Obj. ID: 48959  Holocaust Memorial at the Mass Grave in Petrykiv, near Ternopil, Ukraine, 1992

In 1941, there were about 18,600 Jews in Tarnopol (now Ternopil). The Germans occupied the city on July 2, 1941. Several thousand Jews were killed in a week-long pogrom in July 1941. At the end of 1941 and the beginning of 1942, several hundred Jews were sent to the labor camps in Borki Wielkie, Kamionki, Hłuboczek Wielki, and Zagrobela. On March 1942, Gestapo and Ukrainian Police shot 630 Jews in the Janowska Forest. In May 1942, several hundred women were brought to Jagielnica near Czortków for work. In the second half of 1942, more than 6,000 Jews were deported to the Bełżec killing center. The Jews from nearby villages and towns were brought to the Tarnopol Ghetto at the same time. From March to June of 1943, about 3,000 Jews were killed in Tarnopol. On June 23, 1943, Tarnopol was announced as free of Jews, though about 2,000 still worked in the Julag labor camp in Tarnopol.

On July 23, 1943, Gestapo and Ukrainian police killed about 1,500 Jewish workers from Julag in Petryków village, about 100 Jews were sent to the Janowska Street camp in Lwów. Several hundred Jews hid, and while some of them tried to resist with grenades and guns, almost all of them were killed or committed suicide.

About 750 Jews from Tarnopol and nearby villages survived the Holocaust [Encyclopedia].

According to Yad Vashem, Holocaust survivors marked the killing site with a wooden sign immediately after the war. In 1946, they collected money for the establishment of a proper monument on the initiative of Rabbi Chaim Kleiner. The memorial bore Yiddish and Russian inscriptions, which said "Eternal memory and glory to the Jews who perished at the hands of the German Fascists." Although local government and Communist party representatives were present at the dedication ceremony, the monument was demolished later in the 1950s, ostensibly because it was created without necessary approvals.

A new monument was installed by the Jewish community in Ternopil in 1992, and is still maintained by the community. The Ternopil Regional Executive Committee included the monument to the list of local history monuments by decision no. 14 on August 19, 1994 ["Ternopilska oblast..."].

In the present, local Jewish community representatives gather at the monument on International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), and the Day of mass shootings at Babyn Yar [Kyiv], (September 29th) [Bodenchuk; Chepil].

The monument has suffered anti-Semitic vandalism several times since the 2010s:

On September 19, 2012, vandals painted the monument with nail polish and lipstick, trying to paint a crooked black swastika on a red background. A crack was also noticed on the monument [Likhachev, 2012].

In March 2016, vandals painted the monument [VAAD of Ukraine, 2016]. 

On March 24, 2017, vandals crossed out the Magen David and drew Nazi symbols on the stele with red paint. Police visited the site [Nakonechna]. On March 26, 2017, representatives of local organization "Spilka ukrainskoi molodi" (Ukrainian Youth Association) cleaned up the monument [Ahentsiia informatsii ta analityky "Hal-info"].

On April 27, 2017, vandals defaced the monument with oil. The Head of the Jewish community in Ternopil Igor Banzeruk remarked that local authority does not want to deal with this issue and asked local NGOs to help with installation of security cameras near the monument [VAAD of Ukraine, 2017]. 

On August 3, 2017, vandals defaced the monument with red paint [Likhachev, 2018, p. 6].

On February 3, 2018, vandals drew Nazi symbols on the monument [Likhachev, 2019, p. 3].

In April 2018, a utility company in Ternopil installed a security camera near the monument due to the "unfortunate incident of vandalism of the monument to the victims of Holocaust, which took place on February 3, 2018." ["Komunalnym pidpryiemstvom...", 2018]

On April 26, 2018, a camera recorded that three vandals threw a "Molotov cocktail" at the monument and set it on fire. Police opened a criminal case [Likhachev, 2019, p. 4].