Survivor speaks on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, 80th anniversary of Auschwitz Liberation

Yahoo

28-01-2025

(FOX40.COM) — This International Holocaust Remembrance Day marks the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the Nazi labor and extermination camp where 1.1 million people were murdered.
SS chief Heinrich Himmler was the mastermind of what's known as the 'final solution' the deliberate and systematic plan for the mass murder of the Jewish people via camps like Auschwitz.
96-year-old Benjamin Lesser survived several unimaginable ghettos and concentration camps, including Auschwitz-Birkenau. Of his family of 7, only he and his sister survived.
His brother was murdered for forging documents that allowed Mr. Lesser and dozens of others to escape the ghetto to get to Hungary. They were transported in a truck and hidden under coal, where they were almost caught by Nazis.
'We hear soldiers walking on top of the coal and the coal dust was filtering through,' Mr. Lesser recalls. 'My little brother is about to sneeze, and I'm holding his nose and mouth, but three hours they were with us, and then they said they left.'
When the truck returned to pick up his parents, they were caught, lined up against a wall and publicly executed by a firing squad.
When Mr. Lesser made it to Hungary, the Nazis told the Jewish community that they would be sent to work, and women and children would be cared for.
He recalls groups of 80 people being packed into small cattle cars.
'If somebody wanted to sit down, someone else had to stand up,' Mr. Lesser recalled. 'There were two buckets of water inside that cattle car. There were no sanitary facilities or toilets, so people started to use those buckets and the buckets were overflowing.'
It was three days later when Mr. Lesser first saw 'Arbeit Macht Frei' which translates from German as 'work sets you free,' the haunting sign on what's known as the 'Gates of Hell' at Auschwitz.
1.1 million people would enter through this gate, never to see the other side again.
'Women and children were sent to the right, man to the left,' he said. 'I'm holding on to my sister, Goldie, and my little brother Tuli, and we were pulled apart never to see each other again. They went directly to the gas chambers.'
Upon his arrival at Auschwitz, the infamous Dr. Mengle, known as 'The Angel of Death' for conducting inhumane medical experiments on thousands of Jewish people noted Lesser's strength and sent him to work.
'We saw these five chimneys and flames are shooting out, ashes are flying like snow,' he said. 'Every step you made, you leave a footprint in the ashes.'
He soon learned that these were the ashes of his family and was told he would be next at the first mistake.
'Every morning, we had to stand, and they were counting us naked, and they were looking at each body,' he says. 'If you're too skinny, they pushed you to the crematorium.'
Mr. Lesser shared one of the most horrific scenes he witnessed the Nazis partake in.
'I crossed the other barrack behind us, and I see three trucks full of people in them, and I they're picking up children who were alive, screaming and throwing them into the fiery pits like they were garbage,' Mr. Lesser said.
In June 1944, Mr. Lesser was sent to Durnhau concentration camp for slave labor where he was tortured.
'Every time they hit me, I feel my flesh being torn apart.'
He then endured a 7-week long death march, walking through the snow with no food or shoes.
'Why did they call it the death march? Because if you could not keep up pace with the soldiers, they simply shot you,' Mr. Lesser explained. 'You can hear pop, pop, pop, people being shot.'
He arrived at Buchenwald but was soon evacuated and thrown into another cattle car where he was stabbed trying to get a piece of bread.
'I feel my mouth is filling up with blood, but I have to get the bread,' he said as he pointed to his scar. 'I put my finger here, it went right through the tongue. I have the terrible cut to this day.'
The cattle car arrived at Dachau.
'From 80 people in my cattle car, only four of us walked out, my cousin and I and two other people, everybody else was dead.'
While Auschwitz was liberated in January 1945, Dachau was liberated several months later in April. He recalls the first thing he saw at Dachau.
'We see a mountain full of bodies, skeletons,' he recalled. 'Apparently, they ran out of coal to burn the bodies, so they piled up. I mean, as far as you can see was nothing but bodies.'
On the day of liberation, Mr. Lesser's cousin who survived the Death March alongside him died of dysentery in Lesser's arms. Countless other survivors would also go on to die of dysentery upon liberation.
Mr. Lesser was 16 years old and weighed 60 pounds, adding that he was a 'sack of bones.'
He said his survival was a miracle and soon realized his purpose was to educate others on the horrors of the Holocaust. And at 96 years young, he continues to do just that, as often as he can.
'God needed a witness, someone who could talk about it, and I thank god that he gave me the years so that I can do that.'
And with the staggering rise in antisemitism, Mr. Lesser stresses the importance of Holocaust education. Without it, he says history can repeat itself.
'Hitler and the nazis did not start with killing, it all started with hate, hate propaganda.'
And as the number of concentration camp survivors begins to dwindle with age, Holocaust museums and institutions have made it their mission to continue educating the next generation.
'80 years emphasizes the responsibility on those of us that are educators and have the honor and privilege to have learned with survivors who have entrusted us with their testimony,' Miriam Blum Schneider, Director of the JFCS Holocaust Center said.
Mr. Lesser says sharing his testimony leaves him with nightmares but adds that nothing will stand in the way of his will to teach the next generation the necessary tools to combat hate. Through his non-profit, Zachor, which translates as remember in Hebrew, he has reached thousands of students from across the world.
The 96-year-old survivor leaves us with an important message.
'Love and hate are both contagious. Choose love.'
For more information on Benjamin Lesser's story, you can head to zachorfoundation.org.
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