Letters of Jewish mothers killed in concentration camps to be read on International Holocaust Remembrance Day

The personal words and stories of three Jewish mothers who died in concentration camps are being told to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

The event called ‘Do Not Forget Me’ will be hosted on Sunday by the Canadian Museum for Human Rights in partnership with the Jewish Heritage Centre of Western Canada.

Through personal letters, the event tells the stories of Sarina Saltiel, Mathilde Barouh and Neama Cazes as they lived in Nazi-occupied Thessaloniki in northern Greece.

All three women wrote letters to their sons, who escaped to Italian-occupied Athens.

Jewish Heritage Centre of Western Canada executive director Belle Jarniewski says letters like these telling the day-to-day happenings of the Holocaust are quite rare.

“These are particularly precious because we really don’t have a lot of this kind of correspondence from other places,” she said.

“It really wasn’t possible in a country like Poland, for instance, where the entire country was occupied by the Nazis and all of the Jews were gathered and put into ghettos and then sent to concentration camps or extermination camps.”

While the women talk about their daily fears, like accessing food and clothing, Jarniewski says she was particularly moved by one of the mothers who kept correcting her son’s grammar, adding a particular human angle to a historic moment.

The letters were preserved by surviving family members and donated to the Jewish Museum of Thessaloniki.

Over 50 of the letters were then compiled into a book called ‘Do Not Forget Me,’ edited by historian Leon Saltiel. He will speak via Zoom at the event to give historical context and significance to the letters.

Jarniewski says this year’s Holocaust Remembrance Day bears particular significance, given the October 7th attacks in Israel and the ensuing and ongoing war.

“We have felt alone. I think, in a way that we haven’t for a very long time, and then the explosion of anti-Semitism which just surged on October 7th itself and since then,” adding it has been particularly difficult for Holocaust survivors.

The museum itself has experienced a first-hand rise in anti-Semitic sentiment on its social media platforms. The building was also tagged with anti-Semitic graffiti earlier this month, which has since been removed and reported to police.

“One of the ways we can combat present and future violations of human rights is to develop empathy for victims of past atrocities,” said Angeliki Bogiatj, acting manager of CMHR’s public programs, in a news release. “Reflecting on the Holocaust is an important way of educating future generations about the fundamental principle that we are all born free and equal in dignity and rights.”

The free event runs Sunday from 2 to 3:30 p.m. at the Manitoba Teachers’ Society Classroom at CMHR. It is free to attend.