During the visit, the diplomats learned about the activities of Ganzach Kiddush Hashem and received an overview of the past, present, and future of all areas of education, documentation, and commemoration.
During the visit, the guests were shown a new video created by Ganzach Kiddush Hashem, in which the stories of the Righteous Among the Nations are described clearly, with innovative and sophisticated audiovisual effects.
The embassy staff were presented with the stories of the yeshiva world in Poland, with an emphasis on the Chachmei Lublin yeshiva. They were presented with original and authentic documents from the archive’s collection – rare and valuable documentary material about the yeshiva, its administration, and its students.
They were shown the photos of students and their personal details, alongside the heartbreaking “Pages of Testimony” that recount their tragic deaths.
Mrs. Rachel Yud, the COO, described the glory of Polish Jewry, the variety of ways commemoration takes place today, and the plans for the future.
A detailed presentation accompanied Mrs. Rachel Yud’s words, including photographic clips and documentation summarizing the wonderful nature of Polish Jewry in the interwar period; Agudath Israel, the daf yomi program (studying a page of Talmud a day), Bais Yaakov and Sarah Schenirer, the seminary for teachers, the yeshivas and the educational institutions, and the huge world of kindness and chasidism that was brutally destroyed during the Holocaust.
Later, wonderous and emotional excerpts from Ganzach Kiddush Hashem’s large testimony archive were screened.
From the archives, the director of the photography department, Rabbi Moskowitz, presented ancient periodicals published in Poland before the war and rare documents such as personal diaries written in Yiddish and Polish, Polish passports used by Holocaust survivors until they arrived in Israel, and ancient books that traveled a long way from Poland before prewar to the Ganzach Kiddush Hashem archive, and in between they saw much blood and tears, fire and billows of smoke.
The visit lasted much longer than planned, and it was evident on the faces of the guests that they were touched by the testimonies and the unique atmosphere, the likes of which they had never experienced.
Ganzach Kiddush Hashem appropriately serves as light to unto the nations, since the wind blowing here is the one that the Nazi beast wished to blow out.
Every stone of the walls of our veteran institution, which renews itself “like an eagle” (Psalms 103:5) and looks forward to a great and sophisticated future, cries out “Am Yisrael Chai” (the Nation of Israel lives), and every whisper of the thousands of testimonies within it expresses the victory of the pure Jewish heroism that Ganzach Kiddush Hashem wishes to portray to the new generations, and to the entire world.
