A historic event over Hanukkah illuminated the history of Jews from the former Yugoslavia.
The Alexander forest, named for King Alexander of Yugoslavia, hosted an outdoor, Covid-19 compliant, Hanukkah celebration.
For several years now, a project led by Mr. Yosi Solomon has brought the descendants of Macedonian Jews on a heritage trip to North Macedonia on the anniversary of the day when the Jewish Macedonian community was rounded up and deported to concentration camps. This year due to Covid 19 restrictions we were unable to carry out the trip.
In light of that, a special memorial ceremony was held in the Alexander River Park, where a path was recently cleared where a monument to the park’s namesake, King Alexander of Yugoslavia, lies. The park received its name when, at the initiative of a kibbutz member named Hillel Livni, Jews from Yugoslavia donated funds to the Keren Kayemet Leyisrael (KKL) in the 1930s. Subsequently, the king of Yugoslavia, Peter II, visited several times, even living in Jerusalem briefly when there was a coup.
After all this time, shrubs had overgrown the original marker to King Alexander, and its story had likewise become hidden to many passersby. After the area was cleaned, the Hanukkah memorial ceremony was a rededication to the history of Yugoslavian Jewry.
The event followed the “1000 Menorah” project, led by Dr. Rachel Shelly Levi Drummer, chair of the NGO for the commemoration of the Jews of Bitola-Monastir, together with Israeli Ambassador to North Macedonia Mr. Dan Oryan, joined in the event. During this project, 1,000 Menorahs were lit by special-needs children in North Macedonia, and the remaining Jewish community left in Skopje, as well as Jews in Israel, and the President of North Macedonia together with Isaac Herzog, chair of the Jewish Agency.
At the ceremony, along with a rededication to the stone that has stood there for 85 years now (since 1935), diplomats and descendants of Yugoslavian Jews lit candles in commemoration of the Jewish communities of the former Yugoslavia, including the children of Hillel Livni.
Photo Boaz Lanir
