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Dear Readers,
With this issue of Jewish News from Austria, we are happy to provide you with a broad selection of articles which have appeared in the Austrian media in the course of the last three months.
Within the framework of a joint project by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. and the Jewish Community of Vienna (IKG), a collection of valuable archival holdings, highly significant for Holocaust research, were found in an abandoned building of the Jewish Community of Vienna in 2000 and are being recorded and microfilmed. Altogether two million pages have been currently microfilmed and categorized. As we now know, it involves one of the largest, most complete holdings of any Jewish community - covering a period of 300 years. Among the finds were also deportation lists, emigration applications and many other documents which offer insight into the fate of the victims of the Holocaust.
The previous month was also marked by the sad news of the passing of Leon Zelman, co-founder and head of the Jewish Welcome Service. The focus of his tireless efforts was the program, "Welcome to Vienna," through which some 4,000 Austrians, expelled from Austria in 1938 after the Anschluss, were invited together with their families for a visit to their former homeland.
Finally, we want to remind all readers of Jewish News from Austria that you can find actual news items, information on events, publications as well as useful links on a regular basis on our website: www.jewishnews.at
Yours sincerely,
Wolfgang Renezeder
Director of the Press & Information Service
Embassy of Austria
Administrator
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Leon Zelman, head of Austria's Jewish Welcome Service, dies aged 81
Vienna (dpa) - Holocaust survivor Leon Zelman, head of the Jewish Welcome Service, died aged 81 at a Vienna hospital on Wednesday morning after a prolonged illness, Vienna's city administration said in a press release.
Zelman, who survived the concentration camps in Auschwitz and Mauthausen, was born 1928 in Poland. After WWII, Zelman, a prominent journalist, worked on developing travel between Austria and Israel.
The Jewish Welcome Service, a non-profit organization founded in 1980, works to promote Jewish culture in Austria, in order to "improve understanding between Jews and non-Jews."
A major focus of the body is organizing visits to Austria by Jews who were driven out by the Nazi regime in order take away their initial fears about visiting their old home.
Up to now, more than 4,000 displaced Austrian Jews and their families have been invited back by the organization.
June 7, 2007: ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION
The United Staes Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, D.C., invites to a roundtable discussion:
Rescuing the Evidence: The Archive of the Jewish Community Vienna
When: June 7, 2007; 3 - 5 p.m.
Where: USHMM, Helena Rubinstein Audiotorium, Lower Level
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