Holocaust survivor Werner Gellert told a large group of UNM students Thursday that it is their responsibility to fight hate and intolerance.
“The type of hatred that thrived during Nazi Germany is still alive in our world today,” he said. “As students, it is up to you to do something about it. Do something to make sure that injustice does not continue.”
UNM’s Undergraduate History Association invited Gellert, the president and founder of New Mexico Holocaust Museum and Tolerance Study Center, to discuss his experiences growing up as a German Jew during the Holocaust.
Gellert told the group he was 13 years old during “Kristallnact,” which translates to “Night of Crystals” and refers to the night of Nov. 9, 1938, when Nazis instigated widespread attacks on Jewish synagogues, businesses and homes throughout Germany. The Nazis said it was retaliation for the assassination of Ernst vom Rath, secretary to the German legation in Paris, by a Jewish protestor, Herschel Grynszpan, whose parents were being forcibly evicted.
“My father was taken to Buchenwald concentration camp and my family was convinced we should leave immediately, but at the last minute he was released and my mother changed her mind,” Gellert said. “I told them that we had to leave and that I could not stand to see such sacred places of beauty like our synagogue burn. They didn’t think it would get any worse, but I knew it would.”
He said that by threatening to leave alone, he was able to convince his parents to leave. With passports and visas almost impossible to come by, Gellert said his family headed for Shanghai, where no passports were required. He said the Chinese had roped off an area just outside of Shanghai where European Jews could live.
“It was an experience that taught me that no matter where you are in the world, Jews come together to help each other,” he said. “The Holocaust basically taught us about the sheer will of man to overcome and persevere regardless of the circumstances.”
While Gellert’s family had escaped from Germany, it did not escape persecution. He said that once the United States got involved in World War II, the area he lived in became an internment camp.
“For three-and-a-half years we had to sleep on hay straw with lice and the only way to get the lice out was to burn the straw,” he said. “We had no hot water for three-and-a-half years. We were so terribly malnourished and had no clothing, so I would get frostbite in 30-degree weather and sunstroke at 6:30 in the morning. I remember when a friend asked what I wanted for my birthday, I said half a loaf of bread and jam all to myself. It was horrible.”
Gellert told the group about an officer who ran the internment camp who called himself the “King of the Jews,” was four-and-a-half feet tall and stood on chairs to beat prisoners.
“I remember the time he held a revolver to my temple and told me he could kill me any time he wanted,” he said. “However, no matter how bad it was for me, it was worse in Germany, where 6 million Jews were killed and 5 million others were also killed. That was the truly horrific experience, not mine.”
His family was able to get visas to come to the United States, and Gellert studied at the University of Denver after getting his first degree while in China. He later moved to New Mexico and founded the New Mexico Holocaust Museum and Tolerance Study Center this year.
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“I guess I am proudest that when I came to the United States, I made it on my own without the assistance of the government and was able to raise my family and work my way through school,” he said.
When asked if he thinks whether another leader like Hitler could rise to power in the United States or Germany, Gellert said that it is possible.
He said that in Germany, young people tend to have more progressive points of view, but some people his age upset him because they refuse to acknowledge the Holocaust happened. He said, for the most part, people are changing, but added that the lingering intolerance for others is part of why it is so important to study history.
“We have to kick the hate in the butt,” he said. “The only way to get rid of it is to understand and embrace each others’ differences.”
