On Tuesday, we commemorated Yom Hashoah - Holocaust Memorial Day. The Magid Campus came together for a somber, moving and ultimately uplifting student run Tekes (ceremony) which honoured those who were lost and provided a valuable opportunity to hear testimony from a Holocaust Survivor.

The Tekes provided opportunities for our students to engage with Yiddish songs and poetry and concluded with rousing renditions of the Partisan song - Zog Nit Keynmol (Never Say).

Six students lit candles in honour of the six million Jewish victims and read dedications about their family members who perished at the hands of the Nazis and their collaborators.

It was such a privilege that we were able to hear from Joe Swarcberg, a 95 year old who told his miraculous story of survival. Joe was born in 1930 in Kozienice, Poland. He spoke of an idyllic childhood that was brutally interrupted by the invasion of the Nazis who converted the town into a ghetto. There was no access to food and so Joe was required to risk his life on sorties to acquire food outside of the ghetto. He did so in the knowledge that he would be “shot on the spot” if caught. When Kozienice was liquidated, Joe was able to avoid deportation to certain death at Treblinka. Instead he was transferred to Skarzysko, where he endured forced labour and became accustomed to his fellow inmates dying from starvation and freezing. He was then transported to Buchenwald where he remained until liberation.

On a number of occasions while there he used his ingenuity to survive. For instance, when he noticed some broken steps leading up to a warehouse he volunteered to repair them and was rewarded with a loaf of bread which he shared with his friends. At another time when he was near starving, he snuck back to the same stairs and deliberately damaged them. The next day he volunteered to repair them again and was once more rewarded with a precious loaf of bread.

During the Shoah, Joe lost most of his family including both his parents and grandparents and saw his brother shot dead in front of him. After the war he was placed in an orphanage in France where he connected with other survivors of Buchenwald who became known as the Buchenwald Boys. Joe reunited with his three sisters and ultimately decided to move to Australia.In addition to his testimony, Joe delivered this powerful message to our students: “

Against Hitler’s evil wishes and persecution, my sisters and I continued the chain of Jewish life and tradition through our children and grandchildren. We have left a legacy that will continue for generations to come…‍All of you here today need to absorb everything you have learnt in school and from other survivors about the lessons of the Holocaust. We, the survivors, will not be here forever and it will soon be your turn to pass on the history of the Shoah to your children and grandchildren. ‍You must all work to fight against all hatred and intolerance everywhere in the world and to make sure that nothing like the Holocaust can ever happen again. And most importantly of all, you must never forget the story of the Holocaust, so that generations to come can learn this lesson.”

‍Like everyone present, I am so grateful to Joe for so generously sharing his testimony with us and I promise that we at King David will continue to learn the lessons of the Shoah and commit to teaching our students to fight against injustice and hatred.

Shabbat Shalom.