A Shtetl for Israel -- A Living Jewish History Museum Breaks Ground in Rishon Le Zion, Israel.

A living history museum to be called The Shtetl celebrated groundbreaking on June 1, 2003 in Rishon Le Zion, Israel. Spearheaded by world-renowned Holocaust scholar and author, Prof. Yaffa Eliach, this pioneering Museum will recreate the vanished past of Jewish life in Europe, as well as present lost Sephardic Jewish life from other Diaspora countries.

NEW YORK, NY (PRWEB) June 5, 2003 -- A living history museum to be called The Shtetl celebrated groundbreaking on June 1, 2003 in Rishon Le Zion, Israel. Spearheaded by world-renowned Holocaust scholar and author, Prof. Yaffa Eliach, this pioneering Museum will recreate the vanished past of Jewish life in Europe, as well as present lost Sephardic Jewish life from other Diaspora countries. The shtetl, which so enriched Jewish life in the Diaspora has vanished, but thanks to Yaffa Eliach's project, its dazzling memory will now be brought back to life in Israel", said Eli Wiesel, Nobel Prize Winner and Honorary President of The Shtetl Foundation. The Shtetl will be a testament to world Jewry investing in its future by restoring and preserving its cultural and religious past.

On 67 acres (300 dunam, 27 hectares), donated by the State of Israel, an entire Jewish town, a Shtetl", will be built - replete with two synagogues, a yeshiva, Hebrew and Yiddish schools, a market square, restaurants, stores, businesses and homes. Towering over the Shtetl will be a replica of a 13th century Castle, which will house the museum, archive, library, and performance spaces.

This innovative and hands-on Museum will provide a much needed addition and counterpart to the many worthy and important Museums that document and commemorate the murder of 6 million Jews. Instead of death and destruction, the open-air design, called a living museum, will allow its visitors to experience a thousand years of Jewish life history, culture, and tradition in Europe. While much of the design will be based on maps and extensive research pertaining to the geographic structure of the shtetl of Eishyshok, current plans include buildings representative of many different European shtetlekh and Jewish communities from Middle East countries.

Former Chief Rabbi, Rabbi Israel Meir Lau, the Mayor of Rishon Le Zion, Meir Nitzan, and Prof. Eliach spoke at the Groundbreaking ceremony and reception on June 1, 2003. Indeed this living museum will establish Rishon Le Zion as a historic and cultural capital in Israel. It will attract an international identity in the renewal of the Jewish peoples past and certainly provide for economic development in the Region" says Prof Eliach, President and Founder of The Shtetl Foundation.

The Municipality of Rishon Le Zion, headed by Mayor Meir Nitzan, has committed to providing for the necessary infrastructure to support the building site (i.e. water, sewage, drainage, channeling), and planting of trees around the lake, including the Shtetl's neighboring forest. Mayor Nitzan wrote "we are all waiting with great anticipation for the realization of this unique ... Jewish cultural and educational tourist attraction in Israel" and "..we all are delighted that the Shtetl will be rebuilt in Rishon Le Zion".

The construction of The Shtetl will fulfill the longstanding goal of its founder to establish a major museum that ensures the documentation and representation of Jewish life that stretches from Biblical times to the present remains intact, by recreating history and culture from vanished communities", most of which were destroyed through the Holocaust and other mass collaborative efforts by countries who expelled Jewish communities over the past centuries.
There will be a major educational component to the museum, including dynamic programs for a diverse international audience. Lectures, theater, concerts and films will be featured alongside educational programs and resources, which will provide for meaningful access to the collections of historic, religious artifacts, as well as cultural and literary artistic traditions of the Jewish Peoples past. The museums permanent and temporary exhibits will represent all aspects of European and other Diaspora life and its contributions to the world at large as it has led up to significant achievements and accomplishments of today.

Active fundraising is currently underway for The Shtetl Foundation. Mif'al Ha Pais, (Israeli Lotto Agency) has pledged 10 Million Shekel and many other private donations are being accepted, including contributions from descendants of Prof Eliachs shtetl birthplace. Mr. William and Hilda Clayman of Youngstown, Ohio recently donated significant funds to The Shtetl Foundation in memory of Rosalind Foster Rosenblatt. Clayman and Rosenblatt are both descendants from the shtetl of Eishyshok.

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Note: Dr. Yaffa Eliach is a Professor Emerita of History and Literature at Brooklyn College. The Professor is a pioneering scholar in Holocaust studies, and the creator of the permanent exhibit the Tower of Life at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, located in Washington, DC. Her book, There Once Was A World: A 900-Year Chronicle of the Shtetl of Eishyshok, recounts the history of the shtetl as portrayed in The Tower, is a National Book Award finalist.