Sarid in Warsaw: "The earth screams out"

(May 2) - Education Minister Yossi Sarid represented the Israeli government at the official memorial ceremony at the Warsaw Ghetto Memorial last night. Here is the text of his speech:

My Friends,
This is not the first time that I have been here, in this Square of the Ghetto Heroes, in the heart of Warsaw’s Jewish Ghetto, next to the memorial of what was, and is no longer.

I am pulled to this place, I cannot resist this obsessive pull, and I do not want to resist it either. Time and time again, it brings me back here. The earth here does not want to resist. It pulls me back again and again.

The earth here speaks to me. The earth here screams at me. And if you all listen carefully, you will hear it speaking and crying out.

Everything has changed here since. Everything has been destroyed, as if it is beyond recognition and impossible to identify. But it still stands before us, and we can see and identify life and death.

I always thought that the ground here still shakes beneath the surface, that life below still pulsates – in the tunnels, basements and sewer pipes, and that real soon someone will emerge from the depths and give his testimony.

From these depths they call us brothers and sisters, and we are here.

We, the living, remember the dead, they stand before us, their eyes are glancing back and forth, they are staring at us now, and we stare back, and we call out their names, because they are our family. Mother and father, sister and brother, our cousins, a bone from our bodies, the flesh of our flesh.

My mother and father arrived in the Land of Israel in 1935, almost at the last moment. They came from Poland, together with my sister, who was two at the time. Only four years later, Hitler’s brigade of murderers and hangmen invaded Poland.

I was born in the Land of Israel - one month after the Nazi invasion. In 1945, immediately after the end of the war, we changed our last name from Schneider to Sarid, a Hebrew word that means “Survivor”, because we were the last survivors of my father’s family that was murdered.

Since then, my last name is also the last name of all of us – Sarid – “survivor” – we are all survivors, survivors we are. The personal and collective survival of all of us has brought us here today – year after year – in order to hold this family gathering with all those who we lost.

If my parents had not left Poland in time – there would have been no survivors from our family.

At this gathering we say thanks to the founding fathers of the Zionist enterprise, to the founding mothers, whose heart predicted the worst of all, and they followed their heart – and were saved, and so were we.

The independent State of Israel is the salvation of the Jewish people.

Some three hundred thousand Jews were exterminated in the Warsaw Ghetto. From this place, this very Square, they were sent to the Valley of Death - to their choking deaths and to the crematoriums. The memorial behind me represents the extermination, but primarily stands for the heroism.

The memorial was set up in April 1948, only one month before David Ben-Gurion declared the establishment of the State of Israel. This memorial was set up when the Jewish community in the Land of Israel was fighting for its life. The Warsaw Ghetto bequeathed us the heroism.

Following the Ghetto Uprising it was clear that it was impossible for us to lose our War of Independence. We must win it.

The heroes of the Ghetto, all of the Jewish fighting force, all of the friends of Mordechai Anilevitz, looked upon us from their command headquarters at 18 Mila Street, to push us, and energize us, and incite us, and to strengthen us – with our blood you shall live – with our blood you shall live – and it strengthened our spirits and our lives.

Three hundred thousand is a large number, and all large numbers are incomprehensible.

And therefore, I now see before me your friend, a boy of your age, skin and bones, who is standing in the ghetto and selling cigarettes in order to earn one more day of life.

I now see before me your friend, a girl of your age, uncovered, who is lying on the sidewalk and begging for her life.

Above them, leaning over, is the great educator, Yanosh Kortzuk, all the children were his children, and he will not leave them until he will perish, along with Kortzuk is the Minister of Education, the Minister of Children - of the Jewish People for our generations.

In the name of Yanosh Kortzuk, I would like to tell you how much we love that you are here, at this gathering of the children of the Ghetto, who will always remain children, because Hitler never allowed them to grow up.

In a few days we will all return to Israel. We can go back full of deep hatred and revenge, and this is quite understandable and even human.

And we can return from here with a deep commitment for a better world, a world of kindness.

Each time that I return to my country, to my homeland, to my father’s house, I swear that I will make the world a better place, and make amends for the human race.

And making amends begins at home.

I call upon you, my friends, to join me in my vows and my commitment. Let us together follow the path of Yanosh Kortzuk, who had that great love, the love of children, which is victorious and continues to be victorious, because the future depends on children, and our future
depends on you.

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