AJC Remembers

75 years after the end of WWII, three generations share their families’s Holocaust stories at AJC Virtual Global Forum 2020.

To mark the 75th anniversary of the end of the Shoah, survivors, their children, and grandchildren hoped to explore a new chapter with Germany at AJC Global Forum 2020 in Berlin. Despite the forced cancellation of the in-person conference in Berlin, due to COVID-19, these AJC leaders and staff shared their poignant reflections on why they fight to end antisemitism and protect Israel. Each moving testimony framed a program during AJC Virtual Global Forum, reminding us that regardless of AJC’s progress in Germany over 75 years, we must never forget the past.

AJC Remembers
Eric Adamson: ‘A life my grandfather was denied’
Taunted by classmates and expelled from school for being Jewish, Eric Adamson’s grandfather escaped on the Kindertransport to England. He later helped the Allied Forces liberate the Mauthausen concentration camp. Adamson shares how he works for AJC Berlin “to ensure that Jewish life has a vibrant future in Germany and Europe – a life my grandfather was denied.”
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AJC Remembers
Baron Dr. Julian Klener: ‘Never again is not a certainty’
As a child, Baron Dr. Julian Klener was forced to separate from his family in Brussels, and live
two blocks from where his parents, who were also hiding from the Nazis. “Never again is not a
certainty,” he said, “but it is surely an obligation.” He explains how his son, granddaughters, and
great-granddaughter are his form of Jewish continuity.
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AJC Remembers
Harriet Schleifer: ‘Ensuring Jewish identity can thrive’
Harriet Schleifer’s parents lost most of their relatives in the Treblinka extermination camp and raised their daughters to have a strong Jewish identity. She reveals why she works to ensure Jewish identity can thrive around the world. “I always strived to fill the hole in my parents’ lives … that they would never again be victims or feel fear.”
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AJC Remembers
Steve Zelkowitz: ‘I cannot and will not be a bystander’
Steve Zelkowitz lost grandparents, six aunts and uncles, and first cousins whose names he will never know in the Holocaust. He explains why he “cannot and will not be a bystander while antisemitism grows in Europe, the United States, and elsewhere.”
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AJC Remembers
Edith Chaifetz: ‘Memories haunt me’
As a child, Edith Chaifetz eavesdropped on her parents as they described horrors of the Holocaust. She shares why “those memories haunt me to this day,” and why she’s devoted to the imperatives of fighting antisemitism and preserving both Israel and sacred memories.
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AJC Remembers
Belle Etra Yoeli: ‘Center of my Jewish identity’
Belle Etra Yoeli’s grandmother was born in Thessaloniki, Greece, where more than 95% of the Jewish population was murdered by Nazis. Her grandfather, whose family was also murdered during the shoah, served in the British army as a doctor. Yoeli shares how her grandparents’ story forms the center of her Jewish identity and her missions to protect the memory of the Holocaust and build “a bright Jewish future.”
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AJC Remembers
Beverly Block Rosenbaum: ‘I am a proud Jew’
When Beverly Block Rosenbaum’s mother was told by a Nazi officer that she was “too pretty to be a Jew,” she bravely replied: “I am a Jew and I’m proud of it,” and, remarkably, survived. Rosenbaum shares her mother's story and how it shaped her identity. “Like my mother on the Nazi selection line I will never be afraid to say I am a proud Jew.”
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AJC Remembers
Adam Hall: ‘Never again is not just a slogan’
Adam Hall’s paternal grandfather smuggled his family through the sewers after the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising to survive the Nazis. After a series of truly remarkable events, the family immigrated to the U.S. where Hall’s father resolved to never again be a victim. “Never again is not just a slogan,” Hall said. “It’s a way of life.”
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AJC Remembers
Ruth Krall: ‘Family that never had a chance’
Ruth Krall’s earliest childhood memory is of her father searching for the family he lost after he
immigrated to the U.S. His 44 relatives in Poland were likely burned inside a synagogue. Krall
calculates how many cousins she might have by now and shares how “the family that never had
a chance” inspires her to fight antisemitism and nurture a growing family.
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AJC Remembers
Fred Strober: ‘A better future for all of us’
Fred Strober’s father was part of the U.S. Army unit that helped liberate a slave labor camp where Nazis imprisoned Jews and Roma. But his father did not speak of the horrors he saw there until 40 years later, before Fred took a trip to Auschwitz. Fred explains that he is attending AJC Virtual Global Forum 2020 in honor of those who bore witness, like his father, and to make “a better future for all of us.”
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AJC Remembers
Bini Guttman: ‘Fight for what’s right’
Through a series of miracles and the benevolence of righteous gentiles, all of Bini Guttman’s grandparents survived the Shoah. They lived long enough to teach him that “Never again” is not an empty phrase. “It means you fight for what’s right.” Now president of the European Union of Jewish Students, Guttman knows while life may not always be easy for Jews in Europe, “we have won.”
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AJC Virtual Global Forum 2020