The "Judeo-Bolshevik" image was formed in 1940-1941; that is - during the period of Sovietisation, after Lithuania lost its independence. Marginalization of the Jewish community to Lithuania’s political left came about historically, from when Lithuania’s leftist political parties defended the Jews from the attacks of right-wing radicals in 1923. Bolshevism and the Jews were accused for all of the adversities that Lithuania was faced with. A large part of Lithuanians saw Jewish Communists, but did not see Zionists, who were considerably greater in number; they saw Jews deporting Lithuanians to Siberia, but they did not see Jews being deported themselves; they blamed the Jews for social and economic changes, but did not see or did not want to see that it was the Jews who bore the greatest brunt of nationalization. Upon occupying Lithuania, the Soviets carried out a policy of national opposition, thus promoting anti-Semitism as well. This opened old wounds of society. The Nazis who occupied Lithuania began to use the Judeo-Bolshevik image very intensively. Nazi propaganda had a very strong influence on Lithuanians. The specificity of the Nazi Holocaust in Lithuania was that Jews were killed not just as such, but also as the seed of Bolshevism, as Judeo-Bolsheviks. The image of Judeo-Bolsheviks instilled by Hitler’s Nazis here intertwined with the image of a Jewish youth, a Soviet activist, which emerged during the first period of Soviet rule. The Holocaust began to be researched professionally in the early 1960s. For obvious reasons, such research was not possible in Lithuania. Unable to find a modus vivendi with the Jews in exile, a defensive position was taken
