Yisrael Meir Lau: "Victory was made possible due to unity, when the West teamed up with the East"

This year Russia and the world celebrate the 70th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War. The importance of this historical event only increases with each year. The memory of the peoples of the former Soviet Union about that war is supported by common values. Victory Day, which became possible due to unity, is an opportunity to pay tribute to all those who fought and worked on the home front during the war. Vestnik Kavkaza is talking with some of the people who led the country to victory. Today the youngest survivor of Buchenwald, the chief rabbi of Tel Aviv, Yisrael Meir Lau, recalls the events of his childhood:

‘’The Second World War began on September 1st 1939, but the Kristallnacht, the first massacre arranged by the Nazis against the Jews, took place 10 months before, in November 1938. The first ghetto was organized by the Nazis in Poland, it was opened in October 1939. From 1939 to April 1945 we were isolated, we did not have any connection with the outside world. We were either in the ghetto or in a labor camp, or in a concentration camp, or in the extermination camps, or on the train or on the march, no connection. We did not know what was going on in the world.In the camp more and more transports came with people from different countries- from Hungary, France, Greece, Libya, Tunisia. We realized that the whole world was under the heel of the Gestapo.

On April 11th 1945, when we were in the camp of Buchenwald, and the bombing started, and suddenly the army vehicles burst in, punching the gates of Buchenwald, and the US Army entered. The US Army Rabbi, walking between the barracks, shouted in Yiddish: 'Jews, you are free.' I could not believe in the liberation, like a man walking in a long dark tunnel, which suddenly lit up with bright light.

For us, May 9th 1945 was the precise day when a blinding light shone. We want to make this date in the Jewish calendar as the 26th of Iyar.

As the initiator, German Zakharyaev came to my house in Tel Aviv and told me about his idea, I was delighted, I blessed him. Better late than never, I had to wait 70 years to set this date in the Jewish calendar, so now we are also able to celebrate this date in the Jewish tradition.

Those who are familiar with Judaism know that an event won’t disappear from memory if it is added to the calendar. For example, every year we celebrate the 15th day of the month of Nisan, the Passover, the exodus of the Jewish people from Egypt, even though it happened 3,320 years ago. But since this horrible event is in the Jewish calendar, we remember it.

Everyone is talking about the fact that the Jews were in the death camps, the Jews were the victims, but that 1.5 million Jews fought in the armies of allied countries, including the Jewish Brigade in the British Army.  Half a million Jews fought in the Red Army. And we, too, were heroes of the war. It should be understood that the victory was made possible due to unity, when the West teamed up with the East, when the Red Army joined the armies of the allied countries.

Everyone knows the Yalta Conference, the Potsdam Conference, when there was no communism against capitalism, no Stalin against Roosevelt, or against Churchill, when everyone started together. When we are united, we can win. But if fragmentation occurs, if the call is disconnected, the world is in a danger that threatens us all.

During the Great Patriotic War, people risked their lives to save Jews. My life was saved by a Soviet soldier, Fyodor Mihalichenko from Rostov. 60 million people died during the Second World War, of whom 6 million were Jews. If we knew how to die, then we should be able to live together in unity, in peace, brotherhood."