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Holocaust and Bravery Remembrance Day

The Holocaust as Seen in 2011



imageIt was ten a.m. in Israel on the Holocaust and Bravery Remembrance Day, and I stood in a city square as the siren started. It sounded somewhat distant, yet touched every nerve in my body. People stopped, instantly frozen in their tracks. Cars stopped, their doors opened and the drivers and passengers exited. No one was honking. No one was talking. Everyone stood straight, silent, their heads bowed. In this two-minute freeze-frame time span even the birds ceased their spring celebration. All was still, an entire nation respecting its dead, six million of them, as people recalled the Nazis’ attempt to annihilate their very being.

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For me it was personal: Most of my family, from both my mother’s and father’s side, were exterminated in the Holocaust. Those who survived of my grandparents’ generation are no longer alive. My parents, young children during the Holocaust, are the last bearers of live-testimony to the horrors humanity has bestowed on the collective Jewish presence. My parents’ generation is the story that must be told, for any story I and my generation can tell is a first hand memory of the real facts told to us. We have only witnessed the witnesses, not the events. It is even more personal to me. My grandmother’s last will and testament stated there is only one place the Jewish people must call home, the Land of Israel. It was her upbringing as a Hebrew teacher before the war, her will to survive the war and her dedication to teaching generations of Israeli children that focused on strengthening the Jewish State. Serving in the Israel Defense Forces was an obligation to our country, no questions asked. No one else would do it for us, and we must be as strong as possible to ensure the Holocaust is never repeated. It is this obligation, passed from my grandparents to my parents (my grandfather fought with the Allied Forces against the Nazis) that I inherited and stands before me every moment of every day. Today we live in a more perilous time than the 1930s. Anti-Semitism wears a different colored cloak, but is more potent than ever before. Jews in Europe are encouraged not to wear outward signs of their Judaism. European leaders use stereotypes and blood libels as part of their mainstream discourse. The number of anti-Semitic incidents rises constantly, and the rate of increase during the first decade of this century is much greater than the rate during the previous decade. In the United States, anti-Semitism is disguised as “legitimate criticism against Israel.” The situation is so egregious that Israel is demonized by traditional haters and now also by the mainstream. Israel is equated with Apartheid, Occupation and every other evildoer in the world. The process of demonization has become so prevalent and successful that anything bad happening to Israel, Israelis or Jews anywhere is justified, expected in fact. And this brings me to my grandparents’ will: We must not be quiet. We must not wait for others to act. We must engage and fight. That is, if we are to survive, and survive we must. Osama bin Laden was paid a visit by the United States of America, and the American President announced that justice has finally been served. “Justice.” On September 11th, nearly 3,000 people perished. During the five years of the Holocaust, some six million Jewish people were murdered inhumanely—their only crime was being a Jew. Ten years have passed since the attack on the United States, and if it were not a “decade” commemoration, many would not remember any more. Geographic distance and time diminish memory. Some haters claim it was a Zionist scheme. Others say that the United States deserved what it got. Now we go back in time some sixty years before that Tuesday morning in 2001. How many really remember? American Jewry did little to help. The generation that survived is disappearing so fast that soon those who participated and witnessed the Holocaust first hand will only be a memory, and once my generation and possibly the next generation is gone, no one will be left to bear witness to a survivor or a tattoo on a left arm. The words and propaganda of the “deniers” will resonate along with the terms “occupiers” and “Zionist terrorist.” A final indignity? Enormous sums of money sit in the coffers of the Israeli Government or various NGOs like the Claims Conference. Yet many (some say most) Holocaust survivors (whose number in Israel is estimated at 200,000, with six percent dying each year) do not have enough to pay for medicine or live their last years in dignity, respect and minimal comfort. Israel is just waking up to the realization something must be done. For the first time, the Government of Israel has embarked on a project, HEART, to collect information about lost property, moveable (like paintings, jewelry and artworks), non-moveable (like real-estate or industrial complexes) and other possessions (patents, bank accounts, insurance policies). This is the last opportunity to create such a database, and even now it is most difficult since many of those who were young during the Holocaust and survived may only remember they lived in a certain village or have other vague memories. What will this database do? The Government of Israel is intent on negotiating with other governments (other than Germany and Austria who have been paying restitution for decades) on the claims for the heirs of the survivors. The survivors themselves likely will never see the results. There is much to be done, for now time is our fiercest enemy as survivors are dying. I often tell the story of a visit to the office of the Claims Conference in Tel Aviv. My grandmother, a Holocaust survivor, was asked what year she was born. “1914,” she replied. She had two children when World War Two started, my mother and my uncle. Her husband died, as most other relatives. She, my mother and my uncle survived. The Claims Conference bureaucrat responded: “We have not reached your birth year yet.” They never did, not while she was alive (and she was alive several years after that visit). The bureaucrat and his colleagues all continue receiving their salaries and pensions, probably to this very day. “JUSTICE?” At a press conference yesterday, another reporter was quite critical of the Claims Conference. I waited until the press conference ended before speaking with the person who headed the Claims Conference. He reported to me that every year the German Government expands the definitions of entitlement, relaxing requirements, adding more beneficiaries. I could only say a silent prayer that some of this money would indeed reach the survivors, instead of all the bureaucrats and huge mechanism that cares more for its own continuation than the task at hand. The long day started with an annual press conference about Anti-Semitism at Tel Aviv University, continued with another press conference about the new HEART project of the Israeli Government and the Jewish Agency then ended with a private initiative. If one asks what can one do, with limited resources and little access, we can learn from one young person, Gilad, who for the past three years has hosted a Holocaust-Gathering on the Eve of the Remembrance Day. He invites friends aged in their 20s and 30s, those he knows in person and those from Facebook, to his condo in Israel. Many dozens of them gather and because there are not enough chairs, they sit on the stairs and floor. Each year he invites a different Holocaust survivor to tell their story. And so, those who were born some four decades after the Holocaust meet and hear a survivor bear witness. This is not a celebration of life. Life sits around and focuses on the stories of death and survival. Young and restless, they are consumed with the sights and sounds, the darkness and freezing cold, the cruelty, diseases and lack of humanity, and the elements of chance and survival against all odds in the story unfolding before them. There is no food served, only bottles of water. There is another, unstated purpose for these get-togethers: To get to know someone you might like. So life will have continuation, a new chance for rebirth once again. Despite all, we remain, and we are here to stay, as are our children, both the born and unborn. There is no need to attend ceremonies or spend money. Just invite a Holocaust survivor then open your home and your heart. Utilize Gilad’s example, his friends’ determination to forgo any other activity and gather, for the third year in a row, to bear witness to the very last remnants of a satanic fire still alive and growing after all these decades. This is different from watching a movie, even the best of them, or listening or viewing a broadcast. I sat mesmerized as I listened to the two hours of live testimony. I looked around at the young people and knew they would remember the story forever, never forget the Holocaust and understand they must do everything in their power to protect Israel. I was reminded of my grandmother’s will—that we must fight—and so I continue. I wait for no one else and know that our fight is just and that we must prevail—we have no other choice. The most elegant acts seem so simple, yet are so effective. Let us emulate Gilad’s tradition, for we will feel better knowing we are doing something to ensure, “Never Again!”


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Ari Bussel -- Bio and Archives

Ari Bussel is a reporter and an activist on behalf of Israel, the Jewish Homeland.  Ari left Beverly Hills and came to Israel 13 weeks to work in Israel Diplomacy’s Front from Israel.


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