Killing of other human beings in cold blood is something no society should be proud of. But yet in the last century, almost six million people approximately have lost their lives, brutally being slaughtered and killed. It is a day to remember that humans have the ability to fall to their lowest possible point. &nbsp; &nbsp;

The Holocaust was the systematic eradication of the Jews in Europe by Adolf Hitler during the Nazi rule. The narrative of the Holocaust is one that continues to this day, though it is not restricted against those of the Jewish faith. Hitler believed, as did many others of that time, that Germany&rsquo;s loss in WWI was caused by the Jews. The Jewish population of Germany came to thrive with several prominent intellectuals and captains of industry. Hitler thought they were racially inferior to the white Aryan race.

What came as a forerunner to the extermination of Jews and gypsies was the &lsquo;Euthanasia Programme&rsquo; where the Nazis gassed a total of about 275,000 handicapped people with mental or physical disabilities through Germany and later Europe in secret. Concentration camps came much later, the persecution of Jews started by marking them, by forcing them to wear a yellow star wherever they went. They were forced into ghettos and their possessions taken away from them. Between 1933 and 1939 several Jews left Germany so that they did not have to live in constant fear.

As Hitler continued expanding into Europe, Jews from all around his conquered territories were transported to the Polish ghettos. In 1941, the Nazis started their experiments with mass killing. They gassed 500 Soviet POWs with Zyklon-B, a pesticide, killing them. Next came the gas chambers in the concentration camps. &nbsp;

Over six million Jews and European gypsies were killed during the genocide. The UN marks the 27th of January as the International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

The first mass gassings began at the camp of Belzec, near Lublin, on March 17, 1942. Five more mass killing centres were built at camps in occupied Poland, including Chelmno, Sobibor, Treblinka, Majdanek and the largest of all, Auschwitz-Birkenau.

During the summer of 1944, even as the events of D-Day (June 6, 1944) and a Soviet offensive the same month spelled the beginning of the end for Germany in the war, a large proportion of Hungary&rsquo;s Jewish population was deported to Auschwitz, and as many as 12,000 Jews were killed every day.

In his last will and political testament, dictated in a German bunker that April 29, Hitler blamed the war on &ldquo;International Jewry and its helpers&rdquo; and urged the German leaders and people to follow &ldquo;the strict observance of the racial laws and with merciless resistance against the universal poisoners of all peoples&rdquo;&ndash;the Jews. The following day, he committed suicide. Germany&rsquo;s formal surrender in World War II came barely a week later, on May 8, 1945.

Never again

We as humanity have said never again many times but have gone on to kill more people.

If we have to call ourselves human beings we will have to first stop right here and make sure we stop the&nbsp;persecution of people based on religion, colour, caste, sex. But we have to remember that we haven&rsquo;t yet become a mature civilisation to handle this because every now and then we see streaks of animal behaviour. May be one day we will see light at the end of the tunnel. We will then be able to say never again.

 
&nbsp;

What came as a forerunner to the extermination of Jews was the ?Euthanasia Programme? where the Nazis gassed about 275,000 handicapped people

Killing of other human beings in cold blood is something no society should be proud of. But yet in the last century, almost six million people approximately have lost their lives, brutally being slaughtered and killed. It is a day to remember that humans have the ability to fall to their lowest possible point. The Holocaust was the systematic eradication of the Jews in Europe by Adolf Hitler during the Nazi rule. The narrative of the Holocaust is one that continues to this day, though it is not restricted against those of the Jewish faith. Hitler believed, as did many others of that time, that Germany’s loss in WWI was caused by the Jews. The Jewish population of Germany came to thrive with several prominent intellectuals and captains of industry. Hitler thought they were racially inferior to the white Aryan race. What came as a forerunner to the extermination of Jews and gypsies was the ‘Euthanasia Programme’ where the Nazis gassed a total of about 275,000 handicapped people with mental or physical disabilities through Germany and later Europe in secret. Concentration camps came much later, the persecution of Jews started by marking them, by forcing them to wear a yellow star wherever they went. They were forced into ghettos and their possessions taken away from them. Between 1933 and 1939 several Jews left Germany so that they did not have to live in constant fear. As Hitler continued expanding into Europe, Jews from all around his conquered territories were transported to the Polish ghettos. In 1941, the Nazis started their experiments with mass killing. They gassed 500 Soviet POWs with Zyklon-B, a pesticide, killing them. Next came the gas chambers in the concentration camps. Over six million Jews and European gypsies were killed during the genocide. The UN marks the 27th of January as the International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The first mass gassings began at the camp of Belzec, near Lublin, on March 17, 1942. Five more mass killing centres were built at camps in occupied Poland, including Chelmno, Sobibor, Treblinka, Majdanek and the largest of all, Auschwitz-Birkenau. During the summer of 1944, even as the events of D-Day (June 6, 1944) and a Soviet offensive the same month spelled the beginning of the end for Germany in the war, a large proportion of Hungary’s Jewish population was deported to Auschwitz, and as many as 12,000 Jews were killed every day. In his last will and political testament, dictated in a German bunker that April 29, Hitler blamed the war on “International Jewry and its helpers” and urged the German leaders and people to follow “the strict observance of the racial laws and with merciless resistance against the universal poisoners of all peoples”–the Jews. The following day, he committed suicide. Germany’s formal surrender in World War II came barely a week later, on May 8, 1945. Never again We as humanity have said never again many times but have gone on to kill more people. If we have to call ourselves human beings we will have to first stop right here and make sure we stop the persecution of people based on religion, colour, caste, sex. But we have to remember that we haven’t yet become a mature civilisation to handle this because every now and then we see streaks of animal behaviour. May be one day we will see light at the end of the tunnel. We will then be able to say never again.

The Holocaust will continue to haunt humanity

They survived the Holocaust, and held on to their love of life despite their childhood ordeal and in their twilight years, now living in the United States, they started a band. 
 
This week, the two grandfathers returned to their homeland Poland to pay their respects to the victims of the Nazi German genocide&nbsp;and to perform at the site of Warsaw&#39;s wartime Jewish ghetto. 
 
Peering at the crowd from behind his drum set on Wednesday night in the capital, 91-year-old Saul Dreier yelled into the mic: &quot;Is everybody happy?&quot; The crowd cheered. 
 
The dynamic duo came to &quot;play for the people that perished and to play for the peace of the world. As simple as that&quot;, the retired building contractor said. 
 
Dreier, who welcomed his first great-grandchild last week, survived three concentration camps and lost most of his family in World War II. 
 
&quot;My parents were burned in Treblinka. Either Treblinka, Majdanek or Belzec. I don&#39;t know which one,&quot; he said, referring to death camps set up by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland. 
 
&quot;And the rest was burnt in Auschwitz&quot;, the largest Nazi German death camp where 1.1 million people, mostly European Jews, lost their lives. 
 
While Dreier sometimes joins in, the lead singer in the band is Reuwen &quot;Ruby&quot; Sosnowicz, who also plays accordion and keyboard. 
 
Together, they mainly perform klezmer music, traditional Jewish songs from Eastern Europe. 
 
Sosnowicz, 88, was back in his native Warsaw for the first time since he escaped the ghetto and hid in a barn for three years thanks to a kind Polish farmer. 
 
&quot;Some people were nice people. They helped, you know. The farmer did a big thing. If they would find out that he did it, they would kill him,&quot; said Sosnowicz, who is more low-key than his fast-talking bandmate. 
 
&#39;Miracles in our music&#39; : 
 
Non-Jews who stood up to the Nazis have been honoured as &quot;Righteous Among the Nations&quot; by Israel&#39;s Yad Vashem Holocaust remembrance centre. 
 
Some of them attended the packed concert, sharing in the joy of the evening as hundreds of music lovers danced, sang along and drank beer. 
 
The band was joined on stage for part of the gig by the youthful and folksy Warsaw Sentimental Orchestra, plus popular 52-year-old Polish rocker Muniek Staszczyk, who said: &quot;It&#39;s a great honour to be with the boys.&quot; 
 
&quot;Their optimism is contagious. They&#39;re full of life,&quot; audience member Justyna Tarnacka said of the Holocaust Survivor Band. 
 
&quot;It&#39;s phenomenal. I admire these people. They have so much energy. We might not have as much at 90&nbsp;if we even live that long,&quot; the 32-year-old television journalist said. 
 
Dreier attributes their good health and vigour to &quot;God and miracles&quot;. 
 
&quot;We had miracles in concentration camps, we had miracles in hiding, now we&#39;ve got miracles in our music,&quot; he said. 
 
He was inspired to start the band two years ago&nbsp;when he read an obituary for 110-year-old Alice Herz-Sommer. 
 
She survived Terezin concentration camp by playing the piano. 
 
&quot;When I saw this, it hit my heart,&quot; Dreier said, saying he immediately went to his wife with the Holocaust Survivor Band idea. 
 
&quot;What? You crazy?&quot; was the response. His rabbi later told him, &quot;What you need this for?&quot; 
 
&quot;And because those people tell me no, I said yes!&quot; Dreier exclaimed, adding: &quot;I went out the following day and bought a set of drums. Brand new.&quot; 
 
His search for a bandmate led him to Sosnowicz, a hairdresser and lifelong musician, or as Dreier put it: &quot;Not only he&#39;s a musician, he&#39;s a master musician. He&#39;s number one.&quot; 
 
&#39;The best healer&#39; : 
 
The idea came at a good time, according to Sosnowicz&#39;s daughter Chana Rose, who had moved back in with her parents to help them out. 
 
She later went on to become the band manager and a fellow musician, doing backing vocals and percussion for the Holocaust Survivor Band. 
 
&quot;My mom got very sick, she had a massive stroke. And, you know, dad went into a depression... My first inkling was, &#39;Wow this would be great for dad,&#39; &quot; she said. 
 
They have since played nursing homes, synagogues and other local Florida venues, even The Venetian casino in Las Vegas. In Poland, they also brought their instruments to Auschwitz and Treblinka. 
 
&quot;Music makes you alive. Even during the war, we played music. We didn&#39;t have what to eat but enjoyed music,&quot; Sosnowicz said. 
 
&quot;Music is the best healer in life.&quot; 
 
(AFP)

The duo, Saul Dreier and Reuwen Sosnowicz, mainly perform klezmer music, traditional Jewish songs from eastern Europe

They survived the Holocaust, and held on to their love of life despite their childhood ordeal and in their twilight years, now living in the United States, they started a band. This week, the two grandfathers returned to their homeland Poland to pay their respects to the victims of the Nazi German genocide and to perform at the site of Warsaw's wartime Jewish ghetto. Peering at the crowd from behind his drum set on Wednesday night in the capital, 91-year-old Saul Dreier yelled into the mic: "Is everybody happy?" The crowd cheered. The dynamic duo came to "play for the people that perished and to play for the peace of the world. As simple as that", the retired building contractor said. Dreier, who welcomed his first great-grandchild last week, survived three concentration camps and lost most of his family in World War II. "My parents were burned in Treblinka. Either Treblinka, Majdanek or Belzec. I don't know which one," he said, referring to death camps set up by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland. "And the rest was burnt in Auschwitz", the largest Nazi German death camp where 1.1 million people, mostly European Jews, lost their lives. While Dreier sometimes joins in, the lead singer in the band is Reuwen "Ruby" Sosnowicz, who also plays accordion and keyboard. Together, they mainly perform klezmer music, traditional Jewish songs from Eastern Europe. Sosnowicz, 88, was back in his native Warsaw for the first time since he escaped the ghetto and hid in a barn for three years thanks to a kind Polish farmer. "Some people were nice people. They helped, you know. The farmer did a big thing. If they would find out that he did it, they would kill him," said Sosnowicz, who is more low-key than his fast-talking bandmate. 'Miracles in our music' : Non-Jews who stood up to the Nazis have been honoured as "Righteous Among the Nations" by Israel's Yad Vashem Holocaust remembrance centre. Some of them attended the packed concert, sharing in the joy of the evening as hundreds of music lovers danced, sang along and drank beer. The band was joined on stage for part of the gig by the youthful and folksy Warsaw Sentimental Orchestra, plus popular 52-year-old Polish rocker Muniek Staszczyk, who said: "It's a great honour to be with the boys." "Their optimism is contagious. They're full of life," audience member Justyna Tarnacka said of the Holocaust Survivor Band. "It's phenomenal. I admire these people. They have so much energy. We might not have as much at 90 if we even live that long," the 32-year-old television journalist said. Dreier attributes their good health and vigour to "God and miracles". "We had miracles in concentration camps, we had miracles in hiding, now we've got miracles in our music," he said. He was inspired to start the band two years ago when he read an obituary for 110-year-old Alice Herz-Sommer. She survived Terezin concentration camp by playing the piano. "When I saw this, it hit my heart," Dreier said, saying he immediately went to his wife with the Holocaust Survivor Band idea. "What? You crazy?" was the response. His rabbi later told him, "What you need this for?" "And because those people tell me no, I said yes!" Dreier exclaimed, adding: "I went out the following day and bought a set of drums. Brand new." His search for a bandmate led him to Sosnowicz, a hairdresser and lifelong musician, or as Dreier put it: "Not only he's a musician, he's a master musician. He's number one." 'The best healer' : The idea came at a good time, according to Sosnowicz's daughter Chana Rose, who had moved back in with her parents to help them out. She later went on to become the band manager and a fellow musician, doing backing vocals and percussion for the Holocaust Survivor Band. "My mom got very sick, she had a massive stroke. And, you know, dad went into a depression... My first inkling was, 'Wow this would be great for dad,' " she said. They have since played nursing homes, synagogues and other local Florida venues, even The Venetian casino in Las Vegas. In Poland, they also brought their instruments to Auschwitz and Treblinka. "Music makes you alive. Even during the war, we played music. We didn't have what to eat but enjoyed music," Sosnowicz said. "Music is the best healer in life." (AFP)

Two grandads return home to Poland as the 'Holocaust Survivor Band'

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The Holocaust will continue to haunt humanity

Two grandads return home to Poland as the 'Holocaust Survivor Band'