JNF IS 100% ISRAEL Dutch family honoured NEGEV DINNER OCT 27 AMSTERDAM-ISRAEL MISSION OCT 30-NOV 14 Ottawa reception honours family ISRAEL CULINARY EXPERIENCE NOV 6-10 for heroic efforts during Holocaust JNFOTTAWA.CA FOR DETAILS [email protected] 613.798.2411 > page 3 Ottawa Jewish Bulletin MAY 16, 2016 | 8 IYAR 5776 ESTABLISHED 1937 OTTAWAJEWISHBULLETIN.COM | $2 Ottawa community marks Yom HaShoah with solemn commemoration Remembrance was the theme, May 3, as hundreds gathered at the Soloway Jewish Community Centre for the community commemoration of Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day. Louise Rachlis reports. e know that whilst we Waisman described being liberated by cannot bring the dead Leon Bass, a 19-year-old African back to life, we can American soldier from the United States. ‘Wensure their memories Waisman said he thought Bass was an live on and that their deaths were not in angel because he’d never seen a black vain. And so, on this Yom HaShoah, we man before. commit ourselves to one simple act: Bass died a few months ago, and Yizkor, Remember.’ Waisman said he misses him. After both Those words, from a prayer written by being silent for decades, “We travelled Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, were read by together to tell our story.” Allan Shefrin near the beginning of Waisman described how “after emer- HOWARD SANDLER Ottawa’s Yom HaShoah commemoration. ging from the abyss, questions bom- Holocaust survivors (from left) Elly Bollegraaf, Raoul Korngold, Elena Keen, Tova Clark, “Remembering is not only the respons- barded me.” His life was shattered, and Agnes Klein, and Jessica Fiksel gather after lighting six memorial candles at the Yom HaShoah commemoration, May 3. (Nestor Hobe is missing from the photo.) ibility of survivors and their relatives, but he wondered, “How will I recapture the duty and obligation of everyone in feelings so I can cry again and laugh the worldwide Jewish community and again? ... We existed for the moment and ing again. We have a responsibility to Waisman was introduced by Shira beyond,” said Debbie Halton-Weiss, chair every effort was made to survive. We had ensure it doesn’t happen again to Benlolo and Cody Miller, Ottawa students of the Shoah Committee of the Jewish to relearn how to be human again.” anyone,” added Waisman. who formed a special relationship with Federation of Ottawa, which presented In his early life, he was “spoiled and Waisman believes the young people of him when he accompanied their group the commemoration in collaboration loved,” and he still cherishes those today will work diligently for a better on the March of the Living in 2012. with the Azrieli Foundation. memories. “The power of memory world. The event also included a video “History must not only be studied, but provided the template to lead a caring “When I speak at schools, I see hope in presentation by students who partici- experienced, and Yom HaShoah is a time life.” their faces,” he said. pated in March of the Living last year in to do that,” said Israeli Ambassador Waisman quoted author Elie Wiesel, “What you’re doing tonight gives me which they gave their impressions of Rafael Barak, who brought greetings on another of the “boys from Buchenwald,” hope for humanity,” he said of the Yom their life-changing experience. behalf of the Jewish state. who said: “The Nazis did the killing. The HaShoah commemoration. “This “Eleven Ottawa students are presently Keynote speaker Robbie Waisman, 84, Jews did the dying. The world was evening, you are following the long-held in Poland participating in this year’s shared his experiences as one of the 426 indifferent.” Jewish concept of ‘from generation to March,” noted Halton-Weiss. “We are teenagers liberated from the Buchenwald “It was left to us to serve as a reminder generation, L’dor va’dor.’ It gives me enormously proud of the students who concentration camp on April 11, 1945. of what can happen and is still happen- hope. I am very proud of you.” See Yom HaShoah on page 2 Irwin Cotler on the lessons Israeli soccer player joins Rubin Friedman on Gary Barwin’s inside: of Nuremberg > p. 2 Ottawa Fury FC > p. 14 ‘Yiddish for Parrots’ > p. 24 With over 50,000 square feet in warehouse space, whether you need bulk storage space or rack slots, we can customize your account to meet all your needs. Publication Mail Agreement No. 40018822 Inventory Management 613.244.4444 • www.boydmoving.com 2 May 16, 2016 OTTAWAJEWISHBULLETIN.COM The lessons of Nuremberg: Stand up to hate, and remember hate’s victims the gas chambers – it began with words.” doesn’t end with Jews. IRWIN COTLER THE RESPONSIBILITY TO COMBAT THE RESPONSIBILITY GUEST COLUMN OLD/NEW ANTI-SEMITISM TO REPUDIATE FALSE WITNESS Anti-Semitism is the oldest and most The Holocaust denial movement – the enduring of hatreds and the most lethal. If cutting edge of anti-Semitism old and new the Holocaust is a metaphor for radical – is not just an assault on Jewish memory om HaShoah arrived this year on evil, anti-Semitism is a metaphor for in its accusation that the Holocaust is a the eve of two historic anniver- radical hatred. hoax, and the Jews fabricated the hoax. saries: the 80th anniversary of From 1941 to 1944, 1.3 million people Rather, it constitutes an international Ythe coming into effect of the were murdered at Auschwitz – of whom, 1.1 criminal conspiracy to cover up the worst Nuremberg Race Laws, which served as million were Jews – recalling Elie Wiesel’s crimes in history. The Holocaust denial prologue and precursor to the Holocaust, dictum that “the Holocaust was a war movement whitewashes the crimes of the Irwin Cotler and the 70th anniversary of the against the Jews in which not all victims Nazis, as it excoriates the “crimes” of the Nuremberg Trials, which served as the were Jews, but all Jews were victims.” Jews. And now, in an inversion of the foundation for the development of ideology of hate. Genocide starts with Jews died at Auschwitz because of Holocaust, Israel is labelled as a genocidal contemporary international human rights teaching contempt for, and demonizing, anti-Semitism, but anti-Semitism did not state and the Jews are smeared as the new and humanitarian law. the other. As the Supreme Court of Canada die there. As we have learned only too Nazis. This historic juncture was the theme of affi rmed, “The Holocaust did not begin in tragically, while it begins with Jews, it See Cotler on page 8 an international legal symposium on May 3 at Jagiellonian University in Krakow. It was followed the next day by the March of the Living, when some 10,000 young people and survivors marched in remembrance and solidarity from the gates of Auschwitz to Birkenau. We must ask ourselves two questions: What have we learned? What must we do? THE RESPONSIBILITY OF REMEMBRANCE The fi rst lesson is the importance of zachor (remembrance) of the victims defamed, demonized and dehumanized as prologue and justifi cation for genocide, so that the mass murder of six million Jews, and of millions of non-Jews, is not a matter of abstract statistics. THE RESPONSIBILITY TO PREVENT STATE-SANCTIONED INCITEMENT TO HATE AND GENOCIDE The Holocaust succeeded not only because of the industry of death – of which the crematoria are a cruel reminder – but HULTON ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES because of the Nazis’ state-sanctioned Members of the tribunal presiding over the Nuremberg war crimes trials in 1946. Yom HaShoah: Remembering is the responsibility of all Continued from page 1 Post, Jewish War Veterans of Canada and take part in this challenging, and, as you veterans of the Israel Defense Forces, and heard, life-altering experience.” the singing of “O Canada” and Perhaps the most poignant moments “Hatikvah,” led by the Ottawa Jewish of the evening came as Holocaust Community School Choir. survivors – Elly Bollegraaf, Tova Clark, The evening concluded solemnly with Jessica Fiksel, Nester Hobe, sisters Agnes “Kel Maleh Rachamim,” a remembrance Klein and Elena Keen, and Raoul prayer for the soul of the departed led by Korngold, assisted by students of Temple Cantor Pinchas Levinson and “Kaddish,” Israel Religious School – lit the six led by Cantor Moshe Kraus. memorial candles, each representing one The national Holocaust Remembrance million Jews murdered during the ceremony took place May 5 at the HOWARD SANDLER Holocaust. Canadian War Museum. A report will be (From left) Shoah Committee Chair Debbie Halton-Weiss, keynote speaker The evening began with the March on published in the May 30 edition of the Robbie Waisman, Jewish Federation of Ottawa President and CEO Andrea Freedman, and Israeli Ambassador Rafael Barak gather at the Yom HaShoah commemoration, May 3. the Colours by members of the Ottawa Ottawa Jewish Bulletin. May 16, 2016 3 OTTAWAJEWISHBULLETIN.COM Dutch family honoured in Ottawa for heroic efforts during the Holocaust Among the events marking Yom HaShoah this year in Ottawa was a special reception, May 4, honouring the Makkinje family of Bussum, a suburb just east of Amsterdam in the Netherlands, for its efforts in sheltering the Veffer family from almost certain death during the Holocaust. Ian Chodikoff reports. hen the Nazi persecution of discovered by neighbours or of being Dutch Jews intensifi ed in betrayed by passersby. With the help of 1942, fl ower shop owners the Dutch underground, rations, books WSara and Jonas Veffer, and and medical assistance helped sustain their six young children, needed a place the family. to hide. Following the liberation of the Finding a place of refuge proved Netherlands in 1945 – largely by the First diffi cult, until Rachel, the second oldest Canadian Army – Jonas Veffer spent time of the Veffer children, eventually found in the Canadian military hospital in them safe haven at her friend Annie Bussum where he was tended to by Makkinje’s house in Bussum.