The Macedonian town of Bitola commemorated on Tuesday 72 years since the deportation of the Jews from the town.
The event took place in the presence of the Israeli Ambassador to Macedonia, Dan Oryan.
At the ceremony which was also attended by Bitola mayor, Vladimir Taleski, Ambassador Oryan said that Bitola will again be mapped as a Jewish town and announced joint events on the occasion of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Israel and Macedonia twenty years ago.
“Today we remember the tragic past of the Jewish community in Bitola. At such a day, it is best that we remember the past but also think of the future. I hope that together with mayor Taleski we will work on putting Bitola again on the map as a Jewish town, as it was in the past,” Ambassador Oryan said.
3,200 Jews were deported from Bitola in 1943.
“Bitola remembers and doesn’t forget. Our town misses an entire organism, when even 3,200 Jews were deported. That’s why our common goal is to put Bitola on the world map of historical events related to the Jews from our town. That is a gap that cannot be so easily filled, but we are making everything possible to ease the pain for the lost part of our town,” Taleski said.
The president of the Jewish Community in Macedonia, Berta Romano-Nikolic, also attended the commemorative event in Bitola.
