Martyrs of Rhodes and Kos and the Liberation of Majdanek
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This week marked the 80th anniversary of the Nazi deportation of 1,600 Jews from Rhodes, Greece and the nearby island of Kos. Over 90% of those Jews were murdered in Auschwitz. The very same day – July 23, 1944- the Russian troops liberated Majdanek. It’s hard to comprehend that while the Nazi leadership knew that the Russians were advancing, that the murderous and heinous inhumanity would be stopped and exposed, they continued in their obsession to dispossess, deport and murder Jews.
2,600km separate Rhodes from Majdanek; yet, on that day 80 years ago, these two places were worlds apart. The few remaining Jews in Majdanek were given their lives back, albeit surrounded by death and destruction. The physical nightmare was ending (although they would still suffer from a lifetime of trauma). For the Jews 2,600km to their south, their physical torment and murderous path was just beginning.
Majdanek
80 years ago, on the night of July 22-23, 1944, Soviet soldiers came upon the Majdanek concentration camp, freeing fewer than 500 prisoners from the main camp of a system that the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum estimates between 95,000 and 130,000 people perished in starting in November 1941.
Between 89,000 and 110,000 of the victims were Jews.
Being the first major concentration camp to be liberated, what researchers uncovered and documented following the freeing of the camp helped shape the understanding of the Nazi genocide and made the liberation of Majdanek one of the most significant moments in the history of World War II and the Holocaust.
Dr. Josephine Janina Mehlberg, using the identity papers of a Polish aristocrat – “Countess Janina Suchodolska,” Holocaust survivor Dr. Josephine Janina Mehlberg worked in Lubin, Poland, as a welfare official while serving in the Polish resistance.
As the “Countess,” Dr. Mehlberg persuaded SS officials to release thousands of Poles from the Majdanek concentration camp and gained permission to deliver food and medicine for thousands more while smuggling supplies and messages to imprisoned resistance fighters.
Dr. Mehlberg was able to elude detection, survive the Holocaust and emigrate to the United States with her husband after the war. Dr. Josephine Janina Mehlberg passed away in May 1969.
Please find this Claims Conference video, featuring Joanna Sliwa, a Claims Conference historian, commemorating the 80th Anniversary of the liberation of the Majdanek concentration camp and Dr. Josephine Janina Mehlberg, who is credited with saving 10,000 people from the Nazis.
Rhodes and Kos
This July 23 marked 80 years since 1,604 Jews from the communities of Rhodes and Kos were deported and murdered in Auschwitz. While the Germans conquered the islands of Rhodes and Kos in September and October 1943, respectively, they did not include the Jewish community living there in deportations until July 1944. On July 20, 1944, the Germans ordered the Jewish men of Rhodes to report to the Italian Air Force officers’ headquarters with their ID cards and work permits under the guise that they would be joining the German war effort. The next day, the Germans ordered women and children to do the same. They arrested the community and confiscated their property, except for those with Turkish citizenship.
On July 23, the Jewish population of Rhodes was forced onto ships that stopped at Leros to pick up approximately 200 Jews from the island of Kos. After almost eight days at sea, the two communities arrived at Piraeus. From there, they were taken to the Haidari concentration camp and, eventually, arrived in Auschwitz on August 16, where most were murdered – about 150 survived. The Nazi deportation of the Jews of Rhodes and Kos virtually erased the prosperous communities that lived there; today, there are few traces of former Jewish life.
The beauty of the community commemoration was that 250 descendants of Rhodes and Kos came from all over the world. I was in Rhodes and Kos this week for the commemoration. Rabbi Benchlouch and his congregants at Ezra Bessaroth Synagogue in Seattle, such as David Behar, praised the event, enjoying the connection with the destroyed community. With only a handful of elderly Jews remaining in Rhodes, one could think that the Nazis had accomplished their goal. The enthusiasm of the descendants belied that notion, proving that the Sephardic traditions will live on and – Am Yisrael Chai!
Rabbi of Athens, Gabriel Negrin, with whom the Claims Conference has a close relationship, led the gathering with awe-inspiring tefilot.
The commemoration was organized by Claudia Restin, President of the Jewish Community of Rhodes with love and care. There were week-long events from Sephardic cooking to historic lectures to screening of the film, “Samuel Modiano, The Mission: From Rhodes To Auschwitz” all designed to showcase the vibrant Jewish community which existed in these Greek islands for hundreds of years before the Nazi devastation.
The formal ceremonies also featured President of the Central Board of Jewish Communities in Greece, David Saltiel; German Ambassador to Greece, Andreas Kindl; Israeli diplomat Doron Lebovich, as well as others but the most moving address was from Holocaust survivor Sami Modiano. I had met him over shabbat at the Kahal Shalom Synagogue. When he realized I was from the Claims Conference, he gratefully acknowledged the aid but ruefully added that no compensation could ever wipe away the number tattooed on his arm, undue the pain and loss he experienced, or bring back his mother, father or family murdered. It was a sad, poignant, important moment. To view the film about him, please click here.
The next day, the group boarded a ferry and traveled to the neighboring island of Kos. There, I met Holocaust survivors Renata Menasse, and her sister Matilda Menasse-Porat, both of whom grew up in the Jewish community there. Renata spoke of her childhood and her family’s survival due to her father’s Turkish citizenship. After liberation, Renata and Matilda went to Athens and then Israel. A dozen of their family members and a grandson, who had just finished his IDF service, accompanied Renata and Matilda on their trip back to Kos in memory of the Jewish community that was murdered there.
We remember and honor the Jewish martyrs of Rhodes and Kos. Now, 80 years after the deportation and murder of the men, women and children, only a few Jews are living on these islands. Yet, survivors from Greece and their descendants gather, their hearts heavy with the weight of history, to commemorate the loss of community and culture. This perseverance of survivors’ memories is remarkable and serves as a lesson for our collective duty to never forget these lost communities.
Shabbat Shalom,
Greg Schneider
