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Yahoo
06-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
I saw Bergen-Belsen through the eyes of a 94-year-old survivor returning for the first time
Twenty-five years ago, as I left Auschwitz, I was certain I would never set foot in a concentration camp again. As the granddaughter of a survivor, I felt a duty to witness and to honour – but I knew that what I saw during those few days in Poland would remain etched in my memory forever. And I was right. I remember so clearly stepping into those cramped barracks, seeing the blue residue of Zyklon B on the gas chamber walls, walking the railway tracks that had carried thousands of Jews on a catastrophic one-way journey. Certain memories time cannot erode. Yet fast forward a few decades, and I find myself visiting a concentration camp again – Bergen-Belsen. This time, my motivation is not to see, but to hear – from survivors themselves. The opportunity to visit the camps alongside those who lived through those dark chapters of history is becoming ever more rare. But to mark the 80th anniversary of its liberation by British troops – and ahead of VE Day – survivors (as well as dignitaries including Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner and Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis) have gathered at the former concentration camp. Among them are Bergen-Belsen survivors Mala Tribich and Susan Pollack, both gravely ill with malnutrition and typhus when they were liberated in April 1945. Susan, 14 at the time, has never returned to Bergen-Belsen – until today. She still remembers that moment of liberation in painful detail. 'I was starving, and I wasn't able to walk any more,' she tells me, her eyes watery with age and memory. 'So I crawled out [of the barracks]. I crawled out to die. There were so many rotting bodies to be seen everywhere.' Her tone softens: 'Then a pair of gentle hands lifted me up. And who was that? A British soldier.' Does she remember what went through her mind at that moment? 'It was a miracle,' she says. At 94, she is still a walking miracle. When I first meet her, it is 6am and she is striding through Stansted Airport clutching a stick that seems to be struggling to keep up with her. She's resplendent, even at such an ungodly hour, in a pretty pink pullover and matching lipstick. We are flying to Hanover and then driving the hour-long journey to Bergen-Belsen as part of the UK delegation organised by Ajex (the Jewish Military Association). Eighty years ago, when the British freed the people from that hell on earth, they didn't just bring skeletons back from the brink of death; they restored humanity and dignity. As a British Jew, it's a piece of history that fills me with both pride and gratitude. The first troops to enter the camp were from the 63rd Anti-Tank Regiment, Royal Artillery, under the command of Lt Col Richard Taylor, accompanied by a loudspeaker truck from the Intelligence Corps. Amongst them was Sgt Norman Turgel, a Jewish officer in the British army. His son, sitting alongside me at the ceremony today, tells the story of how Norman came across a young woman in the camp, who, despite her own unbearable grief and frailty, was helping to nurse other survivors. 'That woman was my mother,' he says. 'They formed a bond that turned into love, something almost unimaginable in a place built for death.' Six weeks later they were married – his mother, Gina, wearing a wedding dress sewed from British military silks, gifted from Norman's comrades. Meanwhile, British veteran Stanley Fisher from the West Midlands, who was unable to make the journey (he's 100 years old), recalls his experience in a message. 'I fought through France and all the way to northern Germany, eventually stationed very close to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp where I witnessed horrors that have stayed with me all my life.' By the time Bergen-Belsen was liberated, around 70,000 people had already died there, mainly due to disease or starvation. Albrecht Weinberg, a 100-year-old survivor from Germany, remembers the moment British soldiers arrived. He had been deported to Bergen-Belsen on a wagon. 'Our bodies were tipped out,' he says. 'Two days later, a tank drove in. I thought, 'Now I'll finally be freed by death', but it was British soldiers coming to liberate us.' He was a 20-year-old man at the time, but weighed only 4st 7lb. Over afternoon refreshments, Susan explains what perhaps needs no explanation – why she has never returned. 'Bergen-Belsen, for me, was a place of death,' she tells me, leaning in, her voice low, her words hesitant. 'Of suffering.' Today, very little of the camp remains. The site is barren, save for a memorial obelisk, but grass mounds now mark the locations of mass graves, with thousands buried beneath each. Susan shares a memory from her arrival here in 1944. Among the 'walking skeletons,' she recognised an old friend and neighbour from her hometown of Felsőgöd in Hungary. Susan's father had been taken by the Nazis early in the war, and she had been separated from her mother and brother while at Auschwitz. So the familiar face must have been a comfort to that teenage girl, and the memory still swirls in her mind more than 80 years later. 'She recognised me and asked, 'Do you think I'm going to survive?' The following day, I went back to see her, but she had lice all over her.' In the camp, lice spread typhus. A look tells me what I need not ask. 'Very few survived in Bergen-Belsen,' she says simply. Susan (then Zsuzsanna Blau) was one of those who did – just – but she was alone. More than 50 members of her family had been murdered. She later discovered her mother had been gassed at Auschwitz. Her brother survived but never mentally recovered. He had been made to work as a Sonderkommando (work units made up of death camp prisoners), shovelling dead bodies from the gas chambers to the ovens. Recalling those early years after liberation, Susan says: 'They were very difficult times. Here I am, a youngster. I don't speak English. I have no support and no financial help because I had no relatives.' She was sent to Sweden to recover and was then taken to Canada, where she met fellow survivor Abraham Pollack. 'He liked me. Then we became friends. And we shared many similar experiences, so we understood each other.' Susan was 18 when they got married but says they didn't know many people; her husband had to pay two people at work to be their witnesses. 'I'm here now because of my husband. He used to work two shifts every day,' she says. Her philosophy has always been to look forward. She had three children and in 1963 the family moved to London, where she worked as a librarian and eventually got a degree in history, aged 60. It was only later in life she started to work with organisations like the Holocaust Educational Trust to share her experiences and educate. I know little of my own family's experiences, one generation always wanting to protect the next from their horrific memories, except that my grandfather Brian, originally from Pabianice in Poland, was in Buchenwald when he was liberated. He passed away when my father was 14, so I never had the chance to meet him. My grandmother, also from Pabianice, moved to London before the war, but her mother and sister survived Auschwitz, passing off as sisters. One of the only details of their experience that I know is that they lived in relentless fear – not only day-to-day, but second-to-second. They knew any moment could be their last. My grandmother's other sister, Yadja, was gassed in a lorry, and most of the large extended family perished. But her cousin, Helen Aronson, was one of the few survivors of the Łódź Ghetto – she celebrated her 98th birthday last week. She survived by hiding underground when the Nazis came to 'liquidate' the ghetto. Like Susan, every life to emerge from those camps was miraculous. Being part of that legacy means I will always feel gratitude for being here, but it also feels like it comes with responsibility – to ensure memories are kept alive and lessons are never forgotten. As we file off the plane in London, I take a moment to sit with Susan, still perky at the end of an 18-hour day. With a warm smile and an invitation to pop over to her house for tea, she tells me she's happy she made the decision to go. I am too – and I hope to help keep the memories she's shared with me alive. Like that visit to Auschwitz 25 years ago, Susan's story of survival will always be with me. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Telegraph
06-05-2025
- General
- Telegraph
I saw Bergen-Belsen through the eyes of a 94-year-old survivor returning for the first time
Twenty-five years ago, as I left Auschwitz, I was certain I would never set foot in a concentration camp again. As the granddaughter of a survivor, I felt a duty to witness and to honour – but I knew that what I saw during those few days in Poland would remain etched in my memory forever. And I was right. I remember so clearly stepping into those cramped barracks, seeing the blue residue of Zyklon B on the gas chamber walls, walking the railway tracks that had carried thousands of Jews on a catastrophic one-way journey. Certain memories time cannot erode. Yet fast forward a few decades, and I find myself visiting a concentration camp again – Bergen-Belsen. This time, my motivation is not to see, but to hear – from survivors themselves. The opportunity to visit the camps alongside those who lived through those dark chapters of history is becoming ever more rare. But to mark the 80th anniversary of its liberation by British troops – and ahead of VE Day – survivors (as well as dignitaries including Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner and Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis) have gathered at the former concentration camp. Among them are Bergen-Belsen survivors Mala Tribich and Susan Pollack, both gravely ill with malnutrition and typhus when they were liberated in April 1945. Susan, 14 at the time, has never returned to Bergen-Belsen – until today. She still remembers that moment of liberation in painful detail. 'I was starving, and I wasn't able to walk any more,' she tells me, her eyes watery with age and memory. 'So I crawled out [of the barracks]. I crawled out to die. There were so many rotting bodies to be seen everywhere.' Her tone softens: 'Then a pair of gentle hands lifted me up. And who was that? A British soldier.' Does she remember what went through her mind at that moment? 'It was a miracle,' she says. At 94, she is still a walking miracle. When I first meet her, it is 6am and she is striding through Stansted Airport clutching a stick that seems to be struggling to keep up with her. She's resplendent, even at such an ungodly hour, in a pretty pink pullover and matching lipstick. We are flying to Hanover and then driving the hour-long journey to Bergen-Belsen as part of the UK delegation organised by Ajex (the Jewish Military Association). Eighty years ago, when the British freed the people from that hell on earth, they didn't just bring skeletons back from the brink of death; they restored humanity and dignity. As a British Jew, it's a piece of history that fills me with both pride and gratitude. The first troops to enter the camp were from the 63rd Anti-Tank Regiment, Royal Artillery, under the command of Lt Col Richard Taylor, accompanied by a loudspeaker truck from the Intelligence Corps. Amongst them was Sgt Norman Turgel, a Jewish officer in the British army. His son, sitting alongside me at the ceremony today, tells the story of how Norman came across a young woman in the camp, who, despite her own unbearable grief and frailty, was helping to nurse other survivors. 'That woman was my mother,' he says. 'They formed a bond that turned into love, something almost unimaginable in a place built for death.' Six weeks later they were married – his mother, Gina, wearing a wedding dress sewed from British military silks, gifted from Norman's comrades. Meanwhile, British veteran Stanley Fisher from the West Midlands, who was unable to make the journey (he's 100 years old), recalls his experience in a message. 'I fought through France and all the way to northern Germany, eventually stationed very close to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp where I witnessed horrors that have stayed with me all my life.' By the time Bergen-Belsen was liberated, around 70,000 people had already died there, mainly due to disease or starvation. Albrecht Weinberg, a 100-year-old survivor from Germany, remembers the moment British soldiers arrived. He had been deported to Bergen-Belsen on a wagon. 'Our bodies were tipped out,' he says. 'Two days later, a tank drove in. I thought, 'Now I'll finally be freed by death', but it was British soldiers coming to liberate us.' He was a 20-year-old man at the time, but weighed only 4st 7lb. Over afternoon refreshments, Susan explains what perhaps needs no explanation – why she has never returned. 'Bergen-Belsen, for me, was a place of death,' she tells me, leaning in, her voice low, her words hesitant. 'Of suffering.' Today, very little of the camp remains. The site is barren, save for a memorial obelisk, but grass mounds now mark the locations of mass graves, with thousands buried beneath each. Susan shares a memory from her arrival here in 1944. Among the 'walking skeletons,' she recognised an old friend and neighbour from her hometown of Felsőgöd in Hungary. Susan's father had been taken by the Nazis early in the war, and she had been separated from her mother and brother while at Auschwitz. So the familiar face must have been a comfort to that teenage girl, and the memory still swirls in her mind more than 80 years later. 'She recognised me and asked, 'Do you think I'm going to survive?' The following day, I went back to see her, but she had lice all over her.' In the camp, lice spread typhus. A look tells me what I need not ask. 'Very few survived in Bergen-Belsen,' she says simply. Susan (then Zsuzsanna Blau) was one of those who did – just – but she was alone. More than 50 members of her family had been murdered. She later discovered her mother had been gassed at Auschwitz. Her brother survived but never mentally recovered. He had been made to work as a Sonderkommando (work units made up of death camp prisoners), shovelling dead bodies from the gas chambers to the ovens. Recalling those early years after liberation, Susan says: 'They were very difficult times. Here I am, a youngster. I don't speak English. I have no support and no financial help because I had no relatives.' She was sent to Sweden to recover and was then taken to Canada, where she met fellow survivor Abraham Pollack. 'He liked me. Then we became friends. And we shared many similar experiences, so we understood each other.' Susan was 18 when they got married but says they didn't know many people; her husband had to pay two people at work to be their witnesses. 'I'm here now because of my husband. He used to work two shifts every day,' she says. Her philosophy has always been to look forward. She had three children and in 1963 the family moved to London, where she worked as a librarian and eventually got a degree in history, aged 60. It was only later in life she started to work with organisations like the Holocaust Educational Trust to share her experiences and educate. I know little of my own family's experiences, one generation always wanting to protect the next from their horrific memories, except that my grandfather Brian, originally from Pabianice in Poland, was in Buchenwald when he was liberated. He passed away when my father was 14, so I never had the chance to meet him. My grandmother, also from Pabianice, moved to London before the war, but her mother and sister survived Auschwitz, passing off as sisters. One of the only details of their experience that I know is that they lived in relentless fear – not only day-to-day, but second-to-second. They knew any moment could be their last. My grandmother's other sister, Yadja, was gassed in a lorry, and most of the large extended family perished. But her cousin, Helen Aronson, was one of the few survivors of the Łódź Ghetto – she celebrated her 98th birthday last week. She survived by hiding underground when the Nazis came to 'liquidate' the ghetto. Like Susan, every life to emerge from those camps was miraculous. Being part of that legacy means I will always feel gratitude for being here, but it also feels like it comes with responsibility – to ensure memories are kept alive and lessons are never forgotten. As we file off the plane in London, I take a moment to sit with Susan, still perky at the end of an 18-hour day. With a warm smile and an invitation to pop over to her house for tea, she tells me she's happy she made the decision to go. I am too – and I hope to help keep the memories she's shared with me alive, as the collective voice of the survivors becomes ever quieter. Like that visit to Auschwitz 25 years ago, Susan's story will always be with me.
Yahoo
14-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
You Can't Seriously Be Shocked That Big Law Caved to Trump
On Friday, five more Big Law firms capitulated to President Donald Trump's demands, committing to provide a total of $600 million in 'pro bono' legal services to causes aligned with the president's 'conservative ideals.' All told, the world's largest firms now have put nearly $1 billion in legal firepower at Trump's disposal—a parade of obeisance that began back in March with Paul Weiss. At that time, many in the legal community were shocked. The firm, which claimed in 2016 that its 'secret sauce' was a refusal 'to sacrifice culture and values in favor of the bottom line,' is dominated by Democratic Party heavyweights, with partners including former U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch; Sen. Chuck Schumer's brother, Robert Schumer; and Karen Dunn, who led debate prep for both Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris. How could Paul Weiss agree to help Trump's assault on democracy? But this isn't a story of corporate law firms breaking an honorable tradition of upholding the rule of law. It's a story of Big Law showing its true colors. I wasn't surprised by Paul Weiss's acquiescence to Trump and neither were many of my Harvard Law School classmates, who joined together years ago to protest a series of Paul Weiss recruitment galas at law schools around the country. We were calling out the firm's 'blatantly obstructionist' work (as the Massachusetts attorney general called it) shielding ExxonMobil from accountability for its campaign to defraud the public about climate change—work that included the frequent use of SLAPP suits designed to censor, intimidate, and silence ExxonMobil's opponents. But there were other, equally appalling examples of malfeasance by Paul Weiss that we could have been demonstrating against. The firm helped to win immunity for the Sackler family for their role in creating the nation's opioid crisis; defended Big Tobacco giant Philip Morris in the racketeering case U.S. v. Philip Morris; fought for many of Wall Street's most notorious criminals; shielded the NFL against its concussed players; helped subprime lenders evade liability for the housing foreclosure crisis; and represented the creditors holding Puerto Rico hostage. Paul Weiss is not unique in this regard; the exact same story can be told about every other Big Law firm now joining Trump's fascist front. Many Democrats expressed outrage when Neal Katyal's firm, Milbank, committed $100 million in free legal services to the president's authoritarian ventures, despite the image of Katyal—a former acting solicitor general under President Obama and legal analyst for MSNBC—as a self-proclaimed leader of the #Resistance. But the reality is that Katyal already had a record representing monstrous causes. This is the guy who, in order to win immunity for U.S. corporations that abetted child slavery, cited as a worthy legal precedent the failure of Nuremberg prosecutors to prosecute 'the firm that supplied Zyklon B gas, which the Nazis used to kill millions.' When criticized for this kind of work, corporate lawyers inevitably fall back on the same defense—that 'everyone deserves a lawyer.' Big Law partners regularly compare themselves to John Adams, who in 1770 risked his reputation and livelihood to represent the British soldiers charged with firing on colonists in the Boston Massacre. In his old age, Adams called this defense 'one of the most gallant, generous, manly, and disinterested actions of my whole life, and one of the best pieces of service I ever rendered my country.' Many corporate lawyers cast their advocacy for massive corporations in the same light. Of course, many in our country do regularly find themselves in desperate need of a lawyer: A 2017 study found that low-income Americans reported receiving inadequate or no legal help for 86 percent of their civil legal problems. In the midst of this genuine crisis, which forces millions of Americans to face life-changing judicial consequences without any professional representation, hearing millionaire lawyers use this principle to justify working for the most powerful and well-represented entities on the planet feels like a sick joke. To be clear, my argument is not that Big Law firms like Paul Weiss, Milbank, Wilkie Farr & Gallagher (where former second gentleman Doug Emhoff is a partner), Skadden, Kirkland & Ellis, Latham & Watkins, A&O Shearman, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, and Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft are evil institutions. The point is that by repeatedly weaponizing their vast legal firepower to ensure corporations and billionaires avoid accountability for their immensely destructive conduct, these firms were already perverting the rule of law before they began debasing themselves to the Trump regime. A legal system in which justice is largely for sale to the richest and most powerful is already a destabilized one, and this foments a distrust in institutions that empowers authoritarian charlatans like Trump. The problem, then, is not just that Democratically dominated law firms are now bending the knee to the president. It's that the Democratic Party has for so long been dominated by elites whose project of corporate lawlessness paved the way for Trump in the first place. I do appreciate the minority of Big Law firms that so far have refused to cave to Trump. And the same goes for the individual lawyers who have resigned in protest after their firms capitulated, such as Paul Weiss's top pro bono leader. But these folks aren't heroes. They deserve credit, but they made the choice to join Big Law in the first place. After graduating from elite law schools, they could have made a livable salary doing good work for the world, or a comfortable salary doing neutral work. Instead, they chose to get rich at the expense of a better society. This is all that Big Law stands for: an industry of mercenary elites from both parties sacrificing everything—justice, democracy, a livable future—for their own venal wealth. If there's one silver lining from this sordid saga with Trump, it's that the mask is off, and we can all see these parasitic firms for what they really are.
Yahoo
27-01-2025
- General
- Yahoo
DC Holocaust Memorial Museum honors 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz with event
WASHINGTON (DC News Now) — In honor of the Jewish victims who died during the Holocaust, the in Washington, D.C. is hosting its International Remembrance Day Commemoration. Jan. 27, marks the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, a time to remember six million Jewish victims of the Holocaust and the millions of other victims. This year is the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. Auschwitz memorial marks 80th anniversary of the death camp's liberation According to the , it is estimated that at least 1.3 million people were sent to the Auschwitz camp between 1940 and 1945. Records show that about 1.1 million people were murdered. Around the beginning of September 1941, the SS at Auschwitz conducted the first tests of Zyklon B as a mass murder agent. The success of these experiments led to the construction of a chamber. The museum's encyclopedia notes that of the three camps established near Oswiecim, the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp had the largest total prisoner population. 3 teens charged after shooting death of 14-year-old boy in Southwest DC In remembrance of the victims, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum is hosting a series of events on Monday. From 10 a.m. to 4:30 pm., numerous names will be read in the Hall of Remembrance. The museum said that attendees can listen to others read names or light a memorial candle. The museum said a special commemorative pin will be distributed to all visitors. Also starting at 10 a.m., a live stream of the commemoration ceremony at the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum will begin. At 1 p.m. guests will have the chance to speak with Holocaust survivors before watching a special episode of the museum's award-winning series in the Helena Rubinstein Auditorium. For more information about the museum's events to recognize the Day of Remembrance, click Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
27-01-2025
- General
- Yahoo
'The inhumanity that humans are capable of' on display in Holocaust exhibit at WWII museum
SOUTH KINGSTOWN – In the beautiful Rhode Island village of Wakefield sit dozens of symbols of evil, weapons used in mass murder. The International Museum of World War II has many disturbing reminders of the deadliest conflict in human history, but none are more haunting than those in the section containing remnants of the Holocaust. There's a uniform worn by a concentration camp prisoner; an empty can of Zyklon B, the gas that was used to kill innocent civilians, and a signed letter from Adolf Eichmann, the architect of the Holocaust. Thomas Brassil, the museum's director of educational programs and operations, said, "It's really important" to have such items on display "so we can learn from them." "Whenever talking about the Holocaust, it's very difficult to wrap your mind around it, and so having these items here for you to see shows the inhumanity that humans are capable of and a reverberation of the motto of the Holocaust: 'Never forget,'" Brassil said. In observance of International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Jan. 27, the World War II Foundation will show its film "A Promise to My Father" at the museum. The 2013 documentary tells the story of Israel Arbeiter, a Holocaust survivor from Poland whose parents and younger brother were killed in a concentration camp. (The foundation has added a second showing for Jan. 29 because its 50-seat theater got overbooked.) As part of the free event, Tim Gray, founder of the foundation, has urged guests to visit the museum's Holocaust exhibit. Here are some of the items they will see: A uniform worn by a prisoner at the Auschwitz concentration camp. The gray and white striped pajamas and hat were worn by a young boy who worked as a cobbler at Auschwitz making and repairing shoes for the guards and other Germans, according to Gray. "He would be a cobbler for as long as he could work," Gray said. "If he got sick or something else happened so he could not work, he would be immediately sent to the gas chambers." An opened, empty can of Zyklon B. The pesticide released hydrogen cyanide and was used by the Nazis to murder more than a million people in gas chambers. According to Gray, prisoners were herded into rooms for what they thought were showers. "After penetrating the lungs through inhalation, Zyklon B caused in its victims excruciating pain, violent convulsions and, finally, a heart attack," according to "Auschwitz. Not Long Ago. Not Far Away," a traveling exhibition about Auschwitz and its historical implications. A signed letter from Adolf Eichmann, whom Gray calls "the architect of the Holocaust." A leading member of the Nazi Party, Eichmann was in charge of organizing mass deportations of Jews to ghettos, concentration camps and extermination camps, according to the Wiener Holocaust Library. In the June 1944 letter to a friend, Eichmann refers to his busy work schedule and upcoming meetings with members of the Hungarian government and representatives of the German Railroad Administration. Is it likely that those meetings were to arrange transportation of prisoners? "Very likely," Gray said. A bag of coffee beans. Brassil said it might seem like an "odd item to have in the collection." The bag of coffee beans came from Block 11, a building at Auschwitz where the Nazis did some of their "worst experiments" and first tested Zyklon B, Brassil said. Coffee was given as a reward to "capos," prisoners who also acted as guards at the camp, Brassil said. A program for German Day at Madison Square Garden. On Oct. 3, 1937, "20,000 people poured into Madison Square Garden for a pro-Hitler rally," Gray said. "That just goes to show you, again, that antisemitism wasn't just limited to Germany. Standing beside a case holding the program, Gray said, "To me this is an example of or a reference point in history, where you say, 'It can't happen here.' Well, it did happen here." This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Take a look at the Holocaust exhibit at Wakefield's WWII museum
