December 22, 2012 | 11:23 am

Jewish travel tips for Berlin: much more than Holocaust history

Posted by Ruth Ellen Gruber

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My friend and colleague Toby Axelrod, who has lived in Berlin for years and knows the city -- and its Jewish life and culture -- in detail, has put together a brief itinerary for Jewish-interest tourists to the German capital.

"Berlin offers Jewish tourists more than Holocaust history," she writes for JTA, and she provides a run-down of famous sites, like the Berlin Jewish Museum of Berlin, as well as more out of the way places..

It used to be that few Jews would consider Berlin, or even Germany at all, as a tourist destination. But that has changed as Berlin has become a top European draw, particularly for young people and artsy types.

For Jewish visitors, it’s not despite the history, but largely because of it that Berlin is so compelling. The place where the destruction of European Jewry was planned is now a site of Jewish resurgence, and Jewish visitors would do well to see both sides of the equation.

She describes how the immigration of thousand of Jews from the former Soviet Union -- and Israel --  has changed the face of Jewish Berlin:

Though the official number of Jews in Berlin is 11,000, up from 4,000 two decades ago, locals believe there may be as many as 30,000 Jews here, half of them Israeli expats who have come for Berlin’s thriving cultural and arts scene. The Hebrew language website Israelisinberlin.de and Aviv Russ’ weekly Kol Berlin radio show offer a taste of Israeli life here. Those interested in clubbing it Jewish style can also see if Israeli expat Aviv Netter is planning one of his famous dance parties by visiting the Facebook group Berlin Meschugge. Or they can party with young Jews from Berlin’s Russian-Jewish scene at the “Russendisko” dance parties of Jewish writer and DJ Wladimir Kaminer.

If you time your visit to the city’s annual Days of Jewish Culture, held in late summer for about two weeks, you’ll see not only world-class musicians and other Jewish and Israeli performers in Berlin -- but also the undying fascination non-Jewish Germans have with all things Jewish. Likewise, the annual Berlin-Potsdam Jewish Film Festival, which is scheduled for April 29 - May 12, 2013; many films and events are in English.

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December 12, 2012 | 5:19 am

Czech 10 Stars Project will be nationwide Jewish Museum

Posted by Ruth Ellen Gruber

I've written an article for JTA about the Czech Republic's 10 Stars project -- and innovative Jewish heritage project that will amount to a nationwide Jewish Museum with 10 thematic exhibits located in 10 restored synagogue in 10 different towns and cities around the country: Úštěk, Jičín, and Brandýs nad Labem to the north; Plzeň and Březnice to the west; Nová Cerekev and Polná in the south-central part of the country;  Boskovice, Mikulov and Krnov to the east..

The project is being coordinated by the Czech Federation of Jewish Communities, which owns the buildings, with 85 percent of the funding coming from a $14 million grant from the European Union. About 15 percent of the financing is being provided by the Czech Culture Ministry.

“It’s actually one museum scattered around the country,” said Tomas Kraus, the executive director of the federation.

“The exhibition in each site will be linked to one certain phenomenon in Jewish history, culture, religion, traditions,” he said. “The idea is that if you visit one of the sites, even by chance, you will realize that there are nine other parts of the exhibition, so you will want to visit them, too.”

To encourage this, 10 Stars will issue a “passport” that can be stamped each time a person visits one of the synagogues in the network. When all 10 stamps are filled in, the passport can be redeemed for a prize.

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10 Stars is due to open in October 2013, around the time of the new Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw. But it so far has received little publicity -- even its web site is only in Czech, limiting the audience.

I have visited a number ot these sites already: some of them were already restored in earlier years but are now undergoing maintenance and other work. Exhibits that already existed in the synagogues at Boskovice, Mikulov, Ustek and Polna are being revamped or expanded as part of the 10 Stars program.

In Ustek, the rabbi's house next door to the restored synagogue will be used to house an exhibit on Jewish education. The restored Jewish schoolroom, already installed in the basement of the synagogue, will remain as part of the new exhibit.

 Ustek synagogue. Photo © Ruth Ellen Gruber

 

Recreated Jewish schoolroom installed in Ustek synagogue basement. Photo © Ruth Ellen Gruber

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December 7, 2012 | 10:50 am

New books on Jewish heritage in Czech Republic and Poland

Posted by Ruth Ellen Gruber

I’ve got my hands on two new books that deal with the restoration of historic Jewish sites in Poland and the Czech Republic. Both are oversized, both are bilingual (English and the local language)and both feature a combination of text and photographs.

Both, too, are, in a sense, celebrations of the restoration of Jewish heritage sites in those countries since the fall of communism in 1989.
But they are quite different in scope, design and presentation.

Brány spravedlivých. Synagogy Moravy, Slezska a Čech - The gates of the righteous. Synagogues of Moravia, Silesia and Bohemia, by Jaroslav Klenovsky and photographer Ludmila Hajkova (FotoStudio H, Usti nad Labem), is a gorgeous coffee-table book that examines in some detail 54 of the synagogues that now stand in the Czech Republic, chosen to illustrate different architectural and decorative styles as well as history.

Klenovsky, based in Brno, is a pioneer in the post-World War II and post-Communist documentation of Jewish heritage sites in Czech lands, especially in Moravia, and has written widely about synagogues, cemeteries and Jewish quarters.

The synagogues in the book are arranged in chronological order, from the 13th century AltNeu (Old-New) synagogue in Prague, to the modern synagogue in Liberec, dedicated in 2000.

Several pages are devoted to each building: an explanatory text sketches the history of the synagogue and local Jewish community and also provides an architectural description. Lush color photos depict both the interior and exterior of each building, as well as details, and each is also accompanied by drawings showing the floor plan of the building as well as its location in the city.

The Nazis destroyed 70 synagogues, but 105 more were destroyed under Communist rule. The Czech Republic and its Jewish community hold an enviable record in post-Communist preservation of Jewish heritage sites: 65 synagogues have been reconstructed since 1989. (The Jubilee Synagogue in Prague hosts a permanent exhibition on restorations that opened in June of this year. It focuses on heritage sites that come under the jurisdiction of the Jewish Community of Prague — which is responsible for the management of 28 synagogues and 159 cemeteries in three regions of Bohemia. The Prague Jewish Community web site has a section with an interactive map of the heritage sites owned and maintained by the community.)

Currently, seven synagogues in CZ are used as Jewish houses of worship, 35 are Christian churches, 43 are used as museum or for cultural purposes, 15 warehouses and storage facilities, 20 are under reconstruction or without use.

Preserving Jewish Heritage in Poland – in which I am pleased to say I have an essay – was officially launched Nov. 4 in Warsaw.

Co-financed by the Polish Foreign Ministry (which will distribute copies of it), it was published explicitly to mark the 10th anniversary of the Foundation for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage in Poland, or FODZ. It highlights FODZ’s work over the past decade and presents examples of FODZ’s synagogue and cemetery restoration projects, such as the restoration of the Renaissance synagogue in Zamosc, as well as its educational programs and its Chassidic Route tourism itinerary. The full text and photos of the book can be downloaded from the FODZ web site.

The focus of the book, thus, is more on policy and process than on the buildings or cemeteries themselves.

In one of the chapters, FODZ CEO Monika Krawczyk traces the history of the Foundation, which was born out of a compromise agreement following the heated debates over who should obtain restituted property that took place after Poland passed its 1997 law regulating the relations between the state and Jewish communities in Poland. A main focus of that law was restitution of pre-WW2 Jewish communal property. An agreement in 2000 led to the establishment of FODZ, granting it territorial jurisdiction for restitution and Jewish heritage in those parts of Poland where no active Jewish community now exists. This includes most of eastern and southeastern Poland.

In her essay, Veronika Litwin of FODZ notes that it was not until that law was passed that “hope for change began to emerge” that the widespread neglect of Jewish sites since World War II might be redressed.

As for my own essay? It's a personal look back on my nearly 25 years of involvement with Jewish heritage issues in Poland.

 

 

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