Yasinskaya Maria ; Son: Yasinskiy Boris ; Son: Yasinskiy Aleksandr

Yasinskaya, Maria Yasinskiy, Aleksander Yasinskiy, Boris Israel (b. 1902) and Sara (b. 1911) Goland lived in Minsk with their three children: Lev, Yelena, and Nina. At the onset of war, the family tried to flee to the Russian interior, but they were unsuccessful and were compelled to move into the Minsk Ghetto, along with 80,000 of their fellow Jews. Sara contacted Maria Yasinskaya, a non-Jewish friend who was a widow with three children. Maria helped provide food for the Golands, and Aleksander and Boris, Maria’s sons, helped smuggle goods that could be traded for food out of the ghetto. On November 20, 1941, during the second Minsk Ghetto Aktion (mass execution), Lev, the Golands’ eldest child, was killed. Meanwhile, following an informant’s tip, Israel was arrested and accused of being a Communist. He was sent to a camp on Shirokaya Street, where he awaited execution. Maria, who had underground connections within the camp, managed to arrange Israel’s transfer to the sick ward. He later escaped by hiding among corpses sent for burial at the local cemetery, where Aleksander and Boris awaited him and then brought him to their home. Armed with forged papers identifying him as Russian, Israel eventually reunited with his family. During this period the Golands’ home within the ghetto doubled as a partisan storeroom, holding literature, a typewriter, and even weapons. In March 1942 the family again managed to avoid an Aktion, again with the help of Maria and her sons, who removed the Golands from a convoy and sheltered them in their home. Over a year later, in July 1943, the Golands left the ghetto for good, joining partisans in the forests. Maria’s rescue efforts were not limited to the Golands. She also helped Josef Kruglianski, Israel’s sister’s husband. Josef’s wife and children had escaped to the east, but Josef did not join them, instead trying to pass as an Aryan outside the ghetto. Maria provided him with false papers stating that he was Tatar (her deceased husband had been Tatar). This allowed him to “marry” Maria in a mosque, and Josef was able to publicly identify himself as Maria’s husband. In addition she was in contact with the local underground antifascist and ghetto resistance movements, helping to procure forged documents, hiding places, and arms. Eventually, Maria, her children, and Josef joined the remaining Golands in the partisan camp of Shalom Zorin. Following the war, Sara returned to Minsk (Israel had fallen in battle with the Germans). She and Nina immigrated to Israel in 1979, and Yelena joined them eleven years later. Josef Kruglianski reunited with his wife and settled in Riga. Maria passed away in 1962. On April 22, 2012, Maria Yasinskaya and her sons, Aleksander and Boris Yasinskiy, were recognized by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations.