The only item Hedy Bohm keeps from her mother is a handwritten letter from 1939.
In fact, the only thing the Holocaust survivor has to show for her life during World War II is a notebook and her vivid memories.
“I was in hell at Auschwitz. It was really hell,” Bohm told Global News.
It hasn’t always been easy for Bohm to relive his past since he began sharing his story 15 years ago, but he says the educational impact it has had on a new generation has been worth it.
She says she and other fellow survivors felt they were contributing to a positive change in global perceptions of Jews, but the current conflict abroad has raised new doubts.
“Seeing the students’ faces (and) eyes as they understood and learned new things that they weren’t aware of…kept me going. Looking back, we wonder if there was anything good in what we did,” Bohm said.
“Whatever we did, it wasn’t enough.”
The world marked 79 years since the liberation of Auschwitz on Saturday, January 27. However, this year’s Holocaust Remembrance Day comes at a dark time for the Jewish community, as authorities in several countries report a rise in anti-Semitic crimes.
“What we see now is devastating: a global hatred of Jews,” Bohm said.
Hedy Bohm is a Holocaust survivor living in Toronto.
Toronto Holocaust Museum
IN THE PHOTO: Hedy Bohm with her mother.
Toronto Holocaust Museum
Muslim and Jewish community groups have told Global News that incidents of verbal abuse, vandalism, hate and intimidation against Canadians across the country have increased since the Palestinian militant group Hamas attacked Israel on October 7.
B’nai Brith Canada, a Jewish rights and advocacy organization, said in mid-October that they were seeing a “large increase in threat assessments” against the Jewish community, with incitement on university campuses and in the streets, and slogans genocides directed at Jews in demonstrations. .
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In Toronto alone, local police said 98 hate crimes were reported between Oct. 7 and Dec. 17, 2023, compared to 48 during the same period in 2022. More than half of the incidents were anti-Semitic.
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Canada sees rise in anti-Semitic incidents since start of Hamas-Israel conflict
Educational institutions have been hotbeds of hate related to the Middle East conflict in recent months, including Concordia University in Montreal, where a fight between two students in November led to multiple injuries and an arrest.
Raheel Raza of the Council of Muslims Against Antisemitism says Canada’s Jewish community has every right to be afraid.
“What’s happening in synagogues, schools and businesses, in people’s homes… this is not Canada,” he told Global News.
Two Jewish schools in Montreal were also targeted by anti-Semitic attacks in November, with one of them hit by gunfire twice in the same week. No injuries were reported, but the incidents sparked urgent calls for action.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau urged Canadians at a news conference that month to denounce violent anti-Semitism in the strongest terms and called for calm.
“This hatred has no place here in Montreal, nor anywhere in Quebec or Canada,” Trudeau told reporters in Longueuil.
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Rabbi Menachem Karmel, principal of Yeshiva Gedola Elementary School, said the anti-Semitic attack on the school is “unconscionable.”
“I looked at it not just literally as someone shooting bullets through the school gate, but figuratively (as) someone shooting a bullet into this warm, beautiful community, and just shaking us up for no reason other than hate and prejudice.” . he told Global News on November 12.
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Holocaust Remembrance Day
On Saturday, about 20 survivors from various camps established by Nazi Germany across Europe laid wreaths at the Death Wall in Auschwitz to mark the 79th anniversary of the camp’s liberation.
The ceremony in southern Poland remembered the camp’s 1.1 million victims, most of whom were Jewish. Nearly 6 million European Jews were murdered by the Nazis before and during World War II.
Jan Grabowski, a history professor at the University of Ottawa, says the Holocaust has “unfortunately” become a point of tension in the political landscape.
“What you see now is that, from the left and from the right, there will be… attempts to influence the celebration, the commemoration (of Holocaust Remembrance Day),” he told Global News.
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Hate crimes increase in 2023, most calls about anti-Semitism: Toronto police
From a historical perspective, Grabowski says it is not surprising that the conflicts in the Middle East have an impact on the way the world reflects on the Holocaust.
“The left is (trying to) justify the policies of the State of Israel, while the right will have the typical old anti-Semitism fueled by this atmosphere of conflict and war. So now we have an unprecedented explosion of anti-Semitism, fueled by various political movements,” he said.
In the meantime, Bohm hopes people will take advantage of every opportunity to hear the stories of the past to prevent history from repeating itself.
“I can imagine a world where people are kind to each other, regardless of color, religion and nationality,” he said.
– with files from Global’s Saba Aziz and Caryn Lieberman
© 2024 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.