If These Forests Could Talk

As someone whose two major obsessions are genealogy and the Holocaust, my recent 3-day trip to Poland was a huge check off my bucket-list.

As of writing this blog, the journey was completed two weeks ago and I'm still not over it. It was by no means a vacation. It was a trip jammed-packed with three 18 hour days of touring what was the home address of my ancestry for roughly 800 years.
Tzvi Sperber, a world-renowned historian and Holocaust educator, assisted by our esteemed Rabbi Eitan BenDavid, led our 34 strong group which mostly consisted of people from our congregation, Kehilat Shivtei Yisrael, plus a few who arrived from London, guided us through what was a deeply moving experience. On a side note, if anybody is seriously considering a journey to Poland to learn about our ancestry as well as see up close what we've seen in movies and in books pertaining to the Shoah, I strongly recommend Tzvi Sperber and his team at JRoots.org.

Arriving at Warsaw in the morning, we all davened Shaharit together, introduced ourselves, got our much-needed coffees, and then got onto the coach that took us to the heart of Warsaw.

Warsaw in February - damn that's cold! I'm a native New Yorker and I have driven through blizzards in white-out conditions, I've skied the slopes in upstate NY and parts of NJ. I've survived snowball fights that I myself have instigated, I've trekked to school in snow that reached up to my waist, and never have I ever felt a bitter biting to the bone cold like the cold in Poland.

It was a grey, over-cast day. As one who grew up during the cold war years, it looked exactly how I was taught Poland always looked like - miserable, cold and a place I would never want to visit.

Our first stop was the Jewish cemetery right in the middle of Warsaw. Not only is it a cemetery that is several hundred years old, yet during the Nazi occupation, it was the border between the Warsaw Ghetto and the Aryan side.
Since my dear wife's grandmother, Millie Peskowitz Z"L (nee: Manya Pindig) was born Warsaw to a well-established, industrial family who have had roots in Warsaw for many generations, I was in the cemetery where her ancestors were laid to rest. It was also the final resting place of many esteemed Rabbis, like HaRav Soloveitchik (the Rav's (from YU) paternal grandfather), and many other illustrious Rabbis as well.

Yet, what slapped me across the face was the last grave we visited. It wasn't any ordinary grave either, as thousands of bodies of all ages was interred there. It is covered with large, white stones. This is a mass grave that was used from 1940 until 1943, when the Warsaw Ghetto was in operation. Sperber said that kids (from age 10 and up) were forced to bury the dead there. Throughout my life, I have seen gory pictures of emaciated bodies being dumped into this grave and I was standing right in front of it. My solar plexus nearly caved in as I then realized that this mass grave more than likely bears the remains of my cousin, Bronka Feigenbaum Z"L who perished in the Warsaw Ghetto in 1942.

Walking about downtown Warsaw was odd. Despite the weather, I did see the beauty in the architecture, and the people seemed OK enough, and I'm stating that with a grain of salt. The locals have seen groups like ours touring their cities for years. They know who we are and why we're there. Most of the time, people just look the other way, but every now and again, you see some people looking our way and either scoffing, giggling or outright laughing.

For the local Poles in Warsaw, reminders of the Holocaust are almost everywhere. Remnants of the ghetto walls still stand with rusted metal prongs protruding from the tops of these walls that supported barbed wire are found throughout the city. These walls are now in front of high rise apartment buildings, lovely restaurants, shops and cafes. A public high school that was once an exclusively Jewish school still sports signs stating this fact. Just across the street is a large, state-of-the-art sign in memorial to Janus Kirchak, his orphanage and his children who he looked after. Nothing there is clandestine. It's in their faces.

Remnants of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising are apparent as well. Archeologists have secured where they strongly believe is Mila 18, the bunker where the officers of the uprising were stationed.

I was never really prepared for the next stop. It must have been a 2 to 3 hour bus ride from Warsaw. It was already getting dark and we were walking a lot around Warsaw, and this was after being awake most of the night because our flight left Tel Aviv at 5:00 AM. So, needless to say, we were all pretty tired. Yet the cold woke us up as we got off of the bus. Bear in mind, it was very dark and I have a feeling that most people who visit here come in the day time. Yet Tzvi admitted that he deliberately planned for us to arrive at this hour. We were standing in front of what looked like the entrance to a forest. Yet that thought was erased when you see a wooden sign that said in Polish "Muezeun Treblinka". We were given candles to walk with to give us some light. This with our cell phones, we were OK, but it did add to the eeriness.
We walked up a path surrounded by a forest, with very tall trees, lush with green and a thick grass at our feet, following what were the train tracks that led to the station in front of this death camp. The Nazis tore down the place to hide evidence, and boy did they do a good job. The sole remaining witnesses were all around us, yet silent as trees do not talk. But, they were there and witnessed everything.
The cobble-stoned platform as well as some of the remnants of the tracks is still there. My heart shuddered when I realized that I was standing on the very platform where nearly one million Jews stood only an hour or so before they were rushed to the gas chambers and murdered in the most heinous ways. Herded towards the pathway nicknamed "Der Himmelstrasse" (The Way to Heaven) accompanied with screaming guards armed clubs and whips, fierce, angry German Shepherds just ready to attack. There was one building that by the time people got there, they were already stark naked. Apparently there was a velvet curtain in front that was stolen from a synagogue ark that read "?? ???? ??' ?????? ????? ??" (Trans: "This is the gate to GD where the righteous are called in".

This building listed as showers was nothing more than a gas chamber where an estimated 900,000 (probably much more) men, women, children and infants were murdered in masse. There was another building with a Swiss red cross on it designated for those who felt ill. Tzvi mentioned that according to testimonies, the entrance was a waiting room with a sofa and plush red carpet, yet behind the door was a pit with a burning fire, where the victim was shot in the head on pushed in to incinerate.

Aside from the memorial where the gas chamber stood as well as tombstones representing communities that perished there in large numbers, nothing else exists, except for the lush green vast forest and greenery that surrounds the area. From what I have read and understood, this forest grew lush and large quickly as it fed off of the bodies beneath it.
Being an overly sensitive person, I couldn't help but notice one thing - we weren't alone. They were still there. I heard no voices, saw no sightings, but I felt a presence and it was strong. They haven't left. They were throughout the entire area. There was nothing I could say but shed tears that I kept to myself.

We davened ma'ariv (the evening prayer) together and we shouted out "Shema Yisrael Hashem Eleokeinu Hashem Echad" and "Baruch Shem Kavod Malchuto L'olam Vaed" as if it were Yom Kippur, the only time one shouts these words out aloud and together, for the remainder of the year, we say it to ourselves. This is one ma'ariv that I will never forget as long as I live.
Indeed it was late, and we boarded the bus again to an inn where we stopped for a much welcome catered dinner. After relaxing, eating and chatting, we boarded the bus once again and headed for Lublin.

Lublin. I still get chills when I think about it. I'm one of the first in my mother's family to visit since my great-grandmother, grandmother, aunt Sara and uncle Hy emigrated from Poland post WWI in 1919.

As far as I know, my mother's family has history going back roughly 800 years in Poland on several sides. Although there are rumors that my grandfather's ancestry was in either Spain or Portugal, they more than likely ended up in Poland via Holland or Germany 300 or so years prior.

Despite the very late hour (we arrived to our hotel past midnight), I slept on the bus, and in a punch-drunk sort of way, I was trying to soak in the sites of this ancestral city. It was lovely really. The architecture was exquisite and from what I was told, in 1939, a good majority of those living where we were driving through were all Jews. One wouldn't know that now, though. There are so few remaining Jews, it is as if this fact was merely a rumor.

Yeshivas Chochmei Lublin, now known as the Hotel Ilan, was founded by HaRav Meir Shapiro, the founder of "Daf Yomi". It was home to the finest and brightest young yeshiva students throughout the world, including North Americans. Sperber mentioned that a student had to know 'by heart' 200 blott (full pages, back and front) of gemara to be admitted.

It's a lovely 4 star hotel now. The rooms were large and immaculate. When I arose the next morning, I had to go to the window and look out and saw a bustling, quaint, old city. I was just in awe and full of emotion thinking that my grandparents, aunt, uncle and extended family walked these streets over a century ago.

Shaharit (morning prayers) were held in the synagogue in the hotel which functioned as the beit midrash (study hall) back in the day. I don't mean to come off as a snob, but I have had my fair share of leading the tefila in shuls during my lifetime. I have sung in choirs since age 12 through high school. I sang with an operatic company when I was 17. Since my family and I moved to Israel, I was singing in cantorial choirs off/on for 25 years. One thing I don't like leading is with "Pesukei D'Zimra". I feel it's more for bar mitzvah aged kids and up, not for us adults. However, this go-around, I remember walking over to Tzvi Sperber and our shul gabbai, Alon Ronen and respectfully asking if I could lead just for Pesukei D'Zimra. They both said, "sure"!

Alon Ronen took pictures of me and said that he heard the emotion in my voice. I was the first in my family's generation to come to Lublin and lead in tefila after my grandparents, great-grandmothers, aunt and uncle left. The experience for me was overwhelming.

Along the city's periphery is none other than Majdanek, a concentration established in October 1941 and was in operation until 22 July 1944 when Soviet forces liberated Lublin. An estimated 78,000 victims were murdered there and 59,000 of said victims were Jews.

The weather that day was very clear. It was lovely, but very cold. To visit a camp that I have seen so many times in pictures is surreal. Yet what really boggled my mind was that back in the 1940s when the camp was in operation, where the chimneys of the crematoria were constantly spewing out black smoke, a raging fire and ashes of human beings 24/7, private homes were adjacent to the barbed wire fences surrounding the camp. Backyards were literally facing the hell that was transpiring.

I'm not one of those people who asked why or criticized these Poles as to why they did and said nothing. What the hell were they supposed to do? Go out and protest? Seriously? If they were caught passing a slice of bread to a Jew they would be executed as well as all of their family members. Yet, what bothers me is that they claim that they had no idea what was going on. It is an outright lie that has been alive and well since 1941. These houses are still standing to this day as well as other homes and buildings as well. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't be able to live in a house with a concentration camp facing my own backyard. It was very astonishing that directly across the street is a McDonald's as well as a shopping plaza. The camp is sitting right on a boulevard of a busy section at the periphery of the city. It is functioning as a historic site and museum, but tons of human ashes, including those of my own relatives are sitting directly across from there. Just as in Warsaw, it's constantly in their faces. Most of these people alive right now have never met a Jew. Although there are very small pockets of communities sprinkled about Poland in some of her major cities, Poles in general have nothing to do with Jews, and even more so, have no understanding of what Judaism is. It is very tragic that 84 years ago, if you lived in Poland, you knew many Jews and in some cases, Jews were the majority in many major cities and villages.

While riding on the bus, this time it was over 3 hours, we travelled through the vast Polish countryside. My eyes were soaking up the scenery. To be honest, as I mentioned earlier, as an American, I was conditioned to believe that Poland was a grey, cold, dreary country due to its many decades under the thumb of the former USSR. Yet I noticed one thing - Poland is a very beautiful country. It is covered with a lush-green, thick grass covering thousands of square miles. The houses are lovely box-like houses gracing the towns. The outskirts of the Lublin gubernia, as well as many other provinces are peaceful looking towns and villages where the ancestors of the inhabitants and their families can be traced back for centuries.

Three hours later towards the end of the afternoon, the temperature was dropping once again to below 0 Celsius, we stopped in the middle of a quiet, sleepy town in the middle of nowhere. Once we were off the bus, after mandatory trips to a public restroom, we were standing in the middle of what seemed to be a market square. It was empty as well as the roads, and side streets. The buildings were painted yellow, beige, as well as light blues. The square was large and looked like it can host scores of people as well as vendors during their popular market days.
We were told that we were in a town called Jozefow. By the beginning of WW2, Jews comprised nearly 70% of the town's inhabitants. Jews lived towards the market square and in the surrounding buildings, whereas the Poles lived further away, about 1/4 of a km distance by the church. The Jews had little to do with their Polish neighbors with the exception of market days. Both groups more or less kept to themselves and existed that way for centuries.

The market square was surrounded by these buildings, and to the right of where we were all standing was a large, white, box-shaped building which is the town's library. Over 80 years ago, it was no library. It was a synagogue. The arch shaped windows and its front facing south west (towards Jerusalem) gives it away. We davened mincha on the second floor which was the women's section in this former shul. The only evidence of its former self and grandeur, asides from some history in pictures on the wall with captions describing it's history, is the indentation in the wall in the building which was once the ark holding the sifrei Torah. Other than that, it's a library and doesn't really look like anything else. Outside the building is a small, worn sign that reads "synagoga". On the other side of the building is a plaque with the names of the Jewish residents of the village, the majority of who were slaughtered there in the pogrom during the week of 13 July 1942.

Briefly, Sperber explained that on 13 July 1942, the Hamburg 101 Police Brigade entered the village under the authority of Major Trapp, who under orders from the SS and the Reich had to take the fittest of men for slave labor and exterminate the rest, of all ages, from infants to the elderly. They were rounded up in the square and then marched to a forest about 5 minutes from the market square. We walked up towards the entrance of this forest, and on the right was a large pond. We proceeded to cross the road and at the edge of this forest I noticed that there were two paths, one leading left and one going straight. We proceeded left to a path that led up a small hill. It was getting darker, and colder. Leaves and grass were everywhere.

Then, we stopped. In front of us was a round, wooden fence, about waist high. In front was a Magen David, made of wood. In Polish it read that this was the mass grave of nearly 1600, men, women, children, toddlers and infants, who were mercilessly shot into this grave on the 13th of July 1942.

I was standing in front of a mass grave.

What stopped me from fainting? I really don't know. I remember staring at it. I felt my body moving back and forth. I wanted to cry, but I couldn't. Tzvi began describing the trauma, the screams, the frenzy, the fear. People were forced to take off their clothes and shot into the pit stark naked. Babies were flung into the air and shot like clay pigeons in front of screaming and wailing parents.
They were all right in front of us.

I think that what really disturbs me most is that it seems that the locals don't take any notice. People walk along this path, people of all ages ride their bicycles along this path, lovers can 'sneak away' and spend time together in this secluded forest and just in front is this wooden fence with a Jewish star in front of it. About 50 or so metres away from this mass grave is a memorial dedicated to this once thriving Jewish community, erected by none other than the Hamburg 101 Police Brigade, the same brigade 70 or so years beforehand slaughtered 1600 people and dumped them into that pit that we stood in front of. It was an apology and a tribute to their memory.

In my mind, I was thinking, "you know what you can do with your pitiful apology".
We then boarded the bus, and headed towards Krakow.

It was getting dark, and the Polish countryside as well as her cities dotted about the landscape all started to look the same. Finally after a couple of hours we were edging in on Krakow.

Krakow was the location for the movie "Schindler's List". It was appropriately given because this is where Oskar Schindler's factory was opened during WW2 which enabled the German industrialist to rescue 1200 Jews. It was also home to Sara Schnerer, dubbed the "Mother of Bais Yakov" who was born and raised here where she also founded the "Bais Yakov" education system for ultra-Orthodox girls. Rich in Jewish history, it was also home to The Rema, HaRav Moshe Isserlis an ancestor to my dear wife and sons, who lived in Krakow during the middle ages. We visited his synagogue and his grave is found adjacent to his synagogue.

As Krakow was our last stop and we only had several hours to get to the airport, so we had to crush everything in as time really was not on our side.

One thing that I must state about Krakow - it's one flipping beautiful city. We just loved it. I would really love to hang out there for a weekend. The bars look incredibly cool and the architecture, scenery and history is beyond amazing, as well as terribly tragic.

If you're Jewish, and even more so, if you're a practicing Jewish person, you can tell by looking at this city that it once had a strong Jewish majority. Buildings still have signs with Hebrew writing on it - mostly ones that functioned as synagogues, yeshivas or day schools. One huge, renovated white building standing on a corner with large arched windows houses a pub and restaurant.

In 1939, it was a synagogue/yeshiva. The top floor was the Kollel of Gur. The disturbing thing is, it still looks like a shul. It is also more than obvious that the current residents of Krakow have absolutely no idea what it once was.

Several paragraphs ago I mentioned "Schindler's List" and as stated, Krakow was the city where the movie set was staged. In one scene, the Nazis barged into Jewish homes, rounding up the Jews, murdering random men, women and children, as well as looting and pillaging their homes. It was a frightening scene, and it was so well done that one actually felt the fear. It was an enclave with blocks of flats facing one another, with a common courtyard on the bottom.

We were in that courtyard. In 1939 and for decades, if not centuries beforehand, these blocks of flats where inhabited exclusively by Jews. It was designed this way to allow Jews to observe the Shabbat (Sabbath) since the courtyard was surrounded by 4 walls. A bakery was just off of the courtyard. On Fridays, residents would bring large pots of raw cholent to this bakery where the owner would take all of the pots and place them in his oven. On Shabbat morning, after shul, with oven mits people would line up by the bakery and collect their cholent pots with piping hot and ready cholent to serve for Shabbat lunch. Before the invention of the crock pot this is what was done for generations, especially in enclaves such as this.

Today, not one Jew lives there. Again, the residents more than likely have no idea as to who lived there prior to WWII.

To finish off this blog, I must speak about Auschwitz - the most notorious concentration camp and death factory that has ever existed.
It was our final day in Poland. Three long days of getting a glimpse of what I was taught, what I read about and countless movies and TV documentaries as well as TV movies about the darkest age in history. The day was clear and besides the cold which was ever-present, it was a very nice day. The drive from Krakow to Oswiecim, the town in Poland that the Germans renamed Auschwitz took roughly one hour. We were told that of all places, Oswiecim was a spa town. People, including Jews, vacationed here. It was a lovely 'get-away' sort of village that was regularly visited by many during the summer holidays.
The irony makes my head spin, to be honest.

The security is tight at Auschwitz. We had to bring forms of identification with us and the entrance was similar to that of passing security at an airport.

Auschwitz itself was separate from Birkenau. The entire campus really is a huge city. One did need to take a car from one end to the other. The entrance to the gate where the sign "Arbeit Macht Frei" is standing was the entrance to the main camp - Auschwitz. There were administrative offices there, slave labor as well as punishment blocks, etc. The camp where the victims were kept was in Birkenau replete with scores of barracks, gas chambers as well as the crematoria adjacent to the gas chambers. Birkenau is roughly one mile away from Auschwitz.

We went through a number of buildings holding artifacts and evidence of the victims' fate. Seeing the suitcases was eerie enough, yet seeing a suitcase with the name "Rosenzweig" on it really took the cake. Friends of mine sent me WhatsApp pictures, yet I caught it beforehand.
I have seen this suitcase before - in pictures many times. The first time I saw it, I was about 9 years old when I was pouring through a holocaust book my cousin bought from Yad Vashem on his first trip to Israel back in 1976. I finally saw it face to face.
Never mind everything else, but what turned my stomach was the hair. Tons and tons of hair that was going to be used for industrial purposes are on display. We were forbidden from taking pictures here as it was a human body part. There was also hair being manufactured into paper. It was simply disgusting, yet it made it all real. It was way too real.

After our tour, we were onwards to Birkenau. Birkenau was named by the Germans referring to the birch trees that were prominent around the area. Odd has to how a hell-hole was given a poetic name.

We arrived to the platform where the infamous selection took place, tearing families apart, the majority of whom ended up going to the gas chambers which were a good walk away. Anybody with a child was sent directly to the gas chambers, without question. People deemed fit for work was processed into the camp, given a striped uniform with clogs and their bodies were shaven. Tattoos were imprinted on their arms and that was how they were identified. On average, people lasted 3 months as most died from being beaten, shot, starvation or disease. Disease was rampant in the camp as the conditions in the barracks were unbearable. Almost everyone had dysentery; rats were all over the place spreading disease, especially typhoid which when untreated, it was usually deadly. Victims were awakened by 5am every day for roll call where they were forced to stand for hours in all types of weather. Those who were already too weak to work were earmarked for the gas chambers.

I only know of two cousins who were in Auschwitz. My grandfather's first cousin, Pola Feigenbaum-Kupferschmidt whose husband was murdered in Treblinka and whose baby daughter Bella was killed in front of her, was in several camps, one being Auschwitz. She survived the war and moved to Israel from Poland in 1950. She died in Tel Aviv in 1969. I mentioned her sister Bronka before, who perished in the Warsaw Ghetto, whose remains are most likely in the mass grave in the Warsaw Jewish cemetery.

Another cousin, Avraham Klik, my grandmother's nephew (mom's first cousin) actually escaped from Auschwitz with a band of fellow Frenchmen. He and his mates were caught by the SS in the forest, brought back to Auschwitz and shot in front of the infamous wall. I saw that wall and shuddered when I thought about him. His daughter and her children, grandchildren and great grandchildren live throughout Israel. His daughter, who passed away 30 years ago, remained in France with the rest of my extended family and they remained in Paris to this very day.

What seriously bothered me about Auschwitz/Birkenau? It is directly across from a shopping mall and a neighborhood. It is literally a 2 minute walk from the entrance to the gates of hell. Small, modest homes with gardens and BBQs are situated straight across the street. People walk their dogs and stroll in front of this historic site which was deemed "hell on earth". People just go about their business, living across from a place that housed one of the most depraved eras in the history of mankind. Even more so, who in their right minds could ever live near such a place?

The soul remaining witnesses that are still standing are nothing more than the trees and forests that stood in that same spot 80 years ago. If these forests could talk, just what on earth would they say?

Just like the victims - they're forever silenced.







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