site.btaKyustendil to Have Tolerance and Humanism Centre

A Tolerance and Humanism Center will be set up in the southwestern town of Kyustendil on the initiative of a group of Bulgarian Jews. The first contribution to the project of BGN 50,000, raised from personal donations, has been already made. This transpired when the Bulgarian-Israeli Unity Day was marked in Kyustendil on Wednesday.  

The Bulgarian-Israeli Unity Day was designated by Kyustendil Municipality and the Regional History Museum on the occasion of the opening of the Dimitar Peshev House Museum on October 25, 2002  and as a gesture of solidarity with the people of Israel in connection with the terrorist attack on October 7, 2023.

Members of the local clergy, officials of the Shalom Organization of Jews in Bulgaria and members of the public attended the celebration.

"The Dimitar Peshev House Museum has Bulgaria's only exposition specially dedicated to the rescue of Bulgarian Jews," said Angel Dzhonev of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences Institute for Historical Studies, who arranged the display. It has been seen by thousands of visitors over the years, enlightening them about the fateful events that took place during WWII and the contribution Kyustendil residents Assen Suitschmesow, Vladimir Kurtev, Dimitar Peshev, Ivan Momchilov, and Petar Mihalev have made to the salvation of Bulgaria's Jews.

Addressing the event, journalist Isaac Gozes recalled that the rescue of the Bulgarian Jews has long been hushed up. He pointed out that there are 20,000 Righteous Among the Nations in Poland and only 20 in Bulgaria, which rescued 48,000 people from deportation to the Nazi death camps. He added that not all Bulgarian rescuers have received recognition for their humaneness.