Violinist in Auschwitz

Professor Dr. Erhard Roy Wiehn from the University of Konstanz invited me to write a preface for the English edition of my book. My experiences during lectures in Berlin and Potsdam in 1993 and 1994 provided insights I wish to share with English-speaking readers. The Nazi concentration camps aimed to obliterate human identity, reducing individuals to mere numbers, much like livestock. I was often asked how I found the strength to reclaim my humanity after surviving Auschwitz and Mauthausen, especially after enduring the Death March in January 1945. How could I return to Germany, the land of such organized crime, and convey my suffering to young Germans, assuring them that they and their parents, now my children's age, bore no guilt for past atrocities? The answers came from the children themselves, who were profoundly moved by my lectures. In December 1994, I was invited by Micaela von Marcard to the Memorial Concert in Berlin on the fiftieth anniversary of Auschwitz's liberation and was asked to write "Memories of Auschwitz" for the State Opera's bulletin. This visit allowed me to reconnect with students who had previously written to me. I am grateful to Mr. and Mrs. Leonhard Dünnwald for organizing a reunion and to the girls who contributed to our discussions. Special thanks to James S. Brice for translating my work, and to my wife, Laura, for her unwavering support. Jerusalem and Tiberias, April 1, 1995.