Forest Jerusalem—that's what the Bielski brothers' partisan unit, unique in occupied Europe, was called during the Great Patriotic War. It numbered about a thousand men, regardless of age. Children and the elderly alike. And all of them, without exception, were Jews. The unit's primary focus, oddly enough, was not combat operations, but rescuing people. Those who had managed to escape the ghetto flocked to the Bielskis' forest. They found refuge with the brothers from death.
This week, descendants of those who lived in the Forest Jerusalem arrived in Belarus. This small area in the Nalibokskaya Pushcha united several continents. The children and grandchildren of those rescued flew in from America, Australia, Europe, and Asia. And they themselves walked the path their ancestors had taken.