Heart-wrenching and unfathomable stories of pain, suffering and death were shared in Owen Sound on Sunday as the local synagogue observed Yom Hashoah, the day held each year to commemorate the approximately six million Jews murdered by Nazi Germany and its collaborators during the Holocaust of the Second World War.
More than 100 people sat shoulder to shoulder in the tiny Beth Ezekial Synagogue on 3rd Avenue East for the service marking Holocaust Remembrance Day. It was the first time the local congregation invited the public to attend the event, which included music, poetry from both those who died and survived, and the lighting of candles. Aly Boltman shared the story of the Holocaust Memorial that graces the wall of the synagogue.
Included in the moving and poignant service were stories shared by the children of Holocaust survivors. The local congregation no longer has any surviving members who experienced the horror first hand, but those who spoke on Tuesday still carried the memories of their parents and the few other family members who got out alive. The crowd sat in complete silence for most of the hour-and-a-half long service.
One of those who spoke was Marilyn Fedorenko of South Bruce Peninsula, whose parents Blanka and Chaim Kronenberg both spent time in Nazi concentration camps during the war.
Fedorenko shared an excerpt from a book — written and compiled by her sister and mother – that included her mom’s experiences under the rule of the Nazis in Poland, her time in the Warsaw ghetto, then Auschwitz and the death marches as the Nazis evacuated the concentration camps ahead of the approaching Allies. Out of a family of six children only her mother and an aunt lived through the war. Federenko’s dad was the only one of five children still alive when the war ended in 1945.
“My parents had both been married before the war. Their spouses and my dad’s two sons all perished,” Fedorenko said, her voice cracking. “I am forever grateful to the Allies who ended the war. Because of them I am alive today.”
Fedorenko said after Sunday’s service that her mom, who died 18 years ago, wanted the book done so that her grandchildren and “grand grandchildren” would know her.
“She liked to write, she liked to paint and she was really good at it,” said Fedorenko. “She wrote in English too, which wasn’t her first language, so it was really an accomplishment.”
Fedorenko said that sharing her mother’s story on Sunday was difficult to do as she tends not to spend time thinking of the Holocaust. But she said it was important to share what happened with others.
“It is my mother, and her best times and her worse times are in your head, so it is important for people to know and believe that the Holocaust existed,” Fedorenko said. “I find it incredible that people might not believe. Well, I have got proof.”
Fedorenko said entire families were wiped out in the Holocaust. For her, she never had a grandmother until she got married and inherited her husband’s.
“This is something that most people take for granted. They have grandparents. I never had grandparents,” Fedorenko said. “I had one aunt. That was it.”
Also speaking on Sunday was Judith Katz of Owen Sound, whose parents Agnes and Bela and most of the rest of her family were Hungarian Jews who were rounded up and sent to the camps. Her parents were the few members of her family who lived through the war. Her grandmother miraculously survived despite being shot in the head.
Her husband’s father was the only survivor of a family of four children. He spent six years in nine different concentration camps, only surviving because he was a tailor and was of use to the Germans.
“It is hard to talk about what happened to my family, not just because so many died in the Holocaust, but because the ones who did survive didn’t talk about what they lived through or the horrors they witnessed,” said Katz, who was born in Hungary in 1954 and came to Canada in 1957. “The Holocaust in Hungary was the forceful displacement, the deportation and the systemic murder of Hungarian Jews. This was the final solution of the Jewish question in Hungary.”
By the end of the Holocaust close to 900,000 Hungarian Jews had died.
Katz said Holocaust education and remembrance events like the one held Sunday gives them the opportunity to reflect on the lessons of history. She said they share a responsibility to counter Holocaust denial and seek justice for survivors.
“It was hard. You don’t always go into the details of what they endured and that is what is hard to actually say out loud,” Katz said following the service. “My father-in-law never spoke about his six years in the camps and as long as I knew him he never touched another sewing needle because that is what kept him alive in those camps. He never even sewed on a button.”
Katz said the only family she has left in Hungary is two cousins, while her only family in Canada is her immediate family.
“When my kids did the family tree in grade school we had nobody,” Katz said. “My kids would say, ‘we don’t have anybody.’ I would say, ‘yes that is right, this is us.’ ”
Katz said that if her mother was alive today she would have cried through the entire service.
“I am not even sure my mother would be able to sit through it. Too many memories, relatives who died,” said Katz. “You tend to block out all the really crappy things that happen to, otherwise you never would be able to move forward.
“But you never forget the ones who died, who gave up their lives so that you could survive.”
Synagogue President Jeff Elie said following the service that he feels it served its purpose.
“I think we achieved our goals, which was to remind people what happens when hate goes unchecked,” Elie said. “This was a very carefully curated program. A lot of thought and time went into finding the right mix of music, poetry and readings to present a sombre, but very serious reflection of what happens when hate goes unchecked.”
Elie said Saturday’s service was about not just about marking the pain and suffering experienced by the Jews, but to also to stand together against hate of every kind.
“Things have taken a dark turn, locally, nationally and globally,” Elie said. “We believe that now is the time for us to come together and stand up against hate of all kinds, not only directed against Jews, but any targeted group, whether it is because of their ethnicity, their colour, their sexuality, their religion.”
Elie said Jews are in a unique position to facilitate such discourse because they have been persecuted for thousands of years.
“We can’t make the haters unhate, but we can push them back into the shadows where they do relatively little damage,” Elie said. “As soon as we allow it to be normalized we become complicit in what happens.”
Elie said they will continue to post ideas, thoughts and messages on a blog on their website at bethezekial.org in order to form future discussions on the issue. They also plan to post content from Sunday’s event on the website, including music, poetry and more.
SOURCE: THE SUN TIMES