News
22nd March of the Living
The 22nd March of the Living was held on 8 April on the grounds of the former German Nazi concentration and extermination camp Auschwitz. The participants, mostly young Jews from more than 50 countries around the world, but also a group of young Polish people, went from the "Arbeit macht frei" gate in Auschwitz I to Auschwitz II-Birkenau.
Among ;those who lead this year’s March were: Chairman of the Council of the Yad Vashem Memorial Institute and Head Rabbi of Tel Aviv and former prisoner of the Buchenwald camp — Rabbi Israel Meir Lau, President of the World Jewish Conference — Ronald S. Lauder, whose foundation financed the Museum’s conservation laboratories, Chief of General Staff of the Israel Defence Forces — General Benny Gantz and Chief of General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces — General Mieczysław Cieniuch, as well as Mayor of Thessaloniki — Yiannis Boutaris.
This year, the organisers wished to commemorate the three anniversaries in a special way. 2013 marks 70 years since the outbreak of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, 70 years since the start of the deportation of Jews from Greece to Auschwitz, as well as 25 years since the first March of the Living. So far, over 185,000 people have attended the 22 editions of this event.
The March of the Living ceremonies took place at the memorial at the former camp of Auschwitz II-Birkenau, near the ruins of the gas chambers and crematoria II and III. It was attended by more than 10,000 people.
The main keynote speaker this year was Frank Lowy, an Australian businessman and philanthropist, whose father, Hugo Lowy, died in the camp in 1944. Thanks to his efforts, it was possible to conserve the historic freight wagon, which in 2009 stopped at the ramp at the former camp of Auschwitz II-Birkenau and which is dedicated to the memory of all Jews deported by the Nazis to Auschwitz from Hungary.
At the end of the ceremony, the Kaddish was read — the Jewish prayer for the dead.
In many places in the former camp, participants of the March left wooden plaques with the names of the murdered, symbolising Jewish gravestones (matzevas). Many of them were placed on the ramp where the Nazis carried out the selection of Jews brought from all over Europe.
The March of the Living has been organised since 1988 on the Holocaust Remembrance Day (Yom HaShoah), whose date is related to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. The first march was attended by approximately 1.5 thousand Jews. Since 1996, it has been held annually. The largest took place in 2005 on the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, when it was attended by nearly 20 thousand people.
The Holocaust was an unprecedented attempt at mass murder through industrial methods, which has never before or ever since been carried out on such a scale. The idea was to lead to the "final solution of the Jewish question" - the murder of an entire nation. In Auschwitz, the largest extermination centre, the Germans exterminated more than one million one hundred thousand people, mostly Jews, but also including Poles, Gypsies, Soviet prisoners of war and citizens of other nations.
