Hermina van der Schaaf

I survived Auschwitz

Zeev (Tibi) Ram, a survivor of Auschwitz will be talking about his story in schools, university and the Jewish community. He is in New Zealand from April 19 to May 3, 2012. His visit is organised by the ZFNZ and the Israeli Embassy. He will be in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch.

For more information contact schlicha@zfnz.or.nz

JUSTICE and ACCOUNTABILITY AFTER THE HOLOCAUST

The keynote address by Peter McKenzie QC at the Parliamentary reception for the 2012 UN International Holocaust Memorial Day

In the final stages of the Second World War the allied armies sweeping through eastern Germany and Europe came across sites of such horror and carnage that they found it hard to believe that even the Nazi regime in its worst excesses could have been responsible. Near the town of Gotha they found a death camp where thousands of Jewish prisoners were starved to death and this was reported to General Eisenhower the Allied Supreme Commander. The bodies of naked emaciated men were piled in the rooms and the stench was overpowering. General Patton would not enter fearing he would be physically sick. Eisenhower however strode in and forced himself to inspect every nook and cranny. He called for photographers and ordered that Germans from the neighbouring villages be brought in and required to bury the dead. In this way they would have to confront the reality of what the Nazi regime had been doing. He stated:

Four People behind the Numbers

The German Unger Story - the fate of a family

Four People behind the Numbers

In February 2011 The Listener published an article about Diana Wichtel’s journey to the death camps her father survived. In that article a reference was made to the International Tracing Service, whom I contacted. 6 months later they provided another tiny piece of evidence of the fate of my family. At a time when the world is tuning in to the trials of the 2^nd worst European murders of all time, it is timely to remember the worst genocide, and the faces of some who did not survive.

The Violinist

The book by Sarah Gaitanos about Clare Galambos Winter, past member of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and Hungarian survivor of Auschwitz, is now available from the Wellington Holocaust Research and Education Centre

$40 plus $4.50 postage, $44.50 (NZ)

Are your origins in Austria?

Inge Woolf is collecting material for a Symposium in Vienna on Austrian Jewish migration to New Zealand and the work of the Holocaust Centre. If you would like to contribute your story please fill in this survey

Holocaust survivors

Holocaust survivors Freda Narev (hidden by a Catholic family in Poland) and Bob Narev (survivor of the Concentration Camp of Theresienstadt) are prepared, by arrangement, to speak of their experiences to secondary schools in the Greater Auckland area. They can be contacted by email fabnarev@clear.net.nz

March of the living

THE MARCH OF THE LIVING is an international, educational programme that brings Jewish teens (16 year olds) from around the world to Poland on Yom Hashoah, Holocaust Memorial Day, to march from Auschwitz to Birkenau, the largest concentration camp complex built during World War II, and then to Israel to observe Yom Hazikaron, Israel Memorial Day, and Yom Ha'atzmaut, Israel Independence Day.

Anne Frank

The Anne Frank travelling exhibition tells the story of Anne Frank and the Holocaust to people who are not able to visit the Anne Frank Museum in The Netherlands. The exhibition will tour throughout New Zealand for three years, visiting museums and community centres to teach people the story of Anne Frank and the Holocaust.

Click here for more information.

Holocaust research

Hermina van der Schaaf

By Ed Ptilidi

New Zealand Jewish Chronicle

August 2008

van New Zealander Hermina van der Schaaf was awarded with one of Israel’s most prestigious titles – Righteous among the Nations – at a gala dinner hosted by the Embassy of Israel and the New Zealand Zionist Federation to celebrate Israel’s 60th Anniversary on June 22. 2008.

Along with her late husband, Mrs van der Schaaf was honoured for the bravery shown in hiding Jewish people in Holland during World War II.

“We had a big house, and we could have people staying with us, so there were Jewish people as well as other people,” she said.

For two months in 1943, she and her husband hid three Jewish people in their home. By doing so the van der Schaaf’s risked their lives, as the Nazis threatened any Dutch people found hiding Jews with concentration camps.

She still keeps in touch with some of those Jews they helped. “We’ve had contact with the people who stayed in Holland.” The others have gone to Argentina, but everyone has survived.

As to the question of what she felt during the presentation, Ms van der Shaaf keeps modest. “We never talked about it – it was just by accident that someone found out, but I’m quite happy.”

The presentation of the award by Ambassador Yuval Rotem, MP Hon Luamanuvao Winnie Laban and Robert Narev, a Holocaust survivor, in front of the van der Schaaf’s five children was an emotional event.

“I was extremely privileged and honoured to attend the presentation,” said Winnie. “Hermina’s bravery and that of her late husband in hiding three Jews during World War Two is truly admirable and inspiring. She is an amazing woman, representing the true human spirit of caring for one another, even when at great risk to yourself and your family.”

Mrs Laban added: “It is the role of the international community and citizens to support human beings, who like the Jewish community, experience horrendous persecution. Hermina and her family showed clear action. Inaction can also be abuse.”

Mrs van der Schaaf, who is 90 years old, has been living in Christchurch since 1963.

Links

Holocaust images

Two Holocaust survivors

The current display at the Holocaust Centre describes the lives of two Holocaust survivors, their Holocaust experiences, their lives before and their lives after the Holocaust. One is from Rakovic, the Czech Republic, the other from Szobathely, Hungary. The two stories are two book ends of the Holocaust. The persecution of the Jews of the Czech lands was the beginning of the total annihilation of the Jews of European, the deportation and mass murder of Hungarian Jews was the final act.