Teaching History Matters

Yesterday we conducted our last interviews, two children of camp Bergen-Belsen who actually knew each other then. Miriam Muller was just 4, and Yitzhak Glecer was just 2, but they had memories of playing together in Belsen, digging holes and playing in the mud.

The crew and I took a taxi to the Glecer home just outside of Jerusalem, the driver, conservatively dressed on this Sunday with kippah, white shirt, black pants and shoes, very interested in what we were doing, traveling with all this gear, and Mike explained our mission here in Israel, to film a dozen or so survivors answering our questions about a terrible time in their lives, but also of the miracle of liberation, which is increasingly clear on every one of our stops, and this being our last two interviews.

We found the beautiful apartment building on a beautiful Sunday morning, the view from the family’s 6th floor balcony overlooking the hills and valleys of this part of Jerusalem. We were greeted warmly by Sara, Yitzhak’s wife, and youngest son, who at age 23 may just be the youngest second generation survivor in the world, Yitzhak realizing late in life that he needed to have these children to make the ultimate refutation of he-who-shall-remain-nameless.

He was in his study, preparing for the interview, which he later said he was reluctant to do, but after consulting his books, decided it must be done for not only his family, but for future generations. He emerged from his study after we were seated with coffee, and came to the couch where I was, impeccably attired, and greeted me warmly, so happy to meet me and full of questions.

He carried the well-worn copy of my book, which gratified me immensely not because he simply possessed it, but because it had obviously also been consulted many, many times. Well, you know, I wrote it for him and all the survivors, to help them, as well as the world, contextualize their very personal and unique experiences in the context of the unimaginable Shoah. No small task.

His story was amazing. He was born just before the Jewish people of Krakow were being forced into the ghetto. Well, can you imagine this? A young couple with a newborn baby? Terrorized people, then forced into hiding? Before the action that liquidated the ghetto (yes, see Schindler’s List liquidation of the ghetto scene-that was Krakow), the took a chance an acquired false papers, at no small expense.

In Belsen, the young toddler disappears and his father finds him playing with a dog- the dog of the new camp commandant, who is discussing with the head kapo the list of people to be evacuated to a new place for foreigners like the Glecer family, who is on the list. The father holds his breath, trying to retrieve the son playing with the dog, and the commandant begins to question Yitzhak’s dad. The kapo is trying to persuade the commandant to place his family on the list, apparently instead of the Glecers. The commandant agrees. A week later, it is clear that the transport went to Auschwitz from Belsen, all occupants killed as their papers had been discovered to be false.

This saved their lives, and like Miriam Muller, who had arrived to the apartment as well, brought her father’s actual document, false papers issued by the Chilean Consulate, that kept her family alive- which I had never seen before, but almost all families on the train possessed. And here it was, even bearing the autograph of US Army soldier Abraham ‘Al’ Cohen, whom hundreds of survivors remember as he walked down the hill at liberation, tears streaming down his face, crying in Yiddish, “I am Jew, too!” Here was the actual proof of his existence!

Miriam also brought a red leaflet, with a message in German, calling for the end of the war, that Patton had crossed the Rhine, that Montgomery was on the way, that 1.1 million Germans were already surrendered.

Surrender! Now! And Live!

Apparently, the driver of the train took the message to heart, as he had sped off with the engine towards home, rather than following the last minute order to drive over the bridge at the Elbe River, surrounded by advancing Russian and American forces, and blowing up the bridge over the Elbe with the train and all the victims on it.

Miriam gave her testimony beautifully, and at the end, took my hands, shaking her head, smiling, speaking of “it’s a miracle, a miracle”.

“You know, you are truly a messenger of God. You are His messenger!” I was trying to hold the tears back all afternoon, listening to the two of them. Mike showed the film trailer to the families before we left; I retreated to their balcony to try to process what we had just witnessed once more here in the City of God. Yitzhak’s children were already ribbing their dad about what he might wear on the red carpet of Hollywood.

I was quiet that evening at dinner with the group. I cant believe what we have done here, with the help of our friend Varda Weisskopf, who made virtually all of the arrangements with the survivors.

I’ll be processing it for a long, long time. Thanks for following with us. More later.

Hitler did not win.