Due to COVID-19, Holocaust Remembrance Day observed online
There will be a number of online programs that will mark this day, which is held on the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.
By HANNAH BROWNLighting a candle in the memory of those who've perished in the Holocaust(photo credit: MARK NAYMAN)
International Holocaust Remembrance Day will be commemorated on January 27 and, although due to the coronavirus pandemic there cannot be live events, there will be a number of online programs that will mark this day, which is held on the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.While last year, on the 75th anniversary of this day, world leaders from around the globe came to Jerusalem for a series of events, the scaled-down programs this year will be no less meaningful.The Ghetto Fighters’ House Museum will be holding events from January 24 to 27. The main event will be a collaboration among the museum, the Habima National Theater and the Friedrich Ebert Foundation on January 27 at 9 p.m. It references another important anniversary in Holocaust history, the trial of Adolf Eichmann, which took place 60 years ago. Called “When the Theater Met the Museum: Three Generations of the Holocaust – the Eichmann Trial and Its Impact on Israeli Society,” it will feature readings by Habima actors from the new play, The Eichmann Trial by Motti Lerner, which was directed by Moshe Kaftan. The event will be broadcast on the Facebook pages of all three institutions. It will also feature a panel discussion moderated by Prof. Hanna Yablonka, who is a professor of Holocaust Studies at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and the staff historian for the museum, and will feature a panel of actors and educators.Yigal Cohen, director-general of the museum, said, ”The Eichmann trial had a great impact on society in Israel and abroad, an influence whose signs we experience to this day. At the Ghetto Fighters’ House, we undertook to learn from the past and educate for a better future. Today, more than ever, we feel obligated to stop for a few moments, look around us, and be attentive to what is happening in Israeli society and overseas and identify the warning signs and the slippery slope that may form in any society.”In addition, on January 24 at 9 p.m., there will be a conversation between Yablonka and historian Dr. Tamir Hod on the topic, “Between Eichmann and Demjanjuk: Two Holocaust Trials in Israel.” On January 25 at 6 p.m., Lior Inbar will speak about how the museum participated in preparing for the Eichmann trial. Dr. Batya Brutin, director of Holocaust education at Beit Berl, will speak about the artwork that helped convict Eichmann on January 26 at 6 p.m.The Israel Netanya Kibbutz Orchestra will perform a concert with a small group of musicians on January 27 in an actual train car from Germany that transported Jews. The concert can be seen on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNswoyv4mIg The pieces performed at the concert will include the Schindler’s List theme by John Williams.A number of movies will be broadcast on January 27. These include Love It Was Not by Maya Sarfaty, which won the prize for Best Israeli Film at Docaviv in 2020 and which will be shown at 9 p.m. on YesDocu and will also be available on YesVOD and StingTV. It tells a strange, true story of an affair between an Auschwitz inmate and one of her captors and her dilemma over whether to testify on his behalf at his trial years later. Return to Belsen will be shown on YesDocu at 10:25 p.m. and also on YesVOD and StingTV. It is a documentary about the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp by British troops in 1945 and features newsreel footage of the eyewitness report of the BBC military correspondent, Richard Dimbleby, who was one of the first on the scene. He described the horrific conditions they found and how there were nearly 30,000 prisoners who were still too weak to be saved. His son, Jonathan, revisited the site of the concentration camp last year and follows in his father’s footsteps.
