Community
Mazel Toy!
Sharin The
A bar mitzvah pairs
with Shoah survivor.
oment
SHELLI LIEBMAN DORFMAN
Staff Writer
F
or Jeremy Sweet, a simple discussion with his grandmother added a new
dimension to his Saturday, March 31, bar mitzvah ceremony at
Congregation Shir Tikvah.
Shirley Sweet told her grandson about a time when American kids
often "twinned" their b'nai mitzvah with youth in the Soviet Union unable to cele-
brate their own. Their names would be read during service and, if available, infor-
mation on their lives would be shared.
Jeremy, a seventh-grader at Walnut Creek Middle School in Walled Lake,
came up with his own version. "He told me he wanted to dedicate his bar
mitzvah to someone who never had one because they didn't survive the
Holocaust," says Jeremy's dad, Ben Sweet.
Shirley Sweet called her friend Selma Silverman, who is the administrator
of the Holocaust Memorial Center in West Bloomfield, for help in deter-
mining the name of someone for Jeremy to honor. The conversation con-
cluded with the addition of a new twist to Jeremy's plan. Silverman sug-
gested that he call George Laksberger, who not only survived the
Holocaust, but lives in West Bloomfield, as do the Sweets.
Laksberger spent his 13th birthday in a forced labor camp. In later
years, he watched his three sons, Michael, Raymond and Gerald, stand
on the bimah at the former Beth Abraham Hillel Moses in West
Bloomfield, and do what he never did — become bar mitzvah.
Jeremy and his dad arranged a meeting with Laksberger at the
Holocaust Center, where Laksberger lectures to groups about
his experiences during the Holocaust. "He told me about
himself," Jeremy says. "We talked about how he had
been studying for his bar mitzvah when he was
taken away."
And they talked about Jeremy's bar mitzvah cer-
emony, which will be attended by his friends and
family, including his parents, Ben and Remy Sweet,
and three siblings. Laksberger's wife Sonia will be
there, too, to watch as her husband receives the
honor of an aliyah (being called to the Torah.)
"This is such an unusual and thoughtful request
from a young boy," Laksberger says of Jeremy.
But Rabbi Arnie Sleutelberg of Shir Tikvah isn't
surprised at Jeremy's offer. Rabbi Sleutelberg
describes Jeremy as "a wonderfully sensitive and
loving young man who sensed a deep-seated caring
in Mr. Laksberger for some recognition of the
missed bar mitzvah of some 50 years ago."
When Jeremy and Laksberger stand together on
the bimah, they will share it with another survivor
of the Holocaust — a Torah recovered from a
Czechoslovakian synagogue after World War II,
eventually making its way into the ark at Shir
Tikvah.
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3/30
2001
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George Laksberger
and Jeremy Sweet
prepare for Jeremy's
bar mitzvah.