Official opening is planed on June 16, 2019
More about aim of memorial https://www.birzaijewish.lt/en/be-kategorijos-en/birzai-memorial-to-name-victims/
History of Birzai Jews:
The first Jews arrived to settle in the Duchy of Birzai at the end of the 16th Century. They were invited by the Duke of the House of Radzivill, who promised them protection from their neighbours. There are documents from the 1600’s which mention Jews settling in Birzai and receiving the rights of settlement.
Jews made a living trading in flax and wood. There were weaving and knitting factories, flour mills, furniture manufacturers, tanneries, a winery, a dairy industry, a pottery factory, an electric station and several other small industries as well as a Jewish bank.
The daily activities of the Jews of Birzai, were filled with normality, social awareness and religious devotion. There were Rabbis, synagogues, houses of Torah study, a kindergarten, a Tarbut – secular Hebrew primary and high school. There were charitable organizations, a home for the elderly, an orphanage, a health clinic, Jewish sports clubs and a number of Zionist organizations. There were two musical groups which were famous throughout Lithuania. A Jewish photographer immortalized images of Birzai.
One month after the Germans entered Birzai, Jews were evicted from their homes and forced into a ghetto. A Jewish doctor, renowned for his care of all citizens, rich and poor was the first of the fifteen victims who were shot by German soldiers and buried in the Birzh Jewish cemetery.
On the eight of August 1941, 2,400 Jews, 900 children, 780 women and 720 men were brought to Pakamponys forest near Birzai and brutally murdered, shot by Gestapo officers and Lithuanian collaborators.
In this forest is buried the once vibrant, pulsating Jewish community of Birzai, ordinary people, men, women and children, annihilated because they were Jews.
Hundreds of names of victims of the mass murder are not known but we mourn their loss.
MEMORIAL IS GOING TO BE ERECTED WITH THE HELP OF
Ben Rabinowitz. Cape Town, South Africa
Jack and Esme Rabin. Israel.
In memory of our grandfather, Phillip Rabinowitz. Born in Birzh, emigrated to South Africa at the turn of the century.
Corinne Abel and Johnny Copelyn. Cape Town, South Africa.
In memory of our father, Israel Abba Benjaminowitz who escaped to South Africa. His entire family was murdered in Tauragė.
Raymond, Wendy Ackerman and family. Cape Town, South Africa
Nathan Kirsh. Johannesburg, South Africa
Eric and Sheila Samson and family. Cape Town, South Africa
Anonymous. USA
Jonathan Beare. Israel
Abel and Glenda Levitt. Israel
Joseph and Sylvie Rabie. France
Bertie and Jackie Woolf and family. USA
Sukhdev Tolani. Hong Kong / USA
Jonathan and Renèe Dorfan. USA
Mannie and Dinah Olswang. Israel
Vidmantas Jukonis. Birzai, Lithuania
Merūnas Jukonis. Birzai, Lithuania
Edgar Mendelevič. Vilnius, Lithuania
Leta Vainorienė. Birzai, Lithuania
Veronica Belling. Cape Town, South Africa
Cyril Ferber. Cape Town, South Africa
