Page 24 - TORCH #16 - August 2020

character is holding a violin, perhaps out of defiance or distraction, drowning out the sound of gunshots with tunes of comfort and strength.
There are 18 steps – the number 18 is , ַיח synonymous with the Hebrew word chai which means life or living. Like the sculpture, the cobblestone floor in the centre of the pit was laid by hand out of respect for the victims.
systematic murders, including mass shootings, deportations to concentration camps, and
the notorious gas vans that were brought into the city that further depleted Minsk’s Jewish population.
According to Nazi records, 86,632 Jews had been murdered in Minsk by 1 February 1943. Over the next few months, the Germans began the liquidation of the ghetto. Shootings became commonplace to the point that people were too fearful to go outside. Orphaned children, the elderly and the disabled were systematically annihilated. And with most Jewish doctors now
Standing in the centre of the open space, one feels a sense of vulnerability with only the towering apartment blocks and silent trees staring as you stand isolated. There is
a feeling of emptiness with nothing to see except your stationary
surrounding, yet you
feel obligated to stand
and wait a moment to
take in the magnitude of
the atrocity. So moving
is the experience that
no length of time
is sufficient to fully
contemplate such evil.
According to one source,
authorities during
the era when Belarus
was under Soviet rule
regularly threatened to
fill in the entire pit. One
more visitor is one more
remembrance to ensure
this never happens.
Whilst we are offended
by the cruelty we are appreciative that the memorial exists.
Continuing to the other side of the pit, we come to an obelisk, placed by former prisoners in 1947. It was the first monument within the former Soviet Union that paid tribute to the victims of the Holocaust, although the first public ceremony for the Holocaust took place there in 1991 after Belarus gained independence. It is inscribed in Yiddish, with Hebrew letters, and Russian. There are no English translations here. A poet named Chaim Maltinski wrote (translated), “In bright remembrance for all eternity of the 5,000 Jews who perished at
the hands of the cruel enemies of humanity
— the Nazi criminals, March 2, 1942”. The Russian word translated ‘criminals’ here is so strong there isn’t an English equivalent. The closest would be the word ‘monsters’. Indeed, events at The Pit formed part of many more
killed, German soldiers would enter the hospitals and shoot patients. In the summer of 1943, several thousand Jews were transported from the ghetto to concentration camps. By October that year, the 2,000 Jews that remained in the ghetto were rounded up and shot with only a handful somehow managing to escape by hiding. Minsk was liberated by the Red Army on 3 July 1944.
We exit the pit on the opposite side to the sculpture and ascend to the surface. As we follow
a narrow circular footpath to return to the entrance, our walk is lined by tall lime trees. Under each tree there is a plaque dedicated
to Belarusian non-Jews who gave their lives trying to save Jews. Some of these would
have been part of Belarus’s famous partisan
or underground movement. The partisans’ cooperation with the Jewish resistance movement within the ghetto led to many
Jews escaping. Many Belarusians risked their lives and those of their families by rescuing refugees from the ghetto and hiding them in their houses and apartments. Some took Jewish children under Russian names or placed them in children’s homes.
With the leafy branches gently swaying above us, suddenly the feeling of emptiness experienced in the pit turns to life. A reminder that amid such horror and atrocity, there were those who did all to preserve life. And as the
There are 18 steps
– the number 18 is synonymous with the ,יַח Hebrew word chai which means life or living. Like the sculpture, the cobblestone floor in the centre of the pit was laid by hand out of respect for the victims.
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