— Unidentified persons vandalized a Holocaust monument in Lithuania on the anniversary of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler’s birthday.

The monument in Vilkaviskis, a city located 90 miles west of the capital Vilnius, was stripped of its marble tiles and smashed in several parts on April 20, according to a report posted seven days later on the Facebook page of the city’s tiny Jewish community.

Lithuanian police have been informed of the incident and are investigating.

Forwarding the News

Thoughtful, balanced reporting from the Forward and around the web, bringing you updated news and analysis each day.

Terms(Required)

I agree to the Forward's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Email(Required)

The unfenced monument was vandalized once before in 2012, prompting police to arrest a suspect based on eye-witnesses’ accounts, the news website suduvis.lt reported last year. However, police have not arrested any of the thieves who regularly strip marble tiles off the monument.

On the eve of World War II there were 3,600 Jews in Vilkaviskis, comprising approximately 40 percent of the total population, according to Israel’s Yad Vashem Holocaust museum.

The German army occupied Vilkaviskis on June 22, 1941, destroying many Jewish homes and its synagogue amid pogroms by Lithuanian nationalists. Jews were imprisoned in a ghetto set up in a military barracks outside of town and murdered systematically beginning on July 28, 1941, when the ghetto’s men were shot by Nazis and locals, and dumped in pre-dug pits.

The women and children were shot and buried at the same place two months later.

The Red Army liberated Vilkaviskis in the summer of 1944.

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’re near the end of our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we have a very ambitious goal of $127,000 by April 21.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a Passover gift today!

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Make a Passover Gift Today!

$90 $180

$360

Other amount