The Jews in Lublin - Biblioteka Multimedialna Teatrnn.pl - Brama ...

Valley, where some executions were held 13 . Yet, there is no official permission for local
and regional Lviv authorities to erect a monument 14 .
In Lublin in 1962, on the initiative of the Jewish survivors, a monument was established
commemorating the Lublin and Lublin region Jews murdered during the Nazi
occupation, however, its secluded location (between Świętoduska St. and Lubartowska
St.) proves the then authorities were leaning towards belittling this problematic subject.
A permit was not granted for a location in the present day Castle Square (in 1962 Peoples
Gathering Square), which had been the heart of the ghetto, because it served as the venue
for communist festivals and the monument would purportedly have been excessively
exhibited. Originally, the city authorities intended to place the memorial among the Old
Town tenement buildings, in a little square at the junction of Rybna St. and Noworybna
St. Yet, as a consequence of long negotiations the monument found its place in its present
location 15 . The extermination of Jews was not shown or incorporated in the ideas of
international character, of the victimization, as it was in the case with the Auschwitz and
Majdanek concentration camps or even the Sobibor extermination camp.
After 1968 Jewish issues in Poland were totally supressed. In the USSR this lasted
even longer - until the 1980's, by which time Poland had already started discussions
on the role of Jews in the Polish historical consciousness, and the first commemoration
attempts were undertaken. In both countries, however, the surviving historical buildings
and monuments still suffered devastation 16 .
13 Until 2005 this area was the location of a police kennel. In 2006 the Police moved elsewhere but the
area remains squalid and the kennel buildings are decrepit. The authors observations from a Lviv trip
in 2005 and 2006.
14 The most known Ukrainian site related to Holocaust, which was affected by the Soviet oblivion'
policy, is Babi Jar in Kiev; in September 1941 the Germans murdered over 30,000 Kiev Jews there.
This place had no monument for many years. The site was completely rebuilt and does not resemble
the original Babi Jar today. The nearby Jewish cemetery, where those executed were collected, was
totally devastated in the 1960s. Babi Jar was prohibited from being spoken about. It was not until the
1990s when the site was partially returned its correct place in remembrance.
15 Presently, (since 2006) there is a construction of multi-level underground parking garage, thus the
monument was temporarily moved to the vicinity of the pre-war Jewish female school (currently, Primary
School 24) at 1 Niecała Street. On the location obstacles, see the unpublished author's interview
with Izydor Sznajdman (August 2000).
16 An example of such devastation is the new Jewish cemetery in Kołomyja, Ivano-Frankivsk District
(former Stanisławów Province). In the second half of the 1980s the local authorities decided to have
this graveyard completely demolished. The gravestones were shovelled by a bulldozer and cast into the
river, and the graveyard turned into a square and football pitch. Only part of the wall survived with visible
bullet marks on it - the cemetery was an execution site for Jews, but also for Poles and Ukrainians
who helped them. Until now, no memorial plaque has been installed. The information comes from the
author's own observations in Kołomyja in 2006 and the interview with Borys Bojko an inhabitant of
Kołomyja.
68