On Thursday, I spent the entire day in the International School for Holocaust Studies at Yad Vashem.  It was a fabulous day!  We started with a session in the learning center, which explores answers to historical and moral dilemmas and issues of the Holocaust.  Questions like:

·      How did people become mass murderers during the Holocaust?

·      Could the Holocaust have happened without Hitler?

·      How did Christian denominations respond to the Holocaust?

·      Where was God during the Holocaust?

Next, I spent some time in the Visual Center that houses literally thousands of films, documentaries and survivor testimonies.  I chose to watch the film, "The City the Fuehrer Built for the Jews" which was a Nazi propaganda film showing "the world" how well he was treating the Jews.  It is a staged film showing parks, soccer games, concerts, working in family gardens, social time.  The people in the film (prisoners) seem to be living a normal life, some even smiling.  But if you look closely, at their eyes, you see there is no life in them.  They were forced to "act" in this film, and after it was filmed, the entire ghetto was deported to Auschwitz.

After lunch, we heard a curator from the Art Museum talk about how the art was acquired and how to use art in teaching the Holocaust.  She specifically talked about the work of one artist, Gela Seksztain who depicted life in the Warsaw Ghetto.   They acquired her work because of this note she wrote:

            As I stand on the border between life and death, certain that I will not remain alive   I wish to take leave from my friends and my works…My works I bequeath to the Jewish Museum to be built after the war.  Farewell my friends.

            From the last will and testament of Gele Seksztain, Warsaw 1942.

WOW!  She had the foresight to know that someday, the world would recognize what was happening and would establish a memorial to the victims.  This gave me chills.

We ended the day with a survivor testimony.  I am always amazed at the stories told by survivors and this was no different.  Jackie Hendlely was a Greek Jew and a survivor of Auschwitz .  I have not heard a Greek survivor before (probably because there were "only" 74,000 Jews in Greece, compared to over 2 million in Poland) and his story was quite different. 

He was from a wealthy family and he attended a private school.  Because of his education, he was chosen to go into the Jewish neighborhoods and register the Jews.  Then the anti-Jewish laws started.  First his family had to turn in their telephone, signs appeared in the Jewish businesses telling shoppers not to buy from the Jews, movie theatres were closed to Jews, they could no longer have private transportation.

Next, he was given a number and several yellow Stars of David, printed on fabric, were given to each person.  There was a number printed under the word Jew in the center of the star, which was also printed on his ID card.  The star had to be worn at all times except when in his own home, unless he was near a window where he could be seen, and then the star had to be visible.

The word got out that the Jews were going to be sent to Poland for German manpower.  Since Jackie's father was a builder, he thought it would be best to go early--to get a good job.  So, when the Nazis set up a bogus branch of the Bank of Poland, his father exchanged his Greek money for a slip of paper to exchange for Polish  zlotys once the family arrived in Poland.  His father then paid for the train tickets, which would take his family and their maid to Poland.  Little did he know the family would be riding in a cattle car with 80 other people, and that they were not going to another home, but to Auschwitz.

Jackie and his family spent eight days and eight nights in that cattle car.  The water supply ran out after four days.  When the train arrived at Auschwitz I, the selection began--men and women were separated and he never saw his father or mother again.  He was tattooed, shaved and assigned a barrack.  He was taken to the "hospital" where he was in a group of men who were sterilized, but because a worker secretly told him "to rid himself of semen" before the doctor came in, he was spared--the doctor said he didn't work anyway, not to waste time on him.

Then he was sent to Auschwitz III-Buna where he worked in the synthetic rubber plant making tires for the Nazi army.  After three months working, he was so hungry he stole a turnip and was caught.  He received 25 kicks in the backside for this.  He then said someone must have taken pity on him, because after that, he was assigned kitchen duty.  This he says saved him.  He spent his remaining time trying to help others by smuggling food to them.  He participated in the Death March from Auschwitz and was eventually rescued by the American Army.

He talked to us for almost two hours.  I admire these survivors who relive their horrifying experiences each time they tell their story.  That alone is amazing and a testimony of strength.

Friday was our last day at Yad Vashem.  It began with a session on the Righteous Among the Nations.  This is the department of Yad Vashem that honors those who risked their lives to save Jews.  We learned how the honor is bestowed and then heard numerous stories about the rescuers and those they saved.

The director told us how stories are still coming in to them about a school principal in Paris that hid over 80 children from his school.  We learned about a small farm family in Poland who hid a mother and her small boy in the attic of the school where the father taught.  The boy, who has been awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry has returned to the village and met with the family.

These are just a few of the amazing stories.  There is a Jewish proverb that says, "Whoever saves a single life, it is as if he saved an entire universe."  I would like to think I would have been this type of person, but I'm not so sure.  I know it is the right thing to do, but I'm not sure I could risk the safety of my family, which is exactly what these rescuers did.

We then viewed several of the other memorials on the campus:  the monument to the Jewish Soldiers and Partisans who fought against Nazi Germany, the Valley of the Lost communities with the names of over 5,000  Jewish communities which were destroyed by the Nazis, and the cattle car which carried Jews to the camps.

Next, was the Children's Memorial honoring the 1.5 million children under the age of fourteen who were killed during the Holocaust.  It is a quite simple memorial.  After walking down a long ramp, I entered the room which was totally dark.  After being outside in the bright sunlight I could not see; I had to slide my hand along a handrail to guide myself along, the entire time a voice was saying the names and ages of the murdered children.  After a few seconds, I could see thousands of candles reflecting in the space around me.  It was still dark, I couldn't see the person in front of me and still had to guide myself with the handrail.  After a few minutes of slowly walking, I saw a light in the distance, and soon I was out.  It took me a minute, but I realized that this is probably how these innocent children felt:  alone in the dark, not able to find their way out, except they were on the path to the gas chamber.

The day ended early because Friday is Shabbat for the Jews.   When we returned to the hotel, it was busy with Jews who were checking in for Shabbat.  Many Orthodox Jews who believe that from sundown of Friday to sundown Saturday no work should be done check into this hotel so they don't have to work.  The elevators go on "auto pilot" and stop at each floor on the way up and down so no buttons have to be pushed; pushing a button is work.  They eat their Kosher meal in the special restaurant, and outside the restaurant are basins for the ritual hand washing. Their room lights turn on and off automatically. There are even prayer meetings held in different rooms.  I saw a room for the men and another one for the women.  One had a portable ark to hold the Torah scroll.  It is really quite interesting and I had to make myself not stare!

 

After finally getting to the ninth floor to drop off my books, a group headed back into the Old City.  This time we walked through the Moslem Quarter and looked at the Dome of the Rock (because we are infidels we could not enter the mosque).  We went to David's Tower, which houses a museum of history and spent quite a bit of time there.  We then spent time just wandering through the streets looking at the various shops that all sold the same things! 

Saturday morning we leave for Nahariya, which is north of Jerusalem and on the Mediterranean Sea.  There were will study at the Ghetto Fighter's Museum.  Although it is not that far, we will make a day of the trip because we can't check into the hotel until after Shabbat.  We are scheduled to stop at several historical sites along the way including lunch at the Sea of Galilee. 

This has been an incredible journey so far.  I am so fortunate and thankful to have this opportunity.  I know the remaining days will be just as rewarding.