MORE HOLOCAUST STORIES THE SILENCE OF G-D AND OTHER HOLOCAUST STORIES

http://www.aish.com/ho/i/ http://www.aish.com/ho/i/48961526.html The Silence of God "Where was God in those days?" asked the pope. Here's a possible answer. by Jeff Jacoby

"Where was God in those days?" asked Pope Benedict XVI as he stood in Auschwitz. "Why was he silent? How could he permit this endless slaughter, this triumph of evil?" It is the inevitable question in Auschwitz, that vast factory of death where the Nazis tortured, starved, shot, and gassed to death as many as a million and a half innocent human beings, most of them Jews. "In a place like this, words fail," Benedict said. "In the end, there can be only a dread silence, a silence which itself is a heartfelt cry to God: Why, Lord, did you remain silent?" News reports emphasized the pope's question. Every story noted that the man who voiced it was, as he put it, "a son of the German people." No one missed the intense historical significance of a German pope, on a pilgrimage to Poland, beseeching God for answers at the slaughterhouse where just 60 years ago Germans broke every record for shedding Jewish blood. And yet some commentators accused Benedict of skirting the issue of anti-Semitism. The national director of the Anti-Defamation League said that the pope had "uttered not one word about anti-Semitism; not one explicit acknowledgment of Jewish lives vanquished simply because they were Jews." The National Catholic Register likewise reported that he "did not make any reference to modern anti-Semitism." In truth, the pope not only acknowledged the reality of Jew-hatred, he explained the pathology that underlies it. Anti-Semites are driven by hostility not just toward Jews, he said, but toward the message of God-based ethics they first brought to the world. Click here to receive Aish.com's free weekly email. "Deep down, those vicious criminals" -- he was speaking of Hitler and his followers -- "by wiping out this people, wanted to kill the God who called Abraham, who spoke on Sinai and laid down principles to serve as a guide for mankind, principles that are eternally valid. If this people, by its very existence, was a witness to the God who spoke to humanity and took us to himself, then that God finally had to die and power had to belong to man alone -- to those men, who thought that by force they had made themselves masters of the world." Hitler knew that his will to power could triumph only if he first destroyed Judeo-Christian values.The Nazis' ultimate goal, Benedict argued, was to rip out Christian morality by its Jewish roots, replacing it with "a faith of their own invention: faith in the rule of man, the rule of the powerful." Hitler knew that his will to power could triumph only if he first destroyed Judeo-Christian values. In the Thousand-Year Reich, God and his moral code would be wiped out. Man, unencumbered by conscience, would reign in his place. It is the oldest of temptations, and Auschwitz is what it leads to. "Where was God in those days?" asked the pope. How could a just and loving Creator have allowed trainload after trainload of human beings to be murdered at Auschwitz? But why ask such a question only in Auschwitz? Where, after all, was God in the Gulag? Where was God when the Khmer Rouge slaughtered 1.7 million Cambodians? Where was God during the Armenian holocaust? Where was God in Rwanda? Where is God in Darfur? For that matter, where is God when even one innocent victim is being murdered or raped or abused? The answer, though the pope didn't say so clearly, is that a world in which God always intervened to prevent cruelty and violence would be a world without freedom -- and life without freedom would be meaningless. God endows human beings with the power to choose between good and evil. Some choose to help their neighbor; others choose to hurt him. There were those in Nazi Europe who herded Jews into gas chambers. And there were those who risked their lives to hide Jews from the Gestapo. The God "who spoke on Sinai" was not addressing himself to angels or robots who could do no wrong even if they wanted to. He was speaking to real people with real choices to make, and real consequences that flow from those choices. Auschwitz wasn't God's fault. He didn't build the place. And only by changing those who did build it from free moral agents into puppets could he have stopped them from committing their horrific crimes It was not God who failed during the Holocaust or in the Gulag, or on 9/11, or in Bosnia. It is not God who fails when human beings do barbaric things to other human beings. Auschwitz is not what happens when the God who says "Thou shalt not murder" and "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself" is silent. It is what happens when men and women refuse to listen. (122) Mordechai, May 1, 2011 8:45 PM Hashem Yisborach "My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are My ways your ways (Yeshaya)." All of us here would do well to remember a few very important things. First and foremost, Hashem (G-d) is an all-loving, all-knowing, all-powerful, and unlimited Being. He is above all things finite and only He truly knows the reasons behind His actions in reference to His universe and His creations. We are limited, physical, and finite beings who can only see this world through our 5 senses and think about it through the limited faculties of our finite perspective. We cannot understand why 6 million people, righteous and wicked alike, had to die, any more than we can understand when a baby dies shortly after his bris mila. The only thing we know for sure is that He is running the show, and regardless of how bad it looks and feels, it is all ultimately for the good, which only He can know through His inifinite wisdom. Secondly, and I apologize in advance if this upsets anyone, but we humans have a bad habit of forgetting that we are not our bodies and that we do not end after our time here on earth. We are eternal, created in the image of the Master of the Universe, and as sad, awful, and scary as death seems, be it our own or our loved ones, we must remember that it is not the end, but the beginning of an eternity of bliss and ultimate connection with our source and the Source of all. I would never try and minimize the suffering of all those involved in the Holocaust, I myself never met many of my own family members because of Hitler (yemach sh'mo), but if we are to ask such large questions as these and throw out accusations against Hashem (most of which, I am sorry to say, are not intellectual arguments but emotional responses to grief or loss), we must remember the basics. _________________________________________________________________________________ http://www.aish.com/ho/p/65148467.html Angel of Orphans One father. 100 children. 20 years. A story of epic proportions. by Malky Weinstock

When World War II broke out in all its fury, European Jews scrambled for safety, desperately seeking a haven from the madness that was Adolf Hitler. But in the midst of this struggle for survival, Reb Yona Tiefenbrunner abandoned his chances for refuge to save hundreds of Jewish orphans from the Nazi murder machine. In 1942, the Jewish Orphanage of Brussels was created by Belgium’s Nazi Occupational Government as a temporary front to their diabolical plans of Jewish liquidation, and Yona Tiefenbrunner, a young man not yet 30 years old, agreed to head the precarious orphanage. Overnight, he became a father to hundreds of traumatized and tortured orphans. Yona went straight into the Gestapo Headquarters, demanding the release of a child, knowing they could shoot him on the spot. The children referred to him simply as “Monsieur,” but they knew he would risk his life to save them. Time and again, they witnessed Yona manifesting unimaginable reserves of self sacrifice and heroism, leaving no stone unturned when it came to trying to save even one person. Herbert Kessler recalls this story of how Yona went straight into the Gestapo Headquarters, demanding the release of a child, with the dire knowledge that that they could easily shoot him on the spot for his insolence. Once, on Shabbos morning during services, Mr. Tiefenbrunner approached me and said, ‘Herbert, take off your Talit and come with me’. We left the house, heading straight to the tram. I was astounded: Traveling on Shabbos?! Confused, I asked Mr. Tiefenbrunner what happened. How did it come to be that he was traveling on Shabbos? On the way, he told me that he had just learned that the Gestapo Headquarters was holding a boy they were ready to free. There was no time to lose because they could change their minds at any moment. The children on the roof top of the home, 1942. "I want to try to get this boy out of there. I will tell them I’m not leaving without the boy. But I want you to come with me so that if something happens to me, you will report back to the home, informing them that I won't be coming back," Yona told me, handing me his gold watch. When we reached the Gestapo Headquarters at Avenue Louise, he told me to wait at the street corner, from where the entrance of the Gestapo headquarters was clearly visible. "Keep checking to see if they take us away in a car. Wait exactly half an hour. If I don't come back with the child, return as quickly as you can to the Home and tell them to disperse all the children within two hours. Maybe I will return later, so somebody should stay and watch the house. Send the children to play in the Square Margueritte, but don't tell them anything. Should I not come back, advise Blum (a senior staff member in the home) that I have been arrested and that everyone should run and hide as they will come after everyone in the home as well!" He entered the Gestapo and I was waiting at the corner with his watch in my hand, my eyes peeled on the Gestapo entrance. I waited and waited...I don't think that in my life I have ever experienced such a long half hour! At the last minute he came out with the child, white like a sheet. He shook my hand and we returned to the Home. The morning prayers were over, and he didn't mention a word about what had happened. But the next Friday night, when it was my turn to receive his weekly blessing, his hand rested a little longer on my head, and he shook my hand with more strength as usual as he greeted me with 'Gut Shabbos.' Despite the ever-present danger of deportation and the watchful eyes of the Gestapo, Yona managed to infuse his orphanage with Torah, love, and tranquility. There were myriads of Bar Mitzvahs Yona hosted for his boys, and there was Shabbos, Yom Tov, and just plain kids fun too. When the war was finally over and others tried to put the past behind them, Reb Yona and his wife, despite having their own young family of three daughters, made a life choice in a heart beat that few of us would ever contemplate, much less embrace. Yona, aided by his wife Ruth, continued to nurture the orphaned children as his own, rebuilding their shattered spirits and giving them a chance at life. Click here to receive Aish.com's free weekly email. For 20 more years, Yona valiantly stayed at his post, as father to his orphans, until the last child had grown and married. Tragically, Yona Tiefenbrunner, the self-effacing gem of infinite compassion and self sacrifice, lived only a brief 48 years, passing away unheralded, shortly after his orphanage closed in 1960. He left his own three biological daughters, not yet married, orphaned. Let this hero’s story be told Yona and Ruth Tiefenbrunner walking with two orphan children, circa 1947 Today, Yona’s 'children' live all over the world, with children and grandchildren of their own. But the passing of years hasn’t diminished the deep love and gratitude that they feel to their “Monsieur.” In August 2002, on the occasion of Yona’s 40th yahrtzeit, the orphans met in a Jerusalem banquet hall to remember their beloved “Monsieur.” In an emotional testimony from one of Reb Yona’s 'children, Moniek Kerber spoke for them all. “He gave us the will to continue with our lives. He restored the human spirit within each of us after the desolation of the Holocaust. We are all a living monument to his blessed memory.” And indeed, they are. In May 2007, tipped off by a friend who told me there was a legendary story of heroism in his family, waiting to be told, I flew to Israel, finding myself face to face with Yona’s three daughters, now grandmothers. The three sisters showed me album after album, with aging black-and-white photos showing groups of smiling children -- boys, girls, toddlers thru teens, along with their father Yona. They handed me a an alphabetized listing with over 100 names, complete with addresses and phone numbers of former children of their father’s orphanage. Yona's three daugther's with the author. And thus paper trail in hand, I pieced together their story. From around the globe -- from Boston to Arizona, from Antwerp to London and throughout Israel, the tales began pouring forth. Everyone shared their excitement that the story of their hero would at last be told. And yet each shared individualized details of how “Monsieur” had made a profoundly personal difference, given his or her uniquely tragic circumstances, empowering each to build their own Jewish homes and perpetuate the respective legacies of their martyred parents. Sarah from Monsey, today the matriarch of a prominent family, credits Yona not only for saving her life, but for her and her lovely family’s Judaism. She’d arrived at Yona’s home in 1943, a petrified little girl, eyes bulging with fear. Her parents, who lived in Antwerp, had hidden her with their gentile housekeeper in return for payment. When her parents were deported, the payment stopped coming and the gentile woman no longer wanted to care for her. Grabbing her by the hand, she briskly led Sarah out of her house one day, taking her to a nondescript house. She knocked firmly, and when the door opened, asked to see the director immediately. “See this child?” she demanded of Yona Tiefenbrunner, “she’s Jewish! Either you take her off my hands now, or I will drop her off at the Gestapo!” Yona did take her in, weaving her into his happy family and miraculous island of refuge, faithfully and lovingly raising her as a true Jewish daughter, until he walked her down the chuppah over a decade later. “We were very happy children!” Sarah recounted. “Only after we had grown up and moved on into real life did we sense that we were orphans — that we had no other family.”

_____________________________________________________________________________________ http://www.aish.com/ho/p/48966371.html Angels in the Dark The amazing story of survival in the sewers of Lvov. by Rabbi Shmuel Burstein

It was the end of May, 1943 and Jewish Lvov was burning. Once home to Poland's third largest Jewish community, Lvov's 100,000 Jews numbered less than 8,000. "They are killing the Jewish police! This is the end!" came a cry from the ghetto. Huge buildings, entire blocks were on fire. Jews ran in all directions. Hundreds made a dash for the sewers, hoping to avoid detection by vicious German dogs and their inhuman masters. Jewish children were rounded up and tossed into awaiting trucks like sacks of raw potatoes. Watching helplessly at the fate of their children, some women threw themselves down from several stories high. Little Krystyna Chiger beheld all of this in fear and terror. For months, a small group of Jews were preparing for this moment. Yaakov Berestycki understood the fate of Lvov's already martyred Jews would soon be his own. Daily, he and a few others clawed away at a concrete floor with spoons and forks and small tools from the apartment of a Jew named Weiss to gain entry into the sewers. Ignacy Chiger was their leader. Weeks before the ghetto's destruction they broke through and lowered themselves into the sewers of Lvov. As they searched for a place that might be their 'home,' they were discovered by three Polish sewer workers. The three Poles could have easily handed them over to the Nazis for a reward of badly needed food. The three Poles could have easily handed them over to the Nazis for a reward of badly needed food. With no options before them, Weiss and Chiger explained what they had done. A cherubic-looking Pole named Leopold Socha was amused. He followed the diggers and raised himself up through the floor of the ghetto apartment. He beheld a defiant Jewish mother, Paulina Chiger, clutching two children closely to her chest. Deeply moved by the frightened youngsters, he broke out in a magnificent smile. Leopold Socha was not merely any sewer worker; he was Chief Supervisor of all of Lvov's sewers. He knew the best places to hide and how to lead prowling German inspectors in a direction away from clandestine Jews. For Krystyna, her brother Pavel and the rest, the escape into the sewers was a nightmare. Accompanied by screams and shrieking in a stone and lime chamber that trapped all sound, the Jews entered a world of cold darkness. The deafening sound of the river waters terrified Krystyna. Her subterranean world was inhabited by rats that made no secret of their presence, and she could not see where she was going. Lvov's labyrinth underground system was actually a complicated work of art, designed by early 20th century Italian engineers. As it wove its way beneath the city's major landmarks and streets, the 20-foot wide Peltew River roared, charging mightily. It snatched all those who got too close, including Krystyna's beloved Uncle Kuba. Another Jew who descended that terrible day in May 1943 was a resourceful, spirited Jew named Mundek Margolies. His name was on several deportation lists. Each time he somehow managed to escape. While in the ghetto he grew fond of Klara Keller. Mundek convinced her to take a chance with life by coming with him into the sewers, leaving her sister, Mania, behind Socha promised Chiger that he would protect 20 Jews -- for a price. Socha promised Chiger that he would protect 20 Jews -- for a price. The Chigers provided the lion's share of the money, having stashed some cash and valuables away before the war. Socha brought whatever food he could each day, as well as news from a place called Earth. He gave them pages of newspapers and took their clothes home to clean each week. On Passover he provided potatoes. Over time the 20 hidden Jews shrank to ten. Some died. After living under inhuman conditions for several months, some left out of sheer madness. A newborn baby was smothered by its mother to save the lives of the others who trembled at the sound of his pitiful cries. This small group of Jews struggled to maintain some semblance of Jewish life in their underground hiding place. Yaakov Berestycki, a chassid, found a relatively clean place to put on tefillin each morning. Paulina Chiger asked Socha if he could bring her some candles. She wished to bring light of Shabbat into the sewers. Socha loved those who loved God as much as he did and he was excited by the challenge. Every Friday, Socha was paid by Ignacy and Paulina later lit her candles. Socha spoke to the children. He played with them and tried to raise the spirits of all 'his' Jews. He took Krystyna to a place where she could see light drifting into the sewers as she sat upon his shoulders. Mundek Margolies made daring forays into the destroyed ghetto to bring anything left behind that would make the lives of his friends more bearable. He had resolved to marry Klara after the war. They eventually learned that Klara's sister, Mania, was sent to Janowska concentration camp. Klara blamed herself for abandoning her. In the hellish world of concentration camps Janowska was particularly horrific. People were left overnight to see how quickly they could freeze to death in icing vats of water. Each morning nooses were prepared in the large square. Jews were "invited" to "volunteer" to be hanged. Tragically, there was no shortage of daily volunteers. Despite all this, Mundek determined to sneak himself into Janowska to rescue Mania and other Jews he could convince to follow him into the sewers. It was insane. It was impossible. But angels can fly. It was insane. It was impossible. But angels can fly. Mundek changed identities with a Jewish slave he spied out from a work detail on one of his courageous flights outside the sewer. He smuggled himself into Janowska with the work detail at evening. A little over a day later he located Mania behind a fence. Mania told him she simply could not live in a sewer and wrote a note to Klara, begging that she not blame herself. She blessed Klara with life. Mundek met other Jews, urging them to leave. They thanked him and blessed him. But they were weak and terrified. The angel returned to the sewers, alone. After several months the Chigers' money ran out. They met with Socha and he told them such an enormous risk required compensation; that Wrobleski and Kowalow, his two Polish friends, could not be expected to assist him otherwise. They wished each other goodbye and good luck. The following day a familiar shuffling of footsteps was heard. It was Socha! He became so committed to preserving their lives he saw no alternative but to use his own money. But he was concerned that his buddies, upon learning that the money was his, would back out of the rescue. So he asked Chiger to pretend he had found extra money and that is was really Jewish money being paid to Wrobleski and Kowalow. One day Socha revealed to the Jews his motive for rescue. He had been a convicted felon, spent considerable time in jail before the war. This mission was his way to show that he was a changed man and return to God. Protective wings sheltered the hidden Jews. They survived discovery by a Pole who opened up a manhole cover and shouted: "It's true! There are Jews in the sewers!" (Socha moved them to a safer location.) They survived the planting of mines only days before the Germans fled Lvov, as the Russian army neared. Socha and Kowalow shouted with all the authority men in overalls could muster before well-dressed German soldiers. They warned that gas pipes lay directly below the ground they were digging for the mines. The Germans would blow up the whole street, themselves included. It was a lie. And it saved the subterranean Jews. They survived the melting snows and heavy spring rains in the winter of 1944. The water filled their small basin and rose above their necks. Krystyna screamed to Yaakov, the chassid, "Pray, Yaakov! Pray to God to save us!" Yaakov prayed and the water receded. Sixty years later she said, "It was a miracle." After 14 months underground, Socha lifted the manhole cover, telling the Jews they were free.The long awaited day of liberation came. In July 1944, after 14 months underground, Socha lifted the manhole cover, telling the Jews they were free! Like creatures from another planet, hunched over from a hideout with low ceilings, ten ragged, thin and filthy survivors found themselves surrounded by Poles who gaped in wonder: "Jews really did live in the sewers!" After months of darkness, their eyes were blinded by the sunshine. Everything seemed red, "bathed in the color of blood." Socha brought them indoors, to dark rooms where their eyes could adjust to light. Months after liberation, Socha and his daughter were riding their bicycles in the street. A truck came careening in the direction of Socha's little girl. He steered quickly to knock her out of the way. Once again he saved a life -- his daughter's -- but Socha was killed, his blood dripping into the sewer. 'His' Jews, dispersed around Poland and Europe, returned to pay their last respects. Krystyna still cannot cry. In the sewer she learned to suffer quietly. Her body swallows her tears. She dreads the sound of rushing water and moments of darkness. But she is a healer -- a medical professional with an office in New York and has raised a Jewish family. Her brother Pavel served in the IDF and also raised a new generation. Ignacy and Paulina lived out their lives in Israel where Paulina continued bringing the light of Shabbat into her home. Yaakov moved to Paris where he, too, raised a Jewish family and lived a full life. All those in the sewer, but for Krystyna, have since passed to a world with angels on high. Mundek and Klara married shortly after the war. After moving to London from Poland, they established together a flourishing kosher catering business, still run by the family. He danced in the very center at every celebration he catered, grabbing his clients by the hand and beaming a broad smile, for his Jewish world was revived. Every Jewish simcha was his simcha. The world of darkness he once knew was now filled with light. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ http://www.aish.com/ho/p/48956731.html Lulek: Child of Buchenwald Rabbi Yisrael Lau talks about the childhood he never had and 10 images engraved forever in his memory. by A. Netanel

When Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau shuts his eyes and recalls his childhood, his mind is crowded with images of trains, of boots pounding on pavement, of barking dogs. He hears children wailing, "Mamme! Tatte!" as they're torn from their parents' arms, the Gestapo screaming, "Schnell, schnell!" as they wield their clubs, and always, the dogs barking. "My first memory," says Rav Lau, characteristically weighing his words, "is of my father, standing with the rest of the Jews in the courtyard of the main shul in Piotrkow, as the Germans 'selected' those who would be deported that day. That's the image that stays with me always, wherever I go. "I'm a five-year-old boy, stretching myself up as high as I can, to see my father. He's standing in the center, with his impressive beard and his black rabbinical garb, and all the Jews crowded around him. Suddenly a member of the Gestapo strides over to him and hits him hard on his back. My father reels forward from the blow, but straightens himself immediately. He's mustering all his strength so as not to fall at the feet of the German and cause his fellow Jews to lose morale. Then comes another blow, and another. My father makes a mighty effort not to lose his balance, to help the members of his kehillah, his community, keep up their courage. "The worst part of it was witnessing the humiliation. A child can't bear to see his father, the hero he looks up to and identifies with, being demeaned. Today, as I look back on those six years of war, it's clear to me that it wasn't the hunger, nor the cold, nor the physical pain of being hit, but the humiliation. To see your father beaten with a club, kicked by hobnailed boots, threatened by a dog, almost falling to the ground, degraded before everyone -- that's a picture that stays with a child. "But I hold on to the other part of the memory, too. I see my father, with tremendous moral courage, keeping himself from falling, not begging for mercy, standing up straight in front of the Gestapo officer. This erases my feelings of helplessness." Although Rav Lau has often been urged to write his autobiography, he has never done so. His book, Al Tishlach Yadcha el haNaar (The title is from Genesis 22:12 -- "Raise not your hand against the lad ..."), can't be called an autobiography. It makes no mention of his nearly five decades of the rabbinate and public service; rather it is a very personal Holocaust memoir, a tale of survival, escape, and starting a new life in Eretz Yisrael. A CHILD IN A PILE OF CORPSES "Lulek," as Rav Lau was then called, was two years old when the war broke out, and eight when he was liberated from Buchenwald. Rav Lau begins to speak of his second Holocaust image: The Americans have arrived; Buchenwald is liberated. "I remember the looks of horror on the faces of the American soldiers when they came in and stared around them. I was afraid when I saw them. I crept behind a pile of dead bodies and hid there, watching them warily. "Rabbi Herschel Schachter was the Jewish chaplain of the division. I saw him get out of a jeep and stand there, staring at the corpses. He has often told this story, how he thought he saw a pair of living eyes looking out from among the dead. It made his hair stand on end, but slowly and cautiously he made his way around the pile, and then, he clearly remembers coming face-to-face with me, an eight-year-old boy, wide-eyed with terror. In heavily-accented American Yiddish, he asked me, 'How old are you, mein kind?' There were tears in his eyes. "'What difference does it make?' I answered, warily. 'I'm older than you, anyway.' "He smiled through his tears and said, 'Why do you think you're older than me?' "And I answered, 'Because you cry and laugh like a child. I haven't laughed in a long time, and I don't even cry anymore. So which one of us is older?'" Rav Lau's terrible childhood, if it can be called a childhood at all, undoubtedly shaped his character. Yet, amazingly, it didn't affect him as it did so many others. In the long run, rather than turning him into a traumatized, fearful person, it increased his optimism. "I have an optimistic outlook on life, and I like people," he says. "This is how I counteracted my childhood experiences. As a child, I didn't follow the dictum of 'honor your fellowman, but be wary.' My rule was 'be doubly wary.' Even after the liberation, I was still suspicious of people. For example, I had a mortal fear of cameras. To see someone pointing something at me, squinting one eye, and taking aim -- it terrified me. It took time for me to realize that no one was trying to kill me anymore. But once I understood that, I made a complete turnabout. I can't explain how it happened. It may be connected to the fact that I really had no childhood. I never had the chance to develop an ego at the usual age of two, three, four, five years. I was more like a little animal, a hunted animal bent only on survival, and therefore, the humiliation didn't touch my inner core." A CHILD LEFT BEHIND Following an order more meaningful than chronology, Rav Lau moves on to his third memory: "We were sitting, in total darkness, hundreds of women and children crowded into the shul, aware of almost nothing except that our lives were hanging in the balance. Sometime in the middle of the night, the doors opened. A beam of light showed two Gestapo men standing guard in the doorway, leaving a narrow passage between them. One of them announced, 'I will now read out a list of names. Whoever hears his name called is to get up immediately and go home. Schnell, schnell!' "The first name called was Chaya Lau, my mother's name. She didn't move; she was waiting to hear the names of her two sons, Shmuel and Yisrael, so that we could all leave together. The German officer finished reading off the list. Our names had not been called. It was clear that the fate of those who hadn't been released was sealed. Meanwhile, the Germans had been counting the figures that passed between them, and they started shouting that one person was missing. 'I'm coming! I'm coming!' my mother called out hastily. She held the two of us close to her sides and, walking sideways as one body, we passed between the soldiers. "There was no need for her to tell us to keep quiet and cling to her; our survival instincts told us that. She'd made her plan quickly, hoping that under cover of darkness she could pass the three of us off as one. But one of the soldiers sensed that there was too much movement in the doorway for one person. He spread his arms and brought them down hard. I'd gone out first, followed by my mother and Shmuel. She and I were knocked down by the Gestapo man's blow. We fell into a puddle of rain that had collected in front of the entrance to the shul, but we were out. My brother Shmuel was knocked back into the shul, and the doors were closed. "We went back to our empty house at 21 Pisudski Street. My mother tried to soothe me to sleep, but I never shut an eye. Some time later, I heard a scream out in the street. I stood on my bed and looked out of the window. A young woman with a baby in her arms was lying in a pool of blood; a Gestapo man was kicking her body from side to side, looking for jewelry. I stood there, paralyzed, until I felt my mother's touch on my shoulder. Silently, she put me back to bed. "My father came in a few minutes later. I remember how strange he looked without his beard. He had been trying to get Shmuel released. A German officer had promised to arrange it in exchange for my father's gold watch. As soon as he had the watch in hand, the Nazi had turned his back on my father and laughed. "'We won't be seeing Shmuel any more,' my father told me, with tears flowing from his eyes. Shmuel was sent to Treblinka that night." ON TATTE'S KNEE "That was also the last time I saw my father," Rav Lau recalls. "I have very few memories of him. In my earliest memories, from the innocent days before war existed in my world, I would sit on his lap and play with his curly peyote (sidecurls)." But that image quickly fades; in its place, Rav Lau's fourth Holocaust image appears: "Men were gathered around the table in our house, listening as my father talked about the current situation. The worry lines were clearly etched on his face. This image, and the heavy atmosphere of fear surrounding it, has remained a part of me to this day. "Today, I look at the pictures of my father displayed in my house, and I think of him often. At every special occasion, joyous or sad, I miss him. He was a very gifted speaker, I've been told, and every time I have to deliver a speech I wonder, how would my father have phrased these thoughts? He's with me everywhere I go." A STOLEN APPLE "Before we went into hiding in the place my father had arranged for us, my mother baked a big batch of her special honey cookies. She knew they were a sure way to distract me and, most importantly, to stop my mouth when we had to be quiet. I can remember looking at her with my mouth full of cookies, as if to say, 'This really isn't necessary, Mamma. I know I mustn't make a sound. I may be only a little boy, but I've been through enough to know what this war is all about.' But I can still recall exactly how those cookies tasted, and the memory of their sweetness comforts me in times of bitterness. "The Germans came one day, searching for Jews. The entrance to our attic hiding-place was open, but by miracle, their attention was drawn to a pile of scrap wood on the floor. They jabbed their bayonets into the pile, thinking there might be Jews hiding there, and then they went away. "Years later, when I was serving my first term as chief rabbi of Tel Aviv, an elderly Jew from London came to my office without an appointment, explaining that he wanted to ask the rabbi's forgiveness. I told my secretary to show him in, and he said, 'Hello, Lulek. I'm Mottel Kaminetzki. I was in hiding with you and your mother in Piotrkow, and I stole an apple from you. I'm sure you never knew it was missing, but it's been on my conscience all these years.' "He had also been a child then, just a few years older than I was. My mother had brought a bag of apples when we went into hiding, and the bag was sitting open next to me. At some point, Mottel couldn't resist; when we weren't looking, he grabbed an apple and took a big bite. It was just at that moment that the Germans came to search for Jews, and poor Mottel was stuck with the piece of apple in his mouth. It was too big to swallow, and he didn't dare chew it, for fear of making a sound ...." "GOODBYE TULEK! GOODBYE LULEK!" The sixth image is of Rav Lau's mother, his final image of her: "I was separated from my mother in November, 1944," says Rav Lau. "I can still hear the Germans yelling 'Schnell, schnell!' as they crowded us onto the train platform. The trains, the boots, and the dogs were all there. My brother Naftali, who was eighteen, had been put with a group of men, and I was with my mother. Women and children were being shoved into one freight car, men into another. "At the last second before boarding the train, my mother gave me a hard shove -- over to the men, whom she hoped would be used for labor and not killed. 'Tulek!' she called to my brother. 'Take Lulek! Goodbye, Tulek! Goodbye, Lulek!' "I never saw her again. "It took a long time until I understood that by pushing me away like that, my mother had saved my life.""There'd been no time to discuss whether Mamma's move was best. All I knew was that I'd been separated from my mother, by force, and I took out all my rage on Tulek, hammering on his chest with my little fists. He tried to hold me, to soothe me, but I refused to calm down. I remember how terribly cold I felt all over; that was the cold of November, 1944 "The men gave me hot coffee to drink, but I spit it out, and cried myself to sleep. Never in my short life had I cried like that, and never in all the long years since then. It took a long time until I understood that by pushing me away like that, my mother had saved my life." THE SPEECH OF HIS LIFE After that, Lulek had to fend for himself. Rav Lau's seventh Holocaust image finds him standing in muddy snow in the Czenstochova labor camp. "We boys were standing in a row in front of the German commander, each of us with his father behind him. In my case, since I was already an orphan, my brother Naftali stood behind me. The commander was shouting, 'What do I need these accursed children for? They're non-productive and they're costing me money. We'll have to get rid of them!' "While the other boys trembled with fear, I used my foot to push some snow and gravel into a little pile. It was about two inches high, but I imagined that if I stood on this little hillock, I'd look taller and my words would carry more weight, and maybe then the commander wouldn't kill us all. "I took a step forward, stood on my 'platform,' and said, 'Sir! Why do you say we aren't productive? In the Piotrkow ghetto, I worked in the glass factory for eight hours a day nonstop, carrying huge bottles of drinking water for the workers in the factory, where the temperature was 140 degrees. For a whole year I did this, in snow, in storms, in heat, carrying heavy bottles into that blazing hot room. And then I was only five and a half years old. Now that I'm so much bigger, I can do more than that. If I could work in the Hortenzia glass factory, why can't I work here?' "If witnesses hadn't told me that this really happened, I wouldn't believe it myself; I would think my memory was playing tricks on me. But the fact is that the Nazi officer was convinced. The Almighty gave me confidence and put the right words into my mouth. "As a result of my little speech, the commander let it be known that he would redeem any child in the camp for a price of 1,000 marks. Our mother had foreseen circumstances like these and provided us with two diamonds and a gold watch. 'These will help you keep your promise to Tatte, that you'll take care of Lulek,' she had explained to my brother Naftali. A Jewish dentist had filled her tooth with a half-carat diamond, and she had sewn a two-carat stone into the lining of her coat. Those diamonds saved my life twice." ALONE IN A FREIGHT CAR "In January, 1945, we were marched to a train station once more. As we were boarding the train, the Gestapo officer on duty noticed me clinging to my brother. He grabbed me by the scruff of my neck and flung me into a group of about fifty women and a few children, who were being packed into another car. That car was going to be detached from the train at a certain point and redirected to a different camp. "Meanwhile, Naftali was crowded into a car at the other end of the train, along with the men. He remembered the promise he'd made to our father; he would do anything he could to protect me and to ensure that our family line would continue. The first time the train stopped, he sneaked out, slipped under the train, and crawled along the tracks to the next car. 'Lulek! Lulek!' he called. He looked for me in every car, trying again at every stop, until he reached the women's car at the front of the train where I was, still clinging to the feather pillow my mother had given me and the loaf of stale bread that Tulek had pushed into my hands at the train station. One of the women had sprinkled a few grains of sugar on the bread for me, and I was busy hunting down every last sugar grain. Then I heard my name. "Stepping over bodies and around them, I followed Tulek's voice until I found myself in his arms. He pulled me down under the train with him, and we crawled along in the thick darkness to the seventh car, where Tulek had boarded. Before we climbed in, he took a moment to fill his hat with snow, so that we'd have some clean water to drink. "The women's car was detached and sent to its fate, while we traveled on. We were taken to a camp. The first thing we saw was a group of men in striped uniforms, shoveling snow. We asked them where we were; in reply, they drew their forefingers across their throats." This was Buchenwald, the site of Rav Lau's ninth Holocaust memory: BLOCK 52 "At Buchenwald, the gold watch Mama had given Tulek was used to bribe one of the German wardens to ignore my presence. A Czech doctor saved my life by injecting me with only a half-dose of the vaccination he gave to all the men. Through a series of miracles and with the help of many good people, I passed through all the selektzias. "I feel amazed when I contemplate the chain of miracles that happened to me." "Often, when I think of the war, I feel amazed when I contemplate the chain of miracles that happened to me. "After the injections, we were taken to a tunnel equipped with a row of showerheads. By 1945, everybody knew what to expect from showerheads in a Nazi camp, and we prepared to die a miserable death. One of the men in our group suddenly fell down dead. Ever since we left the Piotrkow ghetto, he'd been keeping a cyanide capsule hidden under a temporary filling in his tooth, and he'd decided this was the moment to use it. But the showerheads were turned on, and ice cold water sprayed out. I don't know how to describe the life-giving warmth we felt from that icy water. "Next, we were given our prison uniforms and had our numbers tattooed on our arms. Naftali was number 117029; I was number 117030. Then we entered Block 52. "It was a shocking sight, even to me. The occupants numbered about 2,000, most of them 'musselmen' who had lost all hope. They'd become accustomed to relieving themselves right there in the barracks, and the stench was unbearable. "I waited in Block 52 for two days for my brother, who had been hitched along with three other prisoners to a wagon (agalah in Hebrew) hauling corpses to the crematorium. For years afterwards, I thought that the phrase we say in Kaddish, 'b'agalah uv'zman kariv,' was referring to those wagons. "On the third day, I was moved to Block Eight, where the conditions were comparatively good. My brother had cautioned me not to say I was Jewish. One of the Russian prisoners, Fyodor, stole some potatoes and cooked up a soup for me, and he sewed an earmuff for me, too. Meanwhile, my brother was looking worse every time I saw him, but now I was in a position to do something for him sometimes, like smuggling him a slice of bread with margarine." TULEK IS TAKEN AWAY By early April, 1945, rumors had reached the prisoners that Germany was losing the war. But before the hoped-for liberation came about, the brothers, Tulek and Lulek, were separated. Rav Lau's tenth memory: "Tulek came to me and said, 'They're taking me away. I see no way out of this Gehinnom. This is the end of the world.' He spoke for only a minute or two, but every word he said is engraved on my heart. 'You're going to be left alone now,' he said. 'But you still have friends. Maybe a miracle will happen and you'll survive. I just wanted to tell you: There's a place called Eretz Yisrael. Repeat after me: Eretz Yisrael.' "I repeated the words, which meant nothing to me. 'Eretz Yisrael is the home of the Jews,' Naftali explained. 'It's the only place in the world where they don't kill us. If you survive, there will be people who will want to take you to live with them, because you're a cute little boy. You're not going anyplace. Only to Eretz Yisrael. We have an uncle there. Say that you're Rabbi Lau's son, and tell them to find your uncle. Goodbye, Lulek. Remember: Eretz Yisrael.' "That day, Naftali was put on a train. He managed to jump out the window of the building he was brought to, but after five days he was caught and put on another train. This time he jumped out of the moving train, and came back to Buchenwald. With supernatural strength, he crawled into the camp, and then he collapsed. He hadn't forgotten our father and the promise he had made to him, or the sound of our mother's voice shouting, 'Take care of Lulek!' On April 11th, he was put into quarantine. On that same day, American planes flew low over Buchenwald and he survived. "Not a day in my life goes by without my thinking of Naftali. He was given a mission: to save my life. And he carried it out." THE SUITCASE There is one final image. This picture isn't in the collection of agonizing Holocaust scenes stored in Rav Lau's memory. This picture is framed and hung on the wall for all to see as they enter his home. It's the famous photograph of a smiling, eight-year-old Lulek, a coat draped over one arm, the other holding a suitcase. "An American soldier donated an old suitcase to me from the army surplus storehouse. It went with me to Eretz Yisrael, and it held everything I owned, as I wandered from one educational institution to another. By the time I got married, it was so shabby that my wife wanted to throw it out, but I refused to part with it. 'This was my house,' I told her. 'If our children ever complain, I'll show it to them and say, "This is what your father had when he was a boy." I put it up in the storage loft of our building, and when we moved to another apartment, I came back for it. I climbed seventy-five steps to retrieve it, but I found nothing there but the handle. The suitcase had disintegrated. "But I have the photo. Elie Wiesel, who was with me in Buchenwald, presented it to me at a Bundist event; he'd spotted it in a museum in Vancouver. It came as a complete surprise to me. As soon as the children saw it, they all said, 'There's the suitcase!' "When I leave my house every day, on one side of the door is the mezuzah; on the other side is this photograph. Each time I see it, it says the same thing to me: 'Yisrael, look at Lulek. Now your task is to justify the fact that you were saved. You must carry out your parents' mission; you must keep the chain unbroken. This is from whence you came.' "And across from the photo, the mezuzah tells me 'before Whom I'm destined to give an accounting.' '" This article originally appeared in © Mishpacha Magazine 2006 _____________________________________________________________________________________ http://www.aish.com/ho/p/96781769.html Zeidy’s Escape My father's story of good and evil, despair and open miracle, and simple human kindness. by Dina Neuman, as dictated by Baruch Berger I sat as close to my father as I could, with pen and paper in hand. My father, a prisoner trapped in a body stricken with an unforgiving regressive illness, could only speak in a strained whisper. The story he wanted to be told was about his father, my grandfather, a story of good and evil, despair and open miracle, the depths mankind can sink to and simple human kindness. Looking at my father's emaciated form lying helplessly in his hospital bed, it seems as if the disease has won, but anyone who has seen his beautiful smile knows the truth. My father's story and his father’s story are both about struggle and triumph. It took him two hours to dictate the story that is our family legacy to me. “Zeidy’s uncle was a carpenter,” he began, “and Zeidy apprenticed under him. Then the war broke out. He was still just an apprentice, but when the Germans asked for skilled craftsmen, Zeidy raised his hand. Because of his training, he was sent to a work camp instead of a death camp, located in Tanapole, Ukraine. The project of the camp was to build retirement homes for the German officers for after the war. "If you ever get out of this place, come find me. I can hide you."“At the camp there was one watchman who took a liking to Zeidy. It might have had something to do with the fact that Zeidy found a way to get cigarettes to him. Zeidy figured that to have a watchman as a friend in a place like this would be a good thing. He was right, but it would be a while before that friendship came into play.” “One day, as Zeidy was working by the fence surrounding the camp, a woman he had never seen before sidled up to the other side with studied casualness. In a whisper she said, 'If you ever get out of this place, come find me. I can hide you. Here -- take my address.' And then she was gone. The whole exchange happened so quickly he might have imagined it, if not for the piece of paper that he held in his hand. He quickly memorized the address and destroyed the paper. “A couple of days later, when Zeidy was walking back alone to his barracks late one night, he overheard a discussion between the camp commandant and someone else. They were discussing the technical details involved in their plan to liquidate the camp. Click here to receive Aish.com's free weekly email. “With nothing to lose, Zeidy made an instantaneous decision. He knew that there was one section of the fence surrounding the camp that was not watched frequently. He also knew that on the other side of the fence was a sewer canal. Quietly, and without a second thought, Zeidy made for that section of fence and climbed over. He went straight into the sewer. “He wasn’t sure what his next move should be, so he sat there, in the waste, gagging from the overwhelming stench. Then he heard the unmistakable sound of someone entering the sewer. Zeidy froze, heart pounding, as someone sloshed through the muck towards him. As it came closer, he recognized the figure as a fellow inmate.” “’What are you doing here?’ Zeidy asked in astonishment. “’I saw you jump over the fence and into the sewer. I didn’t think about it. I just followed,’ the man said. The sound of running and screaming overhead was heard by the two fugitives. The liquidation of the camp had begun.“Zeidy was glad for the company, and since the man had a watch, a gold watch that he had managed to hide in the camp against all odds, he was also glad they would be able to tell what time it was. That night, the sound of running and screaming overhead was heard by the two fugitives. The liquidation of the camp had begun. “A couple of days passed. They stayed in the sewer. Zeidy wanted to stay there for a while until he was sure that it was all over. Obviously this was a difficult thing to do. The sewers were filled with waste, and claustrophobically narrow. The men also had nothing to eat. Finally, it was all too much for Zeidy’s companion. He needed to get out. He needed to get out now.” My own heart pounded as I scribbled these words, picturing the fear, the panic, not knowing what to do. "What happened? Did he leave? Did they both leave?” “Zeidy pleaded with him not to go, but he said that he was going to go up anyway. He had to. As soon as he went up, Zeidy heard a shout. 'Achtung!' and then the same voice yelling at his companion to take off his watch. There was a pause, maybe as the man fumbled to do as asked. Then a single shot. And then two voices, arguing in German over who would be the one to descend into the sewer to see if there were any more escaped prisoners. “But neither would. Neither wanted to get dirty. Instead, the Germans emptied their machine guns into the sewer. Zeidy protected himself by hiding behind a cement pillar and listened to the bullets zoom harmlessly past him. After an eternity, he heard their footsteps fading overhead, and Zeidy figured he had better move on. He trudged through the sewer in a straight line, until he came to the end. “Covered from head to toe in waste, Zeidy emerged, blinking in the sunlight. He found himself in an unfamiliar countryside. He stumbled around for a while until he saw a girl. Zeidy asked her for something to drink and a change of clothing, but she took one look at Zeidy and started to scream and run away. With equal panic at who she might find to tell on him, Zeidy ran the other way and almost barreled straight into a man walking towards him. It was the watchman from the camp! He was now out of a job since the camp had been liquidated. He gave Zeidy something to eat and drink, and a change of clothing.” “To bump into the watchman, of all people, what are the chances…?” I said, almost to myself. My father smiled faintly. “And then, hoping against hope, Zeidy told him the address of the woman who had whispered to him at the fence and asked the watchman if he knew where to find the house. It turned out that the house was only a few minutes away, and the woman, true to her word, took him in and hid him for almost a year, until the Russians came. “Jews liberated by the Russians were not always out of the woods yet. Zeidy knew that he would have to find a way to make himself useful to them. He met two brothers who knew how to sew and were put to work sewing Russian uniforms. Being a quick study, he learned how to sew from them and sewed uniforms alongside them until he was sent to a DP camp. There, he met the sister of those two brothers. And as soon as a proper ketubah could be procured, he married her. She was, of course, your Bubby.” I heard it said that if you want to get a blessing from a holy man, ask anyone you see who puts tefilin on over an arm that has a number tattooed on it. That man was my grandfather. And as I watch my brother putting tefilin on my father’s wasted arm, I cap my pen, touch his hand lightly, and ask my father for a blessing. Inspiration derived from this story should be a merit for my grandfather’s neshama, Zev Yehuda ben Baruch, and a refuah shelaima for my father, Baruch ben Sarah Chasha.