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Friday, May 17, 1985

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

PURELY COMMENTARY

PHILIP SLOMOVITZ

Holocaust Bookshelves

Continued from Page 2

not even bring themselves to
bury their dead. The imagina-
tion refused to dig their own
graves, enter the gas cham-
bers, provide fuel for the fur-
naces. There was no image
they could refer to . . . that was
acceptable, for what is still
conventionally called human
dignity.
They are indeed orphans,
but they have also been
wounded, ravaged to the core
of their beings by a bereave-
ment, the magnitude of which
attains atrocious proportions.
It is not hard to understand
the feeling of desertion, of an-
guish which overcomes the
child, when he realizes that his
parents' death has been de-
cided and executed in cold
blood by those whose name is
also "humanity"!
When the American
psychiatrists qualify this
tragedy as a "man-made disas-
ter" they are giving it its true
dimension.
In the entire world, why
were there so few people who
heard the cries of agony, who
opposed and fought against
the degradation of a race,
against their total extermina-
tion? Why this refusal to see, to
hear? Why that act of aban-
donment, whether it was de-
liberate or not?
Yes, why? Why? Why? What,
who, is there to cling to in fu-
ture? If the world allowed that
to happen once, why not twice?
This is not intended to be an
interrogation, nor even an ef-
fort to understand. It is rather
the cry of a helpless, aban-
doned creature who still re-
fuses to accept -that the world
remains blind and deaf to all
his pleas.
In fact, it is more than a cry:
it is a howl of revolt, of indigna-
tion, of fear, of pain that can no
longer be soothed ...
In an equally moving after-
word, Bruno Bettelheim takes
into account the agonies inflicted
on the sufferers had become so de-
vastating that they cannot even
speak about them. Yet they live
with them; the horror lives with
them. They are always haunted
by the childhood recollections.
I Didn't Say Goodbye will al-
ways be among the documen-
taries that will be inerasable from
the minds of the readers.
The Claudine Vegh volume was
excellently translated from the
French by Ros Schwartz.

'Music In Terezin'
Retains Record

"Terezin" is an inerasable name
of a Nazi relic as well the glory of
resistance. It perpetuates a period
in the Holocaust history when
Jewish genius flourished under
the threat from barbarians,
nevertheless marking a period
when creative genius could only
be destroyed in the hours when
submission could no longer be re-
sisted.
It is to this camp that the Inter-
national Red Cross representa-
tives were taken for proof that
Jews were treated well by the
-.iimplooseirof

Germans in the World War II era
of horror. Jewish children paint-
ing and showing their skills at
Terezin was a trick used by the
Nazis to prove they were not
cruel.
Terezin also had functioning
musical troupes and the Red
Cross was left with an impression
falsely circulated that Terezin
was merely a prison operated
humanely.
How could such evidence gain
root?
Music in Terezin, 1941 to 1945
(Beaufort Publishers), by Hoza
Karas, traces the miracle of
creativity in Terezin. The author,
himself an eminent Czech musi-
cian, relates the achievements of
the musicians in the Czech-based
concentration camp who smug-
gled in instruments and began to
play music, to organize orches-
tras, to concertize.
It was like a miracle that these
lovers of music were able not only
to play individually and later as
orchestras, to concertize under
cruel conditions. They also wrote
music and, thanks to Karas and
those who were able to preserve
the compositions, created what
became living legacies.
Music in Terezin is a notable
contribution to an historic record
of resistance to the Nazi terror.
That's really how the story must
be treated: as part of the resis-

tance, for to suffer and at the same
time to create is to resist tyranny.
That's the record provided by
Karas — his compilation of the
cast of characters, the resisters,
the composers and their composi-
tions.
Karas' is a record of glory and of
admiration for people who, al-
ways under the whip, neverthe-
less gathered to concertize, to play
the music.
Hoza Karas, a Christian, read
short articles in the Czech maga-
zine Hudebeni Rozhledi (Musical
Outlooks) about compositions and
fragments of music which origi-
nated in the Terezin concentra-
tion camp. The music was depos-
ited in the archives of the Jewish
State Museum in Prague. That's
when his research began and he
labored for ten years on the proj-
ect that emerged as his book.
Men and women were in the
ranks of that heroic band. They
were eventually liquidated — and
the term is well known when
applied to the victims who were
sent to their death in Auschwitz.
Only a few of the musicians in all
fields of music survived, mostly
women.
Karas' story is the tribute of one
musician to the heroes of Terezin.
It becomes humanity's tribute to
heroes and heroines who paid
honor to the music they loved,
who defied the Nazis as Jews who

Sharon 'Time' Libel
Trial Verdict Analyzed

Ariel Sharon: Vindicated

Dov Aharoni (Fisch) included,
among his numerous communal
positions, the national executive
directorship of Herut Zionists of
America. In a sense, it explains
his very strong supporting atti-
tude toward the Israeli leader
Ariel Sharon. In General Sharon's
War Against Time Magazine pub-
lished by the newly emerging
American-based branch of the
popular Israeli Steimatzky Pub-
lishers, the subtitle to the book
about Sharon, "His Trial and
Vindication," at once reveals the
approach to the documented re-
port.
The Aharoni volume is so
thorough in the reporting on the
trial that it could serve as a total
record of the sensational case for
judicial and journalistic history.
There is no doubt about the
favoritism toward Sharon in this
important book. Nevertheless, as
a record of what transpired, as the
history of a case dealing with
libel, Aharoni makes a very defi-
nite contribution with a splendid
journalistic treatment of a famous
court case. -1)tx-t

.

Remarkable about the Aharoni
compilation is the completeness of
the evidence that was submitted
during the recent trial, the view--
points in both the Time and the
Ariel Sharon presentations.
In the process, the personalities
involved emerge in their specific
and major roles, with the
peculiarities outlined as means of
emphasizing the approaches that
affected the legal aspects.
Special significance attaches to
the book in its resort to the histor-
ical factors that led to the Israeli
Lebanese operation. Therefore
the involvement of Menachem
Begin is of value in the manner in
which Aharoni outlines his case.
Therefore, the condemnation of
the misrepresentations relating
to the Shatilla and Sabra tragedy
is valuable in dealing with the
Sharon case against Time.
Aharoni makes it a point to em-
phasize the Sharon charge that
Time resorted to a "Blood Libel"
in its news reports about him.
"Vindication" is expressly em-
phasized by the author-reporter
in this 336-page paperback.
"Exoneration and Vindication" is
the interpretation in a concluding
chapter to the Aharoni book. It is
the evidence of an attitude that
influences the commendable re-
porting. Even with the prejudiced
approach, which needs recogni-
tion with due respect to the
author's communal role, his work
as reporter assumes the impor-
tance of also being an historian.
General Sharon's War Against
Time Magazine is a book of merit
and should be read.
.
34.590‘ .

are being memorialized in the
story labeled Holocaust which, in
the descriptive task of a Czech
author-violinist, adds to the in-
dictment of a people and its bar-
barians who besmirched the name
of German and the Germans.

The Gypsy Tragedy:
A Novel As A Reminder

Ronald Florence:
"The Gypsy Man"

With all the admonitions and
many recorded outcries of protest
against the horror that spells
Nazism, the Gypsy role is often
ignored. A reminder of it, there-
fore, is an obligation, and a story
in novel form must not be ignored.
Let it be recorded to the credit of
Israel that the Gypsies are not
forgotten, that their plight is re-
membered, that the 500,000 vic-
tims are fully honored. A Jewish
Telegraphic Agency cable from
Tel Aviv reveals that the Gypsies
will have a place of honor in the
kibbutz established in tribute to
the ghetto fighters — Lohamei
Hageta'ot. Then the cable reads:

Miriam Novich, a veteran
member of the kibbutz
museum staff, has collected
hundreds of documents and
photographs attesting to the
genocide of the Gypsies by the
Nazis during World War II.
They were rounded up from all
over Europe. Many perished at
Auschwitz, the most notorious
of the Nazi death camps.
The museum will be the
largest repository of this evi-
dence. As a spokesperson ex-
plained, the Gypsies, whose
origins as a people remain
obscure to this day, were for
many centuries transients in
most European countries.
They have no homeland of
their own and no public body
anywhere has documented
Nazi crimes against them. The
material collected by Novich
includes orders signed by Ges-
tapo chief Heinrich Himmler
for the destruction of the Gyp-
sies and progress reports on
how this was carried out. Re-
levant documents published
since World War II will also be
on display.
Tragically, there are charges
that facts about the persecution of
Gypsies were suppressed, that
American officials may have had
a share in such guilt. This is told

in the novel The Gypsy Man (Vil-
lard Books, a Random House di-
vision) in which Ronald Florence
portrays a deeply moving narra-
tive.
The plot in the The Gypsy Man
draws in the evil intentions of a
German anthropologist who was
co-opted by the Nazis because his
knowledge of Gypsy life was used
in the mass extermination
brutalities. The resultant re-
search into the banalities and
crimes provide a basis for
flashbacks which emerge as ex-
pressly informative data about
Gypsies, their background, their
way of life.
There is a court case in the
process of which much of the in-
formation is disseminated.
Thus, the novel exposes the
crime of the mass murder of the
Gypsies, serves as a valuable
addendum to Holocaust litera-
ture, adds to the currently grow-
ing appeals that the Nazi terror
should not be forgotten.

Bernbaum's Photos
Of Warsaw Ghetto Add
To Indictment Of Nazism

An oft-quoted Chinese saying
applies to the accumulation of in-
dictments of the German Nazis.
One of the most deeply-moving
books that have just been added to
the vast collection of data about
the Nazi horrors is My Brother's
Keeper (Putnam) by Israel
Bernbaum.
Bernbaum, a native of Warsaw,
escaped the terror just before the
Nazis occupied his native city. He
was in the Soviet Union during
the war and afterwards he lived in
Paris where he pursued his art
studies. He and his family — he
has three sons — now live in New
York.
He tells the story of the
Holocaust through art. He de-
clares: "The language of art can
leave a more lasting impression
than words, and has a universal
appeal." That's where the picto-
rial effects enter into his very ar-
tistic and deeply moving My
Brother's Keeper.
For his text, Bernbaum used
Nazi-photographed accounts of
what they did and how Jews were
humiliated by them. He applied
his art to five of the most depress-
ing Nazi photographic portrayals
and used his artistic skills to mak-
ing paintings of them.
The paintings include the Anne
Frank reproduction, and some of
the most notable of the Nazi relics
related to Warsaw and its de-
struction under Nazism.
There is realism and symbolism
in this artistic expose of the hor-
rors. One of the paintings is of a
skeletonized Menorah, symboliz-
ing the destruction of the Warsaw
Great Synagogue. Exposed are
the faceless Nazi soldiers hurling
children into fires or assembling
them for the death camps.
The story as depicted by
Bernbaum, whose generation was
annihilated by the Nazis, is so
deeply-moving that his illu§-
trated book is among the most im-
portant testimonies against the
crime now reverberating news-
wise under the slogans of
Holocaust experiences.

