[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 6]
[House]
[Page 8050]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




           COMMEMORATION OF THE 60TH ANNIVERSARY OF AUSCHWITZ

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from New York (Mr. Israel) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. ISRAEL. Mr. Speaker, in January I attended the commemoration of 
the 60th anniversary of the Auschwitz death camp in Poland. This month 
and over the next several weeks, the world will pause and reflect on 
the 60th anniversary of the liberation of so many Holocaust death camps 
and, in fact, the drawing to a close of the Holocaust.
  Every day the memory of the Holocaust diminishes as survivors find 
their eternal rest. And that is why it is so profoundly important that 
we teach the lessons of the Holocaust to our young people, to 
generations who become more and more removed and more and more distant 
from that gruesome experience.
  I recently received a poem from a very bright young woman who met 
with a survivor from Auschwitz named Josephina Prins. I want to read 
this poem on the floor of the House because it shows just how powerful 
that experience was, bridging the divide of generations and making one 
of histories most unfathomable tragedies real for a 13-year-old girl 
named Ophelia Snyder. The poem is entitled ``The Miracle, Josephina 
Prins.''

     They called you a number,
     A thing.
     They called you an animal.
     You were a star.
     You were a Jew.
     They treated you like a smudge,
     Like an object.
     You are a person just like us.
     Prick your finger.
     What comes out?
     Ask a friend.
     What comes out?
     Red blood.
     We are all the same.
     Then why,
     Why did you seem so different?
     Why are you not treated the same?
     Are you not flesh?
     Are you not blood?
     Does your heart not beat?
     Are we not the same?
     74937.
     You are special.
     But then you are the same.
     74937.
     P-R-I-N-S.
     Let that name live forever.
     Even in the darkest night.
     Let those letters shine with the hope of others.
     Let her memories live forever.
     Let her life inspire.
     Let others remember.
     And let us never forget.
     P-R-I-N-S.
     Josephine Prins.
     The Jewel.
     The Jew.
     A miracle.
     By the girl who met the miracle.
                                              --Ophelia B. Snyder.

  Ms. Snyder is 13 years old, but she teaches lessons that are, in 
fact, eternal.

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