AM YISRAEL CHAI

AM YISRAEL CHAI

Today is Yom HaShoah.  By the time you read this, my son Josh and 266 people from Los Angeles; teens, adults and survivors will have participated in this years March of the Living. They will march from Auschwitz to Birkenau, walking on the railroad tracks where Jews and other prisoners were brought into the camps, and they will pass under the gates still bearing the sign “Arbeit Macht Frei”; work makes you free. 

Josh will be wearing the Israeli flag on his shoulders, and he carries my miniature Torah that I received as a child. Surrounded by delegations of Jews from all over the world, he enters a place of dark memories for our people. Survivors will show the kids their bunks at Auschwitz, and tell their stories of how they managed to survive the camps and the ghettos. I cannot begin to imagine the images they will see, and the feelings of these children, who have lived a very sheltered life until now. I asked Josh to carry my Torah in his backpack so that he would have a visual reminder of the words in the Torah, and also to illustrate that in spite of the Nazi’s ruthless methods of extermination and evil, we are still here. I also asked him to say Shema Yisrael; words that were uttered as Jews were being put to death, to affirm life instead. I’m sure that many parents had a similar request of their children. But the irony of these children standing at Auschwitz 71 years later, proudly carrying signs and displays of Judaism is very satisfying to us all. 

This year, two of the survivors who were scheduled to go with the group fell ill last week and could not travel. One of the ladies is making her last trip.  Situations like these make it even more crucial for our teens to go and continue to bear witness in Poland, so they can share the experience with others when there are no survivors left. Our teens on the March now share the responsibility to keep the memories of the victims alive. There were many tears today from all ages in the delegation. These kids are on the brink of going to college, where they will encounter people in different parts of the country, many with different views about Jews and Judaism. We need to be sure they have the tools to talk positively about Israel, past and present on campus. They need to be able to fight with reason against groups that bring hatred to college campuses. They need to remember what they saw in Poland. May it always stay with them throughout their lives. 

After a week in Poland, 3 concentration camps, the Warsaw Ghetto, cemeteries and mass graves, the kids fly to Israel after Shabbat. They will leave the darkness and gloom in Poland. In Israel they will visit national sites, but also they will join the people of Israel in Jerusalem. They will be there to celebrate Yom Ha’atzmaut with delegations of teens from all over the world. There will be dancing in the streets to renew the pledge of statehood when Israel became a country in 1948. While they need to remember Poland here too, Israel is a celebration of the guts, chutzpah, and determination of those who settled in Israel. Our teens will be in Israel to commemorate the bravery of the fighters; Haganah, Irgun, Mossad, and the IDF.  Israel is the best and the bravest. 

The polar opposites of these 2 weeks of travel?  Poland represents darkness, the worst of mankind and the attempted genocide of a people. It may not be in black and white like the old photos we see, but is a country surrounded by gray.  Israel is the sparkling jewel on the Mediterrean Sea. While her enemies surround Israel on all sides, she fiercely guards her freedom, and will defend it by any means necessary.  

The staff at the BJE-March of the Living, and the volunteers who staff the trip and supervise all these kids deserve out thanks and our blessings. Along with the survivors who share their stories, these people take the history of World War II and the effects on the European Jewish Communities and bring them out of the history books, and into our teen’s everyday experiences. Parents have been assured that their kids come back from the experienced changed. I am grateful from the bottom of my heart that my son can now bear witness.

AM YISRAEL CHAI!

Cantor Toby Schwartz