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Kielce Monument to Jewish Pogrom Victims
Visitors to Poland can now see a menorah-shaped steel monument in Kielce, designed by New York-born artist Jack Sal, whose parents survived the Holocaust. The monument commemorates the 42 Jewish Holocaust survivors who were killed in a pogrom by a Polish mob in that city. Another 50 were injured in that pogrom.
Of the 25,000 Jewish inhabitants of the city, the Nazis killed up to 1,500, including pregnant women and children, on the spot and sent the rest in three transports to Treblinka. Only a few hundred of them survived. The Kielce city pogrom was the most hideous of attacks on Holocaust survivors who returned to their homes after the Holocaust.
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Nine people were quickly tried and executed by Poland’s communist authorities for the murders. The Polish Government in the 1990s made an official apology for the attack.
The monument began as a private initiative. The Kielce authorities provided and maintain the site, with the monument’s construction financed by the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America’s heritage abroad. Jack Sal describes the monument as “White/Wash II” partly because of the reluctance of the authorities to deal with the pogrom. The whole surface of the monument is painted with a white limewash, which signifies that before the war Jews in Kielce were active in the quarrying and manufacture of lime.
Poland’s Chief Rabbi, Michael Schudrich, lead a prayer for the dead, in the presence of the mayor and representatives of the Israel and German embassies, during the monument’s unveiling.
Give Your Survivor Testimony
We want to hear from all survivors and to record their vital testimonies.
This is especially urgent for future generations.
Over the years, the Holocaust Testimonies Department, part of the worldwide project under the patronage of Yad Vashem, has recorded more than 1,200 testimonies of Holocaust survivors. These have become a living record of what happened to men, women and children during the Nazi Era., and an answer to those who deny the Holocaust occurred.
Have you given your testimony yet? If you haven’t, please call:
Phillip Maisel: 9527 6282 or Holocaust Centre: 9528 1985