Echo of the Sambir Tragedy

Two memorials were unveiled in Stary Sambir and Ralivka, a village fifteen minutes away. One is a Jewish cemetery, ranking with Ukraine’s best renovation projects and accommodating some 900 prominent members of the local Jewish community. The cemetery dates from the sixteenth century and is a precious historical site. The Ralivka memorial has an even sadder background: almost 10,000 inmates of the Sambir ghetto were shot there in 1943.

The restoration of both memorials was made possible thanks to the persistent efforts of Jack Gardner, 87, US patron of the arts, born in Stary Sambir and perhaps the only Jew surviving the local Holocaust. After World War II, he immigrated to the United States and spent almost fifty years writing letters to the Soviet government, asking only to place memorial signs where his near and dear had died a violent death. His dream came true after Ukraine proclaimed independence.

(More on this in coming issues)