On December 10, the highly anticipated exhibit of the Central Europe Center for Research and Documentation (CENTROPA), Survival in Sarajevo: Jews, Muslims, Serbs and Croats during the Siege of Sarajevo, 1992-1995, opened at the Osher Marin Jewish Community Center and will remain on display until December 27. It then opens at the San Francisco Public Library on January 22 and will remain on display there until March 16, 2014. Over a hundred community members attended the Osher Marin JCC opening.
CENTROPA director and photographer Edward Serotta, based in Vienna, Austria, attended the opening and gave a presentation about the exhibit. The exhibit chronicles how, when war came to Bosnia, a handful of Holocaust survivors and their children turned Sarajevo's last remaining synagogue into a humanitarian aid agency. Called La Benevolencija, Ladino for "good will," more than 50 Jews and Muslims, Serbian Orthodox and Catholic Croats all worked there every day, reaching out and helping an entire city. While outside of the besieged Bosnian capital, nationalist politicians swore these ethnic groups could not get along, La Benevolencija proved them wrong. In this European war, Jews were not the victims. In this war, Jews were saving Muslims and Christians. The exhibit and their actions are testament to the power of collaboration and the true meaning of tikkun olam.
