I read this today in Fox News. it hit me in the middle of my heart and
mind. So, just sharing with you... and you know why... but I always get chills
when I read about this time period in the World’s history.
It is almost with
disbelief that such a monsterous thing could happen on the World stage.
As the
article says, so many people no longer have any real knowledge of what happened
to millions obliterated from life by Hitler and the Nazis. When bad men ruled
the Earth... “Never forget!” is emblazoned in my mind... and I
wasn’t even there.
I recall visiting the Diaspora in Israel many years ago. I
can never forget. So, I would like all of you to remember also... and teach others
to “Never forget!” also... because if we forget, it can happen again....
P
A survivor looks back on Auschwitz 70 years later
Seventy years ago I
was in a Nazi concentration camp.
Since then, I’ve
seen tyrants and dictators enter and exit the global stage. Yet as the world
prepares to mark the 70th anniversary of the Auschwitz liberation, it
is perhaps well and right that we reflect on how the Holocaust shocked the moral
imagination on a scale the world could scarcely fathom.
Why ponder such
things? Because for far too many, the Holocaust remains a
mystery.
A major poll
taken last year of 53,000 people found that just 54 percent had ever heard of the
Holocaust. Knowledge of Auschwitz is likely even more limited, particularly
among young people. Past surveys have shown that nearly half of Britons had never
heard of Auschwitz. Some schoolchildren even thought Auschwitz was a type of beer.
Here at home
in America a debate erupted last year when a teenager posted a smiling selfie at Auschwitz. Whatever your
opinion on the appropriateness of her actions, I was at least pleased to be
reminded that some young Americans still visit the Nazi concentration camp to
learn history up close.
In 1944, my family and I stood in line before Dr. Joseph Mengele—the Nazi physician known as the “Angel of Death”—as my mother, grandparents, two sisters, and baby brother were all sent to the left to be burned in Hitler’s ovens. My father and I were sent to the right.
I, too, visited
Auschwitz as a teenager. In 1944, my family and I stood in line before Dr.
Joseph Mengele—the Nazi physician known as the “Angel of Death”—as my mother,
grandparents, two sisters, and baby brother were all sent to the left to be
burned in Hitler’s ovens. My father and I were sent to the
right.
The first night
inside Auschwitz my father said we must separate because together we would
suffer double. “On your own, you will survive,” he told me. “You are young and
strong, and I know you will survive. If you survive by yourself, you must honor
us by living, by not feeling sorry for us. This is what you must do.” That was
the last time I ever saw my father.
I’m grateful for my
father’s words of grace and guidance. They echo in my heart even still. It’s a
cruel thing, feeling guilty for surviving. But my father erased any future guilt
and replaced it with purpose. It was a gift only a father’s wisdom could give.
It gave me a reason to go forward, a reason to be. It does
still.
Part of heeding my
father’s words involved replacing the horrors of my Holocaust past with a life
spent creating beauty in the form of hand-tailored suits for U.S. presidents,
Hollywood films, and the world’s most influential men. In fact, my first sewing
lesson took place in the Auschwitz concentration camp laundry when I accidently
ripped the collar of Nazi soldier shirt. A guard beat me before a kind older
inmate taught me how to sew a simple stitch to repair the torn shirt. It was
hardly the ideal tailoring apprenticeship, but it was my first lesson in a skill
that became my livelihood.
But at 86, another
part of honoring my father’s wishes requires being a voice for the voiceless.
Indeed, as parents, educators, and citizens, we must all do our part to help
ensure that “Never Forget” remains much more than a threadbare catchphrase that
gathers dust and loses meaning with each passing year.
For example,
many people are surprised to learn that Auschwitz was actually a complex
comprised of three main camps and dozens of satellites. The United States Holocaust Memorial
Museum’s statistics estimate that between 1940 and
1945, at least 1.1 million Jews and 200,000 of Hitler’s undesirables were sent
to the Auschwitz complex. Of those, 1.1 million were murdered. As I’ve notedelsewhere, that number would have been
far greater were it not for the courage of the American soldiers, sailors,
airmen, and Marines who traveled around the world to defeat a moral darkness
that consumed at least six million Jewish souls.
That’s a lesson
worthy of remembrance. The 70th anniversary of the liberation marks that
moment when freedom conquered barbarism through sureness of virtue and strength
of will. Sadly, as recent events reveal, that remains a lesson humanity must
learn and relearn from generation to generation.
The word Holocaust
means “sacrifice by fire.” May the memory of the millions who were engulfed in
the flames like my family never be forgotten.
Martin Greenfield
is author of "Measure of a
Man: From Auschwitz Survivor to Presidents’ Tailor" (Regnery Publishing, November 10,
2014).
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