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August 10, 2001/Av 21, 5761, Vol. 53, No.44
Never forget. How could they?
VICKI CABOT
Contributing Editor
Den Holocaust hat es nie gegeben.
The Holocaust never happened.
The offensive message, emblazoned on an idyllic alpine background, catches the eye and captures the attention. Displayed around Berlin, most prominently adjacent to the city's legendary Brandenburg Gate, the posters are part of a brash campaign to raise public consciousness, and to raise private money, for a planned Holocaust memorial in the German capital.
We inconspicuously shoot a photo, making sure to include the pro-Palestinian graffiti scribbled beneath.
So this is Germany. The new Germany.
Like many Jews, my husband, Howard, and I were loathe to go to the Rhineland. How to rationalize spending time and money in the nation that bred Adolf Hitler and implemented the Final Solution? Yet, when our travels took us through Frankfurt, it seemed time to overcome our reluctance. Perhaps visiting Germany would deepen our understanding of the Holocaust. Perhaps it would enhance our appreciation of the rich Jewish culture that thrived there for centuries. Perhaps it would help us comprehend how Hitler's hate-filled regime could have prevailed.
Instead, we left with more questions than answers, more despondent than hopeful.
A walking tour of Jewish Berlin afforded context - and contradictions. Yes, there had been a thriving Jewish community. Jews had built synagogues - 15 in Berlin before the Holocaust - a day school, a community center, a cemetery. They were engaged actively in the city's commercial life and in its cultural and intellectual activity. They were highly assimilated, highly regarded.
On the corner of Gross Hamburger Strasse and Oranienburger Strasse, a statue marks the site of the first Jewish old-age home in the city; it was also the site for a Nazi transit camp from which 55,000 German Jews were transported to Auschwitz and Theresienstadt.
Around the corner stands the imposing Neue Synagogue. Desecrated by the Nazis during Kristallnacht in 1938 and bombed in 1943, it was partially rebuilt in 1990 and restored as a museum with a rather meager collection of Judaica. A large green tank emblazoned Polizei is parked at the curb, standard security at Jewish sites. On the synagogue faŤade, the words "Vergesst es Nie," never forget, were inscribed in 1966 by members of the East Berlin Jewish community.
Never forget? How could they?
And yet, the entire time we are in Berlin, we see few signs of Jewish life. We encounter no one wearing a kippah, find no kosher restaurant, see no mezuzot on doorposts. We are told that the Jewish community, numbering some 80,000, keeps a low profile. There have been some anti-Semitic attacks, says our guide. The neo-Nazis are still alive and well, she says. I shoot another photo, of the English words "Racism is a privilege" scrawled on the front of an apartment house on a quiet residential street.
Since our visit, the in-your-face Holocaust memorial ads have been taken down. Pressure from the Berlin Jewish community, citing ostensible worries about Holocaust revisionism, reportedly led to their demise.
"Not suitable," said some. "Unbearable," said others.
Too Jewish, we might add. Too much of an affront.
And maybe in a country still wrestling with its past, anti-Semitism remains a threat - and hate remains a privilege.
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