SEARCH SAVE PDF TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTERS A Welcome and Introduction 1 B Acknowledgements 2 C To the Children... A Dedication 3 D Suggested Reading List 4 E This Study Guide and You 6 F My Journal - A Silent Dialogue with Myself 7 G Understanding Human Emotions 11 H Hurricane Andrew and the Holocaust 16 I You Are the Best 17 UNIT I - DANGER SIGNALS I Exploring Our Roots 19 II Prejudice and Discrimination 27 III A Study of Words 37 IV Anti-Semitism and the Holocaust 44 V "Vus is geven is geven" - What was lost is lost forever 53 UNIT II - THE PERSECUTION YEARS VI A State of Terror: Germany 1933-1939 70 VII The War against the Jews 79 VIII The Ghetto 95 IX The Camps 110 Study Guide X Living with Dignity in a World Gone Insane 133 XI The Silent World and the Righteous Few Who Did Respond 154 XII Poland Today 176 XIII PostScript 186 UNIT III - ISRAEL XIV Shivat Zion - The Return to Zion 196 XV The Yishuv - During the Shoah 206 XVI B'riha - The Illegal Immigration (1945-1947) 213 XVII The Struggle for Independence and the Birth of the State of Israel (1945-1948) 224 XVIII The War of Independence (1947-1949) 238 XIX Yom HaZikaron and Yom Ha'Atzmaut 254 XX Jerusalem 261 XXI The Legacy: The War of Independence and the Current Peace Process 269 HOME A. WELCOME Dear March of the Living Participant, You are about to embark upon an exciting experience, one that may just change your life. The March of the Living will take place in a few months. You will be transported, along with thousands of other teens from all around the world, back in time to one of the darkest chapters in human existence, to one of the most terrifying times in Jewish history. Then, before you can take a deep breath, you will travel to Israel, the Jewish Homeland, to celebrate with the people of Israel, Independence Day. It will be a journey from darkness to light. It will be an experience of a lifetime. You will be one of the chosen few who will walk in the footsteps of the 6,000,000. The march from Auschwitz to Birkenau will be along the same path which once one million of our people marched to their death in the gas chambers and crematoria of hell. You will visit the death camps of Treblinka and Majdanek. You will be witness to the remnants of the once vibrant Jewish population centers of Warsaw, Cracow and Lublin. You will see Israel as you have never seen it before, through the prism of your Polish experience. To get you started on this journey we have enclosed the first installment of the "The March of the Living Study Guide". In the coming months you will receive three additional installments. READ THEM CAREFULLY!!! Your experience on the March will be greatly enhanced by the amount of time you spend now in preparation. Previous Marchers have told us how important it was for them to read such material before going on the March. Study Guide HOME WE WOULD LIKE TO SUGGEST THAT YOU: B. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS • Buy a 2" three ring binder for these and future chapters, so you can add The March of the Living had barely returned from Israel when a group of material as it arrives; staff members from the CENTRAL AGENCY FOR JEWISH EDUCATION in Miami, headed by MILES P. BUNDER, sat down to evaluate the study • Clip out articles from newspapers and magazines about Poland, the guide which had been prepared for the March. Shoah or Israel and place them in your binder; It was decided that a complete revision was needed and that every • Create a JOURNAL either use the binder or purchase a more participant would receive his/her own copy directly in the mail. The focus appropriate "Diary" so that each day you can write down your own of the new guide would be centered on the March program itself, rather thoughts about the upcoming trip. You can then take the Journal with than teach the Holocaust, Zionism and the birth of Israel. The Marchers you to Poland and Israel and continue your writing. (See the enclosed would be urged to take courses on these subjects in their local community "Chapter F: My Journal") and to read books from a prepared reading list. The project was launched and now, the first unit of this new "Study • Call your local Bureau of Jewish Education or Federation to see if there Guide" is in your hands. It is the product of countless hours and days of are other participants coming from your area. Try to meet with them so effort, which extended into weeks and months. you can study together. If all else fails, call the National Office and we will tell you who is coming from nearby. All of us involved in the March owe a deep sense of gratitude to the major editors and compilers of the March Study Guide: MILES P. BUNDER, DR. The March of the Living is now only months away. As we are sure the ALEXANDER (SANDY) ANDRON and SHARON HOROWITZ. Their excitement will begin to grow, we will share with you the plans for the commitment and total dedication was truly a "labor of love." March, and send you further updates from the Study Guide. READ AND GENE GREENZWEIG played a key role in helping to focus and shape the LEARN! Study Guide, challenging the editors to find a better way to express their We look forward to meeting all of you soon. Mark the date. Afterwards, ideas and make it more likely to be read and studied. you may never be the same! And you may like what you will become. STEPHANIE HAUSER AND JILL TANDLICH were of significant help in doing the research on the unit on Israel. HADASSAH KAPLAN and EDITH SIRULL spent hours at the computer, sometimes in tears themselves as they felt the impact of the readings. RUTH EISENBERG created the design work for the entire Study Guide and interpreted all of the words and graphics into a creative, easily readable and eye appealing finished product. DR. WILLIAM SHULMAN, who participated in the 1990 March, did the final reading of the Study Guide and his insightful and critical eye helped to shape this final version. Page 2 Study Guide HOME C. TO THE CHILDREN... A DEDICATION The Holocaust data (Units 1 and 2) was updated by DR. BETH COHEN. When a Jewish child is born, wishes are bestowed upon the parents to A special thanks goes to the officers and board members of the CENTRAL raise the youngster to be educated, to perform good deeds and to be AGENCY FOR JEWISH EDUCATION of Miami whose strong support for able to be led to the wedding canopy...but the Nazis prevented 1,500,000 the March inspired the staff to produce this Guide. These children from fulfilling this traditional blessing by snuffing out their young acknowledgements would be incomplete without an overwhelming lives, because they were Jewish. "thank you" to the people who really made this possible: the Marchers. The plight of the child was immediately realized when the Nazis came to It was their inspiration, their motivation, and their incredible dynamism power. How parents would save their children from the worst imaginable which showed the compilers the importance of preparing this guide, and fear was uppermost in their minds. They understood the only possible helped to keep their candles lit into the wee hours of the morning when hope was a parting. But it took an incredible amount of courage and their own strength began to wane. strength for parents to separate themselves from their children. In 1938- And lastly, to you, the new Marchers, this Study Guide is now dedicated. 39, 10,000 children journeyed from Berlin and Vienna to England on the May you learn from it. May you learn from each other before, during and Kinder transports. As time went on and conditions became worse for the after the March. And may you learn to love. Jewish people, many children were put into various hiding places. Some of the hidden children were placed with Christian neighbors, while others spent their young years in convents and monasteries, growing up in AN IMPORTANT NOTE: strange, foreign surroundings. Then there were those youngsters who hid in the forest aiding the partisans, serving as couriers and helping the In the Study Guide, you will find asterisks (*) in a number of places in the resistance groups. Children who managed to survive life in the ghettos text and graphics. Please note these changes carefully. They reflect saw their childhood end abruptly. Many were orphaned and left alone to updated corrections based on new evidence and information provided fend for themselves after their parents were deported or died from by DR. WILLIAM SHULMAN, Director of the Holocaust Resource Center disease and starvation. The ghetto child was forced to work and had to and Archives of Queensborough Community College, New York, to beg for bits of food. At selection, some children were able to pass as whom we are greatly indebted. adults and managed to be put in a concentration or forced labor camp. They matured overnight. They not only acted as adults but were treated as such. Youngsters who survived the Holocaust were not only cheated of their youth, but their lives as adults and parents would be affected forever. Claire Shavrich Hertzberg, Associate Director, Queensborough Holocaust Center Page 3 Study Guide HOME D.