This wall/fence preserved Bitola’s Jewish Cemetery from further desecration and destruction even during the Bulgarian occupation of Macedonia in World War II. евр гроб1The Cemetery was abandoned and left to ruin after the deportation of all Bitola’s Jews in 1943. The Bulgarian soldiers had used the gravestones to pave the military camp, the parade grounds, the floors of their barracks, the swimming pool, the walls of the washrooms, sidewalks etc…. All that was left were smashed pieces of gravestones strewn all over the Cemetery.