Obj. ID: 48581
Jewish Funerary Art Old Holocaust Memorial at the Poboy Anti-Tank Trenches in Iziaslav, Ukraine
Memorial Name
No given name
Who is Commemorated?
The roughly one thousand Jewish residents of Izyaslav murdered at this site during the Holocaust.
Description
This monument took the shape of a short obelisk with a flat top with smooth sides carved from a block of granite. It's base was a connected cube of the same stone.
On the monument's front face is a plaque with an inscription. When the monument was first erected in 1949, the inscription was Russian, but after Ukraine gained it's independence the plaque was replaced by one in Ukrainian (after 1991). Neither inscription mentioned the Jewish identities of the victims.
Inscription
Russian (earlier) inscription:
Здесь
покоятся
мирные
жители
растрелянные
немецкими
фашистами
в 1941 г.
Translation: Here are buried innocent residents [of Iziaslav] who were shot to death by the German Fascists in 1941
Ukrainian (later) inscription:
Тут
захороненi
мирнi жителi
м. Iзяслав
розстрiлянi
нiмецькими
фашистами
Translation: Here are buried innocent residents of the town of Iziaslav who were shot to death by the German Fascists
Commissioned By
Unknown
2 image(s)
sub-set tree:
In 1939, the Jewish population of Iziaslav numbered 3,208 individuals, roughly 28% of the population. Few local Jews managed to flee when the war began, and when the Germans occupied the town city on July 5th, 1941, they were made to wear yellow badges on their chests and backs. In August 1941, members of the local police and Germans killed over 1,000 Jews, and the rest were herded into a ghetto.
The Ghetto was destroyed in June 1942, when the rest of the Jewish victims were murdered except, for a small group of skilled workers, who were murdered in January 1943. Iziaslav was liberated by the Red Army on February 28th, 1944.
This monument was erected at this site in 1949 by the local Jews. It was vandalized several times with antisemitic graffiti. When Ukraine gained its independence the inscription was replaced with a similar one in Ukrainian, though the inscription still didn't reference the Jewish identities of the victims ("Izyaslav," Yad Vashem)
According to records at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Center, this memorial was placed at the site of the first "killing action" at Iziaslav during the Holocaust, on August 30th, 1941. Roughly 1,000 Jewish residents of Iziaslav, mostly women, children, and the elderly, were murdered and buried here (ibid.).
An new, additional monument, was erected nearby by the Tsal Kaplun Foundation in 2019 (see ID 48448).
"Destruction of Jewish Community of Izyaslav" (Tsal Kaplun Foundation), https://www.tkfgen.org/izyaslav_shoah.html (accessed March 23, 2023)
"Izyaslav" Untold Stories (Yad Vashem), https://collections.yadvashem.org/en/untold-stories/community/14621971 (accessed March 23, 2023)