GREAT SYNAGOGUE SAGA | OLD CEMETERY SAGA | RESTITUTION AWRY | LJC | AJC | GWF | USCPAHA
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VILNIUS—Ruta Bloshtein, a prominent member of Vilnius’s small Orthodox Jewish community, today launched a new petition via Change.org asking that the posh modernist office building planned by the “Good Will Foundation” and its state-sponsored “Lithuanian Jewish (Litvak) Community” be moved away from right on top of the remnants of the Great Synagogue, to a venue where it would not serve to irrevocably ruin the majesty and sanctity of the remnants of the Great Synagogue and its square. Many of these remnants were revealed for the first time this summer thanks to archaeological excavations that were sponsored by the same foundation as prelude to its own building project. Follow the saga in Defending History. It is understood that the eminent architects commissioned, Fuksas Studio, and its chief architect Massimiliano Fuksas were honestly not aware of the offense caused by the very idea of replacing Lithuania’s holiest Jewish site with a Scandinavian style modern office building for the GWF and LJC. An international petition in underway.