64 Friday, August 24, 1919 THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS Hebron: 50 Years Since Frenzied Arabs Killed Jewish Residents o By SHOLOM MORGAN World Zionist Organization JERUSALEM — Hebron, reputed to be one of the old- est cities in the world, played a vital role in the early history of the Israel- ites. It was the residence of the biblical patriarchs, and King David's capital before he took Jerusalem. From the time of the return from Babylon and up to the Crusades, there seems to have been a Jewish presence in Hebron. At the end of the last century Jews made up some 10 percent of the population. Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and their wives Sarah, Rebecca and Leah are buried in the cave of Machpela in Hebron and the Talmud says it was the last resting place of Adam and Eve. Access to the traditional site of the cave, a most sac- red shrine (also to Muslims and Christians), was denied to Jewish pilgrims from 1948 to 1967, until it was occupied by Israeli soldiers. The town of Kiryat Arba (an alternative name for Heb- ron in ancient times) was established near Hebron in 1968. This month marks the 50th anniversary of the 1929 Arab riots, in which the Jewish community of Hebron was killed or dis- persed. The story of the massacre makes grim reading. In the summer of 1929, there had been Arab' riots against Jews in other parts of Pales- tine. No one is certain just what precipitated them: speculation is that broken promises to the Arabs by British Mandate author- ities were largely responsi- ble. Unlike many parts of Palestine, Hebron at that time was composed of a heterogeneous group of Jews consisting of Ashkenazim, Sephardim, Chabad, as well as many yeshivot, including the world-famous Slobodka Yeshiva, in which many foreign students studied. Shortly before the mas- sacre, several sympathetic Arabs warned the Jews of Hebron that riots could break out at any time. They cautioned the Jews to be particularly careful after Moslem religious services on Friday night, the 18th of Av, when the Arabs were exhorted by the Koran dur- ing their prayers to wage a "holy war" against enemies. A few Jewish residents heeded the warning and left Hebron; most simply ig- nored it. One man who did not ignore the warning was the vice mayor and only Jewish member of the Hebron Municipal Com- mittee, Mr. Slonin. The Slonin family was well- respected in the commu- nity for their philan- thropy. Slonin was also the founder and owner of the Anglo-Jewish Bank, the forerunner to Bank Leumi. Taking the warning seri- ously, Slonin contacted British Mandate suthorities iiw4eggwI rior• Shown are the new markers which were corn- memorated this month o ver the graves of the Jewish victims of the 1929 Arab riots in Hebron. to express his concern for and one of his two daugh- the safety of Hebron's Jews. ters were ruthlessly kil- They reassured Slonin that led, along with 15 others the Jews would be protected who sought refuge in and told him not to worry. what they believed to be Slonin and the Jews of the safest place in Heb- Hebron probably slept well ron. that Friday night. Little did The band of a few they realize that when they would arise the next morn- hundred Arabs then turned ing, they would be seeing its fury toward Beit Hadas- sah. Part of the out-patient their last sunrise. Early Saturday morning, clinic was a pharmacy an Arab from Jerusalem owned by Shlomo Gershon, ran through the streets of who dispensed free drugs to indigent Arabs and Jews. Hebron proclaiming that Gershon's eyes were gouged the Jews of Jerusalem had out and he was tortured to just murdered all the Arabs of the Holy City. From that death as his eight-year-old daughter watched from her moment on, the genocide hiding place under a bed. and terror began. Another Jewish man was Angry Arab mobs armed with sticks and brutally murdered at an unknown location when the knives first invaded the gang held his face against a house of Slonin, the one lit bunsen burner. man most people be- lieved would not be (The occupation of Beit harmed. Slonin, his wife Hadassah by 37 women and Korczak Memoirs Published in English NEW YORK — Most Jewish commentators see Dr. Janusz Korczak as an "ish gadol," a hero of the people, for in a sense, deeds speak louder than words. On Aug. 5, 1942, Dr. Korczak, then 64 and in poor health, and his assis- tant, Stefania Wilczynska, accompanied 200 orphan children and personnel from their Jewish orphanage in the Warsaw Ghetto to the Nazi concentration camp in Treblinka, where they were all exterminated. But Polish commentators — at a recent symposium at the Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences in America, New York — recall the "Old Doctor" as the author of more than 20 volumes of short stories, novels, dramas (mainly about chil- dren), radio talks, and his career as a physician, philosopher, pedagogue, with an ability to communi- cate with children in simple language about painful, complex problems. His spe- cial ability is documented in "The Warsaw Ghetto Memoirs of Janusz Korczak (University Press of America). Recipient of the German Book Trade Peace Prize in 1972, he was honored by UNESCO, which pro- claimed 1978 as "Janusz Korczak Year" — a fitting prelude to the international observance of 1979 as the International Year of the Child. In a life of selfless dedi- cation to others, chil- dren's rights occupied most of Dr. Korczak's time and writings. He fought against physical and psychological abuse, against molding children according to state, reli- gious or social class interests — rights still not fully secured in East European countries which honored him in 1978 when a bust of Korczak was unveiled in Treblinka. His "Memoirs" were writ- where 100,000 Jews perished from hunger and disease alone. Under these conditions Korczak worked to create some semblance of a toler- able environment. School- ing, work assignments, children's court, games, di- versions, and even a news- paper functioned in the face of sickness and fright. At night, surrounded by his sleeping children, he would write trying to find some reason for all this madnes -§. Toward the end, de- spair, hopelessness, and JANUSZ KORCZAK a presentiment of the ten in the last year of final tragedy facing his Korczak's life and under the orphans crept into his most unfavorable condi- notes. They became more tions for himself and for his brief, more cryptic and orphans. evasive — the inevitable He was director of an or- was drawing near. The phanage housing some 200 last entry begins: "I am children, age 5-17, in the watering my flowers ..." Jewish ghetto. Terror, re- When it became apparent prisals, starvation, round- that the end was in sight, ups, on-the-spot executions, friends made plans for beatings, lockups, forced Korczak's escape: But he labor — these were daily preferred to remain with his conditions in the ghetto, children. Korczak's "Memoirs," ex- cellently translated and annotated by E.P. Kulawiec of George Washington Uni- versity, with pertinent background notes, offer more than just a brief in- sight into those final terri- ble days. It also is a docu- ment which reveals the rare human being Janusz Korczak was. children from Kiryat Arb a Recent press reports indi- to stress Jewish rights i n eating that the original Hebron, as well as in thei ✓ gravesites of the 1929 mar- own nearby town, mad e tyrs were recently dis- headlines some thre e covered by the military gov- months ago. The old build - ernment are totally inaccu- ing had served as a combi rate, according to Yigal nation synagogue, Talmu d Klein, Hebron tour guide Torah and clinic.) and expert on Hebron Kis- Where were the Britis h tory. Klein said Prof. Ben Mandate authorities dur - Tziyon Tavger, a physicist ing the carnage? Nor - from ...the USSR, found mally, British police car stones of the graves while ried guns and ammuni digging on his own in mid- tion to protect them - 1975. He was assisted by selves and residents. Bu t Rabbi Zalmon Kore on that fateful Saturda y possessed burial rem f morning, only one British the period recorded by he policeman could be seen burial society. — carrying a baton. The town of Kiryat Two yeshiva students , Arba recently com- whose colleagues' bodies lay memorated the 50th an- mutilated on the floor , niversary of the mas- managed to escape. One was sacre (Aug. 12). Cere- murdered by a pursuing monies included an ex- Arab gang, but the other hibition of 4,000 years of managed to approach the Hebron history, dating policeman w ith a back from the time of Ab- passionate plea for assis- raham; the unveiling of tance. The policeman re- the graves of the martyrs sponded that since he had in the old Jewish no weapons, there was noth- graveyard in Hebron; ing he could do. Oddly tours of the original enough, the terror, which Jewish community sites began at 9 a.m., abruptly in Hebron; and the com- ended at noon when the pletion of the writing of a policeman mysteriously Torah scroll in memory found his weapon and fired of the victims. one shot into the air to dis- The ceremonies recalled perse and angry Arab mob one of the bloodiest episodes that was approaching him. in the history of Arab at- It was the only shot fired ,tempts to crush the Jewish that day. return to Zion by crude When it was all over, 58 force. Jews lay dead, their muti- — Fifty years after the mas- lated bodies left for burial sacre, the great question is: by the Hebron Burial Will the next half-century Society. Nine others suc- see Jews and Arabs living cumbed either en route or in together in peace in Hebron Jerusalem hospitals and 60 and in the whole of Eretz were wounded. Yisrael? Prison Camp Experience Leads to Holocaust Project ALBANY, N.Y. (JTA) — Dr. Fred Crawford's experi- ence as a non-Jew in a Nazi prison camp in 1944 has led to a unique "Witness to the Holocaust" project at Emory University's Center for Re- search in Social Change in Atlanta, Ga. Now director of the Emory Center and a profes- sor of sociology, Crawford left high school and enlisted during World War II. When his fighter plane was shot down over Hungary, a Nazi-inspired mob thought he was a Jew and almost lynched him, he told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. He was beaten, dragged to the nearest poplar and had a noose placed around his neck. At that moment, his dog tab flopped outside of his shirt and the crowd noticed that a small gold cross was attached to it. De-' ciding that perhaps he wasn't Jewish, the mob spared his life. Crawford was incarc- erated in a civilian prison near Budapest, and he watched through the narrow window of his cell each morning as Jews were marched off to be hanged. He later was sent to Stalag 7A, a POW camp near Dachau. His camp and Dachau were both liberated on the same day, and Crawford saw the death camp, complete with boxcars of bodies, on April 30, 1945. Believing that the Holocaust was a "unique catastrophic event of mod- ern history," Crawford and Dr. David Blumenthal, pro- fessor of Judaic Studies at Emory, set up the "Witness to the Holocaust" project in the summer of 1978. To trace the influence of the Holocaust, they began to re- cord the testimony of liberators of Nazi concen- tration camps. . "We thought we'd have 10 liberators volunteer," Crawford told the JTA, "but we had 30 names in one month, 150 names vo months and now w, ye over 300 names." Inter- views with these liberators are being taped and trans- cribed. The purpose of the study is two-fold: to add to the existing historical tes- timony concerning the camps and their liberation from a previously untapped source, and to measure the impact of the event on the liberators themselves. With the attempts to re- write history and deny that the Holocaust occurred, Crawford feels it's impor- tant to prove what hap- pened with a source that non-Jews will not reject.