True stories of survival of abuse and injustice Books

Book SynopsisThe book focuses on the heroism of Jews throughout Europe who risked their lives to save their coreligionists under Nazi rule. The contributors discuss and analyze the actions of Jews who rescued other Jews from the hands of the Nazis. These actions took place, to different degrees, in Germany, in Axis states and all across Nazi-occupied Europe, from the early stages of persecution until the war’s end, in the framework of collaborative efforts and individual initiatives. The Jews who rescued other Jews during the Holocaust came like their non-Jewish counterparts from different backgrounds: men and women, old and young, religious and secular, wealthy and poor, educated and uneducated. The rescue missions took place in ghettos, areas without ghettos, jails, camps, hospitals, children’s homes, schools, monasteries, in hiding. This book focuses on these rescue missions and the people behind them, reminding us of their courage and willingness to act, even when it put their own lives in danger.Table of ContentsIntroduction Belgium A Closer Look at Jewish Resistance Members in Occupied Belgium From Insubordination to Resistance in the SS- Sammellager für Juden in Belgium Jewish Double Agents in Belgium: CDJ (Jewish Defense Committee) Employees within the Jewish Council Jewish Civil Resistance and the Slow Emergence of the Memory of the Holocaust in Belgium The Netherlands Hiding in Plain Sight: Gender, Faith, and the Conflicted Legacies of a Dutch Rescuer "Even if We’ll Lose" – Jews Saving Jews in the Netherland The Palestine Pioneers and the Westerweel Group France OSE Fieldworker: Madeleine Dreyfus Women in the Jewish Resistance in France André Chouraqui: The Earthly Vocation of an Underground Ferryman Italy and Greece The Work of DELASEM for the Rescue of Italian and Foreign Jews (1939– 1945) Romaniote, Sephardic, and Mizrahi Jewish Rescuers in the Holocaust Rescue in Ghettos and Camps The Angel from Auschwitz: The Rescue Activities of Jacob "Jakitto" Maestro in Auschwitz "A Steadfast Spirit": The Rescue Work of Surviving Ghetto Fighters after the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising Jewish Physicians in Ghettos and Camps Who Rescued Jews during the Holocaust, 1939– 1945 Saving Jews in Buchenwald and Auschwitz: The Story of Chaskel Tydor Other Areas of Rescue The Bernese Group: A Major Joint Polish- Jewish Rescue Operation Jews Rescue Jews: Immigration and Illegal immigration during the Holocaust

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Book SynopsisThe book Researchers Remember: Research as an Arena of Memory Among Descendants of Holocaust Survivors, a Collected Volume of Academic Auto-biographies is composed of over 30 essays written by prominent researchers worldwide belonging to the “Second Generation” and “ Third Generation” of Holocaust offspring. Each essay traces the author’s path to a research profession, focusing on the influence of their family’s Holocaust background at various crossroads of their life.Table of ContentsIntroduction - David Clark: - A Legacy of Displacement and the Search for Home - Samuel Juni: Righting a Life Which Started on the Wrong Foot - Ela Karpowicz: Becoming - Abraham J. Peck: Towards the Holocaust: A Son of Survivors in Search of Himself - Abraham Z. Reznick: The Holocaust and I - Bela Ruth Samuel Tenenholtz: Nature or Nurture and My Search for Roots - Judith Tydor Baumel- Schwartz: In the Beginning There Was Auschwitz - Dov Dori: My Mother the Hero - Yehudit Judy Dori: From Holocaust to Breaking the Glass Ceiling - Dov Eichenwald: I Have No Other Country - Zehavit Gross: “I Didn’t Choose to be a Second Generation” - Anita H. Grosz: Would the Real Anita Please Rise - Jacqueline Heller: Surviving Survivors - Naomi Levy: On Being Second Generation and My Major Life Choices - Hilda Nissimi: The Holocaust Is a Black Hole - Katalin Pécsi- Pollner: Rewriting My Identity – From “Feeling Jewish” to Discovery of My Heritage - Haim Taitelbaum: Pass the Parcel - Dorota Glowacka: Hide and Seek: A Conversation with My Father in Three Voices - Susan Jacobowitz: Singing History - Shmuel Refael: A Greek- Jewish Family in a German Bauhaus - Dov Schwartz: Academia as a Voyage of Survival - Anita Winter: My Parents’ Story Is Also My Story – But Different - Dan Carter: My Heritage - Emmanuel Friedheim: Between the Shoah and Masada – An Unfulfilled Historical Journey - Rahel Jarach- Sztern: Memory, Tradition, Family: A Second Generation as Mother and Researcher - Rina Krautwirth: (Re)affirming the Past: Growing Up as the Child of a Holocaust Survivor - Liat Steir- Livny: From Holocaust “Intrusions” to Holocaust Research - Daniela Ozacky Stern: Reflections of a Third- Generation Holocaust Scholar - Ariel Zellman: Coming Home - Contributors

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Book Synopsis"This standout survivor’s account will move and inform even those well versed in the inhumanity of the Shoah." — Publishers Weekly (starred review)Ita Dimant’s gripping diary is a detailed account of her experiences during the Holocaust. She describes the chaotic living conditions in the Warsaw ghetto and her dramatic escape to the ‘Aryan’ side. She wrestles repeatedly with the burden of losing close friends and family, revealing her emotional responses to the unfolding tragedy. As one ghetto after another is liquidated, she becomes a courier carrying vital information and supplies between Polish cities. Ita must rely on her wits, skillful deception, and a few trusted friends, as she seeks to evade the noose closing around her. Trade Review“In this posthumous soul-wrenching memoir, Dimant… reconstructs and expands a diary she’d kept during the Nazi occupation of the Warsaw Ghetto… There’s a palpable urgency to Dimant’s writing, which is haunted by the specter of almost unbearable regret… This standout survivor’s account will move and inform even those well versed in the inhumanity of the Shoah.”— Publishers Weekly (starred review)“Archiv­ing the vast, diverse expe­ri­ences of Jews dur­ing the Holo­caust is an impor­tant his­tor­i­cal task — and Sur­vival is a wel­come addi­tion to the canon. … [T]he memoir’s com­bi­na­tion of eye­wit­ness tes­ti­mo­ny and trea­sure-trove pho­tographs makes Ita’s sto­ry come to life. Those who are inter­est­ed in Jew­ish-led resis­tance move­ments, as well as women’s roles with­in them, will find this book par­tic­u­lar­ly compelling.”— Leah Grisham, Jewish Book Council“Ita Dimant's diary is an extraordinary and harrowing account of bravery, resilience, and loss. Translated by Teresa Pollin and edited by Martin Dean, with an introduction by the author's son, Jacob Dimant, this new volume will serve as a valuable and compelling resource for researchers, educators, and general readers, detailing one woman's story of courage and survival, amidst the destruction of a people. This is a fascinating account written and re-written three times over during the course of the war, a testament to Ita’s determination not only to survive, but to bear witness to the tragic scenes she endured in the ghettos of Warsaw, Częstochowa, and elsewhere in Poland through her work as an underground courier, as well as in slave labor in Germany. Ita's survival was a product of remarkable courage, determination, profound resilience, occasional acts of kindness, and no small measure of luck.”— Avinoam J. Patt, Doris and Simon Konover Chair of Judaic Studies, University of Connecticut; author of The Jewish Heroes of Warsaw: The Afterlife of the Revolt“When I first read the manuscript of Ita Dimant’s diary, I was very touched by the author’s personality, her literary talent, her detailed description of everyday life in the Warsaw and Częstochowa ghettos, and by the power of Ita’s spiritual resistance. This extraordinary testimony of the Holocaust should be read by as many people as possible.When I met Ita Dimant in person, she was full of warmth and had a great sense of humor. For me, she will always remain a heroine of everyday life, despite the hunger and suffering, covering the table in the ghetto with a white tablecloth. Her moving diary describes with compassion and accuracy the struggles Jews endured in German-occupied Poland, both inside and outside the ghetto.”— Barbara Engelking, Founder and Director of the Polish Center for Holocaust Research“What makes this diary stand out from other diaries of women Holocaust survivors is not only the multi-layered and readable character at the heart of its narrative, but the fact that we are able to follow the story of a woman who did not consider herself special or brave but had no other choice but to become so as she fought to survive. During this process, she learned a lot about how easy it would be to forget how important doing good in the face of evil could be. Always keeping a good pair of shoes nearby, she never allowed herself the luxury of not remaining vigilant or preparing her loved ones for possible flight. With the help of an excellent translator and editor, her diary shares the moving story of becoming a survivor against all odds.”— Andrea Peto, Professor, Central European University, ViennaTable of ContentsPrefaceIntroduction: A Story of Courage and Survival by Jacob DimantPrologue by Ita Dimant (published originally with the 1993 English and Hebrew editions)The DiaryThe Warsaw Ghetto YearsThe Częstochowa YearLeaving for GermanyFreedom Epilogue by Jacob Dimant Courage and Survival—Symcha Dymant by Jacob DimantAppendix 1: The Brust Notebook DiaryAppendix 2: A Diary in Note FormAppendix 3: Documents, Photographs, and Artifacts Donated to the USHMM by the Dimant FamilyAppendix 4: Miodownik Family TreeList of Illustrations

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Book Synopsis"This standout survivor’s account will move and inform even those well versed in the inhumanity of the Shoah." — Publishers Weekly (starred review)Ita Dimant’s gripping diary is a detailed account of her experiences during the Holocaust. She describes the chaotic living conditions in the Warsaw ghetto and her dramatic escape to the ‘Aryan’ side. She wrestles repeatedly with the burden of losing close friends and family, revealing her emotional responses to the unfolding tragedy. As one ghetto after another is liquidated, she becomes a courier carrying vital information and supplies between Polish cities. Ita must rely on her wits, skillful deception, and a few trusted friends, as she seeks to evade the noose closing around her. Trade Review“In this posthumous soul-wrenching memoir, Dimant… reconstructs and expands a diary she’d kept during the Nazi occupation of the Warsaw Ghetto… There’s a palpable urgency to Dimant’s writing, which is haunted by the specter of almost unbearable regret… This standout survivor’s account will move and inform even those well versed in the inhumanity of the Shoah.”— Publishers Weekly (starred review)“Archiv­ing the vast, diverse expe­ri­ences of Jews dur­ing the Holo­caust is an impor­tant his­tor­i­cal task — and Sur­vival is a wel­come addi­tion to the canon. … [T]he memoir’s com­bi­na­tion of eye­wit­ness tes­ti­mo­ny and trea­sure-trove pho­tographs makes Ita’s sto­ry come to life. Those who are inter­est­ed in Jew­ish-led resis­tance move­ments, as well as women’s roles with­in them, will find this book par­tic­u­lar­ly compelling.”— Leah Grisham, Jewish Book Council“Ita Dimant's diary is an extraordinary and harrowing account of bravery, resilience, and loss. Translated by Teresa Pollin and edited by Martin Dean, with an introduction by the author's son, Jacob Dimant, this new volume will serve as a valuable and compelling resource for researchers, educators, and general readers, detailing one woman's story of courage and survival, amidst the destruction of a people. This is a fascinating account written and re-written three times over during the course of the war, a testament to Ita’s determination not only to survive, but to bear witness to the tragic scenes she endured in the ghettos of Warsaw, Częstochowa, and elsewhere in Poland through her work as an underground courier, as well as in slave labor in Germany. Ita's survival was a product of remarkable courage, determination, profound resilience, occasional acts of kindness, and no small measure of luck.”— Avinoam J. Patt, Doris and Simon Konover Chair of Judaic Studies, University of Connecticut; author of The Jewish Heroes of Warsaw: The Afterlife of the Revolt“When I first read the manuscript of Ita Dimant’s diary, I was very touched by the author’s personality, her literary talent, her detailed description of everyday life in the Warsaw and Częstochowa ghettos, and by the power of Ita’s spiritual resistance. This extraordinary testimony of the Holocaust should be read by as many people as possible.When I met Ita Dimant in person, she was full of warmth and had a great sense of humor. For me, she will always remain a heroine of everyday life, despite the hunger and suffering, covering the table in the ghetto with a white tablecloth. Her moving diary describes with compassion and accuracy the struggles Jews endured in German-occupied Poland, both inside and outside the ghetto.”— Barbara Engelking, Founder and Director of the Polish Center for Holocaust Research“What makes this diary stand out from other diaries of women Holocaust survivors is not only the multi-layered and readable character at the heart of its narrative, but the fact that we are able to follow the story of a woman who did not consider herself special or brave but had no other choice but to become so as she fought to survive. During this process, she learned a lot about how easy it would be to forget how important doing good in the face of evil could be. Always keeping a good pair of shoes nearby, she never allowed herself the luxury of not remaining vigilant or preparing her loved ones for possible flight. With the help of an excellent translator and editor, her diary shares the moving story of becoming a survivor against all odds.”— Andrea Peto, Professor, Central European University, ViennaTable of ContentsPrefaceIntroduction: A Story of Courage and Survival by Jacob DimantPrologue by Ita Dimant (published originally with the 1993 English and Hebrew editions)The DiaryThe Warsaw Ghetto YearsThe Częstochowa YearLeaving for GermanyFreedom Epilogue by Jacob Dimant Courage and Survival—Symcha Dymant by Jacob DimantAppendix 1: The Brust Notebook DiaryAppendix 2: A Diary in Note FormAppendix 3: Documents, Photographs, and Artifacts Donated to the USHMM by the Dimant FamilyAppendix 4: Miodownik Family TreeList of Illustrations

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