Street signs in memory of the victims of Nazism appeared in Chisinau. They are called “Stolpersteine” or “Stumbling stones”, IPN reports, quoting the website of the Jewish Community of the Republic of Moldova.
The commemorative stones represent 10 x 10 cm brass plates that are set up directly on sidewalks near residential buildings, universities and offices. They include the names of persons, their birthdate and also the date and place of death. The places of birth are primarily concentration camps in Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic. All these people earlier lived or worked in building near which “Stolpersteine” are placed.
The project “Stumbling stones” started to be implemented in Moldova in July 2018. Then, the first two such commemorative stones were set up in Chisinau. One is located at 17 Alexandru cel Bun St and contains the name of Moise Berland, while the second is situated at 27 Armenească St where Bunia Bron lived. Recently, the Jewish Community of the Republic of Moldova placed four more such stones, at 42 Shcusev St, with the names of the members of Bragar family who were deported to the Transnistrian region and killed in 1941. Only Claudia Bragar avoided arrest after she visited a Christian neighbor and this placed a cross at her chest and said that she was part of his family. Claudia survived the Holocaust and after the war settled in Bucharest, where she died in the 1970s.
According to Jewish Community of the Republic of Moldova, the project “Stumbling stones” is a method of studying and keeping history. The teaching of the Holocaust in schools in Moldova has been discussed long. Several years ago, the Republic of Moldova was recommended by the OSCE and other international organizations to review the approach to this subject in school programs. The Holocaust is mentioned in textbooks only twice - in the course book for the ninth grade and in that for the twelfth grade – and the subject is devoted not more than half a page. Even the Faculty of History and Philosophy practically does not study the Holocaust on Moldova’s territory.
The Jewish Community noted the “Stumbling stones” that became a pan-European memorial are a different opportunity of influencing the young people to study the Holocaust so that such tragic events never happen again.
