2 min read
ByNathan Jeffay, Nathan Jeffay
With each passing month, fewer and fewer young people have the opportunity to walk with Holocaust survivors
March 12, 2020 15:39Once a year, they create a remarkable scene of Jewish life in Auschwitz. But thousands of people from around the world who were due to attend March of the Living next month will not be travelling.
“It is with a heavy heart due to the global attack of the coronavirus we will not march together on Yom HaShoah 2020,” Phyllis Greenberg Heideman, the president of the organisation which runs the large annual trip, announced in a statement on Sunday.
The March of the Living team just did not have a choice, said Shmuel Rosenman, its chairman: “Given that this is an international event involving 110 delegations from around the world, we have a responsibility to take precautionary measures in accordance with the guidelines given by authorities in various countries.”
Plans for re-scheduling the march in Poland later this year are underway.
Corona cancellations and postponements are part of life — and will undoubtedly save lives. But the impact can still be hard to swallow.
It means that on Yom HaShoah this year, there will be no large-scale memorial prayer for Holocaust victims, no rousing rendition of Hatikvah to communicate hope at the site of devastation, and no meeting of Jewish teenagers from around the world united by the same respect for history.
Saddest of all, there will be no survivors walking alongside Jewish youngsters, bravely returning to a site of horrors and showing that Jewish life continues and the link between today’s young Jews and those who Hitler tried to kill is rock-solid.
These encounters are one of the greatest gifts that March of the Living has given the Jewish world. I actually ended up in print journalism due to March of the Living. Back in 1998, aged 18, I wanted to cover the cost of the trip, so I got a commission from the Manchester Evening News to write about it and publish my first ever article.
I can still hear that ceremony echoing in my ears. Visiting the historical site with survivors and many others was deeply moving, and changed the way I related to the Holocaust.
Today, the survivors are more than 20 years older, and it takes every ounce of effort for them to attend. They gird their strength through the cold winter months, and prepare for the often-therapeutic trip. While they know the postponement makes sense, it is still a blow, and the health of some is deteriorating at such a rate that they may well be unable to attend a rescheduled march.
I know how small the window is for meeting and talking to survivors. I know that when my youngest children are teenagers they will have difficulty getting their heads around the fact that their dad visited the site of Nazi evil with people who lived through it.
It is not just the experience of survivors and 10,000 participants that will be in jeopardy if the corona crisis does not allow it to be rescheduled, but the Holocaust education of many in the future who could benefit from hearing about each marcher’s experience.
