Photos from the Kushner family archive
MINSK, 3 December (BelTA) – Many have recently seen Jared Kushner, U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, featured in news reports from Moscow. Fewer people are aware that decades earlier, in 1989, he visited Belarus as a child, traveling with his father Charles Kushner to Novogrudok. A BelTA correspondent uncovered more of the family’s history at the Novogrudok Museum of History and Regional Studies.
The large Kushner family stems from Novogrudok, its story inseparable from the town’s tragic yet heroic history during the Great Patriotic War – a past the town continues to honor. Zeidel Kushner, his wife Chinda, their son Honya, and daughters Esther, Rae, and Lea were prisoners of the Novogrudok Ghetto. Along with fellow prisoners, they took part in the largest mass escape in the history of the war on 26 September 1943. More than 230 people fled through a tunnel dug by ghetto prisoners, though only half ultimately survived.
The tragedy and heroism of the ghetto prisoners are documented at the Museum of Jewish Resistance in Novogrudok, which opened in 2007. On commemorative dates, residents bring flowers and candles to the Wall of Remembrance, erected near the exit of the escape tunnel, and walk the Road of Life, which is the path from the former prison to this memorial wall.
“Before the war, Jews constituted a significant portion of Novogrudok’s population,” said Aleksandra Varava, Acting Director of the Novogrudok Museum of History and Regional Studies. “Among them was the large, close-knit Kushner family that consisted of a father, mother, and four children. The head of the family, Zeidel Kushner, was an excellent leather and fur tanner, making fur coats and hats that were in great demand. However, the war destroyed their peaceful life overnight. An enemy bomb left only ruins where the Kushners’ home once stood. And soon, like other local Jews, they became prisoners of the Novogrudok Ghetto.”
During the first “aktion” (the term the Nazis cynically used for mass executions) the Kushners’ eldest daughter, Esther, perished. The third “aktion” claimed the life of the family’s mother, Chinda. Zeidel witnessed the deaths of his wife and other relatives. It was after this that the decision was made to prepare an escape.
The escape from the Novogrudok Ghetto is a significant chapter in the history of Jewish resistance to the Nazis in Belarus during the Great Patriotic War. The tunnel was dug over four months. In that time, around 250 tonnes of earth were removed and concealed from the guards. It was hidden in attics, between barrack walls, and poured into a well. A 200-meter passage was fitted with air ducts, and even electric lighting was pieced together from collected wires.
It is known that Rae Kushner helped procure digging tools and carried out earth. Honya dug the tunnel alongside young men. When the time came, a list was drawn up, placing the youths at the forefront.
Until the end of the war, the Kushners, together with other survivors of the ghetto, remained in Tuvia Bielski’s partisan brigade, which not only fought the occupiers but also provided protection for Jews, saving them from extermination by the fascists. In the “Forest Jerusalem” (as the brigade was called), Rae met a young carpenter named Yosif Berkovich, who later became her husband and took his wife’s surname. After the liberation of Novogrudok, the Kushners returned to the ruins. In 1945, using a special permission from Stalin, they emigrated to Romania. In 1947, they left for the USA, where they achieved great success in developing their business. The family’s most famous member, Jared Kushner, became the son-in-law of U.S. President Donald Trump by marrying his daughter Ivanka. Today, he plays a significant role in politics and runs his own large business.
“The Kushner family remembers and honors its history. Its members have visited Novogrudok many times. Rae’s son, Charles Kushner, has been to Novogrudok repeatedly, bringing his children and grandchildren. It was Charles who supported the idea of building a Wall of Remembrance in Novogrudok, inscribed with the names of all the people who escaped through the tunnel. The Seryl and Charles Kushner Family Foundation provided the funding for this project. The Wall of Remembrance was opened in 2019 during the commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the city’s liberation from the Nazis,” Aleksandra Varava said.
Now, new prospects are emerging for the Museum of Jewish Resistance, which is part of the local history museum. “Over the years of work, the exhibition, which is today part of the Novogrudok Local History Museum, has gathered extensive factual material about the history of the ghetto, the escape, and the fates of thousands of Holocaust victims who perished or suffered at the hands of the fascists. The need has matured to transform it into the Belarusian Museum of the Holocaust and Resistance in Novogrudok. Work on this is already beginning. This is our contribution to preserving historical memory and our desire to uphold historical justice,” said Natalia Zhishko, Head of the Ideology Department of the Novogrudok District Executive Committee.
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