT
Western Media Begins to Cover the Far Right and Nazi-Worshiping Aspects; See also Ukraine Section; Page; 2014 Media Page.
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Plungyán (Plungė), 30 July 2014
Yankl-Yosl Bunk (Jakovas Bunka), Famed Wood Sculptor, Last Jew of Plungyán (Plungė, Lithuania), Dies at 91
His Art Commemorates the Holocaust in Western Lithuania
Was World War II Red Army Veteran of the War Against Hitler
Yankl-Yosl Bunk (13 July 1923 – 30 July 2014) Photo: Adam Ellick
2011 VIDEO INTERVIEW WITH YANKL-YOSL BUNK IN PLUNGYÁN
Bunk’s sculptures; his memoir of Jewish Plungyán; JewishGen Kehila links; Adam Ellick on Bunk; JTA; Bunk’s list of the Jews of Plungyán; “hypothetical” speech at the 2011 Plungyán commemoration.
Bunk’s massive wooden sculpture at the forest hill spot (Plungyán/Plungė, western Lithuania), where 74 teenage Jewish girls (from the local high school) were murdered by locals who knew them. Photo: DefendingHistory.com.
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Summer 2014
WELCOME TO DEFENDING HISTORY (FROM THE NEWEST BRAND OF HOLOCAUST DENIAL)
When Citizens of Lithuania Speak Out Boldly
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New Latvian Musical, “Sugar Herbert Sugar” Glorifies Holocaust Mass Murderer Herberts Cukurs
Tickets now available online for performances around the country. About the show. Signature tune released on YouTube (Would they have done better with the old Archies version of “Sugar Sugar”?)
Are we back to Springtime for Hitler, just focused on celebrating a local mass murderer of Latvian Jewry? Will the hosting venues, including the City Cultural Centers in Jelgava and Valmiera, and prestigious halls in Riga, Liepāja, Rēzekne and Ventspils also be holding memorials for their citizens murdered in the Latvian Holocaust in which Herberts Cukurs, known as the “Hangman of Riga,” took such a personal and violent part?
———
Meanwhile…
Latvian Constitutional Court Upholds “Double Genocide” Restriction on Free Speech; Five Years Max
Surpasses Lithuanian law (up to two years imprisonment) and Hungary’s version (up to three years)
Opinion that there was one genocide in the country (the Holocaust) remains criminalized by 2014 law, in the spirit of the laws passed in Hungary and Lithuania in 2010
Comment on Eastern EU speech laws by: Milan Chersonski, Leonidas Donskis, Dovid Katz, Efraim Zuroff; See also: FREE SPEECH Section
QUESTION: Does the new musical Sugar Herbert Sugar perhaps violate the new law which bans (with punishment up to five years jailtime) “glorification, denial, justification or gross derogation of genocide, crimes against humanity, crimes against peace or war crimes against Latvia perpetrated by the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany.” Or is the law null and void when it comes to the Holocaust in Latvia?
LATVIA SECTION
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Summer 2014
Is a Vilnius Police Unit Again Harassing Evaldas Balčiūnas for his Articles on the Holocaust?
LATEST NEWS. EARLIER REPORT. BALČIŪNAS SECTION.
FREE SPEECH SECTION
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Evaldas Balčiūnas (left) joined Dr. Efraim Zuroff, director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center Israel office, last February in Kaunas, Lithuania, for a small, silent, peaceful protest against the state-approved neo-Nazi march in the city’s center on the nation’s independence day.
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June 2014
Did Someone Sneak Some Holocaust Revisionism into the US Congress?
Under the Radar: Did East European nationalists — trying to insinuate the “Two Holocausts Theory” into the West — slip a resolution right onto Capitol Hill?
Flying in from the east?
Hurtful Shock for Veterans, Holocaust Survivors & their Families: US Congress Approves Mixed Soviet-Nazi Commemoration Day in Line with 2008 “Prague Declaration” (Text)
RESPONSES:
Clemens Heni; Dovid Katz
BALTIC NATIONALIST GROUPS PRESSED FOR THE RESOLUTION; GOVTRACK; IT WAS ATTACHED TO THE MILITARY APPROPRIATIONS BILL (SEE AMENDMENT 134 / 1266); FULL TEXT; LITHUANIAN AMBASSADOR IN WASHINGTON CONFIRMS CURRENT POLITICAL AIM OF (DE FACTO) REVISION OF HOLOCAUST HISTORY.
SAME GROUPS THAT HAVE SUPPORTED PROJECTS TO HONOR NAZI COLLABORATORS?
But what’s wrong with a single “red-brown” remembrance day?
YITZHAK ARAD
YEHUDA BAUER
ABRAHAM COOPER
EFRAIM ZUROFF
SEVENTY YEARS DECLARATION
THE HOLOCAUST IS IN EFFECT DOWNGRADED TO ONE OF TWO SUPPOSEDLY “EQUAL HOLOCAUSTS”; See: Yitzhak Arad, Yehuda Bauer, Danny Ben-Moshe, Milan Chersonski, Leonidas Donskis, Esther Goldberg Gilbert, Dovid Katz, Rachel Kostanian, Denis MacShane, John Mann, Efraim Zuroff
♦
Are US officials aware that the Prague Declaration is the foundational document of the ultranationalists’ “Double Genocide” campaign to revise Holocaust history? Of the Seventy Years Declaration (2012) response? Do these members of Congress really believe that those who liberated Auschwitz are morally identical to its killers?
FILMS: Danny Ben-Moshe’s Rewriting History; Richard Bloom’s Defending Holocaust History; Gerit Ziegler’s When Double Genocide Means Single Genocide
BATTLE OF EUROPEAN DECLARATIONS: Seventy Years Declaration (2012) is a reply to the Prague Declaration (2008); Statement of the World Union of Progressive Judaism (2013); of the British Board of Deputies; History of SYD (to 2014)
RELATED:
Double Genocide section; Blaming the Victims; Glorification of Collaborators; 2012 reburial of 1941 Nazi puppet prime minister; Sample of the antisemitic essence of Double Genocide (by current official at the Economy Ministry)
Freedom of Speech in the Eastern EU?
ŠIAULIAI, 22 MAY 2014
DH Staff Writer Evaldas Balčiūnas is Investigated by Lithuanian Police
Summons Issued
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
PATTERN OF CRIMINALIZING THE TRUTH ABOUT THE HOLOCAUST? PROSECUTORS ON YITZHAK ARAD (2007); HARASSMENT OF VILNA GHETTO SURVIVORS (2008); 2 YEAR JAIL LAW (2010); POLICE PURSUIT OF JOSEPH MELAMED (2011); RED-BROWN COMMISSION’S DEFAMATION OF PINCHOS FRIDBERG (2013-14); SUMMARY OF STATE DEFAMATION OF SURVIVORS (2008-2014); GIEDRIUS GRABAUSKAS (2014); SAULIUS BERŽINIS (2014); EVALDAS BALČIŪNAS (2014).
Evaldas Balčiūnas
♦
RELATED: Defending History report on Lithuania’s 2010 law. Essays by: Leonidas Donskis; Milan Chersonski. Section on Democracy in the Eastern EU.
RELATED: Police action against feminists who stood up peacefully to the neo-Nazis in Lithuania.
“We stand with Evaldas 100%.”
—Editor
With Efraim Zuroff
On February 16th 2014, Evaldas Balčiūnas joined the small, peaceful and silent protest led by Dr. Efraim Zuroff, director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center Israel office, on the occasion of the annual neo-Nazi march in Kaunas which again glorified the city’s 1941 Nazi puppet ruler who collaborated in sending his city’s 30,000 Jewish citizens to their deaths.
♦
♦
PRAGUE, 20 MAY 2014
European Union
“Double Genociders” in Prague Triumphantly Announce Participation of “Cabinet of Viviane Reding” at 12-13 June Conference on “Legacy of Totalitarianism Today”…
Will EU’s Commissioner for Justice legitimize the Prague campaign to obfuscate the Holocaust for the East-European-nationalist inspired rewrite of history?
Will there be a single paper on current glorification of Nazi collaborators in a conference on “Legacy of Totalitarianism Today”?
♦
BACKGROUND:
THE PRAGUE DECLARATION (2008); SYD (2012)
THE RED-BROWN COMMISSION (1998-2014)
DOUBLE GENOCIDE
STATE GLORIFICATION OF HOLOCAUST COLLABORATORS
DOES DOUBLE GENOCIDE “NEED” TO TARGET HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS?
♦
The “Prague Platform” organizing the conference features on its home page the Prague Declaration and partnership with (inter alia) the Vilnius based Genocide Center and the “red-brown” commission. Also: Is EU funding squandered on rampant infighting?
LONDON, 9 May 2014
Appeal to Prime Minister David Cameron
Survivor Calls on Prime Minister to Reject “Double Genocide” Revisionism
Ernst Lowenberg, 91, pictured at the May 2014 UK consultation with Holocaust survivors, has written to David Cameron calling for rejection of the “Double Genocide” revisionism emanating from Eastern Europe. In 2012, he handed a petition to the Lithuanian embassy in London.
UK PAGE UK SECTION
VILNIUS, 16 May 2014
Genrich Agranovski on the Fate of the Old Jewish Gravestones of Vilna
Confirms rumors about the steps outside the Contemporary Arts Center on Vokiečių Street
♦
Related: Jewish gravestones (matséyves) in the decorative walls of Lazdynai; on steps of the Reformed Evangelical Church on Pylimo; Blood libel plaque in the Bernardinai Catholic Church
◊
Spring 2014
UKRAINE: BIG PART OF STORY IS TABOO FOR MAIN WESTERN MEDIA, BUT WHY?
Putin’s indefensible actions are robustly exposed. But there is reluctance to look critically at “pro-Western” forces that glorify (as “national heroes”) Nazi collaborators and Holocaust mass murderers…
What’s Western about that?
HISTORY FOR SALE? AS EVENTS UNFOLD, ARE WESTERN GOVERNMENTS TACITLY HELPING TO “FIX” THE HOLOCAUST BARBARITY OF BANDERA, THE UPA AND THE OUN? THESE GROUPS MURDERED TENS OF THOUSANDS OF CIVILIANS (UKRAINIAN CITIZENS) ON AN ETHNIC BASIS IN THE CAUSE OF HITLERIST RACIAL ELIMINATION.
WESTERN VALUES? IS IT MORAL FOR THE US, NATO AND THE EU TO COVER FOR THE ELEVATION OF HOLOCAUST PERPETRATORS TO NATIONAL HERO STATUS? CAN STATE-SANCTIONED NAZI-WORSHIP REALLY BE IRRELEVANT TO TODAY’S RACISM, ANTISEMITISM & HOMOPHOBIA?
HISTORIANS FOR HIRE? ARE BIG (AND SMALL) GUN HISTORIANS ALREADY BEING MOBILIZED TO OBFUSCATE THE ISSUES AND SANITIZE THE MASS MURDERERS OF UKRAINIAN JEWRY? TO PROMOTE MORE “DOUBLE GENOCIDE” REVISIONISM? ALLIES’ DEFEAT OF HITLER AT HUGE SACRIFICE IS INCREASINGLY MARGINALIZED BY THE REVISIONISTS.
Huge banner in Independence Square in Kiev glorifies wartime fascist leader Stepan Bandera, whose Hitlerist organization murdered tens of thousands of civilians — citizens of Ukraine — on an ethnic basis. Photo: Washington Post. Earlier, BBC News published images of the Bandera banner gracing Kiev City Hall.
American values?! Svoboda party chief Oleh Tyahnybok. With his soul-mates, and “legitimized” by US Senator John McCain. . . On Svoboda see UCSJ; SWC; Grzegorz Rossolinski-Liebe; Per Anders Rudling; report in the The Nation.
BUT SOME HAVE HAD THE COURAGE TO GO AGAINST THE TIDE…
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♦ See articles in Foreign Policy, BBC Newsnight, LA Times, Tablet, Huffington Post, International Business Times, Reuters and MORE.
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♦ Ukraine section (also: On Bandera).
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♦ In Defending History: Franziska Bruder, Eleonora Groisman, Jared McBride, Grzegorz Rossoliński-Liebe, Per Anders Rudling (see also Dr. Rudling’s other papers).
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♦ Major museum in Lviv; Was Canadian PM manipulated?
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♦ Are geostrategic concerns morally blinding some Western powers to East European adulation for Hitler’s allies (and their values) Issues for Canada, EU, UK, US (and Israel).
REVISIONISM IN THE MAKING: PHOTOSHOPPED IMAGE AT THE LONSKY MUSEUM IN LVIV
SEE ARTICLE BY DR. PER ANDERS RUDLING
♦
Spring 2014
Five Holocaust Survivors Still Wait for Apologies after Years of State-Sponsored Defamation
Four of them, in their late 80s or 90s, are heroic veterans of the anti-Nazi war effort who escaped the Vilna, Kovno or Svintsyán Ghetto to join up with the partisans in the forests of Lithuania. All their families perished in the Lithuanian Holocaust.
♦
SURVIVORS PROGRESSIVELY DEFAMED FOR POSTERITY, FROM 2006 ONWARD, BY STATE-SPONSORED AGENCIES
“ONE PUBLIC LETTER OF APOLOGY COULD REPAIR MUCH OF THE DAMAGE”
ITEM NO. 1 IN LONDON BASED INTERNATIONAL PETITION
THE SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT THEMSELVES: YITZHAK ARAD; FANIA BRANTSOVSKY; PINCHOS FRIDBERG; SARA GINAITE; RACHEL MARGOLIS (2); JOE MELAMED
COMMENT BY: SHIMON ALPEROVICH & TUVIA JAFET (2); CHEN IVRI APTER; DANNY BEN-MOSHE; GORDON BROWN; MILAN CHERSONSKI; LEONIDAS DONSKIS; THE ECONOMIST; ABRAHAM FOXMAN; ESTHER GOLDBERG (GILBERT); SIR MARTIN GILBERT; DOV LEVIN; DENIS MACSHANE; YOSSI MELMAN (2); UK PARLIAMENT EARLY DAY MOTION; UNITED STATES CONGRESSMEN 1 & 2; VALDAS VASILIAUSKAS; EFRAIM ZUROFF
“STILL TIME TO END THINGS WITH THE LAST SURVIVORS ON A NICER NOTE, AFTER 700 YEARS OF JEWISH HISTORY IN LITHUANIA“
FILM: REWRITING HISTORY; DEFENDING HOLOCAUST HISTORY; LIZA RUFT
MEDIA COVERAGE (SELECTION): Dana Gloger in the Jewish Chronicle (2008); Arne Bengtsson in Baltic Worlds (2008): Raphael Ahren in Haaretz (2009); Avi Friedman in Mishpacha (2009); Ricky Ben-David in the Jerusalem Post (2010); Esther Goldberg in Canadian Jewish News (2010); Cindy Mindell in the Jewish Ledger (2010); Bernard Dichek in Jerusalem Report (2013); Daniel Brook, coming soon (2014).
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8 April 2014
April 2014 International Romani Day
ROMA SECTION
Vilma Fiokla Kiurė looks at Roma issues in Lithuania: Roma: Presumption of Guilt
31 March 2014
Criminalization of History in the Eastern EU?
Is a police crime unit the appropriate authority for investigating EU/NATO citizens of 2014 who oppose state glorification of alleged Nazi collaborators of 1941?
Vilnius Police Crime Unit Harassing Holocaust Researcher and Film Maker Saulius Beržinis
Beržinis is one of many bold Lithuanian citizens who have spoken up
PATTERN OF CRIMINALIZING THE TRUTH ABOUT THE HOLOCAUST? PROSECUTORS ON YITZHAK ARAD (2007); HARASSMENT OF VILNA GHETTO SURVIVORS (2008); 2 YEAR JAIL LAW (2010); POLICE PURSUIT OF JOSEPH MELAMED (2011), GIEDRIUS GRABAUSKAS (2014), SAULIUS BERŽINIS (2014)
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27 March 2014
Dr. Shimon Alperovich
11 Oct. 1928 — 27 March 2014
REPORT HERE
SHIMON ALPEROVICH SECTION IN DEFENDING HISTORY
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23 March 2014
British Board of Deputies Calls for European Parliament to Reject Prague Declaration’s Holocaust Downgrade
Move follows statement by the World Union for Progressive Judaism. More on Prague Declaration. Responses include: SYD, Rewriting History and other films.
What’s wrong with Double Genocide? Shimon Alperovich, Vytenis Povilas Andriukaitis, Yitzhak Arad, Evaldas Balciunas, Yehuda Bauer, Danny Ben-Moshe, Milan Chersonski, Leonidas Donskis, Pinchos Fridberg, Esther Goldberg Gilbert, Dovid Katz, Rachel Kostanian, Denis MacShane, John Mann, Geoff Vasil (Vasiliauskas), Efraim Zuroff
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18 March 2014
More Holocaust Revisionism in “Prague Declaration Europe”?
Vilnius Constitutional Court: “Double Genocide” via New Attempt to Inflate Definition of the G-Word?
THE NEW DOCUMENT; REPORT; SEE ALSO STATE “GENOCIDE CENTER” AND ITS “HOLOCAUST ENVY”…
Move comes four years after parliament passed a law effectively criminalizing the opinion that there was one Holocaust in the country
On Double Genocide see:
ARTICLES: Shimon Alperovich, Vytenis Povilas Andriukaitis, Yitzhak Arad, Evaldas Balciunas, Yehuda Bauer, Danny Ben-Moshe, Milan Chersonski, Leonidas Donskis, Pinchos Fridberg, Esther Goldberg Gilbert, Dovid Katz, Rachel Kostanian, Denis MacShane, John Mann, Geoff Vasil (Vasiliauskas), Efraim Zuroff
FILMS: Danny Ben-Moshe’s Rewriting History; Richard Bloom’s Defending Holocaust History; Gerit Ziegler’s When Double Genocide Means Single Genocide
BATTLE OF EUROPEAN DECLARATIONS: Seventy Years Declaration (2012) is a reply to the Prague Declaration (2008); Statement of the World Union of Progressive Judaism (2013); History of SYD (to 2014)
RELATED:
Double Genocide section; Blaming the Victims; Glorification of Collaborators; 2012 reburial of 1941 Nazi puppet prime minister; Sample of the antisemitic essence of Double Genocide (by current official at the Economy Ministry)
DOUBLE GENOCIDE IN THE ANTISEMITIC IMAGINATION:
- “Thank you for our victory,” says the swarmy Jew to the Soviet soldier as the city burns and a raped blonde lies dead. Courtesy of “Zeppelinus” who allegedly still works in the Economy Ministry.
DOUBLE GENOCIDE TOURISM:
Survey; Genocide Center; Genocide Museum; Gruto Parkas; Tolerance Center; Street names and university shrines for Nazi collaborators
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February-March 2014
Baltic Marching Season
Interface of Pro-Fascist Marches, Holocaust Revisionism, and Contemporary Racism
EFRAIM ZUROFF IN THE HUFFINGTON POST, JERUSALEM POST AND TABLET
Defending History, in harmony with the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Israel office, monitored the three 2014 Nazi-ally glorifying marches in the Baltics. Authorities invested shrewdly this year in downplaying all three, but failed to simply move them away from prestigious city centers (which would have offended the far right and ultranationalist base). Visible fascist symbols were reduced from previous years, local opposition sometimes neutralized, and media interest discouraged.
Kaunas on February 16th
Vilnius on March 11th
Riga on March 16th
But the noxious worship, in 2014’s EU, of Hitler’s allies in Holocaust-era Europe (now being cast as implicitly “acceptable”) remains a shameful constant, one that calls out for urgent scrutiny in the West. Yet again, Defending History is defense of today’s — and tomorrow’s — human rights and EU/NATO values. The adulaters of wartime Hitlerism are its moral heirs: today’s propagaters of racism, ultranationalism, antisemitism, homophobia and Aryanist theories of national purity.
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27 February 2014
Prague’s Double Genocide “Platform” is Broken
ITS “CONSTITUTION” IS THE HOLOCAUST-REVISIONIST “PRAGUE DECLARATION”
The “Platform”; the Orwellian “Reconciliation” of histories; What is Double Genocide? DH’s section; What’s it all about?
A EUROPEAN RESPONSE: THE SEVENTY YEARS DECLARATION (SYD)
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February 2014
New (and unconfirmed) report from Vilnius
STILL NO DENIALS FROM POLICE OR PROSECUTORS ON AUTHENTICITY OF FEB. 2014 DOCUMENT CIRCULATING
IS A 2014 EU POLICE FORCE HARASSING A CITIZEN FOR A 2013 ARTICLE ABOUT ALLEGED 1941 LOCAL HOLOCAUST COLLABORATORS?
New (and confirmed) report from Vilnius
ONE YEAR LATER:
Vilnius Holocaust Survivor Prof. Pinchos Fridberg is Still Defamed on State-Sponsored Commission Website
BACKGROUND ON THE AFFAIR; ON THE COMMISSION
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27 January 2014
Hungarian Medal Returned
Randolph Braham, 91, Survivor and Major Holocaust Scholar, Returns Medal to Hungarian Government over “Whitewashing” of Holocaust
Reports in New York Times & Guardian; Braham’s Open Letter
Is Hungarian Government Abusing Good Will of Congressman Tom Lantos’s Widow?
Focus shifting to recipients of Lithuanian state honors after gov. glorification of Nazi collaborators by reburials, street names, Kaunas univ. shrine, marches, events & campaign against Holocaust survivors
Honoring a Hero of the Anti-Nazi Resistance in Rechovot
Dr. Rachel Margolis, 92, Honored on Holocaust Remembrance Day
Rachel Margolis, 92, is honored at her home in Rechovot on 27 January by Brig. Gen. Zvi Kan-Tor (center), head of the task force establishing Museum of the Jewish Soldier of World War II and Abraham Grinzaid, head of Israel’s association of Soviet army veterans who fought against the Nazis.
WHO IS RACHEL MARGOLIS? GORDON BROWN SPEAKS OUTEvaldas Balčiūnas
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