A Memorial for the Jews of Slutsk

On Sunday, September 16th, Erica and I, along with many members of the Minsk Jewish community, traveled to Slutsk, a small town about an hour and a half drive from Minsk. Once the hometown of many Jews and a prominent yeshiva, Slutsk’s Jewish community now contains only about 100 Jews. This past Sunday, a memorial was dedicated to honor and remember “the victims of the Slutsk Ghetto” and a ceremony was held to officially open the monument. Until now, very little has been done to honor the memory of the many Jews who once lived in Slutsk and were forced to live in the Slutsk ghetto, eventually displaced and killed. Sunday was a special day because the Jews of Slutsk were publicly remembered and the mood at the ceremony reflected a sense of both solemnity and accomplishment.