March of the living 2011 — Association of Jews of Vilna and vicinity in Israel

Mickey Kantor's speech to  speech to Mr. Andrius Kubilius, Prime Minister of Lithuania in 2011

Prime Minister Kubilius, Mr. Imanuelis Zingris MP, Minister of Culture and honored guests, Thank you, Mr. Prime Minister for hosting us so graciously on this special occasion. Our delegation is having a difficult time – especially the Holocaust survivors among us – when they tread once more on the ground of their childhood home that so cruelly betrayed them during those war years. They return here with a yearning to take a peek at what was the entire world of their warm, pampered childhood and has been a continuous nightmare ever since they managed to escape, by the skin of their teeth, from the inferno that raged here.

We, their extended families, support, embrace and fortify them. We are here with them and for them. We are also here to see, learn, absorb, internalize and familiarize ourselves with all that our parents lost, to encounter the wellsprings of our roots while also trying to come to terms with our childhood growing up with phantoms, ashen shadows who had returned from the inferno only months before.

We are here both to proudly bear the incredible stories of heroism and survival, against all odds, from those years of darkness and destruction that befell the hapless victims and to celebrate the promising illustrious spiritual and cultural heritage they were born into.   

Mr. Prime Minister, you have demonstrated just how important you believe the symbolism attached to the March of the Living is by inviting all of the members of the delegation to your office: the feeling that you comprehend the gross evil done to our people and that you identify with the great losses, theinsult of betrayal, the nightmarish cruelty and life in their shadow since then.

It is a small comfort, but a comfort nevertheless, which lights a sparks of hope. The fact that you have announced that the Jewish cemetery, the Great Synagogue and the Jewish museum will be renovated together with your declaration that 2011 will be the memorial year for the Lithuanian citizens who perished during the Holocaust,  dedicated to commemorating the heritage of the Jewish people, is evidence of your openness, sensitivity and understanding that, as a member of the enlightened nations in the New Age, human rights, respect and protection for minority groups are mandatory. During your recent visit to Israel you promised your support for Israel to join the European Union; I wish that, together with that announcement, you were courageous enough to go one step further in condemning those who collaborated with the Nazi murderers in Lithuania who are still free men in that very same Lithuania.

On a happier note, I must mention the outstanding work done by our friend, the Lithuanian ambassador to Israel, Mr. Darius Dagotis, who confronted difficult realities and attitudes fearlessly, who was sufficiently open-minded to absorb new facts and understand processes, open-heartedly meeting people and respecting their opinions.

Mr. Prime Minister, we leave your office in the spirit of friendship and invite you to join us in our trip around the city, to hear authentic stories from members of our group in the ghetto lanes, to encounter the Jewish pride in Vilna, to participate in all the special events arranged for us during our visit to your country and, above all, to lead the March of the Living at Ponary on Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day on the 2^nd of May, 2011.

My dear Ms. Irene Degutiene, chairperson of the Lithuanian parliament, honored guests, friends, Firstly, on behalf of the Association and its members, our heartfelt thanks to our honored hosts, for the warm reception extended to the members of the Association's delegation upon our arrival in Vilna, the capital of Lithuania.

Your reception intensifies the sense of belonging and returning "home" that we, the descendants of our dear families from Vilna feel. We are returning to the place where they were born and brought up, studied and lived full cultural, economic and religious communal lives for countless generations, here in 'Jerusalem of Lithuania', until the horrendous events of that terrible war.

Our presence here, in this building, at this particular point of time on the eve of Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, where this year, 2011, has been declared Memorial Year for the Victims of the Holocaust in Lithuania, is symbolic, significant and miraculous.

Just think about this exceptional situation: here we are, together with our honored Lithuanian hosts, public figures of different ranks and from many different walks of life, in the same room with survivors of the terrors of the Holocaust that smote them in their motherland, their extended families, like me, for example, and their grandchildren who are the third generation of those survivors. They have all come from Israel and many other parts of the world to sanctify the memory of their families who were exterminated in that Holocaust and to learn about the illustrious heritage of their forefathers in Vilna, a center of Jewish culture in Europe.

The reception here, in this building, the home of the legislative assembly of the republic of Lithuania, the house of representatives of the Lithuanian people, is extremely significant for all of us present: a bilateral meeting with the new faces that have arisen from that terrible period with the hope that an atmosphere of calm, tolerance, dialogue and understanding will enable the lessons of that dark age to be learnt; the hope that we can build a new enlightened infrastructure of education for tolerance and loving kindness for the younger generations, understanding and respect for the other, developing new bridges and links of culture and goodwill.

On behalf of the chairman of the Association, Mr. Michael Shemyavitz and all our members, who have appointed me an ambassador of goodwill and on behalf of my husband Rami and my other good friends, who are seated here in this hall, I wish us all success in our mission.

I send my best wishes from here to the leaders whose common sense, intelligence and sensitivity have brought us to this point and will continue to guide us to a healthy, fruitful and flourishing continuation of this special momentum which we are experiencing this evening, in the precincts of the Lithuanian parliament.

Mickey Kantor's speech at Ponary –March of the Living 2011:

Prime Minister Andrius Kubilius, Deputy Foreign Minister of Israel, Mr. Danni Ayalon, the Lithuanian ambassador to Israel, Mr. Darius Dagotis, the Israeli ambassador to the Baltic States, Mr.Nati Tamir, the head of the Lithuanian Jewish community, Mr. Shimon Alperovitz, head of the Vilna Jewish community, Ms. Faina Koklianski, ministers, members of parliament, community leaders, the board and pupils of the Shalom Aleichem school, members of the Association's delegation – Holocaust survivors who mustered  both physical and emotional strength to be here today, our dear extended families and honored guests.

Once again, we have come from all over the world, to assemble here – Holocaust survivors, pubic leaders, pupils, students, religious and lay people; we stand with our heads bowed, suffused with the awesome silence that prevails at this memorial site. Only the rattle of the train wheels that seems never to have ceased to break the silence up into rhythmic blocks, occasionally adds to the silence and the humming of the sounds of spring in this green forest.

I can feel the earth moving below my feet, screaming from the body-filled pits of our murdered brethren. I hear the cry of our brethren's blood that is soaked into this earth. I can smell the stench of the bodies burning in the furnaces. I can see the pure souls floating above my heads; up, up they go beyond the treetops that protect us, as though they were concealing this terrible secret…

It is extremely difficult to disconnect from the picture of this inferno; when one tries to imagine a situation in which entire families, ordinary people like you and me, found themselves between the mallet of the Nazi enemy and the anvil of old, trusted neighbors, who were transformed overnight, thirsting to join in the mass racist cleansing. That is the only way to make any sense of the helplessness of the victims, on the one hand, and the efficacy of the extermination machine, on the other hand. Oh G-d!!!

My dear friends, today, seventy years later, look around you and you will realize that the destructive, demonic Anti-Semitism is still here and its cells are alive and kicking right across Europe and the globe. Prime Minister Kubilius and the Lithuanian ambassador to Israel are constantly on the alert to combat and condemn this phenomenon in their country. The presence of all the participants here today is further proof of the prevailing attitude towards Anti-Semitism. It is also fitting that all the world leaders loudly condemn and work tirelessly to eradicate this ugly stain on the new world which we dream about –a world of tolerance, respect for the other and building bridges of fraternity and inter-national culture.

Let us bow our heads in silence once more and honor the memory of our families –those helpless people who were assembled here from all parts of their beloved homeland, Lithuania, to be tortured and murdered in cold blood.

With their death, they bequeathed us their memory, life and the uncompromising concept that our place in the history of the nations is only possible in an independent state of our own and its continued existence is vital to us.

May their memory be blessed!!!             

Unveiling the Plaque at Bet Yung Vilna in Memory of Avraham Sutzkever

During the March of the Living in Vilna, the members of the delegation participated in the unveiling of the plaque on Bet Yung Vilna in memory of Avraham Sutzkever. The mayor of Vilna attended the ceremony together with Sutzkever's two daughters, Mira and Rina and his granddaughter, Hadass Kalderon.

Lithuania – notes on my trip to Lithuania / Liora Ben Aryeh, 2011

I heard, by chance, that for the past five years, around Holocaust Memorial Day, the Association has been organizing a group to tour Vilna and participate in the March of the Living at Ponary.

It is well-known that Ponary, not far from Vilna, was the site of the mass murder of 70,000 to 100,000 people, the vast majority of whom were Jewish.

I decided to go on the trip knowing full well that the emphasis would be on Vilna and the horrors of the Holocaust. I also knew that during the trip there would be official memorial ceremonies connected to the Holocaust. Despite the fact that I had no personal links with the Holocaust I decided to go because I felt this was an opportunity for me to see Lithuania and to come full circle with the memory of my parents who were both born in Lithuania. I didn't imagine that I would be going on a journey that would be so emotional, moving, interesting, amazing and exciting.

The group ranged in age from 14 to 87; in other words, there were three generations on the trip. Six of the members of the group were survivors and the rest were second and third generation of survivors. It was heart-warming to see several families united for the trip. For example, one son came from Argentina to make the trip with his parents and brother. A son came from Sweden to join his parents and sister for the trip.  The 14-year old came with his grandfather who had experienced the horrors in the Vilna Ghetto and another grandson joined his grandmother, even though they had no connection to Vilna or Lithuania but wanted to learn, hear and know more about what happened during the Holocaust.

The two daughters and a granddaughter of the poet Avraham Sutzkever were also in the group; we attended the ceremony unveiling the plaque in his memory that was hung on the building where artists would meet and where he wrote some of his poems. Of course, we also heard about what happened to him in the ghetto and during the war.

The daughter of the vocalist, Nehama Lifshitz was also on the trip. It transpired that she and five or six of the other members of the group have participated in the March of the Living at Ponary ever since it began three years ago.

The survivors' personal stories were compelling. It is so different hearing what happened first-hand to reading about it in a book or watching it on television. For example, during our visit to the Rudniki forest we heard how the partisans managed to get there and hide there. Another member of the group was the daughter of two survivors who told the spine-tingling story of her parents who were partisans and met in the forest; they later named their daughter Ya'arit (forest). It was very meaningful to stand there in the forest, singing the Partisans' anthem and to feel that we were fulfilling a mission.

"The March of the Living" – is like a password that is transmitted from generation to generation and our steps will thunder, proclaiming that we are here!

We visited the Ninth Fort that is a fortress that was built during the time of the Russian Tsars as one of a network of nine fortresses designed to defend Kovno from a German invasion.

"The Ninth Fort" was chosen as a central mass murder site in accordance with the blueprint of the "Final Solution" of the Jewish problem.

We heard the incredible story of the escape from the Fort when Ya'arit's father was the commander of the escape. My heart tingled as I heard the story and the tears flowed freely; I can still not comprehend how they survived.

One of the most moving parts was the presentation of certificates of honor and decorations to the Righteous Among the Nations in the presence of some of the survivors: I could not stop crying.

During the trip, the people began to open up: they were flooded with memories and  the members of the group discovered links and contacts that arouse great excitement that is both indescribable and inexplicable.

Whether voluntarily or involuntarily, I became attached to the group, with every fiber of my being, in a way I could never have dreamt of.

All that happened even before my own personal experiences, which I would never have dreamt that I could accomplish.

Unplanned and almost totally unexpectedly, I managed to get to the house where my late father was born and to walk around the courtyard. The excitement I felt was both visceral and palpable. For the first time in my life I understood the expression "I was beside myself". I saw the inner courtyard where my grandparents and my father and two of his married sisters lived. The house is still standing but the surrounding are neglected and deserted. I tried to imagine what it must have looked like then when the bakery they owned was also in the yard.

I knew the exact address of the place where my father grew up but I only knew the name of the township where my mother had grown up (known as Sad today). Her entire family migrated to South Africa in the 1920s, but I even managed to reach that godforsaken place.

If the township seems godforsaken now, I tried to imagine what it must have looked like one hundred years ago. I recalled my mother's stories about her happy childhood and I looked about trying to "see" her skipping, playing jacks and jumping sticks with her friends. We managed to find the remains of the Jewish cemetery and the synagogue. The synagogue was a wooden building that, today, is abandoned, rotting and rickety. I told myself that at this place my grandfather who was the gabbai (the voluntary organizer of the synagogue services), the beadle, the ritual slaughterer and the mohel (who circumcises the baby boys) of the township, stood. I even took a sliver of wood from the synagogue as a memento.

I am quite sure that this annual trip sows additional seeds in the attempt to weave the threads anew, to prove that "we are here to stay" despite, or perhaps, because of, the Lithuanians' hatred of the Jews in the past and the present; this trip must be continued with all that it entails.

Regardless of all that I have written above, Vilna is a beautiful city, Kovno less so, but Riga (in Latvia) is the most impressive of all with its Art Nouveau architecture.