Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Belarus Museum Opens Exhibit About Ariel Sharon

The National History Museum of Belarus inaugurated an exhibition about Ariel Sharon.

Titled “Profile of a Leader,” the exhibition on the late Israeli prime minister was launched Monday on the entrance floor of the state museum. The ceremony was attended by diplomats, Jewish community leaders and Israeli guests connected to Sharon’s life, including his youngest son, Gilad, and Israel Maimon, who served Sharon’s Cabinet secretary.

“Ariel Sharon brought pride to Israel, but also to Belarus, where his roots lay,” said Yuri Ambrazevitch, a senior official of the Belarusian Foreign Ministry.

Sharon was born in prestate Israel in 1928; his parents had immigrated there from what is now Belarus.

The exhibition — featuring of dozens of photos of Sharon as well as quotes from his speeches and letters — was compiled by the Limmud FSU educational nonprofit.

“Russian-speaking Jews responded to Sharon’s warmth, they adored him,” said Limmud FSU founder Chaim Chesler, who knew Sharon. “He spoke Russian and would correct you if you made a mistake in Russian.”

Chesler added that “celebrating his life is celebrating world Jewry’s deep, deep roots in Belarus.”

The exhibition on Sharon, a former general and defense minister who died in January after eight years in a coma following a stroke, opened with a quote from his 2005 address before the United Nations General Assembly, months after Israel pulled out of Gaza.

“If the circumstances had not demanded it, I wouldn’t have become a soldier but rather a farmer,” he said. “My first love was and remains farming, sowing and harvesting, the pastures, the flocks and the cattle.”

A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.