ADL honors four, April 16, 1999

ADL honors four

by Jill Belmont

"We who survive are the voices of the past." - - Sam Fried, Holocaust survivor

Four Holocaust survivors, who have spent years using their "voices of the past" to educate countless children and adults about the horrors of the Holocaust, were paid tribute last week by the Anti-Defamation League.

Nearly 200 people joined together at the Jewish

ADL honors four

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Community Center for the ADL's "Courage to Share" dinner, honoring Miriam Grossman, Bea Karp, Sam Fried and Cantor Leo Fettman for their unwavering commitment to speaking out publicly about their lives during the Holocaust.

"Tonight, we take a moment to thank those people who have shared their stories of pain and their history, who have shared a window into those unspeakable times, into the darkness that none of us can really understand if we didn't live through it," said I. Robert Wolfson, ADL's Plains States regional director. "I am continually humbled by their strength, by their incredible commitment to share their stories with so many in the community."

Bea Karp, a native of Germany, experienced the Holocaust as a hidden child in France. Her family had been taken to a forced-labor camp in southern France, but she and her younger sister were saved by an international humanitarian group operating homes for refugee children.

She lost both parents and many extended family members in the Holocaust, and years later--around the time of the Eichmann trial--she decided to speak publicly about her experience. Although sharing her story was difficult at first, she said speaking to others, especially children, "has added a lot to my life.

"I do it because of my parents and also so that the six million who died will not be forgotten."

Miriam Grossman, 82, spent four years in the Lodz Ghetto before being transferred to Auschwitz in 1944, and was spared from death by a last-minute need for additional factory workers. Her parents, six siblings, and most of her extended family perished in the Holocaust.

"Remembering is the most important thing," Grossman said. "This is our mission, and because only I am alive from a very large family, I have a responsibility to speak for them, to make people remember them and others.

"If we remember, then we can improve," she added. "We have to better ourselves and then teach our children by good example. And when we do this, we perform God's wish."

"We who survive are the voices of the past," --- Sam Fried, survivor of the Holocaust.

Cantor Leo Fettman, author of Shoah: Journey from the Ashes, told the audience that "building bridges of brotherhood" has motivated him to speak to groups all over the country.

Fettman, cantor emeritus at Beth Israel Synagogue, said that fostering understanding among people "can only be accomplished with education, not only about the Holocaust, but Judaism as well."

Commending the ADL's educational programs, he noted that because of them, "these bridges of brotherhood can be built."

A native Hungary, Fettman and his family were taken to Auschwitz in 1944, where most of his family was murdered. Fettman was taken from one camp to another. At one point, he was falsely accused of a crime and was led to the gallows by a Nazi SS officer. As the hanging took place, the rope broke and Fettman fell to the ground, his life spared.

Following the war, he immigrated to Canada in 1948, where he later was ordained as both a rabbi and cantor. In 1960, he moved to Omaha and began his 20-year tenure at Beth Israel.

With their move from Czechoslovakia to Omaha in 1949, Sam Fried and his late wife, Magda, both Holocaust survivors, began to realize their hopes and dreams.

"We were totally determined that our children would be born and grow up in the greatest country on earth: a country where the streets would be paved not with gold, but with freedom of choice and opportunities," Fried said.

"In Omaha, the impossible became possible. In Omaha, life rose out of the ashes of the past. In Omaha, a life which could be very subjected to enormous hardship and pain became a life of happiness and promise. In Omaha, dreams became substance. In Omaha, life became beautiful again."

Fried said he experienced the Holocaust as a frightened young teenager.

"I was subjected to the unbelievable," he said. "The unbelievable became believable, and the world was silent.

"What we endured was unmentionable, but gradually we began to share our past. We do so not for the sake of those who perished, who became ashes. It is too late for them. We do it not for our sake; nothing can expunge from us the memories of the worst tragedy in human history. We do it for the sake of future generations."

Expressing gratitude to the ADL for giving survivors the platform to speak out, Fried said that without the organization's commitment to education, "our voices would not have been carried far."

He encouraged those in the audience to be "the voices of the future," and continue to tell the truth about the Holocaust, so that "the beast shall never be able to come forth again."