This Yom HaShoah, the Suncoast did something quietly powerful. Temple Emanu-El distributed more than 300 yellow candles, and each one carried the name of a child killed in the Holocaust. Congregants adopted those children, lighting a flame for kids like 5-year-old Morthe Abrahomovic, murdered at Auschwitz in 1944, who left no descendants behind to say his name. This year, our community said it for him.
The day was built on firsthand testimony. Helga shared how she survived Auschwitz and a death march before being liberated from Bergen-Belsen at 46 pounds in April 1945. Marcel told the story of his father, murdered at Auschwitz, and his mother, who crossed the Alps carrying forged papers to survive. Both survivors are featured in “Survive: Stories from the Holocaust,” the documentary from ABC7 directed by Benjamin Edelman, streaming online now.
Remembrance stretched across the region. Downtown St. Petersburg hosted Tampa Bay’s first “6 Million Steps” walk, musicians performed recovered works by Jewish composers the Nazi regime tried to erase, and students at Community Day School planted trees and read historical poems. As Rabbi Brenner J. Glickman put it, if humans are capable of the darkest evil, it could happen again, and it takes people of goodwill, spirit, and memory to prevent it. When survivors speak, who in your family needs to hear it?
