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April 9, 1999/23 Nisan 5759, Vol. 51, No. 28
To see is to understandTravels to Europe's camps make Holocaust realROBERT FRIEDLANDER
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 Train tracks lead straight into the camp at Birkenau where, as people were loaded off boxcars, Josef Mengele would separate out the Jews he wanted to use in experiments. Photo by Robert Friedlander |
From my hotel room in Poland the second evening, I called my parents in Chicago.
Dad reminded me that he and Mom had visited Dachau six months earlier. He told me that I was on a very important mission, that I was seeing things that every Jew should see. Then he paused for a moment and corrected himself - things that every person should see.
It wasn't until a week later, at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem, that I realized the significance of what my father had said.
I knew in advance that this trip would be difficult for me. But all the reading I had done about the Holocaust, and all the films I had seen, were nothing compared to being there, actually visiting the places where the atrocities occurred. I finally began to understand the true meaning of the phrase "Never forget."
My father is right. People must bring their families and friends to see these places. We can never forget what happened there, nor can we allow others to forget either. It may not be fun or inexpensive, but it's one of the most important trips anyone can take. If members of every generation visit and remember, then maybe someday such crimes will never again be committed by one group against another.
I recently returned from three-and-a-half weeks touring Poland, Israel and Jordan with the Future Leadership of the Jewish National Fund. Annually for the past eight years, JNF has conducted a mission to Israel for people from across the United States ages 21 to 40. The mission is called Artzenu, which means "our land."
This year, Artzenu offered a pre-mission visit to Poland plus an extension to Jordan. As this was my first trip overseas, I decided to do all three. I thought of it all as an opportunity to get away and see where history was made.
Poland was once a center for Judaism, home to the most important yeshiva in Europe. Some 3.5 million Jews lived there before World War II. Only 5,000 to 20,000 remain; no one knows exactly how many because many Poles don't know or don't want to admit they have Jewish ancestry.
One evening we had dinner at the Ariel Cafe in the old Jewish quarter in Krakow. The restaurant serves Jewish-style, but not kosher, food. There was a klezmer band playing Jewish music, and every table was full, but the only Jews were at my table. Although the atmosphere was festive, my group of six felt somewhat alone.
We saw three synagogues in the Jewish quarter. One, built in the 1300s, is no longer used as a shul. The second was the Isaac Synagogue, which is being renovated by the Lauder Foundation. The third, the Ramuh shul, is currently being used as a synagogue but has no rabbi.
In back of the Ramuh shul is a Jewish cemetery with graves dating from the 1300s to the 1800s. Many of the headstones are falling apart. In an effort to preserve history, volunteers are building a wall around the cemetery using pieces of the broken headstones.
As we walked down the streets of the Jewish quarter, we saw shadowy areas on many doorposts where mezuzahs once hung prominently. Much of Krakow is still as it was before the war. It's not difficult to imagine the streets bustling with Jewish life.
Auschwitz was the first camp we visited. The first image you see as you approach its wrought-iron gate, are the German words, "arbeit macht frei," which translates to "work makes you free." Our guide told us that the Jews at Auschwitz knew this was Nazi propaganda, so to annoy the Nazis, during construction of the sign they turned the "b" in "arbeit" upside down.
Inside the camp, I put my hand on what had been an electrified barbed-wire fence. Every morning the camp was in use, we were told, Jews who were killed trying to escape would be peeled off this fence.
The streets and barracks are clean now. Grass grows, walls are painted, floors waxed, and the stench of dysentery and human excrement is gone. The barracks are now referred to as "museums." This pristine, offenseless word choice disturbs me.
I walked into my first gas chamber quietly, unsure what to expect. I couldn't help but envision the thousands of my fellow Jews who had taken these same steps not so very long ago on their way to certain death. Inside the gas chamber, bluish green stains mark the walls and floors, evidence of the Zyklon B used to murder. I knelt down, lit a candle and recited the mourner's Kaddish.
Birkenau is two miles from Auschwitz. Here the train tracks lead straight into the camp. As the packed boxcars were offloaded, Nazi Dr. Josef Mengele would select the Jews he wanted to use for medical experiments. Barracks stretch far off in the distance. Concrete open latrines line the center of each barracks still standing. Our guide told us that captives were given just a few minutes to relieve themselves, and had no privacy.
The gas chambers are located at the rear of the Birkenau camp. During the Holocaust, Jews somehow were able to sneak dynamite into the camp, we were told. One day, some of the women who were slated to be gassed put the sticks of dynamite into their body cavities. After the gassing, Jewish workers removed the dynamite from their bodies and used it to destroy one of the gas chambers. Other gas chambers were destroyed by the Nazis themselves at the end of the war, in an attempt to try to cover up their crimes.
Behind the camp today, new homes are being constructed and families are moving in. I wonder, "What kind of people would want to live here?"
The average lifespan of a Jew transported to Treblinka, another death camp we visited, was one hour and 40 minutes, mostly waiting inside an overloaded boxcar. Treblinka had no barracks or living quarters for the Jews. The Nazis had built a mock train station there to con the Jews into believing they were at a transfer terminal, a ploy intended to keep them calm and orderly.
At the end of the war, Treblinka was dismantled by the Nazis. Today its existence is marked by more than 17,000 stones planted in concrete. Each stone represents a community from which Jews came. The larger the stone, the larger the community. Most larger stones bear the names of the communities they represent. I found the stone for Bialystok, where some of my family had lived. I said a prayer and lit a candle.
The first camps we saw were secluded. Majdanek, in contrast, sits at the edge of Lublin, a medium-size town in Eastern Poland. The crematoriums there burned constantly; the Poles had to know what was going on. The vastness of this camp is incredible. It expands in all directions as far as the eye can see.
Inside one Majdanek barracks are huge wire crates filled to the ceiling with shoes - thousands and thousands of shoes. I could reach through the wire to touch them. I thought about what the person might have been like who wore this or that shoe - someone's loved one wore this shoe every day to go to work or school, to go on a date or play a game.
Bones and ashes are still visible in the Majdanek crematoriums. A gigantic urn stands as a memorial to this terrible place. Inside the urn, ashes are piled up like a mountain. One of the most disturbing things about Majdanek is that it is so well intact. We were told that it could be up and running in just 72 hours.
During World War II, more European Jews were exterminated in Poland than in any other European country as part of Hitler's final solution. Today, Poland has its gangs of skinheads and rebellious youth, just like the United States. Yet although I saw disturbing graffiti, I never felt uncomfortable around the locals. In fact, I found many of them to be courteous and helpful.
After nearly a week in Poland, we flew to Israel. When I arrived, I experienced such an uncontrollable euphoria that it was impossible to wipe the smile off my face. Everyone in our group felt somewhat like a survivor. We had made it through four of Poland's camps alive and unscathed. We made it to the Promised Land. We made it to Israel.
Just two days later, at Yad Vashem, I was asked to speak about my Poland experience with the rest of the Artzenu group members, those who had joined the mission in Israel. They were knowledgeable about the Holocaust, but hadn't seen the camps firsthand. As I talked, I remembered my father's words, and it occurred to me how important it was to encourage others to go where I had gone.
To obtain information about Artzenu IX, call the JNF office at (602) 277-4800.
Robert Friedlander is a Phoenix resident employed in sales who is active in several Jewish young-adult groups.