Obj. ID: 34370
Memorials Holocaust Monument near the Killing Site in Miadzel' (Miadel'), Belarus, 2000s (?)
Memorial Name
No official name
Who is Commemorated?
60 Jewish victims from Miadzel' (Miadel'), shot to death on September 21, 1942.
Description
The monument, erected in the approximate vicinity of the Miadzel' (Miadel') Jews' killing site at Lake Batoryn, is a massive boulder of irregular shape. It bears a memorial plaque with a Belarusian inscription.
Inscription
In Belarusian:
Паблiзу гэтага месца 21 верасня
1942 года нямецка-фашысткімі
захопнікамі растраляны 60 мірных
жыхароў стврыкоў, жанчын і дзяцей
яурэйскай нацыянальнасці
з гарадскога паселка Мядзел
Translation: Near this place, on September 21, 1942, 60 peaceful inhabitants of the Jewish nationality from the urban settlement of Myadzel - elderly, women, and children - were shot to death by German fascist invaders.
Commissioned by
Probably, the victims' relatives.
sub-set tree: 
Miadzel' (Miadel') was occupied by the Germans on July 2, 1941 [Al'tman]. The occupiers issued a slew of anti-Jewish decrees, including the requirement to wear a yellow Star of David on the clothing, a prohibition on leaving the town, and the imposition of forced labor. In September 1941, the Germans shot a group of 35-50 local Jews near the Mkhi Forest. In November of that year, a ghetto was established [Yad Vashem: The Untold Stories].
In August 1942, rumors began to circulate about the impending liquidation of the Miadzel' (Miadel') Ghetto. In September of that year, some 70-80 Jews escaped from the ghetto into the forests. On September 21, the Germans and the Belarusian auxiliary policemen rounded up all the remaining Jews of Miadzel' (Miadel'), separated fifty "specialists" (skilled artisans) and their families, and then shot seventy people in the Bor Forest. Of those Jews who had managed to flee, some twenty were tracked down in the forests and shot by the Germans and the local policemen over the following days [Yad Vashem: the Untold Stories].
Ninety Jewish workers remained in the ghetto. In October 1942, Yakov Segalchik, a local Jew who was serving with the Soviet partisans at the time, entered the ghetto. On behalf of his unit, he urged the "specialists" to flee with him and join the partisans. Only when Segalchik began to speak Yiddish did they believe him and agree to flee [Yad Vashem: The Untold Stories].
The commemoration of the Miadzel' (Miadel') Jews began in 1993 when the first memorial stele was erected in the Mkhi Forest by Israeli relatives of the victims. A second memorial commemorates the Jews of Miadzel' (Miadel') who were killed in September 1942. It, too, was erected by Israeli relatives of the victims in 1993. This monument stands on the shore of Lake Batoryn, not far from the present-day Minsk-Naroch road, a mile south of the town. By the side of the road, there is a stone under the discussion pointing to this memorial at Lake Batoryn.
Il'ya, Al'tman (ed.), Kholokost na territorii SSSR (Moskva: ROSSPEN, 2011)
"Miadzel,"
Untold Stories - Murder Sites of Jews in Occupied Territories of the USSR (Yad Vashem project), https://collections.yadvashem.org/en/untold-stories/community/14622429.