v A Holocaust educational charity has hired a mobile studio to broadcast the stories of survivors to schools during the current pandemic crisis.

Learning from the Righteous focuses on the stories of rescue and resistance of those who came to the aid of Jews during the Shoah.

“We have set up a Covid-secure space with a high-quality recording facility,” said the charity’s founder, children’s author Antony Lishak.

“The point is to go to survivors and record their story so they can share it in a Covid-secure way.”

As well as pre-recorded sessions, it will be providing live broadcasts for schools in the run-up to Holocaust Memorial Day in January.

The studio has been hired for three months, with the particular help of Finchley Reform Synagogue. “I see it as a mobile classroom,” Mr Lishak said.

Echoing the HMD theme of “Become the Light in the Darkness”, the organisation is also running a Chanukah project for Jewish schools and chedarim.

For “Chanukah Lights in the Darkness”, it has produced a set of resources including candle templates featuring the inspirational story of someone who made a difference.

They include some of the British Heroes of the Holocaust such as Frank Foley, the intelligence officer who issued passports to enable Jews to escape from Nazi Germany. Or Sergeant Roddie Edmonds, the American soldier who protected Jews while a prisoner of war.

But it also offers some more contemporary examples of activism such as that of footballer Marcus Rashford, who forced the government to provide meal vouchers for needy schoolchildren. Or Darnella Frazer, the teenager whose video of the killing of George Floyd by an American policeman sparked worldwide protests.

The templates can be downloaded from the project’s designated Facebook group.

Children are encouraged to share one candle’s story each night of Chanukah. Learning from the Righteous will also be broadcasting nightly sessions with a rabbi over the festival from its studio.