Navahrudak & Castle

Navahrudak

Navahrudak – Wikipedia

Navahrudak (Belarusian: Навагрудак), more commonly known by its Russian name Novogrudok (Новогрудок) (Lithuanian: Naugardukas; Polish: Nowogródek; Yiddish: נאָווהאַרדאָק‎ Novhardok) is a city in the Grodno Region of Belarus. In the 14th century it was an episcopal see of the Metropolitanate of Lithuania. It is a possible first capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, with Trakai also noted as a possibility. It was later part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Russian Empire and eventually Poland until the Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939 when the Soviet Union annexed the area to the Byelorussian SSR.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navahrudak

With Mike Silver of NY and his guide Alexander (centre)

 

Navahrudak Castle

Navahrudak Castle – Wikipedia

The former castle in Navahrudak, Belarus (Belarusian: Навагрудскі замак, Lithuanian: Naugarduko pilis, Polish: Zamek w Nowogródku) was one of the key strongholds of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, cited by Maciej Stryjkowski as the location of Mindaugas’s coronation as King of Lithuania as well as his likely burial place.[1][2][3][4] Modern historians cannot make up their minds as to the true location of Mindaugas’s coronation.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navahrudak_Castle

Adam Mickiewicz

Adam Mickiewicz – Wikipedia

Adam Bernard Mickiewicz ([mit͡sˈkʲɛvit͡ʂ] ( listen); 24 December 1798 – 26 November 1855) was a Polish poet, dramatist, essayist, publicist, translator, professor of Slavic literature, and political activist. He is regarded as national poet in Poland, Lithuania and Belarus. A principal figure in Polish Romanticism, he is counted as one of Poland’s “Three Bards” (“Trzej Wieszcze”)[1] and is widely regarded as Poland’s greatest poet.[2][3][4] He is also considered one of the greatest Slavic[5] and European[6] poets and has been dubbed a “Slavic bard”.[7] A leading Romantic dramatist,[8] he has been compared in Poland and Europe to Byron and Goethe.[7][8]

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Mickiewicz

 

Navahrudak Jewish Cemetery and Holocaust Sites

NAVAHRUDAK: Grodno Belarus – International Jewish Cemetery Project

NAVAHRUDAK: Grodno [Novogrudok,Novaredok, Novogrudek, Novohorodok, Novradok, Nowogrudok, Nowogradek, Navharadak, Nawahradak, Nowogródek, Navaredok , Naugardukas , | belarus – International Jewish Cemetery Project

The IAJGS International Jewish Cemetery Project mission is to catalogue every Jewish burial site throughout the world. Every Jewish cemetery or burial site we know of is listed here by town or city, country, and geographic region is based on current locality designation.

Source: www.iajgsjewishcemeteryproject.org/belarus/navahrudak.html

Novogrudok, Belarus KehilaLink

Novogrudok, Belarus

Source: kehilalinks.jewishgen.org/navahrudak/Home.html

Holocaust Memorials

First Site

Second site  

Third site

  

From Wikipedia:

WWII

Soviet troops entered the city in 18 September 1939 and it was annexed into the Soviet Union via the Byelorussian SSR. The Polish inhabitants were exiled, mostly to Siberia and the Soviet Union, as prisoners. In the administrative division of the new territories, the city was briefly (from 2 November to 4 December) the centre of the Navahrudak Voblast. Afterwards the administrative centre moved to Baranavichy and name of voblast was renamed as Baranavichy Voblast, the city became the centre of the Navahrudak Raion (15 January 1940). On 22 June 1941 Nazi Germany invaded the USSR and Navahrudak was occupied on 4 July, following one of the more tragic events when the Red Army was surrounded in what’s known as the Novogrudok Cauldron. See Operation Barbarossa: Phase 1.

During the German occupation it became part of the Reichskommissariat Ostland territory. Partisan resistance immediately began. The Bielski partisans made of Jewish volunteers operated in the region. On 1 August 1943, Nazi troops shot down eleven nuns, the Martyrs of Nowogródek. The Red Army reoccupied the city almost exactly three years after its German occupation on 8 July 1944. During the war more than 45,000 people were killed in the city and in the surrounding area, and over 60% of housing was destroyed.

Navahrudak was an important Jewish center and shtetl. It was home to the Novardok yeshiva, led by Rabbi Yosef Yozel Horwitz, as well as the hometown of Rabbi Yechiel Michel Epstein and of the Harkavy Jewish family, including Yiddish lexicograph Alexander Harkavy. Before the war, the population was 20,000, of which about half were Jewish; Meyer Meyerovitz and Meyer Abovitz were the Rabbis there at that time. During a series of “actions” in 1941, the Germans killed all but 550 of the approximately 10,000 Jews. (The first mass murder of Navahrudak’s Jews occurred in December 1941.) Those not killed were sent into slave labor.[3]

Navahrudak Tunnel

NavaHrudak Jewish Partisans’ Tunnel

Video

Navarudok Jewish Partisans’ Tunnel

Tamara Vershitskaya 14 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/iB1okmue4fg

 

We Remember Novogrudok

Video

We Remember Novogrudak

Novogrudak School #4

Source: youtu.be/PDIGVhRKH3E

Museum of the Jewish resistance

Novogrudok, Belarus

Source: kehilalinks.jewishgen.org/navahrudak/Museum_of_History.html

Lenin

Monument to mark mass ghetto escape unveiled in Novogrudok | Press releases, Belarus | Belarus.by

Monument to mark mass ghetto escape unveiled in Novogrudok | Press releases, Belarus | Belarus.by

Official press releases, Belarus

Source: www.belarus.by/en/press-center/press-release/monument-to-mark-mass-ghetto-escape-unveiled-in-novogrudok_i_0000065139.html

 

The Beis Aharon Bielski School

Moshe Fhima Intro – Eli

Video

Moshe Fhima Intro

Beis Aharon School Pinsk Belarus 13 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/vi86WhEv3tA

Zog Nit Keynmol – Pinsk

Video

Zog Nit Keynmol – Pinsk

Beis Aharon Bielski School

Source: youtu.be/yN3QGZkmGjY

Counting of the Omer – Moshe Fhima

Video

Counting of the Omer – Moshe Fhima

Beis Aharon Bielski School Pinsk 13 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/qawR9BEqqjM

Yad Yisroel – Wikipedia

Yad Yisroel – Wikipedia

The Yad Yisroel is non for profit 501(C)(3) organization which was started by the Stoliner Rebbe in 1990. Yad Yisroel is an organisation with a goal to bring Russian Jews closer to their heritage.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yad_Yisroel

  

Moshe Fhima Enjoying Oif Dem Pripetchok

Video

Moshe Fhima Enjoying Oif Dem Pripetchok

sung by Cantor Harry Rabinowitz 1959 Beis Aharon School Pinsk 13 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/XQDfkp1s1ys

Oyfn Pripetshik

Oyfn Pripetshik – Wikipedia

Oyfn Pripetshik (Yiddish: אויפן פריפעטשיק‎, also spelled Oyfn Pripetchik, Oyfn Pripetchek, etc.;[1] English: “On the Hearth”)[2] is a Yiddish song by M.M. Warshawsky (1848–1907). The song is about a rabbi teaching his young students the aleph-bet. By the end of the 19th century it was one of the most popular songs of the Jews of Central and Eastern Europe, and as such it is a major musical memory of pre-Holocaust Europe.[3] The song is still sung in Jewish kindergartens.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oyfn_Pripetshik

Itzik Soloveitchik and Moshe Fhima

Video

Itzik Soloveitchik and Moshe Fhima

Great (great) grandson of Chaim Soloveitchik Halevy Beis Aharon Bielski School Pinsk 13 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/y-D_ssh8S4A

Itzik Soloveitchik

Video

Itzik Soloveitchik

Great (great) grandson of Chaim Soloveitchik Halevy who taught my Zaida Nachum Mendel Rabinowitz in the Brisk Yeshiva c1905 Beis Aharon Bielski School Pinsk …

Source: youtu.be/IOA1FS6dkrE

Shacharit

With Moshe Fhima at Chaim Weizmann’s school, Pinsk

 

Video

Moshe Fhima at Chaim Weizmann’s school, Pinsk

Source: youtu.be/I_ik3K4I1zw

Two Pinsk Synagogues

Moshe Fhima – Kiseh Elijahu – Circumcision Chair

Video

Moshe Fhima – Kiseh Elijahu – Circumcision Chair

Source: youtu.be/roYeLnUqVXo

The Second Synagogue
Some Previous Jewish buildings opposite

With Moshe Fhima at The Holocaust Site & Memorial

Moshe Fhima at Holocaust Memorial

Video

Source: youtu.be/Q4TQ0gIeSWk

A second site and memorial

1919 Pinsk massacre – Wikipedia

Pinsk massacre – Wikipedia

The Pinsk massacre was the mass execution of thirty-five Jewish residents of Pinsk on April 5, 1919 by the Polish Army. The Polish commander “sought to terrorize the Jewish population” after being warned by two Jewish soldiers about a possible bolshevik uprising.[1]. The event occurred during the opening stages of the Polish-Soviet War, after the Polish Army had captured Pinsk.[2] The Jews who were executed had been arrested were meeting in a Zionist center to discuss the distribution of American relief aid in what was termed by the Poles as an “illegal gathering”. The Polish officer-in-charge ordered the summary execution of the meeting participants without trial in fear of a trap, and based on the information about the gathering’s purpose that was founded on hearsay. The officer’s decision was defended by high-ranking Polish military officers, but was widely criticized by international public opinion.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinsk_massacre

The Town Square

Pinsk – Cultural Heritage Card – Shtetl Routes – NN Theatre

Pinsk – Cultural Heritage Card – Shtetl Routes – NN Theatre

Pinsk is a town, a district center in Brest region. It is situated on the bank of Pina River (the left tributary of Pripyat) 186 km to the east from Brest, 304 km to south-west from Minsk. It has a railway station on the line Brest-Homel.

Source: shtetlroutes.eu/en/pinsk-cultural-heritage-card/

 

ZNK – New videos

Here are new videos of students singing Zog Nit Keynmol that reached me in the last ten days.

  1. Melbourne Yom Hashoah Holocaust Commemoration in April:
Resistance

The background and context

The ‘Partisans’ Song’ – Zog Nit Keynmol–written by Hirsch Glik, 22,  in the Vilna Ghetto in 1943   is one of the most powerful songs of resistance and defiance ever written.

While Hitler boasted that his Reich would endure for a thousand years, it is the Jewish people who resisted the forces of hatred and have endured, not the murderous Third Reich,  which lasted twelve years.

Today, 75 years on, long after the demise of Hitler’s murderous regime, the partisans’ song is now sung worldwide to mark the Jewish spirit of resistance.

(Michael Cohen, Melbourne)

Melbourne Yom Hashoah – Zog Nit Keynmol

Melbourne Yom Hashoah – Zog Nit Keynmol

Commemoration April 2018 Using video footage from The Partisans’ Song Project

Source: youtu.be/SvNoyReKxO0

PARTISANS’ SONG

Zog nit keyn mol, az du geyst dem letstn veg,
khotsh himlen blayene farshteln bloye teg.
kumen vet nokh undzer oysgebenkte sho,
s’vet a poyk ton undzer trot: mir zaynen do!

Fun grinem palmenland biz vaysn land fun shney,
mir kumen on mit undzer payn, mit undzer vey,
un vu gefaln iz a shprits fun undzer blut,
shprotsn vet dort undzer gvure, undzer mut!S
s’vet di morgnzun bagildn undz dem haynt,
un der nekhtn vet farshvindn mit dem faynt,
nor oyb farzamen vet di zun in der kayor –
vi a parol zol geyn dos lid fun dor tsu dor.

Dos lid geshribn iz mit blut, un nit mit blay,
s’iz nit keyn lidl fun a foygl oyf der fray,
dos hot a folk tsvishn falndike vent
dos lid gezungen mit naganes in di hent.

To zog nit keyn mol, az du geyst dem letstn veg,
khotsh himlen blayene farshteln bloye teg.
kumen vet nokh undzer oysgebenkte sho –
es vet a poyk ton undzer trot: mir zaynen do!

 

2 & 3

Schools are now recording the song on their travels:

JDS 8th Graders from Seattle WA sang the Partisans’ Song while visiting Yad Vashem and Masada in Israel:

JDS Seattle School Video – Zog Nit Keynmol

Seattle School Video – Zog Nit Keynmol

Yad Vashem May 18

Source: youtu.be/O8ZOBgVrxNs

JDS Seattle School Video – Zog nit KeynMol

JDS 8th Grade at Masada 14 May 2018

Masada, Israel

Source: youtu.be/NZRH7aq-N3I

 

Beis Aharon School and Orphanage 
Zog Nit Keynmol – Pinsk

Zog Nit Keynmol – Pinsk

Beis Aharon School Pinsk, Belarus 13 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/yN3QGZkmGjY

Moshe Fhima Intro

Moshe Fhima Intro

Beis Aharon School Pinsk Belarus 13 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/vi86WhEv3tA

Learn More about how to get involved
An Inspirational School Project

An Inspirational School Project

A Project For Your School We are seeking students who will recite or sing the Partisans’ Song in their home tongue, or in a language they have learnt. Please make a video, which can be as cre…

Source: elirab.me/znk/

Forest Jerusalem

My visit to the Naliboki Forest in Belarus on 16 May 2018, with Tamara, Alexander and Ivan.

This is where the Bielskis and many other partisans had their camps in the latter part of WWII. Aptly named Forest Jerusalem.

Please watch the nine videos of Tamara telling us more.

The road into the forest.

Naliboki forest

Naliboki forest – Wikipedia

Naliboki Forest (Belarusian: Налібоцкая пушча, Nalibotskaya Pushcha (pushcha: wild forest, primeval forest)) is a large forest complex in the northwestern Belarus, on the right bank of the Neman River, on the Belarusian Ridge.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naliboki_forest

Alexander and Ivan walking towards the partisan camp.

Oak Tree Remembers

Oak Tree Remembers

Tamara Vershitskaya in the Naliboki Forest

Source: youtu.be/oaL75ktaeVs

Tunnel Escape in Novogrudok

Tunnel Escape

Tamara Vershitskaya

Source: youtu.be/wt1odw9pU9c

A metal bucket

Proof of Bielski Camp

Proof of Bielski Camp

Tamara Vershitskaya

Source: youtu.be/HQ8HCRYDVJM

Partisans in the Naliboki Forest

Partisans in the Naliboki Forest

Tamara Vershitskaya talks about the Naliboki Forest and the Bielskis

Source: youtu.be/q6u8qcKO7Cg

Amount of People

Amount of People

Tamara Vershitskaya

Source: youtu.be/5C_M-kNrJiA

Women and children

Women and children

Tamara Vershitskaya

Source: youtu.be/OKc_wMsKxwE

Attack on the camp

Attack on the camp

Tamara Vershitskaya

Source: youtu.be/bOKtffhGIkk

Naliboki Forest Jerusalem- Information

Naliboki Forest Jerusalem

Tamara Vershitskaya talks about Naliboki Forest and Bielskis with Alexander Pilinkievich

Source: youtu.be/Uc6O0YJUyfc

Artifact found

Artifact found

Tamara Vershitskaya

Source: youtu.be/wl6LA6vNI9o

Ivan preparing our picnic lunch near the fire ranger

A VERY treif lunch – I had the herring!

Beekeepers

Trees for sale

Amnesia’s Antidote by Ariel and Ryan Luckey

Amnesia’s Antidote by Ariel and Ryan Luckey

www.arielluckey.com www.comuntierra.org In May 2013, the Luckey Brothers journeyed to their great-great-grandfather’s childhood village Lubca in rural Belaru…

Source: youtu.be/XPCGtmxd2Hk

Zog Nit Keynmol – The Partisans’ Song

Zog Nit Keynmol

Source: elirab.me/zog-nit-keynmol/

Bielski partisans 

Bielski partisans – Wikipedia

The Bielski partisans were an organization of Jewish partisans who rescued Jews from extermination and fought against the Nazi German occupiers and their collaborators in the vicinity of Nowogródek (Navahrudak) and Lida in German-occupied Poland (now western Belarus). They are named after the Bielskis, a family of Polish Jews who led the organization.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bielski_partisans

 

Naliboki

Nalibaki – Wikipedia

Nalibaki – Wikipedia

Nalibaki (Belarusian: Налібакі, Russian: Налибоки, Polish: Naliboki) is an agrotown in Minsk Region, in western Belarus.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nalibaki

Video – Jewish Historical References in Naliboki

Jewish Historical References in Naliboki

Tamara Vershitskaya 16 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/TU2ZVBzldtE

Video – Jewish Memorial in Naliboki

Jewish Memorial in Naliboki

Tamara Vershitskaya, Alexander Pilinkievich, chairman of the local village council, and Ivan – builder 16 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/Nf3QBLP-YYA

Video – Plans for Naliboki

Plans for Naliboki

Tamara Vershitskaya and Ivan 16 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/aFb4YnB9j4Q

A Private Mikvah

 

Video – The Private Mikvah

The Private Mikvah

Tamara Vershitskaya talks about the mikvah in Naliboki Belarus 16 May 2018

Source: youtu.be/lndsEPiKshM

Naliboki massacre – Wikipedia

Naliboki massacre – Wikipedia

The Naliboki massacre (Polish: Zbrodnia w Nalibokach) was the mass killing of 129 Poles,[2] including women and children, by Soviet partisans[3] on 8 May 1943 in the small town of Naliboki[4] in German-occupied Poland (the town is now in Belarus).[5] Before the 1939 German-Soviet invasion of Poland, Naliboki was part of Stołpce County, Nowogródek Voivodeship, in eastern Poland.[1]

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naliboki_massacre

New Doornfontein Tour

I am posting this on behalf on my friend Ishvara.
Do not miss this tour!
I have included Links below to the 2016 tour I went on.

  Doornfontein : a journey through a Jewish Shtetl

on Sunday the 27th May 2018 at 10 am we are meeting otside Ellis Park for

a walk through the old Jewish neighbourhood of Johannesburg.

Some of the highlights en route include :
* the Lion Shul : 1906
* Yiddishe Arbeiter Klub : the Jewish Workers Club : 1928
* the Alhambra Theatre
* the Yiddishe Altesheim : Jewish Old Age Home
* Beit Hamedrash Hagodel : the Sherwell St Shul
* the first Greek Orthodox Church in Joburg : 1913
* the Beit St shops – Wachenheimers , Nussbaums etc
* the Ottoman Embassy : home of Henri Bettelheim
* the University of Johannesburg Campus
* the Jewish Govt School : IH Harris Primary
* the Hebrew High School : Talmud Torah
* the old Victorian homes on Sivewright St
* the Great Synagogue on Wolmarans St : 1914

Meeting Place : corner Dora St & Beit St at the main entrance to Ellis Park Stadium
Parking : safe free parking outside Ellis Park entrance : Dora / Beit St ( paid security guards to look after cars )

Date : Sunday 27th May 2018
Times : 10h00 till 14h00

Cost : R180-00 per person
Lunch : I suggest that you bring a snack or picnic, sorry all the Kosher delis moved away many years ago.

However there are plenty of places along the way to buy cooldrinks.

LIMITED SPACE : please send an email to confirm that there is space available before doing an EFT  deposit of R180-00 per person

NO CASH PAYMENTS ON THE DAY

NO CREDITS

NO REFUNDS

..use your surname/Doornfontein as a reference.
send an email with names and proof of payment to ishvara@africansecrets.co.za after doing an EFT

Please note – men please bring a yarmulke for entering the synagogues

***************

Doornfontein Walking Tour – Part 1 2016

Doornfontein Walking Tour – Part 1

I have divided this outstanding 4 ½ hours walking tour of Doorfontein into separate posts. Here is the first: Introduction and the Lions Shul. I only found out about this tour a couple of weeks bef…

Click on source: elirab.me/doornfontein-walking-tour-part-1/

There are 4 parts to this post!

Back