Insights and Perspectives from Yad Vashem

Global interest in Holocaust education

2012-02-15T13:04:00.000+02:00

Interesting article about growing worldwide interest in Holocaust education in today's New York Times:

From Overseas Visitors, a Growing Demand to Study the Holocaust

New Yad Vashem Exhibitions Open in Israel and New York

2012-02-08T16:26:00.002+02:00

January was a busy month here with the opening of our new International Seminars Wing, 2 exhibitions on display at UN headquarters in New York ( "A Monument of Good Deeds: Dreams and Hopes of Children During the Holocaust," intended for a younger audience, and a new international poster design project, “Keeping the Memory Alive,” as well as a moving new exhibition in the Exhibitions Pavilion in Yad Vashem, Jerusalem.

Esther Lurie (1913-1998)
Self-portrait, Kovno Ghetto, 1941-1944
Ink on paper

"Last Portrait, Painting for Posterity" opened here at Yad Vashem, in advance of International Holocaust Remembrance day on January 27. The exhibition presents some 200 portraits from Yad Vashem's Art Collection that were drawn by 21 artists of varied origins and backgrounds. The artists labored to preserve images of their friends and loved ones for posterity. For many of the subjects, the artists' record of their faces, moments before death, is their final portrait. Each portrait in the exhibition joins together three stories: the artist's, the subject's, and that of the work itself. In addition to the biography of each artist, also noted, wherever possible, are the special circumstances in which the portraits were made and how the artist succeeded in procuring art supplies despite the severe shortages of food and other basic necessities. The exhibition will run until Fall 2012.

Arthur Ritov (artist)
Philip Hirshberg, 1944

Philip Hirshberg was conscripted to forced labor

in the Fahrbereitschaft unit in the ghetto.
Sent to the minefields, where he was murdered.

Charcoal on paper

František (Lustig) Lukáš (1911-1996)
Marion Podolier, Theresienstadt Ghetto, 1942-1944

Soprano Opera singer.Deported to the Theresienstadt Ghetto

on September 12, 1942. Survived.

Charcoal on paper

International Seminars Wing Inaugurated to Meet Rising Demand

2012-01-30T17:53:00.000+02:00

Today, the new International Seminars Wing of Yad Vashem's International School for Holocaust Studies opened in the presence of Israel's Minister of Education, Gideon Sa'ar and Foreign Minister of Canada, John Baird. Mr. Baird remarked on the close relationship Canada shares with Israel, stating that Canada, as Israel's firmest supporter, doesn't "stand behind Israel, but at its side." Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev noted that "the passage of time has not only brought a blessing to the realm of Holocaust education, but also created new challenges . . . This functional building, beautiful and inspiring, will be a home for in-depth educational work." Generously supported by Joseph Gottdenker of Canada along with Friends of Yad Vashem worldwide, the wing adds 45,000 square feet of space to the International School, and provides state-of-the-art facilities, including the new Edmond J. Safra Lecture Hall, to meet the ever-expanding demand for educational seminars for teachers and public opinion-shapers from Israel and around the globe. The wing incorporates eleven new classrooms, a videoconference suite and conference rooms, as well as a 330-seat lecture hall, donated by the Edmond J. Safra Philanthropic Foundation, which will greatly enrich the quality of the many large-scale events and seminars run by the School.

Rabbi Israel Meir Lau, Chairman of the Yad Vashem Council, spoke movingly about the need to remember and pass on the memory of the Holocaust. He noted that today is a significant date in history -- the rise of Hitler to power in Germany; and encouraged the audience to tell their children and grandchildren.

Joseph Gottdenker reflected on the Righteous Among theNations who rescued him and on his deep commitment to ensuring the future ofHolocaust education. "Itis not enough for us to remember the Holocaust in our hearts. To truly honorthe memory of those who perished, we must ensure that they and the Shoah areremembered in the hearts of the third generation and fourth generations andevery generation to come. It is because I believe so deeply in education that I chose to contributeto the new international seminars wing, and I stand here proudly today at itsopening. This was a critical decision for me but also an obvious one. YadVashem is, without a doubt, the most influential and active institution insafe-guarding the memory of the Holocaust."

Israeli Education Minister Gideon Sa'ar cuts the ribbon at the inauguration of the new wing to Yad Vashem's International School for Holocaust Studies, flanked by Chairman of the Yad Vashem Directorate Avner Shalev (r); Chairman of the Yad Vashem Council Rabbi Israel Meir Lau (l), and Canadian Foriegn Minister John Baird (left) (photo by Isaac Harari)

Read more about it in Yad Vashem Jerusalem Magazine now online.

Rescue in the Sewers

2012-01-19T15:35:00.002+02:00

Some of you may have seen the Polish film "In the Darkness" about Leopold Socha who helped rescue Jews during the Holocaust. The film recounts the WWII exploits of Leopold Socha, who was recognized by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations. Read here the real story of how he and his wife hid Jews in the Warsaw sewer system.

Abdelwahab: the full picture

2011-12-29T16:39:00.000+02:00

An opinion piece that ran in the NewYork Times accuses Yad Vashem of having different standards for recognizingrescuers of Jews as Righteous Among the Nations, because a Tunisian man, KhaledAbdelwahab was not recognized as a Righteous. Nothing could be further from the truth.

From Irena Steinfeldt, Director, Dept. for the Righteous Among the Nations, Yad Vashem, Jerusalem:

When Yad Vashem was established to commemorate the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust, it was tasked with another mission: to honor the Righteous Among the Nations - those non-Jews who had taken great risks to save Jews during the Holocaust. The Righteous program is an unprecedented attempt by the victims of an unparalleled crime to search within the nations of perpetrators, collaborators and bystanders for persons who bucked the general trend of indifference, acquiescence and collaboration.

For five decades, Yad Vashem has worked toward this goal, in the process identifying some 24,000 Righteous Among the Nations, without regard to their countries of origin, age, religious denomination, sex, or ethnicity. The Righteous include Christians of all denominations from around the world, as well as Muslims from Turkey, Bosnia and Albania and other countries. The Commission for the Designation of the Righteous, an independent body comprised of Holocaust survivors and historians, examines whether the rescue story can be substantiated by primary sources and if the person in question took risks in order to rescue Jews during the Holocaust.

Holocaust survivors describe myriad forms of help, encouragement and assistance provided by non-Jews, which helped them survive. However, the Yad Vashem law uses a more restrictive characterization when designating the Righteous Among the Nations, delineating a small group within these wider circles of men and women who supported Jews in the darkest hour of Jewish history. The Righteous, according to this definition, were people who not only helped the Jews, but were prepared to pay a price for their stand and even share the victims' fate.

From its inception, the Commission for the Designation of the Righteous noted that the risk in helping Jews during the Holocaust differed from one country to another and from one period to another. In the case of diplomats, who enjoyed diplomatic immunity and only in exceptional circumstances were in physical danger, the Commission decided they would be recognized if they risked their positions In all cases, however, there must be demonstrated risk for actions to rescue Jews, before someone can be recognized as a Righteous Among the Nations.

As in each case, the file of Khaled Abdelwahhab from Tunisia was meticulously researched and carefully evaluated by the Commission.

According to the testimonies, Abdelwahhab hosted the extended families of Boukris and Ouzzan on his estate during the period of German occupation in Tunisia after their house in Mahdia had been billeted by the Germans. The testimonies describe his kindness and protectiveness during this time.

A close examination, however, revealed that as much as his deeds were admirable, in doing so he broke no law and the Jews stayed on his farm with the full knowledge of the Germans. According to Annie Boukris, the men continued their forced labor service under German supervision, and had contacts with other Jews of Mahdia who had been evicted from the town and concentrated on a Jewish-owned farm nearby.

Edmee Masliah (Ouzzan) explained that the Germans would come from time to time to Abdelwahhab's estate and check if they were all present; she describes how when seeing the Germans approach, they would put on their yellow badges and wait for the Germans to count them. Eva Weisel said that her father would go back and forth to Mahdia to bring food and that when they needed medicines, they would get them from the German medical facility that was across the road from the farm.

The picture we gain from these testimonies matches the historical facts and the evaluation of historians that were consulted in the course of the investigation of this file

Because the German occupation of Tunisia lasted only six months, the plans to implement the final solution there never came to fruition. There were also no laws or regulations preventing Abdelwahab from hosting Jews, and he therefore never had to face the ultimate test. Thus, the Commission concluded that in the absence of risk, he was not eligible for the Righteous Among the Nations designation.

The commission's decision in this case reflects its commitment to evaluating cases without prejudice and without ceding to other considerations, even if there are those who believe that recognizing Abdelwahab could somehow help in the fight against Holocaust denial.

The account of this honorable Tunisian's solidarity with the Jewish victims commands our deep appreciation. It should be remembered and will certainly inspire people worldwide. Indeed, Yad Vashem's publications department has published his story in Hebrew. Yad Vashem is committed to preserving and imparting this and other stories, and to continue its search for the rare moments of humanity in the darkness of the Holocaust.

You can find out more about the Righteous here.

Hanukkah during the Holocaust

2011-12-22T15:36:00.000+02:00

Yad Vashem wishes everyone a Happy Hanukkah.

Here's testimony of Holocaust survivors describing Hanukkah during the Holocaust (English subtitles)

Also check out the online exhibition "Hanukkah - The Festival of Lights: Before, During and After the Holocaust"

President of South Sudan Visits Yad Vashem

2011-12-20T10:55:00.001+02:00

Photos: Isaac Harari / Yad Vashem

The President of South Sudan Salva Kiir visited Yad Vashem this morning, accompanied by four of his government ministers. He was greeted by Avner Shalev, Chairman of Yad Vashem, and toured the Holocaust History Museum and Hall of Names, guided by Dr. Robert Rozett, Director of the Yad Vashem Libraries. He participated in a Memorial Ceremony in the Hall of Remembrance and visited the Children's Memorial.

Keep the Light of Holocaust Remembrance Burning This Hannukah

2011-12-18T12:33:00.000+02:00

Westerbork transit camp, the Netherlands, Hannukah 1943.

Children crowd around the lighting of Hannukah candles. The very next day most were deported to Auschwitz.

Hannukah is a time of joy and hope, celebrated by Jewish parents and their children around the world. The brightly lit candles symbolize the triumph of good over evil, weak over strong, and light over dark.

To this day that same message of hope holds true. Yet there are still those who are intent on spreading a message of hate.

Each year, drawing upon the stories of the Jewish victims and survivors of the Holocaust, Yad Vashem’s educational programs connect more than one million visitors, Jewish educators and students to their heritage, giving them a renewed and strengthened sense of identity, as well as the tools to deal with the challenges of Holocaust denial and antisemitism.

On Hannukah 1943, even in the darkness of the Holocaust, these children sought to maintain their connection to their Jewish heritage. You can help us pass their legacy on to future generations.

Only with your help will we be able to reach our year end goal of $450,000.

Click here to make your donation.

A Day of Infamy

2011-12-08T15:56:00.001+02:00

First published in the Jerusalem Post, December 7, 2011

On December 8, 1941, Franklin Delano Roosevelt declared: “Yesterday, December 7, 1941 – (is) a date which will live in infamy.” Of course he was talking about the Japanese surprise attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbor, the attack that catapulted the United States into the Second World War 70 years ago.

Catapulted is right, because beforehand, the clear majority of Americans did not want to see their husbands, fathers and sons embroiled in another war on a distant continent. Only after war reached America’s farthest shore, did American begin a concerted effort to fight not only the Japanese, but the Nazis and their European partners, as well.

As momentous as the attack on Pearl Harbor was, December 7, 1941 was also the date of another event of no less consequence for mankind. The first transports set out for the first extermination camp, Chelmno, which began its murderous operations the following day, December 8.

Over the course of the next three-and- a-half years, the Nazis would murder some three million Jews in a handful of extermination camps, most infamous among them Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Another three million Jews were murdered in a wide variety of venues, first and foremost in the killing fields of Eastern Europe by shooting – a process that had actually begun several months before Chelmno went into operation. December 7, however, marks the start of the unprecedented industrialized mass murder of innocent human beings at a complex designed solely for that purpose.

The American entry into the war, as students of history and political science know, is really the beginning of America embracing its role as a great world power. It is true that Nazi Germany was defeated primarily on the ground by Soviet forces in a long, drawn out and extremely deadly war. Indeed in retrospect, it may be argued that the downfall of Nazi Germany was already sealed when the German military failed to defeat the Soviet Union decisively before the onset of the Russian winter in 1941. Germany simply did not have the wherewithal for a long protracted war, especially in the face of Russian winters.

Nevertheless, America's role in the defeat of Nazi Germany was crucial. To a very large degree, it was American supplies that allowed the Soviets to fight for four long years, and certainly after the D-Day invasion of June 1944, the American fighting man made a considerable contribution to the fall of Nazi Germany. The reluctant entry of the Americans into the war on December 7, 1941, to say the least, greatly hastened the destruction of Hitler’s regime.

Significantly, another outcome of the attack at Pearl Harbor was the dawn of the age of nuclear weapons. The first nuclear weapon was not deployed against Nazi Germany, rather the Americans deployed it against Japan in Hiroshima and Nagasaki after Hitler’s regime had already crumbled.

The use of the most devastating weapon in history brought about a swift end to the other half of the bloodiest conflict ever, the war in the Pacific. In its wake, the world now would face issues of nuclear arms proliferation and escalation, nuclear arms deterrence, and still true today, the very real fear that such weapons in the wrong hands could wreak new and unimaginable destruction.

In the immediate postwar period, American power, bolstered with nuclear might, gained additional ground. Whereas Europe was devastated by the fighting America was strengthened, overcoming the Great Depressionand coming out of the war with vastly increased industrial capabilities.

While Europe embarked on a painful process of recovery after 1945 (made easier by American aid) America embarked on an extraordinary period of prosperity.

So December 7, 1941 lives in infamy for the surprise attack of the Japanese on the United States, but it also marks as a watershed event in modern history.

The start of systematic industrialized mass murder in Chelmno is less well known, but has no less importance for mankind. In the Chelmno extermination camp the Nazis murdered over 150,000 people, almost all of them Jews. The murder method was asphyxiation in gas vans – group after group, after group.

As is now well known, before being murdered in the extermination camps, Jews were shorn of their hair, fleeced of their valuables and robbed of their clothing and any other possessions they had brought with them. None of this material was meant to go to waste, and much of its found its way back into Nazi Germany where many ordinary citizens benefited from it.

The idea that in the name of an ideology a regime could plan and carry out the despoliation and murder of an entire people, using the most modern means available and doing so in a “rational,” “dispassionate” way, continues to reverberate profoundly.

The murder of the Jews, and especially the use of modern means to do so, may well mark the beginning of a retreat (now well advanced) from the notion that technological progress is always by definition for the greater good. It certainly underscores the idea that advances in science and technology should not occur in a moral vacuum.

Especially when technological know-how outstrips our ability to understand its implications or when people willfully ignore those implications, the door to nefarious acts and even radical evil opens.

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the advent of murder in the first extermination camp, Chelmno, are historical signposts that need to be marked and remembered. The first for its great impact on the course of human affairs and role in the ultimate defeat of the consummate evil embodied by the Nazis, and the latter as a ghastly warning of what can happen when technologically advanced barbarians, imbued with an ideology of hate, have the unfettered freedom to act.

After 70 years, the significance and caveat of December 7 remain as compelling as ever.

The writer is director of the Yad Vashem Libraries, author of Approaching the Holocaust, Texts and Contexts, (Vallentine Mitchell, 2005). His study on Hungarian Jewish Forced Laborers on the Eastern Front will soon be published by Yad Vashem and University of Nebraska Press.

The Jerusalem of Lithuania – New Online Exhibition

2011-12-05T14:28:00.001+02:00

On the eve of the Holocaust, the Jewish community of Vilna was the spiritual center of Eastern European Jewry, the center of enlightenment and Jewish political life, of Jewish creativity and the experience of daily Jewish life. It was a community bursting with cultural and religious life, movements and parties, educational institutions, libraries and theaters; a community of rabbis and gifted Talmudic scholars, intellectuals, poets, authors, artists, craftspeople and educators. Known as "The Jerusalem of Lithuania," some 60,000 Jews lived in Vilna where they constituted 30% of the total population. The Jewish community of Vilna which had flourished for hundreds of years was decimated during WWII. This exhibition utilizes texts, video testimonies, photos and more to present episodes from Vilna's illustrious history.

Chinese Educators Inspired at Yad Vashem

2011-11-22T11:43:00.001+02:00

“By participating in the seminar, I deeply recognize the importance of Holocaust education. I think the essential goal of Holocaust education is ‘to remember the past, to live the present, to trust the future.’ (Abba Kovner)” - one of 29 Chinese educators who spent two-weeks at the International School for Holocaust Studies at Yad Vashem

Earlier this month, 29 educators from Macau, Shanghai, Shangdong, Nanjing and Kaifeng, Xian, and Zhengzhou came to Jerusalem, Israel to take part at the second Chinese seminar for Educators at Yad Vashem's International School for Holocaust Studies. MA and Doctoral students, university department heads and professors as well as a participant from the Nanjiing Massacre Memorial Museum, all came for in-depth study of the Holocaust and how to teach it in the classroom. The group also an opportunity to tour in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and other areas in Israel and experience a singular communal Shabbat Jerusalem.

The special 2-week seminar was comprised of academic lectures and presentations of educational resources including Antisemitism, the Final Solution, the Allies and the Holocaust, the Righteous Among the Nations, Nazi Racial ideology, the unprecedentedness of the Holocaust, and Yad Vashem’s pedagogical approach to Holocaust education. Among the seven survivors that met with the group at Yad Vashem were two ‘Schindler Jews’ (Jews rescued by Righteous Among the Nations Oskar Schindler) who shared their experiences in the Emile Factory in Krakow and the best friend of Anne Frank spoke extensively of their friendship as young children.

In the end, the reflections of the participants themselves speak of what has been accomplished in such a short, but intense, study period. In the words of one of the participants, "These two weeks in Israel is my most beautiful memory in my life…With this new knowledge.…I will do my best to tell the spirit of the Holocaust and the Jewish people, to promote the friendship between China and Israel."

Last year a similar seminar inaugurated Yad Vashem’s ongoing activity in China; and since then Yad Vashem experts have been to China to hold seminars there as well. The seminar is sponsored by the Adelson Family Charitable Foundation. Dr. Miriam Adelson is Chairperson of the Council for the Promotion of Israel-China Relations.

Yad Vashem’s International School for Holocaust Studies conducts dozens of seminars annually for educators from around the world, and produces educational material in many languages.

Yad Vashem Holocaust Database Unites Lost Cousins

2011-11-20T09:38:00.011+02:00

Aron Heller, AP

For five long years during World War II, Nahum Korenblum never left the side of his younger brother Yaakov as the two fled the Nazi invasion of Poland, escaped forced labor camps across Europe and ultimately joined the Soviet Red Army. There, they were separated and dispatched abroad, never to meet again.
On Thursday, more than a decade after they died, their children were united at Israel's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial thanks to a recently uploaded family photo discovered on its comprehensive online database of Holocaust victims.
It was just the latest successful byproduct of the memorial's database, established years ago as a means of commemoration aimed at gathering the exact names of all the 6 million Jewish victims of the Nazi genocide. But since the database went online in 2004, it has become a powerful genealogy tool that has led to hundreds of emotional reunions of long lost families.

In 1958, shortly after Yaakov moved to Israel, he and his wife filled out a page of testimony at Yad Vashem commemorating his dead parents. Nahum had meanwhile settled in Ukraine, where his surname was mangled into Koramblyum. For the rest of their lives, the brothers searched for each other in vain, the paper trail often coming to a dead end because of the differing spellings of their names.
In 2006, Yaakov's daughter, Bracha Fleishman-Korenblum, updated the online entry, attaching an old black-and-white photo of her grandparents and four of their children – including Nahum and Yaakov.
Two months ago, one of Nahum's American grandchildren stumbled upon the entry and was shocked to recognize his grandfather in the picture. He reached out to the Korenblum clan in Israel and a reunion was put into motion.
This week, Gennadiy Koramblyum, of Queens, New York, and his son, who is named after Yaakov, arrived in Israel for the wedding of one of their newly discovered relatives.
"It was joy, I cried, I didn't sleep for two nights," Gennadiy Koramblyum said. "Since I was a little boy, I remember my father told me 'I have another brother, he is somewhere.' He said 'I always held him in my hands, I never let anyone separate us.'"
Koramblyum's father moved with the family to the United States in 1991 and he died there in 1997. Yaakov passed away in Israel four years later.
"I am sure they are happy now upstairs seeing us all here together," Koramblyum said, shaking. "This means everything to me."
His Israeli cousin shared that sentiment, saying the children's' joy was mixed with sorrow that their fathers never managed to reunite.
"It's sad, but they meet in heaven," said Rafael Korenblum, who bears a striking resemblance to his late father Yaakov. "A circle has been closed. There was something unresolved all these years, it lingered and now there is closure."
Cynthia Wroclawski, the manager of Yad Vashem's name recovery project, said such breakthroughs are being made possible by the increased openness of aging survivors and the curiosity and tech-savvy of their descendants.
"The lock is being opened by the younger generation. They have more intuition and more interest," she said. "That's the power of the database, the torch of memory is being passed."
The project began in 1955 and had reached 3 million confirmed names by the time the online database was launched. More than a million more names have been added in the seven years since.
Efforts are continuing, primarily in eastern Europe, where name collection is particularly difficult because Jews there were often rounded up, shot and dumped in mass graves without any documentation. The names of Jews killed at German death camps, on the other hand, are easier to collect because of meticulous Nazi records.
The information can be accessed online in English, Hebrew and Russian. Yad Vashem actively encourages survivors and their kin to come forth and fill out pages of testimony for those killed, before their names and stories are lost forever.
"We are not giving up, there is still much more to do," Wroclawski said. "For these families, you see the rift of the Holocaust is getting smaller and that some kind of healing process is taking place."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/17/yad-vashem-holocaust-data_n_1099955.html?ref=world#

Google Street View Trike Comes to Yad Vashem

2011-11-15T13:13:00.010+02:00

Last week visitors to Yad Vashem were surprised to see a tricycle being navigated around the Campus with a camera, almost like a periscope, perched on the back of the trike. Google's Streetview Trike had arrived for a several hour ride around the Mount of Remembrance. Negotiating the different paths, gardens, monuments - and even the Visitors' Center – the Trike, specially fitted with cameras that allow 360-degree imagery, captured images of the Avenue of the Righteous Among the Nations, Warsaw Ghetto Square and the monuments and gardens throughout the 45-acre Campus. The images will be integrated into Google Street View, allowing exploration of Yad Vashem's unique outdoor grounds and memorials from anywhere in the world.

Helping others discover family connections

2011-10-02T14:22:00.004+02:00

by Rose Feldman

When Yad Vashem made its Central Database of Holocaust Victims' Names available to the public on the Internet in 2004, it provided a treasure chest of information to all those researching their families who disappeared in the Holocaust. Many families had been spilt by immigration during the 19th and 20th centuries with siblings immigrating to different continents and in some cases part of the family staying behind in Europe. The Holocaust severed all contact with those members of the family that remained in Europe and the new generations did not know them or of them.

The initial 800,000 Pages of Testimony in the Database were filled out in the late 1950’s. Great efforts were made on the part of Yad Vashem to reach out to the survivors of the Holocaust in Israel and those members of the families who had made aliyah before World War II. The Pages were designed as a memorial for victims of the Shoah, but they incidentally provided a source of genealogical information. But at that time in Israel few people had telephones, many immigrants lived in immigrant housing, and the Pages of Testimony were not necessarily filled out with all available information. These three factors made finding the person who filled out the Page a nearly impossible mission.

Being involved in genealogical research, I volunteered to answer requests about forms filled out by people in Israel. During the database's first three years online, I received over 1,000 requests by e-mail. The ratio of success of finding the person that filled out the Page was 1:4. Not bad considering most of the forms were filled out more than fifty years ago. What enabled those that were lucky to connect to members of their families? Uncommon family names that were not changed to a modern name; living in a small community where the home was passed on to the descendants; and sometimes even just a family name being the name of someone I knew personally. At times I suggested that information about deceased submitters of Pages of Testimony could be found from the Hevra Kadishas (Jewish Burial Societies). Several had online websites, and information could be found about who arranged a burial – another source of discovering family connections.

The excitement of receiving letters telling of family reunions, even if it was of second, third and fourth cousins was reward enough for the time I volunteered. I personally found my paternal grandmother’s family, who didn’t know that a branch of the family had left the Ukraine in the 1920s and made aliyah to Israel. With the ongoing expansion of this Database to include additional sources and joint projects with the archives in Eastern Europe, it will continue to be a useful resource for genealogical researchers.

Rose Feldman is at: http://twitter.com/JewDataGenGirl where you can keep up to date on archives, databases and genealogy in general and Jewish and Israeli roots in particular.

Reflections on a summer of collecting names

2011-09-25T13:51:00.002+03:00

Rose Rosen, a volunteer coordinator for Yad Vashem's Shoah Victim's names Recovery Project in central Florida shares her thoughts and personal experiences on assisting survivors in commemorating their family and friends who were killed in the Holocaust by filling out Pages of Testimony. Read more here

Orchestra Brings New Dimensions to Survivor Testimonies

2011-09-12T15:20:00.006+03:00

On September 8, 2011, a unique concert featuring the stirring words of Holocaust survivors, performed by the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra - IBA, soloists and choirs from Israel and the United States, and conducted by Gil Shohat took place at Yad Vashem.
Created by composer Dr. Lawrence Siegel and named for the Jewish prayer for the dead, Kaddish - I am Here conveys the stories of Holocaust survivors in their own words, in their own languages, providing a window into their experiences. One of the key movements is a litany of thousands of names of Holocaust victims.

The September concert at Yad Vashem’s Warsaw Ghetto Square is part of Yad Vashem’s ongoing activities to commemorate the Holocaust through the arts.

"Her Mission is Over"

2011-08-22T16:59:00.005+03:00

“My grandmother is resting more peacefully today, knowing her mission is over.”

With these words Magdalena Wojciechowska of Lodz, Poland handed a simple necklace to Michael Tal, an artifacts curator in Yad Vashem’s Museum Division. The necklace had been in Magdalena’s grandmother’s possession for over 60 years; but she always wanted to return it to its rightful owners.

The necklace was given to Magdalena Wojciechowska’s grandmother, Julia Podwarska-Nyderek by an anonymous prisoner of Auschwitz. Wojciechowska’s grandmother lived outside of the camp’s gates, and would regularly leave food for prisoners who worked outside the camp, in pots she would hide in the bushes. One day, she found a jeweled necklace in one of the empty pots, left as a gesture of gratitude by one of the prisoners.

Magdalena Wojciechowska spoke movingly about the necklace and her decision to give it back to the Jewish people:

“Noach Flug, a tireless advocate for the rights of Holocaust survivors, died in Jerusalem two weeks ago. Reading his memoirs, I found the sentence: 'We saw
people going to work. So we cried out: Give us water, give us bread!'

GIVE US WATER, GIVE US BREAD - that was all my grandmother wanted to do, to feed those poor hungry souls she saw passing by her every morning and night. Noach Flug was a prisoner of Auschwitz, and for all we know, maybe he was one of those souls, or even knew one of those who left the necklace for my grandmother in gratitude for the food she was leaving them. Now Noach is no longer with us, but I am sure he is looking down upon us and smiling, happy to see such a tiny piece of property return to its rightful place and its rightful owners. My beloved grandmother Julia had kept this necklace in a heart shaped box. She always knew the necklace was not hers to keep. She always knew that the necklace had to be returned to whoever gave it to her. She never expected anything in return for what she did, and always made us know that if we ever could, we should give the necklace back.

I do not know whether to call it fate, or diving guidance --- I met Mr. Bobby Brown [Executive Director of Project HEART] and found out about the HEART project. I was so moved. I mean THAT WAS IT, The absolute right place for the necklace. From the heart of my grandmother to the HEART of all the Jewish people. I need look no more. And I know that project HEART, through its mix of Internet and new technologies, together with the strength of the Jewish HEARTS and minds will achieve the justice so long denied Noach Flug, his family and all the victims of the Holocaust and their heirs.

Past the Holocaust, the dark years of the Polish Communist Regime, to this day and time in the 21st century; and from Auschwitz, via Katowice, Lodz, New York and
Jerusalem to Yad Vashem, the necklace given to my grandmother ends its journey
here, TODAY, in the heart of the Jewish People. MY MISSION IS OVER. My
grandmother is resting more peacefully now, her aspiration accomplished. I can
only say thank you for all those who helped me in the realization of her wishes.”

[photo courtesy of Jorge Novominsky]

Holocaust-Fugitive Girl's Art Brings Tears at Yad Vashem Show

2011-08-22T12:43:00.003+03:00

Check out this article from Bloomberg on the San Francisco Chronicle about art that was created during the Holocaust by a little girl in hiding, and that has now gone on display at the Museum of Holocaust Art at Yad Vashem:

Holocaust-Fugitive Girl's Art Brings Tears at Yad Vashem Show

Renata Braun (Rina Levy) (1931-1969)
Nobleman kissing the hand of a Lady, probably a scene from Aleksander Fredro’s play “The Revenge”, 1943-1944
Gouache and watercolor on paper
Collection of the Yad Vashem Art Museum, Jerusalem, Israel
Permanent loan, courtesy of the artist’s Family

Gene Simmons and family visit Yad Vashem

2011-08-15T16:30:00.004+03:00

Earlier this year, Gene Simmons, Shannon Tweed and their son Nick toured Yad Vashem during a visit to Israel. They visited the Holocaust History Museum and the Archives, where they learned more about Gene's family's Holocaust experience. They were guided by Martine Cohen, a Yad Vashem Guide.

Here is the clip which aired recently on "Gene Simmons: the Family Jewels" on A&E:

Gene Simmons was born in Haifa, Israel in 1949 and is the only child of his mother, a Holocaust survivor from Hungary. He is the co-founder and bassist/vocalist of the band Kiss.

Yad Vashem Firefighting Staff Receive Certificates of Apprecation

2011-07-28T13:58:00.008+03:00

Yesterday, Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev and Director General Natan Eitan presented certificates of appreciation to the employees who fought the fire that threatened Yad Vashem last week. At a special ceremony they paid tribute to some 30 Yad Vashem workers who stood on the front lines, fighting last weeks' wildfire in the Jerusalem Forest that threatened Yad Vashem's Campus. Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev commended the group of Jewish and Arab workers for their courage, and noted they did not hesitate to place themselves on the frontlines of the fire, implementing training they had received earlier this year. "I am here to tell you, friends: You did the job."

Reading from the certificate Shalev said, "Sunday, July 17, Yad Vashem faced a dangerous and difficult event: A fire broke out suddenly in the Jerusalem Forest and threatened to damage the Museum, the School, and our Archives. These are central buildings, well-known and vital to our activities as a commemorative institution, that educates the entire world about the Holocaust and its meaning for mankind. Some of Yad Vashem's employees took an important part in distancing the flames from the Institution. You are counted among this group of workers, which expressed their loyalty in a determined and especially dedicated way. Your joining in the firefighting activities and your standing steadfast in the face of the fire, added to the removal of this threat to Yad Vashem during critical minutes. Yad Vashem's managers, which worked side by side with you and your colleagues, were amazed by your courageous behavior, as were the entire Yad Vashem family who heard what happened that day."

In the words of Sami Abu-Diab, one of Yad Vashem's longtime workers, "I have been at Yad Vashem for 12 years, taking part in Holocaust Remembrance Day Ceremonies. The night of the fire, I spent the night at Yad Vashem with 2 other workers as well as firefighters. This is like our home, it is our place."

(photos by Yad Vashem and Jim Hollander/EPA)

Reflections on the 4th National Conference on Holocaust Education, July 5-6, ‏2011

2011-07-12T13:05:00.002+03:00

by Richelle Budd Caplan, Director, European Department

In June 1981, Abba Kovner stated, “As long as it is not too late, we must recognize that the Holocaust is not the obsession of those who survived, and that the identification with the six million victims, and the elements of that period are not just the concerns of those who experienced it themselves, but part of the long collective memory of the Jewish people, and the place of the Holocaust is in the historical consciousness of every Jewish generation everywhere.”

This week, almost exactly thirty years later, Kovner’s words reverberated in the hearts and minds of more than one thousand Israeli teachers who gathered at the International School for Holocaust Studies at Yad Vashem to participate in the fourth national conference on Holocaust education, “The Individual and the Collective during the Holocaust.” During her remarks at this conference, Professor Dina Porat, incoming Chief Historian of Yad Vashem, related to Kovner’s personal dilemmas during the Holocaust, touching on the tension between his perceived responsibility to himself, his family and to his community. Kovner wrestled with his memories, and the choiceless choices that he faced during the Holocaust period, until his death in 1987.

Sitting among educators from throughout the country, inside a large tent that was especially built for this event, it quickly became evident that their commitment to teaching about the Holocaust was of the utmost importance to them – not only professionally but also personally. Holocaust survivors sitting among them were clearly moved by the teachers’ dedication as well.

However, at one point, a question popped up in my mind: Would Kovner and his generation have approved of such a mass gathering of educators, discussing the pedagogical imperative after Auschwitz, rather than a more intimate setting of a smaller group in the School auditorium? Although we will never know the answer to this question, hopefully he would have been pleased that the message of his generation has become engraved on the memories of future generations.

A Story of Strength - Rescued by the Grace of his Voice

2011-07-10T15:15:00.003+03:00

"Everyone must do the maximum that they can"

Yesterday, along with some 50 teachers attending a break-away session at Yad Vashem's Teachers ‘conference, I was privileged to "listen in" on an intimate conversation between David Zucker – who as a young boy escaped with his family to England – and his daughter – Shulamit Imber, Pedagogical director of the International School for Holocaust Studies. Zucker's family moved from a small town in Poland to the larger German-controlled town of Boytem in 1921. (After WWI, the area was placed under German control, granted by the League of Nations.) The city of 100,000 had around 10,000 Jews, and Zucker's father was a mainstay of the Jewish community – the cantor, shochet (ritual slaughter) and mohel (circumciser). A group of young men gathering at their home every Shabbat to hear his learned father, and their house was always filled with family, friends, Torah learning as well as German culture, including opera.

Zucker gave us a unique glimpse of Jewish life in Germany the 1920s, from the viewpoint of a young boy. The community and its resources were small, and while there were both an active Reform and Orthodox congregation, during the cold winter months, the two groups held Friday evening prayers harmoniously together – saving the cost of heating an extra building.
The Zionist Zucker family encouraged Zucker's older sister and brother to emigrate in the mid-1930s and fulfill their dreams of living in Eretz Israel –something that seemed perfectly natural at the time. Zucker was nine years old when the Nazis came to power. Boycotts of Jewish-owned shops ensued; the town was filled with people wearing pins that supported Hitler. Zucker was refused entrance to middle school where four of his siblings had previously studied although he passed the entrance exam (the class was suddenly "full"), and things began to change for him. In 1936, Zucker left his parents, and traveled with a cousin to Danzig, where he spent six months living with the mother of his stepmother so he could go to school.

Around this time - in the summer of 1936 – Zucker's father went to visit his sister in England for a family bar mitzvah. Sensing the encroaching danger for the Jews in Germany, she encouraged him to get a job in England in the Jewish community in Cardiff. Despite the pleas of the Boytem Jewish community – promises of a lifetime job! – the family left Boytem, their possessions in a handcart, in the middle of the night to join their father in England.

The city of Boytem was due west of Auschwitz, and the Jews of Boytem were among the first to be deported to the extermination camp. The promise of a job serving a Jewish community in Leeds provided the Zucker family with the necessary permission to emigrate to the UK, thereby saving their lives.

We listened to two moving recordings of David's father – Shulamit's grandfather – filling our classroom with beautifully sung liturgical passages that essentially saved his family from death.
Remarking on his immense inner strength, David told Shulamit: "It is in my genes – everyone must do the best they can.”

David Zucker went on to become a construction engineer, building among other things the model of Jerusalem now on display in the Israel Museum (for many years at the Holyland Hotel), the Carmelit in Haifa and Heichal Shlomo. In 2008 he was named "Patron of Jerusalem." Today, his daughter Shulamit dedicates her life to helping educators around the world meaningfully address the Holocaust in their classrooms and beyond.

1,200 Israel Teachers to Attend Yad Vashem Conference

2011-07-04T12:37:00.004+03:00

Each year Israeli school teachers get a much needed summer recess from the pressures the school year. This week – only a few short days after the close of the school year - close to 1,200 Israeli pre-school, elementary and secondary school teachers are taking part in a two day conference at Yad Vashem. The International School for Holocaust studies is hosting the largest conference of its kind.

Here's what teachers in Israel are saying:
81% - of teachers of all age groups - stated that they discuss the Holocaust during their educational activities
72% noted that during the last 5 years their students are increasingly interested in the topic of the Holocaust
79% of middle school teachers said that they require additional educational materials for teaching about the Holocaust
85% of the nursery school teachers stated that pre-school children ask questions about the Shoah

From a survey among the conference participants, the Smith Institute, July 2011

Prof. Bauer on the cause of World War II

2011-06-26T15:52:00.004+03:00

Murderous mutation of anti-Semitism
On the 70th anniversary of Hitler's invasion of the USSR, Yad Vashem Academic Advisor Prof. Yehuda Bauer proposes a theory to explain the reason why the Fuehrer led his people into war.
The full article ran in Haaretz this weekend.
The article is based on remarks Prof. Bauer delivered at the Symposium held by Yad Vashem's International Institute for Holocaust Research last week.

Honoring an Ecuadorian Righteous Among the Nations

2011-06-23T13:00:00.009+03:00

"My mother and I owe him our lives - he saved us.” -- Holocaust survivor Betty Meyer speaking at today's event honoring Righteous Among the Nations Dr. Manuel Antonio Munoz Berrero.

Today a special event was held at Yad Vashem posthumously honouring the first Ecuadorian Righteous Among the Nations. Family members of the Righteous and the rescued from around the world were in attendance as were Holocaust researchers and members of the Commission for the Designation of the Righteous Among the Nations. The full story is here.

Symposium at Yad Vashem marks 70 years since German invasion of Soviet Union

2011-06-22T16:15:00.004+03:00

“The Nazi invasion to the Soviet Union is a distinct and significant watershed. With the invasion, the war became a World War and the destiny of the Jews was determined: the mass-murder of the Jews began in earnest, with brutality reaching an unparalleled level.”

With these words Yad Vashem chairman Avner Shalev opened an academic symposium marking 70 years since Operation Barbarossa - the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union.
The Symposium took place with the support of the Genesis Philanthropy Group and European Jewish Fund, and the Gutwirth Family Fund.

Holocaust historians gathered together early this week at Yad Vashem's International Institute for Holocaust Research to discuss various political, economic and military aspects of the war in the Eastern Front and its devastating impact on the Jews. Operation Barbarossa was a campaign that determined the outcome of the war according to Dr. Daniel Uziel, a historian working in the Yad Vashem Archives. Despite the comparative advantage maintained by the Soviets, in terms of number of troops, planes and tanks, the Germans achieved exceptional results during the first month of the Operation. Their technological superiority and the element of surprise in their initial attack gave them an unprecedented advantage. Nevertheless, the Germans suffered from logistic difficulties, exhausted troops, and internal conflicts between Hitler and the German generals regarding the war strategy. Those difficulties gave the Soviet leaders an opportunity, and time to mobilize reserves and send troops from the Far East to the area of battle. The harsh Russian winter took a tremendous toll on the exhausted Germans, who lacked the necessary supplies and appropriate winter gear. The Germans now realized that victory in the war was uncertain.

The Germans, who suffered great losses on the Eastern Front, now lacked supplies and military equipment and were in desperate need of an inexpensive manpower. Dr. Yitzhak Arad, a former partisan, chairman of Yad Vashem (emeritus) and world-renowned researcher on the Holocaust on the eastern front described the inadvertent rescue of some Lithuanian, Latvian and Minsk Jews, who were spared in order to be used as labor in the Occupied Soviet territories.

The traditional assumption that the Wehrmacht was a professional army that did not take part at the murder of the Jews was refuted by Dr. Leonid Rein, of Yad Vashem's International Research Institute. He discussed new findings proving the direct participation of the Wehrmacht in the mass murder of Jews such as the mass murder in Liepaja.

Prof. Mordechai Altshuler, of The Hebrew University Jerusalem, discussed the destruction of formerly held convictions among Jews. The Soviet Jews’ belief in the invincibility of the Red Army was shattered, and the lack of stability reignited local antisemitism. The Soviet Jews, who believed that antisemitism in the Soviet Union had ended, woke up to a harsh new reality.

The Institute will hold two additional symposia this year examining different aspects of the invasion. New information has also been uploaded to the “Untold Stories” Research Project which tells the story of the murder of Jews in the occupied areas of the former Soviet Union that began with the German invasion of the former USSR on 22 June 1941.

Grey's Anatomy stars visit Yad Vashem

2011-06-19T13:17:00.004+03:00

Today, Kevin McKidd and Sarah Drew (Dr. Hunt and Dr. Kepner on 'Grey's Anatomy') visited Yad Vashem along with Lucas Neff and Shannon Woodward ('Raising Hope'), Gregory Smith ('Everwood' and 'The Patriot') and Zach Levy ('Chuck'). The group visited the Avenue of the Righteous Among the Nations (pictured), and had an emotional tour of the Holocaust History Museum, the Visual Center, the Hall of Remembrance and the Children's Memorial.

70 Years since Operation Barbarossa

2011-06-16T13:55:00.007+03:00

A new mini-site dedicated to Operation Barbarossa has just now been uploaded to http://www.yadvashem.org/. It is now 70 years since the military invasion of the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941 which marked a turning point in the Nazis' plan to "solve the Jewish problem." Hundreds of thousands of Jews managed to flee into the depths of the Soviet Union, but approximately 2 million Jews remained under Nazi occupation and were the victims of mass murder carried out by the Einsatzgruppen units. In less than half a year, by the end of 1941, about half a million Jews had been murdered within the areas of the Soviet Union conquered by the Nazis.

Research Institute Symposium

On Monday, June 20, the International Institute for Holocaust Research will hold the first of three daylong symposia marking 70 years since Operation Barbarossa. The public is invited to "Exploring the invasion of the Soviet Union as an Ideological War: Symposium Exploring the invasion of the Soviet Union as an Ideological War" which will take place at the Yad Vashem Auditorium in Hebrew and Russian.

Historians will gather to discuss political, economic and ideological aspects of the war between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, and its critical and destructive impact on the Jews living in those areas, the Wehrmacht’s role in the murder of Jews in the first months of the Eastern front war, and the Jews’ mistaken beliefs in the great military power of the Red Army and that antisemitism among Soviet citizens was a matter of the past. Among the lecturers will be Dr. Yitzhak Arad, a former partisan, chairman of Yad Vashem (emeritus) and world-renowned researcher on the Holocaust on the eastern front. Dr. Yevgeniy Rozenblat, a researcher from Belarus will speak about the relationships between Poles, Belarusians, and Jews in the first months of the war. Prof. Mordechai Altshuler of the Hebrew University will address the shattering of myths amid Soviet Jewry. New material from Yad Vashem’s The Untold Stories: The Murder Sites of the Jews in the Occupied Territories of the USSR Research Project will also be presented.

The symposia are taking place with the support of the Genesis Philanthropy Group and European Jewish Fund, and the Gutwirth Family Fund.

Yad Vashem Among Top Ten Reasons to Visit Israel

2011-06-14T12:27:00.004+03:00

Yad Vashem is included as one of the top 10 reasons to visit Israel and number 5 in a list of Top ten sites in Israel.

Meeting the Challenge

2011-06-12T11:45:00.006+03:00

by Szilvia Peto-Dittel

History teacher and youth educator Péter Heindl is more like a father figure than a teacher to his students in Magyarmecske, a remote and poverty-stricken Hungarian village near the Croatian border. After returning from a teacher training course at Yad Vashem’s International School for Holocaust Studies, Heindl not only shared his fascinating experience with “his kids,” but was also eager to teach them the human and moral significance of the history of the Holocaust.

In order to raise his students’ interest and curiosity, Heindl hung on the school notice board an old photo of a young, school-age girl with the following lines underneath: “Lili Ney: a girl from Magyarmecske disappeared from our village. A few weeks later she was killed. Who was she? Why did she die? She was not the only person from Magyarmecske to suffer this fate. Let’s find out together the history of Lili Ney and the others!” The poster had an enormous effect on the students; dozens wanted to take part in the investigation sessions Heindl scheduled one afternoon a week for the entire school year. “The crime story opening solved one of the biggest challenges of Holocaust education,” explains Heindl, “how to involve young learners in dealing with a gloomy topic that only adults feel is important enough to remember?”

During the series of “detective workshops,” Heindl and the students gradually found out the truth about the events of WWII. Heindl, the “chief detective,” carefully chose and planned the program from week to week, making sure that each phase revealed more details, and the students did not lose interest over the yearlong process.

With the help of a local historian and researcher (István Vörös, also a Yad Vashem graduate) they learned about the various religious communities in the village at the time of the war, and discovered that there were once 17 Jewish and two Roma families living there. “Aunt Cinka” (Bence Kálmánné), an eldery lady from the village who still remembered the events from 64 years earlier, took the group on a guided tour of the village, pointing out former Jewish houses and describing each family that lived there, as well as their deportations and the plunder of their possessions. Students were shocked to find out that a real mass murder had taken place in their small village. Based on Aunt Cinka’s account, a Jewish survivor from the village, László Szántó (Steiner), was traced in Budapest. Szántó visited the young students in Magyarmecske, bringing with him some old photos, including one of himself with the two children from the Ney family outside their house.

Further lessons for this special group of investigators included a visit to the closest living Jewish community in the city of Pécs and a meeting with their chief rabbi, András Schönberger; a conversation about questions of responsibility with the Catholic priest of Alsószentmárton, who actively ministers Roma groups in Magyarmecske; a visit to the Jewish cemetery in Kacsóta, where most of the Jews from Magyarmecske are buried; and a two-day excursion to the Holocaust Memorial Center and the Jewish quarter and museum in Budapest.

The school year ended with the discovery of the house belonging to Righteous Among the Nations Erzsébet Tóth (née Juhász). Inside the house, the current owners were surprised to be shown an original hiding place. “The topic was a perfect one to close the detective story,” Heindl says. “It drew my students’ attention to positive examples of human behaviour in times when inhumanity prevailed.”

The end of the school year, however, did not mean the termination of the project, which had already surpassed all the expectations of its creator. On 8 August 2008, the whole village actively joined the group’s initiative, and a memorial plaque to commemorate the 11 Jewish victims from Magyarmecske was dedicated on the wall of the local school (once home to the Jewish Ledrer family). An exhibition was also organized from the findings of the student group. The national media took great interest in the project, and coverage of the work was broadcast and reported in several different forms. As a result, Heindl soon received an emotional phone call from Judit Ney, Lili’s niece, who had read a newspaper article on the project. More family photos were gained from Judit, one of which shows the Ney children standing together with the Roma children of the village. “My eyes filled with tears when I saw the photo,” recalls Heindl. “No matter how small the Jewish community is now (only two survived), almost seven decades after their destruction, it has become a living community once more – for my students as well as the entire village.”

Yad Vashem Chairman to be Honored as Patron of Jerusalem

2011-06-01T19:00:00.001+03:00

Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev will receive the prestigious Yakir Yerushalim (Patron of Jerusalem) award in recognition of his activities. The award will be presented this evening (Wednesday June 1) on Jerusalem Day in a ceremony in the Tower of David Museum. Since 1967, the award has been presented by the Mayor of Jerusalem on Jerusalem Day to individuals who have contributed to the capital city of Jerusalem, and whose public service has been focused in Israel's capital and on its behalf.

Dutch Righteous Among the Nations Honored Today

2011-05-23T16:23:00.002+03:00

Today, a special event honoring the late Johanna (Pieterse) & Jacobus Witte as Righteous Among the Nations was held at Yad Vashem.
During the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands, the Jewish Kalfus family decided to go into hiding, and their four-year-old son, Leopold Robert Kalfus was brought to Johanna and Jacobus. Robert was introduced as a nephew of Johanna and was treated as one of the couple's children. He slept in the attic with the two Witte sons, Cees and Jan, soon calling the Wittes Uncle Jaap and Aunt Jo. Despite increasing risk, Robert remained hidden on their farm. The Wittes looked after Robert for two years; during this period they also sheltered a downed Allied pilot.
“I am standing here in Yad Vashem, 66 years after the war. I cannot express in words the emotional turbulence I am feeling right now,” said Robert at today’s event. “I am thankful that I survived, thanks to the courage of Johanna and Jacobus. I joined the Witte family as a nephew. The hope and the love that they have showered upon me were a substitute to my lost childhood. I am happy to be here today with my children and grandchildren. I would like to thank Yad Vashem for this ceremony.”

“Johanna and Jacobus lacked for nothing,” said Amb. Michiel den Hond, Ambassador of the Netherlands in Israel, “They could choose to keep a low profile and go through the Holocaust without any danger. Instead, they took into their home a four-year-old boy, and took care of him as their own child. Even after their death, their legacy lives on. This is the outcome of being a human being even under these hard conditions.”

Robert’s son Danny expressed the family’s appreciation to the Wittes. “We are here to celebrate life itself. The rescuing of one is the rescue of many generations. We would like to thank the Witte family from the deepest place in our hearts. We will never forget what you did for us,” he said.

State Ceremony Marks VE Day

2011-05-16T09:04:00.003+03:00

Yad Vashem marked the Allied Victory over Nazi Germany in an inspiring and moving ceremony. Partisans and Veterans decorated with medals stood proud as the IDF Chief Cantor Lt. Col. Shai Abramson sang the traditional prayer of thanks, and the The Israeli Police Orchestra, conducted by Inspector Eitan Sobol played a medley of patriotic songs.

“We are gathered here in Jerusalem, the eternal capital of the Jewish people, the place to which Jews yearned for over two thousand years, in order to mark the victory of the Allied forces over Nazi Germany, and to salute Jewish bravery,” said Ehud Barak, Israeli Minister of Defense. “My brothers - veterans and partisans - as the Minister of Defense of the State of Israel, I salute you.You have fought not only for your own lives, but also for the future of the Jewish people, and the future of all humanity.”

Chairman of Yad Vashem, Avner Shalev, spoke about the special role of Jews who fought for the Allies. “The fighting of Jews was unique. As citizens they fought in order to defend their countries against a cruel enemy. But they have also fought for their personal and collective existence, on behalf of the entire Jewish people."

Captain Vadim Kornblitt, grandson of a veteran of the Red Army, drew a connection between the past, the future and the present. “It is a great honor to be here today among you. Among decorated soldiers and heros. We cherish you and will continue to tell your story - to embrace your heritage….I am proud to follow in your footsteps. I would like to thank you for the opportunity to serve the State of Israel and to defend you.”

Tony Blair at Yad Vashem Today

2011-05-04T20:59:00.004+03:00

Today, Quartet Representative Tony Blair took an in-depth tour of the Holocaust History Museum at Yad Vashem. Following his visit, he wrote the following in the guestbook:

"Thank you for what will remain with me forever. It is hard to describe what this means to me or how profoundly it affects my emotions. For me, this is a memorial, it is a tribute, it is a reflection of an event almost too terrible to contemplate. But it is also a warning, a warning of the wickedness of which humanity is capable. I leave here with that warning in my mind. I also leave, however, with a sense of hope, because amidst all the evil and tragedy, those that survived built a better world and had the grace and wisdom then to build this testament to suffering and to the human spirit."

Gathering the fragments

2011-05-04T14:34:00.004+03:00

Yad Vashem has launched a nation-wide project to encourage people who have Holocaust-era documents, artifacts and photos to deposit them with Yad Vashem for preservation and safekeeping.

Here's an interesting piece by Dr. Robert Rozett on the idea behind the campaign:

Gathering the Fragments, The Jerusalem Post, May 1, 2011.

Israeli cousins unite thanks to a Page of Testimony

2011-04-28T16:08:00.005+03:00

“I was looking for information about the dead, instead I found a live relative”

Over half a century after their grandparents were murdered by the Nazis in Poland, first cousins Liora Tamir and Aryeh Shikler met for the first time at Yad Vashem over the Passover holiday.

(Photo: Isaac Harari / Yad Vashem)

Tamir was born in the Soviet Gulag town of Vorkuta in 1946. Tamir’s mother, Yona, promised her that when she turned 15, she would reveal the family’s story to her. But Yona Shapira died when Tamir was only 12, leaving her an orphan with no information regarding her family roots. Tamir spent the rest of her youth in an orphans’ home in Leningrad and believed that she was alone in the world.

“Excitement doesn’t even describe what I felt,” said Tamir after meeting her cousin Aryeh. “I felt that I had gone to another space, where I am not alone. I understand that I need to get used to thinking of myself as part of something: Before, I had my children, but now there is an entire family.”

Tamir’s daughter, Ilana, launched a determined search through archival information for clues about her grandmother, Yona Shapira. She discovered that her grandmother traveled from Poland to British Mandate Palestine in the 1920s and was arrested and deported by the British because of her communist activities, which ultimately led to her being sent to the Gulag town of Vorkuta where Liora was born.

After receiving documents from a KGB archive confirming the names of Liora’s grandparents, Golda and Naftali Herz Shapira from the town of Brody, she searched Yad Vashem’s Central Database of Shoah Victims Names and found a page of testimony under their names submitted in 1956 by a Simcha Shikler — Aryeh’s father. Ilana then tracked down Shikler’s son Aryeh, and also found his granddaughter Limor Ganot via Facebook.

“It definitely feels like I cracked a mystery and we now we have a better picture of our family,’’ said Ilana Tamir. “I feel like I gave my mother a gift, I gave her a family. We had a hole in our hearts, and we didn’t have a family or blood relationships with anyone — and suddenly a family was born.’’

Justin Bieber visited Yad Vashem

2011-04-17T11:45:00.006+03:00

Justin Bieber, in Israel for a concert last week, took time out to visit Yad Vashem with his family. After the visit he tweeted:

also got to visit Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum. An incredible place and something i will never ever forget.

Making Holocaust Studies Relevant

2011-04-05T11:49:00.001+03:00

By: Adina Abecasis

As a teacher of Jewish Studies for the past 20 years in both England and Gibraltar, one of the major obstacles I have encountered is how to best teach the Holocaust to a generation that, regrettably, has not been sufficiently informed or educated regarding this momentous part of our recent history.

The oft-quoted citation “history repeats itself” resonates strongly with the Jewish people regarding circumstances of persecution and antisemitism. As a child of survivors, I passionately believe that no matter how difficult it may be to teach this subject matter, everyone must be educated on this subject. I know this is a challenge, but I believe it is one worth expending energy to solve. Inscribed on one of the barracks in Auschwitz I is a quote from George Santayana stating: “One who does not remember history is bound to live through it again.” Teachers bear the tremendous responsibility of accurately and effectively educating their pupils of such life lessons.

Still, the dilemma over how to prepare materials for this difficult subject remains a taxing one. Recently, I found the help I was searching for: an opportunity to join a group of British educators for weeklong program at the International School for Holocaust Studies at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. Thanks to The British Friends of Yad Vashem, some 20 British primary and secondary teachers involved in Holocaust education were invited to this tailor-made seminar, in which we heard lectures and held discussions with top experts and historians on topics ranging from antisemitism and Nazi ideology to a historical perspective on the ghettos and using poetry to teach the Holocaust. We were furnished with a range of methods to teaching the difficult subject matter, and provided with vital tools for combating Holocaust denial. We took guided tours of the Yad Vashem campus, including the Holocaust History Museum, the Archives, the Valley of the Communities, and the Avenue of the Righteous Among the Nations. We also met with Holocaust survivors and visited various sites in Jerusalem. One of my colleagues told me that the seminar indeed "opened her eyes to new ways of teaching the Holocaust."

But to me, the most important aspect of the seminar was how to adapt each lesson to make sure it is age appropriate, and allows students of all backgrounds to feel they are in a safe learning environment. The lecturers took pains to explain that teaching the Holocaust should never be a negative or scary experience, rather an environment in which students can discover their identity through the life lessons the topics can teach us.

Now that I am back in the classroom, I am still digesting all that I learned. But among the ideas that most impacted me was with how much of my own Jewish self I have become more in tune. This in turn has helped me focus on encouraging my students to learn about their own identities, as well as increase their awareness of the different communities around them.

Above all, I firmly believe that we must all insist that the national curriculum in every school include Holocaust education. It should not be mentioned only in the context of World War II. The extent to which the Jewish nation was persecuted and murdered by the Nazis and their accomplices is a part of who we are, as Jews, but it is equally part of who we all are, as members of the human race. Its implications are always current – recognition of right and wrong, balances of power and the humane treatment of others, the value of life and the tragedy of death. The Holocaust was an extreme example of the extent that humans can fall to the lowest depths of morality, or soar to the highest ethical peaks. It was cataclysmic, and as such its impact is still felt by all of us, and is very much part of our identity. But it must be learned – and taught – correctly, so that its meaning is properly absorbed.

I am extremely grateful to Yad Vashem for all the hard work that they have put into making teaching resources adaptable for all the age groups. The lesson plans and suggestions on the Yad Vashem website have allowed me to create a working syllabus for all the children I teach, and are invaluable to thousands of other educators worldwide, most of whom are unable to visit the Mount of Remembrance.
I am now preparing my Year 12 students for their annual trip to Poland, and with the tools and teaching methods I acquired during the seminar I know my students will have a much more enriching learning experience, enhancing awareness of their own Jewish and human identity. I know this will lead them down the best path towards whatever the future holds.

Adina Abecasis, Hasmonean High School Jewish Studies and Head of Holocaust Ed. Enrichment, London

Remembering the Jewish community of Macedonia

2011-03-27T15:57:00.005+02:00

“The shortest journey”, wrote the Israeli poet Lea Goldberg, “Is upon the years. … The shortest journey is the journey to the past”. The past had a significant presence in the annual commemoration of the Jewish community of Macedonia recently at Yad Vashem’s Synagogue. It seems that the journey to the past becomes more and more difficult. The journey through the years becomes hard and impossible, when the people who are able to remember are dwindling rapidly. People that can remember the rich Jewish life of this community, which was eliminated in the fires of Treblinka. “How can one memorialize an entire community?” asked Eliezer Papo, the vice principal of the Ladino cultural center in the Ben Gurion University. “For that we have to go back, make a personal, individual memorial, and portray short scenes from the community life.” He described a vital Jewish community, which revolved around the Jewish tradition. He highlighted the synagogue as the center of communal life and the Zionist activity of a community who referred to Zionism as a part of the Jewish tradition. Irena Steinfeldt, head of the department of Righteous among the Nations at Yad Vashem, related that a spark of light in the darkness of the war came in the form of Bishop Smiljan C’ekada, a Catholic priest from Skopje, who was recently recognized as a Righteous Among the Nations, thanks to the research of the late Holocaust survivor Jenny Labelle. Labelle’s research followed the footsteps of the Bishop who demanded the release of the Jews that were kept in the camp ‘Monopol’ before transfer to Treblinka. The Bishop also hid Jewish children in his monastery, saving them from certain death. Paio Avirovitz, the ambassador of Macedonia in Israel, drew a line between the past, the present and the future of the Jewry of Macedonia. He described the Holocaust of the Macedonian Jews as a “tragedy that lives on in the collective memory of the Macedonian people”, and referred to the Holocaust research center that was recently opened in Skopje, the capital city of Macedonia, where the Jewish neighborhood stood before the Holocaust. “The victims have symbolically returned home. The national memory has a home. Each Macedonian Jew who perished in Treblinka has a home. Macedonia has its own Yad Vashem.” At the end of the event, representatives of Yad Vashem urged attendees to help Yad Vashem save fragments of memory, by giving Yad Vashem objects, documents, papers, photographs and even personal testimonies, in order to insure that the traces of the community will be forever remembered. -- Talia Alon

Purim during the war years

2011-03-20T11:56:00.004+02:00

Today in honor of Purim, the day celebrated in commemoration of a time when the Jewish people living in Persia were saved from extermination, you can view a special online exhibition with pictures from Purim celebrations in Europe before, during and after the Holocaust.

Happy Purim to all those celebrating!

Yad Vashem on Jeopardy

2011-03-15T12:28:00.002+02:00

On Wednesday, March 9th, Yad Vashem was featured as a category on "Jeopardy!"
"Jeopardy!", the #2 series in syndication, averages 9 million daily viewers and since its 1984 syndication debut, "Jeopardy!" has been honored with 28 Daytime Emmy Awards, more than any other syndicated game show. Eleven Emmys have been awarded for Outstanding Game Show/Audience Participation. Its host, Alex Trebek has won five Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Game Show Host.
You can see Yad Vashem around the 5:30 minute mark

Block 27 at Auschwitz closed as of March 7, 2011

2011-03-07T13:54:00.000+02:00

From March 7, 2011 the exhibition in Block 27 "The Martyrdom and Struggle of the Jews in Europe from 1933 to 1945" at the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum will be closed as work begins on preservation and renovation of the barrack, and building of the new exhibition.
The Hall of Remembrance will still be available for Israeli groups visiting the Auschwitz Memorial. The new exhibition, being prepared by Yad Vashem, will open in 2012.

Bronka Klibanski, Holocaust survivor, partisan, woman of valor, 1923-2011

2011-02-28T14:58:00.002+02:00

On 23 February, Bronka Klibanski (née Winicka) - Holocaust survivor, fighter, researcher and author - passed away, leaving behind a heritage of resistance, courage and admiration from all who knew her. Born in Grodno, Klibanski was a member of the Dror Youth Movement who joined the Bialystok ghetto underground and worked closely with its leader Mordechai Tenenbaum, about whom she recently published a book. Klibanski became a kasharit (courier) - one of the brave young Jewish women who took on assumed non-Jewish identities and risked their lives on missions of reconnaissance, food and weapons smuggling in and out of the ghetto. These couriers were brazen in their courage as they used their looks, wits, and whatever other method they could to carry messages, smuggle documents and weopons, and provide information to Jews in ghettos around Poland.
After the war, Bronka was dedicated to Holocaust remembrance and research, and she was one of a last of the generation of Holocaust survivors who also worked professionally and objectively to commemorate the Shoah.
Bronka was a noble and brave woman who gave her all to her people during their hour of need and to Yad Vashem and its archives in their memory and their honor. As a member of the Yad Vashem Council, she was active in its work here for the rest of her life. We salute her resilience and courage and will treasure her legacy that continues to inspire us all.

Yad Vashem Online Photo Archive Chosen as the "Site of the Week

2011-02-10T20:11:00.002+02:00

www.yadvashem.org. was recently chosen as the “Site of the Week” by the editors of eSchool News, an online technology magazine for K-12 educators and included in the “Tools for Schools” e-mail newsletter which was distributed to over 60,000 subscribers each Wednesday. Read about it here

Read about Yad Vashem's recent partnership with Google to preserve and share Holocaust archives.

You can visit Yad Vashem's online photo archives here.

Marking Int'l Holocaust Remembrance Day

2011-01-27T14:56:00.005+02:00

Myriad events and endeavors have been taking place this week to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Here's a brief wrap up of some of our most prominent events:

Yad Vashem and Google partner to preserve and share Holocaust archives

Marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Yad Vashem and Google announced a partnership that will greatly facilitate preservation of and access to the world’s largest historical collection on the Holocaust.

The collections are visible at http://collections.yadvashem.org/photo.

New YouTube Channel in Farsi Launched
In keeping with its commitment to raise Holocaust awareness worldwide, on Sunday January 23, Yad Vashem launched a YouTube channel in Farsi and substantially expanded its Farsi website. The YouTube channel contains survivor testimonies, archival footage, and mini-lectures by Holocaust historians. The comprehensive updated website includes frequently asked questions about the Holocaust, online exhibitions, stories of Righteous Among the Nations, a multi-media presentation of the Auschwitz Album and more.

Among today's visitors to Yad Vashem:

Under Secretary General Robert Serry, the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, today visted Yad Vashem, leading a delegation of heads and representatives of UN agencies, including: UNOPS, UNDP, UN-OCHA, UNODC, UNRWA, UNFPA, OHCHR, UNTSO, UNESCO and the World Bank. Deputy The grouped visited the Holocaust History Museum, participated in a memorial ceremony in the Hall of Remembrance, visited the Children’s Memorial and signed the Yad Vashem Guest Book. Danny Ayalon, Deputy Foreign Minister for the State of Israel, participated in the memorial ceremony in the Hall of Remembrance.

Serry remarked at the close of the visit:
"The visit to Yad Vashem today left a strong impression on me today, as I'm sure it did on all my colleagues. It is one thing to read about the Holocaust and see films about it, but it is another to look at the luggage, the shoes, and the photos of those individuals sent to their deaths. Moments ago we visited the Children's Memorial for the 1.5 million Jewish children slaughtered in the Holocaust. It is incomprehensible."

"The United Nations condemns and rejects any form of Holocaust denial without reservation. Such denial desecrates the memory of the six million Jews and the many others murdered and opens the door to future atrocities."

New Mini-site on www.yadvashem.org

A special mini-site marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day is now available on Yad Vashem's website.

Some other events that took place internationally:
A special concert took place in Berlin’s Rykestreet Synagogue on January 24, 2011 in the presence of Germany’s President Christian Wulff and Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev. The concert was organized by the German Society for Yad Vashem, chaired by Hildegard Mϋller.

The UN General Asssemby in NY will hold its memorial ceremony on Thursday January 27, on the theme of “Women in the Holocaust.” After the ceremony, all attendees will receive an educational DVD on the topic, produced in conjunction with Yad Vashem’s International School of Holocaust Studies.

At the official ceremony at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris on January 27, Israel’s Education Minister Gideon Sa’ar will address diplomats who will then attend a seminar run by Yad Vashem’s International School.

A memorial ceremony will take place at the Headquarters of the European Parliament in Brussels, in cooperation with the European Jewish Congress and the Israel Ministry of Public Affairs and the Diaspora. Rabbi Israel Meir Lau, Chairman of the Yad Vashem Council, will open Yad Vashem’s “Architecture of Murder” exhibition which displays the plans of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp complex, as well as aerial photos of the complex, photographs of the camp’s construction and quotes from its SS staff and Jewish inmates.

Traveling Exhibitions Worldwide
The photographic exhibition "BESA – A Code of Honor: Albanian Muslims who Rescued Jews in the Holocaust" opened on January17 in the British House of Commons and the "No Child's Play" exhibition will open in German at Landhaus Innsbruck, Austria on January 27 in the presence of the Governor of Tirol Gunther Platter.

Attend a Unique Virtual Event Marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day

2011-01-20T10:10:00.006+02:00

Join Yad Vashem and our Facebook friends for a unique virtual event the week of International Holocaust Remembrance Day. You are invited to a special Facebook event - the “Yad Vashem I Remember Wall” where you can personally remember one of the six million by being matched with a name from the Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names. The event will be open through January 30th.

A New Stage at Yad Vashem

2011-01-17T14:18:00.001+02:00

As we were standing in the construction site of a 330-seat Edmond J. Safra Lecture Hall being built as part of the new wing of the International School for Holocaust Studies at Yad Vashem, I began to reflect on Brundibar, a theatrical event performed by Jewish children in Terezin as well as productions in other ghettos during the Shoah. Despite hunger, disease and despair, by acting on stage these thespians attempted to retain their own humanity as well as that of their audiences. Many of them would never have believed that their names and personal stories would be remembered within the framework of lectures and workshops given by School staff on the Mountain of Remembrance in Jerusalem.
The new, modern lecture hall, to be opened in 2012, is nestled in the Jerusalem forest, surrounded by trees that commemorate the rare actions of Righteous among the Nations who dared to help Jewish people during the Holocaust period.
The destruction of Jewish theater under Nazi occupation, a loss to western civilization, can never be repaired. However, I believe that future events in the new School auditorium will not only uphold the power of culture, but also contribute to mending the world (tikun olam).
Richelle Budd Caplan

Creative Expression Under Occupation

2011-01-05T09:36:00.006+02:00

Clairette Vigder, a seven-year-old girl living in Nazi-occupied Paris, devoted hours to drawing what she was not permitted to go out and see in person – brightly colored birds and the sun. With arrests of Jews commonplace in Paris, Clairette was confined indoors by her parents, where she devoted hours of her time to drawing. With paper scarce, Clairette drew colorful images on materials immediately available – including the covers from packages of Camembert cheese.

Soon after her father was deported, Clairette’s mother decided they had to leave their home, and arranged for Clairette and her younger brother to go into hiding. Her mother gave the family's personal belongings, including Clairette’s drawings, to a neighbor for safekeeping, but fearing discovery, the neighbor disposed of everything – except for Clairette’s artwork. The children were reunited with their mother at the end of the war. Their father was murdered in Auschwitz in 1943. In 2009, Clairette gave a number of the colorful paintings, along with several other personal items, to Yad Vashem for safekeeping and preservation.

Clairette's drawings are among the thousands of items contained in Yad Vashem's collections. The professional staff of Yad Vashem ensures that the items are properly preserved and maintained. Yad Vashem urges the public that may have artifacts and documents from the Holocaust to give them to Yad Vashem for preservation and safekeeping. (Contact: +972-2-644-3249, mailto:collect@yadvashem.org)

4 Million Victims of Holocaust Identified

2010-12-21T14:53:00.004+02:00

Today, Yad Vashem announced that it has identified two-thirds of the Jews murdered in the Holocaust - 4 million names.

“In the past decade (2001-2010) we have succeeded in adding about 1.5 million victims' names to the Names Database, increasing by some 60% the information we had,” said Avner Shalev, Chairman of Yad Vashem. “The Germans sought not only to destroy the Jews, but to obliterate any memory of them. One of Yad Vashem's central missions since its foundation, the recovery of each and every victim's name and personal story, has resulted in relentless efforts to restore the names and identities of as many of the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis and their accomplices as possible. We will continue our efforts to recover the unknown names, and by harnessing technology in the service of memory, we are able to share their names with the world.”

In 2004, Yad Vashem launched the Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names onto its website, with 3 million names. At the same time, a new 11th hour project to recover unknown names was initiated. Names are recovered via Pages of Testimony, special forms filled out in memory of the victims by people who remember them, and by combing archival lists and documentation for names.

Of the 4 million names currently known, some 2.2 million (about 55%) come from Pages of Testimony and the remainder from various archival sources and postwar commemoration projects. While in Western Europe in particular there were often lists kept of the Jews and deportation, making identification easier, in countries of Eastern Europe and the areas of the former Soviet Union, as well as Greece, much information was still lacking.

“During the last five years we have concentrated our names recovery efforts in areas where most of the names remain unknown,” said Alexander Avraham, Director of the Hall of Names at Yad Vashem. “We have made great progress. In 2005, we knew the names of some 20% of Jews murdered in Ukraine, today we know 35%; in Byelorussia the figure has risen from 23% to 37% today, Poland (1938 borders) from 35% to 46%, Hungary from 45% to 65%, and Greece from 35% to 70%.”

The indexing of the names database and the names recovery project are supported by the Victim List Project of the Swiss Banks Settlement, Hi-Tech Entrepreneur Yossie Hollander, the Claims Conference, Dayenu Ltd led by Gail & Colin Halpern and family, the Nadav Fund and the Noaber Foundation, The National Fund of the Republic of Austria for Victims of National Socialism, the American Society for Yad Vashem, the Fondation pour la Memoire de la Shoah, Wexner - The Legacy Heritage Fund, Stichting Collectieve Marorgelden Israel, Dora Zitno, Hanna Rubenstein, Edith Steinlauf, and additional supporters.

The entire Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names is available on www.yadvashem.org in English, Hebrew and Russian. Assistance in filling out Pages of Testimony in Israel is available at: +972 2 644 3808.

Exploring hiding, sheltering and borrowed identities as means of rescue during the Holocaust

2010-12-20T09:17:00.004+02:00

Yesterday the annual international conference of Yad Vashem's research institute opened. This conference, the 18th since they began, looks at various issues connected to hiding, sheltering and borrowed identities as means of rescue during the Holocaust.

In the opening session, Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev noted that Holocaust research has undergone different phases, when varying questions were at the forefront of study. Now, questions relating to the individuals’ actions are at the center. He noted that the activity of Jews during the Holocaust was so important to all the rescue efforts and that the sessions ahead would examine Jewish efforts at rescue as individuals and groups.

Prof. Dan Michman, the chief historian of Yad Vashem, expanded on Shalev's remarks regarding the trajectory of research, and added that the study of the Righteous Among the Nations has also come into being in recent years. However, he said he disagreed with those who attributed all of the Righteous' motivations to altruism. While this was certainly the case in some instances, Michman noted that this does not provide a convincing explanation for those who rescued Jews despite being antisemites, or those who acted out of ideological or religious reasons. He also noted that one cannot speak of a "national character" when it comes to rescue, at least not based on the Righteous Among the Nations, and looked forward to the next three days as an opportunity to shed more light both on the Righteous, as well as on Jewish efforts and involvement in rescue, failed attempts at rescue, and more.

Dr David Silberklang reminded attendees at the full auditorium that during the Holocaust not everyone behaved as one would expect. People behaved in unpredictable ways -- for the good and the bad -- and Jews could not predict what to expect if they turned to someone for help.

It should be an interesting few days.

The full program is here.

A Legacy of Jewish Continuity

2010-11-30T10:02:00.006+02:00

Each year, just prior to Hanukkah, Yehuda Mansbach arrives at the Holocaust History Museum at Yad Vashem to take a nostalgic piece of history back home with him for the eight days of the Festival of Lights. Yehuda brings his grandfather’s Hanukkah menorah home to his son, who was named for his great-grandfather, Rabbi Akiva Baruch Posner, the last rabbi of the Jewish Community of Kiel, Germany. The family uses this special menorah during family celebrations of Hanukkah - a testimony to the continuity of Jewish life - and after the holiday returns it to its place of honor where it is on display at Yad Vashem.

Yehuda Mansbach [left] receives the Hanukka menorah from Michael Tal, [right] an artifacts curator at Yad Vashem.

The Hanukkiyah was photographed in the family’s window in Kiel in 1931, by the Rabbi’s wife, Rachel (nee Wirtzburg) Mansbach. On the back of the photo, she wrote in German,

“Hanukkah 5692,
‘Judea Dies,’ thus saith the banner.
‘Judea will live forever,’ thus responds the light.”

The Hanukkiyah was donated to Yad Vashem by the Posner family estate, courtesy of Shulamit (Posner) Mansbach, Haifa, Israel and is on display in the Holocaust History Museum.

The Hanukkah menorah is one of thousands of items contained in Yad Vashem's artifacts collection. The professional staff of Yad Vashem ensures that the items are properly preserved and maintained. Yad Vashem urges the public that may have artifacts and documents from the Holocaust to give them to Yad Vashem for preservation and safekeeping. (Contact: +972-2-644-3703, collect@yadvashem.org.il)

Hanukkah menorah from the home of Rabbi Akiva Baruch Posner, the last rabbi of the Jewish Community of Kiel, Germany, photographed by his wife Rachel (nee Wirtzburg) during Hanukkah 1931.

New "Righteous Among the Nations" High School in Lodz

2010-11-17T14:04:00.008+02:00

Richelle Budd-Caplan, Director, European Desk of the International School for Holocaust Studies at Yad Vashem

Tomasz Klos, principal of the lyceum of the University of Lodz, is a trail blazer. Although an expert in the field of law, he opted to channel his energies to found a new high school in an effort to invest in the shaping of young minds, the leaders of tomorrow.

On September 1, 2011, this new high school named in honor of the Righteous among the Nations, will officially open in a building that once was a textile factory owned by a Jewish family. Graduate students at the University of Lodz who are specializing in the humanities, including Jewish studies, will be connected with the high school students in the hope to deepen their appreciation of prewar Lodz.

pictured: Dorit Novak, Director of the International School for Holocaust Studies, and Tomasz Klos

This week, he visited Yad Vashem for meetings with experts in Holocaust education at the International School for Holocaust Studies, and extensive tour of the campus. He received a certifcate welcoming the intent of the new Righteous Among the Nations High School to engage in meaningful Holocaust education.

Huge New Holocaust Research Project Launched in Europe

2010-11-17T12:31:00.003+02:00

A huge and important new archives and research project was launched yesterday by the EU in Brussels. The European Holocaust Research Infrastructure (EHRI) is to date the most important European research project about Holocaust documentation.

Avner Shalev, the Chairman of Yad Vashem noted that, “The establishment of EHRI is especially important as different historical narratives are competing in Europe. Through EHRI Europe is stating its understanding that the Holocaust has unique standing in the joint European historical narrative.”

Lead by the Dutch organization NIOD (The Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies in Amsterdam), EHRI is a project of the European Union that will be a source of information for researchers and educators around the world. Yad Vashem has been active in this project since its inception, and is playing a leading role in the various sub-projects that make up EHRI. Working projects will focus on creating a shared thesaurus of 5,000 keywords to allow unified searches across collections that contain millions of documents in numerous languages, encouraging research by creating a network among experts in various Holocaust-related fields through forums to explore cooperation in names recovery, Holocaust art, identifying photos from the Holocaust period and more. Other aspects of the project will deal with information technologies, access and scholarships for researchers to study at Yad Vashem and at other archives.

With 20 partner organizations, from 13 European countries including Israel, the 4-year, 7 million euro project, is a part of the EU’s research program FP7, in which Israel is a partner.

Here's a piece from the Jerusalem Post about yesterday's launch: Europe launches new Shoah project in Brussels

Dozens of Children Saved by one Family Give Group Testimony at Yad Vashem

2010-11-14T08:42:00.004+02:00

Children Saved Thanks to Single Family Visit Yad Vashem

From Ynet.com, by Zvi Singer

Dozens of children saved during the Holocaust thanks to one family's efforts came to Yad Vashem Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority to give testimony on Monday, Yedioth Ahronoth reported. Yad Vashem takes testimonies from groups only in special cases; usually testimonies are collected on a one-to-one basis – but this is a special case.

Esther Reiss, 72, nee Musel, was seven-years-old when the Second World War came to an end. She arrived at Yad Vashem with her three children and three grandchildren. They all wore T-shirts printed with the picture of Esther when she was a child in the orphanage of the family which rescued her – the Birenbaum family. "My parents didn't survive the Holocaust, but I survived, and it's clear that it was because of the Birenbaum family," Esther said Monday. "That family saved hundreds of children… Hundreds came to Treblinka and Yehoshua Birenbaum simply took them into the camp's children's house. That's how he saved them."

Among others, Heni Birenbaum saved 50 children who were to be sent from the concentration camp to the death camp. She told the camp commander that the children were not Jewish because they had been born to German soldiers and Jewish mothers. She even gave him a list of names coordinated with the Dutch underground. The commander approved the list, but the children were later sent to Theresienstadt. Those who survived were known as the "unknown children" because their Jewish past was blurred and they were given Christian identities.

Yehoshua and Heni Birenbaum lived in Berlin and were married in 1927. After Kristallnacht in 1938 they fled to the Netherlands. When the Nazis occupied the country, they were sent to the concentration camp where they were given the task of looking after the orphans.
After the war they set up an orphanage in Amsterdam, which moved to a villa in a smaller town in 1946. The orphanage became a center for Zionist activities: The children learned Hebrew and later came to Israel with Aliyat Hano'ar (the youth aliyah.)

The Birenbaum's eldest daughter, now 82, also came Monday to Yad Vashem and was deeply moved to see the children saved by her parents.

Few remain from Nazi camp Treblinka

2010-11-01T13:17:00.005+02:00

Read an interesting article about survivors from Treblinka that appeared today. You can view Eliahu Rosenberg's testimony, a survivor from Treblinka mentioned in the article, who recently passed away, on Yad Vashem's Youtube Channel. The testimony is also on display in the Holocaust History Museum at Yad Vashem.

Yad Vashem's Jerusalem Magazine Now Online

2010-10-27T13:45:00.004+02:00

The fall edition of Yad Vashem's quarterly magazine Jerusalem is now available online. Highlighted is the online communities project which focuses on an individual community to describe its uniqueness in a special virtual exhibition. Other articles focus on Yad Vashem's role in a new initiative of the EU to make Holocaust documentation fully accessible, a unique program which films survivor testimonies in the locations where the events took place, educational endeavors, new research, recent publications and more.

An Emotional Journey - Yad Vashem's Bar/Bat Mitzvah Twinning Programme

2010-10-20T09:44:00.007+02:00

My name is Jodi Margolis and I will be celebrating my Bat Mitzvah in December this year. I heard about the Yad Vashem Bat/Bar Mitzvah twinning programme, which gives me the opportunity to link my Bat Mitzvah with a girl who died in the Holocaust, and bring her name to life. This girl’s name is Lusia Margolis who died at the age of twelve. Her name had been given to Yad Vashem by her two first cousins, Edith and Rose, who survived the Holocaust. We managed to trace them and unbelievably they are both still alive and living in America! We took a chance and phoned them and they were overwhelmed when they heard the reason for our call. It was an extremely emotional phone call and I was particularly moved when they said that this was the first time they had heard Lusia’s name mentioned since the Holocaust. They are now 93 and 89 years old and I am honoured to be able to be in contact with them. Edith and Rose sent me a copy of the only photo they had of the whole family, which helped to bring Lusia to life. I talk about her on a daily basis and I really feel as if I know her. I regularly email Edith and Rose and they really are such wonderful ladies, who are so full of life.

This has been a very emotional journey for me, and there are some aspects of it that I just can’t put into words. When I started the twinning process, I never in my wildest dreams thought that it would have come this far and be so much more meaningful and special than I had originally anticipated! I really feel as if there is some connection between Lusia and myself, and if it weren’t for Edith and Rose putting her name forward to Yad Vashem, I never would have been blessed to honour Lusia’s memory. There is so much more to this wonderful story, including aspects from Edith’s and Rose’s sides, but I have only given a brief overview of my perspective. In the meantime, this is an ongoing story!

For more information about twinning in the UK, contact the British Friends of Yad Vashem, linda@yadvashem.org.uk

Greek Foreign Minister Visited Yad Vashem today

2010-10-18T14:39:00.004+02:00

The Foreign Minister of Greece, Dimitris P. Droutsas, visited this morning. He had a special tour of the Avenue of the Righteous Among the Nations, the Synagogue at Yad Vashem which showcases Judaica from destroyed synagogues in Europe, and the "Virtues of Memory: Six Decades of Holocaust Survivors' Creativity" exhibition, which features the work of some 300 Holocaust survivors. He was guided in the exhibition by Eliad Moreh-Rosenberg, an art curator at Yad Vashem.

At the conclusion of his visit, the Foreign Minister wrote in the Guest Book,
"As a visitor to Yad Vashem, I was struck by the simplicity and directness of its message. Watching the worst crime ever against humanity so thoughtfully documented, I wholeheartedly commit myself to always remember the millions of innocent victims in the Holocaust and to continuously work for universal respect of human, fundamental human rights. It is my firm conviction that this is our only guarantee against future repeating of our tragic past."

Chinese Educators at Yad Vashem for First of its Kind Int'l Seminar

2010-10-05T12:33:00.007+02:00

Some twenty Chinese educators are currently participating in a 2-week seminar at Yad Vashem’s International School for Holocaust Studies that opened October 4, 2010. This first of its kind seminar brings together participants from China, Hong Kong and Macau, for in-depth study of the Holocaust and how to teach it in the classroom.

For most of the participants it was their first visit to Israel. One of the educators, currently on leave from her teaching position in order to complete a thesis on Petr Gintz was especially gratified to see authentic Holocaust-era artifacts.

While at Yad Vashem participants will tour the Holocaust History Museum, Valley of the Communities, and other sites at Yad Vashem, and have the opportunity to hear from top educators and historians about various topics related to the Holocaust. Antisemitism, the ‘Final Solution’, the Allies and the Holocaust, the Righteous Among the Nations, the unprecedentedness of the Holocaust, and Yad Vashem’s pedagogical approach to Holocaust education and presentations of specific educational resources, will be among the issues presented during the seminar. Participants will also meet Holocaust survivors and tour Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and other areas in Israel.
　

Paying Tribute to a Courageous Survivor

2010-09-28T13:55:00.006+02:00

Fanya Gottesfeld was born into a traditional Jewish family in Skala, a small village or “Shtetl” in Eastern Galicia, which is located in the Ukraine, during Sukkot. When the Germans entered Skala in the summer of 1941, life immediately became much worse for the Jews there, including the Gottesfeld family - Benjamin, and Charlotte, and their children, Fanya and Arthur. As the eldest child, Fanya, had to go out daily to scavenge for food. On one of these forays, she met Jan, a Ukranian militiaman who began to help and look after the Gottesfelds.

In their desperate efforts to find somewhere safe to hide they approached Sidor Sokolowski, a former employee in the building firm where Benjamin Gottesfeld had worked as an engineer. Sidor took the family in, and Fanya, Arthur and their parents settled into the attic in Sidor’s home. After a suspicious neighbor came snooping around his house, Sidor moved the Gottesfelds to the chicken coop. They had little air and no light and subsisted on whatever meager rations Sidor was able to share with them. Lice and rats were their constant companions. The Gottesfelds hid in the chicken coop for nearly two and a half years.

Following the liberation of Skala by the Russian Army in May 1944 the family moved to Byotm, Poland where Fanya was introduced to Joseph Heller. They were married in 1946, and subsequently lived in several cities throughout Europe. Fanya and Joseph moved to New York in 1960 where Fanya was reunited with her brother Arthur and mother Charlotte.

In March 1996, Yad Vashem recognized Izydor Sokolowski as a Righteous Among the Nations.

In the meantime, the Hellers rebuilt their lives in New York.
Fanya’s commitment to Holocaust education was recognized by the New York State Board of Regents who in 1988 awarded her the Louis E. Yavner Citizen Award in recognition of her contribution to teaching about the Holocaust. She received honorary degrees from Yeshiva University and Bar Ilan University.

Fanya recently reissued her autobiography under the title Love in a World of Sorrow originally entitled Strange and Unexpected Love: A Teenage Girl's Holocaust Memoirs. The book is mandatory reading in many schools and universities. Fanya lectures at universities and conferences to promote further awareness of the Holocaust, speaks to hundreds of inner-city schoolchildren every year, and commissions an annual conference on Holocaust education at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City.

Fanya Gottesfeld Heller currently serves on the boards of numerous educational institutions and charitable organizations, many of which focus on Jewish education, feminism, and raising awareness about the Holocaust. She lives in New York City and has three children, eight grandchildren, and eleven great-grandchildren.

Fanya, a good friend of Yad Vashem, serves on the board of the American Society for Yad Vashem. Fanya and her family’s commitment and contribution to Yad Vashem will ensure that the torch of Holocaust education will be passed on for generations to come.

Today, at a moving ceremony in the Yad Vashem Synagogue, Yad Vashem paid tribute to Fanya’s courage, resilience and commitment to Holocaust education.

Avner Shalev, the Chairman of Yad Vashem, spoke about Fanya Gottesfeld Heller as a unique person and praised her courage and candor in sharing her story. He noted that she wanted to understand what makes human beings evil or good, and that she says that there are no answers, only activities that you can do to build up hope. "You're a great educator, and through your art and studies, you've tried to create harmony between nature and human beings."

Fanya's granddaughter Aliza spoke very movingly of her experiences of being Fanya's granddaughter, and over the years gaining a deeper and better appreciation for her grandmother. "She always said that she made no apologies – let the judgments land where they may... Her courage lies in her ability to confront and face that terror every day of her life. She survives every single day. Each and every day she emerges a survivor. "

Fanya, teary-eyed after her granddaughter's words, said she was filled with humility and gratitude to be standing here in Jerusalem with her family. "In 1981, I was here for the first survivor’s conference, together with my late husband. We made a vow. We would do what we can for Yad Vashem. I came today to fulfill my vow."

pictured L-R: Eli Zborowski, Chairman of the American Society for Yad Vashem, Avner Shalev, Chairman of Yad Vashem, Fanya Gottesfeld Heller, and Benjamin and Beth Heller

New Rosh Hashanah Campaign Launched to help Commemorate the Victims of the Holocaust

2010-09-07T14:41:00.004+03:00

We are now embarking on a new campaign to help commemorate the memory of the Jews who suffered Nazi oppression and fought valiantly to hold on to their identity, history and traditions. This new initiative will help preserve, restore and digitize millions of documents in our unique archive: a source of educational inspiration for our youth.

Throughout the Nazis' attempts to destroy both Judaism and the Jewish people during the Holocaust, Jews fought to cling to their most cherished traditions such as crafting a shofar (Ram’s Horn) under perilous conditions in a forced labor camp, transcribing a High Holiday Prayer Book from memory on strips of burlap sacks and sending New Year’s greetings cards from the ghettos to family and friends. Each of these acts, carried out in the face of Nazi attempts at dehumanization, was a gesture of defiance, a stubborn assertion of identity, a determined attempt at the preservation of their heritage for future generations.

Yad Vashem is privileged to possess the largest collection of Holocaust related documents, artifacts, photographs, Art, and testimonies in the world, within which we witness the richness of European Jewish life before the Holocaust, the calamity of its destruction, and the remarkable efforts of postwar revival. These collections are essential for grasping the scope and implications of the Holocaust, and the fate of its victims, and comprise an unparalleled source of educational inspiration for our youth.

As we enter the New Year period, and we think about our own wishes for the coming year, let’s make a vow: inspired by Jews who suffered Nazi oppression and fought valiantly to hold on to their identity, history and traditions, let us do our part to maintain and safeguard the past in order to secure a more meaningful future for our children.

If you'ld like to support this important project, please click here and make your commitment to help Yad Vashem preserve, restore and digitize our unique archive.

From Our Collections: Marking the New Year

2010-09-06T09:08:00.003+03:00

The holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are traditionally a time for introspection, asking for and giving forgiveness, resolving to do better, and praying for a healthy and happy year to come. Through testimony, artifacts, photos, cards and prayer books from Yad Vashem’s collections, this online exhibition, offers a glimpse into some of the ways that Jews before, during and immediately after the Holocaust marked these special days.

Remember the Holocaust and Soviet Crimes Separately

2010-08-23T10:00:00.001+03:00

A number of European countries, under the direction of the continental wide parliament, now commemorate the crimes of the Nazis and the crimes of the Soviets together. The date designated for this is August 23, the day in 1939 when the Nazis and the Soviets signed a pact that essentially gave them the green light to gobble up most of Poland, an act which resulted in the outbreak of the Second World War in Europe. This endeavor to merge the crimes of the two regimes into one common memory is deeply flawed.

Arguably, the most serious problem regarding the conflation of these two disparate histories is where the Jews fit into them. On the one hand, students of the war know that the Jews were the foremost victims of the Nazis and their partners. This is not just a matter of statistics. The murder resulted from the Nazi view of the Jews as their main and implacable enemy on racial and ideological grounds. It is an undeniable fact that the attempt to murder all Jews everywhere was helped along by not insignificant groups in the countries allied to or occupied by Nazi Germany. On the other hand in the counties that comprise the former Communist bloc, Jews are still generally regarded as the main villains who perpetrated Soviet crimes. Even though the historical record shows this to be false - for example in Estonia before the Nazi invasion of summer 1941, Jews suffered deportation under the Soviets in twelve times greater numbers than their percentage in the population - the myth that Jews as a collective collaborated with the Soviets and benefited from them at the expense of their neighbors, continues to be a truism.

The post-Communist societies of Central and Eastern Europe feel a tremendous need to commemorate their suffering under the Soviet regime and desperately want that suffering to be recognized by fellow Europeans. At the same time a minority in these societies believe they must squarely face their communities’ role in the persecution of the Jews during the Holocaust era. For those, however, that would like to avoid genuine introspection the joint commemoration, of Nazi and Soviet crimes provides an extremely useful vehicle. Through such joint commemoration they feel they can admit a lesser degree of culpability in the murder of the Jews, pointing a finger at “a few extremist collaborators,” and then immediately diverting attention to the “fact” that the Jews did their neighbors much more harm than the neighbors did to them. In other words, in this line of reasoning, collaboration in the murder of the Jews was warranted.

Officially sanctioned historical distortion sets the stage for a variety of reactionary, xenophobic, racist and neo-fascist political and ideological movements to gain ground with impunity. Jobbik in Hungary is a salient example. Moreover the rise of Jobbik and similar groups represents a very dangerous trend in post-Communist Europe: the glorification without qualification of all forces that struggled for the nation and opposed Communism, and concomitantly, the denigration of absolutely everything that happened during the Communist period. The first includes lionizing those who surely fought the Communists, but often waged war alongside the Nazis as well, and even took part in the murder of the Jews. Much too frequently, such figures are seen as unadulterated patriotic heroes and their criminal acts are glossed over. By casting the Communists as an evil equal to or greater than the Nazis, no credit at all is accorded to the Soviet Union for their pivotal role in the defeat of Nazi Germany and its partners. The understanding that had the Nazis won, life under them would have been infinitely worse for the great majority of Europeans than it was under the Communists (as awful as it often was), is not only given short shrift, it is not mentioned at all. In a nutshell, fostering misshapen versions of history makes the difficult business of nurturing truly democratic and pluralistic societies in the former Communist bloc infinitely harder.

The crimes of the Holocaust and the crimes of the Soviet regime each deserve to be researched, discussed, taught and remembered. But this must be done in a way that is true to the historical record, and which ultimately serves efforts to create a better society. Thoughtful comparisons and contrasts are important for cultivating greater understanding of all historical events that have even a slight degree of similarity. Equating and merging distinct events, however, never clarifies issues. Rather the opposite is true, it obscures them under a patina of oversimplification and artificial congruity. So we must remember the Holocaust, and we most certainly should remember Communist crimes - separately - each in their own context, and with a finely tuned sense of similarities and differences, and what they mean to us.

Dr. Robert Rozett is the Director of the Yad Vashem Libraries in Jerusalem, author of Approaching the Holocaust, Texts and Contexts, Vallentine Mitchell, 2005 and a soon to be published study on Hungarian Jewish Forced Laborers on the Eastern Front

Palestinians Learn about the Holocaust at Yad Vashem

2010-08-19T11:38:00.002+03:00

A group of Palestinians visited Yad Vashem yesterday. Here's an interesting article about this grassroots effort to learn more about the Holocaust.

Palestinians Learn About the Holocaust at Yad Vashem

Yad Vashem Comment Following Reports of a Fire in Majdanek

2010-08-10T15:11:00.000+03:00

Following reports this morning that a barracks at the Majdanek camp was seriously damaged by fire last night, Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev spoke to Majdanek Museum Director Tomasz Kranz and expressed his support.

Shalev offered assistance to the Majdanek Museum, and expressed his deep sorrow that such an important site, including valuable artifacts had been damaged or destroyed. According to the Museum, some 10,000 shoes from victims of Majdanek were destroyed during the fire. “The damage to these irreplaceable items is a loss to a site that has such historical value to Europe, Poland and the Jewish people,” said Shalev after his conversation with Kranz. The cause of the fire is not yet known, and all possibilities are being investigated.

A Rich Culture Remembered

2010-08-09T16:23:00.002+03:00

Yad Vashem’s Synagogue was filled last week with Holocaust survivors from Greece and their families who gathered together for an annual remembrance day commemorating the Jews of Kos and Rhodes who were murdered in the Holocaust. They sang traditional songs in Ladino, remembering their lost communities and rich culture, listened to testimony of survivors and a lecture by Na’ama Galil about the day the Jews of Rhodes arrived at Auschwitz, and took part in a moving ceremony that including lighting the Yad Vashem candelabra. Foundation for the Preservation of the Jewish Heritage of Rhodes Chairman Mario Suriano remarked, "We have met at this holy place, Yad Vashem, in order to remember the event that shouldn't have occurred - the Holocaust. Our purpose is to remember, not to forget. To forget is to murder them once again.”

Holocaust survivor from Greece lighting a candelabra to comemorate the Jews of Rhodes and Kos who were murdered in the Shoah.

In September 1942, the Nazis conquered Rhodes immediately following their invasion of Italy. As a result of the allied bombardment of Rhodes, bombs also exploded in the Jewish quarter of the Island. A great number of Jews - among them young children, died. In July 1944, some 1,650 Jews that remained on the island were ordered to gather at assembly centers. They were then sent to Athens on two coal barges, without any food or water. The barges initially made their way to the nearby island of Kos where another 120 Jews were piled onto the barges to be deported along with the Jews of Rhodes. The boats then stopped at the island of Leros to deport the single Jewish man who lived on the island. Upon arriving in Athens the Jews were detained at the infamous Haidari and from their deported to Auschwitz. Only 180 of them survived.

2010-08-01T16:14:00.004+03:00

After visiting Yad Vashem on Friday, NBA star Amare Stoudemire said, "It was an incredible experience. I learned a lot, and encourage my friends and others to visit Yad Vashem as well."

The Little Red Dress that Survived Generations

2010-07-29T12:37:00.006+03:00

Over the years, Yad Vashem has been dedicated to both commemorating those that were murdered in the Shoah, as well as educating future generations throughout Israel and the world about what took place. One of the programs that Yad Vashem has recently developed in this vein is the Bar/Bat Mitzvah program.

Left to right: Haviva Peled-Carmeli, Debbie Berman, her mother and Emma Berman

A few weeks ago, I was privileged to witness a very special Bat Mitzvah ceremony at the Yad Vashem Synagogue. Twelve-year-old Emma Berman not only participated in Yad Vashem’s Bat Mitzvah Twinning program, but Emma, her mother, and grandmother, also donated a very special artifact to Yad Vashem’s Senior Artifacts Curator, Haviva Peled-Carmeli. This special artifact is a dress that belonged to both Emma’s grandmother during the war and Emma as a little girl – a dress that has since witnessed both suffering and happiness.

Emma’s great-grandmother, Emma Salgo nee Steinberg, whom she is named after, was born to a family of 7 in Balmazuvarois, Hungary on February 20, 1914. She later married Haim Salgo and started a family of her own. Haim and Emma then moved to Budapest where their two children, Robbi and Shoshana were born.

The Salgo family lived peacefully in Budapest until 1944, when the Germans invaded Hungary. While Haim was able to escape to Switzerland and the two children were hidden in Budapest, Emma was taken to the Kaufering labor camp, a sub camp of Dachau, in Germany in November 1944.

Emma managed to keep one of her daughter’s dresses throughout the entire period she was interred at Kaufering. This red dress continuously provided Emma with strength and a glimmer of hope that her living nightmare would end and she would one day return to her family.

With the dress still in her possession, Emma was finally liberated from Dachau at the end of the war. When she returned to Budapest she found that though many members of her extended family had been murdered, her entire nuclear family had in fact miraculously survived.

During the moving Bat Mitzvah ceremony recently Yad Vashem, Emma also spoke about Emma Vadnai, a young girl from Hungary murdered by the Nazis, who she was twinned with to mark the occasion. At the conclusion of the event, Emma and her mother, Debbie Berman (a project Coordinator for Yad Vashem's Shoah Victims' Names Recovery Project), donated the little dress to Yad Vashem.

Emma Berman in her grandmother's dress

One of the most magnificent displays during the ceremony was a slideshow that played in the background while Debbie spoke. At the end of the slideshow there was a picture of Emma’s grandmother as a little girl and then a picture of Emma Berman wearing her grandmother's dress.

Debbie explained, “Many years later, before I moved to Israel, my mother gave me her little red dress, which I have kept all these years. When my daughter Emma was a baby I dressed her in the dress.

“Only when I saw [Emma] playing and smiling while wearing the dress did I realize how much pain my grandmother must have been in all those months away from her little baby,” said Berman.

Berman convinced her mother to donate the dress to Yad Vashem as she realized that the dress was starting to fall apart.

“In honor of the Bat Mitzvah, my mother, Emma and I, donated the dress […] it was very moving for all of us and I felt we did the right thing,” said Berman. “The story of Emma Salgo and her baby’s red dress is our family’s private story, but it also belongs to the Jewish people. Now the dress and the story will be preserved here at Yad Vashem for generations to come.”

Greek Prime Minister just left Yad Vashem

2010-07-22T11:40:00.006+03:00

The Prime Minister of Greece, George A. Papandreou has just left Yad Vashem after an emotional visit. The Prime Minister experienced a tour of the Holocaust History Museum, with a special emphasis on the story of Greek Jewry, guided by Yehudit Shendar, Deputy Director of the Museums Division and Senior Art Curator at Yad Vashem. He also participated in a memorial ceremony in the Hall of Remembrance and visited the Children's Memorial.

The Prime Minister and Ms. Shendar listen to a testimony from a Greek Jewish Holocaust survivor in the Holocaust History Museum.

At the conclusion of his visit the Prime Minister said, "It is difficult to describe with words what one feels, after the going through the memories of the Holocaust. It is a constant reminder to all of us to cherish and protect everyone's rights for the good of humanity. When even one person's rights are violated or even threatened, it is a violation of the rights of us all. Never again ...to xenophobia, racism, antisemitism... [we must] fight for open societies, freedom, equality, justice to each and every one. This is how we in Greece see democracy, the birthplace of democracy. We continue to highlight the history of Jews in my country... Thank you for this passionate description of the terrible violence and barbarism that the Jews went through."

Yad Vashem Visit Leaves Young Palestinians Deeply Reflective

2010-07-21T16:43:00.008+03:00

“I am acquainted with Israelis and I’ve participated in meetings between Israelis and Palestinians, but I wanted to know more about the Holocaust… I sent out an e-mail to a few friends and posted on Facebook, and was surprised by the interest. I received more than 60 positive responses from people that I didn’t even know – from Ramallah, Hebron and other places.”

That is how 27 young Palestinians, in their 20s and early 30s, came to make the trip to Jerusalem to try to understand for the first time the tragedy of the Holocaust. For technical reasons (travel permits etc) only 27 men came on the visit, but “A”, who organized the group, is convinced that there will be another group soon. The young people were mainly university students, and even a former security prisoner who served 12 years in an Israeli jail.

"A" was also criticized for initiating the visit. “People found it very difficult to accept,” he said. “Some said what, now you are working toward normalization with the Israelis?”

Their visit to Yad Vashem included a guided tour of more than two hours in the Holocaust History Museum and several intense hours of discussion in the International School for Holocaust Studies. Yaakov Yaniv, who guided the group in Arabic noted that they came with heavy baggage and with a great deal of ignorance and many pre-conceptions. “They didn’t know anything about Nazi ideology, and they spoke about the Holocaust in terms of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” After speaking to them at great length of the Nazi ideology, Yaniv told them his own personal story, the loss of the majority of his family members in the Holocaust and his own longing as a young child to sit on his grandfather’s lap and tug at his beard. He found it especially important to explain to them that the Holocaust was not simply another political disagreement. Yaniv commented that at the end of the day he doesn’t know how much the visit influenced the group, but he does know that they left with grave reflections.

Discovering the Unknown

2010-07-18T11:07:00.012+03:00

By Danielle Singer

Between studying the Holocaust in both university and Hebrew day school, I consider myself to be no stranger in the world of Holocaust memory. Nevertheless, during Na’ama Shik’s lecture, earlier this week, on Jewish female experience in Aushwitz-Birkenau, I found myself dumbfounded. I realized I knew very little on the topic of women’s experiences in the Holocaust.

Shik was one of many historians who participated in Yad Vashem’s International Institute for Holocaust Research’s almost two week long workshop “The Persecution and Murder of the Jews: A Grassroots Perspective” that took place from July 5th to the 13th. After sitting through a couple of lectures, Shik’s in particular, hit home.

Only quite recently, give or take a decade, have scholars begun to focus on women and the Holocaust. It was just two years ago that Yad Vashem opened its first exhibit focusing on women and the holocaust, called "Spots of Light" (http://www1.yadvashem.org/exhibitions/women-eng/intro.html). It is an obvious fact that Jewish women in the camps were terrorized and tortured and murdered by the Nazis. Yet, the specific differences between men and women’s experiences in the camps are still subjects that have not been significantly studied. Though Jewish women were tortured and killed because of the fact that they were Jews, the women’s day to day experiences in the camps and ghettos were obviously different then the men by virtue of the fact that they were women. Women and the Holocaust is such a crucial facet in Holocaust research. I realized at the end of the lecture that there has been a void in my Holocaust education, which before today overlooked half of the Holocaust’s victims and survivors.

I have been interning at Yad Vashem for six weeks now and though this period has been quite short I have still learnt so much. I have realized that the Holocaust is an infinite vessel of unknown information that historians are constantly discovering. Even though the Holocaust is one of the most documented and researched events in history, there are still many pieces of information waiting to be uncovered. For example, just last year, Yad Vashem put together a research project called “The Untold Stories” (http://www1.yadvashem.org/untoldstories/homepage.html) focuses on the previously unknown fates of the mid-sized and smaller communities that were murdered by Nazis.

One thing that I will take away from this internship is the fact that the study of the Holocaust is vast. There is always so much to learn it is clear my Holocaust education will never be complete.

Shik, a historian from Tel Aviv University and Yad Vashem’s International School for Holocaust Studies, presented on the last day of the conference, sponsored by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.

Danielle Singer, a student at Dalhousie University, is interning at Yad Vashem this summer.

Jonathan Safran Foer and Nicole Krauss at Yad Vashem

2010-07-08T10:58:00.004+03:00

This week, bestselling authors Jonathan Safran Foer and Nicole Krauss visited the Holocaust History Museum at Yad Vashem. The couple were visibly moved during an emotional visit of some three hours. Their guided tour concluded with a visit to the Yad Vashem Archives where they saw several documents regarding members of Krauss' family. Foer and Krauss are in Israel to particpate in the Jerusalem Cultural Fellowship at Mishkenot Sha’ananim.

Jonathan Safran Foer and Nicole Krauss, guided by Yehudit Shendar (left) Deputy Director of the Museums Division at Yad Vashem, during a tour of the Holocaust History Museum.

“Because they had a heart”: Yad Vashem Honors Bulgarian and Polish Righteous of the Nations

2010-06-30T16:34:00.007+03:00

As a granddaughter of a survivor, I grew up with the horror stories of what happened to the Jews in the Holocaust. I have walked hand in hand with my grandfather through Auschwitz, listening to his real-life nightmares. After each story I am always left with the same question: how could people stand by and allow such atrocities to happen to a fellow human being?

The families of Reiber and Lisieczynski
in the Garden of the Righteous of the Nations

This past week, however, I heard the stories of three unique individuals who did speak out and fight for those who were victimized and persecuted by the Nazis. In fact they put their own lives on the line to help others. On Monday and Wednesday, ceremonies were held to honor Bulgarian Vladimir Kurtev and Polish Jan and Julia Lisieczynski as Righteous Among the Nations.

On Monday, Kurtev’s grandchildren, Jasmin and Vladimir Kurtev received the award on their grandfather’s behalf. Kurtev was a teacher in Kyustendil who maintained strong ties with the leaders of the city’s Jewish community. In February 1943 Kurtev and other fellow Bulgarians found out about a decree to deport 20, 000 Bulgarian Jews and decided to act. Kurtev was one of four delegates who set out for Sofia to stop the deportation. The four delegates met with the Minister of Interior, Gabrovski and insisted that the edict be revoked. With the help of the other three delegates, Kurtev’s courageous and determined actions succeeded in releasing all arrested Jews from old Bulgaria.

Avner Shalev, Chairman of Yad Vashem, perfectly described Kurtev as a truly unique individual who was “a Bulgarian patriot, courageous fighter and loyal friend to the Jewish community.”

From left to right: Avner Shalev (Chairman of Yad Vashem), Jasmin Kurtev, Foreign Minister of Bulgaria, Nikolai Mladenov and Vladimir Kurtev

“Kurtev understood that he is a part of a civic society and, therefore, it was his civic duty to put a stop to what the Germans wanted,” said Shalev. “Kurtev was a unique man who changed the course of history.”

Like Kurtev, the Lisieczynskis also changed the lives of Ben Zion and Yehezkel Reiber. The family repeatedly took both boys and their father into their home. After the boys’ father, Yitzchak was shot on his way to work; the Lisieczynski rescued the boys by hiding them under a pit inside their home.

“They saved us,” said Reiber. “They hid us. They guarded our lives while risking their own.”

I find bravery, such as Kurtev’s or the Lisieczynskis’ perplexing. When the majority of Europe ignored the murder of millions of Jews, how were these few willing to risk their own lives to save the lives of others? Reiber responded simply, “Because they had a full heart.”

Today, at the end of ceremony, all of Ben Zion’s children and grandchildren stood around their grandfather and the Lisieczynskis’ granddaughter, Krystyna Kudiuk, arm in arm, smiling at the camera. It is no small significance that in saving the Reiber brothers, Kudiuk’s grandparents also saved many future children and grandchildren.

“The [Lisieczynskis] are a special family,” said Reiber with tears in his eyes. “Jan, Julia, Krystyna – I love you.”

On Holocaust Education

2010-06-29T11:21:00.004+03:00

Here's a piece in today's International Herald Tribune by the former president of Poland reflecting on the role of Holocaust education today. Interesting read!

On Holocaust Education by Aleksander Kwasniewski

"Her family was my only light in vast darkness"

2010-06-23T10:04:00.008+03:00

Righteous Among the Nations From Belarus Visit Yad Vashem

An emotional meeting took place yesterday at Yad Vashem between Holocaust survivor, Rachel Shmielowitch (née Davidson) and her rescuer, Aysha Trofimova (née Kapatansky) from Belarus. Both women were accompanied by their families while they toured the Holocaust History Museum and then gathered at the Garden of the Righteous Among the Nations, to view Trofimova’s name, which is engraved on the Wall of Honor.

The Davidson family, Israel, Proma, and their children, Rachel, Vladimir and Mira lived in Minsk. In August of 1942, the Davidsons were forced with the rest of Minsk’s Jews to move to the Ghetto. The Davidson family had always been friendly with the Kanapatskys, a Muslim family from Minsk and turned to them for help during their time in the ghetto. Unlike many Belarusians who were indifferent to the atrocities committed against the Jews, the Kanapatskys immediately helped the Davidsons.

The Kanapatskys first hid Shmielowitch’s father, Israel Davidson, after he was ordered to the work camp, Camp Drodzy. Israel spent most of his time in a deep pit he had dug under a pile of firewood. He then returned to the Kanapatsky house for a second time after a mass killing occurred in March 1942, in which 5,000 people were killed at once in the heart of the ghetto.

“They made people stand in a line and would shoot each person: mothers, fathers, children,” recalls Shmielowitch. “The dead fell into a pit that was in the middle of the ghetto. I can still hear the screaming and crying.”

In June 1943, the ghetto began to be liquidated and Rachel’s mother and her two siblings escaped to the Kanapatsky’s house.

“The Kanapatskys hid my family even though they were risking their lives. If they would have been caught they would’ve been killed with us,” said Shmielowitch.

The Kanapatskys provided the Davidsons with clothes, food and shelter. After a few weeks they were taken to the forest in hopes of joining the Jewish Partisans. For a year Shmielowitch’s father fought with the Partisans while the rest of the family stayed in the civilian camp. After the war the Davidsons returned to Minsk and lived next door to the Kanapatskys who provided them with endless amounts of help. In 1958, the Davidsons moved to Poland where they then made aliyah. Shmielowitch promises to never forget what the Kanapatskys did for her and her family.

“The Kanapatsky family is a part of my family,” said Shmielowitch. “It was only because of their help - their humanity - that I stayed alive. They acted with courage even though they knew death was awaiting them. Aysha is a true ‘Righteous Among the Nations’. Her family was my only light in vast darkness.”

Trofimova is one of 600 people from Belarus who are currently recognized by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations.

37,500 Names Deposited at Yad Vashem

2010-06-17T13:28:00.005+03:00

Heinz Kounio, is one of only 1,950 Jews from Salonica who survived the Holocaust. Deported from Greece in 1943, he survived Auschwitz, and at the conclusion of the war returned to his hometown. Kounio, the former head of the Jewish community in Salonica, has spent years gathering and documenting the names of 37,500 victims of the Holocaust in order to commemorate the memory of his fellow Salonicans who did not survive. This week, he presented these names to Yad Vashem to be preserved in the Hall of Names.

Sixty-seven years ago, the deportation of the Jews of Salonica and other Jewish communities in Greece began – most of whom never returned. They were deported to a destination previously unknown to them – Auschwitz-Birkenau. More than 53,000 members of the Salonica Jewish community - out of a total of 56,000 - were murdered there. The deportations of the Jews of Salonica to Auschwitz began in March 1943, and lasted until August 1943. Most were murdered on arrival at the camp. At the end of the war in 1945, only 1,950 Jews remained from the extraordinary community of Salonica. A city with an illustrious Jewish culture, rich in spirituality and creativity was cut off and lost from the world.

The addition of some 40,000 names will double the number of the names of Holocaust victims from Salonica, Greece that are recorded in the Central Database of Shoah Victims' Names. (The Database previously included some 22,000 Salonican names, but some of the names just received are duplicates of ones already recorded in the database.) The new names will be digitized and available online within a few short months at http://www.yadvashem.org/ . At the present time, the database currently contains some 3.8 million names of victims of the Holocaust, and efforts are actively being made to gather as many names as possible before it is too late.

Bette Midler at Yad Vashem

2010-06-14T16:52:00.002+03:00

The actress Bette Midler has just left Yad Vashem after an emotional visit to the Holocaust History Museum. Here she is visiting the Hall of Names.

Discovering Lost Family via the Yad Vashem Database

2010-06-14T10:56:00.010+03:00

In a tale spanning across Poland, Belaraus, Israel and the US, Avner Yonai (38) a native Israeli businessman living in California, recently connected with a lost relative after discovering Pages of Testimony submitted by his grandfather in memory of family members who were murdered in the Shoah.

Since 2008, Avner has served as a volunteer through the JFSF of San Francisco for the Shoah Victims' Names Recovery Project where he meets with Holocaust survivors to assist them in filling out Pages of Testimony in memory of their loved ones. As part of his volunteer work Avner also learned to conduct searches on the Central Database of Shoah Victims' Names database, which ultimately led him to discover a living connection with a descendant of his great aunt Bluma, who was brutally murdered in the Shoah.

Avner's maternal grandfather, David Rybak, was born in Poland in the town of Gora Kalwaria (aslo known as Ger). Yonai recently unearthed his grandfather’s travel and aliyah documents, which show that David Rybak emigrated from Poland to Mandatory Palestine in 1935, before the Nazi conquest of Poland. One of his brothers, Beryl Rybak remained in Poland and was murdered with his wife Bluma (née Goldhecht) in Treblinka in 1942. Bluma’s brother, Yaacov Goldhecht survived and filled out a Page of Testimony in her memory in Israel in the 1950's. Avner then discovered that his grandfather, David Rybak, had also filled out Page of Testimony commemorating his sister-in-law, Bluma.

Avner’s research also revealed that Yaacov Goldhecht was from the same town as his grandfather, where they were neighbors and friends, and played together as members of The Mandolin Orchestra of Ger. Beryl Rybak served as the conductor of the orchestra which was active during the 1920’s and 1930’s; most of its members were killed in the Shoah. Goldhecht explained in an excerpt from the Gora Kalwaria Yizkor book that it was: “A unique orchestra directed by Beryl Ryback …who knows? Under different circumstances Beryl could well have gone on to become a world-renowned conductor.

This all exists only in the memories of the survivors of Ger, in all the countries of the world where they have been scattered…from time to time they feel a longing for this beautiful romantic past, that belongs to a past that is dead and buried… The Jews of Ger died the deaths of martyrs by the hands of the vile Nazi murders!”

Using the contact information on the Page of Testimony submitted by Yaacov Goldhecht, Avner succeeded in tracing the Goldhecht family. He immediately contacted his newly found cousin Giora Goldhecht (Yaacov’s grandson) and members of the two branches of the family came together for an emotional reunion in the Goldhecht family home in Israel.

Avner’s mother Lea and his uncle Yitzhak were both named after members of the family that perished in the Shoah, yet until Avner’s recent discovery, neither of them was aware of the fact that their father had submitted Pages of Testimony to Yad Vashem.

Avner says he used the Internet to plan his travels to Poland and Belarus where he painstakingly traced his family roots in a journey that has knit together the past and present in a way that sheds light on his Israeli American family and the intertwined drama of Jews and non-Jews in four countries. In addition to launching a Facebook page dedicated to the orchestra that was once so pivotal to his family, Yonai is also spearheading an effort to stage a revival concert of the mandolin orchestra of Ger.

The Three R’s: Remembrance, Resentment and Responsibility

2010-06-13T09:57:00.000+03:00

by Richelle Budd Caplan

Remembrance ceremonies and events paying respect to the victims of the Holocaust began to be organized even before the Second World War ended. Official Commemoration ceremonies of Yom Hashoah, Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, beginning at sunset on the twenty-seventh day of the Jewish month of Nisan, became institutionalized in the State of Israel in the 1950s.

On November 1, 2005, the General Assembly of the United Nations designated January 27 as an annual International Day of Commemoration to honor the victims of the Holocaust. Approximately sixty years earlier, on January 27, 1945, Soviet forces liberated the Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi extermination camp complex.

Approximately three-and-a-half years later, on April 2, 2009, the European Parliament in Brussels passed the “European Conscience and Totalitarianism” resolution, leading to the annual marking of August 23 as a day recalling the millions of victims that were deported, imprisoned, tortured and murdered by totalitarian and authoritarian regimes during the twentieth century in Europe. According to the text of this European Union resolution, “ …from the outset European integration has been a response to the suffering inflicted by two world wars and the Nazi tyranny that led to the Holocaust and to the expansion of totalitarian and undemocratic Communist regimes in Central and Eastern Europe, as well as a way of overcoming deep divisions and hostility in Europe through cooperation and integration and of ending war and securing democracy in Europe…”

Clearly, European policy makers did not randomly choose August 23, but rather purposefully sought to commemorate the secretly signed Ribbentrop-Molotov agreement in Summer 1939.

The “European Conscience and Totalitarianism” remembrance day does not implicitly equate the crimes against humanity perpetrated by Nazi Germany and the Communist USSR. However, the crimes of Nazism and Stalinism essentially become blurred even though the uniqueness of the Holocaust is specifically noted. Overall, it appears that this August 23 remembrance day is rooted in deep historical resentment toward the Soviet regime.

In light of recent debates, reports and statements within international circles that have sparked many questions surrounding historical narratives, the International School for Holocaust Studies at Yad Vashem is organizing its seventh international conference on the Holocaust and Education focusing on “Shoah Education and Remembrance in Hindsight and in Foresight: Text and Context,” June 12-13, 2010. More than 200 participants representing approximately 40 countries are taking part in sessions focusing on the current challenges of historical memory.

This international conference, organized under the auspices of the Israeli Chairmanship of the Task Force for Internation Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance and Research is geared for decision makers in the field of education and culture. During these proceedings, world renowned scholars such as Alain Finkielkraut, Samuel Pisar, Yehuda Bauer and others will focus on a number of questions, such as: How is educating about and remembering the Holocaust relevant to young people today who seek to accurately understand what occurred as well as to take responsibility for the truth about the past? Do the many memorial days throughout the year diminish or hightlight the meaning of the Holocaust? How do we authorize the teaching about different historical contexts without a competition between the suffering of victims of totalitarianism?

Although crimes under Soviet rule should be annually commemorated, they should not be linked to the Nazi regime. After all, what is our responsibility toward educating the future leaders of tomorrow about European history? Should different historical contexts be merged into one over-arching text about totalitarianism? Does such a merging blur all meaning out of the events?

All remembrance days provide educators with an opportunity to grapple with the complexity of history. Nevertheless, commemorative events should not come in place of educators creating an active learning process together with their students in their classrooms. Unquestionably, teaching about difficult and complex subject matter is a major challenge. However, on the basis of our professional experience at our School with educators from all over the world, we know that studying about the Holocaust, like all events in history, should not be oversimplified or taught out of context.

Ultimately, it is hoped that this conference will highlight the axiom of remembrance leading to promoting educational responsibility rather than festering resentment among today’s youth.

Richelle Budd Caplan is Director of the European Department, International School for Holocaust Studies, Yad Vashem.

Yad Vashem honors Belgian Baroness as Righteous Among the Nations

2010-06-10T16:28:00.003+03:00

Holocaust survivor Joseph Fruhauf, joined by his family and friends, and the family of Baroness Gisele Van der Staten Waillet from Belgium gathered together at Yad Vashem today, Thursday June 10, 2010, for an emotional ceremony where the Baroness was posthumously recognized as Righteous Among the Nations. The Righteous’ daughter Baroness Gaëtane van der Stegen of Belgium, daughter-in-law of the Righteous Baroness Eliane van der Straten, and several of their children came to Israel especially for the event were they received a medal and certificate of honor on her behalf and unveiled her name on a wall in the Garden of the Righteous Among the Nations. Belgian Ambassador to Israel H.E. Bénédicte Frankinet participated in the event.

"Even though you did not have the privilege to know your grandmother, you have every reason in the world to be proud of her." -- Nadine Hollander Fruhauf and Frederick Fruhauf speaking on behalf of their father Holocaust survivor Jospeh Fruhauf.

The Fruhauf family, Feiwel, Lily (née Rapaport), and their children, 25-year-old Lea and 21-year-old Joseph, lived in Antwerp, Belgium. On September 26, 1942, Feiwel was arrested by the Nazis and deported to Auschwitz and, soon after, Lea’s husband of only six weeks was deported to Auschwitz as well. Lily, Lea and Joseph succeeding in escaping and found various hiding places in Brussels. With the aid of a Catholic organization that helped women find employment, the Fruhaufs were put in touch with Baroness Gisele Van der Staten Waillet, a devout Catholic widow with nine children of her own - eight daughters and a son. Although the pious Baroness initially did not want men to stay in her home, in light of the desperate plight of the Fruhaufs, she permitted Lily to hide with both her son and daughter on her estate in Southern Belgium. There the Fruhaufs posed as household staff: Lily worked in the kitchen as a cook, Lea as a chambermaid and Joseph as a servant – serving meals and taking care of the chapel on the estate. In order to further disguise their identity, the Fruhaufs attended weekly mass and the other servants were strictly forbidden to speak of the Fruhaufs before strangers.

Despite the isolation of the estate, the family was often in danger of discovery. Several times throughout the war, the Nazis searched the estate, looking for members of the underground. On these occasions the Baroness quickly hid Joseph in the cellar or under a bed, and the Germans failed to discover the family hiding on the grounds.

Lily, Lea and Joseph remained at the Baroness’ home from the end of 1942 until September 1944. After liberation, the family returned to Antwerp where they learned that both Fiewel and Lea’s husband had been murdered. Baroness Gisele Van der Staten Waillet passed away in April 1950. The Commission for the Designation of the Righteous Among the Nations decided to award Gisele Van der Staten Waillet the title of Righteous Among the Nations on November 30, 2009 .

30 Survivors Pay Tribute to Rescuer - Major Karl Plagge, Officer in the Wermacht

2010-06-10T16:22:00.004+03:00

Some 30 Holocaust survivors from Israel, Germany, the United States, France and Canada who survived the Holocaust thanks to Righteous Among the Nations Maj. Karl Plagge visited Yad Vashem yesterday. The group toured the Holocaust History Museum before participating in a memorial ceremony in the Hall of Remembrance and an event in the Yad Vashem Synagogue. Also this week, Yad Vashem videoed their group testimony, as part of Yad Vashem project to record survivors' testimony.

Major Karl Plagge served as an officer of the Wermacht in Vilna (Vilnius) from June 1941 to June 1944. While stationed in Vilnius he was in charge of a repair facility for military vehicles (HKP 562), where hundreds of Jews worked. According to the brutal decimation policy adopted by the SS in occupied Lithuania, the first to be slated for extermination were the “unproductive” Jews. Employment at Plagge’s HKP unit thus offered a chance for survival. Plagge treated his workers well, and included many people who were not qualified as mechanics to work there in order to save them from deportation; among the Jews of Vilna it was known that if one wanted a chance to survive, the only option was to work in Plagge’s plant. In the last days of June 1944, on the eve of the German evacuation of Vilnius, Plagge assembled his Jewish workers and warned them in thinly veiled language that they were going to be handed over to the care of the SS. Some managed to escape and/or hide and some 200 survived. Karl Plagge died in 1957 and was posthumously recognized by the Commission for the Designation of the Righteous on July 22, 2004.
Holocaust survivor Michael Shimeyvitz, noted that Plagge not only saved Jews, but "he treated all his workers humanely. This was extremely rare, and for this, justifiably, he received the greatest recognition that the Jewish people can give."

Dr. Michael Good, the son of a Holocaust survivor who was rescued by Maj. Plagge, noted that while Maj. Plagge was exonerated after the war due to the intervention of the Jews he rescued, he always felt that he was guilty. He quoted a letter from Maj. Plagge, in which the Major wrote: "I am no kind of hero; I am actually a very nervous person."

Dr Harald Kindermann, Ambassador to Israel of Germany spoke emotionally about his personal family history, and said that there are two obligations -- to understand what happened -- "Only through understanding, knowing the facts, can we build a firewall to ensure it won't happen again. That is why the Yad Vashem research institute is so important." -- and to recall the Righteous Among the Nations. "They are so important for education. They show us that there is an alternative. Because too many people say, I had to do it. And when young people ask, is that true, the Righteous show us it was not. They show us there is always an alternative."

A Meaningful Connection for Zach Emanuel

2010-05-30T13:56:00.016+03:00

White house Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and his family visited Yad Vashem last week during their trip to Israel marking his son Zach's bar mitzvah. Following a guided tour of the Holocaust History Museum, Zach was "twinned" with a child victim of the Holocaust. Bar/bat mitzvah twinning projects are unqiue way for Jewish children and their families to strengthen their identification with the Jewish people by forging bonds with individual children murdered in the Holocaust.

By searching Yad Vashem's online Central Database of Shoah Victims' Names, bar and bat mitzvah kids can review Pages of Testimony containing the names, biographies and (when available) photographs submitted in their memory by relatives or friends who survived them. For a meaningful connection, the bar or bat mitzvah often chooses to twin with a child with the same Jewish name, birth month or other family connection.

Researchers from Yad Vashem's Hall of Names searched for a child with the same name as Zach and he was twinned with a boy named Zecharia Kanonitz who was shot dead by the Nazis at only 10 years old. Zach's cousin Noah Emanuel, also celebrating his bar mitzvah, was twinned with a toddler named Noah Norman, who was murded by the Nazis in Wilejka, Poland in 1942. When the group arrived in the Hall of Names, Zach and the two bnei mitzvah were each presented with a certificate acknowledging their committment to Holocaust remembrance. The Emanuels also asked for a copy of the Page of Testimony so that Zecharia Kanonitz's name could be remembered in their synagogue when they return to the United States.

A conversation with Dan Michman, Yad Vashem's Chief Historian

2010-05-30T10:30:00.008+03:00

From Haaretz Books, June 2010, by David B. Green

Last month marked the publication of the new two-volume “Yad Vashem Encyclopedia of the Ghettos During the Holocaust."” ‏(Guy Miron, editor in chief, and Shlomit Shulhani, co-editor; published by Yad Vashem and distributed by NYU 67 pages, $199‏).

Though not a book that even a Shoah scholar would be likely to read through from start to finish, the encyclopedia offers a new and comprehensive look at a subject that has until now been largely misunderstood, according to Prof. Dan Michman, the chief historian of Yad Vashem and the author of a fascinating introduction to the book. For those of us who may have thought that the Nazis established ghettos mainly in the big cities and that they were an integral part of a well-thought out “final solution,” Michman’s foreword will come as a surprise. For one, the encyclopedia includes entries on more than 1,100 cities, towns and villages where the occupying Germans forced the Jews to live in concentrated areas. And, despite the widespread existence of the phenomenon across occupied Eastern Europe, Michman states that a policy of “ghettoization” was never decided on conclusively in Berlin, and that implementation varied from town to town.

See the complete Q&A with Prof. Michman here.

Why didn't the Allies bomb Auschwitz?

2010-05-27T12:47:00.003+03:00

Could the Allies have done more during the Holocaust to stop the murders in the extermination camps? The issue of what the Allies could of, or should of done to try to prevent, or slow down the Holocaust and save Jews has been widely discussed and debated. Here, Dr. David Silberklang, Senior Historian at the International Institute for Holocaust Research and Editor-in-Chief of Yad Vashem Studies, offers a insightful look into this question.

Yad Vashem Launches Groundbreaking Encyclopedia of the Ghettos

2010-05-20T15:58:00.008+03:00

"This encyclopedia presents scholars and layment for the first time with a comprehensive view of the ghetto phenomenon" Prof. Omer Bartov

After six years of research, this groundbreaking publication was launched in New York on May 13, 2010. Dozens of professors and researchers of the Holocaust were on hand for the event.

Seventy years after the Nazi regime established the first Jewish ghetto – Piotrków Trybunalski in Poland – Yad Vashem has released a new publication: the Yad Vashem Encyclopedia of the Ghettos During the Holocaust. The encyclopedia includes entries on close to 1,100 ghettos established in the areas occupied by the Germans: Greater Poland, the Russian Republic, Ukraine, Byelorussia, Lithuania, Latvia, Hungary, Transnistria, Romania and Greece.

As the first and only comprehensive collection of the ghettos established by the Nazi regime, the encyclopedia marks an important milestone in the history of Holocaust research and historiography. While some ghettos are quite familiar to the general public – Warsaw, Lodz, Lvov, Vilna and Bialystok – this epic chronicle includes the vast majority of ghettos, large and small, that existed for a few weeks or years throughout the Soviet Union and Hungary.

The encyclopedia is available for purchase online

VE Day Remembered at Yad Vashem

2010-05-10T16:12:00.021+03:00

Close to 1,000 Veterans, many from the FSU, brushed off their uniforms and metals, donning them in the sweltering Jerusalem heat, to attend a special VE Day commemoration at Yad Vashem. This year is 65 years since the Allied victory over Nazi Germany. The Israeli Police Orchestra performed traditional band music - remember "My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean"?, while former servicemen and women, fighters and partisan groups hummed and sang along. During an exceptional moment, the crowd spontaneously rose to its feet as the band played a moving rendition of the Partisans' Song.

Minister of Defense Ehud Barak, Minister of Immigrant Abosrption Sofa Landver and Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev saluted the fighters for their bravery and extolled them for their role in vanquishing Nazi Germany. Representatives of the Israeli government, allied countries, veteran's and partisan associations and decorated fighters laid wreaths at the base of the Monument to the Jewish Solders and Partisans who fought against Nazi Germany.

Names Recovery Project Volunteers Receive Special Training

2010-04-29T14:33:00.007+03:00

This week 40 new volunteers from across Israel participated in a training day at Yad Vashem, joining the ranks of the global network of volunteers assisting Shoah survivors and members of their generation with the task of commemorating family and friends killed in the Holocaust. The volunteers began the day by sharing their personal connection to the Shoah as well as what motivated them to joining the project.

The program included an historical overview of Yad Vashem's efforts to commemorate each individual Jew who perished in the Shoah on Pages of Testimony, special forms where the names, biographical details and, when available, photographs of Shoah victims, are recorded for posterity. To date, 3.8 million names have been entered into the Central Database of Shoah Victims' Names.

Project staff conducted hands-on training highlighting guidelines for submitting a Page of Testimony. One volunteer was moved to tears when she found a Page of Testimony for her uncle who perished in the Shoah submitted by her mother, who she explained had never spoken about her wartime experiences.

The group continued on to a guided tour of the Holocaust History Museum, including a visit to the Hall of Names, where the Pages of Testimony are archived. At the end of the day, each volunteer received a referral for a home visit with individuals who contacted Yad Vashem and requested assistance completing Pages of Testimony, commemorating Shoah victims that they had knowledge of.

More information about the Shoah Victims' Names Recovery Project is available on www.yadvashem.org or directly from Yad Vashem at names.recovery@yadvashem.org.il

“I will never forget them”

2010-04-27T19:00:00.004+03:00

Evelyne Jacobson (left holding medal) of Montreal, and Irene Dutont of Switzerland, daughters of Marthe Helene Ducommun and Pastor Marcel Ducommun receive the certificate and medal on their parents' behalf today in the Garden of the Righteous at Yad Vashem. The Ducommuns were recognized by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations for sheltering Jews during the Holocaust.

Speaking about the couple who hid her for two years, Rev. Marcel & Helene Marthe Ducommun, Holocaust survivor Nadia (Grubain) Rosenblum recalled how even during those difficult times, there were joyful moments. “I will never forget them.”

The Grubstein family had emigrated from Poland to France in 1932. When the Nazis invaded France in May 1940, the Grubsteins were among the many refugees that escaped to Southern France. During their flight, the family was arrested several times, sent to a detention camp, and eventually arrived in the Tarn District. Upon their arrival, Abraham and Sarah Grubstein, and their three children, Jacques, Morris, and Nadia, sought out the leaders of the Jewish community in Castres and requested assistance finding a place to hide. The family was referred to Reverend Cook, who in turn sent them to his colleague Reverend Marcel Ducommun in the village of Senegats.

Reverend Ducommun, who tended to the pastoral needs of three small villages, immediately agreed to provide shelter for the persecuted Jewish family. The family hid inside the church compound and were given free access to the parsonage, and Jacques and Nadia occasionally attended the local school where the Pastor’s wife was a teacher. Nadia recalled that the Reverend and his wife, Helene Marthe, visited them regularly, and gave them the keys to the library. “Thanks to them, I entered the world of music and study,” she said. When Father Ducommun, a member of the French resistance movement, would hear of imminent arrests, he hurried to warn the Grubsteins, who would flee and hide in coal miners’ huts in the vicinity of the village.

The Grubstein family was rescued by remaining under the Ducommuns’ devoted care for a period of two years. After the war, the Grubsteins became French citizens and Frenchified their name to Grubain. Father Marcel Ducommun passed away on May 2, 1990; his wife Helene Marthe passed away on June 11, 1994.

At the event honoring them today at Yad Vashem, a teary-eyed Evelyne Jacobson spoke about how moved she was to be at Yad Vashem to receive the medal and certificate on her late parents' behalf.

She told the audience about how she came to tell Yad Vashem about the story. "In 2005, I visited Israel. My father had toured Israel many times. One day, we spent the day in Jerusalem and we visited Yad Vashem. All of a sudden, I felt as if my Dad was walking with us and I mentioned it to my cousins. Memories from the past came back in full force." She described how she contacted Yad Vashem to find out about going about getting the Righteous designation for her father, and was told to find at least one family her parents had helped. "I could only remember the name of a little girl with whom I had played, Nadia, but I needed a family name. One evening, we were in Montreal, and I was working at my desk when a picture fell from a book I had fell out. A family of three children, and in the back a few words signed, Grubstein, Metz, 1945. We had looked everywhere.” After finding Nadia through the Internet, they met in August 2008 – after 63 years, for a very emotional reunion.

“My parents never hesitated to help anyone, regardless of religion, race or social background. They were committed to their faith and guided by it,” she concluded. “My parents were very modest and probably would not have asked for this recognition. I admire my parents for who they were and what they did. Today I am glad and thankful to receive this honor in their name."

New release from Yad Vashem Publications

2010-04-25T15:45:00.004+03:00

A new Yad Vashem publication has just now been released. Edited by the late Prof. David Bankier and Prof. Dan Michman, this volume addresses the representation and historiography of the Holocaust in post-war trials. The historical significance of the Nuremberg Trials is widely acknowledged, and it is equally agreed by most people today that the murder of European Jews was the greatest crime committed by the Third Reich. So why wasn't the Holocaust a central issue in any of the thirteen trials conducted by the International Military Tribunal in Germany between 1945 and 1949? The book addresses the Holocaust and its coverage by the media in the post war trials of Nazi criminals conducted in various European countries.

The publication of the book follows a symposium held in memory of Prof. Bankier at Yad Vashem this past Thursday. During the symposium Prof. Bankier's colleagues and students recalled his intellectual honesty and curiosity, as well as his personal integrity and humility. Prof. Bankier, the Head of the International Institute for Holocaust Research passed away in February. The void he left behind is felt by all who had the privilege of knowing him.

A Tangible Legacy

2010-04-19T12:57:00.005+03:00

Following the enactment of the Nuremberg Race Laws, Heinz Samson was expelled from school at the age of 15, thereby preventing him from completing his studies. In 1939, Heinz, now 19, left his family home in Norden, Germany. With only ten Riechsmarks in his pocket, he made his way to London, where he waited for his family to join him. Sadly, they never arrived. Before leaving home, his parents Heinrich and Paula gave Heinz two treasured mementos: an intricately designed signet ring from his father and a silver pendant in the shape of a book from his mother. These were to be the final tangible legacy Heinz received from his parents.

Heinz's parents were deported to Minsk November 10, 1942 never to return. His sister Gerda was deported to Auschwitz on October 24, 1942.
After intensive efforts over many years, Heinz successfully recovered a few of the family's personal possessions confiscated from their home in January 1939 by the German authorities. In 2009, Heinz gave several of these objects to Yad Vashem for safekeeping, including the sentimental parting gifts he received from his beloved parents.

Unto Every Person There is A Name

2010-04-12T15:13:00.015+03:00

They began lining up outside the Hall of Remembrance this morning at 11 a.m., each one receiving a number of white carnations before entering. Men and women, teens and seniors, stood patiently in line, waiting to recite aloud the names Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust. Some remembered parents and siblings, some friends and neighbors, others fellow Jews they had never met. Some spoke out in bold strong voices and alone others quietly and surrounded and embranced by family members, each remembered aloud, refusing to let their names be forgotten.

Engraved on the floor of the Hall of Remembrance are the names of 22 of the most infamous of the extermination and concentration camps, and murder sites. Today they were strewn with white carnations in memory of those who died by the hand of the Nazis and their collaborators.

A powerful visual voice

2010-04-11T17:24:00.005+03:00

Tomorrow a new exhibition will open at Yad Vashem. Curator of the exhibition Yehudit Shendar, writes about its significance in Haaretz:

A powerful visual voice

Sixty-five years after the Holocaust, the weight of memory continues to be borne by the survivors. Over the years, many have found ways to unburden themselves, some by means of the written word, others through verbal expression and a number by means of visual images - through film and art. When entering the new exhibition "Virtues of Memory" at Yad Vashem, one is struck by the colorfulness of the mosaic of artworks on display. The exhibit showcases works by Holocaust survivors grappling with memories from 65 years ago and beyond.

While each artist confronts a singular experience, the exhibition reveals recurring themes and modes of expression. Particularly striking is the depiction in color of images long etched into the collective memory in black and white, which reflected photographic developments at the time. Whether abstract or natural, amateur or professional, the reality experienced by the survivors is expressed in natural hues, also incorporating an expressionist element of the most intimate emotions of those who actually experienced the horrors.

The fact that art was created after the Holocaust in and of itself is noteworthy. Shortly after the war there were those, such as the German-Jewish philosopher Theodor Adorno, who raised the question of the legitimacy of artistic expression after one has witnessed the atrocities of human nature. Poetry, he famously maintained, cannot exist in a world that also contained Auschwitz.

This discussion continues today. Are movies, dance, theater and other artistic expressions appropriate outlets for anyone wishing to grapple with the subject of the Holocaust? Or are the only people entitled to use these media, as recently suggested by American author Cynthia Ozick, the survivors themselves?

In the meantime, though, we have the opportunity to view these works by the "witness-survivors," as the late French philosopher Jean-Francois Lyotard called them, "who testif[y] to the incomprehensible, the indescribable." Indeed, the unique nature of the Shoah challenged the ability of anyone to describe or relate to it, including those for whom words were not an option. "How could I tell of a world that has been destroyed?" said artist-survivor Samuel Bak, who himself has a painting on display in the show. "How could I reach out for those elusive and indefinable memories? All these concerns became the concerns of my art."

During the five decades since its founding, Yad Vashem has collected hundreds of artworks from the brushes and chisels of survivors. Together they comprise a powerful body of visual testimony, one that complements the written and oral evidence provided over the years by so many of those who witnessed the events of the Holocaust first hand. Those who committed their memories to drawing paper or canvas, or by sculpting in stone or carving in wood, in a language that was visual rather than verbal, had much to say.

"Virtues of Memory: Six Decades of Holocaust Survivors' Creativity," which opens at Yad Vashem on Holocaust Remembrance Day, April 12, is the manifestation of this collection of artistic expression. The exhibition brings together the work of close to 300 Holocaust survivors from all over the world, made since the end of the war. Each of them has worked in seclusion, yet together they form a "Holocaust school of art" that surely deserves further study. The members of this unique "school" share similar themes and modes of expression. While each faced a succession of unique experiences, in their art, they highlight the dramatic junctions that mirror the annals of the Jewish people during the war years. The crematoria, the deportations, the families torn asunder and the burning, lost world - these are not symbols, but rather depictions, of the real world during those tremulous years.

In contrast to Yad Vashem's Museum of Holocaust Art, which displays art created during the Shoah itself, the new exhibition and its accompanying extensive catalog present the work of survivors. While the former records events in real time, post-Holocaust art is a personal system of remembrance that creates a legacy for others. In that sense one may say that the show is not solely an art exhibit, but an exhibit of memory. Images that were seared into the artists' memories are being transferred to ours.

Art is that most subjective of creative forms, but in the survivors' art we glimpse a truth that we - being removed from the events - may not otherwise be able to fathom. Each of the works is the voice of an individual; combined, they present a powerful ensemble, whose commanding expression of truth and memory calls out to us all.

Yehudit Shen-Dar is deputy director of the museums division and senior art curator at Yad Vashem

Everything is in Place for tonight’s Meaningful Holocaust Remembrance Day Ceremony at Yad Vashem

2010-04-11T16:50:00.005+03:00

Holocaust Remembrance Day begins tonight, and the Yad Vashem campus has been preparing for this solemn day. Usually thousands of people visit the campus on Holocaust Remembrance Day, and tonight and tomorrow there are many events taking place. Already last week, you could already see the preparations in putting together the main opening event, in Warsaw Ghetto Square. Special lighting on scaffolding has gone up so that there is sufficient lighting (the whole event is shown live on Israel’s TV stations), thousands of chairs are being set up, the torches to be kindled are in place for the Official Ceremony which begins tonight at 8 PM.

You can read about the 6 torchlighters, Holocaust survivors who will each light a torch commemorating the six million.

This year’s theme for Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Day is The Voice of the Survivors, men and women who in their daily activities and creative endeavors honor the victims and strive to safeguard their memory for coming generations.

Soon after the ceremony finishes, you can watch the entire event on http://www.yadvashem.org/. New information has been put up on the website including and educational material is available here and Names for Names Reading Ceremonies.

Yad Vashem Statement in Wake of the Polish Tragedy

2010-04-10T22:06:00.002+03:00

Yad Vashem expresses deep sorrow over the terrible tragedy that has befallen Poland today, and sends its condolences to the families of those killed and to the Polish people.
The President of Poland, Lech Kaczynski, who visited Yad Vashem twice, saw importance in maintaining the memory of the Holocaust, and the subject of Righteous Among the Nations was particularly close to his heart. Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev noted that “in addition to the President of Poland, other senior Poles killed in the tragedy included Tomasz Merta, Deputy Culture Minister, Andrzej Przewoznik, Secretary-General of the Council for National Memory, and Janusz Kurtyka, President of the National Remembrance Institute, all of whom had maintained close and ongoing professional relationships with Yad Vashem. We wish to express our deep sorrow over their tragic deaths.”

Jewish Music Comes to Life in Yad Vashem Synagogue

2010-03-28T15:28:00.004+03:00

Last week I was privileged to hear a very special choral concert in the Yad Vashem Synagogue. The Synagogue, a monument to all the Syngogues destroyed in the Holocaust, and filled with Judaica rescued from destroyed synagogues in Europe, was a fitting stage for The "Leipziger Synagogalchor" to perfom. The choir, comprised of non-professional musicians with some professional training, was joined in their performance by two soloists who are singers with various opera houses in Liegpzig, Berlin, and Zurich.

The Choir's 26 non-Jewish members devote their work to 19th and 20th century synagogue music and Yiddish and Hebrew Folklore songs. The songs, all sung with traditional Ashekanazic (German) pronounciation, aim to preserve a vibrant cultural heritage. The choir is committed to reviving and disseminating Jewish muisc in Germany and across Europe.

The moving melodies ranged from traditional tunes like Ma tovu (How goodly are your tents, O Jacob- a traditional prayer said the synagogue) and Leach Dodi (Come my beloved, sung to welcome the Sabbath eve) to Yiddish and other folklore tunes.

The Syngagogue, overflowing in capacity - with an audience ranging in age from young teens to Holocaust Survivors - was filled with the music of Jewish tradition.

The story of a Sephardic community in the Holocaust

2010-03-18T14:03:00.005+02:00

A fascinating new exhibition has gone up on yadvashem.org, looking at the Jewish community of Monastir. Of the 3,351 Jews who lived there before the Germans invaded, only a few survived the Holocaust. Almost all the aspects of the Holocaust -- the various stories and possibilities are seen in the story of this small town. I found the testimonies particularly moving. It's so difficult to think about this entire world that has been lost. It's certainly helped me gain an understanding of what the Holocaust has taken from all of us.
July 1939, Jewish youths from Monastir on a sailboat

Producer of Avatar at Yad Vashem

2010-03-17T15:17:00.002+02:00

Today, Jon Landau, producer of Avatar and Titanic, among other films, visited Yad Vashem with his wife. They visited the Holocaust History Museum, and the Visual Center at Yad Vashem. In the Visual Center, they were touched to discover two films produced by his late father Ely Landau, The Man in the Glass Booth and The Pawnbroker among the Visual Center's collection, and viewed part of The Man in the Glass Booth at one of the Center's viewing stations.

The Visual Center at Yad Vashem is dedicated to creating the world's most comprehensive resource center of cinematic work related to the Holocaust. Currently some 6,100 films have been catalogued, and more than 3,800 films and 60,000 testimonies are available for viewing on demand.

Photo: Jon Landau and his wife viewing his father Ely's film, The Man in the Glass Booth in the Yad Vashem Visual Center today. [Yossi Ben David/Yad Vashem/Editorial Use only]

VP Biden just left Yad Vashem

2010-03-09T19:42:00.005+02:00

Vice President Joe Biden just concluded his visit to Yad Vashem. He visited with his wife, Dr. Jill Biden. Although VP Biden was here in the past, this was his first visit to the Holocaust History Museum that opened in 2005.

After a tour of the Holocaust History Museum, a memorial ceremony, and a visit to the Children's Memorial, Biden spoke about his experiences bringing his sons, as young men, to Dachau and then to Israel.

"As a young father, when I introduced each of our sons - who are grown men now - to Europe, I took them first to Dachau so they could understand as young men... the ability of mankind to be so brutal. But also I took my son here to Israel, to let him know that the indomitable spirit of human beings is not able to be snuffed out.
What I wrote in the book, is - as a fan of the Irish poet William Butler Yeats writing about his Ireland - he said, too long a suffering makes a stone of the heart. What I wrote here is that, 'every day Israel makes a lie of the poet's words, too long a suffering makes a stone of the heart.'

Because for world Jewry, Israel is the heart, for world Jewry, Israel is the light, for world Jewry Israel is the hope. If anyone ever wondered about that they ought to take a tour of the museum, they will not doubt it again."

In Memoriam - Elly Dlin

2010-03-09T14:12:00.001+02:00

Elliott (Elly) Dlin passed a way from a massive heart attack last week. He was 57 years old.

Elly began his career in the field of Holocaust Education and Museums at Yad Vashem in 1978. Along with a changing cast that included Shalmi Barmore, Yehiam Weitz, Itzik Mais, David Silberklang, Yaacov Lozowick, Michael Yaron, Shoshie Rozin, Adina Drechsler and myself, he was the heart of the then Education Department at Yad Vashem throughout the 1980s. In the early 1990s, he became the Director of the Valley of Jewish Communities. After 22 years at Yad Vashem, Elly assumed the position of Director of the Dallas Holocaust Memorial, which he held until his passing.

In the summer of 1978, I entered the Ulpan for Hebrew language study at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, toward my graduate studies. On the first day of class I became acquainted with a tall, husky and very friendly Canadian – Elly Dlin. We soon learned that we had more than being new immigrants in common. My graduate work was to focus on the History of the Holocaust and Elly already had an MA in Modern European History from the University of British Columbia – Vancouver. In addition to starting his studies toward teacher certification at the Hebrew University, he was slated to begin working part time at Yad Vashem as a lecturer and guide.

After I finished my coursework for my MA and begin working on my thesis in the summer of 1980, Elly helped set up my first real job in the field. Joining him, I began lecturing at Massuah, the Holocaust educational institute at Tel Yitzhak. Having never really lectured before, Elly provided me with important tips about outlining a talk. To this day I follow his invaluable advice about focusing on only a few main points.

By the following summer, Elly was working fulltime at Yad Vashem, and I was putting together my PhD. proposal. He suggested I begin work at Yad Vashem and I soon took to guiding groups and lecturing alongside him there as well. Elly was the person who listened to me the first times I guided and lectured, once again offering constructive criticism. Eventually like him, I was able to give a coherent lecture on a number of topics at a moment’s notice.

One of the most important changes at Yad Vashem to which Elly was a partner, was the initiation of seminars for teachers from abroad. He and Shalmi Barmore set up the first seminar in the early 1980s in English. This was the beginning the many international contacts Elly maintained while at Yad Vashem. The seed he helped sow, yielded much fruit. During the last calendar year (2009), Yad Vashem ran 90 such seminars in a multitude of languages. As a senior member of the Education Department, Elly worked on curriculum development and educational units. One of the most successful was his unit on Kristallnacht.

In the early 1980s we frequently had conversations that in retrospect I think were ahead of the curve. I remember us discussing the idea that one cannot construct Jewish identity solely around the Holocaust and talking about how problematic the idea is of deriving a specific set of lessons from that painful history. Pursuant to the latter, Elly used to lecture on how one could learn such a variety of things from human behavior in the Holocaust, much of it contradictory, that one must be very careful about drawing simplistic lessons. No matter which job Elly fulfilled throughout his career, at his core he was an educator.

Around the time Avner Shalev became Chairman of the Yad Vashem Directorate (1993), Elly was made the Director of the then, new, Valley of Jewish Communities. It is in this job that Elly began to shine as a curator of museum exhibits. He brought a number of exhibits to the Valley, including one on Lubomil and another on diplomats who rescued Jews during the Holocaust.

Elly was not only creative, he had an amazing memory and breadth of knowledge. I recall discussing some subject with him on a bus ride, when he not only quoted a passage he had read, but cited the footnote as well. Although he began but never completed his PhD. dissertation, Elly knew as much if not more about the history of the Holocaust than most University professors. He was a voracious reader, redolent with curiosity, and never seemed to be able to learn enough.

For many new immigrants to Israel, friends often take the place of distant family. For me, Elly was like family. I remember his bubbling enthusiasm when he first introduced me to his future wife, Carol. At his wedding, I clearly remember hoisting Elly into a chair, along with David Silberklang and few other close friends, and dancing with him. It must be borne in mind that it was no mean feat, since Elly was never a 90 lb weakling. Over the years we participated in each other’s family events, Brit Milah ceremonies, parties for the births of our children, Independence Day picnics and more. And then there were the dogs. Elly always had at least one dog and they were invariably as friendly, warm and gentle as their owner. Although one may well make friends with co-workers over time, it is a rare treat to begin work with someone who is already a friend, and to maintain that friendship while working together despite the ins and outs of office politics.

Sadly, over the last few years after Elly moved to Texas, our contact lessened. Life sometimes overtakes the best of intentions. But I know that for me, and for many others at Yad Vashem, Elly’s passing came as a great shock. As a colleague, mentor and friend, we continue to hold his memory dear.

Rob Rozett
Tuesday, March 09, 2010

5770 Poster for Holocaust Martrys' & Heroes Remembrance Day

2010-03-09T14:06:00.005+02:00

There is now a new official poster for the commemoration Holocaust Martrys' & Heroes Remembrance 5770. Full of visual strength and meaning, the poster integrates the traditional "yizkor" prayer with the names of victims of the Shoah, creating a dialogue between the two. The use of traditional, and even perhaps cliched symbols - the yellow of the star of david and the gray stripes, remnisicent of the uniforms worn in the concentration and death camps - are utilized in a new way. The differing elements create interest and are sure to successfully arouse curiosity and encourage deeper study of the subject of the Holocaust.