I am a Holocaust survivor and a child of Holocaust survivors, born December 21, 1939, in the city of Czernowitz, Bukovina; then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, now in Romania.
My parents and I were deported when I was only a-year-and-a-half-old and I have no memories of that period of time.My parents wanted their children to have a normal childhood and did not talk of our experiences. They did not want to burden us with those stories. For me, it’s a blessing in disguise. Because I don’t have to relive those whole stories like the older generations do every single day.
If you ask any survivor, “How come you’re alive today?” everybody will use one word: luck. There is no rhyme and no reason why somebody lived and somebody died—I survived.
I was never separated from my parents, but I was subjected to medical experiments. You will look at me and you will never know that I’m in constant pain. I have been, I am, and will be in pain every single second of my life.
From 1941 to 1944, my parents and I were in a labor camp and ghetto called Mogilyev-Podolskiy in what is now Ukraine, an area that was annexed by the Romanian Nazis who were the most brutal group of people. Very few people know about the Romanians’ brutality: for instance, they brought together 19,000 Jews from Odessa and burnt them alive. So very few people know about the cruelty of the Romanians. The camp was liberated by the Red Army in March of 1944, and my family and I made our way to a small town in Transylvania called Reghin and eventually emigrated to Israel in 1961 where I served as a mechanic in the Israeli Air Force.
One main reason I am alive today, my father once explained to me, is because a German woman saved my life. Not far away from the labor camp, there was a farm owned by Germans. She brought food to the guards in the SS, but when she saw the physical signs that I’m dying of starvation—big head, whole stomach, sore feet—at the risk of her entire family, she decided to give me milk, possibly more, but I did not ask my father more details. I don’t know the name of the person that saved my life, let alone why, but, in 2014, I went to Israel giving testimony at Yad Vashem and told her story.
I had a recurring nightmare that lasted for many years. In the nightmare, I was in the corner of a building. I was naked. The only lights and sounds I saw and heard were from the explosions outside. It made me feel like I was in a void and alone. But, today, because I tell my story, I know that is just a dream.
A few months ago, I was invited to speak at MS 447, a Queens public school. Then I learned that the principal denied me this invitation to speak to the kids. I don’t know her and the principal never talked to me, but, apparently, they have Muslim kids there, and they come to school with the kufiyeh and the principal claimed the PowerPoint presentation on my website was her reason for disinviting me. My PowerPoint presentation does not discuss the war in Gaza or Iran, but there is an Israeli flag in the background. I’m an Israeli. Why would I deny my heritage? So, for her, that was too political, but there was a big outcry, and the media was involved, and the superintendent overruled the principal, and I was allowed to speak there on February 5, 2026. The pushback was very important because somebody else will try to deny me or others the right to speak, and now they can use New York as an example of how to overcome that.
There is no rhyme and no reason why somebody lived and somebody died—I survived.
The Jewish people have a future everywhere, with one condition—and this is my mission in life—to educate the next generation; to motivate them to be the best they can be and empower them to become upstanders. All the tragedies in the world—genocides, the Holocaust—happened because most stood by and did nothing. And I want to teach them how the Holocaust happened. I go through the stages—that people did not react in time and it kept escalating. Knowledge without action means absolutely nothing, and they have to take the example of Martin Luther King, Jr., to march nationwide, to bring other ethnic groups with them, and to do it in a peaceful way, without violence. And because of the way Dr. King did it, bringing the media with him, many groundbreaking pieces of legislation have been passed. We must be united and fight for everybody.
When I talk about October 7, I was not surprised by the attack, because I had been saying for years, “Why did Israel expect different results using the same old tactics?” However, a lot of people compare it to the Holocaust because it was the worst atrocity inflicted on the Jewish people since the Holocaust. If you have to make comparisons, compare the Hamas brutality with ISIS, but not with the Holocaust. We have to be very careful with the words that we are using, as people use words too loosely, all kinds of words, and then those words become the norm; then we have to change the norm and we must speak with one voice.
The Holocaust must be taught forever and ever. It is the best example of what hate can do to a person, a group of people, to a nation, to the world. The whole world was involved in trying to annihilate only one group of people, the Jews. Some Jews are offended when they see the Holocaust universalized, because, many people say, the Holocaust isn’t just the story of the murder of the Jews, but it’s the story of the killing of “everybody.” I say, “Please don’t compare it anything, because the Holocaust is a unique moment in history.”
Our enemies use one-word accusations—“genocide,” “apartheid,” “colonialist”—and everybody hears it. We don’t have one word to which everybody can listen, as everybody usus a different word, and so our message is confusing. Therefore, nobody hears us and the media do not know what we’re standing for. Joseph Goebbels explained “the big lie,” and how the bigger the lie the more credible it becomes, and that’s exactly what our enemies are doing.
My mission is to educate the next generation. We have to educate the young people to be upstanders and not to be afraid to talk. Each child should have a very strong voice and each one can make a difference.
I have spoken with Holocaust deniers; for instance, a Pakistani woman who repeated that the IDF is committing genocide. She looked at me and said, “You are part of the problem.” That’s indoctrination. That’s why I start with first, second, and third graders. I talk about hate and bullying, and I start to speak with fourth graders about the Holocaust before they’re indoctrinated. BDS started on campuses, succeeded, then went to high school and succeeded. They are right now in middle schools. And, once the children are indoctrinated, it’s almost impossible to bring them to critical thinking.
I’ve spoken to between 350,000 and 400,000 people in my life; and, from the responses that I get, I know that they will make a difference, but it will take time as true change doesn’t happen suddenly. People will have to be educated, and eventually things will change, but it will get worse before it gets better.
I was also honored to light the torch as an Israeli for the rebirth of Israel one year for Independence Day. That was, so far, the highlight of my life.
I am an optimist, and I will die an optimist. We survived the Holocaust. We survived many other tragedies, and, when I talk to high school students, I remind them of Passover. In the Passover hagadah, there is the sentence that, in every generation, our enemies try to annihilate us, but, instead, their civilizations disappeared. We prevailed and will continue to, and I have a very strong message: we are here to stay, whether you like it or not.
Am Yisrael chai.
