News from Remember Us In this issue: Winter International 2011 developments “So long as we live they too shall live, for they are part of us as we remember them” Righteous Conversations: ATeen Initiative Remember Us The Holocaust Bnai Mitzvah Project About Remember Us Remember Us: The Holocaust Bnai Mitzvah Project offers an invitation to each child preparing for bar/bat mitzvah: remember one specific child who was lost in the Holocaust, and act for the good in memory of that child. We provide the names, and suggest ways for young people and their families to express their commitment to mem- ory: dedicating their Torah reading, doing mitzvot and tikkun olam in the name of the child, lighting yahrzeit candles, etc. Board of Directors Michael Berenbaum, PhD othing gives us more pleasure than to tell opportunity to make a significant step in Gesher Calmenson, Founder Nour readers that our original concept of Judaism through how we shape remem- remembrance is being embraced, owned, and brance. The ad hoc group of teens is being Ruth Goldberg evolved by participating families. In Los fully supported and encouraged by their moth- Samara Hutman, President Angeles a committee of teens has formed to ers and family friends. Harry Pelz sponsor events that bring Holocaust survivors Remember Us acknowledges the great work Barbara Tobin, MPH and teens together for what is being called of conceptualization and actualization being Righteous Conversations. The themes are com- done by the adult committee: Cece Feiler, Current Status plex and important: What do the survivors Helen Jacobs–Lepor, Sheryl Sokoloff, Rochel expect from the rising generations? What do Blachman, and Susan Gotlib. The teens who Over 16,000 children have received the teens want to tell the survivors while they are spearheading this nascent movement are names from Remember Us, in more than 600 congregations in 39 states still have the chance? What is the role of Rebecca Hutman, Lara Sokoloff, Marissa and 8 countries. Participation is Holocaust memory in forming the identities of Lepor, and Jamie Feiler. Remember Us Board voluntary. There is no charge. The people who were not there? What role does Member Michael Berenbaum is advising the concept has been endorsed by all Holocaust memory have in inspiring empower- committee. Survivors Marie Kaufman and Jewish denominations. ment and tikkun olam, repair of the world? Helen Freeman are sharing their insights, wis- From the original seed of an idea, the dom, and concerns on behalf of the survivor Righteous Conversations are developing into a community. Documentarian film maker Jessica program of public events, workshops, and a Sanders and Harvard-Westlake film depart- Remember Us: The Holocaust documentary film. This splendid development ment head Cheri Gaulke will mentor the stu- Bnai Mitzvah Project is centered around families from Harvard- dents who will be filming these conversation 2777 Yulupa Avenue, #273 Westlake School. Remember Us Board on behalf of future generations. History Santa Rosa, CA 95405-8584 President Samara Hutman and her daughter teacher Dror Yaron is the faculty sponsor for (707) 570-2883 Rebecca Hutman have brought together a an event at Harvard-Westlake. [email protected] group of families to further this work. Some In our Spring 2011 newsletter we plan to www.remember-us.org families have a direct connection to the report on some of the answers generated in News from Remember Us is published bi- Holocaust experience, and others recognize response to the timely, vital questions that annually through a grant from the Charles that, in this decade that will see the passing of these young women and their mothers are and Mildred Schnurmacher Foundation the last survivor generation, we have the engaging on behalf of the Jewish future. ■ 2 Winter 2011 News from Remember Us Reflections from Israel and Germany Read the complete series of messages of Israel. I disagree. For me Israel is truly a from Israel on the Remember Us website. miracle, an unprecedented, glorious accomplishment, fulfillment of the promise of millennia, a complex, roiling modern state being built daily by vision, courage, and sacrifice—warm, vulnerable, humor- ous, tough, alive. Its existence is connected to the German experience, but I’m unwill- ing to attribute our homeland’s rebirth to the crazed history of that century. Our whole story of survival is so much larg- er. In Germany my understanding of our experienced deepened, and I came away First-graders in Jerusalem perform for their mindful of the ways that, through group parents at a celebration for receiving their trance, madness can masquerade as reason- first Torah workbook. able behavior. For myself personally, in Israel I learned much more about my ing understanding of our shared individual grandmother and aunt who were murdered responsibility. Afterward I jotted down this in Lithuania, and I went to Germany feel- idea after touring the new museum. Street sign on one corner of the Holocaust ing more sensitized to the sources of their awful fate. I’m glad I went to Germany Memorial in Berlin. Eating lunch in the café reinforced by my delight, appreciation, and Watching the esteem for what has been created by our Sleek scarred fat coiffed lithe broken faith and love. n Germany, our first stop had a moving Jews Ipersonal connection. The Holocaust Walking up and down the stairs Memorial in Berlin is bounded on one side I think: the museum needs by Cora Berliner Strasse. Cora Berliner was One more thing, the great-aunt of Barbara Tobin, one of the Next to the last exhibit two people who started Remember Us. A MIRROR Barbara’s daughter Cora, her namesake, you have to pass by, was one of the first children to participate and a sign for each of us to read: in Remember Us and now, a college stu- HINENI, I am here. dent, maintains our data records. The sen- ior Cora was deeply involved in Kindertransport. She chose to stay in Berlin rather than join her family in the United States, and is believed to have died in Bergen-Belsen. Her great-nieces continue, in their own appropriate fashion, the work for which she sacrificed her life. Often people have commented that we did the trip backwards, that it would have been better to see the Holocaust sites in Germany first and then see the apotheosis Sachsenhausen, the first concentration and extermination camp. At Yad Vashem I had an extraordinaery experience of being the only person in the Children’s Monument, alone with the myri- ad candles and the quiet voice reading aloud the names. It had the air of a myth— trepidation, awe, inspiration. Something The Valley of the Communities at Yad Vashem The Holocaust Memorial in Berlin. changed from being there alone, a deepen- in Jerusalem. News from Remember Us Winter 2011 3 Expanding Remember Us Participation in Israel and Beyond n outreach trip to Israel in June 2010 opportunity to bring the Remember Us con- Aproduced the opportunity to establish cept to the international leadership of Remember Us nationwide in Israel. In a Masorti Olami, which serves the land often fractured by disagreement and Conservative Movement worldwide, and struggling for unifying ideas, the positive World Union for Progressive Judaism, serv- Israeli response to the Remember Us con- ing the same function for the Reform move- cept was remarkable; it was universally ment outside of Israel and America. embraced across the spectrum of education- Remember Us affirmed its commitment to al and religious institutions. We attribute support their efforts to bring the Remember the enthusiastic reception to three factors. Us concept to their international constituen- ■ Holocaust remembrance is a national cies. A Spanish-language version of the web commitment in Israel, and Remember Us site will be implemented this coming Spring. The trip was generously funded by an is seen as adding a personal layer of Doorway to Education Ministry, Petach Upstart Bay Area mini-grant and private meaning and connection on a child-by- Tiqwa, Israel. child basis. donations. ■ ■ The concept is seen by all as an idea on which everyone can agree. Remember Us The first step in creating a portal for is recognized as the ritualization of mem- Israeli participation has been to create the ory without a commitment to any one Hebrew name of the project—Zichru particular practice. It is equally evocative Otanu. This Fall we launched a Hebrew Introducing ITS, the for secular Israelis and religious Israeli website. Individual requests for names to Jews of all persuasions. remember from bnai mitzvah families in International Tracing ■ Remember Us presents this history in a Israel are now quickly fulfilled online. way that levels the differences between The Israeli educational system is another Service in Germany ethnicities and backgrounds. While potentially significant partner. We identified n a very small village in Germany there is Ashkenazi Jews share the history of the vehicles for integrating the Remember Us a remarkable institution that has worked Holocaust, Sephardic, Yemenite, and concept into existing school curricula. The I for sixty years to shed light on the individ- Ethiopian communities do not have the Israeli school system is divided into multi- ual fates of those caught up in the same personal history of the Holocaust in ple schemes (which is the Israeli concept Holocaust. We are honored to intoduce their family backgrounds. for networks). Each has its own unique you to one of our partner organizations, During the three-week trip, founder approach, ranging from curriculum to full the International Tracing Service (ITS). Gesher Calmenson met with Israeli educa- architectural solutions that both combine In its mission statement, ITS declares its tional, civic, government and religious and separate religious education and secu- commitment to serve the victims of Nazi leadership, as well as representatives of lar education.