I Am a Star (10 page)

The townspeople, fearing reprisal from us, insisted that they knew nothing of the horrors we had suffered. They said they had never hated the Jews and were therefore not guilty of any crime. Why then did they not question the fate of so many innocent people taken away so brutally at the time?

Our home became a famililar place for the American soldiers. They showered us with personal goods and candy. Some ran with their melting ice cream rations to our home so that I could have a special treat.

To my knowledge, I was the only Jewish child survivor in the state of Württemberg. My eleventh birthday was a sensation. I was invited to the local UNRRA (United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration) Commission Headquarters. I had but one wish—to receive a new doll carriage, even though I seemed too old for it. I remembered just before my deportation to Terezin how heartbreaking it had been to wheel my light green carriage for two miles to town and give it to another child.

How thrilled I was with my first new outfit, a black and white checked dress sewn especially for me. I felt like an animal let out of a cage. I just wanted to run free and play, instead of studying at school. Papa resumed his textile business and once more began to be successful.

 

Life slowly returned to normal again, but it was still lonely. We took the first opportunity we could to immigrate to America in May 1946. We rode in the boxcars of a freight train to the sea-port of Bremen. The cars had been decorated with tree branches, and on their sides was written with chalk: “God bless President Truman and America.” It was a stormy ten days at sea on the Marine Perch, an American troop transport ship. We arrived in New York Harbor at night. I stood in awe of the blinking lights of Manhattan, which seemed like a wonderland to me. Lady Liberty was especially bright as her lamp’s light welcomed and guided us to a new life. The next morning we disembarked just as the sun rose on a new day.

 

 

W
here were the church and all the good and decent people of the world while this barbarism was going on? The heads of the Christian churches and the leaders of Islam and Buddhism made no protest against this inhumanity. The leaders and intellectuals of the free world did not scream out in protest. Some of the clergy in Belgium and France helped to save Jewish children by hiding them in nunneries and safe houses. Very few of the clergy, however, became involved in this tragedy. Pastor Niemöller of Germany did provide this daring example of the way some people acted during the Nazi era:

Murder on such a scale could not be hidden. The stench of burning flesh from the crematoria reached houses miles away. Many people outside the camps knew of these evil happenings, but did nothing to help. There were some exceptions. The people of Denmark, led by King Christian X, saved seven thousand Jews by helping them escape to Sweden. Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat, saved thousands of lives in Hungary. He devised the protective passport, or
Schutzpass,
with the Swedish colors and embassy stamp that placed many Jews in Budapest under Swedish government control. Some of the people of Bulgaria and a few heroic individuals in Germany and the occupied countries risked their lives to aid the Jews.

One might ask, did the Jews go like sheep to slaughter? Yes, they were slaughtered, but not without resistance. Most of them were completely helpless. They had few weapons, were broken in body and spirit; tortured and starved to death. Some were branded like cattle with a tattoo on their left arm. Soap was made from fat of their dead bodies, and human skin was used to make lampshades. Children, especially twins, were used for painful and gruesome medical experiments by Nazi doctors.

There were some heroic acts of resistance by the Jews in the ghettos and camps. One of them was the superhuman effort of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising in April 1943. A small group of poorly armed young Jewish fighters held off the German army for over a month. They did not give up until the Nazis burned the whole ghetto down. Jews were among the first to become partisans (resistance fighters) against the Nazis. There was also resistance of the spirit. Some children in the ghettos and camps were taught against great odds in illegal classes. Just to stay alive one more day was an immense struggle for the human spirit.

What was the toll of these dreadful years? World War II consumed fifty million lives. A total of eleven million people were murdered by starvation,gassing, phenol injection, shooting, electrocution, torture, experimentation, and disease. Six million of them were Jews: two-thirds of the entire Jewish population of Europe had been slaughtered. The other five million humans so
brutally slain were Gypsies, Slavs, and people who had been branded enemies of the Nazi state. Germany—one of the greatest, most civilized, cultured, and scientifically advanced countries of the world—became the most barbaric nation in history.

Hitler killed himself in his protected bunker in Berlin as the Allies were closing in on him. Some of his aides were tried by an international military tribunal for crimes against humanity. They were sentenced to die or to serve long prison terms. Many escaped to other countries and were never punished for their crimes.

The philosopher George Santayana wrote that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” It is our responsibility to be watchful of all our leaders in government. We must speak out against evil and injustice. Let us build bridges of understanding and love to join mankind in every land. My hope, my wish, and prayer is for every child to grow up in peace without hunger and prejudice.