Thursday, May 24, 2007 at 1:01am
Two people, two genocides, one story
Column: Spiritual Psychology
If you saw David Gewirtzman and Jacqueline Murekatete standing together, you couldn't imagine that they had anything in common. He recently turned 79, is white, Jewish and a retired pharmacist who owned and operated a large drugstore. He and his wife, Lillian, lived in the peaceful suburban community of Great Neck, N.Y., for 35 years, where they raised their two children — Steven, today a physician, and Rena, a psychologist. Jacqueline is 21, black, and an émigré from Africa who just graduated from college. She grew up in a small village in Rwanda, where her family owned a cattle farm. Her father was also a teacher.
Speaking together before audiences of high school and college students and other community groups, their riveting stories merge into one. They are true soulmates with a common destiny. David's harrowing Holocaust memories from Eastern Europe at the hands of the Nazis and Jacqueline's genocide experiences in Rwanda, although 60 years apart, are hauntingly similar — both were witnesses to ethnic hatred and unspeakable atrocities.
While David, his sister, brother, mother, father and a few relatives miraculously survived the Nazi Holocaust by hiding under a pigsty, the rest of his family and most of the residents of his town of Losice, Poland, were killed in the gas chambers — only 16 out of the 8,000 Jews of Losice survived. Jacqueline's Tutsi family — her parents, six siblings, her grandmother and other relatives — were hacked to death with machetes by their Hutu neighbors. Eight hundred thousand Tutsis were eventually slaughtered. Jacqueline, like David, miraculously escaped.
David and his family left their village and comfortable life when it became clear that they would be exterminated if they remained. The German army invaded Poland Sept. 1, 1939. A few days later, his town was bombed and then occupied by the Germans. The town became a ghetto with unrelenting harassment, deprivation and persecution of the Jewish population. David's family built a hiding place in the attic of their building. In August 1942 German and Polish police surrounded the ghetto, and most of the 8,000 Jews were rounded up and shipped to an extermination camp. David and his family remained behind in the attic. Soon after, in an attempt to escape, David and his sister were taken to the town jail. That evening two Polish teenagers who were in the jail for minor theft were shot by German police who didn't speak Polish. David believes the bullets were intended for him and his sister. They were soon released but were placed in a labor camp. A bribe got them out. Then David's sister was taken in by a Polish family, while his younger brother hid in a haystack for 22 months.
Fourteen-year-old David, the rest of his immediate family and a few relatives — eventually eight in all — were hidden by a Polish farmer under a pigsty that was about 8 feet long, 5 feet wide and 5 feet deep. Above it were boards covered with manure that was the pen for pigs and sheep. They spent two years squeezed together head to toe, coming out briefly only twice over the two years. No wonder that his father, Jacob, despaired and even once suggested that they just surrender and "get it over with." But David's indomitable optimism that they would survive sustained their perseverance. In the summer of 1944 they emerged from the pigsty when the advancing Russian army drove out the Germans. Eventually they made their way to Italy, where David completed a degree in pharmacy at the University of Rome. Later they immigrated to the United States. His father died a peaceful death at age 102 after eating fresh-picked strawberries and then lying down to rest.
Jacqueline was 9 years old in 1994 when the genocide in Rwanda began. For safety she was taken to her grandmother's house. But that became unsafe, and they moved into the Town Hall with other Tutsis. When that place became too dangerous, her physician uncle drove them in an ambulance disguised as patients, to get through the checkpoints on the road, to the home of a Hutu man in another village who was willing to hide them. After his neighbors discovered and threatened to kill all of them, her grandmother quickly placed Jacqueline in a nearby orphanage for protection. After the massacres ended, Jacqueline learned from her uncle that her entire family had been butchered. In 1995 she was granted political asylum in the United States. Another uncle who was completing a residency in psychiatry in Virginia brought Jacqueline here and legally adopted her. Two years later they moved to the New York borough of Queens, where the uncle obtained a hospital position.
How did the unlikely duo of David and Jacqueline come together?
After retiring, David started his new career of keeping the memory of the Holocaust alive by speaking to schoolchildren and community groups. One day he came to Jacqueline's high school class in Queens. Jacqueline wept at hearing his story — she felt it was her story as well. She wrote David a moving letter that included, "At one time I, too, like you, had a feeling of guilt for being alive. 'Why was I left?' I asked myself. I never really got an answer to that, but now I'm thankful that I was left, because maybe I can make a difference in this world if I try, and maybe I can do my part in making sure that no other human being goes through the same experience as I did."
David invited Jacqueline to join him in speaking engagements. She agreed. Together they form a dynamic team. Jacqueline's presence and gripping story is particularly effective with young people. Children and teenagers can sympathize with David's retelling of the brutal inhumanity of the Holocaust, but for most young people it's a distant event of bygone times that just as well could have happened in ancient Rome. Not the same as hearing the horrors that a person of their generation went through, while they were unconscious of ghastly world events and absorbed in their comfortable lifestyles — Jacqueline's suffering hits home and registers. Young people in their audiences are often inspired to then initiate Holocaust and tolerance projects that will have a lasting impact.
The powerful message that David and Jacqueline deliver is taking root and spreading; many are listening and honoring them, as David notes:
"We have spoken at several of the Ivy League schools, Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, many of the high schools and universities in the New York area, at temples and churches in Washington, D.C., and numerous other places. In May of 2005 I spoke to the students and faculty of the University of Bologna, in Italy, and on a separate occasion to several hundred Italian high school students (in Italian). We were honored last November by the ADL (Anti Defamation League) with a dinner and concert by the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. In December we received The Global Peace and Tolerance Award from the United Nations. Jacqueline was given the opportunity to give a talk on the floor of the United Nations to over 180 delegates from all over the world during the commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the Rwandan Genocide. We were written up in The New York Times, People Magazine and several other publications. We appeared several times on NPR radio, BBC and Voice of America. On TV we were interviewed on ABC, NBC's 'The Today Show,' the Wolf Blitzer hour on CNN and on 'The News Hour with Jim Lehrer' on public television."
Two weeks ago Jacqueline graduated from New York University with a degree in International Relations. She's taking a year off to work with Miracle Corners of the World, where she is establishing Jacqueline's Corner to raise funds to assist victims of the Rwanda genocide. She plans to eventually go to law school.
Shakespeare said, "The evil that men do lives after them. The good is oft interred with their bones."
Willie, we love you but you got that one wrong. David and Jacqueline are dramatic living examples proclaiming that ultimately the good, the noble and the transcendent spirit survive. They are beacons of light that will shine for eternity.
In case you missed the last two columns on the Holocaust:
Return to holocaust central
A German town faces its holocaust past
— — —
Bernard Starr, Ph.D., formerly professor of developmental and educational psychology at the City University of New York, now teaches psychology and leads the Spiritual Forum at Marymount Manhattan College. In addition to his work in radio, he is a longtime contributor of commentary and opinion articles to numerous major publications. He is also the main United Nations representative for the Institute of Global Education that founded the Mucherla Global School in Mucherla, India. His book, "Escape Your Own Prison: Why We Need Spirituality and Psychology to Be Truly Free," will be published by Rowman and Littlefield in October 2007. His email address is {email OmniCns@aol.com}OmniCns@aol.com{/email}. © copyright 2007 by Bernard Starr
Speaking together before audiences of high school and college students and other community groups, their riveting stories merge into one. They are true soulmates with a common destiny. David's harrowing Holocaust memories from Eastern Europe at the hands of the Nazis and Jacqueline's genocide experiences in Rwanda, although 60 years apart, are hauntingly similar — both were witnesses to ethnic hatred and unspeakable atrocities.
While David, his sister, brother, mother, father and a few relatives miraculously survived the Nazi Holocaust by hiding under a pigsty, the rest of his family and most of the residents of his town of Losice, Poland, were killed in the gas chambers — only 16 out of the 8,000 Jews of Losice survived. Jacqueline's Tutsi family — her parents, six siblings, her grandmother and other relatives — were hacked to death with machetes by their Hutu neighbors. Eight hundred thousand Tutsis were eventually slaughtered. Jacqueline, like David, miraculously escaped.
David and his family left their village and comfortable life when it became clear that they would be exterminated if they remained. The German army invaded Poland Sept. 1, 1939. A few days later, his town was bombed and then occupied by the Germans. The town became a ghetto with unrelenting harassment, deprivation and persecution of the Jewish population. David's family built a hiding place in the attic of their building. In August 1942 German and Polish police surrounded the ghetto, and most of the 8,000 Jews were rounded up and shipped to an extermination camp. David and his family remained behind in the attic. Soon after, in an attempt to escape, David and his sister were taken to the town jail. That evening two Polish teenagers who were in the jail for minor theft were shot by German police who didn't speak Polish. David believes the bullets were intended for him and his sister. They were soon released but were placed in a labor camp. A bribe got them out. Then David's sister was taken in by a Polish family, while his younger brother hid in a haystack for 22 months.
Fourteen-year-old David, the rest of his immediate family and a few relatives — eventually eight in all — were hidden by a Polish farmer under a pigsty that was about 8 feet long, 5 feet wide and 5 feet deep. Above it were boards covered with manure that was the pen for pigs and sheep. They spent two years squeezed together head to toe, coming out briefly only twice over the two years. No wonder that his father, Jacob, despaired and even once suggested that they just surrender and "get it over with." But David's indomitable optimism that they would survive sustained their perseverance. In the summer of 1944 they emerged from the pigsty when the advancing Russian army drove out the Germans. Eventually they made their way to Italy, where David completed a degree in pharmacy at the University of Rome. Later they immigrated to the United States. His father died a peaceful death at age 102 after eating fresh-picked strawberries and then lying down to rest.
Jacqueline was 9 years old in 1994 when the genocide in Rwanda began. For safety she was taken to her grandmother's house. But that became unsafe, and they moved into the Town Hall with other Tutsis. When that place became too dangerous, her physician uncle drove them in an ambulance disguised as patients, to get through the checkpoints on the road, to the home of a Hutu man in another village who was willing to hide them. After his neighbors discovered and threatened to kill all of them, her grandmother quickly placed Jacqueline in a nearby orphanage for protection. After the massacres ended, Jacqueline learned from her uncle that her entire family had been butchered. In 1995 she was granted political asylum in the United States. Another uncle who was completing a residency in psychiatry in Virginia brought Jacqueline here and legally adopted her. Two years later they moved to the New York borough of Queens, where the uncle obtained a hospital position.
How did the unlikely duo of David and Jacqueline come together?
After retiring, David started his new career of keeping the memory of the Holocaust alive by speaking to schoolchildren and community groups. One day he came to Jacqueline's high school class in Queens. Jacqueline wept at hearing his story — she felt it was her story as well. She wrote David a moving letter that included, "At one time I, too, like you, had a feeling of guilt for being alive. 'Why was I left?' I asked myself. I never really got an answer to that, but now I'm thankful that I was left, because maybe I can make a difference in this world if I try, and maybe I can do my part in making sure that no other human being goes through the same experience as I did."
David invited Jacqueline to join him in speaking engagements. She agreed. Together they form a dynamic team. Jacqueline's presence and gripping story is particularly effective with young people. Children and teenagers can sympathize with David's retelling of the brutal inhumanity of the Holocaust, but for most young people it's a distant event of bygone times that just as well could have happened in ancient Rome. Not the same as hearing the horrors that a person of their generation went through, while they were unconscious of ghastly world events and absorbed in their comfortable lifestyles — Jacqueline's suffering hits home and registers. Young people in their audiences are often inspired to then initiate Holocaust and tolerance projects that will have a lasting impact.
The powerful message that David and Jacqueline deliver is taking root and spreading; many are listening and honoring them, as David notes:
"We have spoken at several of the Ivy League schools, Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, many of the high schools and universities in the New York area, at temples and churches in Washington, D.C., and numerous other places. In May of 2005 I spoke to the students and faculty of the University of Bologna, in Italy, and on a separate occasion to several hundred Italian high school students (in Italian). We were honored last November by the ADL (Anti Defamation League) with a dinner and concert by the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. In December we received The Global Peace and Tolerance Award from the United Nations. Jacqueline was given the opportunity to give a talk on the floor of the United Nations to over 180 delegates from all over the world during the commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the Rwandan Genocide. We were written up in The New York Times, People Magazine and several other publications. We appeared several times on NPR radio, BBC and Voice of America. On TV we were interviewed on ABC, NBC's 'The Today Show,' the Wolf Blitzer hour on CNN and on 'The News Hour with Jim Lehrer' on public television."
Two weeks ago Jacqueline graduated from New York University with a degree in International Relations. She's taking a year off to work with Miracle Corners of the World, where she is establishing Jacqueline's Corner to raise funds to assist victims of the Rwanda genocide. She plans to eventually go to law school.
Shakespeare said, "The evil that men do lives after them. The good is oft interred with their bones."
Willie, we love you but you got that one wrong. David and Jacqueline are dramatic living examples proclaiming that ultimately the good, the noble and the transcendent spirit survive. They are beacons of light that will shine for eternity.
In case you missed the last two columns on the Holocaust:
Return to holocaust central
A German town faces its holocaust past
— — —
Bernard Starr, Ph.D., formerly professor of developmental and educational psychology at the City University of New York, now teaches psychology and leads the Spiritual Forum at Marymount Manhattan College. In addition to his work in radio, he is a longtime contributor of commentary and opinion articles to numerous major publications. He is also the main United Nations representative for the Institute of Global Education that founded the Mucherla Global School in Mucherla, India. His book, "Escape Your Own Prison: Why We Need Spirituality and Psychology to Be Truly Free," will be published by Rowman and Littlefield in October 2007. His email address is {email OmniCns@aol.com}OmniCns@aol.com{/email}. © copyright 2007 by Bernard Starr