Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on March 3, 2021

Launceston man Felix Goldschmied moved to Australia when he was nine years old, with his six-year-old brother.

He is one of just a handful of Holocaust survivors left in Tasmania.

"We came in a Jewish transport and were placed in a children's home," he said.

"My time during the Holocaust was not very nice, my relatives were all murdered, went to Auschwitz concentration camp, and my father was interred in a concentration camp.

"I could feel the bad times even as a child because I had to wear a star and walk in the gutter for a while, it was a pretty horrible time."

Dr Goldschmied has welcomed plans for a Holocaust centre in Tasmania, announced in Hobart on Tuesday.

"It's there to stop hatred, inhuman behaviour, discrimination, and it teaches us all that," he said.

The centre will offer education and interpretation for school groups, as well as the general public.

It will house exhibits and literature.

ABC News: Selina Ross

Six million of the eleven million European Jews perished during the Holocaust between 1941 and 1945.

The Nazis also targeted other groups, including people with disabilities and gay people.

"The crime of the holocaust was so enormous that it's left an indelible mark on society and I think it's important that we should all learn about it to prevent it from ever happening in the future," Dr Goldschmied said.

Federal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg announced the centre at the Hobart synagogue, which is the oldest in Australia.

"Tasmania should not be the only state in the country not to have a Holocaust museum," he said.

"Because the students in your schools need to understand what occurred in the Holocaust."

ABC News: Selina Ross

Mr Frydenberg became teary during his speech to the Jewish congregation.

"Ladies and gentleman, this is a very solemn occasion but this means so much to me," he said.

"This is an example of what we can do, to ensure future generations say 'never again'."

There has been no announcement about where the centre will be or when it will open.

Tasmania's Attorney-General Elise Archer said the state government would work with the local Jewish community to develop and progress the plans.

ABC News: Selina Ross

Hobart woman Pnina Clark's father was held in a forced labour camp.

Ms Clark said her parents carried through their lives the trauma of the horrors they had experienced.

"This centre that is going to happen is for the people of Hobart, it's actually not for the Jewish community," she said.

"It's for the people of Hobart to educate them and to let them know that the world can turn one way or another and it's up to us to which turn it's going to take."

ABC News: Selina Ross

Melbourne teenager Gabi Mayer, whose family is part of the Tasmanian Jewish community, said younger people needed to be educated about the horrors of the Holocaust.

"A lot of people [when I was] growing up just didn't even know what the Holocaust was, just didn't have that connection unless they actually knew a Jewish person," she said.

"The history is really important because it shows the struggles that the Jewish people went through and if everyone knows about it then it signifies that you can never do this again and we won't allow it to happen again.

"It really unifies the Jewish community with the greater secular community."

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Holocaust to be remembered in new Tasmanian education centre - ABC News

Category: Holocaust
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