Rohatyn, Ivano-Frankivsk region, Ukraine - 29 August 2018

1. Wide shot of volunteers coming to clean up the cemetery

2. Tracking shot of people on path

3. Various shots of Jewish tombstones in high grass

4. Wide shot of Malla Raucher Osborn removing grass from tombstone and reads the sign

7. Pan from one tombstone to another

8. Mid shot of Marla Raucher Osborn

9. Wide shot of old Jewish cemetery

10. Pan of broken parts of tombstones

11. Close up of tombstone

12. Wide shot of Marla Raucher Osborn showing the tombstone

UPSOUND (English) Marla Raucher Osborn, Head of Rohatyn Jewish Heritage: "The hands represent the Cohen Hands and they were like a priestly class"

13. Various shots of broken tombstones

14. SOUNDBITE (English) Marla Raucher Osborn, Head of Rohatyn Jewish Heritage:

"The first things that almost always happened under the occupation is the burning down oR dynamiting of the synagogues and then the destruction of cemeteries. And the headstones were removed often times using Jewish forced labour. They were usually broken into smaller pieces and used as either building materials, or for paving roads. And the headstones you see here today have all been returned to the Jewish cemetery from roads, private gardens, private residences and foundations in town."

15. Various shots of volunteers clearing the territory of bushes

16. Various of Steve Reece cutting grass

17. SOUNDBITE (English) Steven Reece, Ordained Baptist minister and Head of The Matzevah Foundation:

"To me simply bringing together people who are separated by distance, by space, by conflict and I saw the Jewish cemetery as a way to bring Jews and Christians together in a common place where they can work together with one another to do what we are doing here in Rohatyn."

18. Steve cutting grass

19. SOUNDBITE (English) Steven Reece, Ordained Baptist minister and Head of The Matzevah Foundation:

"In my understanding working on the cemetery is a way in which Jews and Christians can work together toward a common goal which is to preserve Jewish heritage. And it is an opportunity for us to communicate interact, to have dialogue, to learn to work together, to do things that are practical. So to me it's something very practical and the cemetery provides a way to do that."

20. Various shots of people cutting down trees, mowing grass and cleaning up the cemetery

21. SOUNDBITE (English) Rachel Romero, volunteer of The Matzevah Foundation:

"So I really do feel like it's important to honor the memory of Jews who lived in this part of the world and had very rich culture and life for hundreds of years. So I feel like by coming here we are recognizing that. So often we only talk about the Holocaust and how Jews died here in 1940's but there was 600 years of history before that."

22. Various shots of volunteers working

23. SOUNDBITE (English) Jay Osborn, Rohatyn Jewish Heritage Program Manager:

"It was essentially the entire Jewish community of Rohatyn came here including Marla's family, many members of her family came here. And when they reached this point after walking through town to get here they were systematically shot here over some open pits, either one pit or two pits, records on that are indistinct. But approximately 3 thousands Jews were shot here and buried in the pit or pits that were here."

24. Mid shot of monument says in Ukrainian, English and Hebrew "Here lie 3500 Jews citizens of Rohatyn and its surrounding areas who were brutally killed by German Nazis on the 20th of March 1942. God rest their souls"

25. Pan from plate written in Hebrew to plates in Ukrainian and English

26. SOUNDBITE (English) Jay Osborn, Rohatyn Jewish Heritage Program Manager:

"And then in 1998 a group of survivors from Rohatyn and surrounding towns and their descendants of people who had lived here but had immigrated before gathered here to erect this monument, and another monument on the north mass grave because for Jews any burial place is a holy place."

27. Wide shot of people knocking on window of a house

28. Wide shot of Marla Raucher Osborn hugging Mykhailo Vorobets

29. Wide shot of Mykhailo at his home

30. SOUNDBITE (Ukrainian) Mykhailo Vorobets, witness of Jewish massacre:

"I had seen that (mass massacre of Jews) with my own eyes when I was so young, only 7 years-old. That was a horror for me as a child. I saw that and said to my father "Let's go home. I can't stand it." I have never seen before such a terror in my life. I remembered that so much."

31. Wide shot of Mykhailo telling the story

32. Wide shot of Mykhailo shaking hands with Jay Osborn

33. Various shots of Mykhailo talking to volunteers

34. Wide shot of Rohatyn downtown

35. Wide shots of Ukrainian and nationalists' flags

36. Mid shot of local residents

37. Wide shot of Rohatyn down town

A team of volunteers arrives at the Jewish cemetery in the Ukrainian town of Rohatyn.

Before the Second World War the town had long been home to thousands of Jewish citizens.

Many of the old graves here were destroyed by the Nazis and then taken away to be used for building material.

For years the cemetery became forgotten and was overgrown with weeds. Now it's being cleaned-up and restored to remember the town's Jewish history.

Marla Raucher Osborn is leading the clean-up. She's the Head of Rohatyn Jewish Heritage, an organisation run with her husband Jay Osborn.

Marla's grandmother Chaje (Annie) was born in Rohatyn. However, before the start of World War I her family emigrated to US.

The American couple have been gathering old headstones that were scattered in various places, and are bringing them back to the cemetery.

"The first things that almost always happened under the occupation is the burning down of dynamiting of the synagogues and then the destruction of cemeteries. And the headstones were removed often times using Jewish forced labour. They were usually broken into smaller pieces and used as either building materials or for paving roads. And the headstones you see here today have all been returned to the Jewish cemetery from roads, private gardens, private residences and foundations in town," says Raucher Osborn.

The volunteers have come from all over the world to help, like Baptist minister Steve Reece from Atlanta.

Armed with a grass cutter, he begins clearing the site.

In 2010, he launched the Matzevah Foundation, named for the Hebrew word for a gravestone, which organizes Jewish cemetery restoration projects in Europe.

He explains why he got involved in the project: "To me simply bringing together people who are separated by distance, by space, by conflict and I saw the Jewish cemetery as a way to bring Jews and Christians together in a common place where they can work together with one another to do what we are doing here in Rohatyn."

His foundation is working in collaboration with the Osborns to keep the region's Jewish history alive.

"In my understanding working on the cemetery is a way in which Jews and Christians can work together toward a common goal which is to preserve Jewish heritage. And it is an opportunity for us to communicate interact, to have dialogue, to learn to work together, to do things that are practical. So to me it's something very practical and the cemetery provides a way to do that," says Reece.

Volunteer Rachel Romero also travelled from the United States to lend a hand.

"I really do feel like it's important to honor the memory of Jews who lived in this part of the world and had very rich culture and life for hundreds of years. So I feel like by coming here we are recognizing that. So often we only talk about the Holocaust and how Jews died here in 1940's but there was 600 years of history before that," she says.

The cemetery holds particular significance for Jewish history as it was also the site of the massacre of thousands of people by the Nazis.

Osborn says the Jewish community was rounded up during the Second World War and taken to the cemetery to be killed.

"It was essentially the entire Jewish community of Rohatyn came here including Marla's family, many members of her family came here. And when they reached this point after walking through town to get here they were systematically shot here over some open pits, either one pit or two pits, records on that are indistinct. But approximately 3 thousands Jews were shot here and buried in the pit or pits that were here," he says.

A monument now stands on the site of the mass graves to remember the victims.

"And then in 1998 a group of survivors from Rohatyn and surrounding towns and their descendants of people who had lived here but had immigrated before gathered here to erect this monument, and another monument on the north mass grave because for Jews any burial place is a holy place," says an emotional Osborn.

Rohatyn resident Mykhailo Vorobets was a small child when the massacre of jewish people took place in 1939.

He was among many people who witnessed the atrocity firsthand.

"I had seen that (mass massacre of Jews) with my own eyes when I was so young, only 7 years-old. That was a horror for me as a child. I saw that and said to my father "Let's go home. I can't stand it." I have never seen before such a terror in my life. I remembered that so much," he says.

Almost eighty years on volunteers from all over the world have travelled thousands of kilometres for a common goal - preservation of Jewish heritage and reconciliation.

In addition to the cemetery in Ukraine, Reece and his team have cleared seven cemeteries in Poland this summer, including one in Oswiecim, the town where Nazi Germany ran the Auschwitz death camp.