Fleeing a Home, Seeking a Home: Jewish Refugees in Modern Times

In the thick of a refugee crisis, with an official count of 82.4 million forcibly displaced persons worldwide, the Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Crimes Against Humanity (GC–CUNY) and the Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies (NYU) continue to offer a year-long series that tackles historical and current cases. “Fleeing a Home, Seeking a Home: Jewish Refugees in Modern Times” This panel grapples with refugee Jews displaced by war in three different geopolitical contexts: Ukraine, Central Asia, and the Middle East. Profs Jeff Veidlinger, Eliyana Adler, and Shay Hazkani recapture lost voices of displacement and rethink the meaning of “refugee” as they explore the experiences of Ukrainian Jews who left their homes in the wake of anti-Jewish violence unleashed during the Russian Civil War; Polish Jews who, in the midst of the Holocaust, fled the Germans and were deported by the Soviets to Central Asia; and of Moroccan Jews, who immigrated to Israel shortly after the establishment of the Jewish state. Chair: Prof. Elissa Bemporad. This event is hosted in association with The Holocaust and The United Nations Outreach Programme, Outreach Division, Department of Global Communications, United Nations.