In memory of Malca – Z”L
To this day, the extant “Legionaries” – Romania’s equivalent of the Nazi party – openly publish calls to “Kill the Jews” in the Romanian press.
I was 20 years old at the time of the Bucharest Kristallnacht which began on January 21, 1941. I was there. I am a witness!
For a period of more than 72 hours, the Jewish districts in Bucharest were at the mercy of the masses. During this time, thousands of Jews were hauled out of their homes, arrested in the street, and even in houses of prayer (synagogues). For example, the Malbim synagogue, which was occupied and viciously converted into a torture chamber.
The Jewish districts in Bucharest were left for three days and nights to suffer at the hands of the vilest and most barbaric fascist elements. The aggressors had been educated, incited, and trained for years by the nationalistic hooligan press for the “great” moment: the slaughter of the Jews.
On January 21, the legionaries gathered about two hundred Jews into the basement of their headquarters. The fascists did not forget to take all of the victims’ valuables before they set upon them. They drove the Jews into basements and up to attics under a storm of blows from truncheons and improvised iron bludgeons. They started to beat us with a bullwhip and copper rods, with blows to the face, palms, the soles of our feet, our buttocks, in a room specially designated for the purpose.
The following morning we were divided into two groups. The fortunate ones were taken to Straulesti, on the outskirts of Bucharest, where we were beaten. By the day’s end we were released, and made to walk home barefoot. When I arrived home, my sister did not recognize me at the door.
Last week I received the Jewish-Romanian newspaper Realitatea Evreiasca, reminding today’s readers about the Romanian Legionaries party, whose slogan was: “Kill the Jews!” In today’s Romania, it is possible to read about and to hear the same sentiment expressed, that the Jews are best off as smoke in a chimney.
Out of a Jewish population in Romania of 800, 000 people before the war, today’s Romanian Jewish community is closer to 1,500-2,000 people. “Probably no country has had a darker record in the treatment of its Jews than Romania. It was the most virulently anti-Semitic country in pre-War Europe.” (Nora Levin, The Holocaust)
