Massacre Of Jews Research Articles

Holocaust in the Raseiniai County: Annihilation of the Jewish Communityin the Viduklė Rural District (June–August 1941)

The article continues the holocaust research in the Raseiniai County, which was started with the paper about the massacre of Jews in the Kražiai rural district (see Genocide and Resistance, 2009, No. 2(26). The Viduklė rural district was known for the friendly Jewish and Lithuanian relations. Lithuanian F. Stanevičius around 1870 built a brick synagogue (ruined in 1960) in Viduklė. Here in 1940–1941, the occupant Bolshevists did not succeed in opposing the population on the national grounds; the anti-Soviet underground operated actively. During the anti-Soviet June 1941 Uprising, the squad of the rebels did not manifest itself more prominently, since already on June 23 the German army invaded the rural district territory. On that day, the Red Army and German soldiers massacred a big number of the civilian population, and the shooting of two Jews on the racist grounds may be considered as the beginning of the holocaust in the Raseiniai County. The Nazis did not succeed in involving a squad of rebels into the annihilation of the Jews (as it happened in Kražiai), since it decayed. In Viduklė, there were no Jewish pogroms. The Nazis found few local allies. Just several men entered the auxiliary police. The rural district public police avoided participating in the actions against the Jews. Two Jewish ghettos, separately for men and women (with children), were organized. The men’s ghetto in the Viduklė railway station settlement (here also the Jewish men from the Nemakščiai rural district were imprisoned) was guarded by the German soldiers, and the commandant tortured the prisoners sadistically. The Jewish women with children from the Viduklė rural district were confined in the synagogue. The German “professional” killers at first shot the prisoners in the men’s ghetto (camp) (it is considered that there were 243 people, including, probably, about 80 Jews from Viduklė). The execution was not included into the 1 December 1941 bloody report by 3/A operational squad leader K. Jaeger. After several weeks, on August 22, 1941, Jewish women with children (no less than 81 persons) were shot at the township Jewish cemetery. The execution was carried out by a group of Lithuanian killers who came by lorry from the town of Raseiniai, with the aid of several local helpers. The holocaust in the rural district demanded 160–170 victims. Quite a number of rural district inhabitants participated in rescuing and hiding Jews, mostly brought from other places. The Jews from the Viduklė rural district who experienced resignation did not take advantage of the close relations with Lithuanians, who offered help and possibilities for several tenths of Jews from the rural community to save themselves.

영화 『우크라이나에서 온 편지』에 나타난 유대인 주인공의 길 찾기

This article analyzes the journey of the three Jewish heroes in the film <Everything Is Illuminated> directed by Liev Schreiber. It should be borne in mind that this film, which depicts the Holocaust and the life of Jewish exiles by a Jewish director, represents an inevitable connection and politics that cannot be separated from the director's life and worldview in any form of production process, story, and theme. In the beginning, the main protagonist of this film seems to be Jonathan, an American who visited Ukraine, but as the story develops, the person portrayed as important as, or even more important than, Jonathan is Alexander's grandfather. The memories and traditions of the two families, which transcend borders and last three generations, combined with the film's cyclical structure, show that it is impossible to disappear and be forgotten, and that they repeat forever, penetrating the past, present, and future. The film shows the life of an independent Ukraine and Ukrainian citizens like a landscape, and indirectly presents the oppression and massacre of Jews by Ukrainian nationalists and the Soviet government hidden behind the Nazi Holocaust. Although this film about the massacre of Jews in Ukraine in the 1940s was made in the 2000s, it is being recalled these days during the Russo-Ukrainian War. This can be said to show the historical common idea that the historical events of that time are still ongoing.

Holocaust Monuments in Kamianets-Podilskyi as a Resource for Tourism Development

The Holocaust peculiarities of the Jewish population in Ukraine during the Second World War are revealed. Ten sites of the largest mass executions of Jews in Ukraine by the German occupation authorities during the Second World War have been identified and characterized. The largest number of victims are crimes in Kyiv (Babyn Yar – almost 34 thousand people) and Odesa (25 thousand people). The third-largest death toll was in the Kamianets-Podilskyi massacre (23,000 people), but it was the first chronological case of the Nazi massacre of Jews in Ukraine. The peculiarities of the mass extermination of the Jewish population in Kamianets Podilskyi, where a ghetto was created not only for the local Jewish population but also for Jews deported from Hungary, are highlighted. Three memorialization ‘waves’ of Holocaust memorial sites in Kamianets-Podilskyi have been identified. The main monuments of the Holocaust have been characterized, and directions for its further memorialization as a resource for the development of memorial tourism have been proposed.

First Victims at Last: Disability and Memorial Culture in Holocaust Studies

This essay begins with a Berlin memorial to the victims of National Socialist “euthanasia” killings first unveiled in 2014. The open-air structure was the fourth such major public memorial in the German capital, having followed earlier memorials already established for Jewish victims of Nazi atrocity in 2005, German victims of homosexual persecution in 2008, and Sinti and Roma victims in 2012. Planning for the systematic persecution and extermination of at least 300,000 infants, adolescents, and adults deemed “life unworthy of life” (Lebensunwertes Leben) long preceded and extended beyond the 12-year Nazi period of massacre linked to other victim groups. Yet those constructing collective memory projects in Berlin appear to consider these particular victims as an afterthought, secondary to the other groups. Rather than address the commemorations themselves, this essay addresses the sequence in which they have appeared in order to demonstrate a pattern of first-victimized/last-recognized. I argue that the massacre of Jews, Roma, homosexuals, and others had to come into legal jurisprudence, scholarship, and public memory projects first before the murdered disabled body and its related memorialization could be legitimized as a category of violence important in and of itself. I argue further that the delay is rooted in a shared trans-Atlantic history that has failed to interrogate disability in terms of the social and cultural values that categorize and stigmatize it. Instead, the disabled body has been seen as both a physical embodiment of incapacity and a monolith that defies historicization. An examination of the broader foundation behind delayed study and representation that recognizes the intersection of racism and ableism allows us to reconfigure our analysis of violence and provides fertile ground from which to make connections to contemporary iterations still playing out in the present.

Getting away with it: why history still matters

I argue here that ‘history’, though vilified by certain theorists, remains a practice of ethical importance. I focus on Anna Bikont’s research of the 1941 massacre of Jews in the Polish village of Jedwabne, but I also look more briefly at other investigations of past injustices, and conclude that there is some (ethical) point in attempting to approach more nearly to a ‘truth’ about those various past events. There may also be an ethical imperative to assess the record of alternative accounts of those events: some versions of the past have been suppressed and effectively forgotten, while others have achieved hegemonic status; and the reasons for that discrepancy require investigation too. ‘History’, then, still matters: it is needed in the interest of justice, not only for victims, but also for perpetrators who might otherwise succeed in ‘getting away with it’.

In Our Time: Nostra Aetate—How Catholics and Jews Built a New Relationship by James M. Barrens, and: Post-Holocaust Jewish-Christian Dialogue: After the Flood, before the Rainbow ed. by Alan L. Berger, and: Seeking Shalom: The Journey to Right Relationship between Catholics and Jews by Philip A. Cunningham, and: The Holocaust and Nostra Aetate: Toward a Greater Understanding ed. by Carol

Reviewed by: In Our Time: Nostra Aetate—How Catholics and Jews Built a New Relationshipby James M. Barrens, and: Post-Holocaust Jewish-Christian Dialogue: After the Flood, before the Rainbowed. by Alan L. Berger, and: Seeking Shalom: The Journey to Right Relationship between Catholics and Jewsby Philip A. Cunningham, and: The Holocaust and Nostra Aetate: Toward a Greater Understandinged. by Carol Rittner Eugene J. Fisher James M. Barrens, In Our Time: Nostra Aetate—How Catholics and Jews Built a New Relationship. St. Petersburg, FL: Mr. Media Books, 2015. Pp. 114. $5.99, paper. Post-Holocaust Jewish-Christian Dialogue: After the Flood, before the Rainbow. Edited by Alan L. Berger. Lanham, MD, and London: Lexington Books (Rowman & Littlefield), 2015. Pp. 162. $39.99, paper. Philip A. Cunningham, Seeking Shalom: The Journey to Right Relationship between Catholics and Jews. Grand Rapids, MI, and Cambridge, U.K.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2015. Pp. 268. $30.00, paper. The Holocaust and Nostra Aetate: Toward a Greater Understanding. Edited by Carol Rittner. Greensburg, PA: National Catholic Center for Holocaust Education, Seton Hill University, 2017. Pp. 239. $15.00, paper. These four books celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of what was has been called the most revolutionary document of our times, Nostra aetate( NA), promulgated by the Second Vatican Council on October 28, 1965. Barrens's In Our Timesuccinctly summarizes for the general reader the significance of the document, especially its fourth section on Jews and Judaism, and subsequent Catholic Church documents expanding its implications. NArejected two millennia of Christian teaching of contempt against Jews and Judaism in favor of acknowledging the ongoing validity of God's covenant with the Jews as the People of God. Barrens summarizes the tragic history of accusing the Jews collectively of killing Jesus and of claiming that Judaism (the revelation by God to the Jewish People in the Hebrew Scriptures [HS]) had been superseded or replaced by Christianity. The teaching of contempt led to persecution and massacres of Jews, to their marginalization and being forced into ghettos, and to blood-libel charges and expulsion from numerous European countries beginning with England in the twelfth century. The teaching of contempt laid the groundwork for the development of modern racial Antisemitism and the Holocaust/ Shoah, the founding of the State of Israel as a refuge for Jewish survivors, and the Catholic examination of conscience led by such figures as Saints John XXIII and John Paul II, French Jewish historian Jules Isaac, Cardinal Augustin Bea S.J., and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. Barrens presents the teachings of NAand the fruits of Catholic-Jewish dialogue since the Council, concluding with Pope Francis and the future of the relationship. Appended are key texts and a short bibliography. It is an excellent book for beginners in the field and for local parish/synagogue dialogue groups. [End Page 352] Cunningham's lengthier study will be richly rewarding for those who wish to delve more deeply into the re-thinking of Catholic understandings of the HS and the New Testament (NT), as well as the new theological understandings and insights precipitated by NAand subsequent Catholic-Jewish dialogue, with regard to both Judaism and our understanding of the nature of the church and of many of the central elements of our faith. He makes full use of the relevant Catholic documents, both of the Holy See and the U.S. Catholic Bishops, especially God's Mercy Endures Forever: Guidelines on the Presentation of Jews and Judaism in Catholic Preaching(Bishops' Committee on the Liturgy, 1988). Cunningham surveys biblical scholarship, in which Catholic scholars were allowed to engage by Pope Pius XII's classic encyclical, Divino afflante Spiritu(1943), how historical-critical biblical scholarship laid the groundwork for NA, and how NAaltered our understanding of the Bible in general and of the NT—especially the epistles of St. Paul, the Gospels' presentation of Judaism, the passion narratives, and Christology. Christianity and Rabbinic Judaism are seen as intertwining branches from the root of Second Temple Judaism (see Romans 9–11). NAand subsequent official documents, which in turn have been based upon the best of Catholic biblical and theological scholarship developed in...

Niemieccy okupanci w Warszawie a jawność Holokaustu

In several last years there have been many publications concerning the knowledge and attitudes of Germans in relation to the Holocaust. The author deals with the issue what the civilian population and the military troops stationed at that time in Warsaw knew about the Holocaust. The occupants quickly learned about the massacres of Jews. Precise information spread at a rapid pace, and consequently each of the occupants was well informed of the Holocaust. Very few Germans stationing in Warsaw condemned crimes committed against the Jews. There was consensus on the need of extermination of Jews, some reservations aroused only form in which the genocide was carrying on. Open violence intertwined with its general acceptance, which led to a progressive callousness.

Photography, Memory and Ethnic Cleansing: The Fate of the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem, 1948—John Phillips' Pictorial Record

Much of the recent academic literature on the 1948 war portray it a one-sided—and thus simplistic—ethnic cleansing of the Arab population of Palestine. Referred to as the Naqba paradigm, it features the Jews/Zionists as villainous perpetrators and the Palestinian Arabs as feeble victims. Accordingly, the story of “the 1948 Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine” excludes expulsion and massacres of Jews, the destruction of Jewish communities, and the erasure of the Jewish signifiers in the local landscape from the story. As made explicit in John Phillips’ photo-reportage featuring the destruction of the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, the ethnic cleansing of Palestine also involved the expulsion of Jews and the destruction of their communities—whenever and wherever military power relations were in favor of Arab forces.

Poland's Threatening Other: The Image of the Jew from 1880 to the Present (review)

Poland's Threatening Other: The Image of from 1880 to Present, by Joanna Beata Michlic. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2006. 386 pp. $75.00. Arriving in midst of acrimonious public debates in Poland (to which Joanna B. Michlic contributed in past) surrounding revelations about Poles' complicity in murder and suffering of Polish Jews during WWII, Pofond's Threatening Other: The Image of from 1880 to Present is historical inquiry into etiology of antisemitic prejudice in Poland and its long-term impact on Polish society. As such, it belongs to new progressive school of Polish scholarship, dedicated to task of revising Polish historical and cultural dogmas. The book provides much-needed background for events described inj. T. Gross' Neighbors (about massacres of Jews in Jedwabne by their Polish neighbors in 1942) and Fear (about Kielce pogrom in 1946), making them more comprehensible as social and historical phenomena, though by no means more justifiable. Polish philosopher Leszek Kolakowski once remarked that, in Polish language, the Jew always functioned as abstract negative symbol and general term of abuse. Typically, throughout history of Poland, Jews have been blamed for country's social ills and economic and political woes. In her study, Michlic excavates historical trajectory of such pejorative valuations of Jewishness. She examines their exceptional durability and potency, arguing that negative perceptions of Jews have played crucial role in formation of Polish national identity. According to Michlic, ethno-nationalism (a belief that national membership lies in common genealogy, language, and cultural history) emerged in Poland in 1880s, in wake of failed national uprisings against occupying powers. At time when Poland did not exist on map of Europe, language of Jewish menace was disseminated to raise political consciousness and to consolidate sense of Polish identity and unity. The cohesiveness of Polish national myth depended on exclusion of Jewish other. The antisemitic topos gained dangerous momentum after Poland regained independence in 1918, when it became, in Michlic's words, a powerful, emotive tool for nation building (p. 1). The strife for national self-definition culminated in coming to power, in 1935, of ultranationalistEndecja, which implemented discriminatory measures against Jewish citizens and encouraged anti-Jewish violence, leading to deterioration of Polish -Jewish relations on eve of World War II. Here, Michlic's analyses are especially noteworthy since they throw light on political provenance of Polish indifference to Jewish tragedy during war, absence of solidarity with Jews, low societal approval for acts of rescue, and lack of recognition for acts of Jewish resistance, most notably Warsaw Ghetto Uprising as part of Polish struggle against Germans. Immediately after war, idiom of Jewish menace played significant role in Polish people's unsuccessful resistance against Soviet regime. As Jews were being held responsible for imposition of Soviet rule (as reflected in widespread myth of zydokomuna - Judeo-communism), eruption of violence against Holocaust survivors in Poland was perceived as fully justified. Paradoxically, negative images of Jews were evoked also by communist government to fight political opposition, eventually leading to an exodus of remaining Polish Jews (most notably after virulent wave of anti- Zionist incidents in 1968). In this context, Michlic accounts for an apparent paradox of co -existence of communist slogans of equality and internationalism, and communist government's reliance on ethno-nationalist traditions to legitimize its rule. …

The continuities of German history: nation, religion, and race across the long nineteenth century

1. The vanishing point of German history 2. The mirror turn lamp: senses of the nation before nationalism 3. On catastrophic religious violence and the national belonging: the Thirty Years' War and the massacre of Jews in social memory 4. From play to act: anti-Semitic violence in German and European history during the long nineteenth century 5. Eliminationist racism 6. Afterword: where the Sonderweg debate left us.

Jewish settlement of Hebron: The place and the other1

Kiryat-Arba and Jewish Hebron are communities planted in the most heated front of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This paper examines how the Hebron Jewish settlers' collective memory interprets the `truth' of Hebron as a typical Israeli Place that reveals Zionism in its purest form. Today the populations of Kiryat-Arba and of the Hebron Jewish enclaves number about 5,000 and 500, respectively. Kiryat-Arba functions as an economic and educational centre for the nearby Jewish settlements in the region. Rejecting the segregative concept of a separate Jewish settlement overlooking Hebron, the settlers treat Kiryat-Arba as part of Hebron. Some 70,000 Palestinians live in Hebron, many more residing in neighbouring towns and villages, cutting Hebron – Kiryat–Arba off from the nearest Jewish urban centres of Jerusalem and Beer-Sheva. The settlers initiated the narrative of `Return' to the city after the massacre of Jews in 1929 in the city, as the key symbol Symbolically, the first place Hebron Jews reidentified with was its ancient Jewish graveyard. Today, IDF soldiers protect settlers and their visitors who want to tour Hebron. The huge gulf between `metaphorical Hebron' as a symbolic centre and `actual Hebron' as a poor development town creates tensions fuelling violent events. The Jews in Hebron take the Israeli logic of `Place' making to its extreme, thus testing concepts of Israeli territoriality. If Israeli society rejects Hebron as a `Place' constructed from intense memories and violent national encounters, it would leave the Hebron Jews out of the so-called Israeli normalcy.

Premeditation in the Palestine disturbances of August 1929?

Trouble was brewing in Jerusalem over the Western Wall during the summer of 1929, but neither the Mandatory Government nor the Jewish leaders anticipated the scale of the disturbances which erupted. The High Commissioner, Sir John Chancellor, was in London and the Commandant of Police, Arthur Mavrogordato, was on leave. The available security forces were scanty in the extreme. The Palestine Zionist Executive, headed by Colonel F.H. Kisch, had gone to Zurich for the Sixteenth Zionist Congress, which was followed by the first meeting of the new Council of the enlarged Jewish Agency. Kisch, a former British Army officer, was sensitive to security questions. In early August he flew to London to warn the Colonial Office of reports from the committee which had been left in charge of his office in Jerusalem.' The warning apparently had little effect.2 However, Harry Luke, Chief Secretary and head of the Palestine Government in the absence of the High Commissioner, became increasingly alarmed at the growing menace of the situation. He telegraphed the Colonial Office on the eve of the explosion, warning of the risk in the inadequate security forces available.3 At midday on Friday, August 23 murderous assaults on Jews commenced as mobs of excited Moslems swarmed from the Haram area after prayers and rampaged through the Jaffa and Damascus Gates of the Old City. Inflamed by false rumours of what had happened in Jerusalem, the next morning a large-scale massacre of Jews erupted in Hebron. Attacks on Jewish settlements and Jewish urban areas continued in other parts of the country, but order was gradually restored over the next few days with the arrival of troops and battleships, which sent out landing parties equivalent in strength to a battalion. Nevertheless in the late afternoon of Thursday, August 29 another massacre of Jews occurred in Safed while troops were on their way to the town. In all, 133 Jews were murdered and 339 were wounded. Most of the Arab casualties were caused by the actions of the police and military. These were estimated to be 116 killed and 232 wounded, the latter figure referring only to those treated in hospital.4 After nearly a decade of calm, the ferocity of the outburst came as a great shock. Why had it happened? Who was to blame? Was there premeditation? In London the minority Labour Government had been in office since June. It was to fall in August 1931, torn by dissension over the problem of unemployment. Yet most of its foreign and imperial policies, its handling of Palestine being one of the exceptions, received a considerable measure of support from the opposition parties.5 The first stage in its policy towards Palestine was the appointment of a Commission of Inquiry into the disturbances under the chairmanship of Sir Walter Shaw. The report of the Shaw Commission, published at