When my friends and family abandoned reason for the knee-jerk hatred and overly dramatized politics of the DNC in 2016 and all of my favorite news sources decided to plunge right down into the FoxNews rabbit hole -only to cacth up and then pass them in that dark tunnel... I was left behind.
The groupthink behind most movements is infectious, but this one is accompanied by hate-speech, dehumanizing opponents, silencing and shame. This is no different from the claims being made against some imaginary "other side" being peddled by the propagandists in news rooms across the country.
They fan the flames... they grin wickedly when civil unrest threatens everyone. They don't care if they tear the whole temple down on their own heads.
Rather than bear out a president they hate for a measly four years and get support for a fair system, they just want the status quo to go on with them in charge.
Still unfair, still a mockery of human rights.. but with certain people still at the top of the heap.
They incite violence and riots -derailing the most important human rights battle of our time.
We shouldn't have police killing and terrorizing people for the color of their skin. We shouldn't have multiple generations being harrassed along into a hopeless turnstile of institutionalized oppression. It's wrong and we all need to work to change that.
What we have instead are "antifascists" going around burning anything they can and pushing for thinly veiled Marxism. Another deadly beast.
The US Army even through WWII was 1/4 immigrants. When I was in during Vietnam they whined the least. For the adult view of the value of immigrants to national security see George Marshall's Nobel Peace Prize remarks on why America with its ever immigrant turnover has the advantage in developing world peace. Make America great again.
3
I work with an elderly, Jewish man who had escaped Nazi occupied europe as a child. He was very upset Sunday about the news reporting that a policeman had murdered a black man. He was very anxious the next morning and he wanted to talk to me right away. He whispered to me: "When the men with the truck come- tell them it's not for me." I tried to reassure him that everything was going to be O.K.. I told him: "This is America- we are all going to be safe."
I hope I am right.
14
@Yossarian Yes, of course you were right to tell this elder that he would be safe. And no, you aren't right: many have never been safe, and it continues today...
10
@Yossarian @Dancer's Mom
"He was very anxious the next morning and he wanted to talk to me right away. He whispered to me: "When the men with the truck come- tell them it's not for me.' "
I would never say anything to an elderly gentleman.
Aside from him...
I am reading the biography of timpanist Elayne Jones (1928-present), the first black first black woman ever to be hired by the San Francisco Symphony.
She went to the High School of Music & Art between 1941 - 1945 and knew many students who escaped from Germany, etc. I'm not sure she understood the breadth of horror they were running from. Her family were immigrants from Barbados.
A Jewish student asked her to join a political club. When she was wary, he said, "We Jewish people have been discriminated against and have had to endure all types of prejudices. So we know the struggles of Negroes. "
The first thing I thought was -- during the Holocaust, "prejudices?"
But with further reflection, I don't believe that the history we miraculously survived gives us greater insight into what it is like to be black in America at all. Only a minority of Jews ever attempted to cross cultures into the black experience.
As violent as both our histories are, there is still a separation of identity. Our experiences are different, even though white supremacists want us all dead if we both don't stay in the place in which they choose to put us.
I was almost seven years old in November of 1939 when my parents left Hungary for Cleveland. They left behind large famiies, business, home, their parents graves, a land, language and heritage where they have lived for many generations. They never talked about their families, in fact as an only child it was a very quiet home. In time from the few survivors, I was able to piece together a fragment of my families history. The shadow of the holocaust has followed me to this day. I am blessed with eight grandchildren and have imbedded in them how fortunate they are to be here, pride in their Jewish heritage, and how important it is to fight hatred.
23
My Father lost his entire family to the Germans before and during the war. He had it good though as he was drafted in to the Russian Army in 1939 when Poland was invaded. After a brief stint in an anti aircraft unit, he claims that they never hit a plane, he was shipped East "living" out the duration of the war in a Soviet forced labor camp. It's a sign of how horrible things were when having it good was being in a forced labor camp. To this day I've never referred to the regime that killed my Ancestors and all of those people as anything other than German. Like my Father said "who else did this"? And now a bunch of morons in Red Hats and Tiki torches feel it's necessary to take away my oxygen too. Growing up with the belief that it could happen anywhere has shaped my world view. Please vote out this monster in November. I'm begging everyone to stand up and do the right thing.
42
Thank you for this story.
13
God bless you and people like you who represent true moral values despite their forms of worship and expression.
13
Thank you for this poignant story. The lines about how totalitarianism took control slowly at first is absolutely instructive at this time in America.
The cult of trump is a clear and present danger to our free society, an anathema to American democratic values ... In DT's twisted mind we are just ALL subjects to be ruled and object to serve his ego.
30
@APatriot
It’s almost hard to believe what I’m reading. Do people actually buy into this stuff? I mean can you really see what’s going on? What totalitarianism are you talking about? The one where you still free to think and speak as you choose? No MATTER the content? Or are you talking about the one where “most things are okay to think and speak about” (as long as it doesn’t offend, hurt, discriminate, or include prejudice against any one group, race, sex or religion) as long as your thinking and speaking follow the Party Line?
The night of Broken Glass all started because one Jewish man in France was fed up with how he was being treated. However right he was (obviously he was being treated unfairly), his next step didn’t solve his problem. And especially it didn’t solve anyone else’s. His step was to just shoot and kill a low level Nazi officer that was working in France. Which he promptly did. He shot and killed him.
From that one act, because of what ONE person did, the Nazi’s labeled the entire Jewish population as being terrorists! And and after that, they just stood by and watched an entire country fall into Anarchy! Stores were looted and burned, Jewish monuments and statues with torn down, Synagogues were torched and burned to the ground and many Jews and Jewish sympathizers were beaten and some killed!
All this because of ONE act! Blaming an entire set or group of people because of one persons criminal act!
Thankfully we’ve grown so much since this occurred!
Dear Andrea,
Thank you SO MUCH for sharing your grandmother's story. She was a remarkable woman, warm, loving and a great friend to my mother. I never heard her story and am even more appreciative of her warmth, graciousness and genuine interest in us kids. What a wonderful reminder for us to act and not just say "never again."
22
Dear Andrea, Thank you. My father was arrested in Vienna in May of '38 and sent to Dachau and Buchenwald. Released in '39. People always are surprised that anyone was ever released, and I've never completely understood, while knowing that if he couldn't get out of Europe he would be re-arrested. I've looked for more detailed accounts. Some say there were releases on Hitler's birthday in '39. If you have any suggestions for readings, I'd greatly appreciate it.
11
As a child in the late 1950’s my moms father sponsored Jewish refugees from Europe here in Ct.
We had a large family that gathered weekly at grandpas home. These refugeees were relatives and friends. At age 9 I remember my Auntie Mollie and her friend Margot Levy were having a sleepover in my bedroom in gramps house. I was there with them. They were about 39. Margot related how her dad sent her here to protect her. She came with another young woman, Ilsa Rothschild. They lived together till they died. I brought my kids to visit them. Lovely women with no family left to speak of in Germany. Brought to camps. Margots sister showed me the tattoo on her arm. I remember at these gatherings .... somber faces and much weeping.
To see my country slip toward this hell is demoralizing and frustrating. I gave their full names. Beautiful spirits. Gracious ladies. Sharing their families stories to be past along. If you heard the stories as children you are old now!!!!
Please remember to share with the children that are 9 years old today. Youngsters are impressionable and will remember and it will change them forever. The blessings from the Holocaust were the survivors resilience and success at overcoming the horror to laugh again. Margot and Ilsa were always laughing and happy. Unless they were reliving the deaths of their precious families. Including their soldier fiancés. Margots sister married a Catholic. Her two year old son was given to a German family till after the war.
20
Hitler’s party never won more than 40% of any marginally fair German election. Never more than 40%. But can we forget what happened? Can we pretend that it shouldn’t warn us about what is happening across the world (and right in the United States) now?
68
As a child of the 50s, we heard stories of refugees, most of them were not Jewish, but I remember one person who was in Auschwitz. I agree with others that all Americans should read this - and should be ashamed that we have a president who said (in essence) that those who shouted "Jews will not replace us" include good people. I have my doubts.
If you cannot grasp that "Jews will not replace us" is a call to destroy Jews, and in spirit all minorities, you do not deserve to call yourself an American.
59
Actually, that’s not what he said at all.
@A V
Trump said there many good people, on both sides. He said it on live T.V. ; I heard him. There were no 'good people' in the group of men carrying torches while they marched and declaimed "Jews will not replace us". It is odd behavior for a man whose daughter married Jared Kushner and converted to Judaism. Of course, the Kushners are a wealthy family, that might explain it.
15
This is an amazing story. IMO, the paragraph that should be required reading for anyone focused on the issue of immigration is the one that starts this way:
American laws at the time posed a tremendous obstacle to the Nellhaus family’s attempts to resettle in the United States. The Johnson-Reed Immigration Act of 1924 imposed a strict quota for each country, greatly reducing the number of people that could enter the United States from Germany, Poland and other countries that were home to large Jewish populations.
This is the first time it occurred to me that restrictions that the Trump administration enacts now could have long-lasting effects decades into the future.
43
@JEAiil
Jews arriving on a ship in the Caribbean were turned back, not allowed to proceed to the U.S. They died in camps in Germany.
Migrants from Guatamala and Honduras are being kept in detainment at the border. There are understaffed Panels in place to adjudicate their appeals for asylum. It remains to be seen how many will be turned away, forced to return to danger and possibly death.
13
@JEAiil
My father and his parents barely made it into the US in 1940 because of immigration restrictions. Their families were slaughtered.
7
This should be required reading for all Americans, including trump and his henchmen
27
@AMN You know Trump doesn't read. And most of his henchman probably only read sources that mirror their world view.
3
Look what these immigrants do.
During the congressional hearings they step up and defend our nation.
Ms. Goldstein and her family are made of the same stuff.
The Right Stuff, V.2
35
There should be no place in America for right wing "populism"...or for a "president" who encourages it. We should not be slamming the door in the face of people fleeing poverty and oppression. We should be welcoming them.
Anne Frank died because of the barriers America placed in front of her father. Don't let that happen again.
41
@Bill It is happening now, because of the Trump family with their unearrned wealth,
9
These stories read here this morning remind me of part of a documentary I watched on China yesterday. It was regarding a city that is as larger as the NYC metropolitan area, yet relatively unknown outside of China. The narrator was visiting an unusual cafe called "The Communist Cafe", the them harked back to Mao and the cultural revolution. In one part, the narrator was asking various staff about the portraits of historic Communist figures on the Wall: Marx, Lenin, Engels, Stalin, Mao, etc. The staff could, after a moment, name them, but when asked questions as to where they were from, and what they were noted for, the staff either didn't know or else got it miserably wrong. I actually could answer the basic questions but I found 10 -15 years ago that co-workers in their 20s & 30s here in the US would have done no better than than the Chinese employees in that Cafe, probably even worse. Most of our schools don't effectively teach history, and students who leave school without a solid knowledge of history and the ability to differentiate between facts and the manipulation of those facts to push an agenda, are much more likely to fail to recognize trends pointing towards a repeat of mistakes we should have learned from. We ignore history to our peril.
34
@J.R.B. Hear, hear!!!
There are some disheartening parallels today in Marxism and to a lesser degree toward right wing extremism.
I say "to a lesser degree" because of the numbers. A lot less people actually believe in racial supremacy than those that would supplant democratic rule with an authoritarian technocracy of constant spying and invasions of privacy. One could argue the case that the US has been pushed down this road for a long time by money coming directly from the CCP and that the totalitarian system is appealing to the established ruling class here. Nobody will challenge "the system" when they live in fear of being reported by their neighbors for being "other than" what the groupthink dictates.
Thank you, Andrea. As someone who knew and admired your grandmother over many, many years, I appreciate finally hearing her story, and seeing the photos of when she was young. She and my mother were good friends, and each had a history of sadness and trauma from the war. In spite of that, Marianne always seemed to have a sunny, smiling countenance and wonderful optimistic energy. I appreciate your telling the family's story, and hope it will continue to inspire you as we live through these very difficult times.
51
The path of our current president is one to watch as to where it can lead.
This is why Marianne Goldstein kept telling her story.
79
My Mother was a Jewish orphan, adopted and raised by Christians. My Father fought the Nazis from 1939 through 1945, and then came to this country in 1946. I, too, am grateful to this country, and served in the USAF, but I fear for its future. Trump is a cancer eating at its soul.
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@anonymous Authoritarian leaders are not the reason the events that followed took place. There was already an underlying illness in societies from which these people arose, who recognized the inherent weaknesses, divisions, and frustrations, then capitalized on them to rise to power. Germany in the 20s and 30s had suffered a humiliating defeat in WWI, then astronomical reparations payments placed on them by the victor countries which eventually resulted in the hyperinflation and suffering in the early 1920s; the Wiemar republic generally viewed as ineffective; scapegoating of minorities, particularly historic antisemitism, was increasingly an outlet of social pressure; as the government failed to effectively address social and economic weaknesses, people began turning towards the Communist Party and far-right parties as they looked for change in the system. Fast forward to the late 20th and early 21st century we see many democracies failing to recognize and effectively address the economic and social problems that their citizens are experiencing. People have become resentful and angry and looking for new scapegoats and turning to historic ones like antisemitism, racism, homophobia, and xenophobia. Some turn towards increasing theocracy, some towards far-right groups such as the Neo-Nazis, anti-government, and separatist groups looking for answers. It feels like we failed to learn from the past and are rushing towards repeating the same mistakes.
25
@anonymous Why does Trump prattle about "good people on both sides"? Because he is scared to death of offending the neo Nazis who support him.
4
@shermaro I wonder if DT says there are "good people on both sides" because maybe he shares the same thoughts/views as some of the far right groups, for example the Neo-Nazis? I wonder if he makes comments like that because deep down, he sees absolutely nothing wrong with anything he's ever done? After all, that level of distorted thinking is one of the best ways(among others) to recognize a person with narcissistic personality disorder.
-sidenote I'd like to say that I'm not againt DT.. I am however against DT performing any duties and/or roles related to control or discipline.
Jared Kushner will be the first to know when it's coming again: if/when he converts, will be the signal for U.S. Jews (incl. me) to leave. But, if it doesn't happen to us, it might well happen do some other out-of-favor group during Trump's 2nd, 3rd, 4th or 5th term in office (forget the 22nd Amendment - indeed the rest of the Constitution, except the 2nd Amendment) - his base needs to be appeased.
25
@Grant Converting wouldn’t make any difference. Antisemites in the US don’t hate the Jewish religion; they hate the Jewish *people*, as in genetic line, race. There were lifelong German Christians who didn’t know, until forces pulled them from their homes to the camps, that many years before they were born, a Jewish grandparent had converted.
11
@Lenny Rothbart That is what scares the absolute heck out of me. People have always assumed I am Jewish because of my name and the way my family look. Actually, we are ‘black Irish’ and we’ve faced similar persecution in the past including death squads etc.
2
I just read the NYT other article about the Holocaust memorial and viewed the graphic photos from Auschwitz. Very moving. I guess the holocaust deniers are ramping up their attack on the picture as photoshopped fakes of the Great Lie on a massive scale.
21
The most valuable gift from 45 and his republican enablers is the realization "in my gut" that we Americans are not immune to a Hitler strongman and totalitarianism. That how it is already happening here daily as raw power from the WH leeches away our decency and belief in fairness and law. I thought our way of gov. with the constitution and our system of checks and balances would always protect us but I see now how vulnerable it all is w/o decent, brave men in power to do what's right. Only the journalists, the so-called "fake media" is protecting our society now and new media are profit centers who can be corrupted by profit concerns.
60
Brave men and women.
Pelosi is brave. Schiff is brave. And now he is under direct threat directly “trump”.
It IS happening here.
27
@Ole Fart It's increasingly looking like we've had an effective takeover of the government by the Trumpist arm of the Republican Party. We may still have time to change direction, but it feels like the window of opportunity is narrowing. It also feels that all it would take for things to disintegrate into chaos would a huge economic jolt, either as a major worldwide recession or an economic depression for things to disintegrate.
9
In getting to know many Bosnians who fled to safety here in the mid1990s, I too had many internal conversations about whether it could happen here. "No; this is simply too big of a country, there are too many of us and we're too diverse," I told myself. It can easily seems this way when living in what is essentially a bubble (SF). I am seeing it all much differently as these last few years have unfolded.
10
Not for remembrance ... It is so sad to be forced to acknowledge that the worst can happen and has . That so many people are living under the necessity of heightened vigilance because of the reckless speech of the unscrupulous few.
Is mankind evolving intellectually? I suppose the stranglehold on education/information is keeping a good portion of many populations in a spiral of devolution.
20
@Jo No, mankind does not evolve intellectually. Unfortunately.
10
As I read the article, I felt more of danger US is facing. It should be wrong to say the current President has all the responsibility for what is going on in US because the present is based upon the past, i.e. the history. But at least I hope all Americans understand the risk in having chosen a person like Trump as POTUS and the national atmosphere that made many people choose Trump.
29
@Yaz
" But at least I hope all Americans understand the risk in having chosen a person like Trump as POTUS and the national atmosphere that made many people choose Trump."
No, "all Americans: not only do not understand the risks that Trump and his acolytes present they support the goals he espouses. His tool, the constant lying, blaming "others," attacking minorities, etc. are things that the American neo-nazis hope will lead them to a place like Nazi Germany in the 1930-1940's. Our history is replete with people and times that treated people no better than the Nazis.
3
Thank you for sharing your memories and experiences. We Americans can find our better selves and you have shown us specific actions and ways to a good path forward. Respecting and creating conversations, food, time and community are within all our abilities. I am sorry for the loss of your grandmother. I see her legacy living on and shining through you.
17
Thank you for your meaningful remembrance. A thoughtful and motivating way to start a day.
13
Andrea thank you for sharing this. I'm Gerhard's granddaughter and named my daughter after our great grandmother, Minna. How fortunate we are to have such a legacy of resilience. One of the striking lessons from your article is that despite being German Jewish immigrants, our great uncles joined the U.S. military. It is amazing to think that they willingly fought, despite the risk of facing the German killing machine once again. Bless you for following in their footsteps and serving in the Navy. May your voice and this story be heard many more times.
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Thank you, from an atheist in Yosemite.
As a recovering Catholic, artist and college grad, I guess I've had a greater encounter with the variety of religious impulses than many. I've been fortunate to attend some wonderful Seders, and one (and only one...) bris, and had the great good fortune of knowing fine people.
I'm getting old, now, and despite all my hope and progressive thought and company, I think the darkness is upon us. Not gathering: it's here.
If we do not remove the actual cancer from Our Casa Blanca, and take the necessary steps to foreclose a repeat, I fear the actual worst.
For the sake of the brave Marianne's, let us ACT.
56
Thank you for telling your family's story. I do not forget.
18
My great-grandparents were killed with two of their daughters by local partisans in Vilna, Lithuania, in the courtyard of their home.
We know what happened only because my mother's first cousin went back to Vilna after the war and learned the story. After a decades-long separation, he and my mother were re-united, and he told us then.
24
@Bruce Esrig
You write: "killed ...by... local partisans in Vilna, Lithuania". In Lithuania and many other countries, local "fascists" eagerly did the German Nazi dirty work and also looted their victims' property.
Please note in this and other discussions here, that many "DPs" or "displaced persons" were actually 'local' fascists and criminals who fled with the Germans and often ended up in refugee camps and later resettlement in USA, Canada, etc.
4
It is time for the president to give an Oval office speech denouncing antisemitism before it becomes rampant. Do you think it will happen, don't hold your breath.
27
@irene First of all, antisemitism is ALREADY rampant. Second, trump might tweet something weak but he will never speak out to any degree because he needs those voters. Desperately.
13
Trump is a demagogue and division is his currency. If he gave an oval office speech it would have a dog whistle on every line.
4
What a powerful recounting. We have to keep these stories alive, or we are doomed to repeat them. Thank you.
My family was part of the perpetrators. I am still trying to figure out how to manage that: my lineage is not of heroism, like the author’s, fleeing persecution and then fighting the persecutors in war. My family was German and my grandparents were part of the horror; they were in Hitler Youth, and my grandmother embraced Kristallnacht, and my grandfather... was part of the worst, in his Kriegsmarine uniform. Those words choke me. Knowing that has shaped who I choose to become; it is only a thread that holds us to our decency so we must cling to it or become that which we loathe.
I am still learning how to manage the idea that I am descended from such things. I wrote about it just this week, telling the truth about my family and my response to it here https://kristinadahl.blogspot.com/2020/01/telling.html?m=1 .
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@Kristina
Good for you for recognizing and disowning the German Nazi past and their failed attempt to murder all Jewish people and control the world. I was born in Siberia during WW II but ended up living near Berlin on the Polish side of the border until 1957 but antisemitism seemed to follow us everywhere...feeling more secure in 🇨🇦 Canada...the Jewish people will never disappear...Long May We Live...Am Yisroel Chai !
24
@Kristina Your choice to disclose and renounce that heritage gives me hope in this dark time. Peace be with your spirit.
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@Kristina
Your brave acknowledgment is a valuable light on the path of forward thinking.
Thank you.
20
Everyone needs to take note that as much anti-Semitism comes from the Left as from the Right in today’s world. Thanks to ignorance in anti-Israel politicking on college campuses, what should be constructive politics produces hate towards Jewish citizens.
Take a look at today’s article on Valeri Plame.
22
My parents have some very close friends who are Jewish; sone of them are now in their ‘80s and ‘90s, and as kids they survived the holocaust thanks to the kindness of strangers,who risked their lives by adopting them into their families and thus hid their Jewish heritage from the fascist authorities. One of these Jewish families was almost wiped out during the war years, and only few of them managed to escape to the USA before it was too late.
Fast forward to 2016, these families are all fairly wealthy and well established, and not all of them are liberals. Actually, some of them were openly pro-Trump for his pro-business, low-tax ideology. Now in 2020 my parents tell me that none of their Jewish friends support Trump anymore, they are just too uncomfortable with the administration’s tolerance for white supremacist ideology and obviously racist individuals (Steven Miller, anyone?) and groups.
37
@Andy - Confusing, isn't it?
3
Thank you for sharing this story of your grandmother and the wonderful contributions that you and your family have made to this country. I was a child during the Second World War. Never could I imagine that we would see people waving Nazi swastikas in our country or that an American President would state, after the Charlottesville event, that there were "fine people on both sides." Hispanic immigrants fleeing violence in their own countries are the new scapegoats. Men marching down the streets of Richmond with weapons of war, defending their "Second Amendment Rights." Couldn't happen here? Think again.
37
@John Paar
Note that the German American Nazi Party filled Madison Square Garden in NYC in the 1930's with brown-shirted, swastika wearing fascists and racists. They marched in many a parade throughout the USA. Radio programs praised Hitler and the Nazis. Many of those nazis, rascists, fascist misanthropes are no doubt the "grandparents" of the very same MAGA-nazis of today. The good 'ole USA, and Imperial Britain were virulently antisemitic, and most of our good white Christian citizens didn't give a hoot what the heck happened to the Jews in Germany, Poland or anywhere else, many were too busy in the USA pogroms and lynching and brutal murder and genocide of blacks, hispanics, anybody of color, which as we all know was a very popular American pastime.
5
I had a professor at college who was a German Jew. I remember he told us that his family fled Germany a few weeks after Hitler came to power. He commented "We knew the German people."
They sure did.
18
@Don
I suggest we all take a look at the "American People".
I don't suggest that a majority are freely expressing their
mythology of supremacy, however their message is being facilitated in a very powerful way. It is reckless, it is dangerous.
We should make the effort to push this evil back into the darkness where it originates.
Supporting forward thinking, compassionate and logical government is within the reach of all of us.
19
@Don Please be careful. There were, and still are, many very good German people as well as bad ones But now there are many very bad American people, organized in the Party of Trump,
2
Fascism is alive, right here, right now, in the USA under the guise of right-wing christain theocracy infesting our courts and and congress. Via “religious freedom” we are forced to subsidize the worship temples/sales centers of cults through free real estate taxes at the county level while Republicans allow “religion” to be a cudgel to eliminate ANY requirements of legislation the “true christains” find unacceptable.
And now they are tearing down the separation of church and state by forcing state governments to allow public funding for cult schools, leading to state-sanctioned teaching of religious superstition and dogma.
It HAS happened here, under the ironical “make America great again” banner of Trump and his sycophantic christain enablers.
43
inspirational.
13
Last Friday I was hired to be part of a focus group. When we had a morning break, the man sitting next to me and I left the room at the same time. As we passed into the expanse of the hotel, he turned to me and said, You don't look Jewish, are you Jewish?
I said, Why do you ask?
He said, I have a Jewish Joke.
I asked, Is it anti-Semitic?
He replied, It's a joke!.
I said, For me, the Holocaust was yesterday.
He walked away and before the focus group resumed, he changed his seat in the room. We didn't exchange another word for the rest of the day.
46
I am a Jew and swell with pride that my grandparents helped pre war Jewish refugees. I can’t escape my dismay when a Holocaust story is told without taking a stand against Trump. He brought in new nazis into the sacred orbit of the White House and he led Nuremberg style rallies. Blood is on his hands for more than one mass shooting. Trump styled himself from the image and words of Hitler. The past and present are so intertwined that I wish that the author felt the compulsion to take a stand.
45
@william phillips
You hit the nail on the head.
Here is a link to an article directly on point.
1990 Article After The Gold Rush
http://www.vanityfair.com/magazine/2015/07/donald-ivana-trump-divorce-prenup-marie-brenner
Quote
Last April, perhaps in a surge of Czech nationalism, Ivana Trump told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that from time to time her husband reads a book of Hitler’s collected speeches, My New Order, which he keeps in a cabinet by his bed. ... Hitler’s speeches, from his earliest days up through the Phony War of 1939, reveal his extraordinary ability as a master propagandist.
End quote
24
Never Again!!
13
Great article. We beat the fascists once at great cost, only to have them inserted into the Republican party. It's a shame.
19
@Farley Wombat
My dad served in the 101st during World War II.
He used to say that "the only good Nazi was a dead Nazi."
We need to beat them again.
15
Past is prologue as fascism rears its ugly head and threatens the fabric and underpinnings of American democracy.It is becoming increasingly obvious that the Republicans are far more commited to Trumps corruption than the wellbeing of our nation .This time in our history will be labeled profiles in cowardice and those that support our nascent Autocrat show themselves to have utterly corrupted core values and only care about imposing Trumps dark vision of hate and graft on the majority just like what happened Nazi Germany.I firmly believe that it is only a short time until Trump calls out his minions to start shooting their demonized political opponents and impose their bankrupt values and corruption on the country from the barrel of a gun.
15
The holocaust not only can but already HAS happened right here in the USA. White genocide against Native Americans and the enslavement of an entire race of people are part of our culture and history, conveniently downplayed to enable our sense of moral superiority.
Humans' fear and hatred of the “other” is endemic to our entire species – it fans the fires of horror and can only be restrained by wise, careful leadership and a refusal of the majority to tolerate lynchings and pogroms.
We must vote our hopes and dreams in November or prepare to explain to future generations how we again allowed nightmares to happen.
27
We need those who survived the horrors of the Nazis to remind us and keep reminding us of this very dark time in history.
We need everyone to be aware so that this never happens again.
20
@liceu93 :
the problem is, that the adult survivors of the Holocaust are now gone and only the child/ teenage survivors remain.
2
We are all blessed to be able to read and experience the deep love your family had for America. As a New Yorker my older sister had a job as a very bad packer of groceries at the neighborhood Waldbaums. Many of the older customers had numbers tattooed on their arms and when asked they spoke softly about how the numbers came to be on their arms.
My sister always took extra care when she was fully aware of the horrors of the Nazi's and it insired here to be a nurse working with immigrants to ensure that they had a better life from where they came.
nothing can erase the horros of slavery and the concentration camps, we need to fight for our country and hold such despicable people accountable but realize the words never again are not slogans,
Thank you Ms. Goldstein for sharing a painful story that is so close to your families heart and for the NYT for publishing it.
No more fooling around we need to stand up and fight back. We want witnesses. The new Nazi is in the White House like Hitler a failed individual with an oversized mouth. We need to fight ,get off of social media and take these white traitors down. We are the Calvary no one else is coming to help us.
God is on our side.
23
If Hitler had been an American, Germany would have fought us, for the same reason we fought them. Let us not forget that many Germans were against Hitler, and that many Americans supported him.
7
I still have my father and mother’s Nazi passports with the big red letter J in them together with their Hitler-added middle names of Israel and Sara.
They reside in a cigar box underneath my bed.
The passports are impressive, menacing looking documents: sturdy brown covers, thick, expensive paper, sharp, brightly lighted photos, lots of swastikas, very modern typography, official looking stamps and elaborate handwriting; all effectively signifying the desire of German officialdom to put their best menacing foot forward in representing Hitler and Nazi Germany to the world.
You could not beat the Nazis when it came down to typography, excellent penmanship and frightening bureaucrats who coupled robbery with intimidation and ominous threats.
America is not yet lost as long as our State Department functionaries are not issuing passports as threatening as these.
But give Trump a few more years in power and they will try.
https://www.ushmm.org/learn/timeline-of-events/1933-1938/law-on-alteration-of-family-and-personal-names
26
Excellent article, i wish the Times would do something similar for people that suffered under worst and certainly longer persecution by the communists would bear witness to their stories of suffering in the gulags, escape, perseverance, and ultimately triumph.
6
@Gary My Father spent six years in the gulags. It was very bad, and the stories need to be told, but he would be the first to tell you that it doesn't begin to compare to the horrors of the Holocaust.
15
@Gary
Perhaps today's immigrant detention centers are comparable to the gulags that concern you. I also believe that this deserves scrutiny. I support the legal entities that
stir themselves to do just that. ACLU SPLC
10
I am watching in real time how people of bad faith are undermining the checks and balances of our democratic institutions, twisting and subverting our Constitution in the process, enthralled by a self-pitying hate-mongering demagogue.
And now this reminder that anti-Semitism is resurging in America.
Do not take our democracy for granted.
24
"It Can't Happen Here". Sinclair Lewis, 1935-36. The title tells you all you need to know. Now more than ever.
20
Half Polish woman here (100% American), raised with immigrant grandparents. Grandma said "Jews are nice, just different." I was too young to understand but I understood "different" so I went on a search of this different in her best friend, a Jewish woman. Since I could find no different in her clothing, house, food, whatever, I concluded with a young child's mind the different was the fat on her arms. See how young I was. Why indoctrinate a child like that. Anyhow I grew older, still searching for this different since now I was told our black neighbors are different too. Humm. Guess what, NO DIFFERENT. We are all humans. I see my face in the photos of this article and in other Holocaust photos. I see myself and my life in the lives of black people, brown people. We are all humans, full stop.
28
And we all bleed the same way. Mourn I was going to say, but I fear not, as many celebrate those “other” they fear caged at our southern border. Where’s the outrage? It should be written and published every single day. Children taken from their parents, families, unrecorded who was taken and where they are, where they were shipped to around the country, put up for adoption never to see their families, parents again. And many Americans celebrate this, because of their fear of other. It’s frightening.
5
Never Forget is meeting the modern version of Know Nothing.
Evil flourishes when good people do nothing.
74
@Dejah
Let us, the good people, stop doing nothing.
Let us take to the streets.
Let us organize, and protest loudly and clearly and peacefully.
We, and humanity, cannot afford four more years.
9
A truly amazing and wonderful story. However, I would like to point out one inaccuracy. "She recalled lighting Sabbath candles on Friday nights in her family’s apartment, with the sound of the Nazi storm troopers’ boots marching past on the pavement, as they sang songs about violently murdering Jews." That recollection is simply not true.
While storm troopers boycotted Jewish owned shops in the late 1930's and before Kristallnacht, and while they certainly encouraged opposing Jews on every level, they never sang songs about murdering Jews and no such songs exist.
There were many ordinary Germans who were appalled by the growing anti-Semitism and by Kristallnacht itslef so the the notion that anyone openly sang songs about murdering Jews is misplaced.
Most Germans and even many Jews at this time naively thought that Kristallnacht was the work of right wing radicals and that Herr Hitler would restore order. Openly singing about violently murdering Jews would not have been tolerated even by the regime. This inaccuracy does not in any way diminish her awful experience or her families bravery or the horror of millions of others during the holocaust. But its important to remember that most Germans were not brutal savages or blood thirsty murderers. Storm troopers singing songs about violently murdering Jews does not reflect any historical facts.
4
@Collin That may be true or not. But, the American stormtroopers in Charlottesville were singing such songs!
9
@Collin
1. You don't have standing to question this person's relating of a family member's personal experience.
You weren't there.
2. Holocaust denialism lite is what you're pedaling here.
3. Cadence songs are not strange or unusual & their themes are often dark & irreverent.
5
@Texan Dem 1. I am not questioning this persons relating of a family members personal experience. I am simply saying that her personal experience with regard to hearing songs about viciously murdering Jews is without merit and has no factual basis. There were no such songs about murdering Jews at that time or any other during the Third Reich. If there had been such songs there would be a record of them. I challenge you or any reader to find any songs sung by any German from 1933-1945 about violently murdering Jews. You wont find any because they don't exist.
Its quite likely she heard troopers singing songs but they were likely military marching songs or the Horst Wessel Lied. The Horst Wessel Lied, the Nazi party national anthem was wildly popular with troopers and the public alike and that song was about the storm troopers and Nazi party victory over the German communists.
2. To suggest that I'm pedaling holocaust denial is patently absurd, childish and insulting. I acknowledge the holocaust quite clearly and unequivocal in my statement.
3. Cadence songs are used by the American armed forces. The German armed forces have never used cadence songs either before or after WW11. The German armed forces have military marches. And whats more, cadence songs were invented by Willie Duckworth, an American army soldier in 1944. That would make German storm troopers singing cadence songs not just strange and unusual but absolutely impossible.
2
My Latino husband is a legal citizen through our marriage for many years. Despite feeling “comfortable” we have mapped our escape route if this administration continues down its dark path. We are living in terrible times with a morally bankrupt leader and greedy supporters.
24
From above article: "authoritarianism slowly gained power, incrementally at first, so that people became accustomed to them."
----------------------------------------
Sound familiar about today's USA under Trump? How about the following:
--"in his statements an element of bitter refusal to submit to reality invariably emerged"
--"[he] lied all the time. Yet he also said clearly what he was doing..."
Written about Trump? No, about Hitler, in "The Death of Democracy-Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic" (pgs 13, 38).
Anyone who has been paying attention the past three years can see those statements about Hitler also apply to Trump.
Willkommen to America under Trump.
19
Thank you. I have suffered discrimination for being Jewish, but never before now have I felt afraid. My synagogue began Yom Kippur services last fall with instructions regarding what to do in an active shooter situation. Contrary to what the President has said, Jews should not support him. Support for Israel is of no consequence if Jews are killed for their religion.
31
Thank you for sharing ! I only discovered about 10 years ago that my family are Jewish...us 4 kids did not know - I am now 79, and reading up on history it's apparent that many Jewish families over hundreds of years changed their names & hid who they were & dispersed throughout the world to survive under the hatred they found themselves in. When my father in his late 90's finally told us...we all laughed...because we really had no feelings of fear about such a thing ! My father was a bit confused at our laughter ! Now that I'm hearing the new rumblings of hatred & racist bigotry rearing up all over again I am beginning to understand just how terrible such attitudes can be & what was suffered by my ancestors that would cause them to try & hide who they were for sheer survival. I am actually enjoying being 'in the middle' so to speak...understanding just how disgraceful humans can be & feeling the horrors of what some have endured just for being born into a shell they had no control over !
7
Too many things are happening right now that we are just letting slide by. One example, the white nationalist/hate group hand gestures made by cadets and midshipmen at the Army-Navy game. After an "extensive" investigation, we are told that they were "only playing the circle game." Sure they were. Open your eyes, people, the rot has already spread into the higher ranks. When the white power militia groups start their civil/race war, which side will the military and government be on?
11
Thank you for sharing your family’s experience. The rise of present day Republican-led fascism is truly frightening and we all need to become aware of where their hatred is heading. We recently visited the camp in Dachau. Unlike many “tourist” sites, walking through the camp and reading the accounts of people interned there was a solemn affair. People from all over the world come and see the remnants of the atrocities conducted there. Silently. We were all shocked. And I think one of the most shocking was the rail line passing through the village to the camp. The villagers claimed that they did not know what was happening in the camp. This is hard to believe.
14
@Lily
It is also impossible to believe that the stench of the smoke from the incinerators where bodies were cremated was not smelled by the villagers living nearby. It is impossible to believe that looted Jewish shops and homes went unnoticed.
Christian laws did not permit "usury", or money lending. Jews took over the business of lending. There were Germans in debt to Jewish lenders. How convenient to have that debt erased by the new laws, and the rounding up of Jews who might own that debt.
Jewish families are still trying to recover valuable art works stolen by Nazi functionaries, sold to dealers, auctioned and sold by respectable auction houses.
1
@Linda Miilu Have you seen "Woman in Gold"?
I found it profoundly moving. I've seen the Adele Bloch Bauer painting both when it was in Vienna, when I was a student, years ago and after in the Neue Gallerie. I did not know its full history until I saw the film.
The socialists such as Mussolini, Stalin. and Hitler were not good for their people, although that is why they obtained power. To have the government control healthcare, education, media, and business always results in disaster. Over 100 million people died due to socialism in the last century, and that is not including wars.
1
@Rosemary I don't think you've accessed correct information.
10
@Rosemary :
if you are referring to modern democratic socialism, look at the Scandinavian countries, not the fascist "socialist" nations of the past.
3
I have hours of tapes of my grandmother Olga Kanarchuk relating her — and my mother’s at age 4 to 10 — experiences during and after the war. In 1950 the entire family were sponsored as refugees (displaced persons) by a small town in the middle of Kansas, Nickerson. Thank goodness for those good people. And thank goodness for the Domino Sugar Factory in Baltimore being willing to accept immigrants with limited English as hard and dedicated workers.
May we all remember what was so wrong. And May we all remember what was so right to try to repair and move beyond. Warm wishes, TG
9
What a moving story! How great it is that the family escaped safely, and how sad and horrifying it is that we are having a resurgence of the hatred that forced them to leave their home. We are naive and blind to think it couldn’t happen here and now.
9
Thank you for sharing your story, I am glad your mother was willing to share hers. I have spent many hours researching my grandparents stories because they told so little. It is important to note how reluctant the US was to accept Jewish refugees from Germany, and as a result, my grandparents could not come here initially, and we lost many relatives to the holocaust. It is a shame that attitude has resurged - and who knows how many refugees will die as a result today.
10
Your poignant family story comes at a time in America’s history that so clearly mirrors what evolved in Germany in that unforgettable (hopefully) era.
There are so many people who should read it and won’t, or will read it and say “it could never happen again.” They are willfully ignorant and don’t have a clue about how primitive we still are as a race (the HUMAN race).
I was an Army officer in the mid-70’s and was stationed in your family’s hometown of Pirmasens for a short period. Actually my post was a small site a very short distance from a small village near Pirmasens - Massweiler - that in fact was literally underneath the village, in a complex dug into the hill on which Massweiler stands. The U.S. did not build the “cave;” it was a WWII relic, obviously built in a place that would discourage bombing by the Allies.
While I am not Jewish, and in fact grew up in a small town that knew virtually nothing about Judaism, I felt compelled to visit Dachau while on a trip to Munich. And I have to say that it was so overwhelmingly sad that I had to leave within a minute of entering the place. Every American should have that experience before making any judgement about ANY other human being.
I’m not telling this story to make myself feel good or to gain any kind of acclaim. It’s because I empathize with you, Andrea, and your family (I can’t possibly say I understand), and I admire your family’s courage and fortitude in the face of truly incredible adversity. Thank you!
14
Lest we forget.
6
As a Black American unable to flee from the hue of my skin living in America has always been a state of risk. I found this article important because this is America and not Germany via pre WWII
We need more stories about people living in space and places where their very presence puts them in daily risk. The world needs to know
BLM
21
this woman's story reminds us of why we must not take our freedoms for granted.
There are awful forces rising up in the US that threaten all of us.
Be sure to vote this Nov and help preserve our country's best traditions.
10
I can only hope that America will survive that hate mongers that have risen under the present White House administrations.
Please let there be more people that realize we are stronger together than divided apart. That scenario may help this president, but it is the end of our country as we know it.
10
Boston might have been Goldstien's refuge, but as a native my Jewish memories of Lexington and my family's of Newburyport and Somerville are those of ostracism, shunning, discrimination and overt physical hostility. I remember well the morning my parent ushered my brother and myself out of the house into the car on some obvious pretext and looking back at the house saw a large letter "J" painted in the front door.
My only attempt at an English language conversation with my grandmother inquiring about Jewish life in Poland brought the pained recollection that " they beat us going to and from school" . I learned then that my experiences were not unique, being chased and beaten leaving elementary school. Injured, now in my old age those American beatings have caught up to me as morbid disability. America is not so so different. The sentiments of antisemites are lingering, smoldering, looking for oxygen to burst into flames
13
Thank you, Andrea. I appreciate very much your telling this story.
4
Thank you for sharing. I look forward to more articles.
3
Today's anti-immigrant climate, perhaps as mean-spirited as that of the 1930s, gives special resonance to what is just a small quirk in this story. The author suggests the possibility that there was no assistant rabbi position in Indiana, and therefore that the author's family may have been rescued from slaughter by immigration fraud.
The possibility that "it" might happen again, right here in the United States, is truly terrifying. But we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that "it" can happen, has happened, and is happening all over the world, from the Tutsis in Rwanda to the Uighurs in Xianjang to the Rohingya in Myanmar.
When Americans build walls and slam shut the gates, we condemn millions to genocide. The fact that a fortunate few have the resources to get over, around or through our walls must draw our attention to the many who lack those resources, and pay for it with their lives.
12
In the seventies, when I first met my husband who is not Jewish, he argued it could never happen here. He has since changed his mind.
59
I have seen the incremental changes that have led this nation to where we are take place since i was a child. I had a knack for extrapolation via deduction that irked people around me. I was abused into hiding it. It started with the degradation of or educational system. Then lowering of standards for giving people raises and promotions and the piling on of high praise for average work.The tendency was to put someone who was well suited to where they were and spoke up for the standards of doing it well into a position that was just beyond their ability to do well.
Then rhetoric of moral superiority and racism all wound up somehow in how the government regulated the economy to make sure it supported our nation. And when reagan won and removed those laws that protected us all I started to connect it to the changes in educational standards back in the 60's/70's when I was a kid. Because the simple fact is in spite of not getting the same education as my siblings I had gleaned enough to be able to think and it was very clear to me that a person could not honestly hold the views reagan and the republicans espoused unless you were very poorly educated, thought average work was excellent and mediocre work was average.
Those vandals were probably kids acting out. They shut down a school because some kid posted a graffiti saying shoot up the place in a bathroom. That gives the kid too much power and ignores reason. It is always some kid seeking this reaction. Shooters never do this.
@magicisnotreal
You understand how terrorism works, right?
The object is to make people fearful, not slaughter everyone. The fear does the heavy lifting where the violence & threats are intended to create said fear.
1
A brilliantly written, stunningly accurate account of the terror of nazi Germany coupled with the promise-fulfilled of the great United States of America.
5
Ms. Goldstein,
Thank you for sharing your story. It reminded me of my own situation when I was a young boy. Some relatives would share their stories. However, most others didn't. They never talked about the "old country" and the things that happened to them.
Their reasoning, in hindsight, was that they didn't want to pass on the hatred and humiliation they experienced, but wanted us, their youngsters to grow up with an open heart. My parents and many relatives worked for the betterment of the community. This was what they wanted me to see.
However, hearing the stories from other relatives and in the media, especially the documentaries and biopics of holocaust survivors brought home the reality of those times.
Although many of "us" have moved on and opened our hearts to others in need, unfortunately, there are those who still sow the seeds of hate and blame and the persecution of others they believe are "different" then they are.
What "we" can do is sow seeds of Light and Love and Harmony, not letting the actions of others extinguish "our" faith in God, our Creator, no matter the religion, and faith in others, who think as we do, that all people are "children of God" and are precious in the way that God created them to to be.
In the end, the people with Love in their hearts will become the future of our world and our global society. The path to achieve this is not an easy one. It is steep, dark, thorny and narrow. Only the strongest of Heart, Will and Love will make it.
10
“You can depend upon the Americans to do the right thing. But only after they have exhausted every other possibility.” Churchill
In a renewed era of dividing people by categories, open hate, closing doors to people in need and punishing people simply seeking a better life, no later than November, we will find out if Churchill’s famous words still apply.
34
@Mark Mohler - We have a long way to go. How are we going to come to grips with our destruction of the planet via the destruction of the environment?
1
Thank you for this thoughtful article. It reminded me of when I lived in Pirmasens myself (well, in Rodalben, a village a few miles down the road) for a year in 1970-71, while my then-husband was serving in the U.S. Army at Pirmasens Army Depot. We became friends with an Orthodox Jewish couple from the Pacific Northwest (he was also stationed in Pirmasens). I remember a conversation with the husband, who made a comment about buying Israeli government bonds, and when I asked him why they did that, he said, “Because we want to know that if we need to go there, we have a place to go.” I was astounded, and said, something to the effect of “you think you might have to leave the United States?” Sure, he said, we might. God, I hope he was wrong, but I’m no longer as sure as I once was.
62
Chills run up and down my body as I read this. Drawn in I am at the table with your grandmother hearing the stories. I am transformed by this account. At the end, I am gobsmacked into silent thought. There are no words. We just know, we can be better than we are right now. The majority of us, are. Many of us have made our own small world bright and work toward helping others. Others fear of the other taking something from someone else or having more than someone else that makes a small marginalized minority of people feel they must express themselves this way. I do not know why some people seem to need someone to hate.
22
I have WWII stories from the German side. An aunt at 16 was operating one of the lights that scanned the sky for bombers. A cousin 14, at the end of the war, her family with 4 daughters was in the French part of the divided Germany. The soldiers heard about the girls & came to the farm. The girls were warned & my cousin came close to being discovered when hiding in a haystack that was stabbed by a bayoneted rifle. Friend was 6 in the Russian quarter when a Russian soldier who was eating his lunch with his unit, saw her & gave her his bread with liverwurst, cheese & jam on it. You see, Andrea, the person who desecrated your synagogue was just a bad person. None of us can be protected from them.
6
The human spirit is amazing and beautiful. Thank you
8
Thank you for sharing that touching story and family history.
Even more important, thank you for reminding us that it not only can happen here, but is happening here. If we don't stop it now, while we still can, we'll have only ourselves to blame.
45
Thank you for the beautiful photos and heart rending history. May we all have the courage of your forebears and continually work to uphold human dignity.
38
Thank you. Your family story, and millions more like it, shows the importance of perseverance while facing persecution from all sides. Authoritarianism, unfortunately, is just beneath the surface in many places, turning neighbors against neighbors - and its happening here right now. America has always been a safe haven for families facing terrible danger and almost sure death. Let's hope that it will always remain as such.
52
@Michael Gilbert
Is hope enough? Perhaps for the boomer generation, but is it enough for our grandchildren?
6
@Michael Gilbert "America has always been a safe haven for families facing terrible danger and almost sure death." Really? some 200,000 Jews did manage to reach the United States between 1933 and 1945; still, this number is a small fraction of those who attempted to come. Those who were rejected (most of them) had to return to Germany and ended up in death camps! This was a time when German Nazis used Henri Ford's anti-semitic publication The International Jew for their propaganda. After WWII, on Miami Beach, there were signs posted "no dogs, no Jews". And later, this country's OSS (later CIA) allowed Nazi criminals to escape through the Vatican to South America because they had the Americans believe they held useful information on the Russians! Are we talking about the same country?
11
@Viking 1
Ask the Japanese interred in our very own concentration camps about whether "America has always been a safe haven for families facing terrible danger and almost sure death."
The parents of my room mate, one of my best friends from college, met in one.
1
And my Israeli friends are sharing memes about how no Democratic politicians attended the opening ceremony for the new US embassy in Jerusalem, and that Jews should “remember that this November.” The implication that no Democratic politicians came to the 70th Liberation Anniversary is a lie.
Did Jews in prewar Germany support politicians who laid the foundation and/or eventually became architects of the Holocaust? An article exploration that possible parallel to the integrity crisis face American Jews today would be more timely and poignant journalism than yet another article describing the horrors of what happens after it’s too late. The Holocaust was only inevitable in hindsight.
28
@Skip Bonbright
Why was a modern safe Capitol moved from Tel Aviv to a conflict zone in Jerusalem? Why was Netanyahu allowed to insult President Obama in front of Congress? He received a standing ovation from Republicans. What is happening on the West Bank where peasants from Russia are placed, rather than accommodate them in Tel-Aviv? Israel is not immune to jingoism; the 1967 borders are being ignored.
1
Hatred is everywhere. Goodness is everywhere. Safety is nowhere other than in the mind of the haters. Fear should always be in the mind of the good.
5
Any body with eyes to see, look, look, look. We are currently suffering from an authoritarian executive, embodied by this avaricious sicko in our Whitehouse. Beware, be wary, put a stop to the rise of authoritarianism in America, be aware that it is funded by multinational capitalism, by big Pharma, big oil, big Ag., know that it is fostered by our congress members particularly the Republican Party. The fool Trump is operating from Putin's playbook. They have a great deal in common; white supremacy, greed, and the hatred of all who wish to obstruct them in their quest for absolute power and the accumulation of massive personal wealth.
84
@ridgewalker1
It behooves us to remember, that DJT does not think what you write is so. Neither do the Republican Senate, Fox and Sinclair networks, and haters generally. He really believes he is doing a good job. He really thinks he is working on what matters to people all the while appointing takers and fakers to all the cabinet positions. The cabinet heads are raping this country of everything, every program, every regulation on industries, every control, every dollar for social programs. It is very dangerous. However, DJT truly does not see it. We have to react to him from that premise. The lobbying efforts have quadrupled in the face of a more receptive government to the sway of money and power. We need to run for office, support diversity of voice and view and oust the swamp, especially those over 60. Those in Congress the longest from BOTH parties do the most damage.
6
We are lucky to have immigrants in our country.
74
Thank you for your story.
39
Just before reading this article this morning, I read one in the local paper about "white supremacists" from all over the nation attending a camp where they trained in weaponry and discussed overthrowing the government. The local article never used the word "Nazi", but that's obviously what they were.
An FBI agent infiltrated the camp and managed to uncover a murder scheme and evidence that they were linked to the gun nuts in Virginia.; I was wondering why the FBI didn't raid the camp altogether.
We need to connect the dots and realize the threat of resurgent Naziism.
75
And trump & co. are once again closing our ports to those who need refuge, while stirring up hate, here, there, and everywhere.
Do not vote for the hate-mongers. Do not ignore the hate.
95
Ms. Goldstein, your story mirrors my own.
My father was born in Berlin in 1922.
He, his parents and siblings, along with the Ziegler family, escaped from Germany in April, 1939, crossing the French border and sailing from Marseilles to Cuba; they were not allowed into the United States at that time, and stayed in Havana for 20 months, surviving by selling cigars.
A second cousin, Herman Hidden, arranged for their visas and paid for their transport.
Eventually, they were allowed into the United States, where by father joined the United States Army, and was sent back to Europe to fight the Nazis.
I don't know how they had the strength and fortitude to do what they did.
But I tell my children on a regular basis to practice their Hebrew. I am fairly certain we will have to leave this country over the next 20 years. Yet another place Jews will become unwelcome.
49
My father was born in Dortmund in 1926. I too listened to my grandmother's retelling of the Nazi's horror.
My father's memoir also recounts how he was no longer able to swim in the schools pool because he was Jewish, how they made him skate on the side of the lake where the ice was too thin and he fell into the freezing cold water. Thankfully a goodhearted gentile rescued him.
In 1939 is was difficult to immigrate but fortunately my grandfather made a friend while he was interned in South Africa during WWI. So at age 13 my father and parents immigrated to South Africa. Our family subsequently immigrated to the New York City in the early 60's.
I am glad he is not alive to witness the current state of affairs. It would be very traumatic.
30
@G
wrote" I am fairly certain we will have to leave this country over the next 20 years."
Well many of us will vote with passion to stop this rising xenophibia and racism coming from the President, and the GOP.
7
@G
Intestinal fortitude, what we need more of now. It is interesting, however, that the story of immigrants helping each other is still true today. Really there is no place to go. I believe that Jews are still hated because you will never see a Jew take an AK47 into a mall or school and shoot it up for no reason. Peaceable people. They were the ones picked on the most when I was a kid. We used to call bullying being picked on.
2
The truths and insights of our elders are important.
My mother-in-law, born German but not jewish, was 19 when naziism spread thru Germany. What she said over, and over was that the nazi's were not "the bad" people. They were not the town's gangsters and criminals and crazies. No. They were your neighbors. Everyday people whom you grew up with and went to school with turned to hatred and scapegoating and became believers in the righteousness of the "final solution." This was the message she wanted everyone to hear. That up and down the streets of her neighborhood people had the individual choice to embrace all the hateful horrors of nazi ism or to instead resist it. Unfortunately, many many everyday people embraced the horrors.
Many people study the social and political situations that can lead to genocide. But in my mind the more important question is why does one person in a community fight these kinds of horrors when next door their neighbor embraces them? What is it in the individual, personal psychology that lets a person push back against the idea of "other" as "inhuman?" What is it in another person's individual understanding of themself and the world that leads them to mentally justify human slaughter?
119
@kathleen
Well written. There were plenty of Schindlers during the war. What makes some stand up against injustice and others join up. Interesting questions.
30
@kathleen
If not an explanation or answer, an excellent description of your questions is Hannah Arendt's "Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil."
5
@kathleen You are aware that Hitler followed the US government system of exterminating a people. Hitler lauded Americans on how they “gunned down the millions of Redskins to a few hundred thousand" while forming the new world. There is an absence of American Indian family stories of what they witnessed and endured in popular newspapers or other media. Its like such horrors only ever happened over there, overseas in a far away land, unfamiliar to most of us. To make familiar the American Indian stories (families, tribes) at the level of the Holocaust would be a start to acknowledging they are and always were human beings.
18
Thank you for this timely article. The most chilling sentence is that incremental changes that resulted in Nazi authoritarianism came slowly, so that people became accustomed to it. In the posthumously published memoir, Defying Hitler, Sebastian Haffner, said much the same thing: that governmental structures and norms eroded so that by the time good people realized what was happening, there were no systems or structures to protect anyone who despised and fought the Nazis.
We are watching erosion of our checks and balances and constitutional protections in real time. At the impeachment hearings, Senate Republicans stand behind a man who lies incessantly, secretly withheld $400 million in taxpayer money appropriated by Congress to aid Ukrainian national security (and therefore ours) to benefit himself and hurt his political rival, has obstructed justice, and grossly abused the powers of his office. Democracy dies when such people put their private political fortunes and power above their oaths of office.
We would do well to listen to voices from the past who experienced the horrors of Hitler’s rise to power. It can happen anywhere.
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It can happen anywhere, as the correspondent notes. The immediate lesson, of course, is that under Trump, his family, so many GOP Senators, and the white supremacists and overt neo-Nazis supporting him, it IS happening here.
It took about 5 years for the Nazi party in Germany to gain enough control (roughly 1933-1938) and to consolidate enough power to turn political prisons into concentration camps—and another couple of years to turn them into extermination camps. That’s about 8 years...
Are people seriously willing to risk another 4 years of Trump/fascist rule here to see the same “evolution” occur in America?
Quite possibly many in the country apparently are! A sad, but frightening, prospect indeed, but one that nobody at risk should think can’t happen here, because it is happening here right now.
28
@J. Your parallels are exceedingly accurate.
13
@J. It is happening here.
16
How beautifully you told your family’s story, and how you have honored them by your life’s work. It truly breaks my heart to see ignorance and hatred find space here once again, like a replay of a nightmare. Each one of us must speak up, stand up, use our voices and our votes to say Never Again! It is our obligation and our duty.
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Thank you for sharing your story in this way...
8
"... no society is immune from once again committing or becoming complicit in such violence, whether it’s directed against Jews or another group."
Our president refused to condemn the actions of the Alt Right in Charlottesville that resulted in so much violence and death. I've always voted, but I have never before felt that our votes were so critical to the future of our country. I truly hope for a high voter turnout next November... we must send a message that clearly defines what kind of society we are.
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Thank you for your beautiful and thought-provoking essay. If memories of the Holocaust are recorded, as you have done, and we read them, we do our part to ensure, Never Again. As the years go by and Holocaust survivors age and pass on, the importance of recording their memories become even more vital.
I was struck by your account of the insidious growth of the hatred against the Jews. Often, I feel it happening right here in the United States, and I wonder if we are mirroring some stage that was experienced in Nazi Germany in the early years.
25
Thank you for sharing this. I hope the gift that your grandmother gave you sustains you as you grieve.
13
I have told my kids that it might not be the best idea to admit to people that they have half-Jewish ancestry. Times are changing again, and antisemitism is emboldened by Trump and his kind.
My mother was born in Paris in 1936. following the Nazi invasion, she and my grandmother escaped to southern France with the help of the resistance. At one point they wanted to leave my 5 year old mother behind because they feared that she would cry and give away the whole group at a patrolled railroad crossing. She didn't cry. She lived for a time separate from her mother in a convent. My grandfather was in the foreign legion in north Africa. After the war they made it over to New York where she later met my father. My mother also never stops talking about those years.
Most of my grandparents siblings on both sides died in WWI and WWII, on battlefields and in concentration camps. My father volunteered for the navy in 1945 while the war in the Pacific was still going on. He and his brother both became engineers. His brother, my uncle worked for NASA during the 60s and 70s. They were both children of Jews who fled eastern Europe.
Such events are the end-point of unchecked right wing philosophies, make no mistake. Not many people know or understand the significance of history. We are right to revile Trump and the Republicans, for not having an awareness of this, if nothing else. That any Jews could support him/them is mind-boggling.
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Jewish support for Trump is mind boggling. But it’s important to remember that the Democratic Party is now hostile to Israel. Bernie Sanders is close to Linda Sarsour and that’s enough for me to never consider Sanders positively.
8
"The story she told, preserved in her unpublished memoirs...detailed the changes that came as authoritarianism slowly gained power, incrementally at first, so that people became accustomed to them."
This is the scariest part of the article. I believe it is what we are experiencing right now with Trump.
The rest of the article reminds me of the survivors I have known. Invariably they have tried to give back to the country that took them in and invariably they were scarred by the experience of living under Nazi rule. We must make sure that "never again" is a reality.
28
I, like you, Ms. Goldstein, have lived in this country and not had to live in fear until recently.
Both of my parents served our country during WWII. My father was a photographer in the Army and stationed on Okinawa. My mother also enlisted in the Navy as a W.A.V.E. I'm unbelievably happy that they didn't live to see what's happening in our country and in countries around the world today.
As a Jewish woman and one who knows her genealogy intimately, I can attest to what my ancestors have had to endure and it's unconscionable and obscene.
We were driven out of Spain/Portugal during the Spanish Inquisition and resettled in Holland. We lived in the Pale of Settlement in Russia and were subjected to countless pogroms, where we were murdered with little thought or concern.
Close to ten thousand of my ancestors were murdered during WWII. Contemplate that number and tell me Jews haven't paid a heavy price for living peacefully and educating their children.
When we speak of Judaism, speak softly and with pride. We are an ancient people and we stand up to hate, racism and anti-Semitism. We will survive and thrive.
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@Pamela L. - yes we are. Thank you.
9
An excellent story of courage and convictions. Hatred does not arise overnight, it is cultivated slowly, step by next step until it seems to be a commonly held value. Thank you for illustrating how this is happening here and now. We must all speak up to put a stop to this disease wielded as a weapon to acquire power.
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@Laurie Rychnovsky Hatred may not arise overnight but with the proper catalysts hate can soar quickly. For a good take on this read "In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin". You are right that all of us who are not yielding to this hate must speak up, and we must vote against these forces which are currently embedded into our electoral college.
6
We're so lucky that your grandmother shared her story, and left behind a written record of her thoughts and recollections. So many did not. My father (age 20 at the time), three brothers and my grandmother escaped the easternmost province of Romania just two weeks after Hitler's Anschluss in March 1938. They had spent years trying to get visas without success, even though my grandfather had already been in the U.S. for ten years, had become a citizen, and had a good job as a furrier. My father hid his travails from the next generation his entire adult life, never once speaking about their escape from eastern Europe. The reaction to the lived experiences of fear and dread takes many forms.
30
This is what refugees bring to this country. Thoughtful contributors who embody the best that America promises and help our country continue to flourish.
47
thank you for your service and sharing your grandmother's story (your story/our story)
"elizabeth really from boston"
14
This is a story that everyone should be reading.
I had tears at the end not so much because of what happened to this heroic family, but because their incredible and ultimately triumphant story illuminates an insidious process of hatred and intolerance that is going on at this time in our country and also around the world.
I weep for America.
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@Parthenope Oglethorpe
Why are you weeping for America? We are still the number 1 destination for the Worlds people seeking Freedom and opportunity. We could improve our immigration "profile" by better controlling Illegal immigration and better sourcing immigrants who will actually thrive here. Defending our Republic and its laws and institutions will preserve this legacy of immigration for future generations. Abusing our system may cause lack of this opportunity in the future.
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@William Grey
I guess the issue is who decides how we accomplish "better sourcing immigrants who will actually thrive here." Often that excludes people who most need the freedom and opportunity America offers.
Sadly, that would likely preclude those African and Central American refugees who have done so much to enrich the city I live in. Minneapolis has many neighborhoods that have improved greatly--more local businesses, shops, restaurants created by a hard working immigrant community, and a booming economy because people who the Trump administration has tried to block from coming have worked hard to create a life for themselves here.
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@robert
It would not exclude anyone with education or technical skills needed in the US. Africa and South American has great Universities and scholars just like the US. If you have a million extremely poor, often uneducated people coming in uninvited have those numbers precluded anyone else from coming in. Those skilled people have no reason to leave wealthier countries. Do you REALLY think we need more illiterate workers? Who will hire them in country where most job ads start with 4 year college degree needed?
2
I thought it couldn’t happen here, but now know better. Thank you for keeping your grandmother’s vital message front and center.
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This is a right-minded, balanced story about universal contrasts: the best and worst of human behavior. It will always be relevant as a commemoration of virtue and a warning against the evils that can arise in any place, any era, in any society.
19
Wow. Thank you so much for sharing. Hopefully we never forget and can keep this from happening again. It is my greatest feared result of the current administration - that people will consider they have permission to express such hate.
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Beautifully written. Thank you for sharing your family's story.
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Thank you Andrea. And you write so clearly, evocatively, and beautifully. Thank you NY Times: we must never forget these stories.
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May your grandmothers memory be a blessing. Your essay brought me to tears. I’ve never worried about our place here. 3rd generation American Jew- but now I worry and don’t know the answer. The world as we know it is an exceedingly scary place.
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Your journey and story is inspirational on many levels. Thank you for sharing this and your service. You represent the best of America. Godspeed
13
My family were Norwegian Jews. We were well off, my mother's family owned a fishing fleet, my father's family were bakers and the like.
My grandfather was a brewer and a baker and spent his time between Norway and the West Coast. My aunt was born in Washington state but my mother was born in Norway. My mother was a music teacher in Norway.
Two days before the Nazis invaded my mother went to visit my aunt in California. She was trapped there for the duration of the war. She taught music at a Southern California university.
After the war she went back to Norway to try to find the family. Nothing was left. Nobody was left. Everybody had gone to the camps and nobody survived.
My mother returned to California, married, had me, and built a life. She died when I was an infant and I was raised by my aunt - who would never talk about what had happened. I found out about it only after she died and I went through her papers.
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First, so sorry for your loss. We visited Norway in September and attended Friday night services (after going through a security background check) in Oslo. We were deeply saddened by the annihilation of Norwegian Jews, a tragic fact that is not widely taught in American schools, unlike Denmark and Sweden where the leaders and governments actively protected the Jewish population. Public policy against violent anti-semitism makes a difference.
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@Alternate Identity Nobody survived? That's not correct at all. Norwegian Jews who survived the war still live in Oslo. Some of them are my relatives.
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@Bess That is some misunderstanding you have there! Sweden wasn't occupied by Nazis, but Norway was! The Danish government promised "loyal cooperation" with the Germans. Norway was occupied by several hundreds of thousands of German troops, in a country with just a few million people. The Norwegian Jewish population were also smuggled to Sweden. How can you claim to have visited Norway and say they were "annihilated"? You better tell my relatives who survived! You really don't know your history.
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I love that Marianne considered it her responsibility to carry forth a story that can never die, not without grim consequences.
That she passed on what we mark as the first day of Winter seems somehow fitting as part of your chilling reminder.
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Although I am not Jewish, my father said to me when I was a young girl to always keep my passport current because you never know when you have to flee your country. That's one bit of advice I'll always treasure from my dad in these turbulent times.
I've read several stories in the last 20 years of Jews who fled their countries in the mid 1930s because they saw the writing on the wall, while so many thought the horror of anti-Semitism would pass and the doors closed on them before they could flee.
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This is the most moving story about a family and its survival in a world often hostile to minorities and filled with hatred and antisemitism.
How lucky the world is that you and your family survived to settle in an America that with its anti-immigrant laws of the 1920s left so many Jews, so many great and kind human beings to perish in Europe. Now in today’s America there is a resurgence of hatred and antisemitism as right wing populists seek to blame and scapegoat minorities and immigrants as the excuse for today’s difficult social and economic changes with deindustrialization, a diminished and struggling middle class, globalization, a more diversified citizenry and extreme social and income inequality. It is easy for demagogues to appeal to anger, resentment, and divisions by blaming others and imaginary elites for these wrenching changes.
Adam Schiff was correct last night when he spoke of the loss of goodness, of kindness, of tolerance and truth in our society and in our politics. He said our democracy and our Constitution will be worthless until we restore truth, goodness, civility to our country and in my opinion see in every individual regardless of ethnic or religious origin, an American , especially when they share like your beloved and loving family the best of American ideals. In observing the America of today I see almost the opposite, a loss of those ideals, political expediency, demagoguery, a love of political power and expediency over the truth.
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My family as well. Never forget.
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I read stories like this when I was a kid in the 1950's and thought, thank goodness this could never happen again. Now I'm not so sure.
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Our president has decided Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security should be abolished. This along with woman's health and any human services for citizens unable to keep up with the technological edge of pollution and red-line lending is a genocide in itself more dangerous than we've seen in history.
Make no mistake, government is knowingly enabling corporations and the military to continue fossil fueled wars that will directly and indirectly annihilate migrating peoples seeking refuge from climate disasters. A catastrophe of unequaled proportions is being leveled against our children in unspeakable dimensions.
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Thank you so much for this poignant and inspiring story. Creeping anti-Semitism in Germany led to legislated anti-Semitism, which led to the camps and murder for millions. We must indeed never forget lest it happen again.
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“authoritarianism slowly gained power, incrementally at first, so that people became accustomed to them.”
Sounds exactly like what’s happening in this country now.
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@CHICAGO
That is part of the picture the author is painting. My hope is when the current WH occupant is ousted along with the Cabinet members, the worst of the Congressional Republicans, the judges, the lobbyists and their influence, there will be enough humanity
and decency left in this country to remember what we are really about.
13
the 1924 National Quota Act did NOT significantly reduce the number of Germans allowed to immigrate to the US. The countries most affected were in Eastern and Southern Europe, meaning for post Polish Jews escape was not an option due to the limited number of available spots and the fact that many were very poor and thus could not afford to buy tickets for a trans-Atlantic voyage.
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There has been an uptick in anti-semitic acts in the last year or two, but how many fewer are there still than there were 20 years ago, or 30, or 100? We are mythologizing the past when we think of it as a time of harmonious relations between Jews and Christians in America.
How long ago was it, really, when Jewish actors had to take Christian stage names, when private clubs excluded Jewish candidates for membership, and whole communities tried to prevent Jews from buying homes within their boundaries?
It's true we need to push back against the anti-semitism that remains, but don't lose sight of the progress we've made, and that we're still making in so many ways.
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@Green Tea
The acts of exclusion were/are certainly painful. Even in "Flyover country" with small Jewish communities they led to the establishment of separate private clubs, separate housing and schools and especially rising barriers between people. Those days seem mostly over ; the Jewish country club was recently sold for development. AAA (with its own golf club and lake resort) has accepted Jewish members (in what we consider our home state despite living away) for some decades now. Educated people rarely use the old anti-semitic language in casual conversation; graffiti on Jewish property is generally the work of the poorly educated who lack a future and are influenced by internet writings of the mentally disturbed. There are just so many easier targets for violence than guarded property.
So, progress? No. Under Trump one never knows who his targets will be so the USA as a steadfast beacon of hope and freedom for the people of the world is failing that challenge by falling into chaos. Israel is under a rabbinate which does not recognize the beliefs of most American Jews and does not seem the "safe home" it was thought to be especially as the nuclear arms race in the Middle East heats up.
The comments in reply to author Goldstein seem to express a high level of fear that history will repeat itself.
3
This story points to a black mark in US history. Most asylum seekers were denied entry into the US, and many of them died. This in contrast to today’s who simply want a better life and pretend to need asylum.
4
In our whole history as a nation, that is the absolute main reason anyone moves here. Any nonsense about "economic migration" is just naked xenophobia. Unamerican. Ugly.
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@Walter GerholdhTheOpium
You might want to check the drug wars and gangs in Honduras; you might want to check the poverty due to civil unrest and climate change in both Honduras and Guatemala. Very few families with small children pick up and leave their homes for a 2,000 mile walk through dangerous bandit infested areas only for better economic opportunities. Many of them are trying to save their children from gangs. They are desperate, as were earlier immigrants from Germany and Eastern Europe.
1
We are 100 seconds to midnight per the Bulletin of Atonic Scientists. And those who control the present, control the past. And those who control the past, control the future per George O.
7
I taught Holocaust literature to high school students and had the privilege of being involved in hosting Elie Wiesel at our school. Your grandmother’s memories are equally as powerful as his. I’m appalled that the evil which arose in 1939 is back today. The only way to overcome it is for more such stories to be shared. Thank you.
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Thank you Ms. Goldstein for your (and your family’s) service to our country and thank you for sharing this crucially important story. All of us need to understand the horrors of the Holocaust and Germany’s waging aggressive, unprovoked war on the rest of humanity. How a nation famous for scientists, composers, artists of all types and brilliance in so many fields became rapt with Hitler and the Nazis cannot, must not, ever be forgotten.
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Thank you for your beautiful piece, a tightly written cataloging of history and feelings. May we never forget. I particularly enjoyed the absence of spite or hatred. You are a true American.
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Amazing story. Thanks for sharing. I think you use a new word to describe what was the WWII and the Holocaust: COMPLICIT. Martin Luther King JR. once said: "In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends"
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Let us remember history and hope our beautiful country survives this terrible time. Please do acts of kindness and work to further respect for all human beings.
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Andrea, thanks for this series. Since you are telling stories that are a bit lesser known, may I suggest a book that was written for young adults: "To Live And Fight Another Day: The Story Of A Jewish Partisan Boy", written by Bracha Weisbarth (in full disclosure, she's my Mom...). It is the story of a 11 YO Benny who joins, with his family, a partisan unit that fights the Nazis in Ukraine. Beyond being a great read, it presents a story and perspective that are seldom told, of Jews who survived and chose to resist and fight back as guerilla fighters, mounting raids, blowing up trains, etc. Thanks for shedding light on all these great stories!
10
It is terrifying how close we are to the Germany of the mid-1930's under Trump. How quickly and easily people are being demonized and the old labels are coming back. The utterly irrational hate that gets sparked by the right kind of rhetoric, the exploitation of hate, envy, ignorance is the classic tool of the demagogue. We don't have a whole lot of time left to stop this either.
31
When I was 14 (1964), I saw the film The Pawnbroker, with Rod Steiger, about a man haunted by holocaust memories. The scenes were horrific and stunned me in a profound way that has never left me. Until then I had not really understood what the families of my Jewish friends endured or my black friends. On the surface we were just kids engaged in foolish ways and silly giddiness. I changed that day, slapped with a reality that ended my safe childhood. I have been on my guard ever since.
18
Let this be a reminder that accepting a “ little” evil leads to bigger evil. Obviously some have not learned from the past or remain blind to events of today. That is the lesson of this memoir.
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My parents were Holocaust survivors as were all of their friends. I grew up surrounded by people who had numbers on their arms. On Saturdays, the families would all come together for a weekend card game and party. After a few drinks, someone would inevitably begin to cry about murdered children, murdered siblings, and parents. The other woman would all come and hug who was crying. These people had no blood relatives, I had none. But we were each other's families and every woman was called "Tanta" by me, "Aunt". When I was little I heard al of the stories about who in my family was murdered and how even little Clara at ten years old was forced to strip naked and be shot into a pit she had been forced to join in digging. I never believed I would actually get to grow up. I thought I would be killed first, just like the rest of my family. Evil among mankind is always just a step away and we have to be so vigilant that power does not get into the wrong hands.
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@Sharon Levine
Thank you! Your last sentence will be copied and pasted to my refrigerator door!
We MUST do away with the evil sources that are in our country now. There is not a lot of time to ignore it. We cannot be complacent.
10
Thank you for telling this story. Your grandmother would thank you too. Without stories like this being told and retold that string of fabric gets pulled from our shared history. And, that changes us more than hearing this story again and again.
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The author's 3 great uncles--belonging to a group of people whom many in this country wanted to exclude from our shores--served overseas in the military during WWII in their newly adopted country. Let that kind of dedication to one's new country sink in when discussing with others our current immigration situation. Who could believe that those fleeing persecution or simply in search of a better life will play any less of a committed or loyal role to our present and future?
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I loved that. Optimism and pessimism at the same time, as I was taught in my formal and informal Jewish education.
7
Beautiful, though harrowing, story. Thank you for sharing.
A good friend's mother was in a concentration camp and had lived in Germany throughout the 1930's. My friend asked her if what's happening in America today was like Germany in the late '30's. Her Mother replied, "Not yet."
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This is a beautiful story. I hope millennials and young adults will read it and take in the message .
Your Navy experiences of religious acceptance interested me. I worked as a civilian in the military briefly in the 80’s. I experienced rampant antisemitism there, both overt and subtle. I’ve spoken to personnel in the current Navy and have been told antisemitism still exists there.
13
Thank you for sharing this. I had an uncle who was a concentration camp survivor, he never spoke of his ordeal, or how he came to this country.
Never again. These stories need to be told and taught.
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Thank you for sharing your grandmother's moving and essential story. Unfortunately, my parents did not make it out of Poland and my father ended up in a concentration camp and my mother fled to Siberia. It is a miracle they survived. Every Holocaust survivor story is unique and astounding. They should all be told. My father passed away ten years ago and my mother is now 95. I will read your grandmother's story to her.
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@Anais. Would your mother be able to share her remembrances of her mother and father's plights? The world needs to know as many stories as can be told so as to never forget.
Andrea, this beautiful article breaks my heart, but thank you for writing it.
I have great fear that this country is going in the same direction as Germany in the '30s.
8
@annec Both my mother and father, years ago, gave their testimonies through Steven Spielberg's Shoah Foundation. They are now on file at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. My father, before he passed away, also would go to schools to speak about his experiences. My father also started a foundation for best high school essay about the Holocaust. Absolutely, Annec, the world can never forget.
2
Baruch dayan ha'emet. May your grandmother's memory be for a blessing. Thank you for sharing your family's story with us, and for demonstrating so powerfully why Never Forget is still so necessary.
30
Thank you, lovely, moving and so timely.
Additionally, I appreciate your service.
30
A beautiful and moving story. Please never stop telling it!
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A great article. Thank you, Ms. Goldstein. How lucky for this country that Ms. Goldstein's family made it to the US and brought their talents to benefit American life. I am also sad to remember that the US could have taken in many more Jewish refugees before World War II, but didn't because of anti-Semitism and economic fears. The US is making the same mistake today by cutting off admittance of most refugees.
135
A very timely and thoughtful article. And a reminder why we must remember injustices of the past to prevent their recurrence.
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Thank you for sharing your story.
Especially in these times, may we never forget.
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Thank you for your courage to share this story and thank you NY Times for creating a platform to gather and retain forever these priceless memories so we will never forget.
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Thank you for this story, and bless you and your family. And bless the kind people who helped them. We need to be there for each other, now and always.
118
If this project is as compelling in the stories it tells as this first offering, I'll be reading each and every one and probably going back to read certain sections again. The 100 years mark is upon the last of those who were actively involved in the War. The time will come soon when it won't be possible to hear these stories from those people directly. We cannot forget. I shall not forget.
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Thank you for sharing your family's story. I'm glad your family came to America. My condolences to you all on the recent passing of your grandmother. Thank you for your service to our country. And thank you for your perseverance.
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Ms. Goldstein's thoughtful essay embodies a frequently uttered yet less often followed aphorism, "never forget". Her grandmother clearly didn't forget, and we the people would be better if we took her words to heart. And action.
133
Thank you for sharing your story. I can very much relate.
25
Thank you for sharing your story Andrea. May your grandmother’s memory be a blessing and comfort to you. And thank you nytimes for this project. We need to keep the stories, each family and individual story at a time, alive. Will you do a piece on the Jewish refugees who lived in Shanghai during the war, in Hongkew? That is my family’s story. My parents meet every year or two with others for their Shanghai reunions. Let me know if you would want to interview any of these folks. They are in their late 80s and 90s now.
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An account would be welcome. Shanghai's Jewish Refugees Museum is an amazing repository of this less publicized branch of the war's dispersion of Jews. Worth a visit (after virus panic ends, hopefully soon).
18
Let us act! And vote this current American administration out. Let’s not dance with joy as the people did to the music of Cabaret,
duped into complacency. Thank you for sharing your horrific story. It is a reminder of our responsibility.
8
@lisa One of the ladies in the Alpharetta Library Book Club was born in China. Her family migrated there before Hitler reached Poland. I never knew that so many Jewish families fled to China.
5
Andrea, thank you very much for sharing your family's story. As an old History and Political Science major, it's a shame how little younger generations know about what happened during World War II and the atrocities committed before and during the war itself. I sense many of the same trends again along both extremes of the political spectrum.
On a more positive note, I hope that you'll be able to make it to JWLS again in June.
36
Thank you for sharing this story. May we never forget.
38
Instead of reading this story with tears in our eyes , I suggest we start to prepare ourselves with any means necessary.
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@Marvin Feinstein I could not agree more.
9
@Marvin Feinstein The elections in November will be here sooner than we think! VOTE!
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@Marvin Feinstein how’s about we elect Democrats instead of Theocrats to public office?
27
What a beautiful article. Your grandmother was a remarkable woman. We need constant reminders of this dark period of history. If we think it can't happen here, we had better think again.
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Thank you for sharing your family story.
19
The stories have passed from your grandmother to you, and it's clear you'll continue to tell them. Our country is in a very dark place right now. People like you speaking out makes it feel less so, and helps others find the courage to add their voice. Things are not well here, and it's important to speak the truth.
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Ah, yes. The main message I've tried to give in talks to high schoolers in years past: don't ever think it can't happen here.
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@Atheist Me too. I teach high school English, and part of our curriculum is Elie Wiesel's "Night". The students are suitably horrified, but they start the unit believing such things could never happen again because we learned something. Then, I have them do a research project about genocide in the post-WWII world up to and including today. They are shocked - and I think we need that shock. We need to be shocked into action.
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Now you can tell them that it is happening here.
5
Never forget means never stop talking.
Thank you for sharing Marianne Goldstein’s story. It can happen here which is why every election matters and every vote is important. Don’t throw your vote away on third parties- it’s not a protest but an accommodation.
234
I agree that we must keep talking.
My grandfather was a guard in a concentration camp. This shameful fact has been hidden by my family, but it is the ugly truth.
If we are to progress in humanity, the perpetrators need to own their truth, too. Otherwise we are doomed to repeat our failures and suffer knowing our shame.
I shared my family’s story here: https://kristinadahl.blogspot.com/2020/01/telling.html?m=1
20
A neat turn of phrase, “not a protest but an accommodation”. Thank you, I will borrow it.
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@Helen Glenn
You are so brave Helen. I followed your link and read your whole essay. Thank you for standing up for truths and for what is right. You do not have to shoulder the family sins. Your words are appreciated.
5
God bless the kind and those who opened their doors. None the less, the dead were millions, and they were led through doors that would never see their return.
Remember them all, though you may know none who carried their ancient faith, somehow, against all odds, into the 20th Century. It was not The Lord who betrayed them but His very own children. Such is the path to life and death.
May those who held out their hands in compassion live at his side in perpetuity.
And may we all be ready to assist the abandoned, the hopeless, the helpless in that decisive moment.
Amen.
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@Mel Nunes
It was the Lord who betrayed them as the Lord is omniscient and omnipotent and could have both foreseen what was to happen and prevented it. And chose not to.
If God is good he is not God. If God is God he is not good.
1
Thank you for reminding us of how much we can learn from each other: people with different cultures, religions and backgrounds who know in their hearts the goodness of every person no matter where they are from. Your family emigrated from a threatening experience and apparently never stopped giving back to your new country.
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Your story should be read in every congregation, school and Congress once a year to reinforce the dangers of bigotry for any member of humanity through religion or race. It is a moving and inspirational account of cruelty and generosity.
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Thanks for sharing this wonderful story to put history into perspective especially today when there is so much anti semitism.
Your grandmother was right, no society is immune from once again committing or becoming complicit in such violence, whether it’s directed against Jews or another group.
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Thank you for your service and for sharing your family's story and the challenges they faced to arrive in the U.S. Remember to pass along these details to other younger family members so that the knowledge becomes part of their heritage.
23
Who knew it would only take one lifetime to have these horrible ideas come back to usage. Vote out the support!
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When I was young in the 1950's, I remember my grandparents (both born in 1906), talked about Adolph Hitler. He was elected by the German people on reforming Germany, and then took over the country. I really didn't understand it all until I was in high school in the mid-60's. My history teacher spent several days discussing Hitler, what he was trying to accomplish, and what he had done. I will never forget him saying, "Do not ever become so complacent to think that it cannot happen here".
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@Charles Raye oh, its happening here...mayhaps not the horrific extermination, but in other insidious ways.
21
@Charles Raye Yep. My grandmother (who was born in NYC in 1931) talked about her experience watching the news (back then, at the cinema) and then having the one remaining survivor of the family move into their one-bedroom apartment (already overcrowded) after the war ended.
Intellectually, I knew the importance of keeping the memories alive. But I didn't truly understand at a gut level why it was so important for her to continue recounting these stories until I watched the march in Charlottesville ("blood and soil").
It's not that it "can" happen here--it is here. We may not quite be at the "final solution" stage yet w/r/t the Jews, but we are already locking up humans in concentration camps at the border. The dehuminazation of one group will inevitably lead to the dehuminaztion of (almost) all.
17
What an amazing story -- your grandmother was a remarkable woman. Thank you so much for sharing it.
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Thank you for writing and sharing this. Important story that we need to hear.
44
This is wonderful and so important - I read it with tears in my eyes. Thank you for sharing.
42
Great story. Thank you for sharing. I look forward to reading more of these little-known events from WWII.
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