JERZY BUZEK AND HANS-GERT PÖTTERING AT THE IYMC AND THE AUSCHWITZ MEMORIAL

THE INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS FOR PEACE

JEWISH CULTURE DAY

THE SNUFF-BOX THAT SAVED A LIFE

no. 10 October 2009

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O Ś W I Ę C I MISSN 1899-4407

EDITORIAL BOARD:Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine

Editor:Paweł SawickiEditorial secretary: Agnieszka Juskowiak-SawickaEditorial board:Bartosz Bartyzel Wiktor BoberekJarek MensfeltOlga OnyszkiewiczJadwiga Pinderska-LechArtur SzyndlerColumnist: Mirosław GanobisDesign and layout:Agnieszka Matuła, Grafi konTranslations: William BrandProofreading:Beata KłosCover:Bartosz BartyzelPhotographer:Tomasz Mól

PUBLISHER:

Auschwitz-BirkenauState Museum

www.auschwitz.org.pl

PARTNERS:

Jewish Center

www.ajcf.pl

Center for Dialogue and Prayer Foundation

www.centrum-dialogu.oswiecim.pl

International Youth Meeting Center

www.mdsm.pl

IN COOPERATION WITH:

Kasztelania

www.kasztelania.pl

State HigherVocational School in Oświęcim

www.pwsz-oswiecim.pl

Editorial address:„Oś – Oświęcim, Ludzie, Historia, Kultura”Państwowe Muzeum Auschwitz-Birkenauul. Więźniów Oświęcimia 2032-603 Oświęcime-mail: os@auschwitz.org.pl

A GALLERY OF THE 20TH CENTURY

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EDITORIAL

Buildings on Jagiełły street. Photographs from the collection of Mirosław Ganobis from the “Gallery of the 20th Century.”

On the recent municipal holiday, I re-called two genre pictures from what by now is the town’s rather remote past. Every afternoon in the early 1950s, one of the residents of what is now Królowej Jadwigi street, then a narrow track through the fi elds, led his horse out by the bridle. There were times when he rode it down Za-borska, Mikołajska, and Jagielły to the post offi ce building. In the courtyard there, he harnessed it to a postal cart on rubber tires, with “Post” painted on it. He loaded the cart with parcels and letters and delivered it all to the train station, and came back carting corre-spondence addressed to Oświęcim.

We, the fascinated children from across the road, knew this daily ritual well. After a time, the post offi ce was able to afford a car, and this equine procession through the streets of the town, like something out of a western, ended to the regret of the local kids.A second picture: a town crier ap-peared every so often at certain stra-tegic points around town. He wore a uniform and carried a drum orna-mented with tassels. He drummed loudly in order to gather as many people as possible together. Then, in a deep voice, he read out offi cial com-muniqués from town hall about the necessity of inoculating all dogs, or

announcing an interruption in water supplies to a given street because of repair work. Already somewhat ar-chaic, this method of communicating with the populace functioned effi -ciently. Anyone who missed the town crier could be sure that his neighbors would keep him up to date. The drum-ming was one of the big attractions in the town in those days, and the town crier’s resonant voice embodied the power of the authorities. He, too disappeared eventually from the town landscape.

Andrzej Winogrodzki

Two Presidents of the European Par-liament, the incumbent Jerzy Buzek and his predecessor Hans-Gert Pöt-tering, were in Oświęcim in Sep-tember. Oś reports on their visit to the Auschwitz site and interviews Professor Buzek on the international signifi cance of the Museum, which has already had more than a mil-lion visitors from all over the world this year. Even more signifi cantly, we publish extensive excerpts from the exceptionally interesting de-bate held at the International Youth Meeting Center on “Europe Lost,

Europe Reborn,” where Buzek and Pöttering were joined by Christoph Heubner and Marian Turski. Our October issue also includes articles on the Open House that marked Jew-ish Culture Day at the Jewish Center. There is a photo essay on this event on the last page. We also cover the international “People and Religion” Congress for Peace. Participants vis-ited the Auschwitz Memorial. You can read the Petition that young peo-ple handed to the representatives of the world’s religions on the pages of Oś. We write about the perform-

ance of the Oświęcim Oratorio and a project connected with this com-position by Janusz Kohut, a seminar at the IYMC on nursing in the Third Reich period, and the exceptional snuff-box made by Auschwitz pris-oner Bronisław Czech, which liter-ally saved someone’s life. We also recommend a report by Maciej Zabie-rowski of the Jewish Center about his educational trip to America.

Paweł SawickiEditor-in-chief

os@auschwitz.org.pl

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Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine, no. 10, October 2009

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Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum

WE SHOULD NEVER FORGET

The President of the European Parliament, Jerzy Buzek, visited the site of the Nazi German Auschwitz Con-centration Camp together with his predecessor, Hans-Gert Pöttering. Paying homage to the victims of Auschwitz, they placed a fl oral tribute at the Death Wall.

“With humility and deep feel-ing, Europe pays homage to those who died and to those who fought. We believe that we will be changed, that we will be wiser, heedful of expe-rience, and that we will avoid

cataclysms. This is why we need unity,” Buzek wrote in the Museum Guest Book.In discussions with Museum director Piotr M. A. Cywiński, the president of the European Parliament declared his sup-

port for the Auschwitz-Birk-enau Foundation, which is creating a Perpetual Fund to preserve the authenticity of the Auschwitz site.On the previous day, mem-bers of the European Parlia-

ment joined Marian Turski and Christoph Heubner, members of the Internation-al Auschwitz Council, in a panel discussion on “Europe Lost, Europe Reborn” at the International Youth Meeting

Center as part of a program on “1939/1989: A Time of Guilt and a Time of Hope.” There is a transcript of the dis-cussion in this issue of Oś.

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AN INTERVIEW WITH JERZY BUZEK, PRESIDENT OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT

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More than 60 years have passed. The last former prisoners are passing away, the last eyewitness-es to those tragic events. Today, the symbolism of Auschwitz is increasingly broad. It is no longer only a historical place, but also a kind of symbol. What does Auschwitz mean to Europeans today? Should we remember?

Everyone who comes here experiences this human tragedy anew. I have been here several times myself, but it does not matter if we come here for the fi fth or the tenth time. It is always a profound experience, and we are never unmoved when we leave. This is the great hope—that the mil-lions of people who have visited Auschwitz since the war, over these 70 or 65 years, will remember the place and remember what it warns about. This is what we are basing our hope on. This is why Auschwitz can make us hopeful today, be-cause it is a great warning for mankind. I am happy that institutions are being built here in Auschwitz

today that speak about hu-man rights, not far from the place where those hu-man rights were trampled in the most blatant way in human history. It is impor-tant for every European to speak about human rights. I am convinced that this is the message today: the Mu-seum in Auschwitz and the town of Oświęcim, a town that is developing, whose citizens are not in any way responsible for what hap-pened not far from them. And that is why, today, the residents of Oświęcim can be the bearers of great truths about liberation, about freedom, about com-munity, about solidarity.

Can we say that the expe-rience of the war, the ex-perience of Auschwitz, is a kind of foundation for the process of the unifi ca-tion of Europe?

What happened during World War II certainly made an impact on the founding fathers of the Eu-ropean Union. They knew how horrible it was. And then they had a brilliant idea about how to avoid

this—through opening up, unifying, through looking at each other in an open, friendly, understanding way, and forgiving—but that does not mean forget-ting. We should never for-get—that is the message of Auschwitz.

So far, maintaining this Memorial has rested mainly on the shoulders of the Polish government. Is there a possibility that the European Union, the member states, will sup-port the preservation of this place?

There is no question that the member states of the European Union, the Un-ion itself, and the Euro-pean Parliament should move in the direction of fi nancial support and ac-tions to help maintain this place. All of us Euro-peans need this. This is our collective memory, on which we build the future. And the future must be good, and it must be bet-ter than what happened in the 20th century in Eu-rope.

Interview by Bartosz BartyzelJerzy Buzek signs the Museum Guest Book

Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine, no. 10, October 2009

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Guests placing fl owers at the Death WallMuseum director Piotr M. A. Cywiński, Jerzy Buzek

and Hans-Gert Pöttering

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Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum

AUSCHWITZ HAS BECOME A SYMBOL ON A GLOBAL SCALE

Auschwitz has the highest visitor fi gures of any Nazi German camp site, and of any museum in Poland. The number of visitors has tripled over the last seven years. “Auschwitz has become a symbol on a world scale. It is a symbol on many lev-els: of the Holocaust, of the German concentration camp system, of Nazi terror, of war and totalitarianism in general, and also a symbol in a moral sense, a symbol of the lowest point that humanity has sunk to in history,” said Dr. Piotr M. A. Cywiński, di-rector of the Auschwitz-Birk-enau State Museum.“People come here to weep for murdered relatives, to express remembrance, but also to try to understand this darkest of the foundations of human nature—the capacity for the mass murder of in-nocent people. After the war, much effort was put into building a world that would be safer and more friendly to people. Things do not always look perfect, yet we really do have something to defend, something to develop, and

something to take care of. Here, on the ruins of Ausch-witz, this can be seen better than anywhere else. That is why it is so important that young people, as they learn about the tragedy of the vic-tims of the Holocaust and the concentration camps, under-stand how much depends on them, and the degree to which shared, mutual re-sponsibility is essential for the good and security of all. No fi lm and no book can take the place of a direct en-counter with the authentic-ity of this vast concentration camp space,” said Cywiński.The rise in visitor numbers, while generally regarded as a positive development, cre-ates certain diffi culties in pro-viding access to the grounds and exhibits. “Especially in the summer season, from May to September and at the peak times, there have been cases over the last two years when certain spaces, for ex-ample the basement of block 11, have been closed out of consideration for the security of such high numbers of visi-tors. Things really became

dangerous when organized groups led by guides were moving through the narrow corridor at the same time as individual visitors and small groups following their own, unpredictable rhythm,” says Andrzej Kacorzyk, head of the visitor services section. “This year, for the fi rst time,

the Museum came up with a different solution. From 9 a.m. until 3 p.m., in August and September, only groups led by trained guides were allowed to enter the Ausch-witz I grounds. Individual visitors had the choice of ei-ther joining organized tours or spending the time until

3 p.m. visiting the Birkenau grounds. If the evaluation of the new system is posi-tive, then next year we will introduce it either at the be-ginning of the season in May, or in June, at least for as long as the annual total of visitors remains above a million.”

Bartosz Bartyzel

Elżbieta, WarsawHer great historical knowledge and the passion and dedication with which she imparted it made the visit to Auschwitz a truly unforgettable experience. Thanks to people like her, the memory of the tragic past will last for generations.

Raisa, USANot only did our guide speak very good Russian, but her knowledge of the subject, her attention to detail, the way she conveyed facts, and her deep sympathy for the people who perished in Auschwitz meant that we will long remember our visit. No one should forget the events of the Holocaust, and professionals like our guide should lead the mission to educate young people about history.

Halina, Krosno OdrzańskieThe meeting with the guide was a big experience for us and made it possible to come closer to the atmosphere of those years full of sufferings. It was a living history lesson, which will be important for me.

Cathlyn, LondonI have toured many places in Europe and around the world and I must declare that the visit to your Museum was without doubt the best of all those I have made in the course of my travels. Our guide was incredibly knowledgeable, was able to answer every question, and presented it all in excellent English in a very clear way.

VISITOR OPINIONS ABOUT THEIR MUSEUM GUIDES:

Crowds of visitors at the Arbeit macht frei gate.

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A million visitors have already come to the Auschwitz Memorial in 2009

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Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine, no. 10, October 2009

In mid-September, the year’s millionth visitor entered the Auschwitz site. Last year, this happened on October 8. It seems possible that 2009 visitor fi gures will rise considerably, and there is a good chance that the record set in 2007 will be broken. There were 1,220,000 visitors that year.

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Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum

Concert by the choir and orchestra of the Silesian Philharmonic

THE WAY OF HOPE —THE WAY TO PEACE

The concert was part of a larger project that includes a production of the Concert for the Intention of Peace, in which, aside from the Way of Hope oratorio, young people representing vari-ous religious denomina-tions recited a Peace Message to the World. At the same time, signatures were col-lected for a “Petition about Peace Directed to All Peo-ple of Good Will Who Are Not Indifferent to the Fate of the World and the Fate of Other People.”

The organizers of the whole project stressed the fact that Oświęcim is a special town. Being proclaimed here—and on the anniversary of the start of the war—the mes-sage is all the stronger and more credible. This is why the Way of Hope Association chose this particular place for its artistic workshops and the inaugural concert in the “For the intention of Peace” cy-cle. The association believes that the voices of young peo-ple have a chance to move consciences and be a voice

speaking against intolerance, xenophobia, racism, hatred, and contempt for people who are “different.”

The Way of Hope is a setting of Old Testament passages. Each section begins with texts referring to the present day—to the tragedy of the Holocaust and the plague of terrorism that has engulfed the world. The oratorio had its premiere at the Church of St. Joseph the Worker in Oświęcim in 2008. It has also been produced in Katowice

and Bielsko-Biała. Excerpts were presented in St. Peter’s Square in Rome during the National Pilgrimage of the Great Jubilee.

The long-term goals of the “Artists for Peace” project include initiating and sup-porting actions for the sake of peace and universal val-ues, action for the sake of propagating the idea of rec-onciliation among nations, and popularizing the idea of tolerance. The oratorio will next be performed around

the world in cities touched by painful historical experi-ences.

The Way of Hope Associa-tion in Oświęcim organized the concert jointly with the National Culture Center. Partners in the project in-cluded the Auschwitz-Birk-enau State Museum, the Offi ce of the Marshal in Cra-cow, the International Youth Meeting Center, and the Parish Church of St. Joseph the Worker in Oświęcim.

Bartosz Bartyzel

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Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine, no. 10, October 2009

The Way of Hope, an oratorio dedicated to the Town of Oświęcim, was performed by the choir and orches-tra of the Silesian Philharmonic, conducted by Jacek Błaszczyk, in the Church of St. Joseph the Worker. Janusz Kohut’s composition is a message of dialogue and of the hope for peace. The concert was part of

the observances of the 70th anniversary of the start of World War II and the 20th anniversary of the recovery of freedom and the fall of communism in Central Europe.

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NURSING IN THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST PERIOD AND TODAY.

A POLISH-GERMAN SEMINAR

Twenty four participants and their tutors took part in the third edition of the project prepared for stu-dents of nursing who represented the Social Sciences Institute of the Faculty of Health Sciences at Medical University of K. Marcinkowski in Poznań, Bremen University (Institut für Public Health und

Pfl egeforschung) and Higher Vocational School in Frankfurt am Main (Fachbereich Pfl ege).

The aim of the project was to teach the young genera-tion (in Poland and Ger-many) about the crimes of the National Socialism and their consequences as well as raising their aware-ness to life situation and suffering of the survivors who suffer physical and mental trauma. Nurses in both countries are faced every day with physical injuries, psychological pressures, reactions and behaviours of older peo-ple whose biographies are more and more difficult to understand. Confronta-tion with the crimes of Na-tional Socialism—in this case Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and exter-mination camp—as well as analysis and reflection of causes and consequences was to help future nurses to develop skills in bring-

ing professional care and support their patients. Participants from Germa-ny before the meeting in Oświęcim prepared pres-entations dedicated to such topics, as: Image of a human being in National Socialism and its impact on the attitudes of nursing staff; Participation of the nursing staff in Nazi crimes—the risks lying in the concept of subordination and following orders or Tri-als against nursing personnel from Meseritz-Obrawalds—testimony of nurses. Stu-dents from Poland worked on the topics, such as: Nurse Maria (Stromberger)—strug-gle to survive in Auschwitz I concentration camp; Dif-ferences between health care systems for prisoners and SS staff at Auschwitz camp or The attitude of Stanisława Leszczyńska as an example of

Visiting the Memorial

Visiting the Memorial

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Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine, no. 10, October 2009International Youth Meeting Center

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professional care of pregnant women in Auschwitz camp.

The seminar began with the introductory lecture and discussion on Nursing in the National Socialist Period. The role of ideology, status of the professional group, its tasks involving euthanasia pro-gram (T4 and 14f13) by Prof. Dr. Eva Maria Ulmer from Higher Vocational School in Frankfurt am Main. Later participants were ac-quainted with history and topography of the former Auschwitz-Birkenau con-centration camp, they visit-ed blocks 28 and 10 that be-longed to the camp hospital in Auschwitz as well as took part in presentations by the Auschwitz Memorial staff dedicated to the structure, functions and people con-nected with so-called HKB (Häftlingskrankenbau—hos-pital for prisoners).

Witnesses of those events were invited to meet and talk to the students—Zofi a Łyś (the former prisoner of Birk-enau, Natzweiler, Raven-sbrück, Berlin-Köpenig and Sachsenhausen) and Euge-niusz Daczyński (during the war a civilan worker at IG Farben in Monowice and after the war a nurse in provisory hospital of the Polish Red Cross which was located in block 10 af-ter the liberation of Ausch-witz camp).

A possibility of independ-ent work in Auschwitz Memorial Archives was a valuable experience for the students. They could use testimonies and memoirs of the survivors as well as documents of the trials connected with health care at Auschwitz camp. The seminar was closed with a lecture on so-called post-traumatic syndrome by Dr. Krzysztof Szwajca from

the Children and Youth Psychiatric Clinic in Cra-cow as well as a visit in an outpatient clinic in Cracow, where the students could learn about the model of taking care of the former Nazi German concentra-tion camp prisoners and the children of the Holo-caust who live in Cracow. In the summary of the his-torical part of the seminar the participants discussed the following questions: How would I act as a perpe-trator and how as a victim? Where is the line of obedience and personal responsibility in the profession of nursing? When should one say “no”? How is “professional prac-tice” understood today? In the professional context the students exchanged infor-mation and experiences on such topics as: education in the nursing profession, international programs of exchange, scholarships, the status of the profes-sional groups in Germany and Poland, professional

opportunities, financing of the health care system, ambulatory care and care of the elderly. During the seminar first outlines for common documents

of the seminar summary to be used at seminars at universities in Germany and Poland were created. They will be published on a common website.

The project if fi nanced by Polish-German Youth Co-operation and Polish-Ger-man Science Foundation.

Ela Pasternak

The health service was expected to serve a political function during the National Socialist (Nazi) period in Germany. The idea of a health service devoted to the health of the indi-

vidual was supplanted by values that related the health service to the nation as a single organism. All occupations connected with the health service were subordinated to this principle. The nurs-ing profession was particularly affected.

NURSING IN THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST PERIOD—A HISTORICAL SKETCH

The unifi cation of the nursing service was the fi rst step. The National Socialist Un-ion of Nursing Services was formed in 1934. All the larger nursing services were affi liated in a Reichsfachschaft, which func-tioned as a state professional organiza-tion. The socialist and communist nursing associations were disbanded. The Jewish nursing unions functioned exclusively to provide nursing services for Jews. In an important change, the tasks of the nursing service were broadened. It was charged with providing nursing care and advice to the nation and the state, and also with carrying out inspections and of-fering health education. Repeated propa-ganda campaigns stressed the important political and social role of nurses. One of the important political tasks was front-line military service. Nurses and nursing instructors followed in the wake of the military victories. Nursing personnel also played a part in crimes against humanity, fi rst in the euthanasia program and later in the Holocaust. The Third Reich period saw a defi nite rise in the prestige of the nursing profession. The ambivalent message of Nazi ideol-ogy for the nursing profession met with results. Nazi public health policy could never have been implemented without the 100 thousand nurses. To this day, we know little about their specifi c role in the process of eliminating “lives not worthy of life.” Nurses took part in all the phases

of extermination. They worked in psychi-atric clinics where patients were selected and sent to their deaths. They were active in euthanasia campaign centers and the extermination centers. During the “wild euthanasia” phase of 1941-1945, they killed people in psychiatric clinics who required full-time care.If we take an overall look at nursing dur-ing the Nazi period, we see that nurses had a choice between siding with the victims or the perpetrators. The peculiar process of the emancipation of the pro-fession required them to renounce their own identity and replace it with unques-tioning obedience. We should hardly be surprised that the majority of nurses ac-cepted the new ideology out of the belief that they were doing good. They were at once victims and perpetrators—hostages to their own vocational ideals, which could lead them to becoming accomplic-es in the killing process without feeling subjectively guilty, since the responsibil-ity for their actions rested in the hands of superior authority. When that author-ity ceased to exist, many of the perpe-trators were left feeling like victims.

Ela Pasternak

On the basis of Hilde Steppe (Hg.) Krankenpfl ege im Nationalsozialismus,

Frankfurt a. M, 1996.

A meeting with Eugeniusz Daczyński

Group photo

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Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine, no. 10, October 2009 International Youth Meeting Center

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EUROPE LOST, EUROPE REBORN

These are extensive excerpts from a panel discussion that took place at the International Youth Meeting Center in Oświęcim on September 18, 2009. The panel was chaired by Christoph Heubner, a member of the International Auschwitz Council, one of the founders of the International Youth Meeting Center, and deputy chairman of the

International Auschwitz Committee. He introduced the other members of the panel.

Christoph Heubner: My dear Marian, you were born in 1926 in what is today Lithua-nia. It is hard for us to be-lieve it now, but when I walk around Warsaw with you, you are swifter than the wind. In 1940, you were sent to the Łódź ghetto, and in 1944 to Auschwitz. You were on the death march to Buchenwald. You were liberated there. Since 1958, you have been in charge of the political desk at the newsmagazine Polityka. You are an active member of the Council of the Memorial at the House of the Wannsee Conference, and the Interna-tional Auschwitz Committee. You are also involved in cre-ating the Museum of the His-tory of the Polish Jews. You constantly point out that this is intended as a “museum of life,” and not a “museum of death.”

President Buzek, we extend our warmest welcome. You were born in 1940. You were a professor at the Silesian Polytechnic. You were Prime Minister of the Polish Repub-lic from 1997 to 2001. In 2002, you founded the Pro Publico Bono Foundation. You are involved in the creation of new structures of local gov-ernment, that is, in building

true democracy. Since 2004, you have been a member of the European Parliament. As far as I know, you were twice chosen in rankings as the best parliamentarian of the year. We are happy that, as the new President of the Euro-pean Parliament, you are here alongside your predecessor. We remember our visit to you, Mr. Pöttering, at the European Parliament. On that occasion, you asked Marian Turski to be your guide to Warsaw, and this occurred during your offi cial visit to Poland. You were born in 1945 in Ber-senbrück, near Osnabrück. You did not know your fa-ther, who was killed in the last days of the war. That was what spurred you to climb through the CDU to the Eu-ropean Parliament. You have been a member of the Euro-pean Parliament since 1979, and you might be called one of the cornerstones of Europe. Who would have thought then, in 1979, that we would be able to meet here today? You were president of the Eu-ropean Parliament from 2007 to June 14, 2009 and then, as it also occurs in the papal tradi-tion, you passed the baton to Mr. Buzek. I greet all three of you most warmly. I fi nd it ex-

ceptionally moving that I can be here today along with so many former Auschwitz pris-oners to enjoy the discussion that we shall now begin.

Marian, you were sent to the Łódź ghetto in 1940, and to Auschwitz in 1944. As far as I know, you lost your eye-glasses in Auschwitz. But what did Europe lose because of Auschwitz? The Germans were to blame and the Ger-mans bear the responsibility, but it was also a European ca-tastrophe. What was lost?

Marian Turski: I think that, if we are supposed to answer the question of what Europe lost, then above all it lost millions of human beings. That is ir-reversible. In my ghetto, there were people like the great painter Trębacz, in the War-saw ghetto were Jan Kram-sztyk and the nightingale of the ghetto, Marysia Ajzensz-tadt, and Bruno Schulz was in Drohobycz. Great artists and thinkers. Consider for a moment as well the fact that so many people were never born, people who could have invented a vaccine for AIDS or cancer. However, of course, there is something else that I cannot fail to mention. Sev-eral years ago, the Taliban de-

stroyed the unique statue of the Buddha in Afghanistan. Similarly unique things were destroyed—a part of the ma-terial culture of Europe. But there are also things that can-not be measured or weighed. I think that, for a certain time at least, Europe lost its clear conscience. I know that sounds banal, but let’s re-member one thing. At least since the 18th century, Europe had been building its modern consciousness on Enlighten-ment thought. It cancelled it out. At least for a certain time, and that interruption is some-thing that it will take a long time to repair.

Christoph Heubner: Presi-dent Buzek, can the Euro-pean Parliament contribute to cleansing the European con-science, the conscience of this newborn Europe? What can you do in this regard in the European Parliament?

Jerzy Buzek: I can give a broader answer to that ques-tion. The European Parliament itself might not be a response, or a search for something that we ourselves have lost. The European Union as a whole is an unprecedented agree-ment among states. It must be admitted that, paradoxically, the European Union grew out of the war and the fear of war. The most bitter thing that we can say today might be that we acted wisely when it was already too late. The countries that could make de-cisions. Let us also remember those great people who came up with that idea and had the courage and the strength to bring it to life. The main fac-tor, of course, was the horror of war and the attempt to fi nd a way out of that horror. The European Parliament is only an emanation of that fi rst idea, and a very wise emana-tion it is. It could be said that one of the creators of what it is, and what it represents, is Hans-Gert Pöttering. The idea of this parliament direct-ly elected throughout Europe is fantastic. Here is a body of more than 700 people, each of whom is directly elected by Europeans—500 million Eu-ropeans. Regardless of how high the turnout in the elec-tions is, 500 million Europeans choose their representatives, and they choose them togeth-er. Every week, we return to

our regions on Saturday and Sunday. On Monday, we re-turn. This is a special bond between us. We are among people from Finland, Portu-gal, Italy, Poland, Germany, Greece, and Cyprus. Every day. We can ask them, in normal, everyday language: “What’s up in your country?” This is especially valuable, because we see each other and discuss things. We have the same problems. In Latvia, Austria, or Luxembourg. It’s very easy to discover this. Of course, we argue and have different opinions, but they are completely different disa-greements and disputes than the ones that accompanied us in the two decades between the wars, or even at the be-ginning of the 20th century. We should remember that, before the First World War broke out, there was also enormous tension when we were arguing over some kind of abstract colonies in order to become rulers of the world. The horrors of the First World War were also great, but the Second World War eclipsed everything. We don’t remem-ber what happened before that. For the fi rst time in his-tory, all Europeans can meet. That is why, in constructing the shared memory and re-sponsibility of a parliament chosen in direct elections, the only such institution in the European Union, it is of great importance, but the specialist in that is Hans Gert-Pötter-ing, because he built this par-liament. I only benefi t from what you did, Hans-Gert.

Christoph Heubner: The fi rst president of the European Parliament was Simone Veil. She spoke out clearly here many times. Her political in-volvement in German-French partnership and also in build-ing a common Europe was motivated by her Auschwitz experiences. She defi ned the cultivation of memory and democracy as pillars on which Europe can develop. Does Europe, in the face of the development of right-wing extremism, in the new member states as well, have a suffi cient amount of “memo-ry potential”?

Hans Gert-Pöttering: I’m immensely grateful for the mention of our predecessor, Madame Simone Veil. As far

Discussion panel at the IYMH

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as I remember, she was elect-ed President of the European Parliament on July 18, 1979, and I personally cast a vote for her. If you will permit me, I would now, on September 18, 2009, like to say something from the depths of my heart. I was in the place where a ter-rible crime was committed. I saw the cell where Maximil-ian Kolbe perished. To be alone there, as I wrote in the guest book, as an answer to all your questions, Mr. Heub-ner: “Eternal memory, so that the things that happened here may never be repeat-ed.” There are eyewitnesses to those days here with us. I say this as a German born in September 1945. When we are here, when Marian Tur-ski looks at me in a friendly way and talks warmly with me, in spite of the fact that I am a German born after the end of the war who therefore had no part in those crimes, this meeting today becomes, for me, an expression of the greatest hope. I would like to say something to Jerzy Buzek now, and what I have to say is not a pleasantry, but it is true. I am happy that the President of the European Parliament today is a Pole. Who would have thought in 1979 that Po-land would be democratic, and that today, in a common Europe, we would profess shared values—human digni-ty, human rights, democracy, freedom, and the rule of law? As Jerzy Buzek himself has said, we can trust each other today. And because Jerzy Buzek, this Pole, is President of the European Parliament, you Poles, and other Euro-peans as well, can be proud. Jerzy, thank you for being the President of the European Parliament, because I know that we look in the same di-rection concerning the future of our countries, our peoples, and all the other peoples of Europe, so that all the things that happened may never be

repeated. We affi rm this on the basis of the principles of freedom, solidarity, and hu-man dignity. That is why I am grateful that I can be here with you today.

Christoph Heubner: Marian, you are a European, a patriot, a citizen of the world who knows many foreign languag-es. When you look at Europe through the prism of your life’s experiences, what do you expect of Europe? Marian Turski: I might start with something very person-al. In recent years, there were moments in Poland when some of my friends were wor-ried about the direction the country was going in. To be frank, I was never upset, be-cause I knew that I am a part of the European Union, that to a certain degree there are standards that are incumbent upon us at this moment, that we are a part of it. That is a splendid advantage of be-ing a member of the Euro-pean Union. But if you ask me—what do I expect? Schol-ars will surely say that they expect Europe to respect hu-man rights and democracy. Everyone knows this. It seems to me that there are new char-acteristics in Europe, and that in some way a new founda-tion for Europe has emerged, that is, the building of new regimes, but not as a result of revolution or armed uprising. I say this because those things were the foundation from 1917 to 1989. Now, there is a foundation of reconciliation and understanding. If I expect anything and if I would like to have anything in Europe, then I would like to have a toler-ant Europe. Since you asked the question, I will share with you a poem that was written by a friend who means a great deal to me. This is a poem by Bolesław Taborski.If you ask me what I expect then, in a nutshell, it’s empa-thy.

Christoph Heubner: Empa-thy, an open and democratic Europe like the one that Si-mone Veil wished for. Let us return to something that Professor Pöttering drew at-tention to during his term, namely the electoral success of right-wing extremists in many countries, and also in the European Parliament. European democracy must be capable of defending it-self, and we can and must be a part of this.

Hans Gert Pöttering: I am deeply convinced that hope is something particularly im-portant in this life, and I do not say that as a Christian. It is necessary to do everything, and we should not rest on our laurels. If we ever think that the job is fi nished, we are wrong. The important thing is to do everything, every day and every hour, to keep mov-ing in the right direction. If we ever stop, if we ever fail to defend those values, then we might as well have already lost them. If we stop being involved in the defense of the cultural values of human-ity—and as examples I will name Tibet and Burma, or Myanmar—and if we stop be-ing involved in the defense of human rights in Belarus, the last dictatorship in Europe,

in the defense of the rights of people who want to live like us. In Vilnius, there is already an “émigré university” for young people forced by the regime to leave Belarus. If we stop being involved in the fi ght for their freedom, we are the ones who will lose. That is why it is incredibly important for us to react to every case of violence and dictatorship, against political extremism regardless of whether it is right-wing or left-wing. The situation in which we live in the European Union is not something that we have re-ceived as a gift. Permit me, la-dies and gentlemen, to recall the date February 13, 2007, which can be compared with last Tuesday, when Jerzy Buzek made the speech an-nouncing his program in the European Parliament. On that day, I proposed the establish-ment in Brussels of a House of European History in which we could remember our past, and also talk about working for the future of a united Eu-rope. Dear Jerzy, I am very grateful to you for not only supporting that idea in your speech, but also joining in it. We must cultivate memory, since it is the basis for knowl-edge about where we come from, and so that we can know where we are going.

We should express our oppo-sition to every form of intoler-ance, whether it is right-wing, nationalistic, or left-wing. We should remember that Stalin was also a devil—I am not trying in this way to down-play Germany’s guilt, but the great Jewish writer Hannah Arendt thought that totalitari-anism was similar whether it was communist or national-socialist. We must see things the same way, in order to give a chance in the future to ac-tions aimed at the freedom that is the characteristic sign of our life.

Christoph Heubner: I’m very happy that you’ve brought up Belarus—the last dictator-ship in Europe. Out institu-tion also has strong ties with young people from that coun-try who are involved in the development of democracy. Mister President, we are talk-ing about a Europe of young people. As you mentioned, the International Youth Meet-ing Center is a joint venture of Germans and Poles. The fact that Germans and Poles are working together here, in Oświęcim, in running this institution is something that continues to strike us as ex-ceptional, and former prison-ers agree with us. For them, this Center is a place that combines the terrible expe-riences of the past with the present. What can we do to make young people pro-Eu-ropean and show them that, in view of the tendencies that you and Marian Turski have presented, there is no other alternative?

Jerzy Buzek: Let me give an example of what happened in the European Parliament dur-ing the preceding term. Hans-Gert Pöttering attached great importance to the issue of the Middle East and the possibil-ity of resolving the confl ict that has been going on there

Empathymost important is empathy for everything on earthpeople, animals, and plants as wellrocks, seas, and I say it again: peoplethis makes life bearable, its absence is dehumanizingtake the Holocaust perpetratorsearthly minions of the devilthey pretended to be humaneven superhuman!they were nothingthey didn’t know what empathy is.

Bolesław Taborski

European Parliament President Jerzy Buzek

Jerzy Buzek and Hans-Gert Pöttering

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for a very long time now. The idea came up of inviting 21 young people from each of the sides in the confl ict to the Parliament, along with 21 Eu-ropeans. They were supposed to spend time together, talk, eat meals together, and get to know each other. The fi rst days were very diffi cult. They were isolated. There were certain problems in making themselves understood, even though they had a common language. However, they broke the ice within a few days. Such is youth. We have a desire to meet other people and get to know them. In this situation, it was possible to do so. It’s not so diffi cult for Eu-ropeans as it is for people from the Middle East. Our confl icts are not as deep as theirs. We are, European problems aside, a happy continent. We don’t have a war in the Bal-kans. Why not? The countries and peoples that were kill-ing each other not long ago are now in line for European Union membership. That is an exceptional success for the

Union. Instead of fi ghting, people want to be in the Un-ion. This confl ict had gone on for decades. Yet today, no one speaks of a confl ict. This is an incredible change, because the Union said: We won’t talk to you otherwise. I speak with those people, including government offi cials, and they are all aiming at mem-bership, regardless of when it occurs. This is an example we can hold up! These young people met in the European Parliament, and once they had spent more time together, they began to talk differently. You have to bear in mind that democracy is not something given once, that lasts forever. You are right in suggesting that there are threats, that there are breakaway groups, that nationalism is rising—perhaps because we believed that we knew how to deal with it. You have to fi ght for it all the time, and show young people that you’re doing so. They can believe this, but only when they see what we, with our greater experience, are

doing. We can never forget this. If breakaway groups and strong nationalist tendencies arise—we have about a hun-dred people in the European Parliament who speak a dif-ferent language from the rest of the Parliament. In the past, there were about 30 or 40 of them. Now their numbers have more than doubled, and this is a sign that we ourselves have overlooked something. We came to the conclusion that, after the fall of the iron curtain, there were no more dangers threatening us. We can never forget! That is why this place is so important, where we are now. It forbids us to forget! That is a great value. On the one hand, the Auschwitz Museum, and on the other the International Youth Meeting Center. Christoph Heubner: This in-stitution also functions thanks to the work of the volunteers who take care of the groups that come here for a certain period of time. I am pleased that we can have a young vol-

unteer from Ukraine, Daria, with us. Daria, wherever you are, I greet you from the heart, just like all the others who have just started work-ing here. I will also add for your information that we also have cooperation going on here between German ap-prentices from Volkswagen and Polish students from Bielsko-Biała and Bieruń, and Volkswagen employees from Polkowice and Chocianów. These young people spend 14 days here and, thanks to the support of Director Piotr Cywiński they can do main-tenance work while learning. This institution is a “House of Life” in a place of educa-tion. Marian, you often talk with young people. All these past years have been a part of your work, during which you explain how this could have happened. What are your impressions from those con-versations? Are young people trying to move forward with-out looking back? Are they open to memories? Will they uphold memory in a demo-cratic Europe?

Marian Turski: I am abso-lutely sure that it is exactly as you say. In order to answer that question, and to avoid quoting myself, I would like to quote something else. I am not ruling out the possibility that I might feel like saying something as well. But fi rst, I must tell you a story. It was several months ago, during the opening of the Meeting Center in Dachau. I was in-vited there, and since I was supposed to go afterwards to visit my friends in the out-skirts of Munich, I asked how to get there. One girl said that she was driving, that she was going in the same direction, and that she would gladly give me a ride. I must tell you one detail, which is important

for the point of the story. I had a bag and a backpack, and that woman, who was about 30, asked, “Can I carry that for you?” I answered her in Lat-in: “Omnia mea mecum porto,” or, “Everything that I have, I carry with me.” I picked up the backpack and the suitcase, and we got in her car, and then after a moment she asked me, “Excuse me, sir, but I can see that you are treated as an hon-ored guest. May I ask why?” I replied, “I am a graduate of the universities of Auschwitz and Buchenwald.” She was silent for a moment, focus-ing on her driving. Then she said, “Could I ask you a ques-tion? Could you describe one day in Auschwitz for me?” I told her about this and that, because how much can you tell somebody in 30 minutes? But I was completely open with her. She drove me there, and then she leaned over and asked, “May I kiss you?” A week later, I got a letter. I will read from it, and it may serve as an answer to the question.“I would like to begin by apol-ogizing for being so tactless. The last thing I wanted was to bombard you with questions. As I told you, I never before had the courage to ask any of my relatives or acquaint-ances about those diffi cult times. Now I was suddenly asking you, a total stranger, to be so open with me and, in addition, in such a short space of time—a half-hour car ride. I hope you did not take this as intrusive curiosity or sensation-seeking. I simply couldn’t stop myself from asking. I cannot even explain such a lapse from good man-ners. I have been interested in that dark chapter in our his-tory for a long time, and I have seen and read a lot. However, the past was always static for me, black-and-white, and that is what made it all the more incomprehensible. Then, sud-denly, by accident, you were right there beside me, within reach. Thanks to you, I am now sure that it all happened so recently, that thanks to you I have come closer to the past than I could ever before have imagined. The enormous suf-fering that you and the other prisoners experienced remains something that I cannot grasp. Thanks to you, those experi-ences have become a part of my life. Omnia mea mecum por-to—that is how you answered when I wanted to help with your suitcase. What you gave to me is something that I can now carry within myself.”

Christoph Heubner: I am convinced that that is a per-fect formulation to conclude our discussion, and further-more a summary of every-thing we have been talking about today.

Hans-Gert Pöttering and Jerzy Buzek

A performance by the Teatr Ósmego Dnia ended the day at the IYMC

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Jewish Centerter

For the tenth time, the European Association for the Preservation and Promotion of Jewish Culture and Herit-age (AEPJ) organized the European Day of Jewish Culture in 25 countries on September 6. This year, for the fi rst time, the Jewish Center in Oświęcim joined in by holding an open house—September also marked the

Center’s ninth anniversary.

OPEN HOUSE AT THE JEWISH CENTER

The event was directed above all at the residents of Oświęcim, people with an interest in Jewish culture, and, perhaps above all, those who had not previ-ously had an opportunity to learn about the Jewish past in Oświęcim, or about the work of the Center. Almost a hundred people, not all of them from Oświęcim, took part in a program lasting several hours, during which Center staff members guid-ed them around the Center, the only Chevra Lomdei Mishnayot, the only surviv-ing synagogue in the town, and the Jews in Oświęcim and New Life exhibitions. They also saw a fi lm titled Reminiscences from Oświęcim. They learned about the im-portance of the synagogue in Jewish life, certain Jewish traditions, and the history of the Oświęcim Jews who, over the course of fi ve cen-turies, played an important role in the development of the town. There were only a few survivors of the Holo-caust, and the open house also featured a chance to learn more about them.

The next item on the sched-ule was a walking tour of Oświęcim in the footsteps of its Jewish residents. As they pass through town every day, the majority of

today’s inhabitants are una-ware that many of the fa-miliar buildings have a Jew-ish past. This was a chance to see the town from a fresh perspective. Unfortunately, little of the prewar fl avor

of the old Jewish streets remains. The old buildings along Głęboka street and Wysoka street, once typical of Jewish settlement, are al-most gone. Stolarska street and other places have lost

their unique character. The guides thus relied on old photographs, documents, and accounts to tell most of the story.

The walking tour began at Father Skarbek Square, with the story of that cleric and his cordial relations with the local Jewish commu-nity. From there, they went on to Żydowska street (Ber-ka Joselewicza), the heart of prewar Jewish Oświęcim, and the main square, with the old bakery behind the pillars at Schmeidler’s uni-versally referred to as the Slebarski House, the Hotel Herz that once belonged to Wiktor Leibler, and the house next door where Rab-bi Eljasz Bombach lived. The last stop on the itinerary was the Jewish cemetery. Along the way, there was a chance to reminisce about the fi rst building in Oświęcim with a fl at roof. It belonged to the Druks family and stood along Nowa street (now Chopina). In its glory, it al-luded to the architecture of the Bauhaus school. Unfor-tunately, it has been com-pletely remodeled.

At the Oświęcim cem-etery, the participants had a chance to learn about the rich symbolism of Jewish gravestone architecture and about the stories of some of the people buried there, in-cluding Rudolf Haberfeld (president of the Jewish community and town coun-cilman) and his wife Erna, Dr. Maurycy Schlank (a lo-cal physician who was also a councilman), the rabbini-cal Scharf family, the Polish legionary Hirsch, and Szy-mon Kluger, the last Jew in Oświęcim.

In the afternoon, the open house featured a multi-media presentation on the principal Jewish holidays, after which Chantal Mass, a Belgian Jew who spends several months of each year in Oświęcim, invited them to her house to explain the Sabbath customs. The fi nal item on the schedule was a workshop for children on Jewish holidays, where the main attraction was build-ing a booth of the kind erect-ed for Sukkoth

Artur Szyndler

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New Life exhibitions

Workshop for children

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Jewish Center

Polish teachers who deal with the Holocaust now have numerous occasions to exchange experience with their colleagues from all over the world. One such opportunity is the International Visitor Leadership Program, organized by the U.S. State Department for people involved in Holocaust education.

TEACHING ABOUT THE HOLOCAUST IN AMERICA

Participants spend a week at an American institution, where they network and learn about new methods. This year, the program fea-tured visits to two of the most important Holocaust education centers, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Mu-seum and the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York.The USHMM is a govern-ment-sponsored institution for recording, commemo-rating, and teaching the history of the Holocaust, and for inspiring discus-sion of contemporary chal-lenges in the light of that tragedy. This latter aspect of the USHMM mission distinguishes it from many similar institutions around the world, about which more will be said later.

The Holocaust Museum stands in the heart of Wash-ington, in the immediate vicinity of many govern-ment institutions and monu-ments. This underlines its importance. The building it-self features straightforward contemporary architecture with three fl oors of exhibi-tion space. The fi rst experi-ence there was a meeting with Christina Chavarria, who coordinates programs for American teachers. The Museum hosts a range of events, conferences, and scholarships to enhance Holocaust teaching through meetings with survivors, ex-hibition lessons, and group work. The institution keeps in touch with its program alumni and encourages them to share their expertise among their peers. There

were also meetings with Mu-seum archivists, who talked enthusiastically about multi-media projects in which new technology makes it possi-ble to analyze the history of the Holocaust and make it accessible to Internet users around the world. A visit to the main exhibi-tion at the Holocaust Mu-seum is an incredible jour-ney through time from the rise of the Nazis to power in Germany in the early 1930s, through the fate of the Jews ensnared in the Holocaust, to the liberation of the camps at the end of the war, present-ed from the perspective of American soldiers. The ex-hibition features exceptional historical exhibits including the milk can in which part of the Ringelblum Archive of the Warsaw ghetto was hid-

den, an authentic section of cobblestones from that ghet-to, and the door of a hospital from the Jewish district in Łódź. A collage of prewar photographs of the residents of the little town of Ejszyszki, then in Poland, cuts through the exhibition on two levels. These moving photographs break through the barrier of statistics to remind us that the people who died in the Holocaust were ordinary, defenseless people.Particularly noteworthy is the fi nal part of the Museum exhibition, a room dedicated to contemporary genocide. Visitors watch accounts by people who witnessed wars in the Balkans, Chechnya, the Congo, Rwanda, and oth-er places around the world where people are killed because of their ethnicity, faith, or other characteristics that distinguish every hu-man being. These disturbing descriptions of violence and photographs from confl ict zones are intended to unset-tle the Museum guests and leave them facing the chal-lenge of being mute witness-es to contemporary mass murder, which is a part of our reality despite the con-demnation of the Holocaust by the civilized world. On the facade of the building is a motto reminding people that, the next time they wit-ness hatred or injustice, or hear about genocide, they should remember what they have seen at the Museum. The Museum of Jewish Her-itage in New York was the second institution involved in the International Visitor Leadership Program. Lo-cated at the southern tip of Manhattan, it consists of an original-looking six-story pyramid and a main build-ing with a breathtaking view of the Statue of Liberty and the Atlantic Ocean. Aside from the visit, the stay there also included an ecumeni-cal program titled “Talking about Teaching the Holo-caust.” As opposed to Washington, Holocaust teaching here is rooted in a rich context of identity and Jewish perspec-tives. A visit to this museum starts with short fi lms where people talk about their Jew-ish roots. This introduction opens the visitor up to the multiplicity of Jewish iden-tity, which makes it easier to

understand the fi rst part of the exhibition—“Jewish Life a Hundred Years Ago.” This section is devoted to Jewish communities and their tradi-tions and culture in various places around the world in the years before the Holo-caust. “The War against the Jews” is the Holocaust sec-tion; it is presented as a fi ght for dignity and survival. The last part of the triptych com-prising the main exhibition is titled “Jewish Rebirth”—a story about the way the survivors rebuilt their lives after the wartime destruc-tion. The founding of Israel and the story of the Jew-ish community in the USA are the principal narrative themes, richly illustrated with personal belongings, photographs, and fi lms. A highlight of the New York part of the International Visitor Leadership Pro-gram was the opportunity to join a seminar on “Dis-cussions on Teaching the Holocaust” with Elizabeth Edelstein, director of educa-tion at the Museum. Organ-ized in cooperation with the Archdiocese of New York, it targets lay and religious teachers from local Catholic schools and consists of four intensive days of lectures, meetings with Holocaust survivors, and visits to the main exhibition. The themes covered include the Jewish resistance movement, the attitudes of the Christian churches to Nazism, and the fate of hidden children. There was exceptional inter-est in a series of lectures by Rabbi Eliyahu Stern on the common history of Jews and Christians. The participants learned more about both the Holocaust and the history of the oldest monotheistic reli-gion, which was the starting point for Christianity. The visits to the museums in Washington and New York were an important experi-ence and an inspiration for a new look at one of the darkest episodes in human history. The two main things I will bring back to my work in Oświęcim are a better un-derstanding of the Jewish perspective, and an appre-ciation of the obligation to draw upon the tragic past in teaching about the need for tolerance.

Maciek Zabierowski

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The Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York

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Throughout the fi rst two days, there were many panel discussions on social-reli-gious themes at sites in the center of the city. One panel was on “Not Forgetting Auschwitz.” On September 8, the conference moved to Oświęcim, where a mass was said and a memorial ceremo-ny held at the Monument to the Victims. Later, a variety of guests called at the Center for Dialogue and Prayer.

Magdalena Wolnik of the Sant’Egidio Community read a Proclamation for Peace, from young people, at the end of the conference:

Men and women of different religions, we convened in the ancient city of Cracow, sev-enty years after the outbreak of World War II, to pray, to dialogue with each other, to foster a spiritual humanism of peace. We pay tribute to the memory of John Paul II, a son of this land. He was a master of dialogue and a tenacious witness of the holiness of peace, capable of providing the world with a vision even in diffi cult times: it is the spirit of As-sisi.

That very spirit has blown through a number of peace-ful changes that took place in the world. It blew in 1989, twenty years ago, when Po-land and other Eastern Euro-pean countries were restored to freedom. In September 1989 men and women of dif-ferent religions, gathered in Warsaw by the Community of Sant’Egidio, fi rmly stated their love for peace: “War never again!”. We have re-

mained faithful to this spirit even when many people, in recent years, maintained that violence and war can solve problems and confl icts in our world.

The bitter lesson of World War II has often been for-gotten, though it was a tre-mendous tragedy in human history. We went as pilgrims to Auschwitz, aware of the abyss into which human-kind had fallen. We needed to come back here, into the abyss of evil, to better un-derstand the heart of his-tory! Such immense pain cannot be forgotten!

We need to look at the pains and sorrows of our world: people at war, poverty, the horror of terrorism, the many victims of hatred. Here, we heeded the plea of many people who suffer. Entire peoples are hostage to war and poverty, and many are forced to leave their homes. Many have just vanished, were kidnapped or lack a secure life.

Our world is disoriented by the crisis of a market that be-lieved it was almighty, and by an often faceless and soul-less globalization. Globaliza-tion is a unique opportunity, yet the world has often pre-ferred to live it as a clash of civilizations and religions. There can be no peace when dialogue between peoples is extinguished. No human being, no people, is ever an island!

Regardless of their differ-ences, our religious tradi-tions strongly testify that

a world with no spirit will never be human. They show us the path to return to God, the source of peace.

Spirit and dialogue will give courage to our globalized world! A world without dialogue will be enslaved by hatred and fear for the other. Religions do not want war and do not want to be used for war. To speak of war in the name of God is blasphe-mous. No war is ever holy. Humanity is always defeat-ed by violence and terror.

Spirit and dialogue show the way to live together in peace. We have discovered, even more clearly, that dia-logue delivers from fear and distrust. It is an alternative to war. It does not weaken anyone’s identity but ena-bles us to rediscover the best of ourselves and of the others. Nothing is lost with dialogue! Dialogue writes a better history, while confl ict opens up abysses. Dialogue is the art of living together. Dialogue is the gift we want to make to this 21st century.

Let us start afresh from the memory of World War II, from the prophecy of John Paul II, and be pilgrims of peace. With patience and courage, let us give shape to a new era of dialogue, unit-ing together in peace those who hate and ignore each other, all peoples, and all hu-mankind. May God grant the entire world, every man and every woman, the wonder-ful gift of peace!

Wiktor Boberek

Pope John Paul II inaugurated the tradition of these annual meetings of religious from all over the world with the 1986 meeting in Assisi to pray for world peace. Assisi 2009 was held in Cracow from September 6-8, with the People and Religions International Congress for Peace.

THE SPIRIT OF ASSISI IN CRACOW

Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine, no. 10, October 2009 Center for Dialogue and Prayer Foundation

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History

PEOPLE OF GOOD WILL

WŁADYSŁAWA KOŻUSZNIK(1917-1998)

VESTIGES OF HISTORYFROM THE COLLECTIONS OF

THE AUSCHWITZ MUSEUM

How many mysteries fi t inside a snuff-box? The answer to this riddle can be found inside the lid, where there is an en-graving depicting a ski jumper. This is the maker’s mark,

left behind by one of the leading Polish skiers of the interwar pe-riod, Bronisław Czech. He participated in three Olympic games, set Polish records in ski jumping, and was a talented artist.Arriving in Auschwitz on the June 14, 1940 transport from Tarnów, he was given number 349. He died on June 5, 1944, after four years

behind barbed wire. In that same fi nal year, because of his fame, a snuff-box that he had carved saved the life of a man in a completely different part of war-ravaged Europe. The snuff-box was made from a piece of an oak stump removed from the roll-call square at the Auschwitz I camp. Czech carved it for his fellow prisoner Józef Polak, who helped him write let-ters home in German. Czech decorated the outside of the lid with a fl oral motif. The initials JP inside a triangle and the number 3288 inside a rectangle are inlaid in lighter wood on the underside of the box. “Auschwitz 1941” is en-

graved on the front side of the box. Polak probably obtained the snuff-box on his birthday in 1941, and guarded it care-fully afterwards.In 1944, Józef Polak sent the snuff-box to his brother, who had been conscripted into the Wehrmacht. The soldier was captured on the frontlines in the region of Monte Cassino. The snuff-box saved his life when he was being interro-gated by Polish soldiers, in-cluding some from Zakopane. He showed them the box and told them “I am a Pole forced to join the Wehrmacht, and I have a brother in the Ausch-witz concentration camp who gave me a snuff-box carved by

Bronek Czech.” Released, this brother of Józef Polak joined the Polish army and fought until the end of the war, after which he returned home with the precious snuff-box that he

restored to its original owner. Józef Polak donated the snuff-box to the Museum in 1968.

Agnieszka SieradzkaCollections Department

Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum

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Pictures from Mrs. Spic’s house

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The snuff-box

She was born on September 25, 1917 into a peasant family in Przecieszyn, the daughter of Jan Kasprowski and Anie-la, nee Lipowiecka, and at-tended public school in her hometown.In 1935, she married Adolf Kożusznik, a miner em-ployed at the Brzeszcze coal mine. She gave birth to their son Józef in 1938.She lived in Przecieszyn un-til the outbreak of the war and the start of the occupa-tion period. When Auschwitz Concentration Camp was established, she joined the effort to help the prisoners. Another Przecieszyn resi-dent, Helena Płotnicka, drew her into this work. Together, they approached the camp, carrying packages of food. If it was too heavy for them to carry, they took other people along to help them. In 1941, Władysława Kożusznik and Helena Płotnicka became couriers for the Peasant Bat-talions group that operated

in the vicinity of the camp. She took the pseudonym „Włada”. From that time on, the women delivered not only food, but also medicine, surgical instruments, and warm clothing. Many prison-ers benefi ted from their help. Among them were the sur-veyors taking measurements in the area around the camp, and the prisoners working on fl ood-control on the river Młynówka as well as those assigned to the Rajsko sub-camp (Gartnerei Raisko). The women acquired food for the prisoners from their neigh-bors or members of under-ground organizations. They also received help from more affl uent persons, such as the owners of grocery stores and bakeries. Physicians and pharmacists who supported their efforts gave them medi-cine. An important part of the effort to aid the prisoners was acting as intermediaries in their secret correspondence, which Władysława delivered to the indicated addresses. On morę than one occasion, she crossed the border ille-gally in order to deliver corre-spondence in person to pris-oners’ parents living in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. She also accepted underground mail containing information about the camp,

and passed it on to the com-mander of the BCh, Wojciech Jekiełek.After the arrest of Helena Płotnicka in May 1943, Władysława was being sought by the Gestapo. She left the area in the vicinity of the camp and concealed her-self for a time in Ząbkowice near Będzin, with the mother of the prisoner Ryszard Ko-rdek. Later, she hid at her sister’s home in Cieszyn, and with her in-laws in Za-olzie. During her absence, the Gestapo repeatedly searched her home, but failed to fi nd any evidence confi rming that she belonged to the under-ground. When things quieted down around a year later, she returned home to Prze-cieszyn.After the war, Władysława Kożusznik was repeatedly questioned by Security Bu-reau functionaries about her underground membership. After attending a course in ad-ministration, she began work-ing in the Communal Coop-erative store in Brzeszcze. Later, she became director of the cafeteria in the Brzeszcze coal mine and remained in that post until she retired. She died in 1998. After the war, she was awarded the Knights Cross of the Order of Poland Reborn.

Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine, no. 10, October 2009

When I was a child, four old paintings hung on the walls of our apartment. I didn’t take much interest in them

at fi rst, because my main interest was hockey, and a collection of memorabilia connected with the sport fi lled my room. Mama prom-ised me that those paintings would be mine one day, but all I could think of was hockey.My sister once asked if she could have one of them. I agreed without even think-ing about it, certain that there would never be any-thing in my life except sport. Years later, when I took up the history of Oświęcim, I decided to take Mama up on her offer. I added the paint-ings to my collection. Two of them were rectangular and presented woods and a road. The other two were oval. One featured a roman-tic couple and the other a woman; it was dated 1843. my mother told me that these pictures once hung on the walls of the home of Spic Meler, a teacher who was well known in the town. How did they ever end up in our apartment?My grandfather was the ad-ministrator of two buildings owned by Mrs. Meler. One stood on Kościuszki Square and the other, where the

owner lived, was located on Władysława Jagiełły Street. After my grandfather died, my grandmother took over as administrator and acted in that capacity until the death of Mrs. Meler. At that point, one of Mrs. Spic’s cousins appeared and asked my grandmother to clean up and take all the furnish-ings from the apartment. This surprised my grand-mother, but she did as she was asked. She consulted with my parents, and they decided to give all the books to the school where Mrs. Meler had worked. Every-one in town had known her, and her name frequently came up in conversation at our home. She educated several generations, who re-membered her as an elderly, good-natured lady who al-ways wore lovely hats when she went out.

Mirosław Ganobis

FROM GANOBIS’S CABINET

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PHOTO REPORT On September 6, 2009, the Jewish Center joined the observance of the 10th European Days of Jewish Culture. The theme this year was Jewish holy days and traditions. The schedule included tours of the Jewish Center and the Chevra Lomdei Mishnayot synagogue, a walking tour of the town and the Jewish cemetery in the footsteps of the Oświęcim Jews, a meeting with Chantal Maas who talked about Sabbath customs, and a children’s workshop on Jewish holidays and traditions.

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Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine, no. 10, October 2009