I lived in Warsaw during the Holocaust
Holocaust Coursework
I lived in Warsaw, in Poland, so was one of the first few to experience the Nazi war machine. They reached my city, the capital, after just 6 days of war. My Jewish friends and I hadn't time to take this all in before we discovered that 'our kind' was being hunted out. So, of course eventually my friends & I were herded into ghettos like sheep. In this situation, we were isolated from the outside world; there were high walls on all sides of this small "village", with only a large, Nazi-controlled gate being our means of getting supplies in and rubbish out. It was so cramped; sometimes half-a-dozen families had to live within one small house. Due to such un-hygienic conditions, disease spread like wildfire, with people coming down with water-borne diseases left right and centre.
My family & I lived like this for about a year before the death squads first appeared. They would come into our ghetto, and many others, just to plough through our people with their machine guns. At the time, I thought & hoped that this would be the worst sight I would ever have to witness; I should have known that the Nazis were capable of far worse.
The first sign of such worse things came when the cattle trucks arrived, along with the promise that we were going to a better place. We happily packed our belongings and were herded onto these trucks. Our baggage didn't come with us though; the Nazis' took it promising we would get it back - a promise never fulfilled. This greatly pained me to learn this, as everything of sentimental value to me was in my small suitcase. This had been repeated though with the rest of my family and everyone else on this truck.
I was in that truck for what seemed years, but must've only been a mere week. I was one of the lucky ones, as I was in a corner. This allowed me to create a crude hammock with my jumper & some string I found in my pocket. From this place of power, I could reach for snow off the top of the truck, which was our only source of food in there. Thanks to this gift, I managed to keep my parents & younger sister healthy enough to make it through this awful trip. Unfortunately, this was more than could be said for 1/3 of the people who started the journey.
When we got out, I saw it, the thing of which nightmares are made, & for me remain whenever I lay my head down to sleep; acres & acres, which I can now safely say was worse than anything else which could possibly exist on this planet: the concentration camp at Auschwitz.
Upon arrival everyone was herded into one of two lines. This was the last time I ever saw my sister & mother. My father & I were put into the left line, meaning I could get a couple of months of hard labour on very few rations before inevitably dying. Unfortunately, my mother & sister went into the other line: instant death.
The camp was very difficult for me, and everyone else, not least because we were forced to do hard labour, and was half-starved; we were so bad that within a matter of weeks I, for ...
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Upon arrival everyone was herded into one of two lines. This was the last time I ever saw my sister & mother. My father & I were put into the left line, meaning I could get a couple of months of hard labour on very few rations before inevitably dying. Unfortunately, my mother & sister went into the other line: instant death.
The camp was very difficult for me, and everyone else, not least because we were forced to do hard labour, and was half-starved; we were so bad that within a matter of weeks I, for one, had been reduced to skin and bone. After all, that's inevitable on daily rations consisting of one piece of stale bread & soup (so thin it was more like boiling water). We all had to get along in extremely cramped conditions; our beds were mere shelves, & at night we had to "stock" ourselves onto these shelves, more like mere things than the people we actually were.
This was not what truly shocked me though, more how the Nazis could blatantly ignore the rulings of God in such spectacular style.
The Jewish religion bases all its teachings on obeying the Ten Commandments, which God handed down to Moses on top of Mt. Sinai. The Nazis' managed to break all 6 regarding how we treat other people, continuously. This shocked everyone in the camp at the hands of these beasts. These 6 are, namely:
Thou Shalt Not Steal
Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery
Thou Shalt Not Covet Thy Neighbours Goods
Thou Shalt Not Bare False Witness
Thou Shalt Honour Thy Mother & Father
THOU SHALT NOT KILL
I have already told of how the Nazis' stole the personal belongings of every person who was to step into the death camps, because they coveted these goods. I'm also pretty certain that some of these officers raped any pretty young thing that stepped in, regardless of their relationship standings back at their homes. In their heavily biased courts, the Nazis' continually gave false evidence, a fact I'm sure the courts were aware of, just to convict more Jews. I'm pretty sure not all of them honoured their parents, judging by how cruel they were to us. And they killed continuously, you can tell by the death figures.
It amazes me, even today how these "people" could break these, yet seem to have a crystal clear conscience. But at the same time it absolutely sickens me & breaks my heart how they could break such simple divine commandments. The Nazis' breaking of the sixth commandment (thou shalt not kill) particularly sickened me as this was done with such order, making the place worse than hell. The Nazis' "laws" were at the opposite end of the morale spectrum from those, which we religiously followed.
However, being in conditions like that can bring out the best or worst in people, as I saw many Jews committing many acts of these same offences. The most common one was undoubtedly the act of theft. Many a time I saw Jews stealing others food, blankets & what little other property my peers may have had.
The worst act of theft I witnessed came one night when 2 girls were talking to each other, one on the diplomats' side, and the other on mine. The girl on the other side looked quite well fed, which must've been due to the fact that they can receive red cross parcels over there, but the girl on mine was just skin and bones, as many of us were. The VIP girl threw her latest parcel over the barbed wire to feed her friend back to some sort of strength, but alas! Another Jew caught it and proceeded to run off. I discovered later that she had died, as I looked at her still body while working in the crematoria at Auschwitz.
This act shook me to my core. I knew Nazis to be inhuman, as this is the only idea to explain their actions, but what excuse could be made by a fellow Jew, blatantly ignoring God's orders, in order to live another week whilst leading a young girl to her starvation sooner rather than later?
If only. I found myself saying this a lot during my time in the camps. These heartless people just needed God, or some sort of religion, and they needed to follow a set of laws by which to live their lives, as the Jews have done for thousands of years. They needed to take a page out of our Shema; our most important prayer. It starts with a declaration of God's oneness. We then pledge to accept God's kingship & keep his commandments. If only these Germans had taken this sort of pledge. Maybe then none of these atrocities would ever have happened & the Jewish faith would now be stronger that it's ever been.
They showed so much hate towards us, which confused every one of us who were wrongly forced into these camps. We had done nothing to them, which would merit such resentment. Leviticus 19.18: "...Love Thy Neighbour as you would love yourself." If only the Nazis' had attended one Sabbath service they may have heard this. Imagine if they had followed this commandment; millions of people would not have perished at their hands.
However, for me this was the hardest commandment to upkeep, when I saw the atrocities they committed to my fellow Jews, & more importantly, friends.
Also, the tenth commandment, warning our peoples of jealousy. The Holocaust partly happened due to Hitler's jealousy of us. If only that jealousy had been removed somehow. If only...
At this hand of evil, I saw hundreds die before my eyes. Of course it was difficult to keep faith when people better than I was were getting killed, & I survived. Did God just sit back and watch all this?
However, I, as well as others, found that even if we did want to give up on God, people such as myself, who had lost everything: family, possessions, right to life, found that we needed something to cling to or else there would be nothing available to give one strength. In this way our faith was defeating Hitler! By surviving & remaining Jewish, we were winning!
Personally, my belief in God was never in question. When I was about to go mad, I found myself able to mentally leave the constant floggings, & find myself somewhere which was completely different to what my body was suffering.
Others, lucky enough to be canned into the tiny shacks with a Rabbi, heard & recited most of the teachings of the Torah, renewing their faith every night, & feeling God's presence even in the throws of the fiery hell of the Death camps.
Also, I saw God in other people's acts. For example, I saw a middle-aged man, just skin & bones & obviously close to death, give up his daily bread & soup to a crying child. That struck me deeply & helped me reach where I am today. I think I would have given up if it hadn't been for those people lifting me up through their acts of kindness and showing me God's presence.
Many of us believed that these events were the birth pangs for the Messiah. We have been taught that our faith will have to suffer, as one does before birth, for the arrival of someone who will bring an age of peace and harmony all over the world - the Messiah. Perhaps we are now on our way to the Messianic Age as in 1948 the state of Israel was created!
As I walked around the Death Camps, I could hear people mumbling to themselves that God cannot control the Nazis so we shouldn't hold the events of the Holocaust against him. People, after all, have the freewill to choose to do Good or Evil. The Nazis chose the latter.
But, for the pessimistic, there was always the idea that this event was a punishment for our sins, for the actions of a previous time when we hadn't kept our side of the covenant. But was this just a test of faith?
The Holocaust needs to be remembered for the survivors, & for the 6 million killed. Who knows what was lost in that 6 million? Great artists, record breakers, a cure for cancer & aids, or even someone who would create world peace. We need to remember it so that it can never happen again, because if one forgets, who can stop it happening again?
This event runs alongside all other events in Jewish history, & for it we get a day, & a museum. We remember all our major events in our history, so we need to "celebrate" on this day fully. So it is not forgotten. The past effects the present, which ultimately affects the future!
Also, anti-Semitism is now rising again, so we need to remember where these ideas led to before, so we can "cut it down at the knees." Many incidents of more recent genocides include the ethnic cleansing in Bosnia, Rwanda etc.
But on the other hand, if people see that we have been suffering throughout our history, the Adolf Hitler's amongst the youth may believe there to be a good, solid reason behind this, & become anti-Semitic themselves. And for all things there has to be a time to let go, maybe it is now, 50 years ago, or 50years in the future, but eventually all past evils have to be let go. Many Jews today don't want to be defined by the Holocaust - they want to assimilate into the wider society.
I have seen unimaginable suffering, spent days after days, (which felt more like decades) in a place worse than hell, and seen countless people killed for the simple reason that they were in the minority. It has taken me 40 years to come to terms with the events and to talk about them, but now that I have, I hope my words, & the words of other survivors will always be remembered as proof of the Nazis' horrific, systematic killing of people who lived, acted or were just different from themselves. I am a survivor of hell. People call it the Holocaust, of which I was in the worst death camp of them all: Auschwitz.
