# Witness: Passing the Torch of Holocaust Memory to New Generations

Witness: Passing the Torch of Holocaust Memory to New Generations is a substantial volume published by Second Story Press, motivated by a 2014 United Nations exhibition featuring reflections and visuals of Holocaust survivors alongside students participating in the March of the Living since 1988.
Both the original exhibition and the accompanying book (published in 2015) aims to inform a new generation of learners about the horrors of the Second World War. The book was produced in partnership with March of the Living, an organization dedicated to facilitating visits to the Polish sites of Nazi crimes and Toronto-based religious figure and Holocaust educator Eli Rubenstein. Witness is available in English, Spanish, Polish, and Hebrew.
The book has an interactive feature and in the revised edition a afterword by Steven Spielberg, while the preface includes contributions from Pope Francis, Pope John Paul II and Barack Obama. In 2021 a short film based on the book was released and features recorded moments used in the exhibition and publication.

## Summary

Based on a photo exhibit launched at the United Nations in 2014, the book, released in 2015, documents experiences from Holocaust survivors revisiting concentration camps and the reactions of teenage visitors confronting the horrors inflicted by the Nazis on various groups. Eli Rubenstein collected photos from the March of the Living Digital Archive Project and paired these with poems from teenage participants and added historical sections to explain multiple events. The book also outlines the commitment of participates to create a better world through education.
The initial chapter opens with an examination by witnesses and a summary of the Holocaust historical context. The subsequent chapter is dedicated to the principal death camps located in Poland (Auschwitz, Treblinka, Majdanek, and Belzec), where systematic extermination occurred. The third chapter emphasizes acts of resistance amidst the Holocaust. Chapter four provides witnesses testimony about survival. The fifth chapter centers on the significance of survivors and the role of students in perpetuating the legacy of remembrance. The concluding chapter advocates for a dedication to fostering a new generation of witnesses through multiple avenues including Holocaust studies.
The book has an interactive feature where the survivors, liberators, and Righteous Among the Nations featured in the book, include an invisible link embedded on their image. When their image is accessed with a smart phone or other device, the reader is taken to an excerpt of their video testimony on USC Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education (created by Steven Spielberg) or March of the Living Digital Archive Project websites.
There is an afterword in the revised edition by Steven Spielberg, while the preface includes contributions from Pope Francis, Pope John Paul II and Barack Obama. In the afterword, Spielberg speaks to the survivors, stating; "Your stories are safe with us. They remind us not only of your steadfast courage but also that the days ahead will be filled with light and hope."

## Publication history
### Translations

Translations in several other languages have been completed and/or published with the launch of the Polish language edition taking place in November 2018 at the Polin Museum, the Spanish edition (Testimonios; traspasar la antorcha de la memoria del holocausto a las nuevas generaciones) launched in January 2019, and the Hebrew edition was release in 2019.

### Revised edition

In 2020, a special edition of the book was published in conjunction with “Liberation 75” an international Holocaust education initiative commemorating the 75th Anniversary of the end of WWII and the liberation of Europe from Nazi tyranny. In the new edition, each photo of a survivor, rescuer, or WWII liberator has an invisible barcode that links to their video testimony via mobile phone. There are 75 videos on the USC Shoah Foundation or March of the Living websites. The edition includes new liberation stories, content honoring those who rescued Jews, a new Afterword, and a Preface.

### Short film

In 2021 a short film based on the book was released; directed and produced by Naomi Wise, the director of the March of the Living Digital Archive Project, features moments documented between survivors and students over the past 33 years used in the book.

### Interactive content

The March of the Living Digital Archive Project, which hosts many of the videos linked in the book was made possible in part, through grants from the Citizenship & Immigration Canada - Multiculturalism Section, and the Claims Conference. The Digital Archives Project aims to gather Holocaust testimony from Canadian survivors who, since 1988, have traveled to Poland on the March of the Living to share their Holocaust stories with their young students in the locations they transpired.

## Reception

Witness has overall received positive reactions and reviews.
Avrum Rosensweig in the HuffPost summarized the book saying; " powerful aspect of Witness is that it stands on its own as a historical document and is an excellent, well laid out read for students of the Holocaust and those who are new to learning about this very complex time in history." Irene Tomaszewski in the Cosmopolitan Review stated; " a remarkable volume that testifies to the power of remembrance, commemoration, and education." Canadian Jewish News described the book as " a treasure trove of photographs, poetry, commentary and history designed to enlighten a broad audience about the events of the Holocaust." Published in the Jerusalem Post, William B. Helmreich remaked " Witness provides a capsule history of the Holocaust that is especially useful for someone who is unaware of what actually happened." The hardback version has been criticized for its "oblong format" resulting in a "heavy awkward" publication. The accessibility concern was negated when the publication was released in digital and paperback formats.

## Notable excerpts

Pope Francis: “Work for peace. Unite with people from different cultures and religions. Keep an open heart. Don’t discriminate. Welcome and understand others. May God bless you.”
Pope John Paul II: “I know all about the March of the Living. God bless your daughter, and God bless the March of the Living.”
President Barack Obama: “I think of Pinchas Gutter, a man who lived through the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, and survived the Majdanek death camp…‘I tell my story,’ he says, ‘for the purpose of improving humanity, drop by drop by drop. Like a drop of water falls on a stone and erodes it, so, hopefully, by telling my story over and over again, I will achieve the purpose of making the world a better place to live in.’ Those are the words of one survivor – performing that sacred duty of memory – that will echo throughout eternity. Those are good words for all of us to live by.”
Elie Wiesel: "Forever will I see the children who no longer have the strength to cry. Forever will I see the elderly who no longer have the strength to help them. Forever will I see the mothers and the fathers, the grandfathers and grandmothers, the little schoolchildren…their teachers…the righteous and the pious…. From where do we take the tears to cry over them? Who has the strength to cry for them?"
Steven Spielberg: "We’ve never had a Remembrance Day quite like this. But today, on Yom HaShoah, we gather for our first-ever virtual March of the Living. And I wish we could all be together in person. But what’s important is that we are together now. Because this virtual gathering not only gives us a chance to remember the horrors we faced in the past, it also shines a light on the struggles that lie ahead and those we face as a community this very day. The work we are doing – which is your work – is already having a generational impact. So for that I can only say thank you. Thank you for your bravery. Thank you for your commitment to the March of the Living. And thank you for gathering today to look back, as we continue the vital work of ensuring a better future.

### Survivor quotes

Faigie Libman: "When you have hatred in your heart, there is no room for love."
Nate Leipciger: "Hate will destroy the person doing the hating."
Max Glauben: "I am a strong believer that we must tell the stories to the youngsters – they are going to be our witnesses.”
Elie Wiesel: "To be a survivor after the Holocaust, is to have all the reason in the world to destroy and not to destroy. To have all the reasons in the world to hate and not to hate… to have all the reasons in the world to mistrust and not to mistrust..."
Judy Weissenberg Cohen: “They say 'When you listen to a witness, you become a witness.' I am only asking you to work for a world where nobody will have to live with memories like mine ever again. Please heal the world.”