Shopping center construction damaging historic Lviv synagogue
The Jewish community in Lviv, Ukraine, has warned that
construction of a new shopping center could seriously damage a historic
synagogue next to the site.
Construction on the shopping center in downtown Lviv
began on July 23 next to the Jakob Glanzer synagogue. Reports in the local
media carried photographs and a description of the construction, and said
drilling under the foundation of the building already had caused cracks to
appear in the synagogue walls.
On Tuesday night, the Jewish Cultural Association of Lviv
posted a YouTube video showing young people lighting candles at the synagogue
to protest the construction. Earlier, the Jewish community sent a letter to the
mayor and the chief architect of Lviv with questions regarding the reason and
legal background of the construction work. A protest banner was hung declaring
that the synagogue, built in the 1840s, is a protected architectural monument.
One of two surviving synagogues in Lviv, the Glanzer
synagogue was used after 1988 as a Jewish cultural center, but suffered damage
in a hurricane in 2010 and has been undergoing restoration.
During restoration work earlier this summer, previously
unknown wall paintings were discovered in the synagogue. They include at least
three large pictures situated on the southern wall under the women’s galleries
depicting, according to partly readable inscriptions, Babylonian rivers, the
Jerusalem Temple and the Western Wall.
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