OSWIECIM, Poland -- Thousands from across the globe marched Thursday
between the former Nazi German Auschwitz-Birkenau death camps in honor
of six million Jews killed in the Holocaust during World War II.
The
mournful wail of the traditional Jewish ram's horn -- the "shofar"
symbolizing freedom -- marked the start of the annual March of the
Living, held this year for the 21st time since 1988 in this southern
Polish town where Nazi Germany built its most notorious death camps.
Eight
thousand marchers including Auschwitz survivors, Jewish youths from as
far as Australia and two thousand young Poles passed through the
infamous "Arbeit macht frei" (Work Will Set You Free) gate at the
Auschwitz camp before proceeding along the two-mile (3km) route to
Birkenau.
"This march for me is like a candle which I have to light for the
victims," said Steven Higgs, a 22-year-old from Boston, Massachusetts.
"It's a small candle in a dark world but I believe, if more people will light a candle, the world could be better," he said.
Maria Hermano, 43, travelled from Mexico with her family for the march marking the annual Holocaust Memorial Day.
"No
one from my family died in a concentration camp, but when you are here,
you feel that every victim is a part of your family," Hermano said.
Still bearing the camp number 3,241 tattooed on his forearm, Auschwitz survivor Willy Manela recalled its unspeakable horrors.
"Words
cannot convey what happened here in Auschwitz. It's unfathomable," said
the Polish Jew who made a life for himself in Ireland after the war.
"It's
my dream for the young people who are marching here not to forget
history. They aren't allowed. They cannot forget what hate of fellow
human beings can lead to," he added.
Israel's former chief Rabbi
Meir Lau as well as US and Canadian World War II veterans who liberated
other Nazi death camps, notably Buchenwald, joined the march.
At Birkenau, six large torches were lit in front of a memorial.
More
than one million people, mostly European Jews, perished at
Auschwitz-Birkenau, operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland from
1940 until it was liberated by the Soviet Red Army on January 27, 1945.
The
site was one of six German death camps set up in occupied Poland, a
country which was home to pre-war Europe's largest Jewish community.
Many
Auschwitz victims were sent to its notorious gas chambers immediately
after being shipped in by train. Others were worked to death as slave
laborers.
Among the camp's other victims were tens of thousands of
non-Jewish Poles, Soviet prisoners of war, gypsies, and anti-Nazi
resistance fighters from across Europe.
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