Historical Background
22 June 1941 marked the start of Operation Barbarossa, a turning point in Nazi anti-Jewish policy, resulting in the mass murder of some 1.5 million Jews under Nazi occupation in forests and ravines such as Ponar and Babi Yar.
By the end of 1941 the 40,000 Jews remaining in Lithuania were incarcerated in the ghettos of Vilna, Kovno, Siauliai and Swieciany, which were later liquidated. Most Latvian Jews had been murdered by the end of 1941. Estonia was reported Judenfrei in January 1942.
"Everything happening was so foreign and strange, so different from every concept and convention of our lives so far. A desire arose in me to paint from this new reality, to convey things as I saw them. [...] Over time I began to see my work as essential."
Esther Lurie
Spotlight
February 1942
March 1943
November 1943
From the Online Exhibitions
When the Germans invaded the USSR in 1941, Ephraim and Ruchama Grinburg fled Kovno with their two daughters, seeking refuge in the East. Their journey through war-torn Soviet territory was marked by hardship, loss and resilience— culminating in the death of their baby daughter and Ephraim’s passing in exile. Ruchama and their surviving daughter Aliza eventually made their way to Israel in 1949.
Music of the Holocaust
In 1944, Shraga, Frida and their three children were deported to camps in Germany
On 22 November 1941, Berta and Josef Eschwege from Frankfurt were deported. Three days later, they were murdered at the Ninth Fort in Kovno.
“My father’s precept, to be a good person, has been the essence of my life”
From the Yad Vashem Art Collection
"Everything happening was so foreign and strange, so different from every concept and convention of our lives so far. A desire arose in me to paint from this new reality, to convey things as I saw them. [...] Over time I began to see my work as essential."
Esther Lurie
(1913 - 1998)
Under orders from the Germans, Lurie began painting landscapes and portraits in the Kovno ghetto. At the request of the Ältestenrat, she documented ghetto scenes.
(1903 - 1945)
At the initiative of the Ältestenrat to document life in the ghetto, Lifschitz joined a group of artists who portrayed daily life.
(1919 - 1993)
Schlesinger drew portraits of members of the Jewish leadership of the Kovno ghetto, the chiefs of the Jewish police, physicians and public figures.
Ordinary People, Extraordinary Courage: Righteous Among the Nations
Japan
"People who had escaped from Poland, a place dangerous for them, and together with their children walking day and night, reached Kaunas and the Japanese Consulate asking for visas."
The Rescue of the Future Chief Justice of Israel
Paukstys provided false papers for the ghetto underground, helped Jews escape from the ghetto, hid them in his quarters and found places of shelter for them.
The Lithuanian doctor, director of the Lopselis orphanage in Vilijampolė, succeeded in saving the lives of dozens of Jewish children from Kovno
During the occupation, Ubarevič took advantage of her position at the Lopselis orphanage in Vilijampolė to turn it into a shelter for Jewish children from the Kovno ghetto
This Lithuanian couple risked their lives to hide seven Jews in a bunker under their cellar during World War II.
Lidija and her family provided a Jewish family with forged papers and a safe haven during the Holocaust
Two sisters smuggled a family out of the Kovno ghetto and hid them until the end of the war
This extended family assisted and sheltered many Jews from the Kovno ghetto
Digital Collections
A Lithuanian Jewish photographer who documented life in the Kovno ghetto during the Holocaust
Documents
A Build-It-Yourself exhibition in an accessible print and display format designed to promote dialogue about the Holocaust
From the Yad Vashem Artifacts Collection
Online Store
Uri Chanoch | Judith Chanoch
Edited by David Bankier and Israel Gutman
Safira Rapoport
Editors: Roni Stauber, Aviva Halamish, Esther Webman
Ilya Gerber, Edited by Lea Prais
Ages 15+ Subtitles in English
Ages 12-14