Vol. 35-No.1 ISSN 0892-1571 September/October 2008-Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 THE AMERICAN & INTERNATIONAL SOCIETIES FOR YAD VASHEM AANNNNUUAALL TTRRIIBBUUTTEE DDIINNNNEERR GUEST SPEAKER MARGARET SPELLINGS, U.S. SECRETARY OF EDUCATION argaret Spellings is the U.S. Secretary of MEducation. As the first mother of school- aged children to serve as Education Secretary, Spellings has a special appreciation for the hopes and concerns of American families. Secretary Spellings is working to ensure that every young American has the knowledge and skills to succeed in the 21st century. She has partnered with states to implement and enforce the No Child Left Behind Act, which commits our schools to bringing all students up to grade level or better in reading and math by 2014. The law has led to rising test scores and shrinking achievement gaps in states across the country. Secretary Spellings has been a leader in reform to make education more innovative and respon- sive. She supported teachers with new financial incentives for gains in student achievement and parents with new educational choices and options. She announced new rules to ensure that students with disabilities and English language learners are educated to the highest standards. She also proposed a landmark Plan for Higher Education that would improve accessibility, affordability and accountability. Secretary Spellings believes we must not retreat from the world in the face of increased competition. She led the effort to pass President Bush's American Competitiveness Initiative to strengthen math and science instruction and It is with great pleasure that we write to invite you encourage high schools to offer more rigorous and advanced coursework. She to join us at the American & International Societies worked to implement Academic Competitiveness and National SMART grants, for Yad Vashem’s Annual Tribute Dinner. which are providing millions of dollars to low-income students who major in On the 70th Anniversary of math, science, or critical foreign languages. Prior to her tenure as Education Secretary, Spellings served as Assistant to the we salute the 60th Anniversary President for Domestic Policy, where she helped create the No Child Left Behind of the STATE OF . Act and crafted policies on education, immigration, health care, labor, trans- Sunday, November 9, 2008 portation, justice, housing, and other elements of the President's domestic agen- da. Previously, Spellings worked for six years as Senior Advisor to Governor Sheraton New York Hotel Towers George W. Bush with responsibility for developing and implementing the 811 Seventh Avenue at 52 Street Governor's education reforms and policies. From the White House and the Statehouse to the school board and college campus, Spellings has been involved with education policy at every level. Reception 4:30 Born in Michigan, Spellings moved with her family at a young age to Houston, Texas, where she attended public schools. She graduated from the University of Dinner 6:00 Houston with a bachelor's degree in political science. Dietary Laws Observed Black Tie Optional IN THIS ISSUE The American & International Societies for Yad Vashem Annual Tribute Dinner..1, 8-9 Jewish Women Prisoners of Ravensbrück...... 4 : A clash for civilization...... 5 The facing war-crimes trials...... 6 The birth of a nation...... 7 Revealing the good...... 10 Status as Salvadorans saved during the Holocaust...... 11 Nazi atrocities, commited by ordinary people...... 12 New debate over looted Jewish art...... 13 The Rape of Europa...... 14 Fun in the sun for a noble cause...... 16 Page 2 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769

AMERICAN JEWS HONOR POLISH HOLOCAUST RESCUERS CHINESE DIPLOMAT WHO SAVED THOUSANDS On one occasion, Nazi officers were bil- DURING HOLOCAUST HONORED BY ROB STRYBEL, leted in the house and German soldiers he heroic actions of a Chinese diplo- found almost no country willing to allow bedded down in the attic, separated from oles who risked their lives a half mat who saved thousands of Jews them entry. their quarry by only the thinnest of slats. T century ago by taking in fugitive from the Holocaust by issuing visas for Some of those who obtained Chinese P ike many Yad Vashem medal-hold- Jews during the Nazi Holocaust were hon- them to flee are being honored in visas were able to escape to Shanghai or ers, Senderska-Rzonca has stayed ored in Warsaw in July, in what may be L an exhibition at the US Congress. made their way to North and South in touch with her beneficiaries. "Miron one of their final gatherings. Against the orders of his superiors, America, Palestine, the Philippines, Cuba Bander was just a little boy back then. He They recalled how they tucked Jews Feng Shan Ho, the Chinese consul-gen- and elsewhere. is now a successful physics professor in into odd hiding places when German sol- eral in Vienna from 1937 to 1940, California," she said. diers were on the prowl, risking the death facilitated the safe departure of Nowinski said he had been in contact penalty for themselves and their families. the Jews in the years immediate- with a rescued Jew named Bronowski "At various times we had up to nine peo- ly preceding the Second World until his death in Israel last year at 103. ple living in our flat. They had free run of War, including those sent to Nazi "We're still in touch with Janina Panski the house, but when they heard a knock concentration camps. of Tel Aviv. My dad arranged forged Aryan at the door, they would all run down to a Ho's extraordinary rescue efforts (racial-purity) documents for her, and special hiding place next to the coal bin," were not known until after his death because she didn't look Jewish she could said Waclaw Nowinski, 83. in 1997 – thanks to his reporter freely walk the streets," he explained. He was one of about 60 ageing Poles daughter's nose for news. During World War Two, was the invited to the event by the U.S.-based Ho had lived after retirement in only country in German-occupied Europe Jewish Foundation for the Righteous 1973 for almost a quarter of a (JFR), all of them medal-holders of the where anyone aiding Jews risked death. century in San Francisco, Yad Vashem Institute's Righteous among In was also the only occupied country California, not far from some of the Nations decoration. whose government-in-exile set up an the people he had saved, but they Manli Ho poses next to a photograph of her father, Dr. Since its inception in 1986, the JFR has underground organization for the express never knew it. Feng Shan Ho. spent millions of dollars supporting needy purpose of aiding and saving Jews. "He did not seek publicity, he Gentile rescuers like Nowinska and Irena According to estimates, up to 120,000 did not seek recognition, he did not seek he Chinese visas were used to obtain Senderska-Rzonca, who was only 13 in Jews who could not have survived the compensation. It was enough for him to Ttransit visas from countries like Italy, 1943 when her family provided a safe haven Holocaust without help were rescued, and know that he had done the right thing," which required proof of an end destination. for a Jewish doctor's family in the eastern over 6,000 Poles were subsequently said Martin Gold, a member of the US The Washington exhibition was devel- Polish town of Boryslaw, now in . awarded the Righteous Among Nations Commission for the Preservation of oped with the help of Ho's daughter Manli She recounted how a Jew named Dr. medal, more than any other country. America's Heritage Abroad. Ho, a former reporter with the Boston Bander asked her father if he could help There was a bittersweet note to the The commission launched the exhibition Globe newspaper, who helped unravel his wife and five-year-old son, she said. Warsaw ceremony. "On the Wings of the Phoenix: Dr Feng her father’s heroic actions. "We hid them in the dovecote, and I "Due to the rising age of the res- Shan Ho and the Rescue of Austrian Ho was among the first of a small would take food and water up to them. cuers, it will likely be the last," said Jews" at the rotunda of a Senate office number of diplomatic rescuers who took They were later joined by the father." one of the organizers. building on Capitol Hill. "extraordinary steps at some personal Ho, born in Yiyang, Hunan Province and risk to themselves" to save the Jews, CZECH REMEMBERED IN TEREZIN who became fatherless by age seven, had Gold said. witnessed firsthand the , the Most of the Jews who escaped were crowd of 1,000 people, headed by plates on the graves that are to replace annexation of Austria by in 1938 from Poland or residents of ACzech Senate chairman Premysl the total 824 bronze plates stolen there and the subsequent imposition of Nazi Lithuania. Sobotka, paid respects to all the inmates earlier this year. racial laws and terror unleashed on Jews. Ho was posthumously bestowed the title of the war-time Terezin Unlike the bronze plates, Many Jews sought to leave Austria, but of "Righteous Among the Nations." ghetto and the local they will not attract metal scrap prison. thieves. BULGARIA ACCEPTS BLAME FOR 11,000 HOLOCAUST DEATHS The Terezin mourning The thief, who has been ceremony was held for the detained, inflicted a damage of resident Georgi Parvanov, during a what we have done to save Jews, we 61st time. more than $150,000 on the Pvisit to Israel, took responsibility for do not forget that at the same time "This year is strange. Due National Memorial in Terezin. the deaths of 11,000 Jewish residents of there was an anti-Semitic regime in to a thief, bronze plates with He faces up to eight years in Thrace and Macedonia, areas that were Bulgaria, and we do not shirk our the names of the people prison, if found guilty. annexed to Bulgaria in April 1941. responsibility for the fate of more than who perished here are The Terezin prison and ghet- Acting under Nazi orders, Bulgarian 11,000 Jews who were deported from missing on a number of to and the Litomerice concen- police arrested Jews in those territories Thrace and Macedonia to death graves," Terezin National tration camp made up the and deported them to Treblinka in 1943. camps," Paranov said at the Israeli Memorial's director Jan largest complex of its kind in The history of those Jews often has been president's residence in Jerusalem. Munk said. the Nazi Protectorate of played down in the face of the saving of Parvanov, a member of the socialist Munk said this barbarous Bohemia and Moravia. Some 48,000 Jews in Bulgaria proper by the –- formerly Communist – party, is the act had provoked a tremen- 220,000 people from all over country's religious and political leaders. first Bulgarian leader to accept respon- dous wave of solidarity. Poignant statue on grounds Europe passed through it dur- "When we express justifiable pride at sibility for the deaths. "We must not be reconciled of infamous concentration ing the war. with the theft. On the other camp Thereisenstadt. Only about one third of them HUNGARIAN ARMY OFFICER WHO SAVED JEWS hand, we have seen a positive response and lived to see the end of the war. Some of help. Sculptor Oldrich Hejtmanek will make the prisoners died in Terezin, others in DURING WWII COMMEMORATED AT EU PARLIAMENT the new plates free," Munk said. extermination camps. Hungarian army officer, who saved the where he joined his son. He died in 1966 The staff of the Czech Terezin National The Terezin Memorial was established Alives of around 2000 Jews in Budapest of a trauma after a fall. Memorial pasted the first 115 new resin in Terezin's Small Fortress in May 1947. from Nazi persecutions during the last During the commemoration event at the months of World War II, was commemorated EU parliament, under patronage of NAZI CAMP GUARD LOSES U.S. CITIZENSHIP at the European Parliament in Brussels. Hungarian MEP Andras Gyurk, whose Captain Laszlo Ocskay, family members also saved U.S. appeals court revoked the citi- While Geiser served at Sachsenhausen, who was recognized as a Jews in WWII, and B’nai Azenship of a Pennsylvania man who more than 3,000 prisoners were murdered “Righteous Among the B’rith Brussels, Leslie J. worked as a Nazi concentration camp guard. or died from brutal treatment, including Nations” by the Yad Pardon, a 83-year-old Israeli The 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals hard physical labor. Many prisoners died Vashem in Jerusalem in who was among the people affirmed a ruling by the U.S. District Court from exhaustion or disease; many were 2003, acted consistently saved by Ocskay, saluted his in revoking the U.S. citizenship shot or hanged. against the policies of the heroism and dedication. of of Sharon, who served Geiser, 81, immigrated to the “Arrow Cross Militia,” the "He was an outstanding during World War II as an armed SS from Austria in October 1956, and was natu- Hungarian pro-Nazi and brave human being who guard at . ralized as a U.S. citizen in March 1962. authorities headed by protected a group of helpless Geiser admitted under oath that he Efforts to denaturalize him began in 2004. Ferenc Szalasi. human beings from annihila- served during most of 1943 as an armed "Individuals like Anton Geiser, who Between October 1944 tion under the most critical SS guard at Sachsenhausen near Berlin. assisted the Nazis in their quest to extin- and January 1945, he used Captain Laszlo Ocskay. conditions, and risked his His duties included escorting prisoners to guish the lives of millions of innocent men, a former Jewish high school building in own life by standing up against the power slave labor sites and standing guard in the women and children, do not deserve the Budapest as a shelter for the 2,000 of institutionalized terror," he said. camp's guard towers. He said he was benefits of U.S. citizenship," said U.S. women, men and children, feeding them “Thanks to him I could miraculously under standing orders to shoot any pris- Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan. "The 3rd with army rations and defending them with escape from a train bound for Auschwitz.” oner attempting escape. Circuit's decision affirms that the United military force. Over 600.000 Jews were killed by the Geiser also admitted serving as a guard States will not be a sanctuary for perpetra- After WWII, Ocskay lived in Austria Nazis in Auschwitz and in Hungary during at Buchenwald and its Arolsen subcamp. tors of the Holocaust." before immigrating to the United States the last few months of WWII. September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE Page 3

THE HOLOCAUST WAS NOT EXPERIENCED SON OF NAZI DOCTOR SEEKS TO DONATE IN THE SAME WAY BY EVERYONE FATHER'S MONEY TO HOLOCAUST EDUCATION ewish experiences of the Holocaust persecution and their own reactions to it, son of notorious Nazi doctor Aribert control of the money, he told the newspa- Jare complex. Swedish researcher and how their experiences can be linked AHeim was quoted as saying that he per he would donate to help document Laura Palosuo from Uppsala University to gender, age and class. wants his father declared legally dead so he suffering in the Mauthausen concentration has studied the testimony of Hungarian The results show that the experiences can take control of his money and donate camp near , Austria, where his father survivors, and in her dissertation she were extremely complex, and that they some of it to help document the suffering worked as camp doctor in October and shows that the way different people expe- cannot be related just to 'race.' that occurred at a former November 1941. rienced the anti-Jewish legislation and the "A clear example of the role played by concentration camp. o far, Heim's children violence in the German occupied areas is gender was the so-called trouser inspec- Ruediger Heim told the Shave made no claim to linked to gender, age and social class. tions. When a Jewish man was outdoors Bild am Sonntag newspaper a bank account with 1.2 mil- Hungary was the first country in Europe the authorities could easily check whether that his father – dubbed Dr. lion euros ($1.78 million) and to legislate against the Jewish minority, in he was circumcised by simply pulling Death and atop the Simon other investments in his 1920. In the late 1930s and early 1940s, down his trousers," says Laura Palosuo. Wiesenthal Center's list of name. To do that, they would several anti-Jewish laws were introduced, Jewish women could move about out- most-wanted suspected have to produce proof that but the did not take place doors more freely if they removed the yel- Nazi war criminals – should their father is dead. until after the German occupation in low star, and since they did not have any officially be declared miss- In July, the world's top March 1944. Then, over half of the coun- physical markers indicating their ing and then dead. Nazi-hunter said he had try's 800,000 Jews were transported in 'Jewishness' they could more easily avoid He reiterated he has not made progress in finding the freight trains to Auschwitz-Birkenau, harassment. However, the differences had any contact with his 94-year-old Doctor Death, where the majority were killed immediate- linked to gender, age and class were father since he fled Germany who stands accused of tor- ly after arrival. erased in the course of time, and towards in 1962, save two short notes turing Jewish prisoners at The thesis Yellow Stars and Trouser the end of the war these factors came to in his family's mailbox. Mauthausen and who may "Between 1962 and have been living for decades Inspections is based on 151 interviews, play a smaller and smaller role in people's , known as Dr Death. reports and memoirs with and by experiences. 1967, two notes appeared in or Chile. Hungarian Jews who survived the Analyzing the importance of gender in our mailbox. There was a single sen- , head of the Israeli branch Holocaust. Most of them came from combined with other factors in the way tence written on them, 'I am doing fine.' of the Center, told a Budapest, and belonged to the group that Laura Palosuo has done is a new and But if those letters were really from my news conference that his mission to the was not deported but that experienced the unexplored perspective in the field of father, I do not know," the paper quoted southern reaches of the Americas led him terror of the Fascist Arrow Cross party. genocide research. him as saying. to at least four people who claimed to With the aid of these accounts, Laura "The results are of interest to anyone Heim also said that he has no idea if his have seen Aribert Heim in the 45 days Palosuo has analyzed the way Jewish who wants to know more about how peo- father, who would be 94 today, is alive or leading up to his visit. men and women of different ages and ple perceive and react to catastrophic sit- dead. He told the paper he is working with Zuroff's two-week mission took him to from different social strata describe the uations," she says. a lawyer to see how he can have his want- the southern Chilean fishing town of ed father declared missing and then dead Puerto Montt, where Heim's daughter REPORT DETAILS CATHOLIC ROLE IN NAZI ABUSES so as to get control of the former Nazi's lives, and to the town of San Carlos de bank account. Bariloche, across the border in Argentina. he Roman Catholic Church in to oppression under the Nazis, but aside He said he, his brother and sister only The believes Heim is hiding TGermany exploited nearly 6,000 from some notable voices of opposition discovered in 1997 that a bank account in out somewhere between the two towns, forced laborers during the Nazi era, the from each church, they generally went his father's name existed. If he could get separated by the Andes mountain range. church said in a report. along with the regime. In 2000, the church acknowledged its The SS expropriated more than 300 DEAL REACHED ON PAINTING SEIZED BY NAZIS use of forced labor under Hitler; it has paid monasteries and Catholic institutions from about $2.35 million in compensation to 1940 to 1942, and thousands of Catholics A valuable 17th-Century deal, the gallery paid an foreign workers. The report, Forced Labor were sent to concentration camps, said painting seized by the Nazis undisclosed sum to Block and the Catholic Church 1939-1945, is the Karl-Joseph Hummel, a historian and a has been returned to the fam- for the painting. most thorough look at the issue. co-author of the report. ily of its former owner, but will Willem Kalf (1622-1693) It documents the fate of 1,075 prisoners At a televised news conference in Mainz, remain on display at a Munich is considered one of the of war and 4,829 civilians who were forced Mr. Hummel said the term cooperative gallery, according to an most important Dutch still to work for the Nazis in nearly 800 Catholic antagonism summed up the church’s strat- agreement signed in June. life painters of the 17th institutions, including hospitals and egy at the time. The report said a large pro- The oil painting Century. monastery gardens, to help the war effort. portion of the workers, mostly from Poland, Still Life with a Porcelain Jug The Nazis stole count- The church, which has financed more Ukraine and the , were forced by Dutch master Willem Kalf less works of art from than 200 reconciliation projects, said final to help the Nazi war effort in military hospi- was unlawfully obtained from Jewish collectors or forced numbers would never be known. tals that would not have been able to keep Jewish art collector Josef them to sell their works at It should not be concealed that the operating without them. Block nearly 70 years ago. knock-down prices. Catholic Church was blind for too long to The Nazis shipped millions of people It has been hanging at the In recent years there the fate and suffering of men, women and from conquered territories, especially in Alte Pinakothek gallery in Still Life with a Porcelain Jug by have been growing efforts children from the whole of Europe who Eastern Europe, to work for the war econ- Munich, where it will remain Dutch master Willem Kalf. to find and compensate were carted off to Germany as forced omy in poor conditions. following an agreement signed with families of art collectors disappropriated laborers, Cardinal Karl Lehmann said at Mr. Hummel said the conditions for those Block's grandson, Peter Block. Under the before and during World War II. the presentation of the report. in forced labor for the church were not as Catholics and Protestants were subject bad as at some other organizations. GERMAN NEO-NAZIS CONDEMN ANTI-SEMITISM azis against anti-Semitism? As inate the world," they wrote in a rare man- SERBIA TO SEEK EXTRADITION OF ALLEGED EX-NAZI Nbizarre as that sounds, a group of ifesto which was posted on their Web site. erbia's war crimes prosecutors his US citizenship. Germans which calls itself "National These unusual statements on the inter- Splan to seek the extradition of an In its complaint filed in US District Socialists For Israel" launched its Web net compliment the group's other public American who allegedly served in a Court in Seattle, the Justice site in support of Israel. campaigns, including the dissemination of Nazi unit that killed 17,000 civilians Department said Egner had failed to "Stop the hatred of the Jewish people," bumper stickers. One of the stickers fea- the Web site reads. "The Jews are a here during World War II. divulge that information when he tures a picture of , the healthy, strong nation." Vladimir Vukcevic, Serbia's chief war applied for US citizenship. Instead, he senior Nazi official who chaired the The organization – whose members have crimes prosecutor, told The Associated reported serving in a German unit and Wansee Conference where the Final yet to reveal themselves to the public – Solution was hatched. Underneath the Press that his investigators have been was granted US citizenship in 1966. claims that Israel's right to exist is anchored gathering information about Peter The US Justice Department, citing photo reads: "As a Nazi, I'm a Zionist." in the principles of social Darwinism, the Another sticker shows a photo of Israel Egner, 86, a native of now Nazi documents, said that in the fall of same principles which the Nazis adopted living in the United States, in order to 1941, Egner's unit executed 11,164 Defense Forces soldiers during the prior to the Second World War. Second Lebanon War under the heading: try him in Serbia. people – mostly Serbian Jewish men, "Israel earned the right to live among the "2,000 years of struggling to survive – In July, the US Justice Department suspected communists and Gypsies. In nations [after emerging] from unending respect to those worthy of it." asked a federal court to revoke Egner's early 1942, it also killed 6,280 Serbian wars," the group writes on the site. "Israel In terms of the group's attitude towards American citizenship, saying he had Jewish women and children who had also has a right to exist. This nation also the Holocaust, the organization says: "We served as a guard and interpreter with been prisoners at a concentration camp has culture... The nation of Israel is appre- must view what is referred to as 'the the Nazi-controlled Security Police and in Belgrade. ciated... It is our duty, as neo-Nazis, to Holocaust' within the context of acts of Security Service in Belgrade from April Over a period of two months the defend this supreme success. " As such, "Nazis for Israel" also leveled crit- self-defense undertaken by nations under 1941 to September 1943. women and children were allegedly threat." It added, however, "that there is Egner, who lives in a retirement com- taken from the camp and forced into a icism at their colleagues in the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD), calling no justification for it." Instead, the Nazis munity in the Seattle area, can only be specially designed van, where they ought to have supported the Zionist extradited to Serbia if he is stripped of were gassed with carbon monoxide. them "politicos, cowards, and reactionaries." "Show us proof of a Jewish plot to dom- cause, the group states. Page 4 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 BOOKBOOK REVIEWSREVIEWS A WALL OF TWO: POEMS OF RESISTANCE AND SUFFERING FROM KRAKÓW TO BUCHENWALD AND BEYOND A Wall of Two: Poems of Resistance A Wall of Two, in sum, chronologically vis-à-vis “Hitler-style” [my words] incarceration. and Suffering from Kraków to Buchenwald is a compilation of these the war. Thus, the first “One, two, three, four . . .” they march by, and Beyond. Henia Karmel and Ilona Jewish sisters poems, piece by Ilona, entitled, and we see them, we hear their footsteps Karmel. Introduction and Adaptations by translated here for the “Autobiography,” and and we can begin to know and feel, by Fanny Howe. Translated from the Polish first time from the Polish subtitled, “childhood,” way of Henia’s writing, that soon these by Arie A. Galles and Warren into English by Arie A. presents us with a world “nameless” ones will know of “trembling Niesluchowski. University of California Galles and Warren (written in the present lamps, [d]rizzle, rifles and hard rain.” Press: Berkeley, 2007. 119 pp. $16.95 Niesluchowski. Fanny tense, but actually Sadly, too, they will soon know “sufferings paper, $45 cloth. Howe, herself a prizewin- remembered) from without number.” Strange, one can almost ning writer, writes a beau- before the war, a gentle, REVIEWED BY DR. DIANE CYPKIN paint this poem. tiful introduction, which tender world of “milk And then, much later, Henia writes of he blurb to A Wall of Two: Poems of tells the story of how the and flowers” . . . and freedom in a piece appropriately titled “My T Resistance and Suffering from girls and their work made “miracles.” A little girl Freedom.” Ironically, the moment of free- Kraków to Buchenwald and Beyond it to freedom. Ms. Howe lives here, soon to dom is not at all what she thought or felt it begins: is also responsible for the become an adolescent, would be like. She feels “sick” and can’t “Buchenwald survivors Ilona and Henia poems’ adaptations into ready to take on joyful “face” it. It came “too late. . .” It feels like Karmel were 17 and 20 years old when English. In fact, in a sep- “adventures.” Then it all everything is gone, “[e]ven happiness had they were sent to the Nazi labor camps arate chapter near the abruptly ends . . . as died with the rest.” Freedom after so much from the Kraków ghetto. These remark- close of the volume, we learn how dili- times drastically change and time itself is loss — it just doesn’t feel free. And it’s not able poems were written during that time.” gently she scrutinized every word and the now calculated in “menace, ashes, ruin, like it used to be . . . nor will it ever be . . . How full with meaning those two sen- rhythm of every line to make sure the writ- pain, despair, terror, suffering, murder.” These aforementioned writings are but tences are. How very much they say so ings kept close to the sisters’ style and And “[t]here are no words . . . [o]nly tears.” a small sampling of the heartfelt pieces in compactly. Just imagine how Ilona and that they did not lose their essential mean- Hitler’s Nazis have arrived! A Wall of Two. Readers of M&R, readers Henia Karmel wrote, usually under the ings in translation. Indeed, this reviewer Then, not long after, Henia’s poem of poetry, will find the volume unique and most horrible of conditions. Imagine the must say bravo to her! The poems don’t called, “Us,” appears. It is short, but has exceptionally moving. miracle of just getting the paper to write sound translated from another language a powerful impact on the reader. Henia on, and writing so the Nazis didn’t notice. at all – and that’s not an easy job. and Ilona are prisoners of the Nazis now, Dr. Diane Cypkin is a Professor of And imagine, . . . both they and their The individual poems themselves, and Henia watches as new and already Media & Communication Arts at Pace poems survived. touching and sensitive, are arranged “nameless” beings are “introduced” to University. JEWISH WOMEN ICON OF EVIL PRISONERS OF RAVENSBRÜCK Icon of Evil. Hitler’s Mufti and the Rise of Muslim Brotherhood whose ideals are Radical . By David G. Dalin and John embodied in the terrorist organizations of Jewish Women Prisoners of secondary sources, as well as some 100+ F. Rothmann. New York: Random House, Hamas, Hezbollah and al-Qaeda. Ravensbrück: Who Were They? By Judith published and unpublished memoirs and 2008. Pp. 227. $26.00. In the historic meeting on November 28, Buber Agassi. Oneworld Publications, manuscripts. All of this was necessary in 1941, between al-Husseini and Hitler in REVIEWED BY RABBI I. ZOBERMAN 2007. 352 pp. $68 order to “reconstruct the crime” as it was the Fuhrer’s Berlin office, the Muslin committed over the course of six years, uthors and scholars David G. Dalin REVIEWED BY RIVKA CHAYA SCHILLER leader made it clear that their goals vis-à- from 1939 to 1945. In the process, Buber A from the Hoover Institution at vis the Jews were identical. Al-Husseini s the grandchild and great-niece of Agassi also succeeded in uncovering vital Stanford University with John F. participated in the destruction of Bosnia’s A women who were incarcerated in data about the more than 16,000 individ- Rothmann of the Fromm Institute at the Jews through his personal involvement Ravensbrück, the first all-female concen- ual Jewish victims — both those who were University of San Francisco, have collab- with the Muslim recruits to the Waffen-SS, tration camp, which began functioning on murdered and those who survived. orated to prove in the riveting account of Bosnia-Hercegovina. Found documents May 18, 1939, I read with much interest ccording to Buber Agassi, whose Icon of Evil that the infamous grand mufti indicate his persistent request of Heinrich Dr. Judith Buber Agassi’s 2007 publica- A own mother, Margarete Buber- of Jerusalem Haj Amin al- Himmler and Herman tion, Jewish Women of Ravensbrück: Neumann, was incarcerated for five years Husseini is directly responsi- Goring to conduct air Who Were They? More than all the other in Ravensbrück, there were a number of ble for the violent identity of attacks on Jews in concentration camps, extermination cen- obstacles to Jewish commemoration. Radical Islam. Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. ters, and ghettos combined, the One of these is steeped in the uniqueness Interestingly, the authors’ However, he did receive Ravensbrück Concentration Camp stands of the Jewish experience during the bond and focus on the book’s poison meant for Tel as the symbol of these Holocaust, as Ravensbrück theme dates back to 1968 and Aviv’s water system unique, female-targeted does not fit this traditional a joint experience as Hebrew which was caught in time. atrocities. However, model. Indeed, it was a University visiting summer The mufti broadcasted on until the past couple of “place of suffering to students in Jerusalem’s Yad German radio in 1943 his years, it was greatly women from all over Vashem. There a shared fatwa, “Kill the Jews.” overlooked in the shad- Europe, the Jewish women photo of the mufti with Adolf If he were captured at ow of more infamous among them constituting a Hitler piqued their curiosity, the war’s end, he would and widely discussed minority.” ultimately resulting in meticu- have been tried and con- killing sites, such as As a sociologist special- lous and revealing research victed as a war criminal Auschwitz-Birkenau, izing in gender and work concerning the close person- beside the German lead- Bergen-Belsen, and Buber Agassi felt that her al as well as ideological rela- ers, assert the authors. Treblinka. chief goal in constructing tionships between the two. The mufti’s Early on al-Husseini would use assassina- One of the first issues such a book was to ascer- planting of the fertile seeds of both anti- tion of his own Arab rivals as an accepted that Buber Agassi tain some of the following Semitism and anti-Western attitude, the weapon and there is even reason to connect addresses in her highly questions: Who were these antecedent authoritatively claimed by the him to the murder of Jordan’s King Abdullah detailed, thoroughly Jewish women? Or – more authors, for today’s Radical Islam’s in Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque in 1951. researched, and deduc- specifically – which coun- uncompromising hatred. The authors clearly conclude, “As the tive book is that of why the Ravensbrück tries did they come from? What was their Ironically, it was the first British high founding father of radical Islamic anti- chapter of the Holocaust has been so age distribution? What types of profes- commissioner for Palestine, the Jewish Semitism in the twentieth century, al- sorely neglected by researchers concen- sional roles did they hold prior to the war? and Zionist-committed Sir Herbert Husseini remains the inextricable and trating on Jewish prisoners in specific Did they come from traditional (i.e., reli- Samuel, whose controversial 1921 enduring link between the old anti- concentration camps. This is only one of giously observant) backgrounds or not? appointment of the 26 year old al-Huseini Semitism of pre-Holocaust Europe and the numerous questions that the author What types of social interactions and as Jerusalem’s mufti allowed the most vir- the Hew hatred and Holocaust denial that sets outs to answer for herself by inter- emotional support existed among and ulently hostile candidate for the significant now permeates the Muslim world.” (p.108) viewing – together with a team of between the various groups of women, Muslim office over Islam’s third holiest researchers – 138 survivors of i.e., Jews, non-Jews, Zionists, non- city, to enter the religious and political Rabbi Israel Zoberman, Spiritual Leader of Ravensbrück on more than three conti- Zionists, Communists, Socialists, et al.? arena with lasting disastrous conse- Congregation Beth Chaverim in Virginia nents, and by sifting through primary and (Continued on page 15) quences. He became a leader in the Beach, is the son of Polish Holocaust survivors. September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE Page 5 THE NAZI CRIMINALS AMONG US Finally, there is Anton Tittjung. Tittjung reopening Nazi-era wounds. egardless of any moral impetus BY TOM TEICHOLZ, LA TIMES was born in what was then Yugoslavia But that does not lift their moral respon- Rcountries might have to extradite and is now . He was a Waffen SS sibility to accept and/or prosecute the Nazi criminals, until now there has been ohn Demjanjuk's last appeal to avoid member and a guard at Mauthausen. criminals of the Nazi era. In what society no legal one. That may change. On May was rejected by the U.S. J Should any of these criminals worry that do murderers go free? What nation can 12, Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., intro- Supreme Court on May 19. The 88-year- deportation is imminent, they might take forget the crimes of the Nazi era? Given duced the World War II War Crimes old accused Nazi concentration camp comfort from the fact that the Supreme that the victims of the Holocaust cannot Accountability Act of 2008, which would guard was stripped of his citizenship and Court declined to require the United States to evaluate for- ordered sent to Ukraine, his birthplace; hear Tittjung's final eign countries' cooperation in extraditing Poland, the locus of the crimes; or appeal way back in or prosecuting Nazi criminals the United Germany, the heir to the Nazi regime 2000. He still States wants deported. Assistance or lack under which he served. remains free in the thereof would affect a nation's visa-waiver Yet, as it now stands, he is still in the United States. In status for business travelers and tourists. United States. Why? He can't be exiled addition, in recent More than 50 years after the end of unless another country agrees to accept years, four of their World War II, it is fair to ask: Why do we him. For the time being, he remains free. denaturalized Nazi care? What's the point of expending our In this, Demjanjuk is not alone. There peers died before time, effort and money and that of other are five other former Nazi criminals they were ever countries on these old men? Why not against whom the U.S. Justice deported. move on? What of forgiveness? Department successfully completed n all of these Forgiveness or mitigation as a legal, or deportation proceedings, but whom no Icases, the even a moral, concept should only be avail- country has been willing to accept. countries of their able to those who are willing to fully confess Romanian-born Johann Leprich, a birth, such as their participation in the crimes of the Nazi guard at Mauthausen camp in Austria, is Ukraine, Romania, era and express remorse. But to date, there one; his deportation was finalized in 2006. Poland or Croatia, have been no complete confessions by the (left) and Johann Leprich. Another is Jakiw Palij, born in a region of and the countries guilty and no remorse. Demjanjuk, for Poland that is now in Ukraine. He was a where their crimes were committed, such cry out for justice, who will? example, continues to deny any Nazi guard at Poland's as Austria or Poland as well as Germany, Poland, Ukraine and Romania might involvement whatsoever, even in the face of (where in a single day in 1943, 6,000 prison- were contacted by the Justice Department, make the argument that they were under incontrovertible documentary evidence ers were murdered), and his deportation was and none expressed interest in receiving Nazi rule at that time. Germany has no unearthed after the collapse of the Soviet finalized in January 2006. Mykola Wasylyk, these now "stateless" persons. such excuse. And although Germany has Union that confirmed his presence at another Trawniki guard also found to be at There is no law, domestic or interna- prosecuted many native-born Germans numerous concentration camps. the Budzyn camp, had his final appeal tional, that requires foreign countries to for their World War II-era crimes, they Still, time is passing. In the case of these denied in 2004. accept or extradite these former Nazis or have been less eager to do so as time criminals, there is some irony in the fact that Theodor Szehinskyj, also born in a part to give a reason why they don't. goes by. Germany has had even less they have lived long enough to be exposed of Ukraine that used to be Poland, was in However, their reasons are easy to interest in prosecuting those non- for who they were and what they did. the SS unit called the Death's Head divine and include not wanting to burden Germans, like Demjanjuk, who served If no country accepts them before they Brigade and was a guard at the Gross- the state with these aged citizens, no the Nazis in the countries they con- die, at least they won't pass from this Rosen, Sachsenhausen and the Warsaw desire for an expensive investigation quered, as though Germany could draw Earth as innocents. concentration camps. His deportation liti- and trial, and fear that nationalist or neo- a border around the Holocaust crimes it It may not be final justice, but it is gation was completed in March 2006. Nazi elements might be aroused by is responsible for. some comfort. THE HOLOCAUST: A CLASH FOR CIVILIZATION with their victims, had a choice and chose of affairs in their hands are Jews here and he difference is between civiliza- BY JASON GUBERMAN-PFEFFER to do evil. According to Daniel Goldhagen, Jews there and Jews everywhere. The T tion and barbarism – a state Hitler “the perpetrators, having consulted their trend of development which we are now openly aspired to champion. Jews, as n trying to understand the Holocaust, own convictions and morality and having experiencing would, if allowed to go on the living memories of civilization – in the inexplicable, it is comforting to I judged the mass annihilation of Jews to unhampered, leads to the realization of Judea Pearl’s phrase, its scouts – were think of the perpetrators not as human be right, did not want to say ‘no.’ the Pan-Jewish prophecy that the Jews rightly seen as obstacles to the beings but Übermenschen – the fanatical, ow could ordinary people commit will one day devour the other nations and Thousand Year Reich’s mission of technologically advanced “Aryan master destroying intelligence, conscience, such fantastic atrocities? This become lords of the earth. race” that the Nazis believed themselves H morality, and freedom. The prohibitions speaks to the success of the Nazis to syn- Therefore, in laying out his political pro- to be. The perpetrators of the Holocaust, of a totalitarian regime are simply incom- thesize historical, pseudo-scientific, and gram, Hitler posited that “the first objective however, were not just members of the SS patible with a people characterized by theological reserves of hatred into an ulti- will not be to build up the idea of the and their bureaucratic enablers. They their stiff-necked willingness to question mately self-destructive obsession with the People's State but rather to wipe out the were, rather, ordinary Germans and their conventional wisdom and constantly Jews. The Nazi’s had a well-documented Jewish State which is now in existence.” rather ordinary collaborators. As Leonard seek the exploration of new pathways. preference, and while they hated and His mission was, in his own words, not to Cohen reminds us, Eichmann was of Abraham questioned the wisdom of idol- killed other groups, there was neither the advance prejudice but justice: “I am free- atry, Moses questioned the wisdom of medium height, weight and intelligence, perceived necessity nor determination to ing men from the restraints of an intelli- servitude and lawlessness, the prophets and without any distinguishing features. carry out similar total extermination cam- gence that has taken charge; from the questioned institutional injustice, and so With no more or less than ten fingers he paigns against them. This is, by no dirty and degrading self-mortifications of a the chain goes on from the Maccabees, managed to compose the orders, requisi- means, to lessen the importance of their chimera called conscience and morality, to Einstein, and the civil rights activists tions, and correspondence which oversaw other victims’ deaths or to create a “com- and from the demands of a freedom and of the 1960’s. the execution of the “.” This petition among the victims.” It is instead to personal independence which only a very Hitler’s assertion that “conscience is a Final Solution was, we should recall, car- put those deaths in their proper context in few can bear.” Jewish invention… a blemish, like circum- ried out, at least for 40% of the victims, by the recognition that the Nazi’s legacy is Now we approach the essence of cision,” provides “a brusque insight into decidedly less than the modern, efficient, inextricably their anti-Semitism. . Its all-encompassing hatred is the infectious nature of morality. Kill the remembrancer, the claim agent, and you and impersonal methods of annihilation The Nazi’s hatred of Gypsies, Poles, why seven years after the Nuremburg will have canceled the debt. Jews are, that are often associated with the event. Slaves, Russians, the disabled, and Laws had effectively disenfranchised the then, akin to canaries in a coal mine. As Holocaust victims died through malnutri- homosexuals was certainly as irrational Jewish community in Germany, Hitler was tion, famine, and disease in the ghettos, Ernst Fischer poignantly wrote: “the as their hatred of the Jews, though, some- still not satisfied – nor should he have degree of a society's culture can be meas- through being worked to death in labor how their anti-Semitism was more so. been. A final solution was not only camps, through deportations late in the ured against its attitude towards the Jews. This is evident from their insistence on deemed imperative, it was of the utmost All forms of anti-Semitism are evidence of war that turned into horrific death march- fighting “an omnipotent ‘Jewish’ power urgency. The or other a reversion to barbarism.” From this per- es, or through the gruesome executions in even as their mass murder of the Jews alternatives were never to get past the spective, perhaps seen as blasphemous, pits, trenches, and ravines, using machine revealed the powerlessness of their planning phases or the occasional propa- Hitler’s motivating ideology and deeds are guns, rifles, and revolvers. enemy.” The other groups were labeled ganda slogan of “Jews go to Palestine.” rational, normal, and understandable. In These practices were just as much a “racially inferior” and “burdens to society” No, Hitler believed that deportations the abyss of nihilism, where truth (“either part of the Nazi’s arsenal as the gas but never accused of being the root of all would be insufficient; the “solution” to the in the moral or in the scientific sense”) has chambers and crematoria. With this evil, as the mythological global enemy of “Jewish problem” was an all-or-nothing been dispensed with, this is undoubtedly acknowledgement comes the realization the Fatherland. At a time when Jews con- proposition or, as Chaim A. Kaplan wrote the case. The Holocaust was nonethe- that the responsibility for the Final stituted around 1% of the German popula- in his famous diary kept inside the less, never justifiable, never excusable, Solution is more widespread than previ- tion and some such similar percentage , “Either humanity would and never forgivable. This is a lesson we ously thought, and that the average peo- worldwide, Hitler wrote: be Judaic, or it would be idolatrous- must forever try to come to terms with. ple who carried it out, often face-to-face The forces which now have the direction German.” First published on Algemeiner.com Page 6 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 SURVIVORS’SURVIVORS’ CORNERCORNER HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR, RESCUER LIVE LIKE SISTERS fter the war, she gave up the Auschwitz. Her only sibling, Ewa, survived against the Jews, I would tell him, 'you for- chance to live with an uncle in the the war but later committed suicide by get who I am.'" BY VANESSA GERA, AP A United States — sealing a fate lived out inhaling gas. And the death of her beloved Despite her own ordeals, including a hey are two silver-haired ladies with for decades behind the Iron Curtain as mother fills her with pain to this day. battle with leukemia now in remission, the T a special bond forged in the Poland came under communist rule. main focus in her life is the woman she Holocaust. One is the daughter of Jews "I was very afraid calls her sister. who perished under the Nazis, the other to leave their family Maria lives on a pension so small that her Roman Catholic rescuer. because I was after paying her nursing home, she only Today Janina Pietrasiak, 74, and Maria happy I had a family, has 300 zlotys ($145) left over — most of Lopuszanska, 79, live like sisters just and I kept holding on which the breast cancer survivor needs around the corner from each other in a to them all the time, for medicine. Warsaw neighborhood shaded by chest- trying not to lose After the war she became an economist, nut trees. them," she said. married and had three children. Her room is They see each other every day, tend to "It was the family filled with photos of her grandchildren, along each other's needs, even finish each that raised me, that with crucifixes. Her husband died in 1987. Janina became a regular Mass attendee other's sentences. rescued me. I also and didn't seek contact with Jews until Their story is a testament to how devotion didn't want to leave Poland — I thought 1997 — and then, it was only in an born of deep adversity can endure for a life- it was the country attempt to seek recognition for Maria. time and how the Holocaust survivors' that let me live." She contacted the Yad Vashem exhortation "never forget" can find reso- The bond deep- Holocaust museum in Jerusalem, which nance as much in acts of great generosity ened during the ill- then bestowed the title of "Righteous as in those of unspeakable depravity. fated Warsaw Among the Nations" to Maria and to her During several hours with The Associated Uprising of 1944, Janina Pietrasiak, right, brings out papers documenting the tragic fate of parents, Henryk and Janina Jetkiewicz. Press, the women relived the events that when the girls had her family, alongside a woman she considers her sister, Maria Lopuszanska. The title, reserved for non-Jews who merged their lives while sitting side-by-side to fend for themselves because Maria's saved Jews, has gone to people from 44 in Maria's tiny room in a nursing home, a hrough the years, Janina suffered countries. On Jan. 1, Poles made up the father was ill and her mother had taken up bouts of depression so severe that five-minute walk from the modest apart- arms against the Nazis in the streets of T largest number, 6,066, followed by the she was forced to retire early at age 59 Netherlands with 4,863. ment where Janina lives alone. the capital. from her work as a translator, and went on Thanks to her recognition as a rescuer, Maria was the teenage daughter of They saw bombs exploding, corpses medication. Maria receives $1,200 per year from the members of the Polish anti-Nazi under- and body parts strewn on the streets, nar- "I think of my mother often because she New York-based Jewish Foundation for the ground who gave shelter in their Warsaw rowly escaping death themselves more was the dearest person in my life. It stays Righteous, which helps with the medicine apartment in 1942 to Janina and her than once. Both recalled how the younger with you all the time, what you go through. and a few extras, such as this year's sum- mother, Roza Feldman. Janina would bury herself in the older You can't throw it out of your memory," mer holiday to the Warsaw countryside. Feldman soon died of tuberculosis, her girl's skirt as the bombs exploded. she said. As the afternoon wore on, the women strength depleted by the cold and hunger "She was like a mother," Janina said, Her to a devout Roman moved to Maria's tiny terrace, ringed by she had endured before escaping from reaching over and grasping the hem of Catholic brought a daughter, but also the peach-colored geraniums, and gazed out the Krakow Ghetto. Maria's skirt as she remembered. fresh pain of a husband, from whom she over the nursing home's lush and bloom- After that, Janina, not yet 8 when she "She thought I wasn't scared of any- is now separated, who taunted her with ing garden. joined the Catholic home, clung desper- thing," Maria added. "But I was 15 years anti-Semitic remarks. Janina wiped a fleck of lint from ately to her new family and was baptized old. I was incredibly scared of the bombs. "My husband is very religious and does- Maria's cheek. Maria then reached over to fit in with them and increase her I was no hero." n't especially care for the Jews," she said. and tenderly straightened out her sis- chances of survival under the Nazis. Janina lost the most. Her father died in "Anytime he tried to say something ter's rumpled dress. THE HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS FACING WAR-CRIMES TRIALS Elderly Jews say they are outraged that Lithuania is pursuing them over their wartime role as anti-Nazi partisans dren. “We fought against the powers of Warsaw. So the teenage Arad decided to The prospect of standing trial has, natu- BY DANA GLOGER the Nazis. Not against the locals. The try to make it alone. “The night before we rally enough, left Arad reluctant to return Nazis wanted to annihilate all Jews and all had to go to the ghetto, I escaped to to his home town. “I have not been back ania Branstovsky was just 20 when people who loved freedom, and I joined Belorussia [then part of the Soviet Union, for two years, and I’m not planning on she joined the Jewish partisan F the underground partisan organization in now Belarus],” he recalls. “In doing that, I going back now,” he says. movement, fighting the Nazis in her home September 1943 to defend myself and my escaped the killings. Forty members of my f trials do go ahead, it seems that a country of Lithuania. In the Vilnius ghetto, people. It was a matter of honor.” she and her fellow partisans carried out family were killed as well as many people Ithird Jewish partisan could be the Even with a possible war-crimes prose- attacks against the occupying German from my village.” primary witness for the prosecution. cution hanging over her, she has no forces. By the end of the war, almost her He returned to Vilnius as a member of the Rachel Margolis, founder of Vilnius’s entire family – more than 50 people – had regrets. “I didn’t want all Jewish people to pro-Soviet partisan movement, whose main Jewish museum, has written a memoir perished at the hands of the Nazis. Yet die with no resistance. I feel very proud, activity was sabotaging German trains. recounting her escape from the ghetto now, over 60 years later, she is the one and I’m very glad that I had the opportunity Having fought so hard to survive the Nazi and her time as a partisan. Extracts from being branded unpatriotic, and is report- to do something for honor and humanity.” killings, Arad, who settled in Israel after the her book, she fears, could be used as edly under investigation by Lithuanian She vows that the prospect of being put war, says he is “upset and disappointed” at evidence by prosecutors. authorities for alleged war crimes. on trial for war crimes will not drive her out being branded a war criminal. Margolis, who lost her family in the National and local newspapers and tele- of her country. “I’m very patriotic. I was “In doing this, they are trying to rewrite Holocaust and now lives in Israel, was vision stations are referring to the 86- born here and have always lived here. Of history and to turn the murderers of thou- unavailable to talk. But according to year-old Holocaust survivor, who now course I am worried, but I am not planning sands of Jews into heroes and the few Efraim Zuroff, director of the Jerusalem works as a librarian at the Vilnius Yiddish to leave because of this. By doing this survivors into criminals,” he says. office of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, an Institute, as a murderer and a terrorist. they want to rewrite history.” Although he has had no formal confir- investigator was sent to the address Earlier this year, the Vilnius-based news- ranstovsky is not the only mation from the authorities that they are which she uses in Lithuania. He says the paper Lietuvos Aidas called for her to be BHolocaust survivor being pursued looking into his partisan activities, or that investigator interviewed Rachel put on trial. The allegation leveled against by the Lithuanian authorities. Yitzhak a prosecution is planned, he says he has Konstanian, the director of the Vilnius her is that during her time as a partisan, Arad, a historian and former chairman of heard through other channels that a group Jewish Museum, and told her that he was she committed crimes against Israel’s Holocaust museum, Yad of anti-Soviets in the country filed a com- looking for Margolis in order to question Lithuanians. But she strongly denies that Vashem, is also being investigated over plaint against him to Lithuanian prosecu- her regarding an investigation into Fania she and her partisan colleagues ever tar- similar alleged crimes. tors. This led to an investigation being Branstovsky. geted groups of local people. Arad joined the partisan movement in launched. The local media have also report- Margolis’s cousin, Budd Margolis, who “It’s very upsetting and shocking,” says the Vilnius ghetto during the war. His par- ed that an investigation is under way, accus- lives in London, fears that the stress of Branstovsky, a mother of two, with six ents had already been taken by the Nazis ing both Arad and Branstovsky of mas- going through a trial could prove life- grandchildren and two great-grand-chil- two years earlier, eventually dying in sacring civilians in the village of Kaniukai. (Continued on page 14) September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE Page 7 HOLOCAUST SIBLINGS MEET AFTER SIXTY SIX YEARS ISRAEL PAID HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS BILLIONS her from her family. She and her brother reunion, there was a doctor on hand at the BY MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN still have no idea what happened to their airport as a precaution. SHORT OF COMMITMENT mother and father. Some of their siblings frail Irene Famulak clutched her Back in the United States, there were he government has paid Israeli lived through the war, but later died; oth- brother on the airport tarmac, her tears, too. THolocaust survivors just over a half A ers, they never heard from again after arm wrapped around him in a tight Linda Klein, the director of the American of the compensation funds transferred as being separated. embrace, tears streaming down their Red Cross Holocaust and War Victims part of the reparation agreement with Tracing Center, said the volunteer who faces. It was the first time since 1942 they But her younger brother never gave up Germany, says a report by the state com- helped the siblings find each other got had seen each other, when she was 17 hope of tracking his sister down. He, too, mission of inquiry into the government's caught up in the emotion herself. and he was just 7. treatment of Holocaust survivors. "When I showed her the picture, That was the night the invading Nazis came The panel, headed by former Supreme she stood there and wept," Klein to take her away from her Ukrainian home. Court judge Dalia Dorner, stated that the said. "She was beside herself." "I remember it well because I kissed him reparation money Germany has paid lein's group has reunited good-bye, and he pushed me away," she said Israel adds up to more than $17 billion 1,500 families since it of her brother. "I asked, 'Why did you do that?' K according to current rates, whereas a began work in 1990. She said And he said that he doesn't like kisses." mere $10.5 billion have been paid to the the former Soviet Union released "The Nazis told my mother that I was survivors themselves to date. records in 1989 of concentration being taken to work in a German labor The 1952 Luxembourg Agreement stip- camps it liberated, greatly help- camp for six months. But it was, of course, ulated that Germany would give Israel ing organizers find information much longer. I was there for years." $833 million in money and merchandise, on Holocaust victims. Both siblings survived the Holocaust and Israel would look after the survivors, "We're playing beat the clock and grew up on different sides of the Iron who would not be permitted to sue right now," she said, adding, "It's Curtain, not knowing the fate of the other. Germany directly. about families that one day they But after 66 years apart, Famulak, 83, Siblings Wssewolod Galezkij and Irene Famulak were sep- The panel claims that Israel has discrim- arated in 1942 when Nazis took her to a labor camp. were together and then they inated against Holocaust survivors, who was reunited with her long lost 73-year- were apart." old brother, Wssewolod Galezkij. They were entitled to compensations from was sent to a German labor camp, but "When a connection is made, there are Germany as well as other countries, and held each other close this time, cherishing just smiles all around." after the war, he moved back to Ukraine, has paid each $363-613 thousand less the moment. That was the case for this family in "I don't believe anyone has ever known then a republic of the Soviet Union. than it should have. Ukraine. Years of trauma, of separation, of The committee also said that the state such happiness. Now, I truly believe I can Under Soviet leader Josef Stalin, infor- not knowing what happened to loved defied a Supreme Court ruling from 1996, die satisfied," Galezkij said. mation on lost relatives was kept sealed, ones, have been replaced by celebration. according to which Holocaust survivors' Famulak made the long journey to and Galezkij said it wasn't until reforms in In a picturesque orchard overlooking stipends should be increased to match the Donetsk in eastern Ukraine from the late 1980s, followed by the Soviet col- rolling fields, Galezkij, his wife and their sum paid by Germany. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, after being lapse, that he started making progress in neighbors laid out a feast for his American The Dorner Committee report says the contacted by the American Red Cross. finding his sister. sister. As the vodka flowed, he told her how government should pay survivors $70 mil- The organization told her they had located Even then, it took him more than 17 he had survived for a lifetime without her. her only surviving sibling. lion with immediate effect, so that 43,000 years to locate her in the United States. "He says he always thought he'd see Famulak said she spent World War II in survivors will be entitled to at least 75% of He broke down in tears as he spoke of his me someday. He dreamt lots about me," a labor camp in Munich, Germany, work- the German reparation funds. overwhelming happiness at finding her. Famulak said, as she sat next to her ing in the kitchens. She had been taken to brother. Also, the panel strongly criticized the "When the Red Cross told me they had the camp with her older sister. When it "And he wrote a song for me. When he Finance Ministry's bureau for the reha- found her in America, it was such a joy," was liberated in 1945, Famulak stayed in went to sleep, he sang every night and bilitation of the handicapped, which Germany for several years, eventually he said, sobbing. cried." caters also to Holocaust survivors, for emigrating to the United States in 1956. In fact, he had to be taken to the hospi- With that, Galezkij, weakened by illness obstructing their treatment and allocat- She never saw her parents again after tal because he was so overcome when he and age, burst into song. But this time, he ing the stipends in a "random and arbi- that day in 1942 when Nazis separated first learned she was alive. At this week's sang the words with pure joy. trary" manner. THE BIRTH OF A NATION the problems of the Holy Land since the enough water. What is it about Palestine?” me. I saw my husband burned. I don’t BY RUTH GRUBER, Arab riots of the 1920s; this one was dis- A 16-year-old orphan — actually, we want to burn. I want to go home — to tinguished by having no rep- Eretz Israel.” The Land of Israel. t was Friday, May 14, 1948. I was sit- resentatives from Britain, “That’s why we’re here,” I told her. “To ting in the press section of the United I which had been universally help solve the problem. But if, Heaven for- Nations General Assembly in its tempo- hostile to the Zionist cause. bid, we fail to find a solution, where would rary quarters at Flushing Meadow in With the members, I visited you like to go?” . I felt my heart thumping. We the camps for displaced per- Her reply: “Back to the crematory.” journalists were waiting impatiently to see sons in Germany and Austria t was this committee’s report that led who would win a tug of war taking place in and listened, dumbfounded, directly to the General Assembly vote Washington. I as the refugees described of Nov. 29, 1947, to partition Palestine into On one side was President Harry S. the horrors of the war. In par- separate Jewish and Arab entities. The Truman, who had told his aides that, with ticular, I remember visiting Jews accepted this proposal, but the the last British troops leaving Palestine the Rothschild Hospital Arabs stormed out and threatened war. that day, he believed the Jews had a right camp in Vienna. Some 100 My mind was drawn immediately back to declare their own nation, and that he refugees had just arrived to the present of May 1948 as I noticed an would make sure that the United States from Romania, many of them American representative to the United would be the first country to recognize it. children covered with sores Nations, Philip Jessup, hurrying toward On the other side was the State and dirt. There was no place the podium. I knew, after talking to his Department, which wanted the land to put them but the street; aides, that in his hand he had a speech placed in a trusteeship under the United they lay, exhausted, on the supporting trusteeship, not statehood, for Nations. Secretary of State George paving stones. Israel. The State Department was about to Marshall was so passionate in his opposi- A young man approached betray the president. tion to a Jewish state that he threatened to us, his eyes bloodshot. “In Jessup was halfway up the stairs when vote against the president in the Romania, they killed 30,000 an reporter handed him November election. For Truman, who had A group sings “Hatikva,” which later became Israel’s national Jews in two hours,” he said, a dispatch. Jessup read it, grew white- come to office with the death of Franklin anthem, at a camp in Zeilsheim, Germany, 1946. his voice sounding as if it faced, descended the stairs and then dis- Roosevelt three years earlier, this was to came straight from his guts. “They took never used the word “orphan” because appeared. The reporter next to me said, be one of his first true tests of power. Jews to the slaughterhouse and hung the term couldn’t convey the horrors these “He’s gone to the bathroom.” As I sat waiting for the announcement of them alive the way they hang cows, and children had been through — gave the I shook my head. “He’s gone home.” the decision in Washington, my mind wan- they put knives to their throats and split most poignant answer. “Everybody has a Then we were handed the A.P. report. In dered back to the spring and summer of them. Underneath them, they put a sign: home,” he said. “The Americans. The Tel Aviv, David Ben-Gurion had just read the year before, which I had spent report- Kosher Beef.” British. The French. The Russians. Only the world’s latest proclamation of inde- ing for The New York Herald Tribune. I In camp after camp, the committee we don’t have a home. Don’t ask us. Ask pendence. Eleven minutes later, Harry had traveled in Germany and Austria with members asked, “Why do you want to go the world.” Truman had recognized Ben-Gurion’s the 11 members of the United Nations to Palestine? It’s such a poor country. The A woman tugged the sleeve of my jack- government as the “de facto authority” of Special Committee on Palestine. There Arabs and Jews are always fighting. They et. “You are the only woman with all these the new state. had been many such committees studying don’t have enough food, they don’t have men,” she implored. “You will understand Israel was born. Page 8 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 THE AMERICAN & INTERNATION AANNNNUUAALL TTRRIIBB HONOREE FRED S. ZEIDMAN HONOREE AV red S. Zeidman was appointed Chairman of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council vner Shalev has been Ch Fby President George W. Bush in March 2002. The Council is the governing board of the A Chairman, he initiated a mu United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. The Museum is America’s national institution dedi- with the necessary tools to addr cated to remembering the Holocaust and teaching its lessons to future generations. century. This includes the establ A prominent Houston-based business and civic leader, Mr. Zeidman is former Chairman of the and the creation of a new Museu Board of Seitel, Inc. He serves on the Jewish National Fund’s Board of Directors and Executive Yad Vashem Holocaust History M Committee and chairs its audit committee. He is also National Board Member, Development the uploading of Yad Vashem’s C Corporation for Israel; Texas State Chairman, Israel Bonds; Vice Chairman, Republican Jewish harnessing modern technology in Coalition; and Vice Chair of The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston 2007, Shalev was awarded the Le Development Board. He serves on the Executive Committees of the American Israel Public efforts on behalf of Holocaust aw Affairs Committee (AIPAC), and the Houston Ear Research Foundation. Asturias Award for Concord on be He is past Vice Chairman of the Board of Regents, Texas Southern University; past Chairman, Shalev was born in 1939 in Je Southwest Region, Anti-Defamation League; former Vice President and Director, Jewish Institute 1956 and 1980, reaching the rank for National Security Affairs, former member of Texas Inter-Faith Housing Corporation’s bureau chief for IDF Chief of Sta Executive Committee, and has played a leadership role in a number of other organizations, Instruction Division of the Genera including the Jewish Federation of Greater Houston; as a member of the Alumni Board of Governors, Washington University, Corps, where he was editor-in-chief of the IDF Radio Statio St. Louis; and as a Director of the American Jewish Committee. IDF National Security College. In April 2004, Mr. Zeidman served on the U.S. delegation to the Anti-Semitism Conference in Berlin. For his work with many varied After retiring from military service, Shalev served as Directo organizations, Mr. Zeidman has received many awards and has been recognized for all the work he has done and continues to do. and Culture, and Chairman of the National Culture and Art Co Mr. Zeidman holds a Bachelor’s degree from Washington University in St. Louis, and a Master’s in Business Administration from New Shalev graduated from the IDF Command and Staff College an York University. He is married with four children. Witness – Holocaust Remembrance at Yad Vashem (2005) and

HONORARY CHAIRMEN Joseph Wilf Hon. Julius Berman Rabbi Israel M. Lau Hon. Edgar M. Bronfman Hon. Tzipi Livni H.E. Salai Meridor Hon. Dr. Yael Tamir Dr. Miriam Adelson Prof. Wladyslaw Bartoszewski Yossi Hollander H.E. Asaf Shariv Ishai Amrami Prof. Yehuda Bauer Hon. Moshe Kantor Prof. Feliks Tych Dr. Yitzhak Arad Stacy & Matthew Bronfman Hon. Ronald S. Lauder Simone Weil David Azrieli Hon. Michael Chertoff Cecile & Edward Mosberg Hon. Elie Wiesel Prof. David Bankier Prof. Israel Gutman H.E. Prof. Gabriela Shalev Prof. Szewach Weiss

HONORARY CO-CHAIRMEN Hon. Hillary Rodham Clinton Hon. Kay Bailey Hutchison Hon. Frank R. Lautenberg Hon. George E. Pataki Hon. John Cornyn Hon. Joseph I. Lieberman Hon. Robert Menendez Hon. Charles E. Schumer Hon. Jon S. Corzine GENERAL CHAIRMEN Sheldon G. Adelson Leonard Wilf Eli Zborowski

GENERAL CO-CHAIRMEN Ira Drukier Cheryl Lifshitz Marilyn Rubenstein Marilyn & Jack A. Belz Sharon & David Halpern Steven Schwarz Audrey & Zygmunt Wilf Roberta & Irwin Chafetz Richard M. Joel Fela & David Shapell Beth & Leonard Wilf Joan & Theodore Cutler Seryl & Charles Kushner Steven Spielberg Jane & Mark Wilf Gale Drukier Rita & David Levy Moshe Steinberg Ruta & Dr. Felix Zandman Lewis M. Eisenberg Dr. Lilly & Avner Naveh Dr. Ingrid Tauber Murry Zborowski Hal M. Hirsch Barry Rubenstein Dr. Teri D. Troy Rochelle & Henryk Schwarz Leslie & Michael Adler Merry & Seymour Cohen Marilyn & Jack H. Pechter Mary & David Solomon Rebecca & Michael Altman Renée & Lester Crown Karen & Harvey Pollak Marcia & Dr. Yaakov Toledano Harriet Becker Abraham Foxman Dara & Brian Rubenstein Mara & Richard Weissmann Susan & Jack Bender Annette & Barry Goldberg Phyllis & William Mack Frances M. White Berne & James Bookhammer Elaine & Joel Goldstein Jean Rubinstein Drs. Rochelle & Robert Cherry DINNER CHAIRMEN Ira Mitzner David Halpern DINNER COMMITTEE CHAIRWOMEN Elly Krakowski Gladys Halpern Stella Skura Elizabeth Wilf Dr. Rochelle Cherry Celina Zborowski Elizabeth Zborowski Esther Born Anna Erlich Eva Halpern Lilly Stawski Rita Distenfeld Doris Gross Dr. Romana Strochlitz Primus DINNER CO-CHAIRMEN Jill Goodman & Melvin Bukiet Caroline & Morris Massel Linda Olmert Rella & Dr. Charles Feldman Michael S. Miller Elisa & Alan Pines Jan & Andrew Groveman Mindy Mitzner Aliza & Elie Singer Debbie & Richard Born Cheryl & Mark Grunwald Andrea & Harry Krakowski David Mitzner Fred Distenfeld Batsheva & Murray Halpern Lee & Murray Kushner Ann Oster Susan & Ed Falk Cheryl & Fred Halpern Barry Levine Nancy & Larry Pantirer Chaya & Howard Friedman Lieba & Jack Halpern Tami & Fred Mack Galit & Ziggy Zborowski Doree & Charles Greenberg Deedee & Mark Honigsfeld Mark Moskowitz Judith & Mark Zborowski TRIBUTE CHAIRMEN Sam Halpern Naomi Shalev Kay Zeidman Pearl Field Jay Zeidman Anat Zuria September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE Page 9 NAL SOCIETIES FOR YAD VASHEM BBUUTTEE DDIINNNNEERR VNER SHALEV HONOREE SELMA GRUDER HOROWITZ hairman of the Yad Vashem Directorate since 1993. As elma Gruder Horowitz was born in Hanaczow, Poland, the second of four ulti-year development plan aimed at equipping Yad Vashem Schildren, to Leah and Bernard Gruder. She came from a well-to-do family ess the challenges of Holocaust remembrance in the 21st who owned a wholesale butcher business. ishment of the International School for Holocaust Studies, During the war, Selma was taken to the Korowice concentration camp. When the um Complex. Shalev serves as the chief curator of the new Germans liquidated the camp in June 1943, she escaped and hid in the forests of useum, which opened in March 2005. He also brought about Hanaczow with her family. They remained hidden until April 1944 when their vil- entral Database of Shoah Victims’ Names onto the Internet, lage was burned by the Ukranians and many Poles and Jews were murdered. She n the service of Holocaust remembrance and education. In later fled with her mother and three siblings to Bilka, Poland where they were hid- egion of Honor by French President Nicolas Sarkozy for his den by Maria Paczkowska in her home until their liberation three months later. wareness worldwide, and also accepted ’s Prince of Mrs. Paczkowska was posthumously designated as a Righteous Among The ehalf of Yad Vashem. Nations by Yad Vashem in August 2003. rusalem. He served in the Israel Defense Forces between Selma’s father, Bernard Gruder, contracted typhus and died during their time in k of brigadier general. Between 1972 and 1974 he served as the forest. Bernard Gruder’s entire family, Leah Gruder’s eight siblings and many aff David Elazar. He was also: head of the Information and aunts and uncles perished in the Holocaust. However, Selma’s mother and sib- al Staff; Chief Education Officer and head of the Education lings survived and they all came to the United States in 1950. on and the IDF weekly magazine; and senior lecturer at the Selma Gruder Horowitz founded and currently serves as President of East Coast Industrial Uniform, Inc., a uniform rental company. She is especially proud of the or General of the Culture Authority in the Ministry of Education fact that the business is owned and run by a woman. Selma is actively involved ouncil. with many American Jewish and Israeli organizations. She is an Executive Board member of the American Society for nd National Security College. Among his publications are To Bear Yad Vashem and a Trustee of Yad Vashem, Jerusalem. She also supports the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, UJA, We Are Here – Holocaust Survivors in Israel (2008). and an orphanage in Israel.

Kenneth J. Bialkin Jean & Eugen Gluck Gladys & Sam Halpern J. Phillip Rosen Irma & Norman Braman Helen & Herbert Gruder Hon. Jack Kemp Nili & Michael Shevi Rhoda & David T. Chase Naomi Jakobovitz & George Klein Dr. Axel Stawski Carl Field Hanoch Lipsky Myrna & Mark Palmer Celina & Marvin Zborowski Renata & Murray Alon Al Bukiet Jocelyn & Gregory Klar Sally Reisman Bernard Aptaker Rose Bukiet Israel Krakowski Evelyn & Dr. Israel Singer Etta & Ulo Barad Susan Crown Connie & Harvey Krueger Leslie Zeidman Elinor & Norman Belfer Suzanne & Jan Czuker William Kunkler Cara Rosenthal & Mark Zeidman Dorothy Berman Hannah & Bruce Goldman Tami & Fred Mack Nancy Zeidman Halina Bitensky Fanya Gottesfeld Heller Diana & Simon Mundlak Yossi Zuria Dr. & Mrs. Mark Blum Danielle & Harry Karten TRIBUTE CO-CHAIRMEN Shirly Bagno Doretta & Jona Goldrich David and Esther Mann Nancy & Sam Shamie Sara & Charles Bedzow Rachel & Barnard J. Gottstein Vladka Meed Maureen & Ira Schwartz Scott Berrie Ruth & Alexander Hart Eva & Ben Mellen Alan Silverman Cesia & Frank Blaichman Kim & Gary Heiman Sandi & David Nussbaum Jacqueline & David Simon Betty Breslaw Martin Heinfling Miriam Oster Nurit and Shay Shevi Sharon & Ram Heskia Meredith Heller Sivan Ochshorn Orly Shevi Susan & Stanley Chesley Pnina & Anatol Hiller Elaine & Bernard Pannagl Sara & Moniek Stawski Lena Correra Susan & Arnold Holtzman Lucy & Murray Pantirer Jerry & William Ungar Michal and Eli Dikstein Genia Horn Sally & Jack Pomeranc Millie & Jack Werber Joseph Distenfeld Meirav & Yoav Jakobovitz M.K. & J.B. Pritzker Patricia Willens Helene & Glenn Dorfman Doris & Simon Konover Bonnie & Arash Rahmani Sara & Leo Wolf Marysia & David Feuerstein Cecile & Roman Kriegstein Noa & Ron Reiter Rose Zarucki Pamela & Barry Fingerhut Beth & Jonathan Kaye Sari & Israel Roizman Millie & Abraham Zuckerman Sandra & Steven Finkelman Pamela & Joseph Lubeck Nina & Jeffrey Rubinstein Anne & David Zygelman Suellen & Gordon Freeman Paula & William Mandell TRIBUTE COMMITTEE Abe Besser Yael Heskia Danni Reiter Devora & Rabbi Mark Urkowitz Rose & Max Blecher Miriam Field & William Jacobie Yahali Reiter Olga & Herman Wachtenheim Lilly & Sam Bloch Gustave Jacobs Miriam & Louis Rosenbaum Regina & David Weinberg Judy & Phillip Bloom Neta Jakobovitz Lillian R. Rozmaryn Bernice & David Weiss Judi & Dr. Kenneth Burnstein Sophie Kalina Arlene & Jerry Sanders Zehava & Steven Wolosky Jane & Alan Cornell Roselyn & Richard Kesof Sally & Joe Schulman Henry Wrobel Batsheva & Joseph Eden Caroline & Daniel J. Katz Marion & Hans Seidemann Julie & Scott Zelnick Lynn & Erwin Fisch Frieda & Walter Katz Ran Shevi Marjorie & Aaron Ziegelman Angie & Moritz Goldfeier Sima Katz Pola & Charles Sporer Abigail Zuria Isaac Goodfriend Jan & John Kornreich Lillian & Milton Steinberg Daniel Zuria Bila & Ernst Hacker Wendy & Peter Lewis Sam Stern Jonathan Zuria Maria Herskovic Ardith & Charles Mederrick Edith & Rudolph Tessler Ruth Zuria Dan Heskia Mindyleah & Sam Pollak Michele Cohn Tocci Shira Zuria DINNER COMMITTEE (in formation) Gail & Larry Altman Rochelle & Maks Etingin Linda & Murray Laulicht Mindy & Alan Schall Barbara & Harvey Arfa Allan Fried Chaya & Lorne Lieberman Judy & Stanley Schneier Lauren Belfer Charles Fried Christine & Richard Mack Esther & William Schulder Michelle & Benjamin Belfer Roselyn & Dr. Mark Friedman Sheila & Martin Major Betty & Howard Schwartz Jennifer & Matt Birnbaum Sharon & Dr. Jeffrey Frieling David Mandelbaum Ann & Bernard Sklar Dr. Debbie & Sheldon Bootin Rachel Goldstein Stanley Nayer Sherry & Henry Stein Nanette & Dr. Arthur Brenner Susan & Richard Goodstadt Susan & Mark Nevins Keren Toledano Gail & Bruce Bukiet Tzipporah & Dr. Jack Gruber Gonen Paradis Freda & Michael Wadler Karen & Michael Bukiet Michelle & Yossi Hadad Shelley & Josef Paradis Ariel & Josh Weiner Adina & Lawrence Burian Abbi & Jeremy Halpern Lilly Stawski Lisa & Orin Wilf Sherrye & David Dantzker Dan Hoffman Lidia & Jimmy Resnick Shira & Dr. Daniel Yoshor Talya & Shmuel Davidovich Margalith Hoffman Jacqueline & Sigmund Rolat Cynthia & Jeff Wisenfeld Cheri & Arnon Deshe Amy & John Jacobsson Dola Rubin Elaine & Irwin Zamore Edith Druyan Judy & Ruben Josephs Bella & George Savran Amy & Brad Zelnick Trudy & Sol Englander Robin & Stuart Koenig Stephen Savitt Page 10 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 REPORTREPORT FROMFROM YADYAD VASHEMVASHEM YAD VASHEM CONCERNED BY ATMOSPHERE OF YAD VASHEM ON YOUTUBE AND HOLOCAUST REVISION IN LITHUANIA ad Vashem has launched English- Yand Arabic-language channels on Shalev letter to Lithuanian PM urges direct intervention by Prime Minister YouTube. The two educational channels were to“restore Lithuania ’s integrity” launched In honor of the Holocaust ad Vashem is increasingly con- Kirkilas: “Sadly, to date, the public outcry ad Vashem will continue to wel- Remembrance Day in Israel. Ycerned by the atmosphere of anti- has yet to yield a fair and reasonable “Ycome and teach Lithuanian educa- One channel, intended for the semitism and Holocaust revisionism in Lithuanian response. If anything, it seems tors about the events, ramifications and Anglophone audience, contains testimonies Lithuania . that the harmful phenomenon of historical legacy of the Holocaust, thus reflecting from Holocaust survivors, archival footage, For nearly a year, Lithuanian authorities revisionism and distortion, of which the and communicating our core commitment historical lectures and stories on issues of have been carrying out investigations into investigation of the is a to the truth. We shall continue to support human interest, such as survivors’ these teachers’ admirable attempts to Jewish Holocaust survivors for their prime example, may actually be increas- reunions. The second channel contains strengthen true democracy in your coun- wartime activities as partisans in Lithuania ing in your country. similar content, but with Arabic subtitles. try and hope that they remain steadfast “We know that YouTube is one of the . Among those being persecuted is Dr. In light of this severe and continuing within an increasingly inhibiting atmos- most popular Web sites today,” Yad Yitzhak Arad, a Holocaust historian and problem, Yad Vashem calls upon you to phere that they can now sense around former Chairman of the Yad Vashem intervene directly and restore Lithuania’s them,” Shalev wrote. Vashem chairman Avner Shalev said in Directorate. integrity as an enlightened and democrat- In tandem to the letter to Prime Minister a statement. “Unfortunately, there is a Despite various protest actions taken by ic nation by ending the misguided investi- Kirkilas, Shalev also wrote to Historical plethora of misinformation and deliber- Yad Vashem and other bodies, the perse- gations. Only by dealing openly and forth- Commission Chair Emanuelis Zingeris ate lies available on the Internet. The cutions of Jewish partisans continues in rightly with the full and complex truth again to urge him to publicly voice his Yad Vashem channels will counter this Lithuania, as do antisemitic incidents, about the past will your nation succeed in protest against the situation. material and make reliable information such as the spray-painting of many building for itself a secure and stable In addition to actions taken with other widely available to anyone who seeks swastikas and antisemitic graffiti on the future,” he wrote. organizations, in September 2007 Yad to know more about this terrible chapter Jewish organizations’ building yesterday Yad Vashem believes that a key way to Vashem suspended its participation in the in human history.” Historical Commission, and in February in Vilnius. combat the Holocaust revisionist trend is 2008 Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev In a letter dated August 10, Yad Vashem through education, and by providing com- presented a letter of protest to Lithuanian GRIM ANNIVERSARY Chairman Avner Shalev wrote to prehensive, credible information to all Foreign Minister Petras Vaitiekunas during n August 7, Yad Vashem marked Lithuanian Prime Minister Gediminas those who seek it. his visit to Yad Vashem. O 66 years since the deportation to Treblinka of Janusz Korczak, Stefania Wilczynska, and the children of their orphanage, from the Warsaw Ghetto. REVEALING THE GOOD Survivors, members of the Korczak socie- an enormous knowledge of the history of cussions, but great efforts are then made ty, and of the youth movements participat- BY IRENA STEINFELDT the Holocaust in different locations. to redirect the discussion to the cases at ed in the ceremony at Janusz Korczak Unlike historians who analyze the com- hand. Conversely, insisting on staying Square at Yad Vashem. t first, the case of Roger and Esther plex human situations of the Holocaust strictly on topic is also unacceptable, Janusz Korczak was the pen name of Perret seemed like any other. A and describe the different points of view, Henryk Goldszmit, a Polish-born doctor, Claude Marx had contacted Yad Vashem since Commission members constantly Commission members must draw a clear author and educator. Born in Warsaw to in 2006 requesting that the Perrets, who remind each other of the sharply different line through the multi-faceted and com- had hidden him during the Holocaust, be context in which the rescuers and rescued an assimilated Jewish family, Korczak plex spectrum of human behavior. They recognized for their act. When the name had to operate, compared to the comfort- dedicated his life to caring for children, are required to raise a hand and decide of the French town — Buzancais — where able and safe room in which they are dis- particularly orphans. He believed that chil- whether the actions described before the wartime events had occurred came up cussing their stories. dren should always be listened to and them will grant an individual the right to be during a session of the Commission for Understanding the enormity of the chal- respected, and this belief was reflected in called a Righteous Among the Nations. the Designation of the Righteous, no one lenge, from the outset of the program, Yad his work. He wrote several books for and noticed the reaction of Dr. Ehud Loeb, about children, and broadcast a children's Commission member since 2004. He too radio program. In 1912, Korczak became had been hidden in Buzancais, though by the director of a Jewish orphanage in a different couple, Jules and Jeanne Warsaw. When World War II broke out in Roger, who had been recognized as 1939, Korczak first refused to accept the Righteous Among the Nations in 1989. Dr. German occupation and heed their regu- Loeb was further astonished to learn that, lations (consequently spending time in just like his own rescuer, Roger Perret had jail). However, when the Jews of Warsaw been a butcher by trade. were forced to move into a ghetto, After the Perrets had also been granted Korczak refocused his efforts on the chil- recognition, it came to light that Roger dren in his orphanage. Despite offers from Perret and Jules Roger had in fact known Polish friends to hide him on the "Aryan" one another. It is possible that during the side of the city, Korczak refused to aban- war they met up occasionally, and it is rea- don the children. sonable to assume that they spoke of their Stefania Wilczynska was born in 1886 in Poland, and completed her studies at the families, about the difficulties of life in One of the earliest meetings of the Commission for the Designation of the Righteous. wartime, and about the cost of meat. But University of Liège, Belgium. In 1909, she it seems almost certain that neither man Over the years, the Commission has Vashem has appointed a Supreme Court met Korczak, and the two began working ever raised one topic: the fact that he was developed a set of defined and detailed Justice to chair the Commission. Today, together. When World War I began, hiding a Jewish child in his home. criteria, but every rescue situation was retired Supreme Court Justice Jacob Korczak was recruited and Stefania Forty-five years ago, the Commission unique, and their circumstances often Türkel devotes much of his time to steer- remained in charge of running the orphan- for the Designation of the Righteous was bring about difficult deliberations on how ing the Commission’s work, reviewing the age, which had expanded and now charged with the task of deciding who is precisely to apply the rules. Should the minutes and examining its decisions. housed some 150 children. In 1935, she entitled to the highest honor bestowed by fact that a family deeply loved the child Simha Rotem (Kazik) has been working visited Palestine and lived at Ein Harod until 1939. With the Nazi occupation, the the State of Israel on non-Jews. This year, they were hiding and didn’t want to give on the Commission since its inception. members of Ein Harod arranged for her as Israel celebrates 60 years of independ- him back at the end of the war prevent “What brought me to the Commission was the possibility of leaving Poland, but she ence and Yad Vashem recognizes the them from being recognized? What about the feeling that this was the least we could turned it down and moved to the ghetto, contribution of Holocaust survivors to the those who started out as members of Nazi do for those who rescued us,” he explains. or fascist organizations but who ended up along with Dr. Korczak and the children. State, it is fitting to pay particular attention “I knew some of the Righteous in Poland rescuing Jews — should the act of rescue In August 1942, during a 2-month wave to the role played by those survivors who, during the Holocaust, I am aware of the rather than sink into vengeance, sought to negate their previous heinous actions? of deportations from the ghetto, the Nazis danger their acts of rescue entailed, and I extract something positive from the hor- In addition, most Commission members rounded up Korczak, Wilczynska and the know that no one could give more than rors they endured. It is they who provided are themselves Holocaust survivors; 200 children of the orphanage. They they gave. Recognizing the Righteous much of the impetus to establish this some were rescued, while others encoun- marched in rows to the Umschlagplatz Among the Nations is a sacred commit- honor, and who continue to work for this tered only apathy or hostility on the part of with Korczak in the lead. He and ment, and I could never excuse myself important project to this day. their neighbors. Delving into the cases Stephania never abandoned the children, from this mission.” Commission members, who volunteer often brings nightmares to the surface, even to the very end. Korczak and the their time and services, together speak and probes still-open wounds. Personal The author is Director of the Department children were sent to Treblinka, where some 17 languages, and bring with them memories flicker through Commission dis- for the Righteous Among the Nations. they were all murdered. September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE Page 11 STATUS AS SALVADORANS SAVED JEWS DURING HOLOCAUST Jews across Europe, in his capacity as distributed to a far broader population. By BY BECCA MILFELD, MEDILL REPORTS Salvadoran Consul General in Geneva. the end of the war, 10,000 documents Now, more than 60 years later, the were distributed, often with multiple family uring the Holocaust, an estimated Salvadoran government is seeking to members on each. When the war ended, 30,000 Jews were protected by D have Castellanos declared “righteous though, Castellanos rarely talked about it. their status as citizens of a small, Central among the Nations,” by Holocaust or years his daughter, Frieda Garcia, American country. remembrance authority Yad Vashem. The knew nothing of her father’s actions, And in June, the Embassy of El F title is awarded to non-Jews who risked but now is helping bring them to light. Salvador was letting the world know. their lives to save Jews during the “The memory of our father is out of the Holocaust. desk, out of the drawers and on the table In addition to Castellanos, El again,” Garcia said at the news confer- Salvador Consulate First Secretary ence held at the Salvadoran Embassy. George Mandel-Mantello, a The people who spoke there included Romanian Jew, played an equally Garcia, Mandel-Mantello’s son, important role. Salvadoran ambassadors Rene A. Leon The granting of Salvadoran citi- and Ricardo Moran Ferracuti, along with zenship papers started when a Brad Marlowe and Leonor Avila de French-Jewish Marlowe, the husband-wife team that approached Mandel-Mantello recently created “Glass House,” a docu- about getting documents for a mentary chronicling the story. number of French Jews. ’s involvement with the These were granted, and then Holocaust was checkered, as the pan- Documents such as this, which stated that the Montello began issuing citizenship holders were Salvadoran citizens, helped thou- papers to Jews he knew and those elists demonstrated. Bolivia and the Dominican Republic, for sands of Jews during the Holocaust. George Mandel-Mantello (left) and Jose Arturo brought to him through Jewish example, “opened the doors on Jewish Jewish Committee. Castellanos. organizations. Castellanos author- ized and put his full support behind immigration during the Holocaust years, But the spotlight is now beginning to Colonel Jose Arturo Castellanos, a fig- the practice, even though he had no while others accepted Nazi criminals as shine on other countries, as well. ure who has remained relatively unknown authority to approve manufacturing of the refugees after the war,” said Dina Siegel “Castellanos and the little country of El in the annals of Holocaust history, made a certificates. Vann, who is Jewish and from Mexico. Salvador became the means for all these significant difference by issuing And when the two finally partnered with She spoke at the event as the director for thousands of people to survive,” Leonor Salvadoran citizenship certificates to the Swiss Legation, the certificates were Latin and Latin America at the American Avila de Marlowe said. FORMER SWEDISH NEO-NAZIS FINAL APPROVAL GIVEN TO HOLOCAUST CLAIMS BECOME HOLOCAUST COMMEMORATORS inal approval of a settlement has can no longer deny it happened, or ball cap and a large pair of sunglasses. he teenagers toured the museum F been granted to thousands of “Isalute what happened,' says former He would only say that he used to have Tand met with Mirjam Akavia, a Holocaust victims and their heirs against neo-Nazi teenager after a visit to ''different opinions.'' Holocaust survivor who fled to Sweden Italian insurer Generali over unpaid insur- Auschwitz as part of Swedish initiative to ''I didn't know so much. I've learned a lot after the war. ance policies during the Holocaust era. confront troubled youths with their distort- about the Holocaust,'' he said, through a She vividly described her childhood and A U.S. appeals court upheld the set- ed anti-Semitic views. translator. ''I have a different perspective how she was yanked out of school and tlement that was reaffirmed by a lower They used to paint swastika graffiti, get on life now.'' sent to the camps, where only she and court judge in January, awarding what into street fights with immigrants, and dis- weden remained neutral during sister emerged while the rest of her fami- lawyers have estimated to total $50 mil- tribute anti-Semitic propaganda. But after SWorld War II. It had a very small ly perished. lion in payouts to more than 50,000 studying the cases of a few of the 6 million Jewish population and closed its gates to ''When I was 12, it was the end of my potential class members. Jews killed by the Nazis during World War refugees. That policy began to change as beautiful childhood. It was the end of "We conclude that it was not error for II, some former Swedish neo-Nazi the horrors of the Holocaust became everything,'' she said. the District Court to approve the settle- teenagers came to the Yad Vashem The Swedish teenagers were ment," the Second Circuit Court of Holocaust memorial to underline their new not much older when they Appeals ruled. attitudes. encountered their own local Generali was among the biggest insur- The kids, some of whom were active brand of anti-Semitism. ers in eastern Europe before World War members of neo-Nazi groups, came to the ''The headmaster of my former Two and its policies were popular with memorial to present the findings of their school, who is here today, was Jews. It faced a class-action lawsuit over research into the stories of 16 Holocaust beaten up by people I knew claims it failed to honor policies held by victims from their hometown of Karlstad, three years ago,'' said 17-year- victims of the Nazis. and add pages of testimony for the previ- old Jennifer Lindstrom, who said An initial settlement between Generali ously unknown dead. she joined Mattsson's group so and victims of the Nazis and their relatives The project, named Combatting Social she could have the tools to bat- was reached last year. Unrest, is the initiative of Swedish tle her classmates' rhetoric and U.S. District Judge George Daniels Holocaust educator Christer Mattsson. actions. ruled in January that appropriate notice The concept is to take troubled youths off ''Maybe because I have been had been given to potential class mem- the street, confront their prejudices and studying about the Holocaust bers, after the appeals court annulled the ignorance, and slowly convert them into and Nazism, maybe because I initial settlement. At that time the court Holocaust educators themselves. have been to Auschwitz and the questioned whether adequate notice had ''The first time I took a neo-Nazi to Group met with Holocaust survivor. empty shtetels in Poland or been given to people with potential inter- Auschwitz, I didn't know what to expect,'' apparent and Sweden began to lean maybe because I got sick and fed up with est in the suit. he said. ''But after seeing it, after seeing toward the allies. racism and neo-Nazis – I could not remain But the appeals court agreed with where Jews used to live, he said: ''I can In 1944, Swedish diplomat Raoul silent.'' Daniels, saying "the record indicates that no longer deny it happened, or salute Wallenberg began handing out papers to Lindstrom's principal was assaulted the notice provided to potential class what happened.'' save thousands of Hungarian Jews from because he tried to keep the neo-Nazi members satisfied the requirements of The journey has been an arduous one. the Nazi death camps. After the war, some students out of his school. The two other Of the 100 teenagers in his program, 27,000 survivors arrived in Sweden. teenagers in the group were Johanna due process." Mattsson said, about five to eight are In Karlstad, 16 Jewish women died Karlsson and Deken Izat, a Kurdish immi- Generali has said it already paid ''hard-core neo-Nazis'' – some completely shortly afterward, most from illness, and grant to Sweden who used to belong to a claims for a total of $35 million and in reformed, others not. Those, some sport- were buried in a Jewish cemetery. rival gang that battled with Joar's. January one of the victim's lawyers said ing Nazi tattoos, did not make the trip to Mattsson took his students there to ask Lindstrom said that finding out what a further 35,000 claims had been sub- Israel, either for fear of offending survivors them if they still believed the Holocaust to happened in her own backyard proved to mitted that could result in a payout of or to remain anonymous for their own be a myth. They, in turn, decided to inves- be the best way for her and her new over $15 million. safety. tigate the women's stories. The result is a friends to counter racism. Potential class members had until The only former active member who 100-page book that details their stories. ''It is slightly unreal to be here today and Dec. 26 to file a claim. But Generali has arrived, 17-year-old Joar, refused to be They presented their findings to Israel's handing over material that we have said the filing date can be extended photographed and would be identified official Holocaust museum and memorial. worked with for so long, knowing that it until 2009 if new documents proving the only by his first name for fear of retribution Yad Vashem spokeswoman Estee Yaari will be here at Yad Vashem for always,'' existence of insurance policies from his former friends. said it probably marked the first time it had Lindstrom said. emerged from the archive in the small The shy, blond Joar hid behind a base- ever dealt directly with neo-Nazis. Associated Press German town of Bad Arolsen. Page 12 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 NAZI ATROCITIES, COMMITTED BY ORDINARY PEOPLE "agreed with Hitler's treatment of the of the working class. And the percentage to witness testimony, Major Trapp was in BY GEORG BÖNISCH AND KLAUS Jews." Another 19 percent said that of psychopaths was not higher than the tears when he ordered the shooting of WIEGREFE, SPIEGEL ONLINE although they felt that his policies toward average in society as a whole. 1,500 women, children and elderly Jews Jews were exaggerated, they were funda- The number of perpetrators is now esti- near Warsaw, all the while saying: "An From doctors to opera singers, mentally correct. mated at 200,000 Germans (and order is an order!" In July 1942, his men teachers to truant schoolchildren, It took until the 1990s before historians ). They were police officers like drove the victims out of their houses, the extermination of European Jews and other experts embarked on a large- Walter Mattner, concentration-camp per- loaded them into trucks and took them to was the work of roughly 200,000 scale search for those men (and women) sonnel, members of the SS, or administra- a remote clearing to be executed. They ordinary Germans and their helpers. tors. Another 200,000 shot them in the head or in the back of the Years of research – not yet complete Estonians, Ukrainians, neck, and in the evenings the soldiers' – reveal how sane members of a Lithuanians and other for- uniforms were covered with bone frag- modern society committed murder eigners also helped kill ments, brain matter and bloodstains. for an evil regime. Jews, some because they Just as there is usually more than one alter Mattner, a police secretary were forced to do so, and perpetrator, there is a host of reasons why from Vienna, was there in October W others voluntarily. perfectly normal men turn to murder: 1941 when 2,273 Jews were shot to death ike Satan in the Old years of indoctrination, blind faith in lead- in Mogilyov in Belarus. He later wrote to Testament, evil had ers, a sense of duty and obedience, peer his wife: "My hand was shaking a bit with L many faces. There were pressure, the downplaying of violence as the first cars. By the tenth car, I was aim- those who committed a result of wartime experiences, not to ing calmly and shooting dependably at the crimes out of conviction, mention the lust for Jewish property. many women, children and babies. the dedicated Nazis in the One man who seemed to have no trou- Bearing in mind that I have two babies at police force – members of ble switching from his desk to the mas- home, I knew that they would suffer exact- the SS and the military sacres in the East was Dortmund native ly the same treatment, if not ten times as who, like Hitler, were con- Walter Blume, born in 1906, the son of a bad, at the hands of these hordes." After vinced that the Jews were teacher and a lawyer who completed the World War II, it was obvious to most the root of all evil. Some German equivalent of the bar examination observers that such acts could only have committed their first mur- with a poor grade of "adequate." been committed by sadists and psy- ders in the 1920s and Nevertheless, in 1932 Blume got a job as chopaths, under orders from a handful of A woman about to be executed in Belzec concentration camp. 1930s. There were also an assistant judge on the district court in principal war criminals surrounding Adolf who carried out the Holocaust. The those who committed crimes of excess, his hometown. Hitler. It was a comforting way of looking research isn't complete yet, but the results taking advantage of the Jews' lack of Blume's career in the Hitler regime start- at things, because it meant that ordinary available to date are shocking. rights in Eastern Europe to rape and steal. ed on March 1, 1933, shortly after the people were not the real perpetrators. The researchers found that the perpe- In Western Galicia, for example, members Nazis came to power. His first position But the horrifying results of an opinion trators included both committed Nazis and of the occupation police force would spend was as head of the political division at the poll that the Americans conducted in their people who had nothing to do with the their free time shooting Jews in the ghetto police headquarters in Dortmund. After occupation zone in October 1945 could Nazis. The murderers and their assistants or blackmailing them for their jewelry. joining the Nazi Party and the Storm have raised doubts even then about the included Catholics and Protestants, the There were those who just carried out Troopers (SA), he became head of the version of the story that blames every- old and the young, people with double orders from above, like Major Trapp of Nazi secret police, or Gestapo, in the thing on a few pathological criminals. doctorates and poorly educated members Reserve Police Battalion 101. According (Continued on page 14) Twenty percent of the respondents : A BEAST ON TRIAL n 1944, when she was 13, Simone and herself on June 6, 1944, the day Ravensbruck, where only 2,000 of the rogated for 19 days, she said, and tor- ILagrange testified yesterday, Klaus Allied troops landed in Normandy to 25,000 people who began the march tured on nine of them. Barbie gave her a smile as thin as a knife drive back the Germans. arrived alive. On the way, Simone saw her First she was hung up by hand cuffs blade, then hit her in the face as he cuddled Denounced by a French neighbor as father marching in another convoy. with spikes inside them and beaten with a a cat at the Gestapo headquarters in Lyon. Jews and Resistance fighters, Lagrange "A German officer told me to embrace rubber bar by Barbie and his men. "Who is Lise Lesevre, 86, said Barbie tortured and her parents were taken to Gestapo him. As we were about to meet, they shot Didier, where is Didier?" were Barbie's her for nine days in 1944, beating her, headquarters where a man, dressed in him in the head," she said. "It wasn't main questions, she said. nearly drowning her in a bathtub and final- gray and caressing a cat, said Simone Barbie who pulled the trigger, but it was Next was the bathtub torture. She said ly breaking one of her vertebrae with a was pretty. him who sent us there." she was ordered to strip naked and get spiked ball. was a little girl, and wasn't afraid of nnat Leger, who lost her sight at into a tub filled with freezing water. Her Ennat Leger, now 92, said Barbie "had "Ihim, with his little cat. And he didn't ERavensbruck after her arrest, was legs were tied to a bar across the tub and the eyes of a monster. He was savage. My look like the typical tall, blond SS officer hoisted to the witness stand in her wheel- Barbie yanked a chain attached to the bar God, he was savage! It was unimaginable. we were told to beware chair by four policemen. to pull her underwater. He broke my teeth, he pulled my hair back. of," she said. She was a Resistance "During the bathtub torture, in the pres- He put a bottle in my mouth and pushed it The man, whom she fighter nearly 50 years ence of Barbie, I wanted to drink to drown until the lips split from the pressure." identified as Barbie, old when she was arrest- myself quickly. But I wasn't able to do it. I The three women were among seven asked her terrified parents ed in 1944, she said, and didn't say anything. people who took the witness stand In for the addresses of their Barbie and his men "After 19 days of interrogation, they put September to testify against Barbie, the two younger children. "were savages, brutal me in a cell. They would carry by the bod- former head of the Gestapo in [Paris] dur- "When we said we did savages, who struck, ies of tortured people. With the point of a ing the Nazi occupation of in not know, he pulled my struck and struck again." boot, Barbie would turn their heads to look World War II. hair, hit me, the first time "Have you heard of the at their faces, and if he saw someone he Barbie, 73, is on trial in Lyon, accused of in my life I was slapped," Gestapo kitchens?," she believed to be a Jew, he would crush it torturing Jews and members of the she said. quoted him as saying, in with his heel," she said. French Resistance and deporting them to During the following an allusion to the torture "It was a beast, not a man," she said. "It Nazi death camps. week, the man hauled chambers. was terror. He took pleasure in it." But he did not hear their testimony her out of a prison cell Lise Lesevre, frail and During her last interrogation, she said, because he has refused to attend the court- each day, beating and upright despite her 86 room sessions since the second day of the punching at her open years, described the Barbie ordered her to lie flat on a chair trial, as he may do under French law. wounds in an effort to defendant as "Barbie the and struck her on the back with a spiked He has, however, denied the accusa- obtain the information. savage," saying she rec- ball attached to a chain. It broke a verte- tions against him and has contended that "He always came with ognized him decades brae, and she still suffers. his 1983 extradition from Bolivia to France his thin smile like a knife Klaus Barbie. later because of his "pale "He told me, 'I admire you, but in the end was illegal. blade," she said. "Then he smashed my eyes, extraordinarily mobile, like those of everybody talks.'" But she never did, and Several of the seven witnesses yesterday face. That lasted seven days." an animal in a cage." she heard Barbie say finally, "Liquidate sobbed as they told of arrest, torture, rail Later that month, Simone and her moth- Lesevre, who belonged to a resist- her. I don't want to see her anymore." convoys to the Drancy collection center near er were put aboard a sealed train for the ance group, said the Gestapo arrested She was condemned to death by a Paris and on to concentration camps. Auschwitz concentration camp on a horror her on March 13, 1944, while she was German military tribunal for "terrorism" but They depicted Barbie as a harsh, sadis- ride "which turned us into different people" carrying a letter intended for a was placed in the wrong cell and deported tic officer ready to resort to any cruelty to and that still gave her nightmares 40 Resistance leader code-named Didier. to Ravensbruck concentration camp, extract information. years later. She said Barbie spent almost three where she survived the war. Her husband Lagrange, her voice breaking, From Auschwitz, where her mother was weeks trying to learn if Lesevre was and son did not. She said they were both recalled the arrest of her father, mother gassed, the inmates were marched to Didier, and if not, who was. She was inter- deported to their deaths by Barbie. September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE Page 13 LOST IN THE HOLOCAUST: EXPERTS PLUMB NEWLY OPENED ARCHIVE govern the archive under the auspices of she said. "She came to the U.S. in the even the smallest discoveries can be BY MELISSA EDDY, AP the International Committee of the Red same year that he did, in 1949." The moving. Tom Weiss of Newton, Mass., Cross cleared the way for public access. mother, if alive, would be 93 and Sack mother and child separated. A found his uncle's name on a yellowing Since then, interest has skyrocketed. father's war wound. An uncle's presumes she is dead. The cousin is in his Gestapo list of Jews arrested in France. A Erich Oetiker, deputy director of the name on a list. 70s and still alive, but Sack asked not to "When you see his name on these orig- archive, said while the staff of 400 contin- The unrelated and disparate items are identify him. inal lists it has an emotional impact," he ue to process some 1,000 tracing among the discoveries made by 40 "They never found each other," Sack said. "It sent chills down my back." requests per day, there are now also near Jewish genealogists who are plumbing a said of her cousin and his mother, her Opening to the public has brought about daily visits from historians, or individuals trove of Nazi documents made public after voice breaking. "If these records had several key changes — digitization, bright eager to trace a lost person's fate or view 60 years. been opened earlier, they might have new research rooms, ITS staff eager to an original document. For genealogists of Jewish families, the found each other. I could have found share their intimate knowledge of the doc- American genealogist Sallyann Sack Holocaust is both a tragedy and a black those documents 20 years ago, when uments with those seeking and often mak- suspected for years that the collection held hole, because so many of the 6 million she was still alive." ing a human connection through a find. answers to questions about her family. Jewish victims disappeared without a Oetiker says the archive is in constant contact Esther Mandelayl, an American who n the 1980s, she put in a request try- trace. For years, researchers hoping to fill with the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in immigrated to Israel two years ago, came ing to trace the birth parents of her the gaps have longed to dive into the I Washington D.C., as well as Israel's Yad to research the fate of Jews from Lublin, more than 50 million documents held in adopted cousin, who had survived Vashem — both of which hold digitized copies Poland. Instead she made an unexpected the German spa town Bad Arolsen and Buchenwald as a 9-year-old, then been of part of the collection — along with the Polish personal discovery. entrusted to the International Tracing brought by her aunt and uncle to the Institute for National Remembrance. Her parents survived the war, but her late Service, or ITS. United States. A form letter came back he Washington museum has drawn father never talked about what happened to him "The Nazis took away our names and saying the search had turned up nothing. T up a list of more than 150 German or why he had a long scar down his neck. gave us numbers. Our role is to take away But digging deeper during her time here, keywords with English translations to use But her unusual family name came up the numbers and give back the names," Sack was able to cross-reference the in computer searches: Arbeitslager (slave on an index card from a displaced per- Gary Mokotoff, a genealogist who helped woman's second given name and access labor camp)... deportiet (deported)... sons camp in Italy. It contained detailed organize the group from Israel, the U.S., records of search requests made to the mosaisch (Jewish)... auf der Flucht information about her father. "It listed Britain and Australia, said. "There is a ITS since it opened in 1955 — often erschossen (shot while trying to escape). every place he had been," she said — wealth of information here." detailed letters by individuals who reveal Historians are trying to map out the from Russia, to Tashkent, to surviving a For decades after World War II, the files nuggets of family history while seeking a archive's unexplored contents and help shot to his neck by the Nazis by falling into were used only to help find missing per- missing loved one. determine how best to use the information. a cellar and being left for dead. sons or document atrocities to support "I found here that his mother, who was Yet for some, who have struggled to She said she could barely believe it: "I compensation claims. But in last separated from him when he was less piece together a seamless family picture, have every answer to all my questions about November, the last of the 11 countries that than five years old, also had survived," my father's story — the scar, everything." HITLER’S RELATIVE FOUND HAPPINESS IN ISRAEL NEW DEBATE OVER LOOTED JEWISH ART ome descendants of Nazis have doubt about it. All the great cultures have IN VIENNA MUSEUM Sdecided to wash off the sins of their left the stage of history. The Romans, the controversial art exhibit in Vienna ounded by Rudolf Leopold, the ancestors by converting to Judaism and Greeks, the Egyptians, the Babylonians. has again raised the debate over museum is categorized as a private finding new life in Israel. But this little people, who gave so much to A F the presence of looted Jewish property in foundation, even though it was bought up The descendants of war criminals are the world, do not – he said. Austrian public collections, ahead of the by the Austrian state in 1994 in exchange often marked by the sins of their ances- haron is not the only convert in 70th anniversary of Austria's annexation for building and funding it. tors. We can find examples of that across Israel. There are many of them, but A by . Muzicant has asked that the law be the globe and throughout human history. the society has never accepted them. Critics say the exhibition at Vienna's modified so that it may apply to this insti- Somewhat more rare are cases of Psychologist Dan Bar-On confirmed this. Leopold Museum of works by Tyrolean tution as well, and the president of the descendants who decided to flee from the He claims that converts are trying to run painter Albin Egger-Lienz, a key figure in High Administrative Court, Clemens past by running off to join the descendants away from the past instead of dealing with of the victims of their ancestors. the past, thus not solving anything. early 20th-century Austrian art, features Jabloner agrees. A reporter for , Tany Gold, While Aharon said his name, the others over a dozen works of dubious origin. "On principle, everything of dubious ori- discovered this paradox after reading a did not wish to do so because their These include a 1910 painting of two gin should be returned," Jabloner said. magazine for Orthodox Jews. The son of anonymity is important, both because of peasants, stolen from a Jewish architect, The culture ministry also said it was "the a notorious SS officer converted to the past life and their present life. It is Oskar Neumann, and Judaism and moved to Israel, where he interesting that all of them decided to con- presented by the local served the army. She also found dozens vert to Judaism when they were young. A Nazi leadership to more of such examples. So she travelled 24-year-old convert from Germany is an on his to Israel to find out what exactly made interesting example. birthday in 1939. them make such a change in their lives. The young man is actually a model of all The opposition Aharon Shear-Yashuv is ashamed of his the other examples because they all went Green party has father and the fact that he took part in the through his youthful rapture and anger. He already described the Holocaust, so he decided to become a Jew. did not want to reveal his reasons for con- exhibit as "the greatest – During my theological studies at uni- verting, although they are obvious. The display of looted art in versity it became clear that I couldn't be a reason is that both of his grandfathers and Austria in years" and minister in the church. I concluded that grandmothers were Nazis. has called for the Christianity was paganism. One of its All these converted Germans are not at paintings to be most important dogmas is that God all as interesting as the great-great restored to their previ- became man, and if God becomes man nephew of Adolf Hitler, a person called in ous owners. then man also can become God. Hitler Israel “the Jewish Hitler”. His great grand- Meanwhile, the Founded by Rudolf Leopold, the museum is categorized as a private became a kind of god – Aharon explained, father was the half-brother of Adolf Hitler. president of the foundation, even though it was bought up by the Austrian state in 1994 adding that later he went to study Judaism – I have neither any blood nor DNA from Austrian Jewish com- in exchange for building and funding it. in America. He then moved to Israel Adolf and his family. I was not socialised munity, , went a step fur- Republic's moral duty" to ensure that where he found his peace. by that famil”y – he says, adding that the ther and called for the Leopold Museum stolen artworks are returned to their right- He did not want to mention his father, only person he recognised was his moth- to be shut down until it complies with ful owners. the only thing he would say is that his er because she denounced Nazism dur- legislation on the restitution of looted Austria's annexation by Nazi Germany father was a Nazi and that he had ing the war and she suffered for it. Jewish property. in 1938 led to the systematic looting of renounced him as a son after he found out His motives for moving to Israel and Austria passed this law in 1998 after a US Jewish property and assets, many of Aharon had moved to Israel and convert- converting to Judaism are therefore, obvi- court seized two Egon Schiele paintings, which were subsequently found in nation- ed to Judaism. Describing these details ous. Like Aharon, he studied theology to apparently stolen from their previous al public collections. he did not show regret, but compared it to find peace and he found himself in Jewish owners, at a New York exhibit. The However, the 82-year-old Leopold, who Germany today. Judaism. He remained in Israel after he artworks came from the Leopold collection. sees himself as "the greatest Austrian collec- My father is living a long-lost ideology with spent six months there studying. But fate Since then, the law has enabled the tor of the 20th century" and "the re-discover- no future. Such is the whole of Germany, act- is a strange thing. As he was trying to run restitution of thousands of artworks, er of Schiele," has always denied knowingly ing proud, but in fact dying, he said. away from his ancestors, his descendants including five major paintings by Gustav acquiring stolen Jewish objects. – People there don't get married, and if surprised him. Klimt, four of which were auctioned off in "Works bought legally and in good faith they do they have one child. But the Turks – Two of my sons are chauvinists and one New York in 2006 for a total sum of over should be able to remain in Austria," he and the other foreigners have many chil- of them is even partially racist. I can't listen 190 million dollars. told the weekly magazine Falter, adding dren. So it is a question of time that to fascistic discourse. I don't suffer that” – But the renowned Leopold Museum, that heirs were "only interested in money." Germany will no longer be German. I think He disclosed a somewhat of an irony and which has some 5,000 artworks, including The Austrian National Fund for the Victims it is a punishment for the Holocaust. sent a strong message about what running sketches in the world, has managed to of National Socialism will submit proposals to Germany will leave the stage of history, no away does to a man’s destiny. avoid any restitutions. improve the restitution process. Page 14 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 THE RAPE OF EUROPA WOMAN WHO SAVED LIVES OF 2,500 POLISH JEWS MOVING DOCUMENTARY DETAILS NAZI ART THEFT DIES AT NINETY-EIGHT t's common knowledge that Adolf he Rape of Europa also chronicles ate may have led Irena Sendler to when Felt and her classmates learned IHitler was a third-rate painter before T the efforts of the rest of Europe to Fthe moment almost 70 years ago that the woman who had inspired them becoming a Third Reich leader. His con- hide their art from the Nazis. In Paris, 300 when she began to risk her life for the chil- was still alive. Through the sponsorship of temporary, famed painter Oskar trucks were used to carry the collected dren of strangers. But for this humble a local Jewish organization, they traveled Kokoschka, once joked that if Hitler had works of the Louvre to castles across the Polish Catholic social worker, who was to Warsaw in 2001 to meet Sendler, who made it in the Vienna art scene, he would country. There was even a special, cli- barely 30 when one of history's most helped the students improve and expand have done a lot less harm, and mate-controlled ambulance to transport nightmarish chapters unfolded before her, the play. Kokoschka would have run Europe very La Joconde, also known as the Mona the pivotal influence was something her parents had drummed into her. differently. Lisa. In Russia's Hermitage museum, art "I was taught that if you see a person But when the little painter that couldn't was taken to the cellars to spare it from drowning," she said, "you must jump into started his march across Europe, he sys- bombing; 46 curators died of cold and the water to save them, whether you can tematically looted cities of their art treas- hunger during the siege of the city. swim or not." ures, carting the best of them back to The Allies did what they could during the When the Nazis occupying Poland Germany and destroying or selling off war, but in one tragedy, the art-laden began rounding up Jews in 1940 and anything he deemed degenerate or not monastery of Monte Cassino in Italy was sending them to the Warsaw Ghetto, Aryan enough. destroyed when it was assumed the Sendler plunged in. The Rape of Europa, directed by Germans were using it as an observation With daring and ingenuity, she saved the Richard Berge, Bonni Cohen and Nicole post; in fact, they had never been there. lives of more than 2,500 Jews, most of Newnham, is a sobering look at how Pilots attacking other cities carried maps them children, a feat that went largely manic but also efficient the Nazis were of no-bombing zones where ancient stat- unrecognized until the last years of her life. when it came to art collecting. ues and other treasures were located. Sendler, 98, who died of pneumonia in The sheer numbers are staggering. Of course, the most tragic element of May in Warsaw, has been called the When the Allies entered Germany at the this story is not the art destroyed or lost, female Oskar Schindler, but she saved end of the war, they found a salt mine that but the Jewish families robbed of not only twice as many lives as the German indus- contained, alongside the collected gold their heritage but their lives. The filmmak- trialist, who sheltered 1,200 of his Jewish reserves of the Third Reich, a cache of ers interview a German historian who is workers. Unlike Schindler, whose story 400 tons of art. In another mine, Hitler had trying to return Jewish religious art to its received international attention in the Called "Life in a Jar," it has been per- salted away a trove that took more than a owners or their descendants. Reparation 1993 movie "Schindler's List," Sendler formed more than 250 times in the United year to remove and was eventually can be difficult, as governments often see and her heroic actions were almost lost to States, Canada and Poland and generat- packed into dozens of rail cars for trans- themselves as the rightful or most adept history until four Kansas schoolgirls wrote ed media attention that cast a spotlight on portation back to from where it came. curators of fragile artwork. a play about her nine years ago. the wizened, round-faced nonagenarian. Nazi Germany seems to have almost The filmmakers do a good job covering The lesson Sendler taught them was that Last year, Sendler was honored by the contained a ministry of plundering, with art all the elements of wartime art theft, repa- "one person can make a difference," Megan Polish Senate and nominated for the lover and Luftwaffe commander Hermann triation and reparation. The Rape of Felt, one of the authors of the play, said. Nobel Peace Prize, which brought dozens Goering as its unofficial head. The gov- Europa may be a straightforward docu- In 1965, she was recognized by Yad of reporters to her door. She told one of ernment went so far as to draw up lists of mentary, with talking heads, archival Vashem, Israel's Holocaust authority, as a them she was wearying of the attention. great art abroad, the better to steal it footage and photographs, but its subject Righteous Gentile. In her own country, "Every child saved with my help is the when they invaded. Hitler was an avid is important and still timely, as even today however, she was unsung, in part justification of my existence on this Earth," personal collector, commissioned a looted works occasionally resurface and because Polish anti-Semitism remained she said, "and not a title to glory." gallery in Munich to house his ill-gotten must be returned to their rightful owners. strong after the war and many rescuers Sendler, who was the last living member gains and planned an even bigger muse- were persecuted. of her group of rescuers, is survived by a um in his hometown of Linz, Austria. First published in Ottawa Citizen Her status began to change in 2000, daughter and a granddaughter. NAZI ATROCITIES, THE HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS COMMITTED BY ORDINARY PEOPLE FACING WAR-CRIMES TRIALS (Continued from page 12) and two associates of (Continued from page 6) younger than Fania Branstovsky is now. eastern city of Halle, in Hannover and organized the deportation of Greek Jews hreatening to Holocaust survivors now in ccording to the Lithuanian embassy later in the capital Berlin. The main pur- to the Auschwitz . their eighties. “This is very shocking and A in London, there are currently no pose of rapid rotation in high-ranking posi- Blume was placed on trial in Nuremberg upsetting,” he says. “My cousin, as well as plans to prosecute Branstovsky. In an tions, typical of the Gestapo, was to pro- in September 1947, together with 22 other the other two people involved, are all quite emailed statement, Minister Counsellor, vide opportunities to gather repressive men, whose regular occupations qualified elderly now, and it’s very unfortunate that Deputy Head of Mission Jonas experience. them as members of upper-class civil they have to deal with this at this stage of Grinevicius said: “There is no lawsuit Starting on March 1, 1941, Blume head- society. They included a dentist, a profes- their lives. It’s terribly unjust.” against Mrs Branstovsky and there are no ed the personnel department in Division I sor, an opera singer, a Protestant pastor, He adds that his cousin is now too charges by the Prosecution General of the so-called Reichssicherheitshauptamt a teacher – and a few journalists. scared to return to Lithuania. “She is wor- against Mrs Branstovsky, nor there is any (Reich Security Main Office, or RSHA). His Fourteen were sentenced to death, but ried she may get arrested.” other legal action against Mrs first assignment was to achel Margolis’s memoir, which has Branstovsky initiated. Mrs Branstovsky is assemble suitable per- been published in Lithuania, con- R only asked to appear in the court hearings sonnel for one of the mur- tains a description of how a group of par- as a witness in the case of the massacre der commandos of the tisans, including Fania Branstovsky, by Soviet partisans of peaceful inhabitants so-called attacked a Nazi garrison in the village of of Kaniukai village in Salcininkai district. (Special Action Groups), “Kanyuki”. She writes: “The partisans had a force consisting of surrounded the garrison, but the Nazis The killing of 38 Kaniukai inhabitants roughly 3,000 men, were exceptionally well-armed and beat occurred in January 1944, it was commit- known as the "Gestapo off all attacks. They broke the flanks of the ted by 120-150 Soviet partisans.” on Wheels." This group Jewish detachments, and the partisans Lithuanian denials do not impress followed Hitler's army as withdrew precipitously. Then Magid jumped Efraim Zuroff. He has written a strongly it marched eastward and up on a rock and yelled: ‘We are Jews. We worded letter to Asta was charged with the will show them what we are capable of. Skaisgiryté–Liauskienè, the Lithuanian immediate liquidation of Forward, comrades!’ This sobered the men ambassador in Israel. In it he accuses "Jewish Bolshevism" and up; they ran back and won.” the Lithuanian authorities of “launching the "excision of radical A willingness to prosecute alleged war a campaign to discredit Jewish resist- Arrival of Jews into the . elements." criminals is something not often displayed ance fighters by falsely accusing them Blume himself led a unit known as only in four cases was the sentence car- by the Lithuanian authorities. Even though of war crimes in order to deflect atten- Special Commando 7a, which was part of ried out. US High Commissioner John around 212,000 of its Jews were killed, tion from widespread Lithuanian partic- Einsatzgruppe B. According to Blume's McCloy pardoned the rest, including the Baltic country has only ever brought ipation in the mass murder of Jews dur- own records, his unit killed roughly 24,000 Blume, and they were gradually released three of its citizens to trial over war ing the Holocaust.” people in Belarus and Russia between from prison over the years. Blume went on crimes, two of whom — Kazys He says that this is a “malicious cam- June and September 1941. A short time to become a businessman. Gimzauskas and Algimantas Dailide — paign against the innocent heroes of the later, Blume returned to the RSHA, where Most of the perpetrators were never were convicted, but were excused impris- anti-Nazi resistance. We are hoping the he was promoted to the position of divi- punished. There have been 6,500 convic- onment, in Gimzauskas’s case because investigations will be dropped.” sion head and SS banner leader. In tions to date, and only 1,200 of them were of illness, in Dailide’s because of And so do Fania Branstovsky, Yitzhak August 1943, he went to Athens, where he for murder or manslaughter. advanced age. Dailide was 85, a year Arad and Rachel Margolis. September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE Page 15

NEW GERMAN FUNDS VISIT FULL OF SURPRISES AND HOPE FOR SURVIVORS Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, the gious purposes, Schwartz said, while BY PEGGY BROWN, NEWSDAY trip's organizer. Cuba has six syna- being rented in the 1980s to the Ministry n its annual negotiations with gogues, including three in Havana, of Culture for a theater. "They had the IGermany, the hatever Rabbi Barry Dov Silverman said; one is Orthodox, the oth- building and the synagogue, but the peo- obtained an additional $320 million for Schwartz and his wife, Sonia, W ers Conservative. At times, a rabbi from ple left," Sonia Schwartz added. "You did- programs for Holocaust survivors. expected to see at Bet Chayim, a Jewish another country will supplement their lay n't have enough people to keep it going." The additional funds to be distributed cemetery on Havana's outskirts, it wasn't leadership. But in 1992, the Cuban constitution was over the next decade are a combination of the grave of an American soldier. changed to permit the practice of religion. increased payments to survivors, inclu- But there it was: a sepia-toned, oval "Castro visited the main synagogue in sion of additional survivors in the pension photo set into a rectangular piece of pure Havana" then, the rabbi said. "They are programs, and funding for homecare white marble, leaning against a grave- very proud of that." needs of Jewish victims of Nazism. stone lined with bold Hebrew lettering. Now synagogue attendance is growing. According to a statement from the "Isaac, son of Aryeh Leib Bender, who fell "They flock there," he: said. German Federal Ministry of Finance, in a mitzvah war in Korea on the 5th day of In the city of Cienfuegos, "there are no about $71 million has been committed for Sivan [July] in the year of 1952, may his synagogues, but there are groups of Jews home care for needy and aging Holocaust soul be bound up in the bond of life." who meet together to maintain their survivors through 2009. The Claims If the Bender family had brought their Jewishness," Schwartz said. "I think there Conference distributes the funds to agen- son's body back to his native Cuba after are eight families who meet there. They cies that provide such care to survivors the communist revolution of 1959, they have a little Hebrew school. It's amazing around the world. might not have been allowed to write what they do to survive." Retroactive to June 1, 2008, monthly pay- those words on his tombstone — calling 'They said they were very inspired by hav- ments from the Article 2 Fund and the the Korean War, in which the West fought ing us come to see them," Sonia Schwartz Central and Eastern European Fund to com¬munist North Korea, a "mitzvah". said. "They said it helps keep them going. It 65,800 survivors worldwide will be raised 8 Still, the dedication never was removed. was like meeting your own family." percent. Payment under the Article 2 Fund That cemetery visit was one of many Just as there was a connection between will increase to $460 per month from $427. touching, even astonishing, moments on American Jewish children and those of Payments under the CEEF will be raised to the Schwartzes' recent mission to Cuba to refuseniks in the 1980s — many bar or $341 per month from $316 to survivors resid- help the country's small Jewish communi- bat mitzvah children would read the name ing in European Union countries. ty — a mere 1,500 souls in a population of of a Soviet child who could study Torah Monthly CEEF payments to survivors about 11 million. only in secret — there are American chil- residing in non-EU countries will be $281 per Besides encouraging the practice of Holocaust Memorial in Cuba dren now helping Cuban Jews. month, up from $261. These increases will Judaism, the Schwartzes had an econom- Silverman said some students result in an extra estimated $166 million pay ic goal. "The Jews suffer like other he 1959 revolution changed nearly "learned to tie tzitzit on the tallit, and we Cubans because of being impoverished," Teverything for Cuba's 15,000 Jews, out over the next decade. Currently, more presented them to the Sephardic syna- Schwartz said. They stuffed their luggage with their history of nearly 500 years on than 52,000 survivors are receiving Article 2 gogue in Havana. When we joined them full of over-the-counter and prescription the island. An "exodus" of 90 percent of Fund payments and more than 13,800 sur- for services on Saturday morning, we saw medicines, school supplies and other them, most to the United States, occurred vivors are receiving CEEF payments. two men of the congregation wearing essentials hard to find in Cuba. Other after Castro nationalized businesses, The organization also secured an agree- these tallitot." agencies had provided religious items, so causing "a true demographic catastrophe ment to extend eligibility to Article 2 funds to `While in Cuba, the Schwartzes they didn't pack any, Schwartz said. for their community," according to "The some 2,000 additional Holocaust survivors received an invitation to the bar mitzvah of Of course, not just anyone can go to Cuba. Chosen Island" by Maritza Corrales, a originally from western European countries, Alberto Mordecai Alvarez Fuentes. But the Schwartzes — she teaches seventh- Cuban historian who acted as guide for who had survived concentration camps or "I saw this bar mitzvah boy as a symbol grade social studies at the Bais Yaakov part of the Schwartzes' trip. ghettos, or who suffered Nazi persecution, of the Cuban Jews," Schwartz said. Academy for Girls, an Orthodox Jewish Yet, there is no Cuban tradition of anti- who lost one or both parents and who "Before the '90s, it was unthinkable that a school in Kew Gardens; he's been spiritual Semitism, the Schwartzes said. received a one-time payment from the boy would study Judaism and know leader of Temple B'nai Sholom for 36 years "It's the only country outside the U.S. Global Agreement with Germany. The Hebrew and stand in front of Torahs — — applied for a religious exemption. where you go into a synagogue and there agreement will make some survivors eligi- and, now, he is. "There are a number of Jewish groups are no security guards," Schwartz added. ble for the first time to receive a pension "That's the story of the Cuban Jews," he who go every year on a license to help," "It's totally safe." from the Claims Conference Article 2 Fund, said. "They consider. themselves part of said Harry J. Silverman, executive direc- Havana's main synagogue, El totaling approximately $83 million over the the global Jewish community.” tor of the Southeast Region, United Patronato, was used "minimally" for reli- coming decade JEWISH WOMEN PRISONERS OF RAVENSBRÜCK (Continued from page 4) no known attempts of sabotage among Jewish survivors of Ravensbrück, one of frequently and purposely made to carry What forms of resistance existed among the Jewish prisoners; they were an isolat- their greatest concerns was that of out jobs which were physically taxing the Jewish women of Ravensbrück? ed minority in the camp, and were not retaining a “human face” and moral even for men. Furthermore, the Jewish Thus, we learn that the Jewish prisoners organized on a grand-scale level. character – not succumbing to the utter women prisoners of Ravensbrück were of Ravensbrück originated in 27 different Accounting for this lack of organization state of animals – that was expected of frequently in maternal positions of having countries, that the majority of was the fact that Jewish women were a them. In the words of one such survivor, to care for children and young teenagers, Ravensbrück’s prisoner population was highly diversified group, bearing some 27 Lotte S. the term “resistance” could be something that was far less common actually comprised of non-Jews, and that different nationalities and speaking multi- defined as follows: among Jewish male prisoners during the among the countries of origin represented ple tongues, which frequently did not coin- In reality, anybody who strived to survive Holocaust. Finally, natural factors such as in the camp, Hungary rated the highest at cide with one another. This does not even performed resistance. Any act of solidari- menstruation, pregnancy, and the fact that 47.85 percent, followed by Poland at begin to take into account the varying ide- ty, any small piece of bread, each friendly women are much more prone to sexual 24.06 percent, Slovakia at 9.92 percent, ologies espoused by or the different reli- and encouraging word was resistance. assault and rape than men, also placed and Germany at 6.9 percent. We also gious backgrounds of this particular group Any attempt to evade a blow of the stick of them in an extremely precarious – if not learn that the largest age range represent- of women. Furthermore, close to half of a guard was resistance. But equally so if dangerous – situation, as compared to ed was that of 19-25, which accounted for Ravensbrück’s overall Jewish population one went to one’s death with head held their male compatriots. 31.7 percent of the prisoner population had already been subjected to the horrors high and contempt for one’s tormentors. In conclusion, Jewish Women Prisoners of during the course of Ravensbrück’s six- of Auschwitz, which must have taken a n her concluding remarks, Buber Ravensbrück: Who Were They? is an out- year-history. Among Buber Agassi’s more serious physical and emotional toll on IAgassi addresses the question of gen- standing and impressive work of scholarship, surprising discoveries, was the fact that these women. Finally, the simple truth of der and the impact this construct – the which was clearly many years in the making. there existed many artists, writers, story- the matter was that by the latter part of the matter of being women – had on the fate Moreover, given her own familial connection tellers, actors, and especially singers camp’s existence – what Buber Agassi and behaviors of women in the Holocaust to the Ravensbrück Concentration Camp – a among the female inmates of delineated as its fourth and fifth periods – as a whole, in contradistinction to those of point which Buber Agassi, in my opinion, has Ravensbrück. Storytelling, in particular, the lack of nutrition, housing, and hygiene men, whose circumstances were compa- perhaps gone too far to objectify – this proj- served multiple functions: it provided a had reached devastating heights. Under rable or similar. According to Buber ect was undeniably part of the author’s per- creative context for social interactions these combined conditions, when taken Agassi, the few salient distinctions that sonal and lifelong calling. Buber Agassi’s between women prisoners, while enabling as a whole, it is not difficult to understand emerge concerning the unique experi- book, because of its fine attention to factual them to detach, if even temporarily, from why there were not more overt attempts at ences of women during the Holocaust are detail, would be better read in conjunction their horrific surroundings. resistance. steeped primarily in the physiological and with some of the other works on s for the question of Jewish resist- In light of the aforementioned remarks, it socialization processes, which directly Ravensbrück, particularly the survivors’ own A ance – What forms did it take and is also important to consider the meaning affected women. memoirs, which provide a greater illustration why did it not occur on a broader scale? – of resistance, which took on various forms For example, the fact that most women of the challenges and horrors with which Buber Agassi provides several logical in the midst of even the most severe and had less physical strength caused them these women were forced to contend on the explanations. For one thing, there were horrific circumstances. According to many greater danger than men, since they were day-to-day level. Page 16 MARTYRDOM & RESISTANCE September/October 2008 - Tishri/Cheshvan 5769 FUNFUN ININ THETHE SUNSUN FORFOR AA NOBLENOBLE CAUSECAUSE

n Sunday, September 14th, the Young Leadership Associates of Othe American Society for Yad Vashem held their fall event for young families. Over 150 people from across the tri-state area joined in apple picking at Penning’s Orchard in Warwick, NY. This event was planned by the Young Leadership as a Chesed project. As the participants settled down for lunch after picking from a variety of apples, all the chil- dren and parents helped to make Rosh Hashanah gift bas- kets. Included in each basket were apples picked fresh from the trees, some honey and a note crediting the American Society for Yad Vashem. The baskets were later delivered to DOROT – Generations Helping Generations. Thanks to all our families who came out and helped to make the holiday a bit more special.

Martyrdom & Resistance International Society for Yad Vashem NON-PROFIT ORG. Eli Zborowski, Editor-in-Chief MARTYRDOM AND RESISTANCE U.S. POST Yefim Krasnyanskiy, M.A., Editor 500 FIFTH AVENUE, 42nd FLOOR, PAID NEW YORK, N.Y. *Published Bimonthly by the NEW YORK, N.Y. 10110-4299 PERMIT NO. 10 International Society for Yad Vashem, Inc. Web site: www.yadvashemusa.org 500 Fifth Avenue, 42nd Floor New York, NY 10110 (212) 220-4304 EDITORIAL BOARD Eli Zborowski Marvin Zborowski Mark Palmer Sam Skura** Israel Krakowski William Mandell Sam Halpern Isidore Karten** Norman Belfer Joseph Bukiet** *1974-85, as Newsletter for the American Federation of Jewish Fighters, Camp Inmates, and Nazi Victims **deceased