by Rachel Barkai

“After the panel discussion I found the tent where survivors were gathering according to their birthplace. An elderly lady approached the Italian table. When she heard my name she told me—while wiping away her tears—that she was in the same bunks as my mother in Bergen-Belsen. If I came to this gathering just for that moment alone, it would have been worth it.”
So wrote Shoshana Evron from Kibbutz Sa’ad, who was born in Italy and hidden in a monastery in Florence during the war. (Shoshana’s mother, Chana Cassuto, survived Auschwitz but was killed during Israel’s War of Independence.) This is just one example describing the emotional experience undergone by the thousands of survivors and their families who came to Yad Vashem to participate in the “Generation to Generation” Gathering at Yad Vashem on 8 May.
The Gathering was held in conjunction with the Center of Organizations of Holocaust Survivors in Israel with assisted by the Claims Conference. Some 11,550 people from Israel and abroad attended this unique event, including 9,500 Holocaust survivors and their families and 2,000 Israeli pupils, youth and soldiers. Yad Vashem was closed to the public, with staff on site to welcome and escort the survivors and answer their questions.
The Gathering was highlighted by 16 educational panel discussions entitled, “The Anguish of Liberation and the Return to Life.” Moderated by members of the second generation, participants included ghettos and camps survivors, former hidden children, partisans, underground fighters, Righteous Among the Nations and others. These educational activities took place throughout the campus, in front of an audience of survivors and their families, school pupils, young people, soldiers and officers. After the Gathering, the Ministry of Education’s Youth and Social Administration wrote: “The students and the student council representatives returned to their schools moved and enthusiastic, filled with stories and pictures, and extremely grateful for their experience on that day.”

In a large tent especially erected in the Warsaw Ghetto Square, spontaneous meetings between survivors from various towns, camps and ghettos took place. Participants filled out Pages of Testimony in memory of lost family and friends, and donated photographs, artifacts and archival material were to Yad Vashem. In addition, private individuals presented diaries, and books published by Yad Vashem and Moreshet were on display. A bulletin board was set up to find relatives and acquaintances. Throughout the day memorial services were conducted in the Hall of Remembrance, as well as meetings of landsmannschaft organizations.

At 11:00 the entrance plaza filled with over 1,000 people for the consecration ceremony of the Survivors’ Wall, dedicated to Holocaust survivors who have carried the memory of the Shoah with them throughout their lives. Participating in the ceremony were donors Gale and Ira Drukier (USA), Natan Sharansky, Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv Rabbi Israel Meir Lau, Chairman of the Yad Vashem Directorate Avner Shalev and Chairman of the American Society for Yad Vashem Eli Zborowski.
Throughout the day, participants toured the new Holocaust History Museum for the first time. “I recreated my journey and retraced my footsteps,” wrote Penina Gurwitz. Mark Dekelbaum recorded: “Yad Vashem is doing wonderful work in keeping the story of the Holocaust alive and relevant. Thank you.”
In the afternoon several discussions were held on the topic, “The Image of Holocaust Survivors in the Works of Second Generation Artists.” An evening of “Songs from my Father’s Home” was held later on in the Valley of the Communities, moderated by Benny Hendel, with the participation of Dorit Reuveni, Orah Zitner, Cantor Asher Heinowitz, and hundreds of conference participants from abroad.
In the weeks leading up to the gathering, interest was so high that registration had to be limited. Additional dates to host other Holocaust survivors were set, and another 540 participants attended Yad Vashem on two separate occasions, at the end of May and the end of June.

The author is Director of the Commemoration and Public Relations Division.

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