A copy of the Torah scrolls that once belonged to the synagogue of Leeuwarden, capital of the Netherlands province of Friesland, was presented to the mayor of that town in ceremonies which recalled how the original scrolls were protected from the Nazis by the Dutch resistance movement during World War II. The original scrolls and the entire inventory of the old Leeuwarden synagogue are now at Kfar Batya in Israel, a settlement sponsored by the Mizrachi Women’s Organization of America.
But the copy, donated by the Mizrachi Women, was sent to the site of what was once a flourishing Jewish community to serve as a symbolic reminder of the Dutch Jews who were deported during the Nazi occupation of Holland.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.