PINKAS Synagogue- Memorial

Immediately after German troops crossed the Czech-German border the early morning of March 15, 1939, Jews were treated poorly.. Of the total number of 118,310 persons that were registered as "Protectorate Jews" about 80,000 after the definitive shutting off of all routes of escape. From the first day in the "Protectorate" the Nazi authorities enforced a tough repressive policy against the Jews and as of September 1, 1941, all Jews were required to wear a yellow Star of David.

We then went to the Pinkas Synagogue, also from the 16th century, a Gothic structure and now a memorial to the Holocaust victims from Prague. It is a beautiful building with vaulted ceilings and stained glass. In response to the Nazi's attempt to obliterate Jews, this memorial was created to save these names and remember them forever. All the walls are covered with the hand-written names of 77,297 Czech Jews lost with their birthdates and date of death. In the upper galleries there are some of the originally written names that are aged and/or worn off from the 1950s or when the Communists took over and removed some since this project began. In 1989, and post-communist times, these names were rewritten on the walls of the main Sanctuary. As you walk through the memorial, you hear the names read and a Rabbi singing Kaddish and El Maleh Rachamim (memorial prayer, God full of compassion).

The town of Terezin - originally a military fortress from the period of Joseph II was converted at the end of 1941 by the Nazis into a transit concentration camp where Jews, primarily from the "Protectorate", were to be gathered before being deported further on to the ghettos and extermination camps of the East. The Nazis wanted to create at Terezín a "model ghetto" whose example would demonstrate their benevolence toward an "inferior race". Before the eyes of the international public they sought to conceal the road to death, and they presented it as an idyllic spa resort. Terezin appeared to be more bearable, primarily owing to its propaganda purpose, in comparison to the other ghettos in the eastern occupied territories, those imprisoned here were still exposed to all the hardships of camp life - starvation, malnutrition, poor hygenic conditions, infection and the tragic lack of medicine. On the upper floor there is a permanent exhibit of children’s art from the Terezin camp. Over 15,000 children passed through here and of the 8,000 very young children that were kept there 142 survived (not one under 14 years old). While they lived there, their teacher had them create this artwork (4,500 pictures) to be able to escape the camps … at least in their minds. The artwork was around themes such as dreams, memories and biblical scenes.

In the courtyard there is also an old Mikva (ritual bath) from the early 16th century.Leia mais