THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
2 Friday, April 1, 1977
Purely Commentary
Passover is the Season to Recall Herosim of Jewish
Fighters for Justice and Self-Respect.. .It is the
Occasion to Recall and Honor Memory of the Martyred
Passover: Recalling the Warsaw Ghetto Heroism,
Marking Memorial Day for Services of'Yad Vashem
Passover is much more than a festival for the enjoyment of the freedoms attained
by celebrants and mankind. It is a season marked by historic events that are inerasable
from memory.
It is the anniversary of an heroic period in the story of resistance to tyranny and
oppression. On the calendar of the year 1943 the Passover embedded into the pages of
history the heroism of the fighters in the Warsaw Ghetto who, against great odds, chal-
lenged the Nazi forces and refused to submit to the death threats from Hitler's armed
forces. That chapter will never be surpassed in human endeavor for freedom and for
determination by a small group of liberty-lovers to defy what was then the strongest of
the world's armies.
Perhaps the Warsaw Ghetto Revolt served as an inspiration to the Allies. Surely, it
symbolized the growing resistance among Jews who had already been doomed to death
but who kept holding fast to the will to live.
Therefore Passover, as the Feast of Freedom, the occasion of rejoicing over the lib-
erties that reject slavery, also has become a season for memorializing the dead, the
victims of the Holocaust, the martyrs who perished so that the generations to come may
live in freedom.
The National Day of Mourning in Israel also occurs at this time of the year. The
date was chosen to correspond with the observance of Yomi Ha'Atzrhaut, the Israel Inde-
pendence Day. While marking liberation of the people of Israel, also recall the
Holocaust -and therefore' pay tribute to the memory of the, martyred.
A National Day of Mourning observed in Israel thus becomes an occasion for sim-
ilar tributes to the heroes and martyrs by Jewish communities throughout the world.
The occasion, therefore, provides an opportunity to express gratitude to a symbol
that has become a movement of great significance in Jewish life. The symbol is the Yad
Vashem in Jerusalem where the record of Nazi brutalities is retained for the entire
world to know the facts and for the Holocaust not to be forgotten. This is a way of pre-
venting the recurrence of the Nazi horrors.
The Yad Vashem has assumed great significance for world Jewry. A brief analysis
of its status and aims needs to be retold, in the words of the Yad Vashem supervisors:
According to the Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Law, Yad Vash-
em is to "commemorate the six million members of the Jewish people who
died a martyr's death at the hands of the Nazis and their collaborators. . .to
gather in to the homeland material regarding all those members of the Jew-
ish people who laid down their lives. . .to confer upon the members of the
Jewish people who perished in the days of the disaster and the resistance
the commemorative citizenship of the state of Israel, as a token of their hav-
ing been gathered to their people."
In order to fulfill this task, Yad Vashem undertook to record the names
of all the Jews who perished at the hands of the Nazis during the Holocaust.
The registration was done by relatives or friends of the victims who filled
out "pages of testimony," which contained all the pertinent biographical in-
formation on the individual and the circumstances of his or her death.
Here is a reproduction of a Page of Testimony from the Hall of Names in the Yad
Vashem memorial halls:
YAD VASHE DA•ED
Madre aid Heroes'
Remembrance
Authority
A Page of Testimony
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6.61
THE ISLAITYILY AND HEWES ItENIENIINANCE LAW. 3713-1953
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walls a place and a name that shall not be cut of f '" ,.,.....,s
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This page serves as de-
fiance of those who would
even now. revive the Nazi
terror. A few, among many
nations, have begun to
spread the word that the
Six Million are a myth, that
Jews are lying about the
Germans, that Hitler was
not a mass killer.
The two and a half mil-
lion names of the martyrs
are the partial evidence of
what had happened under
Nazism, with silence from
the German people, with
failure by the civilized
world to take into account
the brutalities against Jews
which soon became a threat
of a worldwide Holocaust
for all nations.
Tribute to the memory of
the heroes who battled
against the Nazi hordes and
set new standards for Mac-
cabean valor have become
narked by obligations on
the Jewries of the world.
Whatever memories are re-
tained indicate the self-re-
spect of the Jewries of the
world who do not forget the
courage of those who would
not submit to indignities...
Let there be endless joy
on Passover! Let there also
be a retention of the memo-
ry of those who helped
make liberty the most sa-
cred of all aspirations by
Jews and all mankind.
By Philip
Slomovitz
UN Isaiah Wall No Longer Secretive
A Copyrighted Seven Arts
Features Syndicate Article
Passover is a season for libertarianism and a time to remember courageous adhe-
rents to principles of fair play and justice. Many names of the courageous who fought„—
for principles of justice are lost to historic records. The archives devoted to chronicling
the seekers of justice are not complete. At least one such name must be preserved in
the records of justice-seekers.
Sam Brown is a social worker. For some 20 years he directed American Jewish Con-
gress activities in Michigan, Ohio, Illinois and Wisconsin. Then he returned to New York
for a hobby that became his labor of love: to encourage domestic tourism devoted espe-
cially to the New York Metropolis. He became an authority on every conceivable histor-
ic site in the great city. Part of the process was to include the United Nations Building
in his itinerary, with the Wall of Isaiah as a major attraction. That's how his attention
was called to a form of secrecy which forced the origin of the inscription on that wall
into anonymity.
Indeed, the inscription was on a site labeled Isaiah Wall and it displayed prominen-
tly the declaration:
"THEY SHALL BEAT THEIR SWORDS INTO PLOWSHARES AND
THEIR SPEARS INTO PRUNING HOOKS. NATION SHALL NOT LIFT UP
SWORD AGAINST NATION, NEITHER SHALL THEY LEARN WAR ANY
MORE."
But the source was not given. Was it taken for granted either that people knew or
that they could do research for themselves to trace the source?
All other inscriptions at the United Nations were identified, whether they were
American or Russian or Chinese. The Hebraic was left in anonymity.
It became a challenge to Sam Brown to have the injustice corrected. He viewed it
as unfair to the Jewish community and to the historic aspects of the United Nations that
this great Message for Peace should be unaccounted for as to the Prophetic Origin. He
also viewed it as unfair to the hospitality of the United States and to the City of New
York and its 2,000,000 Jewish citizens that Isaiah should he taken for granted. He began
his campaign for a correction of an injustice. Actually, he was not the first to seek
redress for an error. He had begun his campaign in 1974, but in 1972 the UN correspond-
ent for World Union Press and a number of English-Jewish newspapers, David Horo-
witz, had written to the then Mayor John Lindsay of New York urging a correction. Lind-
say was sympathetic but replied that the matter rested with the New York City Plan-
ning Commission, and the issue was dropped until Sam Brown stepped in to make it a
one-man task to correct an injustice.
As advised, Brown went to the Planning Commission. Then he was-told it is the con-.
cern of the New. York Art Commission. He went there, corresponded with numerous offi-
cials, finally was told that it was a matter of expense and New York City didn't have'
the funds for the addition of the missing line:
ISAIAH 2:4
'And He shall judge between the
nations,
And shall decide for many peoples;
And they shall beat their swords
into plowshares,
And their spears into pruning-hooks;
Nation shall not lift up sword •
against nation,
Neither shall they learn war any
more.
One of the New York City officials even condoned the elimination of the source, im
plying that it gave people an opportunity to study the Prophets on their own, but he, too,
was sympathetic to Sam Brown's mission.
Unable to get action from any of the New York City commissions or offiCials,
Brown also communicated with Mayor Abraham B.eame. Again, the same result: sympa-
thy, with a concession that he was right, but the great City of New York was-financially
unable to pay for a vitally needed correction to a grave error.
Finally the question of cost was submitted to bidding and A. Ottavino Corp. Granite
undertook to inscribing the added line for $650. Sam Brown gave the first $50 and the
balance was raised quickly.
A four-year battle for a correction on the UN amphitheater Wall of Isaiah ended in
triumph. It was celebrated at the Isaiah Wall Dec. 7, 1975. National leaders sent their
congratulations to Brown. Israel's UN Ambassador Chaim Herzog commended him. Pre-
sent at the ceremony were only Rabbi Irving J. Block, Rabbi David J. Mathew Dore of
the Ethiopian Jewish Congregation of Harlem and Joseph Patrick Bresnan, director of
historic parks and monuments.
Brown and Horowitz were at the ceremony. But the glory of a great achievement
goes to Sam Brown. He is presently coordinator of activities to integrate 250 newcomers
from Russia into the Miami, Fla., Jewish community. He is a loyalist in making the
hobby of encouraging American Jews to become acquanted with historic sites in this
country. He has helped restore dignity, to one of the major such sites, the UN Isaiah
Wall.