Holocaust memorial in Kyiv bombed by Russians

A Holocaust memorial site in Kyiv was hit with Russian munitions on Tuesday as Russia’s assault on the Ukrainian capital continues.

Russian missiles and shells struck the site of Babyn Yar, a ravine where 33,771 Jews were slaughtered by Nazi troops in September 1941 during its campaign against the Soviet Union. It was one of the largest massacres during the Holocaust, only surpassed by the 1941 Odessa massacre and Aktion Erntefest of 1943 in Poland.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky referred to Babyn Yar’s tragic past in a tweet after the attack.

“To the world: what is the point of saying «never again» for 80 years, if the world stays silent when a bomb drops on the same site of Babyn Yar? At least 5 killed. History repeating…” Zelensky wrote in English.

To the world: what is the point of saying «never again» for 80 years, if the world stays silent when a bomb drops on the same site of Babyn Yar? At least 5 killed. History repeating…

— Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) March 1, 2022

Officials also confirmed that buildings of the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center were hit.

“Just now, a powerful barrage is underway. A missile hit the place where Babyn Yar memorial complex is located! Once again, these barbarians are murdering the victims of Holocaust!” tweeted Andriy Yermak, Zelensky’s chief of staff.

Babyn Yar was the site of other massacres by Nazi Germany of groups such as Ukrainian nationalists, Roma, and Soviet prisoners of war. The Nazis shot between 70,000 and 100,000 people at the site, according to the center’s website.

The memorial center released a statement condemning the bombing and blasted Russian President Vladimir Putin for invoking Nazism as a justification to invade Ukraine.

“Putin seeks to distort and manipulate the Holocaust to justify an illegal invasion of a sovereign democratic country is utterly abhorrent. It is symbolic that he starts attacking Kyiv by bombing the site of the Babyn Yar, the biggest of Nazi massacre,” wrote Natan Sharansky, chair of the center’s advisory board.

“We, at the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center, built on Europe’s largest mass grave of the Holocaust, work to preserve historical memory following decades of Soviet suppression of historical truth, so that the evils of the past can never be repeated. We must not allow the truth to - once again - become the victim of war,” he added.

Putin has referred to Ukraine’s government as “neo-Nazis,” despite the fact President Zelensky is Jewish.