Category: Scotland

By Eli and Jill Rabinowitz

Perth Australia

13 December 2024

Burning The Synagogue

Australians Jill and Eli Rabinowitz visited the site of the Great Synagogue of Kassel Germany in November 2024, where 86 years ago, on 7 November 1938, Kristallnacht, known as Pogromnacht in Germany, began. 

Translation of this plaque

The Synagogue

This is where the Great Synagogue of the Kassel Jewish community stood, completed in 1839 and having 2,301 members in May 1933.

Many had already fled when, on 7 November 1938, activists from the Nazi Party broke into the synagogue and broke open the Torah shrine, setting fire to prayer scrolls and cult objects.

The city administration immediately demolished the intact building in order to build a parking lot there. The community was broken up.

The current synagogue was completed in 2000

With Rabbi Shaul Nekrich of Kassel

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kassel_Synagogue

The Holocaust memorial at the Railway Station

The Rail Track of Remembrance

The information board

More info:

http://www.dasdenkmaldergrauenbusse.de/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=142&Itemid=2

The Stolpersteine for the Oppenheim family in Kassel

Trude and Hans Oppenheim were deported and murdered in Auschwitz in 1944. Daughter Dorrith escaped on the Kindertransport to Scotland in July 1939.

https://www.stolpersteine.eu/en/home

The Jewish Community Centre in Kassel

The Arolsen Archives

https://arolsen-archives.org/en

Meeting Julia and Beate in Hofgeismar

The German language book – In Meiner Tasche

In My Pocket Project educates Australian school children of all backgrounds

https://elirab.au

Jill and Eli Rabinowitz with Tanja Colgan, German teacher Goethe Institute

The Project is a two-hour workshop of a book reading with a creative art activity for upper primary classrooms (Years 5 and 6). The story links with HASS units on civics, migration and refugees. Intercurricular learning opportunities promote values of empathy, kindness and inclusivity in the multicultural classroom.

This project is a stepping stone to the study of the Holocaust, refugees and anti semitism in high school. The project is unique at the primary school level.

The WE ARE HERE! Foundation provides the calico pockets, art materials and paints together with a free mini copy of In My Pocket for each student.

 In My Pocket is Dorrith Sim’s true account of her escape from danger on the Kindertransport. 

The Project is supported by the German Embassy in Canberra and the German Hon Consul in WA.

The German version of the book, In Meiner Tasche, is promoted by the Goethe Institute in Australia.

Zoom/Teams training is available for teachers.

The project was first launched at Jewish Day schools around Australia and South Africa in 2023/4. Since then, it has been successfully extended to state, private, Catholic and Independent schools as well as to public libraries.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kindertransport

Liverpool Street Station

Hannah Devenney at the Imperial War Museum, London