Martyrdom and Resistance, May/June 1994

ID Transcript mare2005_01 "I'iW&M | MARTYRDOM AND RESISTANCE SV PUBLISHED BY THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR YAD VASHEM, INC. Vol. 20 - No. 5 ISSN 0892-1571 May-June 1994 - Sivan-Tammuz 5754 Yom Hashoa V9Hagvurah In Israel Recalls 50th Year of Hungarian Phase With the 50th year commemoration of the annihilation of Hungarian Jewry as a centerpiece, Israel observed Yom Hashoa V'Hagvurah and added themes, notably the 50th year of the destruction of the Lodz Ghetto, and the need to combat Revisionism. Receiving special attention were those from the Yishuv who parachuted into Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, and Yugoslavia to help Jews. The most famous was Holocaust heroine Hanna Szenes; caught, sentenced and executed for treason, at age 23. The central ceremony, as in past years, was at Israel's Remembrance Authority, Yad Vashem, in the presence of Israeli President Ezer Weizman and Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. The flame of remembrance was lit by the President. ""Fifty years have passed,"" he said, and already there are those who have risen to deny the Holocaust. They are almost as dangerous as the Holocaust itself."" This is not only a distortion of history, but an attempt to dwarf, diminish, and ignore it as if it never happened, as if it was permissible and just, as if it was a small and marginal event... ""On this day, let us say to ourselves, the world, that we remember, we shall not forget, and we shall not allow it to be forgotten^ J will end with the words of the poet Abraham Schlonski, in which he remembers, vows to remember everything and forget nothing."" ""SURVTVORS...SLIPPING AWAY"" Picking up this theme, the Prime Minister lamented, ""Quietly and gradually the survivors are slipping away from among those who suffered and could tell... Those who once whispered wicked things are now raising their voices to spew forth their lies. ""It is a national and historic duty to talk, not to hide anything. The Holocaust is part of the personal biography of each and every one of us, even if we were not there...before it is too late: to speak, to reveal, to relate, not to withhold anything...to give difficult testimony orally, in writing, with the use of visual aids, in any way possible in order to preserve it for the history of the Jewish people, for the next generation who will have difficulty believing when faced with the lies of abominable Holocaust deniers. ""The institution of Yad Vashem...and the staff who do its sacred work play a leading role in this battle."" (Continued on page 8) Yom Hashoa: Record Numbers* New Audiences RESERVE THE DATE Sunday, Oct 30, 1994 Tenth Annual Dinner of the American and International Societies for Yad Vashem New York Hilton Hotel HONOR Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel It is nearly 50 years since the end of the Holocaust. As the years pass, the enthusiasm for and commitment to remembrance programs have not become jaded. In fact, the numbers of participants and programs grow. Witness Yom Hashoa V'Hagvurah 5754-1994, 27 Nissan, April 8. Programs and participants were recorded in record numbers across the globe. Observances were sponsored by those who had been inactive in the past, by the Governments of Hungary and Russia, and the Vatican, just to name three. Attention was focused on Israel's Remembrance Authority, at Yad Vashem, and in the Capitol Rotunda Vatican Sponsors First Yom Hashoa Program The first official Vatican commemoration of the Holocaust was sponsored on'Yom Hashoa by Pope John II. The international concert was attended on Yom Hashoa by dignitaries from around the world. Thousands in the Vatican's Paul VI auditorium heard the London Royal Philharmonic Orchestra pay tribute to the Six Million martyrs. Among the guests were Chief Rabbi of Rome Elio Toaff, who for the first time was an honored guest at a Vatican ceremony; Israeli Ambassador to Rome Avi Pazner; Italian President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro; and representatives of Catholic and Jewish groups worldwide. The Pontiff met with 100 survivors and their families before the concert. ""It is not enough that we remember,"" he told survivors, ""for in our own day, regrettably, there are many new manifestations of the anti-Semitism, xenophobia and racial hatred which were the seeds of those unspeakable crimes... History cannot permit all that to happen again."" The Polish-born Pontiff observed that as a young man he had made pilgrimages to Auschwitz and Dachau and visited Poland on his first trip to Poland after being named Pope in 1979. Six survivors of concentration camps lit six candles on a large menora. Speaking after the music, the Pope said, ""The candles lit by some of the survivors seek to demonstrate symbolically that this hall has no narrow limits, but that it contains all the victims: fathers, (Continued on page 6) in Washington, D.C. However, throughout the world, countless ceremonies were held at every governmental level. Especial attention was paid this year to 50th anniversaries: the annihilation of Hungarian Jewry and the heroic rescue by the Danes. Although the world is remembering, observances targeted on the dangers of anti-Semitism, neo-Nazism, and Revisionism. The attention paid and acclaim given Peter Spielberg's movie ""Schindler's List"" brought the theme of Righteous Gentiles to many ceremonies. Other themes included the 1.5 million Jewish children who were martyred and the Jewish resistance against the Nazis and their collaborators. These messages were voiced at a gathering of Jews and non-Jews; survivors, second generation, and third generation; liberators and liberated; soldiers and non- combatants. A striking quality of Y.om Hashoa observances was the cehtrality* of survivors and the leadership of second generation and third generation in both planning, and speaking at these programs. As always, but even more as the years pass, the immediacy and emotional tone of the programs were enlivened and enhanced by survivors who bore witness. Vice President Al Gore urged Jews to tell the story of the Holocaust to prevent the atrocities from ever happening again. Speaking at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum's annual Days of Remembrance ceremony, the Vice President told those in the Capitol Rotunda, ""The purpose of this memorial, of this day, is to tell the story to each generation...We tell the story to remember the need for vigilance."" This year's ceremony was dedicated to the annihilation of the Hungarian Jewish community and of the gypsy community. Benjamin Meed, chair of the Days of Remembrance, said that the world must remember history's ""darkest chapter."" The chair of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, Miles Lerman, presented the Eisenhower Liberation Medal to Gen. Claude Kicklighter on behalf of the U.S. soldiers who helped liberate the Nazi concentration camps. Ruth Mandel, vice chair of the Museum Council, officiated at a candle lighting ceremony attended by Holocaust survivors and Congressional members. The 50th anniversary of the Holocaust in Hungary (Continued on page 6) Torches were lit at Yad Vashem's observance of Yom Hashoa V'Hagvurah by survivors of the camps in Hungary and other areas under its control, and members of the underground. "