EAJC leaders met with Chairman of the Yad Vashem Directorate Dani Dayan

On December 8, Dr. Michael Mirilashvili, President of the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress, and Dr. Haim Ben Yakov, EAJC Director General, held an official meeting with Dani Dayan, Chairman of the Yad Vashem Holocaust Remembrance Center Directorate. During the discussions, the parties outlined future plans and addressed several key areas of joint efforts, including combating antisemitism within the Euro-Asian region, as well as the academic study and preservation of the civic memory of the Holocaust and World War II.

The Government of Israel appointed Dani Dayan as Chairman of the Yad Vashem Directorate in August 2021. He had previously served as Israel's Consul General in New York. Prior to his diplomatic service in the United States, Dayan was a member of the Yad Vashem Public Council.

As the EAJC leadership emphasized during the meeting, the Congress attaches particular importance to Holocaust research, supporting former ghetto and concentration camp survivors, preserving historical memory, and countering Holocaust denial. The EAJC is highly active in public diplomacy, urging state leaders to establish clear and consistent policies aimed at preserving historical memory.

The leadership of the EAJC and Yad Vashem specifically discussed international educational and cultural initiatives of the Congress, prepared in close cooperation between the two organizations in recent years.

The first is the Moshe Mirilashvili Center for Research on the Holocaust in the Soviet Union at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Remembrance Center, which commenced its activities in May 2016. The Center aims to initiate and promote innovative research regarding the history of Jews during World War II within the territories that were part of the USSR at the time of the Nazi invasion on June 22, 1941.

The meeting featured the presentation of the book "Captivity" by Dr. Aaron Shneyer, a historian and researcher at the Center, which documents the fate of Soviet prisoners of war during the Great Patriotic War. The book examines in detail the service and role of Jewish soldiers in the Red Army before, during, and after World War II. Specific chapters address the issue of antisemitism and its causes during the pre-war years, as well as on the home front and the battlefield during the war.

The promotion of Holocaust memory in global culture was also specifically discussed during the meeting. Among the initiatives aimed at achieving this objective is the film "Sobibor", whose international distribution secured support from the Congress. The motion picture is based on actual events that transpired during World War II at the Sobibor death camp in occupied Poland.

Another project supported by the EAJC—an animated short film—won an award at the Moscow Jewish Film Festival in October of this year. The film "263 Nights" received the award for Best Documentary Short. The work artistically depicts the story of 26 individuals who hid from the horrors of the Nazi occupation of Minsk in a dug-out cellar for 263 days.

The EAJC devotes significant attention to information and educational initiatives concerning the Holocaust. These include online resources dedicated to commemorating the victims of the Siege of Leningrad ("Memory of the Blockade of Leningrad") and a collection of educational materials on the history of the Holocaust ("SHOAH"). Visitors to these platforms can access unique historical documents and wartime memoirs.

On the personal initiative of EAJC President Dr. Michael Mirilashvili, direct support for several associations of World War II veterans and disabled individuals in Israel and the former Soviet Union has become a distinct area of social responsibility in recent years.

The International Association of Jewish Former Child Survivors of Ghettos and Nazi Concentration Camps has been an affiliate member of the EAJC for many years, providing medical and socio-psychological assistance to former inmates, alongside preserving and transmitting the living memory of the Holocaust to the younger generation.

Dani Dayan, Chairman of the Yad Vashem Directorate, who is well-acquainted with diaspora affairs, endorsed the initiatives of the EAJC leadership and expressed readiness to maintain active cooperation between the Yad Vashem Remembrance Center and the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress.