[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 61 (Monday, April 16, 2018)]
[House]
[Pages H3338-H3341]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  2030
                REMEMBRANCE OF VICTIMS OF THE HOLOCAUST

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2017, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from South Carolina 
(Mr. Wilson) for 30 minutes.


                             General Leave

  Mr. WILSON of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent 
that all Members have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend 
their remarks and include extraneous material on the topic of this 
Special Order, which is Remembrance of Victims of the Holocaust.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from South Carolina?

[[Page H3339]]

  There was no objection.
  Mr. WILSON of South Carolina. I am particularly grateful to be here 
tonight with Congressman Lee Zeldin from New York for promoting the 
restoration of integrity at the Department of Justice and the FBI with 
a second special counsel.
  Today I rise in honor of the days of remembrance of victims of the 
Holocaust officially designated by President Donald Trump last week. 
President Donald Trump will always be appreciated for establishing next 
month the American Embassy to be relocated and established in 
Jerusalem.
  A recent study has found that the knowledge of the atrocities that 
occurred during the Holocaust is waning as we get further and further 
removed from the horrible events. The phrase ``We Remember'' is used to 
emphasize the importance of remembering exactly what happened to ensure 
that it never happens again.
  It is in this context that I stand today, not only in honor of those 
murdered at the hands of the Nazis during the Holocaust, as well as 
those who survived, but to continue to speak the truth about what 
happened there and hope that it never fades from our collective 
memories, to be never repeated. All citizens should tour the Holocaust 
Museum here in Washington to learn the shocking truth of Nazi 
inhumanity.
  In 1933, Adolf Hitler ascended to power in Germany not through force 
but through an appointment to chancellor by the sitting President Paul 
von Hindenburg. He devised a fictional tale about the need for ethnic 
purity to be successful. The German people were desperate and 
susceptible to lies and deceptions, and, sadly, many eventually 
followed Hitler into the atrocities that followed.
  The level of deception Hitler and the Nazis were willing to go to, to 
gain unilateral authority, was apparent early on. In February of 1933, 
just a month after Hitler was appointed chancellor, the German 
Reichstag parliament building was burned, and they immediately blamed 
it on their opponents. This allowed Hitler to take advantage of this 
situation and issue a decree that placed constraints on the press and 
banned political meetings.
  By June of the same year, the Nazis declared themselves as the only 
legal party in Germany, and the Nazis passed a law allowing for forced 
sterilization of those with a genetic defect. The first openly anti-
Semitic law was passed in September 1933, prohibiting Jews from holding 
land 6 years before the start of World War II.
  After German President Paul von Hindenburg, who appointed Hitler as 
chancellor out of political expediency, passed away, Hitler named 
himself as fuhrer, gaining the power of both chancellor and President. 
One of the most shocking aspects of this ascent, looking back, is that 
Hitler received 90 percent support from German voters who approved of 
his new powers.
  After Hitler took complete control of Germany, the laws persecuting 
Jewish people escalated rapidly. One month after naming himself the 
fuhrer, the Nuremberg race laws were decreed. These laws banned 
interracial marriages between Jews and Germans and established that 
only those who were German or had German ancestors were able to be 
citizens. The rights of the Jewish people living in Germany slowly but 
surely dissipated without much attention from the international 
community; that is, until the Kristallnacht, the Night of Broken Glass, 
the night of November 10, 1938.
  German SS agents and local citizens were encouraged to smash windows 
of Jewish-owned stores, buildings, and synagogues as the local law 
enforcement stood by and watched. Although many Germans, especially 
those who saw the destruction, disapproved, Hitler was able to quell 
any concerns through his control of the media. This event changed the 
nature of the German persecution of the Jewish people from economic, 
political, and social to beatings, incarcerations, and murder.
  By January 1939, Hitler issued the most public statement regarding 
his plans to the German parliament. Hitler's goal, in no uncertain 
terms, was ``the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe.''
  In addition to Hitler's domination over the Jewish people in Germany, 
he began to expand his empire to neighboring European nations. The 
hostile takeover began in Austria, though the union of the two 
countries had been a popular concept for decades. Therefore, there was 
not much resistance originally from the international community.
  It took the German invasion of Poland on September 2, 1939, for 
Britain and France to finally declare war on Nazi Germany. The invasion 
occurred in collaboration with Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, who had a 
joint Nazi-Soviet pact with a secret protocol to invade Poland with 
Nazi and Soviet tanks providing for the partition of Poland. It would 
take two years for the United States to follow suit and declare war 
against Germany, after the surprise attack by the Axis partner Japan at 
Pearl Harbor.
  Despite Britain and France declaring war, that did not slow the Nazis 
advancing across Europe. On April 9, 1940, they invaded Denmark and 
Norway; and on May 10, they invaded France, Belgium, Holland, and 
Luxembourg. By June 14, the Nazis were occupying the French capital of 
Paris.
  The start of World War II also coincided with the Nazis' increased 
brutality against the Jewish people. The same month that Britain and 
France declared war, Reinhard Heydrich issued instructions for the SS 
to gather Jews in ghettos. One month later, the Nazis would seal those 
ghettos so no one, meaning no Jewish person, could escape.

  On March 26, 1941, the German Army High Command gave the Reich Main 
Security Office approval to initiate SS murder squads throughout the 
eastern front. These squads, known as the Einsatzgruppen, were 
responsible for murdering the intelligentsia and cultural elite in 
Poland. This murder squad mainly killed civilians.
  Heydrich, upon inspecting the impact of the murder squads on his SS 
agents, decided these tactics were too costly, demoralizing, and did 
not kill victims quickly enough. That led the Nazis to increase their 
use of gas to murder the innocent Jewish people, which caused the death 
toll to increase exponentially.
  By the end of 1941, America was drawn into the war by the surprise 
murderous attack on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese, who, at this point, 
were part of the Axis powers, which included Germany and Italy. On 
December 11, after Germany declared war on the United States, President 
Franklin Roosevelt declared war against Germany, declaring: ``Never 
before has there been a greater challenge to life, liberty, and 
civilization.''
  America then concentrated 90 percent of its resources to defeating 
Hitler. On January 20, 1942, the Wannsee Conference was held just 
outside of Berlin, where senior Nazi officials and SS met to coordinate 
their Final Solution. The Final Solution to the Jewish Question was the 
official code name for the murder of all Jews within reach, which was 
not limited to the European continent. This resulted in the deliberate 
and systematic genocide of the Jewish people.
  Operation Reinhard, the deadliest phase of the Holocaust, began the 
introduction of extermination camps. The goal was mass extermination. 
This horrific Final Solution was carried out at other execution and 
concentration camps across Europe. Sadly, the largest was at Auschwitz. 
Auschwitz I was first constructed to hold Polish political prisoners, 
who began to arrive in May 1940. The first extermination of prisoners 
took place in 1941, September. Auschwitz II-Birkenau also went on to 
become a major site of the Nazi Final Solution.
  The conditions in these concentration camps were too horrific to 
imagine. There was a barbaric selection process upon arrival where only 
those who were able-bodied and strong would survive the night. The rest 
were sent to gas chambers. The gas chambers were described clearly in 
``The Buchenwald Report.'' An estimated 1.3 million people were sent to 
Auschwitz, of which at least 1.1 million people were murdered. Around 
90 percent of those were Jews. Approximately one in six Jewish people 
killed in the Holocaust died at that camp.
  Mr. Speaker, I now yield to the distinguished Congressman from Texas 
(Mr. Gohmert), who represents the First District of Texas, to speak for 
5 minutes.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my friend so much, bringing 
back

[[Page H3340]]

the account of what happened. And I can remember--I majored in history 
in college--reading about General Eisenhower ordering American troops, 
Allied troops, to go gather people from the German communities near the 
concentration camps where so many Jews were being killed, ruthlessly 
killed.
  It is horrific to even contemplate what went on. And Eisenhower had 
ordered that, apparently, they bring the community citizens and have 
them help clean up the concentration camps. And the reason that was 
given was so that they could never say these things didn't happen--and 
I thought at the time that really is going perhaps too far--because 
these people turned a blind eye to what was going on. Surely they 
suspected. They knew there was ash going over their communities. Surely 
they suspected.
  But I never dreamed we would reach a day when what Eisenhower feared 
would occur actually came about, and that is a time when people are 
finding it popular to deny that the Holocaust ever happened. So I am 
grateful that Israel has this Yom HaShoah, the Israel Holocaust 
remembrance day. But it should not just be for Israel. America needs to 
stand with Israel.
  There are those who are calling for extermination of Jews around the 
Earth again. It is unbelievable. It is unbelievable. It has been 
shocking to see anti-Semitism growing again around Europe. To me, as an 
American, it has been even more shocking to see growing sentiment on 
U.S. college campuses denying that the Holocaust ever happened. That is 
the ultimate irony: having institutions of what are supposed to be 
higher learning in the United States of America, where at one time we 
had the best universities, everyone wanted to come to the U.S. for 
universities; but now we have institutions of higher learning that are 
actually the epitome of dumbing down and destroying history, rewriting 
history, which would make them institutions of the least learning, 
certainly not higher education. So it is important that we take time, 
we remember the horrors.
  I was just talking to my friend Claudia Tenney from New York about 
the Jewish woman who came and spoke to her seventh grade class and 
then, as I understood, spoke to her child's seventh grade class. And 
that is so important, but the Holocaust survivors, we are losing them 
day after day. It is up to us. I am so grateful to my friend, the good 
Joe Wilson, for securing this time so we could talk about the 
Holocaust.
  The Bible makes clear that you must teach about what God has done. We 
would never, ever want to see another Holocaust. After the horrors of 
the Holocaust, that what was prophesied for thousands of years has now 
happened, there is an Israel; it is making, has made, the desert bloom. 
But we should never forget, as long as this Earth is populated by human 
beings, another Holocaust is possible. And the blood would be on the 
hands and head of everyone who has denied that it was even possible.

                              {time}  2045

  Mr. WILSON of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I thank Congressman 
Gohmert for his leadership.
  We have been joined by the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Tenney), 
who has served our country so well on the General Assembly of New York 
and now here in Congress, Congresswoman Claudia Tenney.
  Ms. TENNEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank Congressman Joe Wilson. He has been 
a terrific mentor for me, and I am grateful for his allowing me to 
recognize this really important experience.
  As we are remembering, there is a really important person in my life 
who has inspired me in many of the things that I do, and her name was 
Helen Sperling. She was born in 1920. She is a Holocaust survivor. She 
survived a Nazi death camp.
  She was actually liberated on April 18, 1945--just a couple of days 
away from that anniversary date. She had to be hospitalized in Germany 
for 3 years before she was finally able to immigrate to the United 
States with, eventually, her husband, who was also a Nazi survivor.
  But Helen was a special person, and she was someone whom I got to 
know. As Congressman Gohmert just mentioned, as a student in New 
Hartford, New York, she was a resident of our town, and a very tiny 
woman, wonderfully positive and very excitable and really just a warm 
person.
  I was a seventh grade student, and she came and spoke to our class 
about the Holocaust and explained to us the horrors of what happened to 
her and her family in Nazi Germany, and it was just so impactful. Helen 
basically spent her life telling this story.
  As Congressman Gohmert alluded to a moment ago, this wonderful 
person--one day, my son, 30 years later, came back from seventh grade 
and said: Mom, I met this incredible woman. She spoke in my class, and 
she told us all about the Holocaust and the horrors that occurred 
there, where the Jewish people were annihilated and killed and murdered 
in millions, and she told us her story. And at the end of the story, I 
asked her if I could hug her, and she said of course.
  He said he was so moved by her as well. And I just turned to him, and 
I said: Oh, my God, Helen Sperling is back. She is still talking about 
it.
  Helen, sadly, died a couple of years ago, and we gave honor and 
tribute to her as my constituent when I was a member of the New York 
State Assembly.
  But also, I got to meet Helen on a number of occasions afterwards. 
She was wonderful in speaking to Boys State, you know, the American 
Legion's hosted events.
  I just want to read a little bit from Helen's obituary, because I 
think it is really important to understand this woman who survived this 
and really devoted her entire life to educating children and people. I 
just want to read a little bit from this, and here is where it started 
from her obituary from 2 years ago.
  ``The anguish of the Holocaust scarred Helen for life, and she tried 
to turn her pain into a positive instrument for education. In March 
1967, the Annual Holocaust Lecture series was begun, and it was later 
named for Helen and Leon,'' her late husband. ``This annual program, 
endowed by the Sperlings, will continue to provide Holocaust education 
for many generations to come.''
  That was a dream of Helen's.
  ``From 1968 until her death, Helen had shared her life and her 
Holocaust experiences with tens of thousands of people, lecturing 
tirelessly at schools, colleges, churches, prisons, and clubs, in the 
fervent hope that both young people and adults would remember, learn, 
and build a better, more peaceful world. She will always be remembered 
by her challenge to `Never Be A Bystander.'
  ``Helen believed that the worst part of being in the concentration 
camps was the feeling of being powerless. She tried to teach people 
never to abuse power and to protect those who could not protect 
themselves.
  ``As a result of the mutual love and respect between Helen and the 
generations of audiences that have heard her, Clinton and New Hartford 
Senior High Schools,'' in my district--and New Hartford Senior High 
School, which is my alma mater--``have each developed scholarship 
awards in her name to honor those seniors who exhibit the character 
that Helen believed would help make a better, more humane, and peaceful 
world.
  ``These scholarships, as well as the many other tangible gifts given 
by `her schools,' in her honor, touched Helen deeply. She was moved and 
grateful for the hundreds of lilacs planted by her friends and students 
in memory of her father.''
  The lilacs were her symbol.
  But I also want to mention something really important about Helen. I 
got to meet her, and actually one of the last times I got to speak with 
her was we were speaking together at Boys State in my district in 2012 
and she got a little modern. One of the things she was handing out to 
the young men who were at Boys State learning how to potentially be 
serving our Nation as members of our military or in government, she 
handed out these lovely little, as you can see, one of these wristbands 
that are so common today. And on this wristband--this is the very 
wristband that was handed to me by Helen back in 2012. It says: ``Thou 
shall not be a bystander.''
  Helen handed these out to everyone she spoke with, to remember, and 
to remember to stand up and not let these horrors of events like the 
Holocaust happen again in our time.

[[Page H3341]]

  I just wanted to pay tribute to her tonight.
  I thank Congressman Wilson for this great honor to be able to speak 
and to mention an outstanding member of my district and what she stood 
for, and that we shall not be bystanders and that we shall always 
remember and not let this very horrific part of human history be 
forgotten and make sure that it never gets repeated again.
  I just want to say thank you, and may God rest her soul, Helen 
Sperling, an amazing inspiration to me and so many thousands of others 
in my community. I just want to thank you for giving me a moment to 
recognize the great Helen Sperling from New Hartford, New York.
  Mr. WILSON of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I thank Congresswoman 
Claudia Tenney very much for her heartfelt presentation, and we 
appreciate her military family.
  While I am concluding, I would like to recognize a few Holocaust 
survivors in South Carolina. May we never forget their pain and 
suffering, as well as their family and friends who have become beloved 
citizens of the State of South Carolina.
  Ben Stern, born in 1924 in Kielce, Poland. Ben spent 6 months in the 
Kielce ghetto, where he was beaten and threatened to be hung for 
leaving the ghetto to get food for his family. Then he was taken to a 
forced labor camp called Henrykow, after which he never saw his family 
again. He then was transferred to Auschwitz, where he was sorted and 
sent to Birkenau.
  After being transferred again due to the Russians closing in, Ben was 
forced to participate in a death march where all those left standing at 
the end were murdered. He had fallen over just before those executions 
because he could no longer walk. Ben was later found by the American 
Army and rescued weighing 89 pounds but alive and liberated.
  Bert Gosschalk, born in 1920 in a little village in Holland. He was a 
member of the resistance. After a failed resistance attempt to blow up 
a railway to take away Nazi's access, he and his wife were caught. Bert 
was then taken to the SS headquarters for questioning. There, he spent 
all day on his knees without food or water.
  While he was being questioned at the SS headquarters, a Dutch 
resistance group ambushed the German police. To retaliate, the Nazis 
brought all the prisoners to where the Germans had been ambushed and 
murdered all of them. Bert came back to discover there were only seven 
or eight men who survived, and, thankfully, he was one.
  Bluma Goldberg, born in Poland in a town called Pinczow. Bluma joined 
her sister at a labor camp where they stayed for 2 years making 
bullets, where they worked 12-hour shifts, 7 days a week.
  As the Russians moved closer, Bluma was sent to Bergen-Belsen 
concentration camp, where disease ran rampant and everyone was covered 
in lice. After 3 months, Bluma was able to go with her sister Burgau, 
where they painted numbers on airplanes.
  Renee Kolender, born in the city of Bochnia, Poland, in 1926. In 
1941, Renee was taken from the Kozienice ghetto to a labor camp in a 
Polish town called Skarzysko. There, Renee stayed for 3 years with her 
mother and brother making ammunition.
  As the Russians moved closer, Renee was moved to a labor camp closer 
to Germany where they made parts for machines that made bullets. 
Eventually, she was rescued by a Jewish policeman, and it was all over.
  Pincus Kolender was born in the city of Bochnia, Poland, in 1926. In 
1942, Pincus and his brother were take from the ghetto, where they 
lived for about 2 years, to Auschwitz. When Pincus arrived, he was 
lined up before the gate to be sorted where he was sent to a camp 
instead of the crematorium.
  Inside the camp, his head was shaved, and he was tattooed with the 
number ``161253.'' Pincus described the life in the camp, of which he 
said: ``The hunger was also terrible. We used to search for a potato 
peel and fight over it. We were constantly, 24 hours a day, always 
hungry.'' Every few months, a selection occurred where those who looked 
feeble were sent to the crematorium. Eventually, Pincus was saved by 
General George Patton's Fifth Army.
  Other survivors include: Rudy Herz, born in a very small town called 
Stommeln on the outskirts of Cologne, Germany, in 1925; Trude Heller, 
born in Vienna in 1922. She was 15 years old in March 1938 when Hitler 
took over Austria, and upon coming to America, she served as the First 
Lady with Mayor Max Heller of the beautiful city of Greenville, South 
Carolina.
  Francine Taylor was born in Poland in 1928. Her family moved to 
France when she was 2 years old. They were living in Paris on June 14, 
1940, when the French capital fell.
  Leo Diamantstein, born in Heidelberg, Germany, in 1924.
  I am grateful for this opportunity to highlight these people and this 
important issue during these ``Days of Remembrance,'' and I am hopeful 
that we will make preserving this history and telling these stories a 
priority.
  We will never forget the lessons we have learned from the horrific 
tragedy in history. We must protect natural God-given rights and do all 
in our power to prevent these types of crimes against humanity.
  Helping the world to not forget is an extraordinary artist of West 
Columbia, South Carolina, Mary Burkett, who has produced drawings of 
the murdered children of the Holocaust. These loving portraits were 
placed, last week, on display at the Embassy of Israel in Washington by 
Ambassador Ron Dermer.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________