[MakkabI]

KRAKOW, Poland - Jacek Kujawa only learned he was Jewish two years ago. He had known about the German great-grandfather who served in Hitler's army, but his mother's revelation that the Wehrmacht soldier's wife was a Polish Jew set him off on a search for her lost world.

This weekend, with a Star of David around his neck and a yarmulke on his shaved head, Kujawa, 23, gathered with dozens of other Poles who, like himself, have learned only recently of their Jewish roots and are struggling to reconnect with Poland's Jewish culture that nearly vanished in the Holocaust.

"We know we aren't alone," Kujawa said on the sidelines of three days of praying, singing, eating - and even more eating - in Krakow's historic Jewish district, Kazimierz.


The gathering began with the lighting of candles at sundown Friday to welcome in Shabbat, the Jewish sabbath. It wrapped up Sunday with the launch of a new Polish-Yiddish dictionary, which organizers said was the first since the Holocaust.

The event was set up by Shavei Israel, an organization that has worked for nearly a decade to bring so-called lost or hidden Jews from around the world back into the fold.

"We just want to keep the connection [to Judaism] alive," said Michael Freund, the chairman of Shavei Israel. "It's a connection that has survived persecution and repression, and now that the world is opening up so quickly, it's a connection that in many instances will become endangered."

"So we need to seize the moment, and to strengthen these people's sense of connection to the Jewish people."

Poland was home to nearly 3.5 million Jews before World War II, the largest community in Europe. But the Nazis nearly wiped them out in the ghettos and death camps set up throughout the country after 1939.

During the Cold War, Jews suffered repression and expulsions provoked by the Soviet-influenced communist regime. Many fled, while those who choose to stay often hid their roots, either marrying Roman Catholics and baptizing their children or simply adopting the atheistic ethos of the communist regime.

But since communism fell in 1989, parents and grandparents with enduring memories of their Jewish ancestors have slowly begun passing on the family secret, emboldened by the new tolerance and freedoms that have taken root.

In many cases, it is the young Poles like Kujawa rather than the older generations who seek to reconnect to their Jewish roots, attracted by the culture that is becoming increasingly trendy in cosmopolitan cities like Krakow and Warsaw.

"My grandmother asked me rhetorically, 'So the whole family is Catholic and you're Jewish?' She can't understand why I do this, but told me to go ahead - just not to be too obvious about it," said Kujawa, a student of political science who plans to become an officer in the Polish Army.

Each personal story is unique but with common themes: the fear of being exposed as Jewish in a hostile world, the assimilation into the larger Catholic world.

In Kujawa's case, it was his mother's maternal grandmother who was Jewish, meaning that he is Jewish under Jewish law, which traces religious status through the mother's line.

Many other hidden Jews, however, have their roots on their father's side, and spend years preparing for conversions in order to become real Jews. Others keep up looser ties to Poland's Jewish community, joining youth groups or taking part in cultural events but without strict religious observation.

Iwona Giermala, a 43-year-old interior decorator, also at the event, believes her mother has Jewish roots, but isn't sure. She has no papers or witnesses to prove it, so she is studying for conversion to satisfy her growing attraction to Jewish life.

"I'm finding myself with something that feels mine - but I don't even know how to explain it," Giermala said.

During the event in Krakow, about 120 participants prayed in the Kupa synagogue, a richly decorated 17th-century prayer house with colorful paintings of Biblical cities illuminated by a chandelier; they enjoyed drawn-out sabbath meals of herring, pickles and gefilte fish in a community center, and held discussions in an exhibition hall
filled with black and white photographs of Polish Jews before the war.

Amid the revival of Jewish life in this picturesque town about 50 kilometers (30 miles) from the Auschwitz death camp, there are constant reminders of the fraught relations between Jews and their largely Catholic surroundings.

Late Saturday, as an elderly Orthodox rabbi, Edgar Gluck, walked with a group of young Jews through the city, they encountered a young Pole who appeared to be drunk, staggering toward them.

Fearing he would be attacked, the young Jews encircled Gluck. But the Pole instead broke down in sobs, telling the group in slurred speech that it was the Germans - and not the Poles - who carried out the Holocaust.

"It wasn't the Poles," he said. "I am so sorry."

Matius

HI I am new here so I hope I am doing this correct

Silently Loud

hi welcome
where are u from?

__________________
Tel Aviv:
94 approved
48 proposed
37 under construction

Livni

All stories and issues regarding jewish issues and news from other countries please post in here only.

__________________
הצלחנו בגדול!

[MakkabI]

Flanked by bustling cafes in downtown Recife on Brazil's northeastern coast is a little-known treasure of Jewish history in the New World - the oldest synagogue in the Americas.

Sephardic Jews built the two-story Kahal Zur Israel Synagogue before 1641 - most likely in 1636 - when they enjoyed religious freedom under the Dutch, who ruled part of the northeast region from 1630 to 1654 to control sugar production.

The Mikve Israel Congregation in Curacao, a Dutch Antilles island in the Carribean, was considered by some to have been the first congregation in the Americas. But it was founded only in 1651, also by Sephardic Jews from Holland.

In the world's largest Catholic nation, whose best known icon is the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro, the Recife synagogue became an important symbol of the Jewish heritage in Brazil.

Based on old maps, archeological excavations uncovered the remnants of the synagogue, including the original Mikvah - a bath for religious ceremonies - under six layers of floors. The restored synagogue reopened in December 2001.

Since then it has become one of the main stops on the city's tourist circuit and its archives attract scores of Brazilian and foreign historians.

Their studies are gradually unveiling the prominent role Jews had in early Brazilian society.

"It challenges the stereotypical view that Brazilian culture is based on a tripod of Portuguese, [native] Indians and Africans," said Tania Kaufman, head of the Jewish Historical Archive in Recife, the capital of Pernambuco state.

"We now know Jews were a fundamental part of Brazil's cultural melting pot."

Historical records in Brazil and Amsterdam show Jews helped build the sugar industry, roads, bridges, and a basic sewage system in the northeast. Many also made money by trading slaves.

At its height in 1645, the Jewish community in Recife counted 1,630 members, the same number as in the thriving Jewish community of Amsterdam, according to Dutch historian Franz Leonard Schalkwijk.

"The economic dominance of the Jews prompted various protests [from Catholics and Protestants]," wrote Schalkwijk in his book "Church and State in Dutch Brazil."

When Dutch rule ended in 1654, Jews were expelled, killed or forced to go into hiding under the Roman Catholic Inquisition. One group from Recife defied storms and pirates to reach what is today New York, where they founded the first Jewish congregation in North America, called Shearith Israel, "the remnants of Israel."

An exhibition entitled "Pernambuco, Brazil - a gateway to New York" stirred much interest at the U.S. Center for Jewish History in 2004-05, recalls Kaufman.

The restored synagogue and renewed interest in the legacy of their ancestors is reinforcing the identity of Recife's Jewish community, which has dwindled by more than half to 300 families from two decades ago as many left for bigger cities.

In 2005, Recife received from Israel its first permanent Rabbi since 1654.

There are four synagogues in Recife but many Jews choose to celebrate their weddings and Bar Mitzvahs in the Kahal zur Israel because of its symbolism.

"It's an enormous source of pride," said Ivan Kelner, president of the Israelite Federation of Pernambuco state.

The synagogue is also at the center of a broader cultural renaissance. In November of every year, a Jewish festival offering dance, cinema, and food, from Gefilte fish to fluden, attracts around 20,000 visitors.

"The synagogue is a symbol of the revival of Jewish culture, it has galvanized our community," said Denys Sznejder, a choreographer who heads a Jewish folkloric dance group in Recife.