Holocaust Memorials Hungarian Style

This stainless steel weeping willow is in the courtyard behind the Douhany Synagogue. It was created by Imre Varga, and it is an unusual and peacefull homage to the more than 400,000 Hungarian Jews who were murdered by Nazis during the German pccupation of Hungary during WWII.

I think this sort of memorial, where there are individuals represented, is very powerful for me. It allows for a sense of the magnitude of the disaster.

The courtyard at the Dohany Synagogue was once the witness for many deaths in the Jewish ghetto--either by murder or by starvation and disease. The photograph from the time of the Soviet liberation of Budapest (known in the history books as the day of occupation--non-Jews did not come to feel liberated by the Russians, it turns out) depicts this. Now, there are grave markers devoted to the memories of those who died there.

One monument that I found very powerful in person (and less so in photographic form) were bronze shoes at the endge of the Danube. These are meant to remember that during the German occupation, the Hungarian fascist Arrow Cross Party came to power and carried out violent attacks against the Jews. So many Jewish men, women and children were shot and thrown into the Danube River, it was said that the river water was red. THe shoes are a poignant way to condemn those actions by Hungarians against fellow Hungarians.