{"id":50122,"date":"2017-02-08T17:05:54","date_gmt":"2017-02-08T15:05:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=50122"},"modified":"2017-02-05T14:08:48","modified_gmt":"2017-02-05T12:08:48","slug":"08-05-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=50122","title":{"rendered":"Dutch Jewish wedding film from 1939 shines light on doomed community"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>Dutch Jewish wedding film from 1939 shines light on doomed community<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/h5>\n

Cnaan Liphshiz<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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\"TheThe Boas-Pais family, who perished in the Holocaust, in front of their home in the Frisian city of Harlingen, the Netherlands, before World War II. (Courtesy of the Annehuis ter Harlingen)<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

AMSTERDAM (JTA) \u2014 The Jews of Friesland, a region in the northern Netherlands, are not known for stories with happy endings.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

During the Holocaust, Friesland\u2019s vibrant Jewish community was forever obliterated, including its endemic customs and distinct Yiddish dialect. It is one of the starkest examples of how the Holocaust decimated and irreparably changed Dutch Jewry.<\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s why the recent surfacing of a unique film from 1939 showing the wedding of a Frisian Jewish couple who escaped the genocide is generating remarkable reactions from local media and Dutch state historians here over the past week.<\/span><\/p>\n

The film is the only known footage of Frisian Jewish life from before the Holocaust. Its discovery comes amid a wave of popular interest in the Holocaust in the Netherlands, including in films and series with record ratings and in the construction of monuments \u2013 most recently with the opening last year of the National Holocaust Museum in Amsterdam.<\/span><\/p>\n

The silent, black-and-white film was the subject of a special aired last week in prime time by the region\u2019s public broadcaster, Omrop Frysl\u00e2n. All the region\u2019s main dailies reported on it, as did some national publications \u2014 including the Netherlands\u2019 main television guide. Placed on YouTube by the Frisian Film Archive on Jan. 25, it received thousands of hits, becoming the archive\u2019s second-most-watched video over the past two years.<\/span><\/p>\n

The couple\u2019s children handed it over this month to the Frisian Film Archive after finding it in their late mother\u2019s suitcase in 2008. They had hung onto it for nearly a decade to \u201ccome to terms with it,\u201d Andre Boers, one of the couple\u2019s three children, told JTA on Tuesday.<\/span><\/p>\n

The seven-minute film posted online last week \u2014 excerpted from longer footage \u2014 shows the bride, Mimi Dwinger, wearing a form-fitting satin wedding dress and riding a horse-drawn carriage with her fianc\u00e9, Barend Boers. It\u2019s a sunny spring day and the couple is headed from Leeuwarden City Hall to the local synagogue.<\/span><\/p>\n

As elegantly dressed women and men wearing top hats stream into the synagogue, other locals from the Jewish quarter of this poor, provincial city gather around the entrance for a better view of what seems to be an unusually opulent affair.<\/span><\/p>\n

Inside the synagogue, which seems full to capacity with wedding guests, the region\u2019s chief rabbi, Abraham Salomon Levisson, officiates. He\u2019s wearing the black hexagonal hat favored by Sephardic rabbis \u2014 an influence brought to Holland by Portuguese Jews. Smiling, Boers signs the ketubah, the religious marriage contract.<\/span><\/p>\n

The ring is too small for a comfortable fit. Boers flashes an amused smile at the camera as Dwinger quickly licks her finger to make it easier to slip on the jewelry. Touchingly, Boers holds up her veil while she does this.<\/span><\/p>\n

The newlywed couple appears relaxed at the reception held at the local Jewish kosher hotel, The German Eagle. The guests chat and, after a few glasses of advocaat \u2014 Dutch eggnog \u2014 they giggle at the cameraman. The excerpt \u2014 the full footage was given on loan to the archive earlier this month \u2014 ends with Boers gently kissing his wife on the forehead.<\/span><\/p>\n

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