|
|
| ||||
|
IN-DEPTH FEATURES
Part III
A plain building on Rechov Levinsky in Tel Aviv houses an
organization called Concentration Camp Survivors from Greece.
Moshe Helyon, at the age of 78, is still energetic and
creative. The Holocaust in Greece? Few people know the
country was involved. Yet 60 years after the first train left
Greece packed with Jews destined for the death camps, Helyon
tries to document the experiences of those who were spared
from the Nazi inferno, presenting his own life story as an
example.
In the first part Mr. Helyon described the weeks leading
up to his family's deportation from Salonika to Poland. After
they arrived in Auschwitz, they were separated into four
groups: The first, elderly and disabled men limited in their
ability to perform labor and walk; the second, young, able-
bodied men; the third, elderly women and women with children;
and the fourth, the rest of the women. He and his uncle went
with the group of about 500 able-bodied men.
The second part described some of his experiences at
Auschwitz, culminating in an awful selection from among the
hospital patients that was carried out on Yom Kippur. Mr.
Helyon was spared, and decided to get out of the hospital as
fast as he could.
*
Notice of my discharge from the hospital came as a relief,
but I was worried what Kommando I would be assigned
to. I was very eager to get accepted to the builders' school.
I had sent several requests with a young man from Salonika,
Jakito Mastro, who worked in the camp personnel office and
who was in a position to help in this matter.
While I was once waiting in the yard with the other
prisoners, he stepped into the retinue attached to the person
in charge of assigning us. I was sure I should not pass up
this additional opportunity to speak to him. I stepped closer
to where he was standing and at a certain distance I said to
him in Ladino, loud enough for him to hear me, "Put me in the
meorerschule! Put me in the meorerschule!"
I was sure he heard me, but he made no indication whatsoever
of having heard. By the time my turn arrived to report to the
selectors, I was very tense. The moment arrived, followed by
their whispered consultations, and then they told me I would
be transferred to the meorerschule, the school for
builders.
The Last Remnant of the Family Perishes
I was in the school for builders until March 1944. This was
an exceptional advantage because of the weather conditions.
The whole camp was covered with snow and the temperatures
dropped below zero. However we hardly ever had to leave the
block, except for morning inspection. The instructors, who
were almost all prisoners, were mostly Jews.
Once, after our studies had ended, I was returning from work,
when a prisoner told me he had seen my uncle Yitzchok and he
wanted to see me. I went straight to his block, but since I
was not permitted to enter I stood in the adjacent square and
called his name out loud. In one of the windows of the first
floor of the block several heads appeared. My uncle was among
them.
I was startled by his appearance. He was a
"Musselmann" in the most extreme sense. [In Auschwitz
parlance, the word "Musselmann," of unknown origin,
was used to describe weak, helpless prisoners doomed for
selection.] He broke into bitter tears.
"Morikus," he called out, using my old nickname. "I'm hungry,
I'm sick, I have no strength."
I spent several minutes trying to boost his spirits. Then I
returned to my quarters, took the 250 grams of black bread I
had been saving out of straw mattress and brought it to him.
My uncle thanked me and I promised to bring him more food.
Two days later, when I returned to my uncle's block, it was
empty. I realized that all of its inhabitants, the sick
prisoners, had been taken away for extermination. The last
remnant of my family had perished! My heart shrouded in
grief, I prayed to Hashem to spare me from the Valley of
Death, to leave me as a last survivor from our entire
family.
On one occasion, a prisoner from Salonika told me that one of
my acquaintances, who used to be on friendly terms with me,
needed my support and encouragement. The only way for me to
help him was by sending a letter, because his block was very
far away from ours. In my letter to him, I described the
hardships visited upon Am Yisroel throughout the
Diaspora, particularly the suffering of our forefathers in
Spain and Portugal during the Inquisition and their
expulsion. Yet in spite of everything HaKodosh Boruch Hu
matzileinu miyodom, "and with His help we will yet merit
release from the horrors of death."
The letter was intercepted. The SS searched the deliverer and
under their threats and blows he was forced to reveal who
wrote the letter.
Now I was in real trouble. Contact of any kind between
prisoners from different blocks was strictly prohibited. The
next morning I was summoned to Block 11 to receive my
punishment--25 blows. This block was infamous and every
prisoner was seized with dread upon just hearing its number.
Those sentenced to death for various transgressions were
taken out to the courtyard in front of it.
When my number was called I went into the room. In the
center, was a type of elongated wooden stand one meter long,
40 cm wide and 80 cm high, with a concave board on top. Two
Kapos stood off to the side, each with a rubber bat in
hand. They ordered me to bend down and lean against the
stand, then they proceeded to strike me in turn. Although the
25 blows landed at a rapid pace and the ordeal took less than
a minute, the pain was intense.
The punishment was over. Limping along, racked with pain, I
stepped out into the corridor. I could barely walk down the
stairs. Upon returning to the block I fell, exhausted, into
my bed. I could hardly comprehend that the next day I would
have to report for work. Thus, with all of the physical
strain, I continued working in the Kommando until all
work ceased and preparations to evacuate the camp began in
January 1945, as the Red Army began to draw near.
Friendship on the Death March
The days leading to the evacuation of Auschwitz were filled
with hope that soon the nightmare would be over. We could
clearly see that the SS men were getting nervous. The
condition of the Germany army was deteriorating from day to
day.
At the beginning of January, it was already clear that the
front was coming very close to the camp. Total disorder
reigned. The kitchen and the storehouses were broken into and
orderly food distribution had already broken down.
I, like many others, obtained clothing items from the
warehouses that stood wide open. I wore them underneath my
prisoners' uniform in the event that we were given an
opportunity to run away from the cursed Germans. I also took
a pair of high leather boots, an extremely important find
which allowed me to do away with my wooden shoes which made
walking very difficult.
During the second week of January, there were numerous
alerts, and we often heard the echoing boom of artillery
fire. Expectations of freedom reached their peak. But then we
were notified we would be evacuated from the camp. We were
also informed that parties had already begun to set out from
the auxiliary camps for unknown destinations.
The final evacuation of Auschwitz took place at the end of
January, in freezing weather. When the prisoners' census was
complete, an order was given to head out.
We set out with several thousand prisoners, accompanied by
about 200 Germans. Snow fell and a cold wind blew. Of course
we were not informed of our destination. The more time went
by, the louder the guards shouted at the prisoners stringing
out slowly at the end of the line. Periodically we heard
shots directed at prisoners straggling behind the ranks.
I marched with my friend Binio. Our thoughts focused on the
march. We spoke very little. At a certain stage, I sensed his
footsteps dragging, which opened a gap in the ranks. He told
me he was short of breath and unable to continue walking.
That was dangerous. I tried to persuade him to overcome the
difficulty, but to no avail. I took his gear and it appeared
to ease his effort.
We continued walking, but he started complaining again. His
condition got worse and worse. I was not surprised when he
told me he wanted to leave the ranks and sit down on the side
of the road. We knew what his decision meant. I threw down
the gear in my right hand and propped him up, helping him to
walk, but I soon felt I would not be able to continue
supporting him for long. I grew weary.
Then it came to me that the only chance of saving him would
be to put him onto one of the wagons. I went up to the first
group that came alongside me and proposed to its crew that
they allow my friend to sit in the wagon and in exchange I
would help push it. Only after much persuasion did they
consent. I continued marching behind without any strength,
nearly frozen from the cold. Without noticing, my hands fell
away from the wagon. My footsteps faltering, I began to drop
back.
The echoing shots announcing death had not ceased. I
shuddered at the thought that my friend had been taken down
from the wagon and left somewhere on the roadside. This
distressed me further and made walking more difficult. Only
towards midnight did we arrive at a large courtyard lined
with straw, intended for our overnight lodging.
At the crack of dawn, we were awakened and instructed to
prepare to continue the march. With difficulty, I managed to
stand on my swollen legs and to my surprise, there was my
friend Binio!
"You saved me," he said, embracing me with excitement and
appearing to have recovered his strength. Now we drew
encouragement from one another and continued the difficult
journey together.
Around noon, I felt short of breath and unable to continue.
This time it was Binio who propped me up and carried my
meager pack. When the Nazis made an offer for those not
feeling well to board the trucks I violated the unwritten
rule of, "never volunteer and never refuse," and quickly
climbed up. I couldn't have walked another step anyway.
Binio's eyes grew very sad. He must have thought they would
take us away to be killed. But after a half-hour ride we
reached the train station near the Polish-Czech border.
Years later when I went to visit the government-run museum at
Auschwitz, a worker there told me that our march had been 60
kilometers (37 miles) long! Thousands froze and starved to
death along the way.
The train took us to the Mauthausen camp in Austria and from
there to another camp called Melk and finally to Avenza.
The situation in these camps was more or less like what I
described in Auschwitz. I recall that at Avenza the hunger
was particularly difficult. We ate locomotive coals, which
were in abundance there. The coal tasted slightly sweet. It
was crunchy and easy to eat, and staved our hunger pangs. But
of course it was very hard on the body.
Soon my condition deteriorated drastically. My whole body was
swollen, particularly my legs. Pressing any of the swollen
spots would leave a deep concave impression for a long time.
By observing other prisoners I realized that my condition was
the worst of all -- and fatal.
But chasdei Shomayim did not leave me. Since our
arrival at Avenza, rumors had spread of the severe defeats
the Germans were suffering on all fronts.
On May 1st, we did not go out to work and news that Hitler
had been killed spread quickly. On that same day, when the
afternoon soup was distributed, the man in charge of the
block announced that every prisoner would receive a pack of
cigarettes owed to us from some past debt. For me this was a
gift from Shomayim. I immediately exchanged my pack of
cigarettes for food, which I badly needed.
We didn't go to work for the next two days. On Tuesday, a
prisoner appeared in our hut and from the way he looked we
could tell he was among the camp's VIPs. Speaking very
briefly, the man said that during the muster role soon to
take place with the camp Commandant, he would almost
certainly offer to take us to nearby tunnels as protection
against Allied shelling or aerial attacks. Emphasizing every
word the prisoner said, "You must tell them you refuse!" Then
he left the hut.
And indeed, when the Nazi commandant offered to bring us into
the tunnels we refused, shouting, "We don't want to go! We
don't want to go!" Without saying a word, the rosho
and the soldiers surrounding us turned and left.
A display of joy broke out among us. It was hard to believe
we had actually refused to obey an order by an SS man--not
just any SS man but an officer who had supreme control in the
camp--without punishment.
The next night, I awoke to the sound of loud explosions. It
did not sound like the thundering artillery fire or the
aerial bombing that we had been hearing over the past two
days.
Alarmed, I ran outside along with the other prisoners. From
where I was standing, I could see flashes accompanied by
echoing explosions coming from the mountain slopes near the
camp -- the same mountains where the tunnels were located!
Obviously the explosions were taking place inside the tunnels
themselves. Although they knew--or because they knew--
that Germany's fate was sealed they still plotted to kill
us.
Freedom at Long Last
On the morning of May 6, 1945 there was great tension in the
camp. Everybody went outside. The weather was nice and the
sun, peeping out from behind the clouds periodically, not
only warmed my body but also shone rays of hope.
Around noon, three tanks rolled through the open camp
gate.
"The Americans! The Americans are here!"
Excited voices traveled from one to the next as a crowd
gathered. There was a spontaneous outburst of genuine
happiness. A powerful surge of hundreds of prisoners streamed
toward the tanks, shouting with joy and waving their arms.
Some ran while others walked, some limped while others
trudged along heavily. Everybody yearned for freedom.
On the antenna of one of the tanks I saw a small Greek flag.
It turned out one of the members of the tank crew was a US
soldier of Greek origin. Numerous Greeks, including myself,
gathered around him. We spoke in Greek, laughed, breathed in
freedom.
During the first days after our liberation by the US Army,
large quantities of food flowed into the camp and were
distributed without limitations. The people descended on the
food, but uncontrolled eating had grave consequences,
apparently unforeseen by the new camp authorities.
Approximately 1,000 prisoners died during the first three
days after being liberated. The Americans quickly reduced the
rations and altered the menu to dairy foods and
vegetables.
I was suffering from severe dysentery and did not leave my
bed at all. My block-mates pleaded with me to check into the
hospital, but I adamantly refused, apparently due to
subconscious fears lingering from my recent past. But an
American doctor came to me, gave me various types of
medications and soon I was on the road to recovery.
After being liberated, the camp residents began to visit the
town of Avenza. I did not join them because of my fatigue,
but I know that on one occasion, the American authorities
forced a group of Avenza residents to tour the camp to show
them the atrocities committed by the Nazis.
The people of the town innocently claimed they knew nothing
of all this. We knew they were lying. The camp was very close
to the town and there was no way for them not to see the
prison Kommandos walking down their dirt roads every
day on the way to and from work.
The Americans gave the residents of the town the task of
burying those who died during the first few days after the
camp's liberation. Cleaning work around the camp was
performed by German captives.
We, the survivors from Greece, congregated in two huts. We
began to discuss returning to Greece. The question of which
route we would take was raised. The Communists in the group
wanted to return via Yugoslavia, while their opponents
favored traveling through Italy. The argument was not settled
and eventually we divided into two groups. I was among the
several dozen--all Jewish--who preferred to return via
Italy.
We left blood-drenched Avenza at the end of June 1945, in the
morning, riding on trucks to Italy. From there we were
supposed to travel to Greece.
On the way, we saw military trucks bearing a Mogen Dovid
insignia. The soldiers riding them also wore the emblem on
their sleeves. At one of the stops we conferred with one
another and they introduced themselves as Jews from Eretz
Yisroel serving in the British army (the Jewish Brigade). We
spoke to the soldiers in Hebrew using what we knew from our
talmud Torah days.
Arriving in a town in Northern Italy, we were lodged in a
large building.
Several Jewish soldiers came out to meet us. What was there
for us to do in Greece? Who would we find there, after all
our family members had perished? A civil war was raging in
Greece, they said, and upon our return we would be drafted
straight into the army. They suggested we make
aliyah.
Twenty-five members of our group, including myself, decided
to go to Eretz Yisroel. The soldiers transported us to a town
in Southern Italy, where we stayed in a villa. In the area
were several other towns where concentration camp survivors
had gathered.
The course of events leading to the moment I first set foot
in Eretz Yisroel is another story, which I believe warrants a
separate article. I will say only that in August 1945, our
group was united with groups from Eastern Europe totaling
about 150 people. Some eight months later, we traveled to
Rome, where we waited for two whole months until we were
taken to a remote beach and at daybreak boarded an illegal
immigrant boat. Despite the difficult conditions and crowding
on board, we were glad to have set sail.
Seven days later, a British navy destroyer took over the boat
near Cyprus. We were towed to Haifa and from there we were
taken by bus to Atlit. Only on July 17th, 1946, were we
released from the camp and finally merited freedom in the
long-awaited Eretz Yisroel.
Part III
Part I discussed what is known about the very early times
of Salonika. It is thought that a community existed there
during the time of the Second Beis Hamikdash. Various groups
arrived over the centuries, but the pivotal point was the
settlement of 15,000-20,000 Spanish (Sephardic) Jews after
1492.
The second part discussed the impact of the Spanish
Expulsion on the community in Salonika, which was very great.
About 20,000 Spanish exiles settled in Salonika, establishing
Salonika after it had been destroyed by Turkish conquest, and
establishing Jewish Salonika. In 1519, there were more Jews
than Christians and Muslims combined. For more than two
hundred years, Jews from all over the world came to live in
Salonika.
*
Ottoman files record 16 Jewish neighborhoods since the
beginning of the 16th century.
The Jews separated into autonomous communities, according to
their place of origin. The center of each community was the
synagogue. In fact, it was not only a religious and
administrative center, but also an indication of the tendency
of each group of immigrants to preserve its individuality and
autonomy with respect to each other.
As time went on, the communities came closer together. This
unifying trend became evident in the joint establishment of
the "Talmud Torah HaGadol" synagogue-school, in 1520.
From 1515 and onwards, the Ottoman State bought all its army
uniforms from Jewish textile manufacturers in Thessaloniki.
The synagogues themselves produced clothing, employing their
poor members as workers. The profits from these businesses
were used for charitable and educational institutions.
In 1568, a community delegation to Constantinople, under the
leadership of Moshe Almosnino, succeeded in securing a new
Sultan edict, reconfirming all the written privileges that
were initially granted by Suleiman the Magnificent but were
burned during a fire in 1545. Thereafter, the Jewish
Community of Thessaloniki was treated as "Musselnik," i.e. an
autonomous administrative unit, reporting directly to the
Sublime Porte. It also secured the right to acquire raw
materials at prices lower than market prices.
Thus the Jews of Thessaloniki enjoyed a period of prosperity
that continued until the beginning of the 17th century, when
the discovery of the new sea routes, the decline of Venice,
and the involvement of the Ottoman Empire in destructive
military campaigns brought ruin to Thessaloniki.
Shabbetai Tzvi ym"sh appeared in 1655 in Thessaloniki,
declaring himself to be the Messiah. The Turkish
authorities arrested him and condemned him to death in 1666,
and he converted to Islam and was spared. Around 300 families
followed him even into apostasy. They and their descendants
came to be known as "Donmeh."
This group defection shook the community. Around 1680, the
small independent communities formally united under the
leadership of a single council comprised of three rabbis and
seven lay members.
Around the middle of the 19th century, the destructive ideas
of the Haskalah movement reached Thessaloniki. Also,
for the first time, some civil rights were granted to all non-
Muslim constituents of the Empire.
The city was modernized. Part of the Byzantine fortifications
were torn down in 1869. Narrow streets were widened, fresh
running water was introduced along with electricity. The
streetcar, as well as the railroad, connected Thessaloniki
with Constantinople to the East and Europe to the West, from
1870. In 1854, the first modern industrial complex was
created: the Allantini flour mill, owned by the Allantini
family, Jewish immigrants from Italy. Jews owned 38 of 54
commercial enterprises in the city and were the overwhelming
majority of the workforce.
At the end of the 19th century, Thessaloniki had more than
70,000 Jewish souls, who were about half of the total
population.
Thousands of refugees from the pogroms in Czarist Russia came
towards the end of the 19th century, at about the same time
as more than a million emigrated to America.
Twentieth Century
In 1908, the secular "Young Turks" launched their coup in
Turkey from Thessaloniki. Using the city as their base, they
overthrew Sultan Abdul Hamit II.
Following the Young Turk revolution, the Zionist movement
surfaced in Thessaloniki. It had first appeared in the city
in 1899, but it then operated under the cover of societies
which had as their stated purpose the dissemination of the
Hebrew language -- that is, a cultural, nonpolitical goal.
Around 1909, the Socialist Workers' Federation was born. It
was independent until 1918, when it merged with other Greek
leftist organizations to form the Socialist Workers' Party of
Greece.
On October 26, 1913, Thessaloniki was incorporated into the
Greek state. The jewish community leaders were immediately
received by King George I, who promised full equality for the
Jews, a promise subsequently reconfirmed and proven in
practice.
The great fire of August 1917 was a particularly severe blow,
from which the community was never able to fully recover:
53,737 Jews were rendered homeless and many buildings were
destroyed, including the community administrative offices,
those of the Chief Rabbinate and of various welfare
institutions -- as well as thirty synagogues and eleven
schools.
As a consequence, many Jews were forced to emigrate during
the inter-war period. Nevertheless, the community numbered
more than 50,000 souls on the eve of World War II. The Jews
of Thessaloniki fulfilled their duty to the Greek motherland
during the 1940-1941 war: 12,898 Jews served in the armed
forces (343 officers among them). Their losses were 513 dead
and 3,743 wounded.
The occupation of Greece by the Axis forces marked the
beginning of the end. The Germans entered Thessaloniki on
April 9, 1941. A few days later Jews were banned from public
shops. The Germans imprisoned the members of the Community
Council, occupied the Hirsch hospital as well as many Jewish-
owned houses, and looted the community offices and the
richest Jewish libraries.
On July 11, 1942, all Jewish men aged 18 to 45 in
Thessaloniki were ordered to report to Liberty Square. There,
after being subjected to indescribable humiliations, they
were taken away for forced labor. The community had to pay
the huge sum of 2.5 billion drachmas to the Germans, in order
to set them free. By the end of the year, the Germans
confiscated Jewish enterprises and desecrated and destroyed
the immense, 2,000-year-old Jewish cemetery of the city.
On February 6, 1943, an SD committee (Sicherbeitsdienst-
security service of the German Reich) arrived in
Thessaloniki. It was headed by SS-Hauptstrumfurer Dieter
Wisliceny and SS-Oberstrumfuer Alois Brunner (SS captain and
first lieutenant).
They put in motion the mechanism for the final annihilation
of the Jews: they were forced to wear the yellow Star of
David, according to the Nuremberg Laws of 1935, and to live
only in designated neighborhoods (ghettos). The use of public
telephones and transportation was prohibited.
However, they disguised their true intentions and claimed
that their goal was the restructuring of the community into a
self-administered entity, located in an autonomous area
within the city, with its own mayor and Chamber of
Commerce.
On March 6, 1943, the German occupying authorities prohibited
the exit of the Jews from the ghetto. From the Baron Hirsch
neighborhood, the human herds were delivered for slaughter.
The first rail convoy departed on March 15 for the
extermination camp of Auschwitz/Birkenau. Consecutive convoys
every few days carried, in a few weeks time, the Jews of
Thessaloniki, piled in rail cars designed for cattle, to
their place of extermination.
It is worth noting that the Church (this is the Eastern
Orthodox Church, headquartered in Constantinople, not the
Catholic Church, headquartered in Rome), the National
Resistance movement, and the State Police set an example,
followed by ordinary people, of offering help and shelter
whenever possible, revolting in horror at the crime being
committed. The Chief of Metropolitan Police, Angelos Evert,
issued thousands of false identity cards to Jews, helping
them to evade the Nazis.
An official letter of protest signed in Athens on March 23,
1943 by Archbishop Damaskinos, along with 27 prominent
leaders of cultural, academic and professional organizations,
refers to unbreakable bonds between Christian Orthodox and
Jews. It is noteworthy that such a document is unique in the
whole of occupied Europe, in character, content and
purpose.
Of 46,091 Jews who were deported to the extermination camps,
only 1,950 returned alive.
Today, half a century after the irrevocable disaster, the
Thessaloniki community numbers no more than 1,200 Jewish
souls. The community still maintains two synagogues, a
communal center hosting recreational, religious, literary and
artistic events, a primary school, an old-age home, a museum,
and a summer youth camp. The community is still prominent in
the financial, social and cultural life of the city.
The Jewish Community of Thessaloniki is a legal entity under
Public Law, under the jurisdiction of the Ministries of
Education and Religion.
Since 1979, the Jewish Community of Thessaloniki has been
operating a six-year primary school and nursery, attended by
about 80 children. In addition to the national curriculum,
Hebrew, English and French are taught, as well as Jewish
Religion and History. The nursery admits children from the
age of three-and-a-half.
This historical account is based on material from the
Jewish Community of Thessaloniki and the Foundation for the
Advancement of Sephardic Studies and Culture. It is being
used with permission.
A little known story of the heroism of the Jews of Salonika
came to light almost 30 years ago. The information was
reported in the Jerusalem Post (January 29, 1975) and
R' Yisroel Taub of England, who was also in Auschwitz, was
kind enough to call it to our attention.
The information is based on the work of Mrs. Danuta Czech, a
Polish historian who compiled a day-to-day record of events
at Auschwitz.
According to her reports, on July 21, 1944, an assistant of
the infamous Josef Mengele selected 434 "young and healthy"
Jews to be sent to work at the crematoria. Of these, 400 were
chosen to work on the Sonderkommando unit, whose
duties were to bring incoming victims to the gas chambers,
which were designed to look like showers. The
Sonderkommando were to lie to the victims and tell
them that they were going to wash, so that they would
cooperate. After the gassing, the Sonderkommando moved
the bodies to the crematoria.
Many of the inmates from Salonika had been port workers. It
is well-known that the Salonika ports were shomer
Shabbos for many years.
Many groups of Jews were chosen for this ugly task. They
generally worked for about a month, when they were gassed
themselves.
According to the German documents found by Mrs. Czech, all
400 Salonika men refused to join the Sonderkommando.
They were gassed the next day.
R' Taub, who spend eight months at Auschwitz, said that he
met a bochur from Salonika who was an impressive
lamdan. He of course did not speak Yiddish, but
loshon hakodesh. R' Taub said that most Jews knew
either German or Yiddish, but not the Yidden from
Salonika, who were the only Sephardic community to have been
taken by the Nazis for extermination. The German soldiers
used to get angry at the Salonika inmates when they did not
understand their orders.
R' Taub said that from his experience, this mass refusal of
the Salonikan Jews to do the Germans' dirty work is very
unique.
Hashem Yikom Domom.
| |||
| All material
on this site is copyrighted and its use is restricted. |
||||