Yom HaZikaron laShoah ve-laG’vurah — known colloquially in Jewish culture as Yom HaShoah — is the formal Israeli holiday which remembers and reflects on the holocaust that occured during World War II in Nazi Germany, ultimately leading to the systematic extermination of some six million Jews. While there are many holidays recognizing this particular holocaust — the United Nations passed a resolution enacting January 27th as International Holocaust Remembrance Day and the United States Congress designated the entire week before Yom HaShoah as Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust — it is this particular version of the remembrance that is cherished by those of Jewish heritage across the globe.
The Alpert Jewish Community Center in Long Beach will be hosting a community-wide Yom HaShoah observance this Sunday from 2:00pm to 4:00pm. Temple Israel’s Rabbi Steven Moskowitz will lead a group of Rabbis from and throughout the greater Long Beach community, along with Cantor Finley and the Temple Israel Choir, in a memorial service. Following the service, acclaimed Russian documentary director of the BAFTA-winning Defence Council Sedov, Evgeny Tsymbal, will be the keynote speaker.
Mr. Tsymbal — the only Russian filmmaker who has won a BAFTA award, the European version of the Academy Awards — examines in his latest documentary, Diary from the Burned Ghetto, the horrors of the holocaust in WWII through the eyes and diary of a teenage girl, Tamara Lazerson, imprisoned in the Kovno ghetto. The story differs from that of the infamous Anne Frank, given Tamara survived the atrocity and then hid her diary from the Soviet authorities for 30 years. The diary, having never been published in any language, is showcased for the first time in the documentary alongside commentary from its author.
This program is free and open to the entire community.
Alpert Jewish Community Center in Long Beach, 3801 East Willow Street. 562-426-7601