Tag Archives: Holocaust in Lithuania

Regional Lithuanian Monthly Publishes Noreika Query at Heart of Upcoming 15 Jan. Vilnius Holocaust Trial

Posted on 12 December 2018 by Defending History

OPINION | HISTORY | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS

◊

by Andrius Kulikauskas

◊

Žemaičių Saulutė (“Samogitians’ Sun”) is an esteemed regional cultural monthly newspaper based in Plungė, Lithuania. It is shattering the silence about Lithuania’s state-sanctioned hero Jonas Noreika’s leadership in the Holocaust in Samogitia. It will print, in eight installments, Grant Gochin’s query to the Genocide Center, which asks, how can the Republic of Lithuania honor Jonas Noreika as an anti-Soviet hero when it acknowledges him as a Holocaust perpetrator?

Posted in Andrius Kulikauskas, Christian-Jewish Issues, Collaborators Glorified, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Vilnius's Genocide Center and the Genocide Museum it Manages | Tagged Andrius Kulikauskas, Evaldas Balciunas, Genocide Center Vilnius, Grant Gochin, Holocaust in Lithuania, Silvia Foti | Comments Off

Vilnius “Genocide Center” Defends Legacy of Holocaust Collaborator

Posted on 5 November 2018 by Defending History

◊

“BELIEVE IT OR NOT”

Lithuania’s State Sponsored “Genocide Center” Goes to Court to Defend Legacy of Notorious Holocaust Collaborator

The Question: Does a vibrant and successful EU/NATO democracy really need expensive far-right history “fixing” units that adore Nazi collaborators, stifle free debate of history and ethics, promote ultranationalism, and do untold damage to the country?

Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Collaborators Glorified, History, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, State Glorification of Holocaust Collaborator J. Noreika, Vilnius's Genocide Center and the Genocide Museum it Manages | Tagged Andrius Kulikauskas, Genocide Center Vilnius, Grant Gochin, Holocaust in Lithuania, Jonas Noreika (Vetra) | Comments Off

Museum of The Lost Truth: A Lithuanian Drama

Posted on 5 October 2018 by Defending History

OPINION | MUSEUMS | SHEDUVA | POLITICS OF MEMORY | SHTETL COMMEMORATIONS | HUMOR (OF SORTS)

◊

by Evaldas Balčiūnas

Evaldas Balčiūnas informed the English speaking world of a series of state honors for alleged Holocaust collaborators, starting with Jonas Noreika back in 2012. He paid a hefty personal price for it (scroll down his DH section to 2014).

◊

PREAMBLE

The Lost Shtetl is a massive, holistic project to reclaim the Lithuanian Jewish heritage of Šeduva (Shádeve, older Shádev). Plans include a multimillion euro state-of-the-art museum complex scheduled to open in 2020 that is slated to become an international tourist attraction. Now is an excellent time for public comment and observers’ contemplation.

“The Lost Shtetl” will not be a generic community of faceless Litvaks. It will make tangible the lives of real individuals. But will we learn about the real individuals from the town and its region who destroyed them? Their names and faces? Or will we simply tuck them away into the phrase: “The Nazis and their local collaborators murdered 664 Šeduva Jews in Liaudiškiai forest”?

Posted in Commemorations for Destroyed Communities, Evaldas Balčiūnas, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Museums, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Šeduva (Sheduva, Shádeve, Shádov) and its "Museum of the Lost Shtetl", South Africa | Tagged Evaldas Balciunas, Holocaust in Lithuania, Lost Shtetl Museum, Museum of Jewish Sheduva, Seduva (Lithunia), Šeduva Museum of Jewish History, Sergejus Kanovicius | Comments Off

Landsbergis and Pavilionis Address June 23rd Rally in Central Vilnius

Posted on 23 June 2018 by Defending History

JUNE 23rd MEMORIALS | EVENTS | OPINION | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED | ANTISEMITISM

◊

by Julius Norwilla

◊

Today’s central Vilnius event celebrated the 77th anniversary of the 23 June 1941 “uprising.” Between fifty and sixty people took part. Half of them are members of the motorbike club. The event was organized by the Lithuanian Seimas (parliament). The Seimas was represented by three MPs – Žygimantas Pavilionis, former ambassador to USA; Audronius Ažubalis, former foreign minister; and Laurynas Kasčiūnas. One of the speakers was the Roman Catholic priest and motorbiker Egidijus Kazlauskas who spoke about the suffering and the perseverance of Lithuanians when persecuted by deportations to the eastern Soviet Union. Vilnius city Mayor Remigijus Šimašius was not present, but he has sent his greetings via advisor Mindaugas Kubilius.

A guest of honor was Vytautas Landsbergis, the elder statesman who was modern democratic Lithuania’s founding head of state. In the new century he became a European parliamentarian dedicated to revision of World War II history, most famously via the Prague Declaration which he signed. The event was co-organized by the Lithuanian Freedom Fighters Union (Lietuvos laisvės kovotojų sąjunga).

Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Bold Citizens Speak Out, Celebrations of Fascism, Christian-Jewish Issues, Collaborators Glorified, Double Genocide: The New Form of Holocaust Revisionism & Denial, Events, History, Julius Norwilla, Legacy of 23 June 1941, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory | Tagged Holocaust in Lithuania, June 23rd start of Lithuanian Holocaust | Comments Off

Prof. Lipstadt is Star at Lithuanian Government’s Latest One-Sided ‘Holocaust & Litvaks’ Conference on 29-30 May

Posted on 18 May 2018 by Defending History

◊

VILNIUS—Various officials of the Lithuanian government’s Genocide Research Center, its Genocide Museum, and its “International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupational Regimes in Lithuania” (known for short as the “Red-Brown Commission”) are rather gleeful this week at the latest master PR coup for the long hard road to “soft core” Western legitimization of East European Holocaust revisionism. One of the world’s leading Holocaust scholars, and the activist who did more than any other to bring to an end the era of classical 20th Century Holocaust Denial, Professor Deborah Lipstadt of Emory University, has been attracted to headline a “one-sided Holocaust conference in a Baltic capital” where the naive foreign star’s eminence may help provide cover for ongoing policies. The conference program has just been released in PDF format with, as usual, the star’s appearance artfully sandwiched between much else.

The “ham sandwich” model for political conferences made to look like pure, open, intellectually balanced academic conclaves?

Posted in History, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory | Tagged Deborah Lipstadt, Holocaust Denial, Holocaust in Lithuania, International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupation Regimes, Red-Brown Commission, Vilnius Holocaust conferences | Comments Off

Updated Headlines for Sad Saga in New Britain, Connecticut

Posted on 5 April 2018 by Defending History

OPINION | NEW BRITAIN’S PROPOSED MONUMENT FOR LEADER OF A 1941 HITLERIST MILITIA | GLORIFYING COLLABORATORS | USA | LITHUANIA | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | ANTISEMITISM & BIAS | HUMAN RIGHTS

◊

Will New Britain, Connecticut really allow a public monument to an alleged Nazi collaborator? City Council member Professor Aram Ayalon launches petition calling for moratorium pending research; Latest.

Will Mayor Erin E. Stewart break her silence with some rapid words of simple moral clarity? This is even worse than Charlottesville: It’s about putting up a new monument for an alleged Nazi collaborator on public land in Connecticut. Where’s leadership?

Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Celebrations of Fascism, Collaborators Glorified, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, New Britain, Connecticut: Plans to Glorify Alleged Nazi Collaborator?, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory | Tagged Adolfas Ramanauskas, Erin E. Stewart (New Britain), Holocaust in Eastern Europe, Holocaust in Lithuania, New Britain Conn | Comments Off

Defending History in New Britain, Connecticut Against Plans to Glorify Alleged Holocaust Collaborator on Public Grounds

Posted on 2 April 2018 by Defending History

OPINION | NEW BRITAIN’S PROPOSED MONUMENT FOR LEADER OF A 1941 HITLERIST MILITIA | GLORIFYING COLLABORATORS | USA | LITHUANIA | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | ANTISEMITISM & BIAS | HUMAN RIGHTS

◊

The New Britain Progressive, a newspaper in New Britain, Connecticut today carried a report entitled “Council Petition Would Halt Ramanauskas Monument, Pending Investigation”. It begins with the news that

“Alderman Aram Ayalon has introduced a City Council petition requesting, ‘a temporary halt of the building of a monument to commemorate Lithuanian militant, Adolfas Ramanauskas, until further research has been conducted to help confirm the history behind the man being memorialized.’ Ayalon cites concerns regarding accusations about Ramanauskas and the parts of the Holocaust that occurred in Lithuania in 1941.”

The paper’s report cites the Simon Wiesenthal’s October 2017 protest concerning the Lithuanian parliament’s decision to name the year 2018 for the alleged Nazi collaborator, as well as Defending History’s January 2018 plea to New Britain Mayor Erin E. Stewart to halt the project to glorify in the United States a leader of one of the marauding Hitlerist militias of June and July 1941 whose main “accomplishment” was unleashing the Holocaust starting even before the Germans arrived or before they managed to set up their functioning occupational administration. As it happens, the wider complex of these issues in Lithuania today was the subject of a New York Times report last Friday, 30 March.

Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Celebrations of Fascism, Christian-Jewish Issues, Collaborators Glorified, Debates on Adolfas Ramanauskas (Vanagas), Human Rights, Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, New Britain, Connecticut: Plans to Glorify Alleged Nazi Collaborator?, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, United States | Tagged Adolfas Ramanauskas, Aram Ayalon, Connecticut, Erin E. Stewart (New Britain), Evaldas Balciunas, Holocaust in Lithuania, New Britain | Comments Off

Mažvydas National Library Wants Us to Listen to Valiušaitis, a Denier of Škirpa’s Atrocities

Posted on 10 February 2018 by Defending History

OPINION | HISTORY | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | LITVAK AFFAIRS

◊

by Andrius Kulikauskas

◊

Lithuania’s Mažvydas National Library is curiously fostering two parallel cultures which have yet to engage each other. Up on the fifth floor, on the West side, an eminent Judaic studies scholar leads the Judaica Research Center (cosponsored by the Yivo institute in New York), and on the East side, journalist Vidmantas Valiušaitis leads the Adolfas Damušis Democracy Studies Center.

More on Mažvydas National Library; on Yivo’s history in Vilnius since 2011

Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Christian-Jewish Issues, Collaborators Glorified, Dr. Arūnas Bubnys and State Holocaust Revisionism in Lithuania, In the Era of Yivo's 100th, Kazys Škirpa, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Mažvydas National Library (Issues Arising), News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory | Tagged Adolfas Damušis Democracy Studies Center, Andrius Kulikauskas, Holocaust in Lithuania, Kazys Škirpa, LAF (Lithuanian Activist Front), Mazvydas National Library, Musiskiai, Ruta Vanagaite, Vidmantas Valiušaitis, Yivo + Mazvydas, Yivo at Mazvydas Library, Yivo in Vilnius | Comments Off

Vanagaitė’s PR Rollout in Vilnius of (1) Romance with Wiesenthal Center Nazi Hunter, (2) New Book, Dual (3) Holocaust & (4) Postwar KGB Based Critique of Nationalist Hero — A Mix-&-Match Making for Mass Media Melee

Posted on 30 January 2018 by Defending History

[UPDATED; ORIGINAL PUBLICATION 29 OCT. 2017]

BOOKS (/Mūsiškiai) | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED? | MEDIA WATCH | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS

◊

Jump to: English media section

Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Efraim Zuroff, Events, Humor (Of Sorts), Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Rūta Vanagaitė | Tagged Adolfas Ramanauskas Vanagas, Efraim Zuroff, Free speech in Lithuania, Holocaust in Lithuania, Musiskiai, Ruta Vanagaite, Ruta Vanagaite + Efraim Zuroff, Vanagaite + Zuroff | Comments Off

Two Perspicacious Comments in Today’s Issue of “The Weekly of Vilnius”

Posted on 17 December 2017 by Defending History

OPINION | MEDIA WATCH | FOREIGN MINISTRIES AND HOLOCAUST ISSUES | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | ISRAEL PAGE | ISRAEL SECTION | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED

◊

VILNIUS—With the permission of the publishers of The Weekly of Vilnius, we are reproducing extracts of two comments from this week’s edition that covers Lithuanian news from 11 to 17 December 2017. The Weekly of Vilnius is sometimes considered to be this city’s most prestigious English-language news publication, famed for its editorial independence and capacity for presenting views that tend to be ignored in the nationalist and ultranationalist media that can be fixated with the “official line.” In the spirit of classic journalism, The Weekly of Vilnius has no online edition (there is an online description and Facebook page) and is available weekly by emailed PDF or hard copy to its elite circle of subscribers, known to include embassies, government agencies, captains of industry, politicians, academics, libraries, and think tanks.

See also: Does ambassador’s gesture “legitimize” naming of 2018 for an alleged collaborator?

First, on the subject of this week’s visit with flowers by the ambassador of Israel to the daughter and (successful) chief campaigner for 2018 to be named by the Lithuanian parliament for an alleged Holocaust collaborator (see Defending History‘s coverage), The Weekly of Vilnius highlights, accurately, we believe, the current Israeli embassy’s proclivity for implicitly claiming to act for “the interests of Lithuanian (or Litvak) Jewry” and to speak for “Lithuanian-Jewish relations” when in fact the (sometimes short-term) interests of the present Israeli government are (quite naturally) the determining factor. In fact, the embassy has arguably established a record of harming Lithuanian Jewish interests since it was opened in early 2015. Most shockingly, the Israeli Foreign Ministry seems to have “muscled in” even on restitution payments, deriving from the religious properties of the annihilated communities, now intended for the survival of the Lithuanian Jewish community. See the relevant entries in the grant items enumerated here and here.

Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Israel, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, News & Views | Tagged Amir Maimon (Vilnius), Genocide Center Vilnius, Holocaust in Lithuania, Israeli embassy (Lithuania, Lithuanian Jewish Community | Comments Off

21st Century Lowpoint for Israeli Diplomacy? Ambassador Poses with Photos of Holocaust Collaborator

Posted on 15 December 2017 by Defending History

OPINION | ISRAEL PAGE | ISRAEL SECTION | HONORING COLLABORATORS | LEGACY OF JOE MELAMED | LEGACY OF DOV LEVIN | FOREIGN MINISTRIES AND THE HOLOCAUST

◊

by Dovid Katz (Vilnius)

◊

PHOTO: DELFI.LT

VILNIUS—Israel may have crossed a red line today when it was flaunted on the major News portal Delfi.lt here, both in Lithuanian and in English, that Israeli ambassador Amir Maimon had found the time this week to stage a demonstrative PR-photographed visit to the chief campaigner for the parliament’s decision less than one month ago to name 2018 in honor of Adolfas Ramanauskas — his daughter in Vilnius, Auksutė Ramanauskaitė-Skokauskienė, who is a prime icon of the ultranationalist camp that often glorifies various collaborators and participants in the Holocaust on the grounds that they were also anti-Soviet activists. The PR move came just after a major political commentator asked what Lithuania is getting in return for its staunch political support for the Netanyahu government.

UPDATES TO THIS ARTICLE: WEEKLY OF VILNIUS COMMENTARY; AMBASSADOR’S BETRAYAL OF HOLOCAUST HISTORY A FIASCO AS LITHUANIA VOTES ANYWAY AGAINST U.S. DECISION TO MOVE ITS EMBASSY (PARTING WITH NEIGHBORING LATVIA)

One of the PR photos released shows the ambassador posing underneath adulatory photos of the 1941 pro-Nazi militiaman (from various other periods in his life). Of course Lithuania has a vast number of inspirational historical heroes, including many anti-Soviet heroes, who were not Holocaust collaborators, and state decisions to honor collaborators cause untold pain to survivors, their families, and the remnant Jewish communities in Eastern Europe. They all send a message that becomes part of the history-revision campaign to downgrade the Holocaust in the context of “Double Genocide” revisionism.

Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Debates on Adolfas Ramanauskas (Vanagas), Dovid Katz, Dr. Rokhl (Rachel) Margolis (1921-2015), Foreign Ministries: Holocaust Politics Abuse?, Human Rights, Israel, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Yad Vashem and Lithuania | Tagged Adolfas Ramanauskas, Amir Maimon (Lithuania), Antisemitism in Eastern Europe, Chen Ivri Apter, Dovid Katz, Efraim Zuroff, Evaldas Balciunas, Holocaust in Lithuania, Holocaust Memory, Israel + antisemitism, Israel + diaspora Jewry, Israel + Holocaust, Israeli Embassy in Vilnius, Israeli Foreign Policy + Eastern Europe, Israeli foreign policy + Holocaust, Joseph Melamed, Leivick House (Tel Aviv), Rachel Margolis, Ruta Vanagaite, Yitzhak Arad | Comments Off

The Extraordinary Recent History of Holocaust Studies in Lithuania

Posted on 5 December 2017 by Defending History

OPINION | HISTORY | LITHUANIA’S STATE COMMISSION ON NAZI AND SOVIET CRIMES | LITVAK AFFAIRS

◊

by Dovid Katz

◊

This paper was published today by Taylor and Francis on its website. It appears in Dapim: Studies on the Holocaust, volume 31, no. 3, pp. 285-295 (Dec. 2017). Dapim is edited by the Strochlitz Institute for Holocaust Research at the University of Haifa.

◊

In Lithuania, the primary provider for Holocaust studies for close to two decades has been the state-sponsored International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupation Regimes in Lithuania (ICECNSORL), which was established in 1998 by decree of the nation’s president and is housed in the office of its prime minister, embedding it in the highest strata of Lithuanian politics. Several of its activities have enabled significant contributions in research, education, and public commemoration.

Posted in "Red-Brown Commission", Double Genocide: The New Form of Holocaust Revisionism & Denial, Dovid Katz, History, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory | Tagged Dapim: Studies on the Holocaust, Double Genocide, Dovid Katz, history of Holocaust studies, Holocaust in Lithuania, Holocaust Studies University of Haifa, Holocaust Survivors demonstrate againstAzubalis, International Commission on Evalluation of Crimes of Nazi and Soviet Occupational Regimes, Yitzhak Arad | Comments Off

Joe Melamed, Litvak Champion (Images from the Last Years)

Posted on 21 November 2017 by Defending History

צו די שלשים פון יוסף (יאָסקע) מלמד ז″ל

◊

Memories of Joe Melamed Defending History

MORE ON JOE MELAMED (1924-2017)

◊

DEFENDING HISTORY’S JOE MELAMED SECTION. Scroll to end to review upwards in chronological order.

◊

Posted in Israel, Joseph Melamed, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Obituaries | Tagged Association of Lithuanian Jews in Israel, Beit Vilna (Tel Aviv), Holocaust in Lithuania, Jewish partisans in Lithuania, Jews from Vilna and Vilna Region in Israel, Joseph Melamed, Lithuanian Jewish issues, Litvaks in Israel | Comments Off

“Weekly of Vilnius” Provides Exclusive English Language Coverage of the Vanagaitė Saga

Posted on 6 November 2017 by Defending History

FREE SPEECH | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED | MEDIA WATCH | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | HUMAN RIGHTS

◊

VILNIUS—The Weekly of Vilnius, sometimes considered to be this city’s most prestigious English-language news publication, today released its weekly issue which contains a highly documented summary of many of the sides in the debate over author and PR specialist Ruta Vanagaitė’s comments concerning state plans to name 2018 for someone who led a pro-Nazi militia during the early days of the Lithuanian Holocaust in 1941, but who is being honored for his postwar service in the anti-Soviet resistance. Defending History has published its own take along with a much more limited summary of the debate which readers may consult for comparison and helping “complete the picture” as best as it can be in English. Note that selections of Lithuanian articles on the subject from the major news portal Delfi.lt, and from BNS (Baltic News Service), in both cases generally representing government and “nationalist establishment” positions, are available in English translation on the English Delfi.lt (Lithuania Tribune) site (search “Vanagaitė” for rapid reference).

Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Free Speech & Democracy, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, News & Views, Politics of Memory, Rūta Vanagaitė | Tagged Free speech in Lithuania, Holocaust in Lithuania, human rights in Lithuania, Nehro Khalil, Ruta Vanagaite, Weekly of Vilnius | Comments Off

Linas Vildžiūnas’s Review of Rūta Vanagaitė’s ‘Mūsiškiai’ Now Available in English Translation

Posted on 4 October 2017 by Defending History

BOOKS | POLITICS OF MEMORY

◊

by Linas Vildžiūnas

◊

The following English translation, by Laurynas Vaičiūnas, of Linas Vildžiūnas’s review of Rūta Vanagaitė’s Mūsiškiai appeared today in New Eastern Europe (as PDF).

◊

**A book review of Mūsiškiai (Ours). By: Rūta Vanagaitė. Publisher: Alma littera, Vilnius, 2016.**

What makes Rūta Vanagaitė’s Ours (Mūsiškiai) very different from all other Lithuanian books on the Holocaust is that it was from the start written as a bestseller. Written by an experienced public relations professional as an appeal to the Lithuanian public, the book raises the painful issue of historical responsibility. The author does not refrain from giving a personal twist to the story (it would be impossible otherwise, as the Holocaust is an issue of individual position and individual responsibility). The author is piercingly direct and uses black comedy. She approaches the topic with composure and a sense of supremacy. These two features may irritate the reader. However, she is entitled to it as she aims to confront the reader, which she so eloquently achieves.

Full Transcript of the “Fania Brantsovsky Witch Hunt Ceremony” on Lithuania’s Independence Day

Posted on 13 April 2017 by Defending History

OPINION | DOCUMENTS | BLAMING THE VICTIMS? | DOUBLE GENOCIDE | VILNIUS GENOCIDE CENTER | ANTISEMITISM | PRO-NAZI MARCHES | VILNIUS MARCHES

◊

VILNIUS—This year’s March 11th independence day march here last month was again granted the route of highest prestige, from Cathedral Square, up the whole of the capital’s main thoroughfare, Gedimino Boulevard, and ending at Parliament Square. Defending History’s eyewitness report recounted this year’s “detour” to the presidential palace for the bizarre ceremony of attacking Lithuania’s oldest Holocaust survivor, Fania Yocheles Brantsovsky (Brancovskaja), 95 next month, one of the Jewish partisans subjected to defamation by the state’s campaign of Holocaust revisionism that has included a “blame the victims” components that started eleven years ago.

CAMPAIGN AGAINST (ONLY JEWISH) VETERANS OF THE ANTI-NAZI PARTISANS; RENEWED 2017 CAMPAIGN AGAINST FANIA YOCHELES BRANTSOVSKY

Posted in A 21st Century Campaign Against Lithuanian Holocaust Survivors?, Antisemitism & Bias, Celebrations of Fascism, Collaborators Glorified, Debates on the Postwar "Forest Brothers", Documents, Events, Fania Yocheles Brantsovsky (Fania Brancovskaja): 1922-2024, Human Rights, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Neo-Nazi & Fascist Marches, News & Views, Opinion, Vilnius, Vilnius's Genocide Center and the Genocide Museum it Manages | Tagged Arunas Eifirdas, Fania Jocheles Brancovskaja, Fania Yocheles Brantsovsky, Genocide Center Vilnius, Holocaust in Lithuania, Lithuanian Jewish partisans, Sakalas Gorodeckis, Vilnius neo-Nazi marches | Comments Off

Baltic Holocaust: First Stahlecker Report (1941) Digitized

Posted on 3 April 2017 by Defending History

by Rafael Katz

◊

The two Stahlecker Reports summarize the inner workings of Einsatzgruppe A during the Baltic invasion of Operation Barbarossa, which set in motion the Holocaust. We herewith offer a digitized version of the two reports. For an introduction to the reports and links for download please see our earlier article in January 2015. As of now, we have digitized half of the reports, and will give notice once we complete the conversion. The full reports can be viewed in their JPG version via the link above. Below we offer a digitized version of 1-100 from 1-143 of the first report, and, on a separate page, 1-73 of 150 from the second report.

Posted in Documents, History, Legacy of 23 June 1941, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Rafael Katz, Raphael Katz | Tagged Holocaust in Lithuania, Rafael Katz, Stahlecker Report (1941) | Comments Off

A Major New Shtetl Museum for Shádev (Shádov, Shádeve, Today’s — Šeduva)

Posted on 15 February 2017 by Defending History

OPINION | LITVAK AFFAIRS | MUSEUMS

◊

by Dovid Katz (Vilnius)

◊

VILNIUS—The Litvak world, internationally fragmented and weak, yet so vibrant and creative, has been cheered by news reports of the new shtetl museum to rise in the near future in Shádev, a Lithuanian town of many centuries of Jewish heritage where a great rabbinic personality, Reb Móyshe Ha-Góyle (“Moses the Exile”, Méyshe Ha-Géyle in deep Litvish pronunciation, Moshé Ha-Golé in Israeli Hebrew) thrived in the fifteenth century.

A good shtetl museum here will be a blessing to the Litvak, European Jewish, Yiddish and shtetl heritage internationally. It will be a blessing to modern, democratic Lithuania. To this day, the basket of idols of the contemporary Jewish market downplays the magnitude of Yiddish language, literature, and culture, shtetl culture and heritage, and the magnificent East European Jewish legacy more generally. News media have gone with reports by AFP and by JTA, and there is more on the project’s website.

Posted in Arts, Commemorations for Destroyed Communities, Dovid Katz, Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, Museums, News & Views, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Šeduva (Sheduva, Shádeve, Shádov) and its "Museum of the Lost Shtetl" | Tagged Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Holocaust in Lithuania, Jewish museum + Lithuania, Lithuania, Litvak Culture, Lost Shtetl Museum (Seduva, Milda Jakulyte, Šeduva Jewish museum, Šeduva Shadev Shadov, Šeduva shtetl museum, Sergei Kanovich, Sergejus Kanovicius | Comments Off

Media and Debate on Malát (Molėtai) Holocaust Remembrance Project

Posted on 22 November 2016 by Defending History

[UPDATED]

A Selection for English Readers

Project’s Facebook Page; Website

◊

22 November 2016. ISGAP Flashpoint: ‘Antisemitism in the 21st century shtetl’ by Dovid Katz.

22 September 2016. Tablet: ‘Holocaust commemorations planned throughout Lithuania this weekend’ by Anna Rudnistky.

9 September 2016. Defending History: ‘My take on Malát’ by Julius Norwilla [Norvila].

8 September 2016. En.Delfi.lt: ‘The day Lithuania became a culture of We’ by Alexandra Kudukis.

8 September 2016. Jewish Community of Lithuania website: ‘Molėtai Holocaust procession draws record crowd’ [unsigned article presumably representing the chairperson’s views].

Posted in Commemorations for Destroyed Communities, Defense of Old Jewish Cemeteries and Mass Grave Sites, Lithuania, Litvak Affairs, Malát (Molėtai), Media Watch, News & Views | Tagged Holocaust in Lithuania, Holocaust in Malat (Moletai), Lithuanian shtetl, Malat (Moletai) memorial | Comments Off

Leonidas Donskis (1962—2016)

Posted on 21 September 2016 by Defending History

◊

The Defending History Community Mourns our Colleague

◊

LEONIDAS DONSKIS

13 August 1962 — 21 September 2016

**HIS WORK IN DEFENDING HISTORY INCLUDES ESSAYS ON:**

Posted in A 21st Century Campaign Against Lithuanian Holocaust Survivors?, Bold Citizens Speak Out, Free Speech & Democracy, Leonidas Donskis, Lithuania, Lithuania's Jewish Community Issues, Litvak Affairs, News & Views, Obituaries, Opinion, Politics of Memory | Tagged Donskis on Double Genocide, Donskis on Fania Brantsovsky, Donskis on Holocaust issues, Donskis on Jewish issues, Donskis on Persecution of Lithuanian Jewish Partisans, Donskis on Rachel Margolis, Donskis on Yitzhak Arad, Holocaust in Lithuania, Leonidas Donskis | Comments Off

Dozens of authors & sections. Thousands of posts (& pages). Editor’s papers. Seminars. Contact. Support defending history.

———

Scholars & journalists: When you use DH, please cite DH.

———

Litvak Times

• May 2026 in Lithuania & Poland

• LYVA: Lithuanian Yiddish videos

• Vilna Jewish mini museum

• Interwar mini museum

• Litvak language atlas

• Towns and cities

• Gaon of Vilna

• Mikháleshik yizkor book

• Contemporary Litvak affairs

• Resource page

• Windows to a Lost Jewish Past

• Seven Kingdoms of the Litvaks

• Work in Litvak Studies

• Kaddish

• SUPPORT PROJECTS

◊

Yiddish

◊

Latest

Tag Archives: Holocaust in Lithuania

OPINION | HISTORY | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS

◊

by Andrius Kulikauskas

◊

“BELIEVE IT OR NOT”

Lithuania’s State Sponsored “Genocide Center” Goes to Court to Defend Legacy of Notorious Holocaust Collaborator

The Question: Does a vibrant and successful EU/NATO democracy really need expensive far-right history “fixing” units that adore Nazi collaborators, stifle free debate of history and ethics, promote ultranationalism, and do untold damage to the country?

OPINION | MUSEUMS | SHEDUVA | POLITICS OF MEMORY | SHTETL COMMEMORATIONS | HUMOR (OF SORTS)

by Evaldas Balčiūnas

Evaldas Balčiūnas informed the English speaking world of a series of state honors for alleged Holocaust collaborators, starting with Jonas Noreika back in 2012. He paid a hefty personal price for it (scroll down his DH section to 2014).

◊

JUNE 23rd MEMORIALS | EVENTS | OPINION | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED | ANTISEMITISM

by Julius Norwilla

The “ham sandwich” model for political conferences made to look like pure, open, intellectually balanced academic conclaves?

OPINION | NEW BRITAIN’S PROPOSED MONUMENT FOR LEADER OF A 1941 HITLERIST MILITIA | GLORIFYING COLLABORATORS | USA | LITHUANIA | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | ANTISEMITISM & BIAS | HUMAN RIGHTS

Will New Britain, Connecticut really allow a public monument to an alleged Nazi collaborator? City Council member Professor Aram Ayalon launches petition calling for moratorium pending research; Latest.

Will Mayor Erin E. Stewart break her silence with some rapid words of simple moral clarity? This is even worse than Charlottesville: It’s about putting up a new monument for an alleged Nazi collaborator on public land in Connecticut. Where’s leadership?

OPINION | NEW BRITAIN’S PROPOSED MONUMENT FOR LEADER OF A 1941 HITLERIST MILITIA | GLORIFYING COLLABORATORS | USA | LITHUANIA | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | ANTISEMITISM & BIAS | HUMAN RIGHTS

OPINION | HISTORY | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | LITVAK AFFAIRS

◊

by Andrius Kulikauskas

◊

More on Mažvydas National Library; on Yivo’s history in Vilnius since 2011

[UPDATED; ORIGINAL PUBLICATION 29 OCT. 2017]

BOOKS (/Mūsiškiai) | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED? | MEDIA WATCH | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS

◊

Jump to: English media section

OPINION | MEDIA WATCH | FOREIGN MINISTRIES AND HOLOCAUST ISSUES | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | ISRAEL PAGE | ISRAEL SECTION | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED

◊

OPINION | ISRAEL PAGE | ISRAEL SECTION | HONORING COLLABORATORS | LEGACY OF JOE MELAMED | LEGACY OF DOV LEVIN | FOREIGN MINISTRIES AND THE HOLOCAUST

◊

by Dovid Katz (Vilnius)

◊

UPDATES TO THIS ARTICLE: WEEKLY OF VILNIUS COMMENTARY; AMBASSADOR’S BETRAYAL OF HOLOCAUST HISTORY A FIASCO AS LITHUANIA VOTES ANYWAY AGAINST U.S. DECISION TO MOVE ITS EMBASSY (PARTING WITH NEIGHBORING LATVIA)

OPINION | HISTORY | LITHUANIA’S STATE COMMISSION ON NAZI AND SOVIET CRIMES | LITVAK AFFAIRS

◊

by Dovid Katz

◊

◊

צו די שלשים פון יוסף (יאָסקע) מלמד ז″ל

◊

FREE SPEECH | COLLABORATORS GLORIFIED | MEDIA WATCH | CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RELATIONS | VILNIUS JEWISH LIFE | HUMAN RIGHTS

BOOKS | POLITICS OF MEMORY

by Linas Vildžiūnas

The following English translation, by Laurynas Vaičiūnas, of Linas Vildžiūnas’s review of Rūta Vanagaitė’s Mūsiškiai appeared today in New Eastern Europe (as PDF).

A book review of Mūsiškiai (Ours). By: Rūta Vanagaitė. Publisher: Alma littera, Vilnius, 2016.

READ MORE. AS PDF.

OPINION | DOCUMENTS | BLAMING THE VICTIMS? | DOUBLE GENOCIDE | VILNIUS GENOCIDE CENTER | ANTISEMITISM | PRO-NAZI MARCHES | VILNIUS MARCHES

CAMPAIGN AGAINST (ONLY JEWISH) VETERANS OF THE ANTI-NAZI PARTISANS; RENEWED 2017 CAMPAIGN AGAINST FANIA YOCHELES BRANTSOVSKY

by Rafael Katz

OPINION | LITVAK AFFAIRS | MUSEUMS

by Dovid Katz (Vilnius)

◊

[UPDATED]

A Selection for English Readers

**Scholars & journalists: When you use DH, please cite DH.**

**A book review of Mūsiškiai (Ours). By: Rūta Vanagaitė. Publisher: Alma littera, Vilnius, 2016.**

**HIS WORK IN DEFENDING HISTORY INCLUDES ESSAYS ON:**