Newspaper Page Text
Capitol ceremonies
U.S. remembers the Holocaust
by Joseph Polakoff
TSI’s Washington correspondent
WASHINGTON—In ceremonies
under the dome of America’s capitol
marking the annual Day of Remem
brance for the 11 million victims of
the Holocaust, including six mil
lion Jews, Gen. J. Lawton Collins
remembered “a great Jewish sold
ier,” who was killed in action in
France while fighting the German
forces in 1944 in World War II.
“Lightning Joe” Collins, now
90, was wheeled to the podium in the
hallowed rotunda and helped to
rise because he wanted to say
something about his long-dead
comrade, Gen. Maurice Rose,
commander of the Third Armored
Division in the Seventh Army
Corps, which Collins had led.
In a speech of only 40 words, the
old soldier said firmly to the hushed
audience that crowded into the
rotunda, “Gen. Rose fought with
great distinction. He was killed in
action at Paderkorn (in Normandy).
He was the son of a rabbi.” Collins
was then helped back to his wheel
chair amid prolonged applause.
Collins and Lt. Gen. William
Quinn, who was the Seventh Army’s
assistant chief of staff in the war in
Europe, and the present Army chief
of staff, John Wickham, accepted
the U.S. Holocaust Memorial
Council’s first Eisenhower Libera
tion Medals on behalf of the Amer
ican soldiers who liberated the
concentration camps in 1945.
The Eisenhower Medal also was
presented to Senate Majority
Leader Robert Dole of Kansas,
who was twice decorated for heroic
achievement and was severely
wounded as a soldier in World
War 11. Standing by as the medals
were given was David Eisenhower,
grandson of President Eisenhower,
who had commanded the Allied
armies in Europe.
The awards which the Council
will make annually for outstanding
contributions to the fields of human
rights and freedom, were presented
to the four recipients by Elie Wie-
sel, who had just been appointed
by President Reagan to a second
term as the Council’s chairman.
The sides of the medal show Eisen
hower in his World War II uniform
and Wiesel’s words: “For the dead
and the living we must bear wit
ness.”
Vice President George Bush,
Dole, Senate Minority Leader
Robert Byrd of West Virginia,
Wiesel, three survivors of the death
camps—Sigmund Strochlitz, Ben
jamin Meed and Miles Lerman —
and Kitty Dukakis, wife of the
Mother's Day
May
11th %
Flowers Say
Avant-Garden
Elie Wiesel
Massachusetts governor and a
member of the Council since its
formation in 1980 as a federal
agency, spoke of the evil of the
Holocaust era and appealed for
permanent remembrance so it might
not be repeated.
Flags of 10 U.S. Army divisions
that liberated death camps were
unfurled at the ceremony. The U.S.
Army Band and Army chorus of 24
male voices joined in the ceremony
as well. As he has at all previous
ceremonies in the rotunda. Cantor
Isaac Goodfriend of Atlanta, him
self a survivor, chanted, “Ani
maamin,” (“I believe”) and “El
mole rachamim,” (memorial prayer).
He sang the Star Spangled Banner
to open the program and “The Par
tisan’s Hymn” to close it.
Twelve senators and representa
tives took part in the lighting of six
tall candles to commemorate the
six million Jews who perished.
Mark Talisman, the Council’s
vice chairman who chaired the
program, emphasized that all of
America’s 50 states and their gov
ernors have this year observed
Remembrance Days. The United
States is the only country outside
of Israel to mark the Holocaust as
a nation with annual ceremony.
Congress has unanimously voted
use of the rotunda for the cere
monies.
Bush, who addressed the rotunda
program for the third time, said,
“Our challenge today is to insist
that time will not become the Nazis’
friend,” that “time will not face
our sense of the specificity or the
uniqueness of the Holocaust,” and
that “time will lead us to make the
Holocaust into an abstraction. Our
challenge today is to remember,
always to remember, the Holocaust.”
Protesting the continuing “abuses
of man,” Wiesel referred to Kurt
Waldheim’s explanation of his Nazi
association to exemplify failure to
remember the past. “The former
highest official of the United
Nations, who is now running for
president of Austria, finds refuge
in oblivion,” Weisel said. “What is
this, if not political cynicism on the
highest level? Has the world learned
nothing from its recent past.”
“We do not advocate remem
brance simply as a form of self-
indulgence, or as submission to
melancholy,” Wiesel said, “but as a
means of redemption of the future,
a future that has been so jeopard
ized by the past.” He said, “The
mission of man and the purpose of
his life is to oppose and negate
death rather than offer it his
blessing.”
Wiesel’s remarks were inter
rupted by the screams of a woman,
who was forcibly ejected from the
rotunda. A statement she had given
to a newsman prior to the incident
charged West Germany had refused
to “pay us any kind of restitution
for experiments done upon us by
Josef Mengele,” the German doc
tor who had experimented with
inmates of the death camps.
She asked for congressional
hearings on “Mengele-gate.” The
woman was later identified as Eva
UalleifUiew Ranch
Horsemanship Camp
for girls 7-17. atop Lookout Mountain
Cloudland, Ga 30709
700 acres of trails, hunt fields. 6
barns, 5 rings.
Equitation lessons In Jumping.
English and Western Seat.
Jones family ownership since 1954
Your own horse to care for and
ride from over 100
Complete activities and crafts
program
Overnight wagon-trails
2,4,6 or 8 week <esslons
Call or wnie for brochure
NANCY C. JONES
Stor Route, Dox 41
Cloudland, GA 30731
Phone: (404) 862-2231
GIRLS' EQUESTRIAN CAMP
Robert Dole
Mozes Kor, 52, of Terre Haute,
Ind., a survivor of Birkenau con
centration camp. She is one of twin
sisters used by Mengele for bar
baric experiments. Police released
her without charges after she was
arrested for disorderly conduct.
325-3564
Toco Hill
Shopping Center
By the Clock Tower
GRAND OPENING
‘ For those who relish
the rare and the beautiful
f ^ Y0M
gar HA’ATZMAUT
^afiSS SALUTE
jo ISRAEL
For this 38th Independence Day
Atlanta Zionist District
(Zionist Organization of America)
wishes Medinat Israel continued vigor
in its efforts to move forward. We extend
our best wishes for a Happy Yom
Ha'atzmaut to all the leaders, defenders
and people of the State of Israel.
Zionist Organization of America
Atlanta District
1745 Peachtree Road, N.E.
Atlanta, GA 30309
(404) 874-3018
Nathan S. Lewit
Owner-Operator
LEARN TO DRIVE
• Adults;Teenagers: certificate
w/6 or more hrs. behind-wheel
training—classroom optional;
Seniors’ discount
• Dual Controlled 1986 Cars
• Licensed by the State of Georgia
• Over 10 yrs. Experience
Call for information
454-9100
NATHAN’S Driving School, Inc.
Original wearable art.
Silks, linens and cottons - casual and high fashion
Saturday, May 10 and Monday, May 12
from ten o'clock a.m. until two o'clock p.m.
at our studio - 1893 Harts Mill Road
452-0086
Sharon Greenblatt Adrienne Cohen
^mmmmJ
PAGE 3 THE SOUTHERN ISRAELITE May 9, 1986
