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May 4, 2005
Yom HaShoah: 60th Anniversary of the Liberation of the Nazi Death Camps
For the Survivors: From the Shadow of Death to Rebirth
by Israel HighWay Staff
It is 60 years since the liberation of the Nazi concentration camps. Camps such as Auschwitz and Bergen Belsen will forever be associated with the greatest human brutality in the modern era. More than anything else, the Nazis wanted to eradicate all Jews wherever they may be. Hitler's driving force was his hatred for Jews, nothing else mattered. In the words of Albert Speer, a close confidant of Hitler's, "Hatred of the Jews was Hitler's motor and central point perhaps even the very element which motivated him. The German people, the German greatness, the Empire, they all meant nothing to him in the last analysis. For this reason, he wished in the final sentence of his testament, to fixate us Germans, even after the apocalyptic downfall in a miserable hatred of the Jews."
One historian described World War II in a very frank manner. It was The War against the Jews. In the end Hitler almost got his wish: six million Jews were murdered and millions of lives were shattered.
Click here to continue reading the Issue of the Week below
From One Generation to Another: Needham MA High School Sophs Collect Oral History from Survivors
Our website tells the story of World War II as it was told by survivors of the war to sophomore students at Needham High School. This is how one generation has passed on its experiences and memories to another. Please take the time to read this fascinating collection of stories. This site helps preserve the memories of our friends and relatives for future generations.
Here, you will read about a survivor of Kristallnacht, the gruesome Nazi attack on Jewish shops and businesses in November 1938 that marks the start of the Holocaust. We also have the story of a survivor of a concentration camp in Romania. (Needham MA High School)
MTV Commemorates End of Holocaust
MTV: Music Television will commemorate the anniversary of the end of the Holocaust with one-hour documentary I’m Still Here, set to debut Wednesday, May 4 at 8 p.m. (EST/PST).
The film "brings to life the diaries of young people who witnessed first-hand the horrors of the Holocaust” with archival footage, personal photos and text from the diaries themselves, the network said.
I'm Still Here is narrated by MTV News' John Norris, with a special introduction from Zach Braff and music by Moby. The diaries are read by actors including Elijah Wood, Ryan Gosling, Kate Hudson, Oliver Hudson, Brittany Murphy, Amber Tamblyn and Joaquin Phoenix.
"The stories featured in I'm Still Here illustrate the strength and courage of these young people in such a personal way that is difficult to replicate in a history book," MTV News & Production executive vice president Dave Sirulnick said. (Multichannel News) 
After 1,000 Years, Israel Is World's Largest Jewish Center
Recent population surveys reveal that for the first time in 1,000 years, more Jews live in Israel than anywhere else in the world, including the United States. Israel's Jewish population is more than 5.5 million, surpassing the slightly more than 5.2 million in the U.S., according to official census statistics. (Israel National News)
Sharon to U.S. Senators: Hamas Must Disarm to Run in Poll
by Aluf Benn
Israel is demanding that Hamas disarm before it participates in the elections to the Palestinian Legislative Council this summer, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said yesterday in a meeting with visiting U.S. senators Bill Frist and Joseph Lieberman.
"It is inconceivable for an armed party to participate in the democratic process; from there, it is impossible to move on to the road map," Sharon said.
A similar message was conveyed by Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom in his meeting with economic envoy James Wolfensohn. "If Hamas wants to become a political party, it must disarm," Shalom said. (Ha'aretz)
The End of a Generation
by Yoel Marcus
Ezer Weizman's passing has left us with gloom because we have lost yet another leader of that dying breed known as the 1948 generation - a generation whose members have passed down the torch of leadership since the days of the founders, in the hope that someday Israel would be a country without wars, a country with recognized borders. In short, a normal country. (Ha'aretz)
At the Kotel? On Masada? Sunset on the beach?
What was your most unforgettable moment in Israel?
Send your stories to info@israelhighway.org. Include your school and grade.
Send a digital picture, too, if you have one.
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Varied Israel Experiences Lead Youth to Aliyah
by Adam Segal
They have carried out missions in Israel's army, fallen in love, toured the land and volunteered as emergency workers. Through these experiences, five young Canadian Jews (pictured) have come to the same conclusion – it's time to make aliyah.
"I've been a Zionist all my life,” said 19-year-old Joey Lightstone, who is primed to make aliyah this summer. "I feel that if you're going to support something, you should support it all the way… and the best way [for me] to do that is to join the Israeli army.”
Lightstone recently joined fellow young prospective Canadian olim at the Israel Aliyah Center in Toronto to discuss the allure of Israel and the dreams they have for new, improved lives in the Holy Land. (Canadian Jewish News)
With Blue and White Bands, Kids Help Soldiers
by Eric Fingerhut
Now that just about every charitable cause under the sun has its own fund-raising bracelet, Elena Mircoff thought such wristbands had become "not as cool" as they used to be.
But the North Potomac resident has been pleasantly surprised. She and the rest of her class at B'nai Israel Congregation Talmud Torah in Rockville have sold hundreds of pieces of the rubber jewelry to support "lone soldiers" in the Israeli army. "It's been really cool," she said. "We've gotten people who weren't even Jewish to buy bracelets."
Selling the $3 blue-and-white tye-dye band, with a raised Star of David and the words "They Protect, We Support," became a class project after teacher Rena Rebibo told her students about a trip last year to Israel.
There, she met a Ukrainian named Evgeny, who along with his sister had left their parents behind to make aliyah, because they believed the Jewish people belong in Israel. Evgeny was in the Israel Defense Forces, but told Rebibo that he would probably have to leave the army soon in order to get a job to pay for his sister's education.
Rebibo, carrying money friends had given her for charity in Israel, gave the soldier 50 shekalim - about $12 - and returned home determined to find a way to support soldiers like Evgeny who are without family in the Jewish state. (Washington Jewish Week) 
Bridging the Chasm
by Lydia Aisenberg
Israeli school principals Yochanan Eschar and Noha Khatieb are just waiting for the day that journalists no longer come knocking on their office doors.
But they know that the day when a bilingual Hebrew-Arabic school in Israel no longer interests the media is still a long way off. Established in September 2004, Gesher al Hawadi in the Muslim village of Kafr Kara in central Israel is only the third such school in the country supported by the Jerusalem-based Hand in Hand non-profit organization.
The Jerusalem Bilingual School, inaugurated in 1997 with 20 children in one class, now has 270 pupils in 11 classes, from pre-kindergarten to junior high level, and is due to move into a new building between the capital's Jewish neighborhood Patt and the Arab village Beit Safafa in September 2006. The Misgav school in the Galilee has expanded to 170 pupils since 1997, despite ongoing local tensions, and will also need new premises soon.
"In my experience, as the children grow they naturally form friendships regardless of racial differences," says Khatieb, who taught at the Misgav school for six years.
Khatieb and Eschar are intent on nurturing understanding and tolerance between young Jews and Arabs through bilingual, multicultural education. Even the name of their school is part of the mix 'n' match of the complex dilemma of Israeli citizenship, democracy, and national identity.
Gesher in Hebrew means "bridge," and wadi is Arabic for "valley," so the basic translation would be "Bridge over the Valley." (Jerusalem Post)
Click here to view documentary on Gesher al HaWadi. 
More Than 1,000 Canadians Set To Go On March of the Living
by David Lazarus
The largest single delegation in the world taking part in the 2005 March of the Living trip to Poland and Israel departed on May 2. Montreal is sending 513 people on the two-week journey – the most from any one community, said Susan Laxer, chair of the Bronfman Jewish Education Centre (BJEC), which co-ordinates the Montreal part of the march with the Bronfman Israel Experience Centre. That number includes 251 local high school students, 86 young adults, a 126-member adult mission, and a "chairman's mission” of 50.
"It's indeed a historic occasion," Laxer told an overflow final information session recently at Montreal's Beth Israel Beth Aaron Congregation. Participants from Toronto and elsewhere in Canada, who will leave the same day, will push the national total to well over 1,000. Included on the trip – for the first time – are several dozen non-Jewish Toronto high school students, as well as university students, municipal leaders, Canadian educators and Holocaust survivors. (Canadian Jewish News)
Celebrating a Journey of Healing
by Martha Woodall
Loree D. Jones remembers the chills she felt in 1985 when she stepped into a slave house on Senegal's Goree Island and stood in rooms where shackled African men, women and children had slept before they were forced onto ships and sent to America. Then a 16-year-old student at Philadelphia High School for Girls, Jones visited Senegal and Israel as part of Operation Understanding, aimed at improving relations between Philadelphia's African American and Jewish teens.
As Operation Understanding geared up for its 20th anniversary celebration tonight at the Academy of Music, Jones, 36, reflected on the summer journey that shaped her life. Jewish teens in the group, she recalled, had similar emotional experiences at Yad Vashem, the memorial in Jerusalem for the six million Jews who perished during the Holocaust.
"Because we were able to watch each other at those places, we built more compassion for each other," said Jones, who is concluding a term as co-president of Operation Understanding's board of directors. "We were able to draw those direct parallels."
Since its founding by former U.S. Rep. William H. Gray 3d and investment banker George H. Ross as a way to build bridges between the city's African American and Jewish communities, Operation Understanding has helped 350 students make connections. Each year, the program selects eight African American and eight Jewish students from the city who travel during the summer before they become high school seniors.
More information at www.operationunderstanding.org (Philadelphia Inquirer)
Students Depart on Pilgrimage to Israel
by Sheery Parmet
Tourism to Israel in the past five years has plummeted because of conflicts with Palestinians, but year after year the San Diego Jewish Academy has sent its seniors on a Holy Land pilgrimage.
The students go to support the country, defy terrorists and gain a meaningful educational experience.
As a dozen local seniors recently prepared for a trip to Israel and Eastern Europe that is scheduled to begin tomorrow, they said they viewed the region as a haven, a comfort and a second home.
"When you're there, you feel just so safe," said Giuliette Recht, a senior at the academy, who accompanied her family to Israel for Passover in 2004. "You don't hear the good things on the news. But there's only one Western Wall, one place (where) Sarah was buried," she said of a matriarch of Jewish history. "We have been hearing about this place our entire lives. Trying to get us not to go is what the terrorists are hoping to accomplish." (Sign On San Diego)
Visit to Jerusalem Thrills, Enlightens
by Jean Horne
For more than 3,000 years, Jews have celebrated the miraculous exodus from Egypt at Passover seders that always end with the phrase, "Next year in Jerusalem." At last week's seder, I smiled over my memories of this year in Jerusalem.
Jerusalem shimmers like an oasis in the wilderness. Every building, wall, archway and minaret in the ancient city is faced with Jerusalem stone. From a distance, it glows ivory by day, pink at dusk and pure gold in the moonlight. Here, archaelogists dig with a spade in one hand and the bible in the other. They have uncovered cardos, or avenues, that date to the Roman emperor Hadrian.
But nothing I had read or seen prepared me for the dazzling, picture-postcard panorama of the ancient city with the Muslims' sacred Dome of the Rock gleaming above the Western Wall, the holiest shrine of the Jewish world. So near and yet so far. A portion of the wall is all that remains of King Solomon's temple. It's also known as the "Wailing Wall" for the centuries of Jews who came here to weep over the destruction of the second temple. Believing that it "is the shortest route to G-d's ear," visitors slip prayers on bits of paper between the massive stones at the base.
The Israelis we met were passionate and gracious to a fault, and have proven they will beat their plowshares into weapons to defend their country's right to exist.
"Israel is going through open-heart surgery without anesthesia," reported David Kreizelman, foreign policy associate, on its peace negotiations. (Pittsburgh Tribune Review)
Hadassah Programs in Israel Inspire Clevelanders
by Marcia Landau Elbrand
At Hadassah Hospital at Ein Kerem, Israel, an Orthodox woman holding an infant is seated next to an Arab man wearing a kaffiyeh. A young woman, who looks to be Indian, plays blocks on the floor with a diverse group of children, none of whom is hers. A young man getting on the elevator holds a prayer book in one hand and his son's hand in the other. It is a microcosm of all that is Israel.
I was one of 11 Cleveland women fortunate enough to witness that scene as part of the eight-day Hadassah Leadership Academy.
At the 700-bed Hadassah Hospital, we saw state-of-the-art equipment in the just reopened emergency medical center. The unit is now able to handle double the number of trauma victims it was previously able to accommodate. The facility, the only Level I trauma center in Jerusalem, doubles as a bomb shelter and can easily resist both chemical and biological warfare.
"One of my strongest memories of the trip was standing in the lobby of the Mother and Child Pavilion," remarks Jane Edelstein. "I momentarily blocked out the words our tour guide was telling us and instead looked around. I frequently heard that Hadassah Hospital provides ‘the same health care to Jew and non-Jew alike.' But only at that moment did the knowledge move from my head to my heart." (Cleveland Jewish News)
Tourists Back in Jerusalem
by Abraham Rabinovich
The number of foreign vacationers in Israel was 30% higher than during the previous Passover holiday, with the hotel occupancy rate in Jerusalem reaching 85%. A new rail line into the capital, a scenic route negotiated by slow trains, was overwhelmed by four times as many travelers as could be accommodated. (Washington Times) 
Student Video Wins First-Place Honors
An animated video tour of Israel created by students at the Melvin J. Berman Hebrew Academy in Silver Spring has once again won first place in the Middle School category at the Montgomery County Schools Media Festival.
The three-minute video, titled Israel in Words, was created under the direction of animation artist Leila Cabib.
"For this animation workshop, I thought it would be fun for them to illustrate different aspects of Israel through Hebrew words that dealt with Israel," Cabib said.
The students were given a card with the word in Hebrew and English, and were asked to write the word in Hebrew and then, in a series of drawings, transform that word into what it represents, according to Cabib.
For example, the word kibbutz is transformed into tractors and people picking grapes. The word Jerusalem becomes the Old City's skyline. Ultimately, the students created 1,357 drawings in only a week's time, Cabib said.
Click here to see film (Washington Jewish Week)
Israeli Students Clean Up in Robot Competition
by Allison Kaplan Sommer
What exactly does it take to create a robot that can quickly maneuver through an apartment and put out a fire? Apparently, a team of motivated Israeli high school students know the answer better than anyone else.
Israeli teams made a clean sweep of the top awards for high school teams in the 2005 Trinity College Firefighting Robot Contest held in Connecticut earlier this month.
The goal of the unique exercise, which has taken place for the past 11 years, is to encourage inventors of all ages and levels of skill. The challenge of the contest is to build an autonomous computer-controlled robot that can find its way through an arena that represents a model house, find a lit candle that represents a fire in the house, and extinguish the fire in the shortest time. This task simulates the real-world operation of an autonomous robot performing a fire protection function in a real house. The goal of the contest is to advance robot technology and knowledge while using robotics as an educational tool.
The high school teams from Israel who participated in the contest not only learned a great deal from their experience - but gained a healthy measure of national pride, as well.
Four separate schools from different regions in Israel beat out teams from Singapore, Japan, and Korea and across the United States, taking home the top prizes.
The triumphant Kiryat Sharett team from Holon was notable in that it included a female member: Meital Menasherov (pictured), who said that she was proud to bring home the trophy to Israel and to her school. "I know that the robotics are considered a subject for boys - but that's just a stigma. I am a girl and I really love the field," she said.
Menasherov will soon be flying to another robotics competition in Japan. For that competition, she has brought her own feminine touch to robotics - she will be bringing a robot called 'Daisy' a nearly lifesize robot with the ability to dance. (Israel21c)
Chess Makes Mates of Israelis, Americans and Ukrainians
by Barry Davis
King Solomon, that right royal chess grandmaster of yesteryear, would no doubt have approved of a unique program. For the past three years, thanks to an Israeli initiative, American, Ukrainian and Israeli children and adults have been pitting their chess wits against each other on a regular basis via the wonders of the Internet.
Using webcams and microphones to see and hear each other, and instant messaging to write to each other, several dozen Americans from Chicago, Israelis from the southern town of Kiryat Gat and Ukrainians from the capital of Kiev 'meet' and spend a few hours together online on a regularly basis as part of the trilateral Chess-Net program. (Israel21c)
Shlomo Run! An Israeli in Major League Baseball?
by Karen Pearlman
Is Major League Baseball ready for its first Israel-born player? From the Land of Milk and Honey to the home of apple pie, it's entirely possible for University of California-San Diego pitcher Shlomo Lipetz. At age 26, Lipetz is older than most baseball prospects, but the 3/4-sidearm-throwing right-hander could be one of the chosen in June's Major League Baseball draft. One major league team has already shown interest. Lipetz led the Tritons last season with a 2.84 earned run average. He went 5-0 in 24 relief appearances, holding opposing hitters to a .257 batting average. His three-year mandatory stint in the Israeli army didn't deter him from staying active, mostly through playing softball as often as he could. (San Diego Jewish Journal) 
Why I Am Quitting Your Government
by Natan Sharansky
Dear Mr. Prime Minister,
I am writing to inform you of my decision to resign as Minister of Diaspora Affairs and Jerusalem.
As you know, I have opposed the disengagement plan from the beginning on the grounds that I believe any concessions in the peace process must be linked to democratic reforms within Palestinian society. Not only does the disengagement plan ignore such reforms, it will in fact weaken the prospects for building a free Palestinian society and at the same time strengthen the forces of terror. (Jerusalem Post)
History Holds Its Breath
by Mortimer B. Zuckerman
A half-attentive world is deluded into thinking peace is finally on the way following the death of Arafat and the election of the "constructive" Abu Mazen. Keep the champagne in the picnic basket. Nothing has changed. Abu Mazen is a weak leader who runs the same Palestinian Authority with post-Arafat diplomacy resting on the old Arafat bureaucracy. The officers of the dozen or so Palestinian security agencies are virtually local warlords who continue to collect bribes and protection money from the people they're supposed to be protecting. Their commanders follow Abu Mazen's orders only when they feel like it.
Until Abu Mazen can move beyond Arafat's legacy by reforming his government and rebuilding the security services, his attempt to build a moderate image abroad will fail, and no peace plan will be meaningful.
Abu Mazen's commitment to disarm Hamas and Islamic Jihad has become a bad joke. The danger is not only that Abbas may be Arafat in a suit; it is that he may be Arafat in an empty suit. (U.S. News)
Boycotting the Jews
by Gerald M. Steinberg
In truth, the direct impact of unspecified academic sanctions adopted by the Association of University Teachers (AUT), Britain's largest teachers' union, against the faculty at Bar-Ilan and Haifa universities is likely to be minimal. The quality of Israeli academic research is generally very high, and good work still trumps bad politics, even in the nonsense of "post-colonial," post-modern, and post-Chomsky/Said theory. The real threat, as its authors realize, is not from the direct academic impact, but rather from its broader political objectives.
The boycott is only a small part of the broader political war against Israel's legitimacy as a sovereign Jewish state, and the effort to label Israel as the next "apartheid regime" is designed to put an end to Zionism. The use of the apartheid label does a gross injustice to those who suffered under the real thing, and is a form of modern anti-Semitism, this time turning the Jewish state into the devil. This is the real tragedy of the AUT boycott decision - while talking about peace, its backers are actually contributing to war and hatred. The writer directs the Program on Conflict Management and Negotiation at Bar-Ilan University and is the editor of NGO Monitor. (Wall Street Journal)
Let's Join Our Israeli Cousins in Their Mourning
by Gil Troy
On Tuesday evening, May 10, and all day on Wednesday, May 11, the entire Jewish world should come to a standstill. In honor of Yom Hazikaron, Israel's Memorial Day, every Jew should light memorial candles at home and contemplate the many lives extinguished by decades of Arab assaults against Israel. Jews throughout the world should mob our often under-attended memorial services. This year – and in all subsequent years – Jewish community calendars should frame those 24 hours in black, marking this as a time when no galas are held, no fundraising takes place, no Jewish sports teams play and theatres go dark. It's the least we can do to honor the many Israeli sacrifices for the Jewish people.
This year, Yom Hazikaron is particularly important, because, while it is not politic to shout it out loud, Israel won this ugly war. The Palestinians miscalculated. Israelis rallied when attacked, demonstrating unexpected unity, discipline and grit. (Canadian Jewish News)
Today, it is of ever increasing importance to learn about the Holocaust, especially the personal stories. Knowing the statistics of the numbers of Jews murdered or the names of the concentration camps is not enough. Particularly now, when some "scholars" dare to deny the Holocaust, it is crucial to hear, record, and remember the actual testimonies of those who survived. They are becoming older, and within a decade or two they will no longer be with us. The Shoah Foundation, launched 11 years ago by Steven Spielberg has collected more than 52,000 Holocaust testimonies. Other testimonies can be read or viewed at the websites of Yad Vashem, the Shoah Foundation, and the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.
Halina Birenbaum, a survivor, tells the story of what it was like when she first arrived at Auschwitz: "Rows of brick barracks and fences of barbed wires charged with electricity, turrets with machine guns sticking out of the watchtowers. In the barrack windows shapes dissimilar either to men or women. The endless evil present everywhere around. I will never come out from here, I thought, becoming more and more broken down."
Bergen Belsen was a Nazi concentration camp in northern Germany. Over the course of WWII, tens of thousands of Jews died in Bergen Belsen. Among the most famous victims of Bergen Belsen were Anne Frank, and her sister Margot, who both died there in March 1945.
Judy Rosenzweig describes the liberation of Bergen Belsen in April 1945: "All of a sudden out of the blue sky we saw tanks rolling into the camp…We had no idea what kind of tanks they were. Is it the Americans? Is it the Germans? Is it…We just didn't know. We just suddenly panicked…And loudspeakers started speaking loudly in German and in English:
'You are liberated.'
'We are the English Army - You are liberated.'
'Stay away from danger and stay inside and we'll help you.'
'Stay alive. Try to hang in there. We're here to help you.'
And we knew we were liberated. Needless to say, our feelings were very mixed. So we were liberated. So thank God we are alive. But are we really thankful? Who are we? Where are we going to go? What are we? Nothing. That's okay, we're alive."
Former Israeli Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau retells his own liberation: "I want to share with you some experiences, starting with April 11, the day of our liberation from Buchenwald. I speak not of April 11 1945 but of April 11 1983 in Washington, D.C. at the Second World Gathering of Holocaust Survivors. I was then Chief Rabbi of Nethanya and invited to come as one of the youngest survivors of Buchenwald on the day of liberation. They had arranged for me a meeting with Rabbi Herschel Schachter, a liberator. From 1945 to 1983, 1 had carried with me a memory that I thought was my imagination until I had it confirmed at the gathering by Rabbi Schachter.
Rabbi Schachter was in the first jeep to enter the gates of Buchenwald. The Germans had gone, the gates were still closed, and there was a pile of corpses near the gates. I stayed behind the pile of bodies. The gate was broken down and the jeep entered.
Rabbi Schachter was frightened, he could not believe his eyes. He saw eyes watching him, took out his gun and walked around the corpses, where he discovered a little boy with not even one tooth. He understood this must be a Jewish child and gathered me into his arms. Now I was afraid. He was a man in a uniform with a gun. For six years I had seen the uniforms of the SS, the Wehrmacht, of Einsatzgruppen. He saw how frightened I was. First he wept, then he smiled and asked in Yiddish for my name. "Lulek, in Polish they call me Lulek."
He said, "How old are you, Lulek?" I would not have believed it if Rabbi Schachter had not told this. He said I answered him "What difference does it make? I am older than you." He was puzzled, he was a soldier, a rabbi and I was less than 8 years old and yet I said "I am older than you." So he asked me why I thought so. I answered "Because you behaved like a child. I haven't laughed or cried for years. I am too strong, too tough. I don't cry any more. So tell me who is older, me or you?"
Saved from the Jaws of Death; Now the Decision to Live
Over a short period of time, according to Yad Vashem, Bergen Belsen became the largest Displaced Persons camp in Germany. In 1946, more than 11,000 Jews lived there. Some survivors succumbed to their despair in the DP camp. After years of forced labor, some survivors refused to work at all. The majority of survivors at Bergen Belsen were able to gather emotional energy and channel it towards rebuilding their lives. Holocaust survivor Paul Trepman, a member of the Jewish leadership in the DP camp at Bergen Belsen, described life there: "Teachers established good schools, from nothing. People produced quality newspapers that were worth reading, even without a press. Actors established a theater. All of this was in addition to meeting the daily needs of the new Jewish community in the camp."
Most of the survivors in the DP camp at Bergen Belsen were young people. They found themselves entirely alone, having lost their parents, spouses, children and siblings during the Holocaust. They commonly chose to establish a feeling of normality and fight despair by marrying in the DP camp. During the first year after liberation, in the Bergen Belden DP camp, there were often six weddings a day, and up to fifty weddings a week. During 1946, there were 1,070 weddings at Bergen Belsen. (Yad Vashem)
Finding New Homes
It is difficult to even imagine the suffering and horrors of those who survived the Holocaust. Yet, today we look at the survivors still alive and the families they have created as true testimony that we, as a people, survived. Many survivors like those mentioned above came to Israel and were reborn simultaneously with Israel's birth. Some survivors came to Israel and immediately fought for the independence of their homeland. Some perished, but they died free men fighting for a different future than the one they had.
In Israel, North America, Europe or Australia, the survivors made a place for themselves in the world again. Many came as the sole survivor of their family but they forged on and created new families and success. In the United States, survivors and their children serve in the U.S. Congress, in academia, and business. In Britain, a candidate in the prime ministerial elections is the son of a survivor. And in Israel survivors or the children of survivors are leading rabbis, professors, soldiers, and politicians whose future path was - and forever will be - influenced by the difficult path taken by the survivors. (Israel HighWay Staff)
Additional Reading
* Yad Vashem: Destruction and Rebirth at Bergen Belsen
* U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum: Focus on Liberation
* Proclamation by the President of the U.S. on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz Concentration Camp
* Remarks by Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz at the United Nations Commemoration of the 60th Anniversary of the Liberation of Nazi Death Camps
* 145 Educational Websites about the Holocaust
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