Apr 16th, 2008

Residents of Oświęcim (Auschwitz) gathered at the Auschwitz Jewish Center (AJC) to remember the Nazi deportation of Jews from their town to three neighboring ghettoes of Będzin, Sosnowiec and Chrzanów, which took place in the spring of 1941. In the following two years the ghettoes were liquidated and most of the Jews living there were sent to their deaths in gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau.

The event took place in the women’s section of Oświęcim’s only surviving synagogue, Chevra Lomdei Mishnayot, which is a part of the Auschwitz Jewish Center today. Over 300 people filled the synagogue to watch a documentary with survivors from Oświęcim living in Israel today and to listen to moving testimonies of two prewar Jewish residents of the town, Henryk Schoenker and Chaim Wolnerman, read by students of the local high school. The event was concluded by a ceremony of lighting candles which made up the words Pamietamy and Zochrim (‘We remember’ in Polish and Hebrew) in front of the synagogue. Postcards with the words will be printed by the AJC and residents of Oświęcim will send them to the survivors in Israel.

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