Friday, December11, 1982 19
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
Rashke's 'Escape from Sobibor' Describes
History and Heroism in Nazi Death Camp
By ALLEN A. WARSEN
"Escape from Sobibor,"
subtitled "The Heroic Story
of the Jews Who Escaped
from a Nazi Death Camp,"
written by Richard Rashke
and published by Houghton
Mifflin, is a reconstruction
of the history of the Sobibor
death camp from its con-
struction until its destruc-
tion.
The author commences
his narrative by tracing the
evolution of the Schutzstaf-
fel from its beginning in
1929 when it was formed as
Hitler's bodyguard until
Heinrich Himmler reor-
ganized it into a corps of
250,000 murderers.
When Poland was in-
vaded by the Nazis in 1939,
Hitler authorized Himmler
"to render_ Poland harmless
by killing its leadership; to
Germanize western Poland
and incorporate it into the
Reich; to turn eastern Po-
land into a vast pool of slave
labor; and to isolate Po-
land's three million Jews
until, he, Hitler, could fig-
ure out exactly what to do
with them."
For that purpose,
Himmler created an elite
SS force that murdered
between one and two mil-
lion Poles. In addition, he
confined the Polish Jews
into ghettos and added to
their cramped quarters a
million Jews from west-
ern Poland, Austria,
Germany and Czechos-
lovakia.
To realize Hitler's "Final
Solution," Himmler
selected eastern Poland as
his first slaughterhouse for
these reasons: "One-third of
Europe's Jews lived there; it
had a good railway system
with webs into isolated
towns; it was cut off from
the rest of Europe by the
Wehrmacht, language and
culture; and the eastern
Poles were among the most
anti-Semitic people in
Europe."
Next Himmler estab-
lished three additional
death camps: Belzac,
Sobibor and Treblinka. The
first two he located in the
vicinity of Lublin; the third
northeast of Warsaw. In
overall charge of the camps
he placed the SS murderer
Christian Wirth, "a former
policeman who supervised
the first gassing of the men-
tally ill Germans in 1939."
As Sobibor's Kommen-
dant Himmler appointed
Frank Stangel, who like
Wirth obtained his
"humanitarian" training in
the euthanasia hospitals
where close to "80,000 Ger
man and Austrian .sick
children were murdered by
lethal injections."
Fantastic is the story of
Lieutenant Kurt Gers-
tein, a chemist, who
headed the SS Technical
Disinfection Services,
and whom Himmler sent
on a "top secret mission
to the above mentioned
camps with 572 pounds of
potassium cyanide (used
to kill, among other
things, lice and bed-
bugs)." •
Gerstein, who was
neither a dedicated SS man
nor a Nazi, became horrified
by the sights he saw at the
death camps. The first thing
he did was to destroy the
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BEM&
TEMPLE BETH JACOB: Services 8:30 p.m. today. Rabbi
Weiss will speak on "New Year's Comes But Twice a
Year!"
CONG. BNAI MOSHE: Services 4:40 p.m. today and 8:45
a.m. Saturday. Joel Ungar will chant the Haftorah.
DOWNTOWN SYNAGOGUE: Services 9 a.m. Saturday
(new time). Rabbi Gamze will speak on "Do Good Reso-
lutions Really Help?"
TEMPLE ISRAEL: Services 8:30 p.m. today. Rabbi Fram
will speak on "1983 — The Outlook for America, for the
World, for Israel: A Prophecy for the Coming Year."
Darren Shapiro, Bar Mitzva. Services 11 a.m. Satur-
day.
LIVONIA JEWISH CONGREGATION: Services 8 p.m.
today. Rabbi Gordon will speak on "Jacob's Blessing."
Services 9 a.m. Saturday.
CONG. T'CHIYAH: Services 10 a.m. Saturday, conducted
. by Harold and Mary Ellen Gurewitz.
YOUNG ISRAEL OF GREENFIELD: Services 4:55 p.m.
today and 9 a.m. Saturday. Rabbi Wagner will speak
on "The Blessings of Jacob." Avi Schreiber, Bar
Mitzva.
Regular services will be held at Adat Shalom
Synagogue, Cong. Bais Chabad of Farmington Hills, Cong.
Bais Chabad of West Bloomfield, Cong. Beth Abraham
Hillel Moses, Cong. Beth Achim, Temple Beth El, Cong.
Beth Isaac of Trenton, Cong. Beth Shalom, Cong. Beth
Tefilo Emanuel Tikvah, Cong. Beth Tephilath Moses of Mt.
Clemens, Birmingham Temple, Cong. Bnai David, Cong.
Bnai Israel of West Bloomfield, Cong. Bnai Israel - Beth
Yehudah, Cong. Bnai Jacob, Cong. Bnai Zion, Cong. Dovid
Ben Nuchim, Temple Emanu-El, Temple Kol Ami, Cong.
Mishkan Israel Nusach H'Ari, Sephardic Community of
Greater Detroit, Cong. Shaarey Shomayim (Jewish Center
Jimmy Prentis Morris Branch), Cong. Shaarey Zedek,
Cong. Shomrey Israel (18995 Schaefer), Young Israel of
Oak - Woods and Young Israel of Southfield.
deathly chemicals and then
to reveal the grim story of
the extermination of the
Jews to Baron von Otter,
the secretary to the Swedish
legation in Berlin.
The latter immediately
reported his findings to his
government in Stockholm.
But the Swedish
authorities, instead of
reacting instantly and
courageously, buried the
report, "seeking to avoid
further tension with Nazi
Germany."
In the meantime, Sobibor
expanded and its gas cham-
gers incessantly gassed
500-600 Jews at a time. The
gassed corpses were at once
removed by Jewish slave
laborers and burned. This
way of disposing of the
dead, the German murder-
ers thought, would remove
all traces of their criminal
acts.
In The Jewish News of
Dec. 2, there was a notice
that read: "The World
Jewish Congress, at the
request of the U.S. Jus-
tice Department, is seek-
ing witnesses to the use of
dogs in Buchenwald and
Sachsenhausen concen-
tration camps during
World War II."
An illustration of the
savage use of dogs at
Sobibor follows: "Even
worse (Sergeant Paul)
Groth used to patrol the
train brigade (slave labor-
ers) with Barry, who was
trained to attack on the
command: 'Man, go get that
dog.' When the mongrel
Saint Bernard attacked, he
reached the buttocks and
hip of an average man.
"Groth would watch in
Beth Hayeled
Meeting Planned
Cong. Shaarey Zedek's
Beth Hayeled (nursery and
kindergarten) will have a
meeting on "Assessing
School Readiness" 7:30 p.m.
Jan. 11 in the synagogue
youth lounge.
Kathy Wilson of Oakland
University and the Gessell
Institute will be the guest
speaker.
Refreshments will be
served. The public is invited
free of charge. For informa-
tion, call Rosaline Gilson,
357-5544.
Women's Torah
Seminar Begins
The Women's Torah
Seminar will begin a new
series on "The Laws of
Shabat and Mutzkah and
Carrying" 8 p.m. Monday at
Young Israel of Greenfield.
The four-week series will
be taught by Rabbi Feivel
Wagner. All women are in-
vited.
UJA Position
NEW YORK — The
United Jewish Appeal has
named Charles Lowenstein
of Atlanta, Ga. as national
chairman of "Operation
Upgrade," a program of
leadership development
and solicitor training.
On Education
fascination as Barry tore off
the private parts or pieces of
buttocks or mauled the
Jews who fell down from
fear and fatigue.
"When Sergeant Groth
called off Barry, the dog
obeyed immediately, be-
coming a tame pet once
again. Those whom Barry
had maimed so badly that
they could no longer work,
Groth took immediately to
the 'hospital' (gas
chamber)."
As the Russian armed
forces approached east-
ern Poland, Himmler and
his gang of desperadoes
decided _to liquidate the
death camps and murder
the remaining prisoners.
The Jews, through the
Ukrainian grapevine, dis-
covered the German plan
and secretly decided to re-
volt and escape.
Under the leadership of
Sasha Pechersky, a Russian
Jewish officer and POW, the
prisoners devised an in-
genious plan of escape.
As planned, on Oct. 14,
1943, the prisoners cut the
telephones, destroyed the
electric plant, killed a
number of Germans and
Ukrainians, and about 300
Jews escaped from Sobibor
to the nearby woods.
Unfortunately, fewer
than 50 people survived.
The others perished.
"Escape from Sobibor" is
a unique, unforgettable,
deeply-moving and effective
account of a death camp.
The author, Richard
Rashke, a former Jesuit
priest, wrote "The Killing of
Karen Silkwood."
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PR'+WCAKic" -WRe-5
Ar Ric; pAczi -,E-6 ist - TLE
Education in its widest
sense includes everything
that exerts a formative
influence, and causes a
young person to be, at a
given point, what he is.
PA Art as , ovo_
"ND Evt•-• PrliT -rt Gs/
55-5340
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BUCKLEi slcisksIMITED
HOLIDAY HOURS:
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SUN. 12-5 P.M.
GREAT GIFT IDEAS
1800 Different Styles
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Sportsmen's Buckles
Car & Truck Buckles
Name Buckles
Dog Buckles
Shrine Buckles & Others
BERKLEY
MANY ON SPECIAL SALE
STOCKING STUFFERS: Hat Pins
or Tie Tacs — $2 each
2240 COOLIDGE
5 Blks. N. of 11 Mile
545-6885
CUSTOM MADE BUCKES — ASK FOR DETAILS
JABOTINSKY SOCIETY
OF
HERUT
NEW YEAR'S
Dance & Party
Saturday, January 1, 1983, 8:00 p.m.
B'nai David Synagogue
24350 Southfield Rd., Southfield
(South of 10 Mile)
Music by. Eric Rosenow & His Continentals
Also Wonderful Entertainment Program
Cold Cuts, Wine & BeVerages Served
BRING YOUR FRIENDS AND LET'S CELEBRATE NEW YEAR'S TOGETHER
TICKETS AVAILABLE ,AT THE DOOR - DONATIONS $10 per person
For Tickets Call .
Sam Horning, 551-1841 Simon Cieck, 548-3013, 813-5151
TACH
.
Parents for Torah for AM Children
MICHIGAN CHAPTER
Cordially invites you to its
2nd Annual
Malaya Malkah & Concert
featuring
nesH
ORCHESTRA AnD SIMERS
Saturday Evening
January 8, 1983
8:30 p.m.
Young Israel of Oak Woods
24061 Coolidge Highway
Oak Park, Michigan
Covert: S45.00 per couple
R.S.V.P. Co-Chair Persons
Phyllis Koenigsberg
968-7462
No Solicitations
Michael Hochheiser
399-6866