For the first time since the Berlin wall was erected in 1961, West Berlin Jews were permitted yesterday to cross into East Germany to visit the graves of relatives. Heinz Galinski, chairman of the West Berlin Jewish community, said the visitors were 65 to 75 years old. They entered East Berlin by bus.
The visitors were 40 residents of the Jewish home for the aged in West Berlin. They visited the Weissensee Jewish cemetery. Under present rules, only Germans with close relatives in the East have been granted permits by the East German regime to enter East Berlin from the western sectors. An exception was made for the 40 elderly Jews because all of their relatives were dead, most of them victims of the Nazi holocaust.
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