Holocaust tour

A LESSON IN REMEMBRANCE

By ROBERT H. KLONOFF

article created on: 2008-10-15T00:00:00

At age 53, after reading the late Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal’s powerful book “The Sunflower,” I embarked on an emotional journey to some of the key sites of the Holocaust.
 
I have always felt a strong personal connection to the Holocaust. Although my mother’s immediate family left Poland for Canada in 1929, virtually all of her other relatives were murdered by the Nazis because they were Jewish. My mother is now 88. I wanted to share my observations with her. The timing was meaningful: This December marks the 100th anniversary of Wiesenthal’s birth.
 

My first stop was Auschwitz. As a symbol of the evil side of humanity, no other place on earth can compare. More than one million people perished there—mostly Jews, but also Gypsies, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, political prisoners, and other so-called “undesirables.” Many were shot or gassed, while others died from malnutrition, disease and inhumane working conditions.

Auschwitz opened in 1940 as a concentration camp, not as an extermination camp. The first inmates were Polish political prisoners. Several of the camps established later, including Treblinka, Sobibor, and Belzec, were exclusively death camps from the outset. In 1941, the Nazis began experimenting at Auschwitz with the use of poisonous gas for extermination, using Zyklon B (hydrogen cyanide) on Russian POWs. Mass gassings of Jews began in 1942 after the Birkenau site (about a mile from the main Auschwitz complex) commenced operation with multiple large-scale crematoria. At its peak, Birkenau could accomplish the gassing and cremation of more than 3,000 people a day.
 
Auschwitz attracts more than 500,000 visitors annually. Both the original Auschwitz site and the Birkenau site are open to visitors.
 
The entrance to Auschwitz still has the horrifying arched gate that greeted everyone who entered with the words “Arbeit Macht Frei,” work brings freedom. The irony of the greeting is obvious. Virtually every prisoner who entered the complex perished there, many from sheer overwork.
 
Many blocks at the site are open for viewing. Of the blocks I visited, perhaps the most disturbing was Block 11, the “Death Block,” where prisoners were taken for punishment. Virtually no prisoners who entered this block survived. Inside the block are terrifying torture cells and a room where SS officers held “court”—making summary decisions about the fate of inmates brought to the block.
 
Block 11 shares a courtyard with Block 10—where Josef Mengele and other so-called “doctors” conducted horrifying medical experiments, mostly on Jews. At the rear of the courtyard is the “Wall of Death,” where the camp guards and SS officers shot thousands of inmates. Looking at the wall 60 years later is chilling. The wall is such a powerful part of the camp that Pope Benedict XVI prayed at that spot when he visited Auschwitz in 2007.
 
Birkenau had the greatest impact on me. Birkenau was established for one purpose only: extermination. Nothing can prepare one for the shock of arriving at the Birkenau camp. The watchtower and barbed wire fencing exist in their original state. The train tracks are still there. It is a frightening place.
 
The ovens and crematoria no longer exist; the Nazis blew them up in a futile attempt to hide their crimes shortly before the Soviet army arrived in 1945. Our guide pointed out where these killing machines were located, only feet from where the passengers departed from the cattle car trains. It is possible to see exactly where the trains pulled up and where the arriving inmates were subject to the so-called “selections” made by SS doctors: those who would go directly to the gas chambers (those not fit for work, including children and the elderly), and those who instead would literally be worked to death. Roughly two-thirds of the arriving prisoners went sent directly to their death by gassing. Most of the work involved in removing and disposing of the bodies was done by the working prisoners. One can only imagine the guilt and shame that these prisoners felt in choosing this work over death.
 
The living quarters at Birkenau were inhumane. In one barrack, hundreds of holes built into wooden frames served as toilets. It is difficult to imagine the stench and lack of privacy in this setting. The sleeping arrangements were terrible: dismal unheated cabins with bunks three high. After wandering around Birkenau on my own, including a trip to the top of the watch tower, I rejoined the group, overwhelmed by what I had seen and trying to imagine what it would have been like to be a prisoner there.
 
In the context of a tourist site, the Auschwitz museum was dignified and, for the most part, appropriately somber. Our tour guide was extraordinarily well informed and sensitive. He remarked with outrage that the Poles in the nearby area did nothing to help, even though they knew from the smell of burning bodies exactly what was going on. He repeatedly emphasized that, however grim the camp was today, no visitor could experience what the residents did at the time.
 
It is possible to be critical or cynical about today’s tourism at the site. The restaurants and souvenir stands at the entryway to the site were disturbing. I was deeply offended watching people eat, laugh, socialize and shop after seeing the camp. Even during the tour, some people did not appear to grasp the impact of what they were seeing. The expressions of many teenagers were no different than what one might see at the Air and Space Museum or the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In the immediate vicinity of the site, a cottage industry of restaurants and stores has arisen, reminding me of the tacky city of Niagara Falls. Nonetheless, I am pleased that the Polish government turned the site into a museum. Soon, there will be no Holocaust survivors left, and the truth of the Holocaust will be kept alive only through historical sources and visits to Auschwitz and other Holocaust sites.
 
Upon returning to Krakow, I witnessed the true devastation of the Nazis’ misdeeds. Today, Krakow is a beautiful, bustling city of 750,000, filled with stunning churches and other landmarks that survived the war. Kazimierz is the so-called “Jewish Quarter.” I was horrified by my visit there. There are numerous synagogues (mostly not operational), Jewish museums, and restaurants serving traditional Jewish dishes. But Krakow, which in its pre-World War II heyday had more than 60,000 Jews, now has only several hundred Jews. Kazimierz should properly be called the Extinct Jewish Quarter. It is a Jewish quarter without Jews.

The lack of a significant Jewish presence struck home when I attempted to locate the two remaining pieces of ghetto wall in Krakow. The ghetto where Jews were forcibly relocated was in the Podgorze district, a short distance from where most Krakow Jews had previously lived. The two pieces of ghetto wall are difficult to find, identified only with small plaques. Virtually no tourists were there when I visited.

The Plaszow concentration camp that was featured in Steven Spielberg’s film “Schindler’s List,” is located only a few miles from the center of Krakow but was even more difficult to find. I showed the name of the place to many Polish residents in the neighborhood, but no one had any idea what I was talking about, even though it turned out that I was only a few blocks away.Despite the wide popularity of “Schindler’s List,” the Plaszow camp site was marked only with a small sign. It was filled with weeds and overgrown grass.

There were a few markers: a gravestone, a rather large stone monument, a smaller stone monument, and a cross that stood high over a mass grave. An elderly woman with a dog was lighting a candle at the grave site when I arrived. Watching her light the candle in this jungle of weeds was one of the most powerful moments of my trip. The villa where the notorious camp commandant, Amon Goeth, resided still stands—now occupied by local residents. Nearby was the original factory made famous in Spielberg’s film. It appeared that the building was undergoing renovation; there were no markers or other identifying signs.

Next I visited Warsaw. Prior to World War II, Warsaw had the largest Jewish population in Europe—350,000. But today it has only about 2,000 Jews. Most of Warsaw’s Jews were murdered at Treblinka. Between July and September 1942 alone, more than 200,000 Jews from Warsaw were sent to their death at Treblinka.

As a Holocaust site, Warsaw is most famous as the venue of the heroic ghetto uprising in April 1943. In that incident, hundreds of Warsaw Ghetto Jews fought the Germans for almost a month before the Germans prevailed. There is a powerful memorial commemorating the event, and there were quite a few people visiting the site. Otherwise, with the exception of a second memorial related to the ghetto uprising, and a memorial at the site where the trains left for Treblinka, there are few reminders of the Holocaust.

Only two pieces of the Warsaw ghetto wall survive. I went to the general location where these fragments were supposed to be and was shocked to find that they were in the gated inner courtyard of a private apartment building—with no marking or other identification on the outside. Only one section of the actual ghetto buildings still exists in Warsaw. For the most part, this high-rise building is vacant

For a town that lost so many Jews, it is appalling that there are so few reminders of what went on there with the assistance of Polish collaborators. I saw a sign indicating that a Polish-Jewish museum was going to be built. That would be a welcome addition, but still not enough.

Finally, I visited Berlin. Prior to the war, Berlin’s Jewish population was more than 160,000. After the war, it was only about 6,500, but in recent years, there has been a surge in that population. Today, approximately 120,000 Jews live in Berlin.

In my opinion, Berlin has made a far greater effort than either Warsaw or Krakow to remember the Holocaust. In a busy part of the city is a spectacular structure, the New Synagogue, which was destroyed by the Nazis in 1943 but reconstructed in the 1990s. In 2001, the Jewish Museum opened. This extraordinary museum was designed by world famous architect Daniel Libeskind, the son of Holocaust survivors. The museum contains exhibits on the history of German Jews from the 4th century to today, with a heavy focus on the Holocaust. When I was there it was packed with tourists. More than 4 million people have visited the museum, making it one of Germany’s most popular attractions. Equally compelling and popular is the Holocaust memorial. Dedicated in 2005, it consists of 2,711 grey stone slabs of assorted sizes that looked to me like coffins. (I could not find a definitive answer to whether the number 2,711 had any special significance.)

I also visited the villa where the Wannsee Conference took place on Jan. 20, 1942. That meeting validated a decision now known to have been made earlier to eliminate all the Jews of Europe. Wannsee is only minutes by subway from the center of Berlin. In 1992, on the 50th anniversary of the conference, the house was established as a Holocaust memorial and educational resource center. The physical beauty of the residence—and its stunning waterfront view—mask the evil plans that were affirmed there. There is a large, well-staffed library and various exhibits tracing the history of the Holocaust. The exhibits leave no doubt about the enormity of the crimes committed by the Nazis and their collaborators.

At all of the Holocaust sites I visited in Berlin, the crimes of the Holocaust are candidly acknowledged and condemned. Given the rise in the number of purported “historians” who deny that the Holocaust occurred or who claim it is exaggerated, it is critical that the German government leave no doubt about the existence and enormity of the Holocaust. Germany has at least made a start to come to terms with its difficult past. Poland seems painfully less able to do so.

I left Germany and Poland still not understanding how the Holocaust could have occurred. The Nazi leaders needed collaborators throughout Europe. How did people who had previously led quiet, ordinary lives participate in some of the worst crimes in history? How could a just God have allowed this to happen?

And how can we make sure that these horrors are not repeated? Even after the Holocaust, governments around the world have turned a blind eye to mass murders such as in Darfur, Cambodia and Rwanda.

We must never forget the Holocaust. And we must teach our children about it, even if they have to learn the details at a venue surrounded by restaurants and gift shops.

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Robert Klonoff is dean and professor of law at Lewis & Clark Law School. Klonoff previously served as an assistant to the solicitor general at the Department of Justice. In that capacity, he handled cases before the United States Supreme Court on behalf of the Justice Department’s Office of Special Investigations, the unit that seeks to investigate and deport Nazi War Criminals.