By Mary O’KEEFE

“We commemorate International Holocaust Remembrance Day, designated by the United Nations to mark the anniversary of the January 27, 1945 liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi concentration and death camp. We solemnly remember the six million Jews who were systematically murdered across Europe by the Nazis and their collaborators, as well as the millions of others who were killed. We honor those who survived, thank the liberators and renew our shared commitment to human freedom and justice.” Statement from Secretary of State Marco Rubio

This year marks the 80th year anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau. For years following the end of WWII a group of Jewish survivors shared information on what had happened under the rule of Adolph Hitler. And make no mistake: although Hitler was the leader of the “Final Solution” he could not carry out his genocide plan by himself. Hitler’s inner circle – his cabinet – followed his orders. The cabinet included Dr. Josef Mengele, a German Schutzstaffel (SS) officer and physician. He was known as the “angel of death” and Holocaust survivor Joseph Alexander met the man three times.

Alexander is 102 years old and continues to talk to adults and students about his experience under Hitler’s rule and the 12 camps he was in during one of the darkest times in history. Alexander has shared his story with thousands of students over the years, including those who attend Crescenta Valley High School. 

He said the students’ reactions have been pretty consistent throughout the years. 

“I want them to walk away with the knowledge of what happened,” he said. 

Alexander added he is concerned the facts about the Holocaust are not known by many students. 

“Most U.S. adults know what the Holocaust was and approximately when it happened, but fewer than half can correctly answer multiple-choice questions about the number of Jews who were murdered or the way Adolf Hitler came to power …Nearly three-in-10 Americans say they are not sure how many Jews died during the Holocaust while one-in-10 overestimate the death toll and 15% say that 3 million or fewer Jews were killed,” according to a 2020 Pew Research Center survey.

“So this is what I hope: When I talk to them they [receive] the knowledge …they are our future,” Alexander said. 

Alexander receives letters from students after he speaks and many times those students will repeat his words. The students do seem to have a “light bulb” moment when they understand what happened during the Holocaust. 

He added that oftentimes during his presentation he is not certain if the students are listening, and actually hearing, what he is sharing; but once he gets the letters he knows they were listening. 

“So I see they do pay attention,” he said. 

Alexander had been in 12 different camps during WWII. 

“One of them was Auschwitz, then was Birkenau and one was Dachau and many others,” he said. In all Alexander spent about five years in the camps. 

He was born in Poland. When the Germans entered his village in Warsaw they separated people into restricted and non-restricted areas. A couple of weeks after the invasion, the Germans ordered a group of people to the town square. Alexander said in an earlier interview that he did not know why, but neither the family in his home nor in his uncle’s home, both which were located in the town square, were in this first gathering. 

“Those who were ordered into the town square were taken away,” he said. 

There were rumors the Germans would be coming back to take the rest of the Jews, he added. 

“My dad said, ‘We are not going to wait.’ My father had three sisters who lived 25 kilometers [away],” he said. 

His mother, father, one sister and one brother left the area; Alexander along with two other sisters stayed home. Not long after they were loaded into a wagon to follow their parents. 

Soon after they went to the first camp, which was a work camp. It allowed Jews to return home on the weekends. The work was hard; digging a canal that involved standing in water that was to their knees, without boots. These camps were called ghettos. 

He was there for about five months before the order came from the German Nazis that all Jewish men from ages 16 to 60 were to meet at the schoolhouse.

“And off I went to the camp,” he said. 

He worked at that camp, then two or three camps were combined into one so he moved again. He moved from camp to camp, seven by then, until a train arrived. 

“It wasn’t a passenger train, it was a cattle car [boxcar],” he said. 

The boxcar was packed with Jewish people. They traveled for three days without food, water or bathroom facilities. And then they arrived in Auschwitz. 

Alexander said when they arrived about 30% to 40% of the people placed in the boxcar had died. 

When he arrived in Auschwitz he met Mengele. He got off the train and lined up. 

“Whoever could walk would line up in rows of five and we met Dr. Josef Mengele,” he said. “And Dr. Mengele said, ‘There’s six kilometers to walk to the camp’ and he was selecting people [who lined up, directing some] to the left and they would be taken on trucks. So he went through and picked out the sick people, old people, young kids … I was a little guy and I was a young kid and he told me to go to the left.”

But Alexander had already been in several camps by the time he arrived at Auschwitz and he was learning how to survive. 

“Every camp I was in I had to work. I tried to get in with the biggest, strongest men. And here Dr. Mengele was telling me to go the left. I looked around and saw sick and old people and young kids … that’s not the kind of people I should be with. It was after midnight [when I got off the train]. If it would have been daytime I don’t think I could have done this … I ran back to the other side. If I didn’t run back to the other side I wouldn’t be here talking to you today. The people who were on the [left side] were taken on the trucks and were taken straight to the gas chamber,” Alexander said. 

Alexander is a witness to history. When he is approached or hears someone denying the Holocaust he can say he was there. He has a number tattooed on his arm that the Nazis used to identify prisoners at Auschwitz, and he has the stories he shares to warn people that if it happened once it can happen again. But he is 102 years old and he knows time is now the enemy for Holocaust survivors. 

When asked if he sees similarities between what is happening around him today in the world and at home – is history repeating itself? – Alexander said, “In a way, some [things]. It started in Germany in 1933. It started right away. The Jews couldn’t go to school, Jews couldn’t practice any law or medicine … and that’s how it started.”

He said when the Nazis took power the Jews had no choice.

“You had to follow the rules, follow the order,” he said.

He will continue to share his story of what happened during WWII under Nazi rule. 

“I tell the students, I tell everybody, that six million Jews, one and a half million children, were murdered. They weren’t murdered because they were criminals or did anything wrong. They were murdered because they were Jews. And today we have a lot of Holocaust deniers and a lot of antisemitism. I call the Holocaust deniers crazy because the evidence is still there in existence today. You go to Auschwitz, Majdanek, Treblinka, Dachau – the gas chambers are still there,” he said. 

Alexander has been back to Auschwitz a few times and has been invited to a remembrance event at Dachau. 

When asked why he continues to go back to these camps he said, “Because I survived and Hitler didn’t.”