7.000 Jewish women and children killed in the center of Belgrade

Foto: Milena Đorđević

Preporučujemo

Today is the International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The Soviet troops liberated, on this day 70 years ago, Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest industrial death camp, the biggest death factory in the history of the Mankind. Today we are remembering the genocide that resulted in the death of more than 6 million Jews and 1 million Roma people. They were all killed only because they were born Jewish or Roma. To help us understand what this day really means and how important it is, for the Jews, Roma, Serbia and all of the World, Yossef Levi, the Ambassador of the State of Israel in Serbia, agreed to speak for Telegraf.

What is the Holocaust?

The Holocaust was the most tragic chapter in the history of the Jewish people. We survived for approximately 4.000 years, and we knew many calamities, many disasters. The Jewish history is a long chain of disasters and pain, with some short breaks of happiness and sovereignty. For instance one that we live now since Israel was established. But the Holocaust stands out: it was the physical murder of one third of our people. More than six million Jews were killed during a relatively short period. That was the most horrible chapter in our history, and it became, I think, the trauma for each Jew until today. Some in the Jewish world analyses the Holocaust and observe it as a lesson that teaches us to never again be in such a position of defenselessness. We were the people that contributed to the World so much – the Monotheism, the Christianity, the Prophets, the Bible, the holy language of Hebrew, the sciences... But nothing helped. We were defenseless, without a territory, without an army, and during a very short time, so many people were murdered in all possible grotesque ways of slaughter. People were shot, people were starved to death, people were gassed, people were burned alive, people were thrown into the rivers, and people were used for very cruel medical experiments, only because they were born Jewish. They were not murdered because of what they did, or because of what they thought, they were murdered simply because they were born different. That was a very difficult moral lesson for us Jews – that you can enrich this World and make it a better place for all the people, but when the day comes, you are going to be sent to Birkenau. Nothing will help you, if you do not defend yourself. It was also a very bitter lesson for many Jews about the human cruelty. The Holocaust is one of the common denominators for Jews all over the World. It is a unique experience that we internalized as our personal one. What connects a Jew in Cape Town, in Moscow, in Buenos Aires and in Teheran? Very few things. And the Holocaust is the central pillar in the Jewish solidarity. It is a very strong red sign on the long road we are walking on: Never again.

Foto: Milena Đorđević

What does the Holocaust mean for you personally?

I want to tell you that I was not born into the family which experienced the Holocaust directly. My parents had the luck to be born in Iran and Afghanistan, so none of my family members was murdered by the Germans and their collaborators. But, for me, the Holocaust is almost a personal experience. I was raised on the memories of the Holocaust. When I was a little child, I went to the library and insisted to read the books about it. About Babi Yar, a place in Ukraine where the Germans shot 33.000 women, men and children in two days. About Ponary, a place in Lithuania where they did the same, with 100.000 Jews. I was reading about the women that were burned and thrown into the pits first because they were a bit fattier and were burning better, and were used as a fuel. And, many other cruel descriptions. Later, when I became a diplomat, I wanted to go to the places where the Holocaust happened. My first assignment was in Germany, the second one in Poland, and later in the ex Yugoslavia. This was not by accident. I wanted to come to the places I feel connected to.

Foto: Milena Đorđević

What about the Serbs? Do they know enough about the Holocaust?

People do not know about it enough. One of the reasons that I feel such a great sympathy for the Serbian people is that the Serbs were one of the few nations in which active anti-Semitism was never popular. This nation never collaborated, in big numbers, with the German Nazis. This nation did not create concentration camps to murder Jewish inhabitants. And this nation did not shoot the Jews into the Danube. And this nation suffered, in many cases, with the Jewish brothers and sisters. In many cases when we are putting flowers on the mass graves of Jewish victims, tens of thousands of them, we know that Serbs were thrown into those graves almost at the same time. In the history books, Serbia is not going to be remembered as a villain, regarding the Holocaust, you are not going to be remembered as a nation which was a part of the murder machine. You are catalogued in the Jewish history as one of the fewest brave nations which was fighting against evil. This is something that we Jews will never forget. But still, the percentage of the Jews killed in ex Yugoslavia was one of the highest. About 82.000 Jews used to live in ex Yugoslavia, and about 67.000 of them were murdered. In Serbia, about 34.000 Jews used to live before the Holocaust, and about 31.000 of them were murdered. And Serbia was declared Judenfrei already in 1942, one of the earliest in Europe. Yes, there were collaborators with the Germans, that fact should not be forgotten. Those people connected to the Nedić Government. There were those, in the Municipality of Belgrade and in the Police, who caught Jews on the streets and sent them to the Staro Sajmište concentration camp, to the Gestapo. So, in each society you have saints and you have demons. But the number of the saints in the Serbian nation was much higher than the number of the demons, during the Holocaust.  There were collaborators, and I think this is a dark chapter we should open and discuss. I think the relationship between the Serbs and the Jews is so solid and so intimate that we can also speak about the bad things. But one thing is very important: You hardly hear a bad word about Serbia amongst the Holocaust survivors.

Foto: Tanjug/AP/Jewish Historical Museum, Belgrade via the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Yet, it is proposed that some of these people, like Milan Nedić, should be rehabilitated? Some are saying he „did what he had to do, to save the people“?

There is no excuse and no justification for sending a child, woman or a man to death, just because he was born Jewish, or Roma, or Serbian.

What would it mean for you if Nedić was to be rehabilitated?

The question of the rehabilitation of ex criminals is not in the central place of our dialogue with Serbia, because it is not a huge phenomenon. I know other countries in which the nostalgia for the Nazi times is very popular. I know other countries where I see the admiration for the people who murdered thousands, in the most brutal ways. These things are not happening in Serbia. We will raise this issue when it is needed, but should be careful not to confuse the majority with the minority. Admiration for Nazi murders is not a phenomenon you can find here in Serbia. On the other hand, you can find a lot of ignorance about the things that happened here in the 1940s. I wonder how many Serbs know what happened in the Staro sajmište, which is just across the center of Belgrade. I wonder how many readers of Telegraf know that approximately 7.000 Jewish women, children and elderly were concentrated there, in terrible conditions. Many died of hunger, of cold, of diseases... Every morning, this closed truck, which was called „dushegupka“ (Gaswagen), was taking women and children from the Staro Sajmište to so called „unknown workplace outside Belgrade“. And the Germans would give candies to the children, so they would enter the truck. Just behind the bridge, the truck would stop, with 100 women and children inside. The gas pipe was connected to the inside of the truck. This is how 7.000 Jewish women and children were murdered here, in Belgrade, in the center of the city. They were suffocating, for few kilometers, while this truck was slowly passing through Belgrade. How many people in Serbia know this? How many people know that Jewish women and children were dying in the streets that we love today? Along Terazije, Slavija... And how many people know about the men concentrated in Topovske šupe, in Autokomanda of today, who were later taken to be murdered in Jabuka or Jajinci?

Foto: Milena Đorđević

They are talking about building a mall there?

Yes, there are plans for that. But I am sure, if that happens, a decent memorial will be a part of the project.

So, what should be done so that more people know about this?

The mission of our time is to tell about what happened. And I do not think it is a hard mission for Serbs, because for some nations, knowing about their history causes a natural feeling of guilt, or should cause it, and this is not a case in Serbia. I do not see any reason to avoid saluting the memory of the innocent victims of the war. There is also one more important thing. Whole Jewish families were annihilated during the Holocaust, and there were no survivors. The law, which the Government now is preparing, tries to find a moral and a legal solution to this question, which does not have a simple answer. What do you do with the property of the families from which no one survived? To whom does this property belong? This is the question not only for Serbia, but for all of Europe. You cannot restore the people, but what do you do with the property?

Let us go back in the 1930s. Some people say the Holocaust could have been predicted, having in mind the rise of the anti-Semitism and the rise of the Nazis. Some people are saying anti-Semitism is on the rise again. Do you see a parallel between now and then and could something like the Holocaust happen again?

Could you predict the Holocaust? Of course there were heavy clouds over Europe back then. In Germany, there were race laws against Jews. And let us not forget, if you were a Jew, and you wanted to get out, the gates of the Palestine were closed, by the British, because of the heavy Arab pressure, so you had nowhere to go. Jews were trying to smuggle themselves out, but they had nowhere to go. The smart ones, who understood the earthquake was on the way, and those who had the money to do it, emigrated. This is what we learned: If we do not have a homeland, when there is a horrible time coming, the World will not rescue us. But most of the Jews were waiting for this heavy cloud to pass over, and go away. Imagine that you were a head of a family in Lodz, in Poland. You hear that somewhere in Germany there is this guy with the moustache, who is saying the Jews are guilty, the Jews cannot go to work, the Jews are our enemy... Will you sell your shop, take your children out of the school, because maybe something will happen? Will you change your life? Most of us have a human tendency to just wait until the worse is over. You have Lodz, a city where 60 per cent of all doctors were Jewish, and 70 per cent of all professors were Jewish. And you say to yourself „I am a part of a big community“. So, who could see an option that human beings will sit and make a list of 11,5 million Jews and the plan to kill all of them? Who could think such a sick mind could exist? In 1939 if you would say that in two years whole Jewish cities will be destroyed, you would be called crazy. And there was one Jewish prophet, called Zhabotinsky, who called for evacuation in 1938. Escape! he said. And people said he drank something, or smoked something. This is the human nature: to ignore the problem. I do not blame those who did not escape. I blame those who murdered. It is in human nature to think that the people are good.

Foto: Milena Đorđević

Are we in the same danger now?

There is a new rise of anti-Semitism and you cannot close your eyes to this fact. It is among Christian Europeans, it is among Muslim Europeans, Muslims in the Arab World. Once they were screaming „Jews, go to Palestina“, „Juden, nach Palestina!“ Today, they are screaming „Jews go out of Palestine“! So, where should we go? We know what those who say these things actually mean. They think that we do not belong to this World. They think we should be annihilated again. But the big difference between 1939 and today is the fact that there is a strong Jewish state. We are strong, we should be united, we know what the dangers are, and we are equipped with experience and wisdom. We know very well what those calling for our annihilation are capable of, we know what those building the atom bomb want to do, and we will not let them do that. We know what those anti-Semites walking on the streets of today want. It is not very far away from what those walking on the streets of Berlin or Dresden in 1939 with torches wanted. They all hate Jews. Those of today are not as vocal; they are sometimes hiding behind nice and polite words, hiding behind verbal acrobatics. But anti-Semitism remains what it was. Some say „we do not hate the Jews, but we hate the Zionists“. Some say „we do not hate the Jews, but we hate Israel“. Some say „we think that the Jews are OK, but they do not have the right to have their own state“. This is anti-Semitism. The Jews, as all nations, have the right to be free, to have their own state. After the Holocaust, some people are a bit ashamed to use, directly, anti-Semitic language, so they are diverting their hatred against Israel. If we had, in medieval times, religious anti-Semitism, and the Nazi Germans had the racist anti-Semitism, today we have, in many places, political anti-Semitism. And this political anti-Semitism is anti-Israelism.

Foto: AP/Tanjug

Israel has had a lot of experience with the Muslim extremism. After the rise of this extremism in Europe recently, is there a message to be sent to Europe from Israel?

The message is: Be very careful. They are very dangerous. They want to change Europe. Those extremists believe that the World is divided in two: „Dar al Islam“ and „Dar al Harb“, the House of Islam and the House of War. You have Islamic places, and the places that are going to be Islamic in the future, the places of war. They do not think the others have the right to be different. My message for Europe is this: Wake up and fight back.

Could the reaction to what happened in Paris give rise to the extreme right wing parties in Europe? And as we know, they are mostly anti-Semitic. Could this be a danger, as well?

We should be careful not to generalize. It is a sin. Most of the Muslims in Europe are peace seeking people, they are not extreme. Europe should find the extremists and deal with them. How? I trust in the security apparatuses and the legal systems of the European countries. Some extremists can be followed, some can be imprisoned, some could have their movement limited, and some could be kicked out. The worst that can happen, however, is closing your eyes when they say, in the mosques, „kill the Jews“, „kill the Christians“ or „kill the Western civilization“. This is very dangerous for Europe. You heard what happened in Tel Aviv, just few days ago. A young Arab man, from Turkarem, entered the bus, took his knife out and stabbed 13 innocent people, men, women and children. He was chasing and stabbing women in the back. And he said in his interrogation „I was watching TV, and I got furious, so I went to Tel Aviv to have my revenge“. So, if someone says, on the TV, „stand up and revenge Gaza“, should it be tolerated? Democracy is the most wonderful system, but it has its own limitations. You should draw a line between people having a right to express themselves and your right not to be hurt. So, should it be allowed to people on the TV to say „stand up and revenge Gaza“, if it leads to murder? Our best law experts are sitting and talking, right now, about the things that should be done. We are a democratic country, we respect all human rights, a thousand times more than some of our neighbors, but something should be done. Expressing yourself is legitimate, but murdering women in the bus is not legitimate. And sometimes, one leads to another.

Foto: Milena Đorđević

Let us talk about ISIS. It is getting closer to the borders of the Jewish state. Is Israel the final goal for them?

Of course we are the ultimate goal for those human monsters. If they are murdering other Muslims, cutting heads of women, making all sorts of atrocities to their own people, imagine what they would do in Israel. They do things that words cannot describe, and when you watch them, you cannot sleep at night. These are the monsters of the monsters. By the way, they are not very far from Israel. They are very close. Actually, very, very close. They do not attack us yet, because they want to get stronger. They will try to consolidate themselves first in Syria and Iraq. I hope they will be blocked as soon as possible, not because I am more afraid of them then of the other extremists, but I want them to be blocked because from the human perspective what they do to the innocent people makes me ashamed to be a human.

Foto: Milena Đorđević

Do you see them endangering Hezbollah or Hamas?

Well, they are fighting Hezbollah. They are fighting each other now, but we know very well, if they have the option, they will all turn their weapons against us. We are not afraid for our existence, we are a strong country. We have the weapons, we have the means to defend ourselves. However, if the countries around us fall, that will be a game changer.  Jordan is the most important piece of this puzzle. Lebanon is very important. Syria is somewhere between existing and not existing. Luckily, and we had huge luck that Egypt was saved. Egypt is now the pillar of the security in the Middle East.

Foto: Milena Đorđević

Let us talk about Serbia for a moment. What do we need to change to become a truly prosperous state, to realy become a part of the Europe?

Should I be totally honest?

Totally.

I love Serbia very much. I feel Serbia is my second homeland. And I want it to be happy and prosperous. I am more optimistic than before. I believe that Serbian economy is on the right way and the decisions are right ones. I see some good things coming. I think, personally, the worst is over. But what comes next may not be as rapid and glorious as people might expect. From pure economic perspective there is only one correct grammatical tense for the Serbs: Future. In order to heal economy people must be more efficient, profit-oriented and innovative. A green corridor should be installed for investments and cooperation with minimal bureaucracy and maximum transparency. Serbia’s biggest goldmine is in brains and spirits of young Serbs. Investing in innovation, start-ups and high tech is the most profitable investment. I think your Government understands this very well, and you have great people in the administration, which I totally trust.

Foto: Milena Đorđević

What is the biggest danger for Serbia?

That your nation is demographically shrinking. I think the state should encourage people to have larger families. The only city where I see many young people is Belgrade. Outside the capital, I see mostly old people, pensioners, in the streets. That can be changed. The bridge to the future is children.

If someone asked you „what is the biggest problem in Serbia“, one single thing, what would you say?

Smoking.

(Igor Ćuzović)