OSWIECIM, Poland — A group of survivors of Nazi death camps commemorated the 79th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp during World War II in a simple event in southern Poland. Around 20 survivors from different camps established by Nazi Germany across Europe laid wreaths, placed flowers, and lit candles at the Death Wall in Auschwitz, where the Nazis executed thousands of inmates, mainly Polish resistance members and others. Later, the group, along with state officials and other participants, gathered for a ceremony by a brick women’s barrack at Birkenau that has recently undergone restoration. Following that, they prayed and lit candles at the monument in Birkenau, near the crematoria ruins, in memory of around 1.1 million camp victims, predominantly Jews. The memorial site and museum are situated near the city of Oswiecim.
Observances were also held in numerous other countries on that day. Almost 6 million European Jews were killed by the Nazis during the Holocaust — the mass murder of Jews and other groups before and during World War II. To mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the survivors were joined by Polish Senate Speaker Malgorzata Kidawa-Blonska, Culture Minister Bartlomiej Sienkiewicz, and Israeli Ambassador Yacov Livne.
The theme of the observances was the human being, symbolized in simple, hand-drawn portraits that were projected on a screen during the observances in Birkenau. The purpose was to emphasize that the tragedy of Auschwitz-Birkenau lies in the suffering of the people held and killed there. In Germany, where individuals laid flowers and lit candles at memorials for the victims of the Nazi terror, Chancellor Olaf Scholz stated that his country would continue to bear the responsibility for this “crime against humanity.” He called on all citizens to uphold Germany’s democracy and combat antisemitism as the country marked the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. “Never again’ is every day,” Scholz said in his weekly video podcast. “Jan. 27 calls out to us: Stay visible! Stay audible! Against antisemitism, against racism, against misanthropy — and for our democracy.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, whose country is engaged in repelling Russia’s full-scale invasion, posted an image of a Jewish menorah on X, formerly known as Twitter, to mark the remembrance day. “Every new generation must learn the truth about the Holocaust. Human life must remain the highest value for all nations in the world,” said Zelenskyy, who is Jewish and had relatives who were lost in the Holocaust. “Eternal memory to all Holocaust victims!” Zelenskyy tweeted.
In Italy, Holocaust commemorations included a torchlit procession alongside official statements from top political leaders. Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni mentioned that her conservative nationalist government was dedicated to eliminating antisemitism, which she claimed had been “reinvigorated” during the Israel-Hamas conflict. Meloni’s opponents have long criticized her and her Brothers of Italy party, which has neofascist roots, for not adequately apologizing for its past. Police were also on alert after pro-Palestinian activists indicated that they would defy a police order and proceed with a rally planned to coincide with the Holocaust commemorations. Italy’s Jewish community has complained that such protests have provided opportunities for the memory of the Holocaust to be exploited by anti-Israel forces and used against Jews.
In Bosnia-Herzegovina, Jews and Muslims from the country and from abroad gathered in Srebrenica to jointly observe Holocaust Remembrance Day, and to promote compassion and dialogue during the Israel-Hamas conflict. The event was organized by the center preserving the memory of Europe’s only acknowledged genocide since the Holocaust — the massacre in 1995 of more than 8,000 Muslim Bosniaks in Srebrenica in Bosnia’s interethnic war. The event highlighted the message that the two communities share the experience of persecution and must stand together in their commitment to peace.
New York law professor Menachem Rosensaft told The Associated Press before his participation in the Srebrenica commemoration that this year’s observances were particularly meaningful because they come just months after the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel, which became the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust. He stated, “We need to bring people together and find common ground,” Rosensaft, the son of Holocaust survivors, said. “To make sure it doesn’t happen again, this has to become the conscience of the world.” He mentioned that the international commemoration day, established by the United Nations in 2005, is crucial to ensure that the world remembers the Holocaust long after the survivors and their descendants are gone.
Earlier in the week, the countries of the former Yugoslavia signed an agreement in Paris to cooperate in renovating Block 17 in the red-brick Auschwitz camp and set up a permanent exhibition there in memory of around 20,000 people who were deported from their territories and brought to the block. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, and Slovenia will all be involved in the project.
Preserving the camp, a notorious symbol of the horrors of the Holocaust, with its cruelly misleading “Arbeit Macht Frei” (“Work Makes One Free”) gate, requires constant effort by historians and experts, and substantial funds. The Nazis, who occupied Poland from 1939-1945, initially used old Austrian military barracks at Auschwitz as a concentration and death camp for Poland’s resistance fighters. In 1942, the wooden barracks, gas chambers, and crematoria of Birkenau were added for the extermination of Europe’s Jews, Roma, and other nationals, as well as Russian prisoners of war. Soviet Red Army troops liberated Auschwitz-Birkenau on Jan. 27, 1945, with about 7,000 prisoners remaining, including children and those who were too weak to walk. The Germans had evacuated tens of thousands of other inmates on foot days earlier in what is now called the Death March, because many inmates died of exhaustion and cold in the sub-freezing temperatures. Since 1979, the Auschwitz-Birkenau site has been on the UNESCO list of World Heritage.
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