At the memorial site, Maurice Herszaft says an Av HaRachamim for the Jews shot here had to wait over 70 years. Mordechai Bald, the chief rabbi of Lviv and western Ukraine, said El maleh Rachamim in Rava-Ruska and Bakhiv. Andrew Halpert said kadish for the members of his family who were shot in Kysylyn.
In memory of the victims of the Holocaust, a menorah looms above the mass graves. The menorah, a symbol of enlightenment, is carved on the face of a stone cube. At the foot of the cube, a Star of David is embedded in the ground. All of the paths at the site converge here.
Construction of the memorial site at Prokhid was well underway in October 2014. The four Holocaust mass graves located here will be protected by large prism-like forms. They rise gradually with the slope of the forest floor to a height of approximately one meter. The concept was developed by the architect Taras Savka.
Participants in a training program on Holocaust history visit the memorial site in Prokhid. The theme on this particular day was Jewish remembrance culture. Vitaly Bobrov of the Ukrainian Center for Holocaust Studies and Joe Shik of the Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe accompanied the group.
In September 2011, Serhii Shvardovsky of the Volhynian Religious Community of Reform Judaism and Maurice Herszaft filled in an open mass grave with sand to prevent further damage from erosion and plunder.
Joe Shik of the Committee for the Protection of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe made his first visit to the former killing site and mass grave in Prokhid in July 2011. The scholar supervised construction work on the memorial at this former sand quarry, where the Jewish community of Ratne was shot and hastily buried.