Babi Yar
The Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center identified some 1,031 victims ahead of the 84th anniversary of the massacre.
Regarding help to those fleeing the country in the wake of a continued Russian onslaught, Kyiv Chief Rabbi Yaakov Dov Bleich said: “I’m making this very clear that all of the Jewish communities are doing this, and nobody is asking if you’re Jewish or not. The buses leave from the synagogues, but they’re open to anybody that wants to come.”
“Nazism is born in silence. So shout about the killing of civilians. Shout about the killing of Ukrainians,”
“It is symbolic that [Russian President Vladimir Putin] starts attacking Kyiv by bombing the site of the Babyn Yar, the biggest of Nazi massacres,” said Natan Sharansky, chair of the advisory board of the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center.
Over the years, a number of attempts were, in fact, made to commemorate the victims—most of whom were Jewish, though thousands of Roma, mental patients, POWs, Soviet prisoners and Ukrainian dissidents were killed there as well by the Nazis.
“The majority of killers were German. We have a few names of Ukrainians, but they played secondary roles for the simple reason that the Germans wanted to steal the Jews’ belongings. A genocide is a killing, but it is also stealing,” said Father Patrick Desbois.
“Let us make no mistake: Holocaust denial is still alive and kicking. Anti-Semitism still exists,” said Israel’s President Isaac Herzog.
On the 80th anniversary of the mass genocide the Nazis and their collaborators committed against Ukrainian Jews, a memorial center being built on the site will tell the story of the 1941 atrocity.
At the invitation of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Israeli President Isaac Herzog will participate in events marking 80 years since the Babi Yar Massacre.
“Neo-Nazi groups are trying to re-emerge, and their popularity has increased with the economic crisis. We see them as criminals who deny the Holocaust and promote neo-Nazi ideas; they have no place at all in Greek society,” said Greece’s Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias.
Materials collected by Emmanuel Diamant and Joseph Schneider arrived at the National Library of Israel’s Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog is to take part in an official ceremony inaugurating Kyiv’s Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center, alongside Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier.
