RSS
A Jewish cemetery in Belarus was destroyed by Nazis. Now its headstones are being made into a memorial.
(JTA) — Earlier this year, a British Jewish nonprofit received a call from a young couple in the city of Brest, Belarus, who had just purchased a fixer-upper house and needed some help with a difficult situation: Their basement was built from old Jewish gravestones.
Jewish groups — including the nonprofit The Together Plan and its American arm, the Jewish Tapestry Project, founded to aid Belarusian Jewry — have been receiving such calls for nearly two decades from residents of Brest who have collectively discovered thousands of Jewish headstones in their city’s construction. All of the headstones come from a historic cemetery that was destroyed during and after the Holocaust.
Today, an athletic complex sits on the site of the cemetery, which once contained tens of thousands of graves. But by the end of next year, The Together Plan expects to complete a memorial to the cemetery. It is also in the process of organizing and cataloging more than 3,200 remnants of the cemetery’s headstones, which were used after World War II in construction projects throughout the city.
“Currently there’s nothing there to say it’s a cemetery,” Debra Brunner, CEO and co-founder of The Together Plan, the group leading the project, told CNN.
Before World War II, Brest — also known as Brest-Litovsk, or Brisk to the Jewish community that lived there — was home to more than 20,000 Jews and was a center of Jewish culture and study. But when the city was liberated after the Holocaust, only about 10 Jews remained there. Today, it has a total population of more than 300,000.
The Nazis also destroyed the city’s Jewish cemetery in part by selling half of its headstones. In the decades following the war, when Belarus was part of the Soviet Union and construction materials were hard to find, the gravestones became the foundations of homes, supermarkets, garden walks and cellars. In some cases, the Hebrew lettering on the stones was chiseled away.
The memorial will be erected on what was once a corner of the cemetery, some distance away from the sports complex. It will be made from broken pieces of the headstones that have been recovered over the past two decades and will feature a black granite plaque with text in Russian, Hebrew and English. The area surrounding the memorial will be covered with trees, grass and wildflowers.
Jewish cemetery preservation has been at times a contentious issue in Belarus. As recently as 2017, a Belarusian court approved a plan to construct a luxury apartment building on top of a Jewish cemetery in the city of Gomel, near the country’s borders with Ukraine and Russia. The Brest municipality has pledged to maintain the upkeep of its city’s memorial but did not provide any funds directly to the project. It is being led by the Together Plan and the Jewish Tapestry Project and supported by the Religious Jewish Union of Belarus, the Illuminate Foundation and the charitable Belarus-based organization Dialog.
“Jews have always honored the memory of their ancestors,” Boris Bruk, chairman of the Orthodox Jewish community of Brest, said in a campaign video for the project. “And as there is no cemetery, we wanted to have a memorial sign, or a memorial place which would tell our descendants that their ancestors lie at this place, the people who lived, worked and prayed in this city.”
In 2004, residents, construction companies and homeowners with properties paved with headstones began making phone calls to Regina Simonenko, the head of the Brest Holocaust Foundation and museum, wanting to return them. In 2011, the municipality of Brest approved the construction of a memorial using the headstones. The Together Plan joined the project in 2014 and has been fielding the calls since then.
Apart from 1,287 remnants with writing, another 2,000 to 2,500 headstone fragments without any writing have been collected and stored in a warehouse, where they have been photographed, cataloged and added to a searchable database.
The memorial is being designed by Dallas-based artist Brad Goldberg, who plans to build two arcs opposite each other that each feature some of the headstones. According to his website, Goldberg “sees his work as a fusion between sculpture, landscape, and the built environment.”
“It isn’t a cemetery,” he told CNN. “They are all facing in different directions as if they are having a conversation with each other.”
He added, “One rabbi that we have consulted has described it as being about life rather than about death.”
Goldberg has a connection to Brest, too, which led to his work on the memorial. His family had taken in a Holocaust survivor, the late Jack Grynberg, when Grynberg came to the United States following the war. Somewhere between 70 and 100 of Grynberg’s relatives were killed by the Nazis during the Holocaust. Grynberg was one of only a few Jewish residents of Brest to survive.
In 1997, Grynberg and his son Stephen traveled to Brest together. Stephen Grynberg is a filmmaker who has done work for the Shoah Foundation and was the one who recommended Goldberg as the memorial’s designer. The younger Grynberg is also donating a third of the memorial’s estimated $325,000 cost.
“In 1997 there were no signs of the cemetery,” Stephen Grynberg told CNN. “We were taken there and our guide said, ‘This is where the cemetery was.’ Like so many things with the Holocaust, you can’t really understand them, you just have these complicated visceral feelings.”
He added, “I was just trying to compute the idea of them bulldozing a cemetery and building on it. That was the empty feeling I had.”
—
The post A Jewish cemetery in Belarus was destroyed by Nazis. Now its headstones are being made into a memorial. appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
RSS
Another College President Falls With Resignation of Michael Schill From Northwestern University
Former Northwestern University president Michael Schill on Capitol Hill in Washington, US, May 23, 2024. Photo: Amanda Andrade-Rhoades via Reuters Connect
Northwestern University president Michael Schill resigned on Thursday, just days before the start of fall semester, following nearly two years of a surge in antisemitic discrimination and extreme anti-Zionism on the Evanston, Illinois, campus, as well as blistering criticism of his response to it.
“I have decided, in consultation with the leadership of the Board of Trustees, that I will step down as president,” Schill said in a statement announcing the decision. “I will remain in my role until an interim president is in place, and I will assist in his or her transition. After a brief sabbatical, I will return to Northwestern Pritzker School of Law to teach and conduct research, my first and enduring passion.”
He added, “I appreciate our students, who I am confident will go on to change the world for the better.”
The embattled executive testified last May before the US House Committee on Education and Workforce, where he faced a firing line of conservative lawmakers, such as Reps. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) and Burgess Owens (R-UT), who placed him in their crosshairs after identifying him as one of the dozens of college presidents who allegedly did far too little to combat the nationwide surge in campus antisemitism following Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel.
Schill’s gravest transgression, lawmakers charged, was the Deering Meadow Agreement, reached after a pro-Hamas group commandeered a section of campus and established what they called the “Northwestern Liberated Zone” on April 25, 2024. For five days, over 1,000 students, professors, and non-Northwestern-affiliated persons fulminated against the world’s lone Jewish state, trafficked antisemitic tropes, and intimidated Jewish students.
By the morning of April 29, Schill and the group finalized the infamous deal — a first of its kind accord which became a model for 42 other schools who emulated it. It committed Northwestern University to establishing a scholarship for Palestinian undergraduates, contacting potential employers of students who caused recent campus disruptions to insist on their being hired, hiring two Palestinian professors, and creating a segregated dormitory hall to be occupied exclusively by Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) and Muslim students. The university — after days of hearing the activists shout phrases such as “Kill the Jews!” — also agreed to form a new investment committee in which anti-Zionist students and faculty wield an outsized voice.
In February of this year, the nascent second Trump administration’s newly staffed US Department of Education named Northwestern as one five schools to be investigated by the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) for antisemitism and evidence that school officials violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. Then in April, US President Donald Trump, riding a wave of populist antagonism against higher education, froze $790 million in federal research grants and contracts previously appropriated to Northwestern. The move came days after the university issued a report on its enactment of a checklist of policies it said meaningfully addressed campus antisemitism, which, by that time, had exploded into a full-blown crisis.
“The university administration took this criticism to heart and spent much of last summer revising our rules and policies to make our university safe for all of our students, regardless of their religion, race, national origin, sexual orientation, or political viewpoint,” the university said. “Among the updated policies is our Demonstration Policy, which includes new requirements and guidance on how, when, and where members of the community may protest or otherwise engage in expressive activity.”
The university added that it had adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, a reference tool which aids officials in determining what constitutes antisemitism, and begun holding “mandatory antisemitism training” sessions which “all students, faculty, and staff” must attend.
Parents of students attending Northwestern University rejected the report as an attempt to manufacture positive headlines and mislead the public, most of all the Jewish community.
“The problems at Northwestern are deep. Deep and institutional,” Lisa Fields, founder of Coalition Against Antisemitism at Northwestern (CAAN), told The Algemeiner during an interview in May.
On Friday, she said Schill’s resignation should be the first of major changes at the university.
“As both a parent and CAAN’s national chair, I know the fear and frustration Jewish families have felt watching Northwestern fail to protect its students,” Fields said. “President Schill’s resignation is a necessary first step, but it cannot be the last. The board’s catastrophic governance shows how far Northwestern has drifted. Chair Barris should step aside, and the board must be restructured. Only sustained federal oversight, dedicated civil rights enforcement, structural reform, and a president with integrity and vision will restore accountability and integrity at Northwestern.”
She added, “CAAN will continue pressing, and partnering, until Jewish students are safe, the university is in full compliance with Title VI, and Northwestern again reflects the accountability and integrity its community, and the nation, deserve.”
CAAN member Geri Cohen, another Northwestern parent, told The Algemeiner that Schill should not be rewarded with another job at the university, arguing that his allowing the maltreatment of Jewish students, not conservative politics, was the primary reason for the disintegration of his administration.
“New leadership is absolutely a step in the right direction of accountability and true leadership at Northwestern,” Cohen said. “However, I’m disappointed in his transition to his faculty position at the law school. I’m also alarmed but not surprised at the media’s response and portrayal that this is due to Trump, the Republicans, and not at all to his epic failure of protecting Jewish students.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
RSS
Nazi-Looted Art Recovered in Argentina, Daughter of Nazi Faces Charges Linked to Theft and Genocide
Curator Ariel Bassano addresses the media next to a portrait of Contessa Colleoni by Italian artist Giuseppe Ghislandi, an iconic painting stolen decades ago by the Nazis, following its recovery by Argentine officials after it was spotted in a real estate photo, in Mar del Plata, Argentina, Sept. 3, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Jose Scalzo
The daughter of a Nazi was charged on Thursday by Argentina’s federal court with concealing a painting stolen by her late father and “theft in the context of genocide” after the piece of art was turned over to authorities, local media reported.
Patricia Kadgien and her husband were placed under house arrest for three days earlier this week as authorities conducted raids on properties owned by the family in a failed attempt to find the 17th century painting “Portrait of a Lady” by Italian painter Giuseppe Ghisland. On Wednesday, a lawyer for the couple turned the painting over to the prosecutor’s office in Mar del Plata, outside of Barcelona, and at a hearing the next day, Kadgien and her husband were charged with aggravated concealment of property over their possession of the painting, the Argentine outlet InfoBrisas reported.
The court also banned Kadgien and her husband from leaving the country, ordered the couple to turn in their passports, and said they cannot stay for more than 24 hours outside of their home, according to federal prosecutor Carlos Martinez. “The crimes being covered up are serious, they are linked to crimes of genocide, theft in the context of genocide, and are related to a systematic plan to appropriate works of art and jewelry perpetrated by the Nazi regime,” Martinez stated.
The portrait of Contessa Colleoni is on the international list of lost art and the official Dutch list of artworks looted by the Nazis during World War II.
Kadgien’s late father, Friedrich Kadgien, was an SS officer and senior financial aide to Nazi leader Hermann Goering. He fled Europe after World War II and settled in Argentina, where he died in 1979. “Portrait of a Lady” was owned by the late Dutch Jewish art dealer and collector Jacques Goudstikker, who died in 1940 at the age of 42 during an attempt to flee the Nazis for England. Nazis in Amsterdam reportedly stole or bought under duress more than 1,000 pieces of art owned by Goudstikker, including “Portrait of a Lady.”
The painting by Ghislandi was spotted last month in a real estate photo for Kadgien’s home in Mar del Plata. In the picture, the iconic artwork was hanging on a wall above a couch. Authorities were notified after the painting was seen in the real estate picture, but when officers arrived at Kadgien’s home, the painting was missing and replaced on the wall with a tapestry. Officials could not immediately locate the artwork.
An art expert who worked on the case told the local La Capital Mar del Plata newspaper that he valued the portrait at “around $50,000.” Kadgien and her husband claim they are the rightful owners of the artwork, but Goudstikker’s family is fighting for the painting to be returned to them. Other artworks stolen from Goudstikker during the Holocaust were recovered in Germany and displayed in Amsterdam as part of the Dutch national collection, according to the BBC.
Prosecutors previously said that during raids on other properties owned by the Kadgien family, they discovered several pieces – including paintings, drawings, and engravings from the 19th century – that will be examined to determine if they were stolen during World War II.
RSS
New Yorker Festival Slammed for Inviting Rabid Anti-Israel Twitch Streamer Hasan Piker as Speaker
Hasan Piker. Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Organizers of the 26th annual New Yorker Festival are being sharply criticized for inviting Hasan Piker, a rabid anti-Israel online influencer and one of Twitch’s biggest streamers, to be a speaker at the event despite his vast history of making antisemitic and anti-Zionist comments, as well as expressing support for US-designated terrorist organizations.
The New Yorker Festival, hosted by the magazine The New Yorker, will be held in New York from Oct. 24-26. Piker has been invited to participate in a roundtable discussion on the last day of the annual event about “how the internet has reshaped political life — and what it means for the future of democracy.” The Turkish American political commentator will speak on stage alongside podcaster Saagar Enjeti and New Yorker staff writer Andrew Marantz.
In a series of messages posted on X, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) said The New Yorker‘s decision to give a platform to Piker “is the latest example of mainstream media normalizing his brand of antisemitism and anti-Zionism.”
“Piker’s toxic and extreme rhetoric opposing Zionism and the Jewish state normalizes #antisemitism, reinforces bigotry, and launders terror – and it has no place at a conference devoted to prominent influencers,” the ADL added. The Jewish civil rights group additionally called Piker’s invitation to the festival “deeply ironic” considering that the event will also feature novelist Salman Rushdie, who has received death threats for decades from the Iranian regime that supports Hezbollah and the Houthis – two US-designated terrorist groups that Piker has publicly praised.
Piker, who has 2.9 million followers on Twitch, has compared Yemen’s Houthis to Holocaust victim Anne Frank, broadcast propaganda videos from the Houthis during his Twitch livestreams, and defended terrorist actions by the Houthis are “an act of resistance.” He also described Lebanese Hezbollah as a “resistance group” that is “successful” during a Twitch stream posted on Sept. 28, 2024, and added, “I don’t have an issue with them.” He has also said “America deserved 9/11,” and that “it doesn’t matter if rapes happened on Oct. 7,” referring to the Hamas-led deadly terrorist attack in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
“These extreme statements, and others, should permanently disqualify him from appearing at any major media festival,” the ADL stated in conclusion.
Piker justified the Oct. 7 attack in Israel and said he believes the terrorists were not motivated by antisemitism. “These aren’t barbaric monsters … it is not coming out of a place of antiquated antisemitic tendencies or that they wanted to go out and do mass rapes,” he said of the Hamas terrorists responsible for the attack.
“It doesn’t matter if f–king rapes happened on Oct. 7,” Piker also said during a livestream on May 22, 2024. “It doesn’t change the dynamic [of Palestinians and Israelis] for me.”
During a livestream on April 18 last year, Piker said he believes Hamas is the “lesser evil” in comparison to the Israeli military. He has also joked that a second “9/11” would be “so sick” and when asked during an interview what his favorite flag is, he replied, “Hezbollah.”
High-profile attorney Gloria Allred, who has represented victims of Harvey Weinstein and Jeffrey Epstein, told The Telegraph that The New Yorker Festival should not be hosting someone who plays down the rape of women that took place during the Oct. 7 attack.
“We should not provide mainstream forums for persons who may wish to normalize the concept that rape doesn’t matter, because I believe that rape always matters, not only to the victims of rape, but also to the status and condition and future of women and girls,” Allred said. “I also believe that persons who express hate speech should not be invited to prestigious round tables. Anyone who suggests that it doesn’t matter if rape happened, [that] should be sufficient to exclude a person from an invitation list to participate in the New Yorker round table.”
Allred told The Telegraph that although she believes “people with unpopular and extremist views have a right to express their opinions, I do not believe that a publisher has any legal obligation to provide a platform to such persons to express their views.”
Piker has been celebrated in profiles by Rolling Stones magazine, the New York Times and GQ. He is also a supporter of New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, who has repeatedly accused Israel of “apartheid” and “genocide” in the Gaza Strip, and refuses to affirm Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state.
During a Twitch stream, Piker said any “Zionist entity” should be “treated in the same way as a rabid neo-Nazi, and you shouldn’t even let someone be the local dog catcher if they’ve ever exhibited any positive feelings about the State of Israel.”
At the 2025 People’s Conference for Palestine in August, he said “some of the worst people” in the world include “the Michael Rapaports of the world, the Amy Schumers of the world … Satan-yahu.” Both Rapaport and Schumer are proud Jewish celebrities and “Satan-yahu” is a clear reference to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The New Yorker Festival will be held from Oct. 24-26.