For Capt. Gabriel Granatstein, it’s mission accomplished – or almost. Granatstein is the young Canadian Jewish soldier who discovered a derelict Jewish cemetery in a Muslim village in Bosnia while serving with a peacekeeping mission this past year – as reported HERE on YW. 

Granatstein raised 2,500 euros, or about $3,600 (Cdn), mainly from family and friends back in Montreal, to help restore the Beth Olam cemetery in Jezero-Privilica, about 15 minutes from Bihac in the northwest region of the country.

That amount was matched by the municipality of about 30,000 people, a huge sum in a place where the average monthly wage is $250 and it’s still a struggle to provide electrical power because the infrastructure destroyed during the war has not been fully rebuilt, Granatstein said.

Work on the cemetery was just beginning when he left Bosnia at the end of March and the first phase is now complete.

The 200-year-old cemetery was overgrown and filled with garbage when Granatstein, 26, came upon it during his regular patrols of the mountainous region.

All that was left were 20 or 30 half-toppled, weather-beaten monuments and a crumbling concrete wall on one side. The only clue that this was a Jewish cemetery was the Hebrew inscriptions faintly visible on some markers.

No Jews live in the vicinity today.

The cemetery has now been cleaned up: an entranceway very similar to the one it once had has been installed, and the foundations have been poured for a new wall.

The only known extant photograph of the cemetery when it was in good condition, obtained through a researcher in Israel, served as a guide to reconstructing the entranceway, which consists of a concrete arch with the name Beth Olam carved out on it and wrought-iron gates.

The local authorities have pledged to keep up the cemetery indefinitely.

On June 20, Granatstein will be the guest speaker at an event organized by the Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre (MHMC). Part of the proceeds from the fundraiser will go to the cemetery project.

Granatstein wants to see the fence completed and, if the money allows, some of the monuments restored. He plans to deliver the cheque personally to Bosnian officials during a private trip back to the country in August.

The Canadian mission in Bosnia has now been wound up after 12 years.

Granatstein credits a local Muslim leader, Salko Rekanovic, with bringing the cemetery’s sorry state to the attention of the foreign peacekeepers. For several years, he had been asking for help, but with no success.

Click HERE to read the complete article on CJN.