The president of the Jewish Welcome Service, Vienna’s mayor, Dr. Michael Ludwig, and the vice-president, Vienna’s City Councilor for Cultural Affairs, Veronica Kaup-Hasler, have written a letter to the guests of the JWS at this difficult time. Many of you have already spent many months preparing for an emotionally taxing visit to Vienna. Unfortunately, this will only be possible at some point in the near future.
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Ruth Rotkowitz was in Vienna with her sister and cousins in the fall of 2019. She has now described the feelings and problems of the second generation in a novel. “Escaping the Whale: The Holocaust is over. But is it ever over for the next generation?”Read more

The Leon Zelman Prize has been awarded since 2013 to people or initiatives that are actively committed to the memory of the Shoah and the dialog between today’s Austria and the victims of National Socialist persecution and their descendants.
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At the beginning of December, a memorial stone was unveiled on Mariahilfer Straße in memory of the fate of the Bibring family: the parents were deported and murdered by the Nazis, the children escaped on a Kindertransport. Harry Bibring was in Vienna at the invitation of the JWS several times over the years.
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Ari Rath, an important admonisher against racism, antisemitism and intolerance, as well as editor-in-chief and publisher of the highly respected Jerusalem Post, has been honored by having a square named after him in the Alsergrund district of Vienna. (Preview photo: © ️ Trauneck / JWS)
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In the September issue of the “Jewish Echo”, profiled female writers cast light on the role of women in politics and society as well as in culture and religion – and do so one hundred years after women secured the right to vote in Austria.
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