'Last Generation': Kristallnacht Survivor, 94, Bears Witness
He has shared his testimony with more than 12,000 schoolchildren as anti-Semitic offences in Germany have surged, police figures show.
- Ahead of Monday's 88th anniversary of the 'Night of Broken Glass,' 94-year-old survivor George Shefi returned to Berlin to recount his childhood experiences of Nazi violence to students and police officers.
- On November 9-10, 1938, Nazi forces unleashed a wave of violence across Germany, killing at least 90 people and destroying 1,400 synagogues, marking a major escalation in the persecution of Jews.
- Recalling the violence, Shefi told AFP, "I remember very clearly a hat shop which was broken into." He later escaped to England via the Kindertransport rescue effort that saved nearly 10,000 children.
- Collaborating with German Police Union chairman Jochen Kopelke, Shefi is educating officers on Jewish life; Kopelke acknowledged police historically participated in the Shoah, which led to systematic mass murder.
- Amid rising antisemitism, Shefi warns students, "You're not responsible for what was, but you're responsible for the next 20, 30 years when you grow up." His message reflects urgency as his generation ages.
18 Articles
18 Articles
Remembering Kristallnacht: Witness says night of terror risks being a lesson not learned
Germany is marking the 88th anniversary of the “Night of Broken Glass,” the Nazi-led attacks on Jewish communities on Nov. 9, 1938, when synagogues, homes and thousands of Jewish businesses were destroyed
'Last generation': Kristallnacht survivor, 94, bears witness
"Our generation is the last generation that can tell the true story," Shefi told AFP ahead of Monday's 88th anniversary of the events also remembered as the "Night of Broken Glass". The wave of violence unleashed by the Nazi regime on November 9-10, 1938 saw at least 90 Jewish people killed and 1,400 synagogues set alight across Germany. Shefi, born Spiegelglas in 1931, was just six years old when the anti-Semitic riots shook his home city of Be…
For George Shefi, a 94-year-old survivor of Nazi Germany's “Night of Broken Glass”,
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