Auschwitz
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Maastricht is one of the most beautiful cities in the Netherlands. It’s in the southeast of the country in the Province of Limburg. It is very dear to me. I was born only a few miles away from it, but it is the city where my father was born. A few years after the war,…
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Bernard Henri Piller was born in Maastricht on 8 February 1932 and murdered by the Nazis in Auschwitz on 23 September 1943. He reached the age of 11 years. Henri Samuel Piller was also born in Maastricht on 15 April 1935. The nazis murdered him at Auschwitz on 23 September 1943 at the tender age…
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It always amazes me how easy it was for some Europeans to give up their Jewish neighbours. I know it’s easy for me to say that in retrospect, because I don’t know how I would have reacted if put in that situation. But I have a feeling I would have spoken out about it the…
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I once painted skies.Vast, open, careless heavens that dripped sunlight and hope.My brush danced with joy, my palette a chorus of life.But then came the grey. It was not the grey of morning mist or soft winter clouds—It was the grey of silence,of smoke that climbed like prayerfrom chimneys built to erase names. I was…
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The Nazi concentration camp system evolved into a machine of mass murder, and Auschwitz became its deadliest cog. Located in Poland, Auschwitz initially served as a concentration and forced labor camp for Polish political prisoners. However, in 1941, it became the epicenter of Nazi extermination efforts. Among the most horrifying aspects of Auschwitz’s legacy was…
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Education is often seen as a human right and it really should be, but so often it is a privilege taken away from many. Moshe Flinker was a teenager born in the Hague, in the Netherlands on October 9, 1926. He had a particular talent for language,he studied eight languages including Hebrew. The language he…
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The Illusion of Sanctuary (September 1943) On 6 September 1943, a transport carrying 5,007 Jewish prisoners from the Czech lands departed the Theresienstadt ghetto. Among them were able-bodied men deported together with their families. The prisoners were told they were being sent to a labor camp. In reality, their destination was the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and…
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Some people will probably accuse me of using specific words in the title as ‘clickbait’, and to an extent that is true. But anyone who writes a blog, and especially one with an extraordinary story, wants readers to click on that link to read that story. I make no excuse for using the title, basically…
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I don’t want to tell your story, but I have to. It is my duty as a father and as a human being to ensure that no child will ever get treated, they way you were. My heart breaks each time when I see a photograph of innocence—knowing the war destroyed that innocence. What makes…
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I can’t think of any place on Earth that was more evil than Auschwitz—although other camps had perhaps more cruelty, it is the scale of the cruelty, torture and murder that makes Auschwitz pure evil, a literal hell on Earth. The photograph above is of Yisrael and Zelig Jacob, the younger brothers of Lili Jacob.…
History of Sorts 