[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 17 (Friday, January 27, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1703-S1704]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                   AUSCHWITZ IS SYNONYMOUS WITH EVIL

  Ms. MIKULSKI. Mr. President, perhaps more than any other word, 
Auschwitz is synonymous with evil.
  Fifty years ago today, Russian soldiers liberated Auschwitz.
  The horrors of Auschwitz are incomprehensible and undescribable.
  Over 1 million people lost their lives at Auschwitz--the largest of 
the Nazi death camps. Ninety percent were Jews. Hundreds of thousands 
were children.
  Auschwitz represented the German's campaign to exterminate a people--
the Jews. They almost succeeded--killing two out of three Jews in 
Europe.
  As a Polish-American, I carry the images of Auschwitz in my heart.
  [[Page S1704]] The Germans considered all Poles to be an inferior 
race. After Poland was conquered, German authorities expelled much of 
the native Polish population from regions of the newly annexed 
territories. Polish cities were given German names and German settlers 
were colonized on Polish land. In occupied Poland, the Nazi governor, 
Hans Frank, proclaimed: ``Poles will become slaves in the German 
Reich.''
  The Nazis set out to destroy Polish culture. Thousands of Polish 
teachers, politicians, university professors, and artists were executed 
or sent to Nazi concentration camps. Catholic priests were among the 
main targets of Nazi mass murder in Poland.
  In fact, Auschwitz was created as an internment camp for Polish 
dissidents. And thousands of Poles were murdered alongside the Jews in 
Auschwitz.
  Many Poles risked their lives to save Jews:
  Irena Sendler was a young social worker in Warsaw. She used her 
position to smuggle 200 Jewish children out of the ghetto to safe 
houses. In 1943, Sendler was arrested by the gestapo, brutally tortured 
and condemned to death. On the day of her execution, she was freed with 
the help of the Jewish underground.
  Irena Adamowicz, a Polish Catholic, aided in establishing contacts 
between the Jewish Underground and the main Polish resistance 
organization.
  Jan Karksi, who, while working for the Polish Government in exile, 
was one of the few outsiders to visit the Warsaw Ghetto. He appealed to 
the allies to do something.
  These are just a few examples. But as a Polish-American, it pains me 
to know that these brave patriots were a minority. The majority of 
Poles, like the majority of Europeans, were neither killers nor 
victims. Most merely stood by, neither collaborating, nor coming to the 
aid of the victims. This passivity amounted to acquiescence.
  Elie Weisel, a survivor of Auschwitz, visited Auschwitz 25 years 
after the liberation. He wrote:

       I hadn't realized how near the village was. I had thought 
     of it as worlds distant from the camp. But the villagers 
     could see what was happening behind the barbed wire, could 
     hear the music as the labor details trudged to work and back 
     again. How did they manage to sleep at night? How could they 
     go to mass on Sunday, attend weddings, laugh with their 
     children, while a few paces away human beings despaired of 
     the human race.

  Many years later, Eli Weisel was awarded the Nobel Prize. This week 
he led the American delegation to Auschwitz.
  As a Polish-American, I traveled to Poland in the late 1970's. I was 
a Congresswoman. And I wanted to see my heritage. I went to the small 
village where my family came from. It was a very moving and historic 
experience.
  But I also wanted to see the dark side of my history, and I went to 
Auschwitz.
  In touring Auschwitz, it was an incredibly moving experience to go 
through the gate, to see the sign, to go to see the chambers. I went to 
a cell that had been occupied by Father Kolbe, a Catholic priest, who 
gave his life for a Jewish man there.
  And then, for those of you who don't know, I'm a social worker, I've 
been a child abuse worker and I don't flinch.
  But then I got half way through that tour and I came to a point in 
that tour where I saw the bins with glasses and the children's shoes, 
and this 40-something year old Congresswoman could not go on.
  I became unglued. I had to remove myself from the small tour, go off 
into a private place in Auschwitz, cry in a way that shook my very 
soul. And when I left there, I thought, now I really know why we need 
an Israel.
  And that is why I will fight so hard to ensure the survival
   of Israel. I know its importance. I know why it exists.

  I also know why it is so important for us educate our young people--
about the effects of hatred, about the importance of history.
  Several years ago. I helped my friend Mark Talisman to create a 
living memorial to the Jews of Poland--called Project Judaica. Through 
its cultural center, its international education programs, and its 
rescue of Jewish artifacts, Project Judaica seeks to educate people 
about the rich history of the Polish Jews. Project Judaica's Center for 
Jewish History and Culture is in Krakow, near the village my family is 
from.
  In closing, I would like to read the words of Eli Weisel:

       Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, 
     which has turned my life into one long night, seven times 
     cursed and seven times sealed. Never shall I forget that 
     smoke. Never shall I forget the faces of the children, whose 
     bodies I saw turned into wreathes of smoke beneath a silent 
     blue sky. Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my 
     faith forever.
       Never shall I forget that nocturnal silence which deprived 
     me, for all eternity, of the desire to live. Never shall I 
     forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and 
     turned my dreams to dust. Never shall I forget these things, 
     even if I am condemned to live as long as God himself.

  Mr. President, 50 years after the liberation of Auschwitz, let us 
pledge never to forget. And let us honor those who died in the 
holocaust by fighting against bigotry, hate crimes, and intolerance.


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