The Shtetl Mszana Dolna Foundation in Israel

We spent the last week of 2022 in Eretz Israel. The most important goal of the trip was to meet with descendants of Mshany Jews, survivors of the Holocaust. Some of them we already knew, with others we had spoken to thanks to an online platform, but the reality exceeded our expectations: not only did we manage to pay a scheduled visit to Shalom Rebhun and his sister Miriam Harabash, grandchildren of Amalia and David Pesach Rabhun, who still remember pre-war Mshana and Rabka, but we also met Natan David Holländer, grandson of the penultimate rabbi of Mshana, who was named after his grandfather. The Rebbe lives in the Orthodox neighborhood of Jerusalem, Geula, where he received us in his apartment and told us about the family's fate. His father, Shmuel Meir became a rabbi in Chernivtsi, where World War II found him. He and his wife were sent to the ghetto, and Natan David was born there, and he found for us a photograph of his parents with a yellow star on their clothing. Eventually they survived the Holocaust, and after the war they came to Israel. However, a large part of the Holländer family was murdered by the Nazis. 

Another pleasant surprise was the opportunity to meet a descendant of the Mshan Turner family, Pnina Yogev, who had already spoken to us while we were in the Holy Land and joined a pre-arranged meeting with Jurek Streimer's 3 daughters in Haifa. It was very nice to meet them again: Heli Segal Arama, Ofra Rosenstein and Ayala Rubinstein. We also managed to get in touch with the daughter of Yurek's sister, Janina Samueli, Elisheva Pikovsky, who gave us some family photos and documents. In Kiriat Motzkin we were hosted by Shoshana Rosenberg and her husband Yuda, our longest known descendants from the Borger and Goldberger families. In Jerusalem, we had the pleasure of meeting not only Avraham Taylor of the Rebhun family, but getting to know his wife Tamar and his lovely sister Michal. We found all these meetings joyful, moving and valuable. We received further materials for the study of the history of the Mshan Jews, and were warmly welcomed. 

Another highlight was a visit to the Yad Vashem Institute, where we had an appointment at the archives. We also found, thanks to the help of the institute's staff, the plaque of the Mszan Righteous Among the Nations, Stefania and Jozef Waclawik. We again visited the Valley of the Commons, where the names of all the villages where the Holocaust Victims came from are carved in stone labyrinths.

During our stay, the Festival of Lights, Hanukkah, was in progress, so we had the opportunity to observe its beautiful celebration, lighting more candles/lamps on hanukkiahs everywhere. We visited important places for Judaism and Christianity, and brought back souvenirs that will go to our charity auctions, conducted to commemorate the Victims of the mass execution of 19.08.1942 on Pansky Street, where practically the entire Jewish community of Mszana Dolna and many other towns was killed. We are all the more happy that the life continues, that the descendants of the Victims are alive, that we can together with them recreate our common history 

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)