Romanian City Honors Memory of Jews Killed in Iasi Pogrom
Jerusalem, 9 September, 2025 (TPS-IL) -- Bucharest (Agerpres) – A new edition of the March of Life, an extensive project to commemorate the Iasi Pogrom, was organised on Tuesday by the Iasi City Hall, in collaboration with the Jewish Community of Iasi and Rabbi Josef Wasserman from Israel, chairman of the Foundation for the Promotion and Development of Judaism in Romania.
The event was organised to join the Iasi community into giving a tribute to the Jews who disappeared in the tragic events of June 1941.
Between June 28 and July 6, 1941, thousands of Jews were murdered by order of the government led by Ion Antonescu in the streets of Iasi, in the courtyard of the former Police Headquarters and in the so-called ‘death trains’ Iasi – Calarasi and Iasi – Podu Iloaiei, which reached Targu Frumos and Podu Iloaiei.
“The war in the Middle East prevented us from organising the event on the annually scheduled date, June 29. (…) Europe and the whole world went through a difficult period in the last century in which Nazism and the extermination of large masses of people were part of the behaviour that seemed natural to some. We want to show everyone, especially the younger generation, that it was completely unnatural what happened then. Extremism, fascism and hatred against other peoples do not lead to anything good, just as terrorism does not lead to anything good,” Mayor Mihai Chirica told the press.
The event was attended by a group of family members of the victims and survivors of the Iasi Pogrom, central and local administration officials, members of the diplomatic and consular corps.
“This year’s commemoration is made later than the usual June 29, because of the war that Israel is waging. (…) The Iasi Pogrom is one of the heaviest pogroms in Europe, not only in Romania. That is why I am glad, and I respect the people of Iasi that they help us never to forget those dark days that happened in Iasi and 1941. This is the most important lesson of history. No lesson in the book resembles what people see. People hear stories from survivors; they feel the atmosphere where thousands of people are buried. This cannot be transmitted from one generation to another in books, through lessons, but only through participation, near the graves of our brothers and sisters,” Wasserman, the initiator of the commemorative action, told the press.
Iasi was among the first cities in Romania where a Jewish community settled, getting particularly involved in the development of commerce, arts, medicine, sciences and architectural heritage, being a special city for members of the Jewish community in Romania and Israel. The first Yiddish theatre house in the world, ‘The Green Tree’ operated in the area of the current park of the Vasile Alecsandri National Theatre House.
