Great Choral Synagogue (Riga)
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The Great Choral Synagogue was built in 1870/71 according to a design by the architect Paul Hardenack (1819–1879) in what was then Bahnhofstrasse at the corner of Bärenstrasse (today Gogoļa iela or Dzirnavu iela) in Riga .
After the attack on the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, until July 8, 1941, the entire territory of Latvia, which was then occupied by the Soviets, came under the control of the National Socialist German Reich .
On July 4, 1941, just three days after the Wehrmacht had captured Riga , the Choral Synagogue - like other Jewish prayer houses - was set on fire at the instigation of the Einsatzgruppen .
“A group of about 15 men from the Arajs Kommando went to the Great Synagogue on Gogolstrasse on the same day. A commando car delivered them with petrol. The arsonists stormed into the building [...] and destroyed the interior. The rubble was piled up, doused with gasoline and set on fire […]. Other Jews were in the synagogue, including expellees from Kaunas and other cities in Lithuania and Latvia, who had fled to Riga from the German troops. Anyone who tried to escape from the burning building was gunned down by machine gun posts from the Arajs Command. All the other [...] burned in the building. "
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Almost the entire native Jewish population of Latvia - around 73,000 people - was murdered within the first six months of Nazi rule.
July 4th has been a national day of remembrance since the independence of the Republic of Latvia was restored . In 2001, a Holocaust memorial was built in the ruins of the synagogue .
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Coordinates: 56 ° 56 '32.7 " N , 24 ° 7' 34.8" E