Daniel Romanovsky

Last updated

Daniel Romanovsky is an Israeli historian and researcher who has contributed to the study of the Holocaust in the Soviet Union under German occupation in World War II. [1] [2] Romanovsky was a Soviet refusenik politically active since the 1970s. Private seminars on the history of the Jews were held in his Leningrad apartment in the 1980s. [3] Research on the topic was difficult in the Soviet Union because of government restrictions. In the 1970s and 1980s Romanovsky interviewed over 100 witnesses to the Holocaust, including Jews, Russians, and Belarusians, recording and cataloguing their accounts of the Final Solution. [1] [2] [4] [5]

Contents

Biography

Daniel Romanovsky was born in Leningrad, Russia to an assimilated Jewish family. [6] He graduated from the Leningrad State University. [7] After his marriage and the birth of his first child he became interested in Jewish history, especially of the Holocaust. He made contact with other interested people and contributed to samizdat publications on the history of Soviet Jews. In 1988 he and his wife Elena moved to Israel, describing himself as a "computer programmer and historian." [6] Since then he has contributed to many scholarly works on the Holocaust. [8] He has also lectured to Russian, Byelorussian, Latvian, and Estonian educators under the auspices of Yad Vashem. [9] [10] [11] [12] He was a member of the Editorial and Abstracting staff at the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism at Hebrew University of Jerusalem. [13] He is presently tenured at The Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry, Faculty of Humanities at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. [14] He has been described as among the ""leading scholars in the field," of studies of the interaction between the Holocaust and law. [15]

Views

Based on his interviews of Holocaust witnesses in Belarus, Romanovsky suggested that, although many people did help Jews escape, the collaboration with the Germans by most was partly a result of their experiences under the Soviet government. He invokes the concept of Homo Sovieticus, an ironic label for the "New Soviet man" who has adopted to the system. Jewish survivors mostly attributed people's reluctance to help to fear of the Germans, [16] [17] but also to antisemitism. [18] He concluded that the open-type ghettos in Belarusian towns were the result of prior concentration of the entire Jewish communities in prescribed areas. No walls were required. [1] He points out that people in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, were more likely to help Jews than those in rural areas. He says that this was partly from a greater feeling of separation from the Jews among rural people. [17] He also reports what he calls the "Nazi brainwashing" of the people, which took place through both mass propaganda and intense re-education, especially in Belarusian schools. He notes that very soon most people had adopted the Nazi view of the Jews, that they were an inferior race and were closely tied to the Soviet government; views that had not been at all common before the occupation. [4]

Selected bibliography

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yad Vashem</span> Israels official memorial to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust

Yad Vashem is Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. It is dedicated to preserving the memory of the Jews who were murdered; echoing the stories of the survivors; honoring Jews who fought against their Nazi oppressors and gentiles who selflessly aided Jews in need; and researching the phenomenon of the Holocaust in particular and genocide in general, with the aim of avoiding such events in the future. Yad Vashem's vision, as stated on its website, is: "To lead the documentation, research, education and commemoration of the Holocaust, and to convey the chronicles of this singular Jewish and human event to every person in Israel, to the Jewish people, and to every significant and relevant audience worldwide."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maly Trostenets</span>

Maly Trostenets is a village near Minsk in Belarus, formerly the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic. During Nazi Germany's occupation of the area during World War II, the village became the location of a Nazi extermination site.

<i>The Black Book of Soviet Jewry</i> 1944 Russian-language compilation by Ilya Ehrenburg and Vasily Grossman

The Black Book of Soviet Jewry or simply The Black Book, also known as The Complete Black Book of Russian Jewry, is a 500-page document compiled for publication by Ilya Ehrenburg and Vasily Grossman originally in late 1944 in the Russian language. It was a result of the collaborative effort by the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee (JAC) and members of the American Jewish community to document the anti-Jewish crimes of the Holocaust and the participation of Jews in the resistance movement against the Nazis during World War II. The 1991 Kyiv edition of The Black Book was subtitled The Ruthless Murder of Jews by German-Fascist Invaders Throughout the Temporarily-Occupied Regions of the Soviet Union and in the German Nazi Death Camps established on occupied Polish soil during the War 1941–1945.

<i>The Destruction of the European Jews</i> 1961 historical book by Raul Hilberg

The Destruction of the European Jews is a 1961 book by historian Raul Hilberg. Hilberg revised his work in 1985, and it appeared in a new three-volume edition. It is largely held to be the first comprehensive historical study of the Holocaust. According to Holocaust historian, Michael R. Marrus, until the book appeared, little information about the genocide of the Jews by Nazi Germany had "reached the wider public" in both the West and the East, and even in pertinent scholarly studies it was "scarcely mentioned or only mentioned in passing as one more atrocity in a particularly cruel war".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slutsk</span> Town in Minsk Region, Belarus

Slutsk is a town in Minsk Region, Belarus. It serves as the administrative center of Slutsk District, and is located on the Sluch River 105 km (65 mi) south of Minsk. As of 2023, it has a population of 60,376.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yitzhak Arad</span> Soviet-Israeli historian and military official (1926–2021)

Yitzhak Arad was an Israeli historian, author, IDF brigadier general and Soviet partisan. He also served as Yad Vashem's director from 1972 to 1993, and specialised in the history of the Holocaust.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yehuda Bauer</span> Israeli historian of the Holocaust (born 1926)

Yehuda Bauer is a Czech-born Israeli historian and scholar of the Holocaust. He is a professor of Holocaust Studies at the Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Provisional Government of Lithuania</span> Temporary government of Lithuania in the period between Soviet and Nazi occupations (1941)

The Provisional Government of Lithuania was an attempted provisional government to form an independent Lithuanian state in the last days of the first Soviet occupation and the first weeks of the German occupation of Lithuania during World War II in 1941.

The Encyclopedia of the Holocaust (1990) has been called "the most recognized reference book on the Holocaust". It was published in an English-language translated edition by Macmillan in tandem with the Hebrew language original edition published by Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Remembrance Authority in Israel. All its contributors are reputable Holocaust scholars and academics. Although the encyclopedia is easy to read and use and contains no disturbing pictures, it is not recommended for users younger than high school age.

Holocaust trivialization refers to any comparison or analogy that diminishes the scale and severity of the atrocities that were carried out by Nazi Germany during the Holocaust. The Wiesel Commission defined trivialization as the abusive use of comparisons with the aim of minimizing the Holocaust and banalizing its atrocities. Originally, holocaust meant a type of sacrifice that is completely burnt to ashes; starting from the late 19th century, it started to denote extensive destruction of a group, usually people or animals. The 1915 Armenian genocide was described as a "holocaust" by contemporary observers.

The anti-Jewish violence in Central and Eastern Europe following the retreat of Nazi German occupational forces and the arrival of the Soviet Red Army – during the latter stages of World War II – was linked in part to postwar anarchy and economic chaos exacerbated by the Stalinist policies imposed across the territories of expanded Soviet republics and new satellite countries. The anti-semitic attacks had become frequent in Soviet towns ravaged by war; at the marketplaces, in depleted stores, in schools, and even at state enterprises. Protest letters were sent to Moscow from numerous Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian towns by the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee involved in documenting the Holocaust.

The Holocaust in Belarus refers to the systematic extermination of Jews living in the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic during its occupation by Nazi Germany in World War II. It is estimated that roughly 800,000 Belarusian Jews were murdered during the Holocaust. However, other estimates place the number of Jews killed between 500,000 and 550,000.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Holocaust in Ukraine</span> Aspect of Nazi Germanys extermination campaign

The Holocaust in Ukraine was the systematic mass murder of Jews in the Reichskommissariat Ukraine, the General Government, the Crimean General Government and some areas which were located to the East of Reichskommissariat Ukraine, in the Transnistria Governorate and Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina and the Hertsa region and Carpathian Ruthenia during World War II. The listed areas are currently parts of Ukraine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Krupki</span> Town in Minsk Region, Belarus

Krupki is a town in Minsk Region, Belarus. It serves as the administrative center of Krupki District. As of 2023, it has a population of 8,487.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nikolay Kiselyov (soldier)</span> Russian partisan leader and Righteous Among the Nations

Nikolay Yakovlevich Kiselyov, also commonly transliterated from the Russian language as Nikolai Kiselev, was a Soviet Red Army commissar, prisoner of war, and partisan leader during World War II.

David Bankier was a Holocaust historian and head of the International Institute for Holocaust Research at Yad Vashem.

Livia Rothkirchen was a Czechoslovak-born Israeli historian and archivist. She was the author of several books about the Holocaust, including The Destruction of Slovak Jewry (1961), the first authoritative description of the deportation and murder of the Jews of Slovakia.

Shmuel Krakowski, Samuel Krakowski or Stefan Krakowski was an Israeli historian specializing in the Holocaust in Poland. After surviving the Holocaust, Krakowski worked for the intelligence and security services of the People's Republic of Poland. Later he became a Director of the Yad Vashem Archives in Israel.

Dan Michman is a Jewish historian. He is the head of the International Institute for Holocaust Research at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem and incumbent of the John Najmann Chair of Holocaust studies.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Martin Dean (2005). "Life and Death in the Ghettos". In Jonathan Petropoulos; John Roth (eds.). Gray Zones: Ambiguity and Compromise in the Holocaust and its Aftermath. Berghahn Books. p. 209. ISBN   978-1-84545-302-2.
  2. 1 2 Per Anders Rudling (2013). "The Invisible Genocide: The Holocaust in Belarus". In John-Paul Himka; Joanna Beata Michlic (eds.). Bringing the Dark Past to Light: The Reception of the Holocaust in Postcommunist Europe. pp. 74, 78. ISBN   978-0-8032-4647-8. Between 1941 and 1945, Belarusians in the various German collaborationist formations numbered between 50,000 and 70,000 men.
  3. ↑ Nataliya Yukhneva. "Bygone times are passing in front of me". Memories of eighties. Part 2. Translated by Ilana (Elena) Romanovsky. Archived from the original on 2016-09-21. Retrieved 2016-08-11. The article was published in Neva magazine 4 / 2006, Sankt-Peterburg, (without photographs).
  4. 1 2 Romanovsky, Daniel (2009), "The Soviet Person as a Bystander of the Holocaust: The case of eastern Belorussia", in Bankier, David; Gutman, Israel (eds.), Nazi Europe and the Final Solution, Berghahn Books, p. 276, ISBN   978-1-84545-410-4
    Romanovsky, D. (1 March 1999). "The Holocaust in the Eyes of Homo Sovieticus: A Survey Based on Northeastern Belorussia and Northwestern Russia". Holocaust and Genocide Studies. 13 (3): 355–382. doi:10.1093/hgs/13.3.355.
    Gitelman, Zvi, ed. (1997), "Soviet Jews Under Nazi Occupation in Northeastern Belarus and Western Russia", Bitter Legacy: Confronting the Holocaust in the USSR, Indiana University Press, p. 241
  5. ↑ Interview with Daniel Romanovsky.
  6. 1 2 Poizner, Susan (4 May 1990). "Better read than Dead". Jerusalem Post. p. 28. ProQuest   320979748.
  7. ↑ HeinOnline (2016). "Daniel Romanovsky". Biographies of Contributors. Law Journal Library. 13 (13 Holocaust & Genocide Stud. 539 / 1999): 539.
  8. ↑ Interview
  9. ↑ "Seminar for Russian Educators" (PDF). Yad Vashem. 2010. Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 September 2018. Retrieved 17 July 2016.
  10. ↑ "Seminar for Estonian Teachers" (PDF). Yad Vashem. 2010. Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 September 2018. Retrieved 17 July 2016.
  11. ↑ "Seminar for Latvian Educators". Yad Vashem. 2010. Retrieved 17 July 2016.
  12. ↑ "Seminar for Educators from Russia and Byelorussia" (PDF). Yad Vashem. 2011. Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 September 2018. Retrieved 17 July 2016.
  13. ↑ "Center's Staff". Hebrew University of Jerusalem. 2011. Archived from the original on 14 July 2016. Retrieved 18 July 2016.
  14. ↑ Romanovsky, Daniel. "Staffsearch". The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Retrieved 20 July 2016.
  15. ↑ Bilsky, Leora (2012). "The Judge and the Historian: Transnational Holocaust Litigation as a New Model". History and Memory. 24 (2): 117–156. doi:10.2979/histmemo.24.2.117. JSTOR   10.2979/histmemo.24.2.117. S2CID   45787489. SSRN   2084136. ProQuest   1046160860.
  16. ↑ Leonid Rein (2013). The Kings And The Pawns. pp. 264–265, 285. ISBN   978-1-78238-048-1.
  17. 1 2 Barbara Epstein (2008). The Minsk Ghetto 1941-1943: Jewish Resistance and Soviet Internationalism. University of California Press. p. 295. ISBN   978-0-520-93133-6.
  18. ↑ Romanovsky, Daniel (2009). "The Soviet Person as a Bystander of the Holocaust: The case of Easter Belorussia". In David Bankier; Israel Gutman (eds.). Nazi Europe and the Final Solution. p. 289. ISBN   978-1-84545-410-4. The intervied survivor from Kopyl, daughter of a village smith, considered the village dwellers to be antisemites. (Romanovsky)
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.