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Bulgarian Jews skipped an official ceremony marking 80 years since their rescue from the Nazis. Why?
(JTA) — Bulgaria’s president was on hand on Friday for a ceremony marking the 80th anniversary of the country’s dramatic decision to save its 48,000 Jews from the Nazis.
So were representatives of the Bulgarian Orthodox church whose predecessors instigated the rescue, as well as a prominent Bulgarian-born Israeli historian and politician, Michael Bar Zohar, who published an early history of the episode, which was barely known until after the fall of communism.
Together they marched from Bulgaria’s national library — where an exhibition about Bulgaria’s World War II-era king, Tsar Boris III, is being held — to Sofia’s oldest church, where they lay flowers on a memorial to Boris and his wife, Tsarina Joanna.
But conspicuously absent from the ceremony with President Rumen Radev were any representatives of Bulgaria’s contemporary Jewish community,
Community leaders were invited only at the last possible minute, on Thursday afternoon, according to Alexander Oscar, president of Shalom The Organization of Bulgarian Jews. His group had already planned its own observance of March 10, known by Bulgarian Jews as “Day of Salvation.”
But Oscar said he would not have attended even if he’d been invited earlier — and he thought no one else from the local Jewish community would have either.
“Nobody from the community would have taken part in an event honoring the imaginary role of King Boris in rescuing the Bulgarian Jews and presenting a distorted history of the Holocaust,” Oscar told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Oscar’s comments point to a longstanding and increasingly potent dispute over how Tsar Boris III should factor into Bulgaria’s Holocaust memory. Though Boris did sign off on the order to halt the deportation of the country’s Jews, he was also the leader of a fascist government that allied with Nazi Germany, imposed oppressive racial laws on its Jews and facilitated the murder of more than 11,000 Jews in territory it occupied. Boris died under mysterious circumstances shortly after returning from Germany where he met with Hitler in 1943.
Bulgarian troops deported more than 11,000 Jews living in Western Thrace, Vardar, Macedonia and the town of Pirot in today’s Serbia to Nazi death camps, where almost all were murdered.
St. Sophia Church, where the president’s ceremony took place, is home to plaques honoring Tsar Boris III and his wife that briefly stood in Jerusalem’s Bulgarian Forest. The plaques were removed in 2000 after protests by Bulgarian Jews and their descendants who were uncomfortable with lionizing someone who oversaw the murder of Jews during the Holocaust.
Past “Day of Salvation” commemorations have not specifically exalted Boris. But the wartime leader is a favorite of Bulgaria’s far right and those who admire the country’s pre-communist governments, and his profile has only risen in recent years as Bulgaria, like many other countries, has experienced a strengthening of its right wing.
“What we choose to remember and what we choose to omit when telling our own story is a mark of wisdom, courage and dignity,” wrote Bulgarian Jewish journalist Emmy Barouh in an open letter to Radev before the commemoration event.
“There is no morality to be found in the sinister arithmetic that the lives of 50,000 were ‘paid for’ by the lives of 11,343,” Barouh wrote. “Skipping half of this sad ‘equation’ turns ‘80th anniversary of the rescue’ into another episode of political use of Bulgarian Jews.”
Immediately after the war, the Jewish population of Bulgaria was still about 50,000, its prewar level, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. But unlike in most communist countries, the government allowed Jews to emigrate in large numbers and in fact encouraged them to do so; the vast majority departed for Israel in the late 1940s. Today, the World Jewish Congress estimates the country’s Jewish population at between 2,000 and 6,000; the country recently saw the creation of a Jewish school in Sofia and a cultural center in the remains of a crumbling synagogue in the coastal city of Vidin.
The former sanctuary of the central synagogue in Vidin, Bulgaria, built in 1894, is today crumbling and missing a roof. (Jonah Goldman Kay)
Local Jewish leaders marked the anniversary in other ways. Earlier in the week, some traveled to Kavala, Greece, for a ceremony at the site where Bulgarian soldiers deported thousands of Jews to Treblinka in 1943. On Friday, they also held their own ceremony at a different monument in Sofia commemorating both the rescue and the murder of the Jews in Bulgarian-occupied regions. They were joined by public figures including Sofia’s mayor and Bulgaria’s foreign minister, Nikolay Milkov, and its prosecutor general.
Some Bulgarians had openly called for their country to pay greater homage to Tsar Boris III at this year’s March 10 commemorations. Daniela Gortcheva, a Dutch-Bulgarian right-wing media figure, circulated a petition calling for him to be recognized.
The petition asserted that leaving Boris out of the commemoration would be akin to what happened in the Macedonian city of Ohrid last year, when a Bulgarian cultural club named after Boris drew protests from those who noted that Boris’s government was responsible for the murder of thousands of Macedonian Jews.
That incident, the latest in a long-running conflict between the two Balkan nations over World War II history, rocketed Tsar Boris back into the national spotlight in Bulgaria and made his rehabilitation a focus of Bulgarian nationalists.
After Jewish groups rebuffed the petition, Gortcheva attacked her critics on Facebook as ungrateful “heirs of Communists,” “a fifth column of Moscow” and traitors — claims that Jewish leaders say echo antisemitic smears made against Jews in the past.
Shalom, Bulgarian Jewry’s leading organization, has filed a complaint against Gortcheva with Bulgaria’s prosecutor general — the same official who last month ruled that Bulgaria could bar a neo-Nazi march honoring a Nazi collaborator.
“Gortcheva — a great supporter of the Lukov march — has been persistently involved in the spread of Holocaust denial and distortion,” World Jewish Congress Executive Vice President Maram Stern said in a letter to Milkov. “She combines such statements with slanderous claims that the Organization of the Jews in Bulgaria SHALOM and the Organization of the Bulgarian Jews in Israel are disloyal to Bulgaria.”
Following last week’s ceremonies, a group of Bulgarian scholars have circulated their own appeal this week, calling on Bulgarian leaders to acknowledge the deportations of Jews under the country’s rule during the Holocaust.
“Our state never tried to find the appropriate language to mark two inseparable and yet antipodal historical facts: the preserved life of the Jews from the prewar territories of Bulgaria and the deportation to Treblinka (4-29 March 1943) of those from the lands occupied in April 1941,” the appeal reads. “The Bulgarian state should acknowledge publicly, sincerely and unconditionally its responsibility by apologizing for the persecutions and deportations of Jews during World War II.”
“It is a matter of basic decency and tactfulness that emphasizing the salvation should be done by those who were saved and not by the savior,” the petition added. “Here, exactly the opposite occurs: Bulgarians are engaging in self-glorification and inviting the Jewish community to pay them eternal gratitude.”
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Mamdani’s first statement on antisemitism as mayor-elect got some weird pushback
The morning after Zohran Mamdani won New York’s mayoral election, someone spraypainted swastikas on a Syrian Jewish yeshiva’s windows and walls.
“This is a disgusting and heartbreaking act of antisemitism, and it has no place in our beautiful city,” Mamdani wrote on X that morning. “As Mayor, I will always stand steadfast with our Jewish neighbors to root the scourge of antisemitism out of our city.”
It seemed like a perfect moment for Mamdani, whose campaign was dogged by assertions that he would be soft on antisemitism to reassure the city’s Jewish population that he will have their back — perhaps too perfect.
But immediately after Mamdani made that statement, conspirac y theories began to swirl around the graffiti alleging that it was a “false flag” — an incident that is not, in fact, carried out by the apparently responsible party. In this case, the conspiracy theory implied that the swastikas were painted by pro-Israel supporters trying to prove that Mamdani will encourage violence against Jews.
“Don’t fall for it until you find out who did it. They’re famous for these false flags,” argued one viral reply. “Anything to keep the victim spotlight on them to keep Israel’s stranglehold on the West.”
Others criticized Mamdani’s statement — for overemphasizing the gravity of the incident, and being too friendly to Jews. Some posted that Mamdani had already betrayed his voters. Others urged him to focus instead on Islamophobia.
“There’s no ‘scourge of antisemitism’ in NYC. Acts like these, while reprehensible, are often weaponized to justify Zionist narratives and repression of Palestine solidarity,” wrote Nerdeen Kiswani, the founder of pro-Palestinian activist group Within Our Lifetime. “Mamdani shouldn’t be validating this framing.”
Many people also lauded Mamdani’s statement as reassuring and necessary. But the immediate uproar over what seemed to be a very basic condemnation of Nazi imagery — a condemnation that did not name or blame any particular group for the act, whether pro-Palestinian activists, neo-Nazis or false flag attackers — encapsulates the tricky position the new mayor-elect occupies, particularly when addressing antisemitism.
Part of Mamdani’s new constituency is desperately nervous that he won’t hear them or protect them; the other is worried he will overcompensate by emphasizing Jewish concerns over their own. And judging by the conspiratorial tenor to the response, some feel emboldened to lean into their own antisemitism, even when he is speaking out against it.
But Mamdani’s statement did not rank antisemitism above — or below — other priorities. The controversy around his words calls to mind a famous post from the old days of Twitter, which is still regularly passed around in meme form. It calls the site “the only place where well-articulated sentences get misinterpreted. You can say ‘I like pancakes’ and someone will say ‘So you hate waffles?’”
The post Mamdani’s first statement on antisemitism as mayor-elect got some weird pushback appeared first on The Forward.
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On the trail of a priceless dove, a group of Palestinians and Israelis find that peace is for the birds
When Yaki, a struggling Israeli musician, learns his late father’s beloved dove is worth tens of thousands of dollars, he knows he’s found the key to supporting his fledgling career. There’s just one problem: Yaki has given the dove away.
Bella, co-directed by Israeli filmmakers Jamal Khalaily and Zohar Shachar, chronicles the tumultuous road trip Yaki embarks on to retrieve the prized bird, with the assistance of his girlfriend Limor, and a Palestinian couple, Bilal and Najris. Although the conflict over the ownership of the dove occasionally feels like a heavy-handed metaphor for the struggle for peace in the region, the story balances funny and heartfelt moments.
It’s virtually impossible for a film about Israel to avoid mentioning Israeli-Palestinian relations, but at first, the tensions are only acknowledged in offhand ways. A representative of the Israeli Pigeon Fanciers’ Administration casually tells Yaki that Bilal can’t have the bird because “Arabs eat them.” But as the group encounters military checkpoints and ethnic profiling along their journey, the disparities in Israeli society become impossible to ignore.
The film refutes a popular misconception of Israeli-Palestinian relations that has not been addressed much in other media: that the dynamics can be understood as operating exactly the same as white-Black racism in America.
A narrative common among the American left is that Israeli society is white and Palestinians are brown, therefore the system of oppression can be approached using the same analytical and political tools of racial justice movements in America. But it would not be appropriate to categorize Israelis and Palestinians into the American racial framework, as both of these ethnic groups are incredibly racially diverse. There also aren’t definite phenotypical distinctions between the two groups. When Limor tells the Israeli soldiers guarding a checkpoint that Bilal and Najris are Israeli, they don’t argue with her.
The film exposes the fact that the prejudices have less to do with appearance or actions, and more with the assumptions made about specific ethnic groups.
At one point, the group has to travel to Area A of the West Bank for a wedding. A sign warns that it is illegal and dangerous for Israelis to be there, but Bilal tells the Palestinian Authority guards that Yaki and Limor are from Brussels. He brings them to the wedding where they are greeted warmly. The wedding singer even includes them in his song praising the various guests.
But when Bilal’s son Omar accidentally exposes their true identities, the mood sours, despite the fact that Yaki and Limor haven’t acted in any way that would warrant criticism. Bilal and Najris rush the couple out of the wedding for their safety, as Bilal’s brother in law berates him for “bringing Jews to the wedding.”
From what the film shows, peace among Israeli and Palestinians should seemingly be easy. Without the labels and preconceived notions, these two groups of people would be able to enjoy life together. But reality is never that simple and peace, like the dove, seems way out of reach.
Bella is having its United States debut at the Other Israel Film Festival at the Marlene Meyerson JCC on Thursday, November 13.
The post On the trail of a priceless dove, a group of Palestinians and Israelis find that peace is for the birds appeared first on The Forward.
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Eleven Arrested Amid Heavy UK Police Presence at Soccer Match Between Maccabi Tel Aviv and Aston Villa
Soccer Football – UEFA Europa League – Aston Villa v Maccabi Tel Aviv – Villa Park, Birmingham, Britain – Nov. 6, 2025, Aston Villa’s Ian Maatsen scores their first goal. Photo: Action Images via Reuters
British police said 11 men were arrested during protests outside Maccabi Tel Aviv’s UEFA Europa League game on Thursday night against Aston Villa in the United Kingdom, a match in which the Israeli team lost and also had its fans banned from attending.
West Midlands Police said a 63-year-old man was arrested for a racially aggravated public order offense after he was heard shouting a racist remark during a road rage incident near Villa Park, the arena where the match was taking place. A 21-year-old man was arrested for failing to comply with an order to remove a face mask, and a 17-year-old boy was arrested for failing to comply with a dispersal order.
Three other people were arrested on suspicion of racially aggravated public order offenses, including a 34-year-old and 29-year-old who both shouted abuse toward pro-Israel demonstrators. The latter was also arrested for possession of an illegal drug, and a 67-year-old was arrested for shouting racist abuse at a police officer.
A 32-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of a racially aggravated public order offense after shouting racist abuse toward a pro-Palestinian group. Meanwhile, a 21-year-old man was arrested after trying to throw fireworks on the ground, and another was arrested on suspicion of possession with intent to supply drugs.
West Midlands Police maintained a “high-visibility police presence” around Villa Park throughout the night, the police department said. Roughly 700 officers were dispatched to keep order outside the arena amid planned protests by pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli groups. There were also police horses, police dogs, a drone unit, roads policing unit, and protest liaison officers.
“This has definitely been one of the most contentious and controversial matches we’ve hosted for some time, but our priority, really clearly, is public safety,” said Birmingham Police Commander and Chief Superintendent Tom Joyce. “It’s about protecting the communities that live in and around Aston Villa, and reassuring those communities who are potentially affected by the match tonight.”
Aston Villa beat Maccabi Tel Aviv 2-0 in the league phase match taking place at Villa Park, which located in the city of Birmingham in central England. At the end of the match, lines of police officers made sure soccer fans leaving the stadium were separated from the anti-Israel protesters who remained outside the area and there were no confrontations, according to The Independent. Police officers also pushed back protestors outside Villa Park during the game.
Before the start of the game, hundreds attended a protest outside of Villa Park, organized by the group Palestine Solidarity Campaign, to demand Israel be excluded from all international soccer competitions. Attendees held signs with anti-Israel messages and Palestinian flags, and chanted “Free, free Palestine.” A smaller counter-protest took place in solidarity with the Israeli club and its fans, who had been banned from attending the game.
Maccabi Tel Aviv fan and Arab-Christian activist Yoseph Haddad traveled from Israel to express support for Maccabi Tel Aviv at the venue and protest the ban against the club’s supporters.
“You have a problem with us and not the fact that people cannot come to Britain and watch a football game because you have extremists here who don’t want certain people to be here? You should check yourself,” he said in a video shared on X. “We’re not in Nazi Germany. This is not the 1940s. And I promise you we will not be silent. We will be here, and show the truth of the Israeli society, and we will scream it and shout it as loud as possible. Stop the hate.”
I’m here in Birmingham outside Aston Villa’s stadium standing proudly.
Because we have nothing to be ashamed of and no reason to be afraid – it’s the terror supporters who need to hide, not us! pic.twitter.com/lzs3C6fW8l— יוסף חדאד – Yoseph Haddad (@YosephHaddad) November 6, 2025
The ban against Maccabi Tel Aviv fans was imposed by Birmingham’s Safety Advisory Group and police, which deemed the match as “high risk” and said the ban was necessary “to mitigate risks to public safety.” Government officials in Israel and the UK, including British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, condemned the decision. The UK government said it was taking steps to try to reverse the move, but Maccabi Tel Aviv then announced it would decline to accept any allocated tickets for its fans due to its own safety concerns.
Joyce told Sky News that “significant levels of hooliganism” among Maccabi Tel Aviv fans is the reason they were banned from Thursday’s match.
“We are simply trying to make decisions based on community safety, driven by the intelligence that was available to us and our assessment of the risk that was coming from admitting traveling fans,” Joyce said ahead of the match. “I’m aware there’s a lot of commentary around the threat to the [Maccabi] fans being the reason for the decision. To be clear, that was not the primary driver. That was a consideration. We have intelligence and information that says that there is a section of Maccabi fans, not all Maccabi fans, but a section who engage in quite significant levels of hooliganism.”
Maccabi Tel Aviv’s Chief Executive Jack Angelide criticized the “blatant falsehoods” about the club’s supporters.
“We have not been given a clear reason,” he told Sky News. “I have seen people coming up with all sorts of stories about our fans, especially in Amsterdam, where there was, what the Amsterdam authorities themselves classified as “a Jew hunt,” being portrayed as organized fighters, soldiers, etc., etc. It’s just blatant falsehoods, and people who say those things know that they’re false and shame on them.”