Obj. ID: 44077 Holocaust memorial in the Jewish Cemetery in Rēzekne, Latvia, 1980
Memorial Name
No official name
Who is Commemorated?
Jewish Holocaust victims from Rēzekne
Description:
The monument is situated near the today’s entrance to the Jewish cemetery.
It is a high stele of gray granite of uneven form placed on a concrete pedestal. A Star of David of the Hebrew letters פ"נ appears in the upper part of the stele. Under it, there are three almost identical inscriptions in Yiddish, Russian, and Latvian, divided by horizontal bars with small Stars of David.
Inscriptions
In Yiddish
מיר וועלן אייביק געדענקן
אונזערע עלטערן ברודער
שוועסטער און קינדער וועלכע
זיינען אומגעקומען פון די
מערדערישע פאשיסטישע הענט
אין יאר
1941
Translation: We will forever remember our parents, brothers, sisters, and children. who perished at the hands of the Fascist murderers in 1941.
In Russian
Мы вечно будем скорбить [скорбеть]
о наших родителях, детях,
братьях и сестрах, погибших
от рук фашистов в 1941 году
Translation: We will forever mourn our parents, children, brothers, and sisters who perished at the hands of the Fascists in 1941.
In Latvian
Mēs mūžīgi sērosim par mūsu
vecākiem, bērniem, brāliem
un māsām bojā gājušajiem
no fašisma terora 1941. gada
Translation: We will forever mourn our parents, children, brothers, and sisters who died from the fascist terror in 1941.
Commissioned by
Jews of Rēzekne
The troops of Nazi Germany entered Rēzekne on July 3, 1941. The first murders of Jews took place already on the following day. A week later, for propaganda purposes, a group of Jews was ordered to unearth Latvians killed by the retreating Soviets. After that, regular shootings of Jewish inhabitants began in the Jewish cemetery, lasting during the first two weeks of August 1941. Thousands of Jewish women and children were shot dead in the Ančupāni Hill from August 23 to November 1941. The last Jews of Rēzekne were killed in the Vipinga Forest in March 1943.
The monument in the cemetery, in addition to the monument at the killing site nearby built after the war (see here), was erected in 1980 and renovated in 1989.
"Holocaust Memorial Places in Latvia," a website by the Center for Judaic Studies at the University of Latvia, http://memorialplaces.lu.lv/memorial-places/latgale/rezekne-the-jewish-cemetery/.
Meler, Meyer, Jewish Latvia: Sites to Remember (Tel-Aviv: Association of Latvian and Estonian Jews in Israel, 2013), p. 279.
Meler, Meyer, Mesta nashei pamiati: Evreiskie obshchiny Latvii, unichtozhennye v Kholokoste (Riga: by the author, 2010), p. 308.
Rochko, Josif, Jewish Latgale: Guidebook (Daugavpils, by the author, 2018), 32-33.