was. upbeat so it sounds like that don't go away but they stay with us for all time. for south africa. starts february 7th w. . the world has this week been marking the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the own sure its death camp in 1945 survivors gave painful testimony of the horror they experienced during the holocaust in nazi occupied poland it's a warning to today's world where in germany and elsewhere hatred and anti semitism are on the royce while question on to the point is remembering auschwitz could it happen again.

thanks very much indeed for joining me here on to the point where my guests in the studio are root for the representative here in germany of the young vashem holocaust remembrance center who says the only safeguard against the evils of auschwitz is for individuals of all backgrounds to remember the power of complicity also with us is albert steinberger a daughter got a video maker and producer with both brazilian and german roots he's done a lot of work exploring anti semitism and argues that yes it could happen again there's huge concern he says about the rise of extremism anti semitism and hatred and the world welcome to so much he has high overhead of educational services of the province brooke concentration camp the moral side who says quite plainly know the history of face the consequences. thank you all 3 for being with me here

today on the show about to begin with you route in recent days ceremonies speeches and gatherings very painful testimony from the survivors where have you all thoughts taken you in the last couple of days well absolutely it's been a very intense week with events happening. in auschwitz and him as well as all over the world i. spent a few days. at the ceremony at the 5th world holocaust forum that took place for the 1st time in jerusalem over $45.00 world leaders presidents prime ministers heads of government kings attended and it was a very sobering event. there was a large contingency of survivors in the room. and it was a huge demonstration of the. standing together against the semitism and bringing all those people together is

a testimony to how important this subject is today and it's very important for very many different reasons but one of them is that there are many of the survivors a large contingent who talks about. elderly people that they view themselves as a finite group how important is that absolutely crucial the difference between reading a book and sitting opposite a person who's experienced these things themselves who has emerged from the darkest chapter of human history is in comparable we opened last week an exhibition of $75.00 portraits of survivors in essen at the tech itself. the photographs a hung a level and when you look at these people in the face and see the marks of history on their faces and read the short description of what they went through it's a totally different experience from as i said simply reading the books or watching

a film show but here's how you work at the former concentration camp in ravensbruck which is about sort of 90 kilometers i think north of where we are here in the german capital here i'm rightly informed it was a camp that was exclusively for women and i'd like you to tell us what's work you do today what is the aim of the work you do at the camp today for us it's quite important to let people gain knowledge of what happens there so that they will be able to find links to the presence. for me it's a privilege that i have the chance and my colleagues from a team had a chance to meet a lot of survivors and for it was a form of women's concentration we still have these vital 80 to 90 years old ladies coming over some of them promise to themselves they would never ever would like to. i'm to germany and the more that they came back and for me it's

quite nice to see that we will have ours and it was a real liberation and april and we are preparing a program where we hope that a lot of survivors will come. second generation search generation so this is a place of encounters where the survivors and their stories have their places and it's a place where it's important to confront the german society and others with bystanders issues with the stories of the perpetrators when you talk about confronting german society you or your mantra you or your watch what we just heard it at the top of the show is you know the history of face the consequences to people in germany today know the history do they care i think a lot of people know some people know and they don't care and there are some people who know a lot but they have their different ideas about the the past. from nancy

a lot of nazis know a lot about what happened and they find it ok what happens they come to you they come to your memorial center and they express these views and you are confronted with these views usually we are not confronted with that take some time to find out about nazi ideas among students for instance. because usually the students know from the teachers what they are expected to show up with and form a concentration camp so i can see the current political shifts we have in our society and that was. obvious scheinberg or a lot of the work you have done in recent times has been focused on the holocaust on the scourge of anti-semitism why is it so important to you why i think exactly what kind of a say about the looking at the present. and we have nowadays

a rise of the extreme right in the rise of anti-semitism and this is quite concerning and i think it was a minnow mccrum who in one of the festivities one of the celebrations said that it's not about only it's not a problem that's about the jewish community is about all of us because we lose the human value when we go through these things and that's the point and that's why we were looking at the events also in trying to put it like in the context of today of anti-semitism and you have and centers growing not only in germany but you have also in brooklyn have been people being attacked in the streets in paris so we did a big documentary exactly getting all this angles that's actually at the moment a worldwide problem to me a little bit more about the alternative for germany a very very good political party here in germany the far right populist party that is now the strongest opposition party in the german parliament they talk about and i'm quoting it drawing a line under german history closing the chapter moving on they say we should not

wallow in guilt as they put it what's your response to all that i think they go even further because that what they're doing is trying to tell a new narrative about it when they say that they could as the french and as the british they should be proud of their troops in the 2nd world war they're trying to tell another story and that's very dangerous for society and that's very dangerous as well because i think you always will have people there are a minority there are extremes and there are neo nazis i mean in every society you have that the promise that when that goes mainstream where that goes to the parliament and that's what's i think the biggest issue in the german society nowadays. route what is your response to the a of day. going to that party in some parts of germany. it's a problem for us and sometimes when i read the sources from the late period of the

weimar republic i feel that there are some things in the strategies of the. other right wing organizations which really make me feel about the future because you can read it in the sources from the 9 to twenty's and thirty's how people develop a strategy and opening the room the space for bringing in semitic and other ideas and then you can see how this democracy a very young and weak democracy in the 19th twenty's thirty's failed and this should be the pauline forrest to learn the steps right wing strategies go step by step to the direction which makes a society. i absolutely agree i think that looking at the origins of the holocaust is

a key aspect that has to be has to be learnt has to be society needs to be aware of how discrimination and semitism all forms of xenophobia can have disastrous consequences and. this is has become a huge part of the work of yad vashem which was initially more focused on the holocaust and telling. amassing as much information what i call turning every stone finding information about every individual who was lost and now a lot more work is being done about anti-semitism trying to understand the origins of what happened and i think that our collective. sponsibility of course is to. keep aware of these things. and use the holocaust as a as a narrative of how things can go so terribly well in society and before you talk about it to the roots of anti-semitism let's listen to what some of the survivors

of auschwitz have been saying in recent days. my number is 73305. which i had to shout twice daily. counting. a pin. number then to protect them from the $100.00 and. i can't even think about it why. why a 9 year old girl who hadn't done anything who hadn't sand why did they murder why . all men are more and more and sometimes when i'm asleep i still dream about it and i scream even though i'm 86 years old now. and like snow from the from the smoke from the chimneys and the spirit.

from the cure my cardio and. we just had to. understand that this is what happens. crews have got to come back to you good soon though of that testimony they have so many questions so much bewilderment the nightmares of the some of the survivors despite all that the person on the political now you as far as i understand it a year ago decided to become a german to apply for german citizenship and you have become a german some would ask how could you take that step and join this country join these people who have such a shameful past you know well. i feel actually very proud to be german i've always had an insurgency. yes i think it is and i think that germany has a lot to be proud of. i. first of all.

it's very interesting for me as a jew to now be nudged also be german to have this part of my identity and to be dealing with the holocaust and these issues sort of from the other side or from within in a way and i feel myself as a sort of new immigrant to the country or a story called i'm a stakeholder exactly so i can sort of see it from both perspectives in a way. and i have to say that when i heard president steinmeyer speaking at yad vashem and also at the bundestag yesterday i. i felt that my pride was well founded i felt that he spoke in a way that. reflected the kinds of values that i would want this country to espouse that is that i could relate to and it was done with dignity with solemnity and with an whole hearted commitment to understanding the past and the commitment. to the

survivors to us and to future generations that this is a subject that will remain a top priority despite all of what you are saying and to semitism in germany is still on the rise this is the country of the holocaust this is the country of the testimony that we just heard how does that fit together. well there that good question but i believe that one of the key points here is the internet and the extreme right groups they control a big chunk of the internet at the moment and that's extremely dangerous so how we address the new generations how we tell the stories of these old survivors to the new generation because if you look at like this strategy internet and twitter is the new radio of the ninety's they can reach straight they don't need journalists like us they can go straight and speak their mind out and they go unpunished when they when they spread and summit take ideas or racist ideas sol that is one of the key issues that i think we are missing sometimes when we discuss this and you have

like the rise of the extreme right in several countries internet is always key social media is always key. you have the rise of the far right here in germany you have the rise of anti-semitism at the same time the jewish community here in germany is getting is getting bigger angle americal talks of that as a sort of miracle is that how you see it i think there is one historical fact that most of the perpetrators never were put to trial so the german society for a long time managed to avoid any confrontation with the past and especially the nazis never were brought to trial. in a society where over generations there is a narrative that the nazis came into the country 933 and they somehow. way from the new 45 on and this was a country without the former nazis this narrative was very strong up to the 1980s

since them especially since the ninety's ninety's we have strong. memore real sides a lot of memorials sides of west germany were the product of the fight of peace. struggle of people fighting against the. sure of memory so we always have these. people trying to avoid confrontation we have the who tried to bring. the resistance to the jewish war but the struggle all over the years. gets stronger as part of it it's easier to spread these messages but on the other hand it was always here. that we are in a situation. of saying that it is

constitutional for the german society that israel's there but jews getting afraid to live here in what kind of society are we living and this is what . acts. illustrating the extent to which members of the jewish community here in germany do feel ambivalent about the future . jewish communications designer valentino has been calling home for 8 years he actually feels pretty comfortable living in germany. it's a very diverse community just very pleasant here. this is because the jewish quarter again. but on october 9th this image is shattered. to the synagogue to mark the day of atonement a right wing terrorist attacks the synagogue after he fails to penetrate the door

he shoots 2 people on the street. the attacker had announced his anti-semitic views on the internet using a helmet camera he broadcast the attack on a streaming platform. that is deeply shocked as a consequence of everyday anti semitism he very rarely wears his kippah in public anymore. i try not to provoke people who are with even if there are situations where i don't need to be clearly identifiable as jewish. is germany habitable for jews. well that's the big overarching question but i root for the question i would like to ask is it because in the same direction as how great is your sense of the sense perhaps in the jewish community that there was a before and an after well obviously hollow was

a wake up call. no one imagined that trust of that scale could take place obviously jewish institutions schools synagogues protected. the fact that helen was so unprotected was a shock in its own right. i happened to be in my own synagogue at that time when the news came out of what happened in holland it's a huge shock it's particularly shocking that it happened in germany i mean we've seen a space of attacks all over the world you somehow think that in germany things are different it's shocking that it's going to dine with us because we're much close to bystanders were killed because they happen to be in the vicinity but if they're if the government is going to enter the synagogue dozens of people could be massacred it could be much worse i agree and it's. it's an extremely frightening development and that's why. i speak about our leaders here in germany and across the world we have to take and they have to take a much stronger stand. against such situations i want to go

burn to the educationalist. you know around how much understanding perhaps you have for people who say i'm too young it's not my problem it's engine history how much understanding do you have for people who say. you know i am from a germany is a country of great diversity i am from. a different community not from the mainline german community is not my problem i think if used telling the story of confronting people in a way that they feel that you are. full of respect towards them it's easier for them to accept that it is needed knowledge if you don't have a under your eyes you have it in your neck and in the german situation you need to know about the past and. be able to participate in the. discourse and i feel that some of the students

complaining about it too much these are there is no little the least and there is more they usually do complain to match there is resist among young people where they learn from the parents that it should not be termed just but if you society as a educational system are willing to give the stories to young people in a way that it is not to them then you can open doors if you want. all questions at once in 2 and a half hours of wizarding that memorial side like these then you will close the doors definitely yeah there's been a lot of talk about people saying one of the main solutions to dealing with

anti-semitism is to get the young people to go to places like your commemoration site but they have to be prepared they have to have the right mindset they have to they have to be open to the experience before they arrive otherwise it will possibly backfire or we can create a miracle with them 2 and a half hours we can change a person good liberal democrat this time. by confronting them and some keep shares they want to develop empathy from the students but very often the students feel that they are. dealt with an embassy at school so it's too much arsed from the memorial site to start with gaining or developing this to see if they are not used to it at school how about you sort of the top of the show you were quite forthright you said yes it can happen again that is after all a question of remembering our sure it's kind of be repeated why do you think so strongly

that it can't happen again well if you look at history and you see how democracy can. sometimes can swing to the right to the left and and that's why when a part of it from the extreme right like you have to go mainstream you can have you have already some people from the right party of of germany discussing possible alliances with the for example so this is the sort of thought that's extremely dangerous because then you can have a party inside the parliament that you wouldn't have an idea what they could go through and what what kind of journey could take us through. brute could it happen again i believe not but you believe not i believe not but we're talking about germany now that you were very you were praising for its efforts to come to terms wrestled with history well i believe it's our collective responsibility to fight against it i've heard i'm. mortified to his survivors saying that they believe it can't happen again people who experience human survivors over to start work on

stories through yeah. it must rank than our resolve to do everything we can to fight against under semitism in a phobia in all forms and this is not the response which of the jewish community it is not it is a collective response which is that every single citizen needs to have his her cut it happened again. woody allen's. and her sisters the. way says it's the wrong question how could it happen we should ask why didn't the tappan more often and i think the risk of repetition is always there we are human beings they were human beings so. history doesn't repeat the same way but the wrists in man kind of the same and it was ordinary germans talking about this idea of evil. but since somehow in the human psyche it's not only evil it's human beings potentials and evil is part of its root.

well. does that. evil. i agree the dedication but i think also like we need also to have stronger measures in terms of security of police and and also tackling the issue of internet and end to end up and have these ideas spread because of course you have the ideas already on the ground but they are spreading and they're growing and that's thing and educators on the lives of unfortunately fortunately ok thanks very much for joining us here on earth to the point today we've been talking about remembering oh sure it's going to happen again i hope we've given you plenty of food for thought and if we have to come back next week until then bye bye.

but. the book.

staying up today don't miss our highlights d.w. program online w dot com highlights. a duel with words. where i come from we don't run away from a confrontation. when i was 5 years old my father took me to his friends and i was

hooked on the spot to. a sport a few months old until soul. fencing as a language and a good source for it is a conversation. must keep your opponent i'm stunned thinking new of the men to get close otherwise and con's corey. it's not unlike a tough interview really when interviewing politicians or corporate c.e.o.'s you have to wait for the right moment just to get around that defensiveness then make your own fear. yes of taking risks to get those office. and got office and i work a d w. this

is. it is official the virus outbreak is now a global health emergency the world health organization making that declaration just moments ago in geneva it comes as the total number of cases approaches 8000 despite widespread public screenings the virus is now in every region of mainland china. also coming up in greece planning a new border fence and this is it being bear.