(I was also prompted by this week's Sepia Saturday theme, which includes -- albeit incidentally -- walls.
Here's what the synagogue looked like a couple of years ago when I visited Riga on a family history trip. Its remains were razed and now the site is a memorial park.
Here's what the synagogue looked like once upon a time.
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"Frida Michelson, a Latvian Jew who had been working near Jelgava in a forced labor crew when the synagogues were burned [there were several], reported that on her return to Riga, she was told by a friend 'who had heard it from someone else' that the halls and the backyard of the Choral Synagogue were filled with Lithuanian refugees. Perkonkrusts ['a Latvian ultra-nationalist, anti-German and anti-Semitic political party founded in 1933'] and 'other Latvian hangers-on' surrounded the building, trapped the people inside, and set it on fire."
"The burning of the synagogue was filmed by the Germans and later became part of a Wehrmacht newsreel, with the following narration: 'The synagogue in Riga, which had been spared by the GPU commissars in their work of destruction, went up in flames a few hours later.' According to Bernard Press: 'Eyewitnesses heard the people who were locked inside screaming for help and saw them breaking the synagogues windows from inside and trying, like living torches, to get outside....'"
"The holy scrolls were dragged out of the synagogues and burned. According to the Press, many Jewish wearing prayer shawls and talith went into the fires to save the scrolls, and were all killed. Ezergailis disputes this, stating that no one entered the flames trying to save the holy scrolls."
Old photos (and quoted text) from thecelotajs.com.
Other info is at haolusa.org.
13 comments:
A true horror. Thank you for commemorating this horrific event, may the victims rest in peace.
Man's inhumanity to man has always stunned me. I simply cannot understand how people can do such horrible things to other people.
What a terrible part of history! That is even less understandable than the concentration camps.
I'm silenced by this; it is such a powerful post...
Evil should never go unnoticed. Hate should never be envied. Lost souls should never be forgotten. These visuals says so much about such a horrible happening.
Lest we forget. I'd read of the horrible event but never realized it was July 4th. Well, I'll hopefully never forget it again!
Truly despicable. It’s good that there is a remnant of the synagogue as a reminder.
How very sad. 1941 somehow there was a glitch in humanity which allowed this to happen. Hope it never occurs again. I sincerely hope that people will someday be able to accept and love each other for their differences...in all ways. It starts with each of us, what do we allow that lets hatred seep into our existence today?
In Sunday School one time we had a lesson that asked, "For what are you willing to die?" Of course, the expected answer was one's faith. But I can't imagine being strong enough to go into a fire to save those scrolls. What an example those people set, and yet.... You presented a powerful post for the 4th of July - we take our freedoms too much for granted.
A very moving photographic record. Unfortunately individuals with fanatical hatred against others still exist.
Thank you for your thought provoking post. Having been raised in a country where in the main courtesy to others and tolerance are held in high regard, I never can understand what there is in the make up of human beings that causes such deeds, not just then, but now too in many areas of the world. And that is one sentence which is probably far too long!
And today we still have such insanity. It'll never end.
You do know that Schneider was fed false information by the KGB. Hazners, for example, was not even in Riga at the time.
http://haolusa.org/index.php?en/main-010-shiftinginterpretations.ssi
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