In 1991, I visited Bergen-Belsen, a Nazi concentration camp near Celle, Germany. Although there were no gas chambers there, is estimated 36,000 people died there between 1943 and April 1945. On April 15th 1945, British troops liberated the camp. There they found 60,000 starving and deathly ill people in an overcrowded, unsanitary camp with a typhus epidemic spread throughout. These people, barely alive, were surrounded by the bodies of 13,000 who had recently died. The British, shocked and ill-prepared for what they found, attempted to control the spread of disease and help those that remained however, even with their best efforts, another 15,000 died after liberation. Of the many who died at Bergen-Belsen, the most well know were Margot and Anne Frank who reportedly died only weeks before liberation.

It was a cold February morning when I visited, it had snowed the night before, there were no footprints on the path, no others mourners had passed by. It was so quiet and surreal. Each step I took in the cold dry snow made a crunching sound that broke the silence like steps on shattered glass. As I walked among mass graves and memorials, I was struck by the peacefulness of the moment for a place where so many were tortured, starved and died from diseases and abuse. Near impossible comprehend such evil and hate.

My husband was with me on this journey to mourn and remember those who perished in this place. We both left with a deeper understanding of something that can never really be understood. It was sobering and it was that day a seed was planted in both our hearts to never forget the horrors of that time. It breaks my heart when people make comparisons to the Holocaust that diminish the overwhelming evil, torture, inhumane treatment and murder of an entire generation.

We say never again but antisemitism is on the rise worldwide today and sadly history has shown that hatred, although it kills, it does not die. Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day observed on the anniversary date of the liberation of Auschwitz. Today, I not only remember the 6 million Jews that were murdered during the Holocaust but I reaffirm my vow to speak out against antisemitism and hate ~ Never Again, Never Again this is my prayer.