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A32 FEATURE
Friday 13 december 2019
Ukrainian city remembers Jews on Holocaust anniversary

By VANESSA GERA ed irregulars who fought
RANDY HERSCHAFT against the Soviet Army in
YEVHENIY KRAVS World War II.
Associated Press To what extent this has led
LVIV, Ukraine (AP) — The to greater anti-Semitism is a
Ukrainian city of Lviv, once matter of dispute. Some of
a major center of Jewish the people trying to sustain
life in Eastern Europe, com- the history of Jewish life in
memorated on Sunday the western Ukraine think the
75th anniversary of the an- amount of anti-Semitism is
nihilation of the city’s Jew- exaggerated as part of a
ish population by Nazi Ger- Russian propaganda effort.
many and honored those Among those honored was
working today to preserve Marla Raucher Osborn, an
what they can of that van- American who heads Ro-
ished world. hatyn Jewish Heritage . The
City authorities presented group’s projects include re-
the honored recipients storing a Jewish cemetery
with 75 glass keys — rep- in nearby Rohatyn.
licas of a metal key that Osborn said she was hon-
once belonged to a Jew- ored to be acknowledged
ish synagogue and which along with local activists
an American artist found at “working quietly in local
a street market in Lviv. The Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadoviy presents glass copy of an old metal synagogue key to Yanina communities, recovering
anniversary events, which Hescheles, at ceremony commemorating 75th anniversary of the annihilation of the city’s Jewish Jewish memory with little
included a prayer concert population by Nazi Germany in Lviv, Ukraine. or no knowledge of their
at the ruins of former syna- Associated Press projects outside of those
gogues, come amid other communities, especially
attempts to revive sup- in such an extensive way. of the Jewish heritage. Of Of a population of about among the distant Jewish
pressed memories of the Matsevko said conscious- course, this process is slow. 150,000 Jews, only an esti- diaspora.”
Jews who once were an ness is growing in Ukraini- I want it to be quicker, but
integral part of the region. an society of the need to for the last 10 years we
“God forbid our city once remember the Jews who have seen how the Jewish
suffered such a misfortune,” were annihilated by Nazi heritage is returning to peo-
Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovyi forces, in some cases with ple’s consciousness and a
said at the ceremony. “To- the participation of local lot of activities are taking
day we cannot even imag- people. place,” Matsevko said. “It is
ine for a moment the pain, Initiatives have included very important that people
humiliation and grief that introducing Jewish history are being acknowledged
thousands of Lviv’s people courses at universities, new for their work in Jewish heri-
suffered in the last century.” research by young Ukraini- tage.”
Iryna Matsevko, deputy di- an scholars and grassroots Before World War II, Lviv
rector of the Center for Ur- efforts by volunteers, such and the surrounding area
ban History of East Central as the recovering Jew- belonged to Poland. Then
Europe and an organizer ish gravestones that were called Lwow, it was the
of the anniversary events in used to pave roads and third largest Jewish com- In this undated photo, U.S. citizen Marla Raucher Osborn, a
Lviv, said it was the first time returning them to cemeter- munity in prewar Poland Rohatyn Jewish heritage project leader, shows volunteers the
the western Ukrainian city ies. after Warsaw and Lodz, gravestones at an old Jewish cemetery in Rohatyn close to Lviv,
has acknowledged the his- “This is part of the process with most working as mer- Ukraine.
torical preservation efforts of reviving the memory chants, manufacturers or Associated Press
artisans. Before World War
I, Lviv and the surrounding mated 1 percent survived. The glass keys were the work
area were part of the east- In the postwar years, with of New Mexico-based artist
ern Galicia region of the Ukraine part of the Soviet Rachel Stevens, who found
Austro-Hungarian empire Union, the memories of the rusted synagogue key
and the city was called the murdered Jews began on which they were based
by its German name, Lem- to vanish. Historian Omer in February while seeking
berg. Bartov has called the area remnants of Jewish culture
In June 1941, Germany at- a “land of memory and in eastern Galicia as part of
tacked the Soviet Union, its oblivion, coexistence and a research project.
former ally. When the Ger- erasure, high hopes and Stevens used glass for the
man forces entered the dashed illusions.” replicas because in Jewish
city, they and their Ukrai- The remembrance work tradition the material “rep-
nian collaborators massa- is taking place as Ukraine resents the fragility of life.”
cred Jews in the city and finds itself mired in crisis and Creating them “became
countryside. While occu- conflict following Russia’s a tangible way for me to
pying the area, Germans annexation of Ukraine’s express my grief about the
murdered Jews in the ghet- Crimean Peninsula and a past and my hope for the
to, the Belzec death camp continuing Russia-backed future,” she said.
In this undated photo provided by artist Rachel Stevens an old and a forced labor camp, insurgency in the east. “The idea for this artwork
synagogue key discovered by Stevens at a market in Lviv,
Ukraine, and a glass replica that she made modeled on it are Janowska, with the final Nationalism has been on seems almost mystically
photographed. annihilation completed by the rise, and some Ukraini- delivered to me,” Stevens
Associated Press June 1943. ans laud the Nazi-affiliat- said.q