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Otto Weidt — A Blind Hero
11 AM LOS ANGELES • 2 PM NEW YORK
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Otto Weidt was a visually impaired Holocaust rescuer who was named Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem. He owned a workshop in Berlin that manufactured brushes and brooms created by visually impaired workers, many of whom were Jewish. During the Nazi period he found hiding places for his Jewish employees, with the help of his sighted assistant Alice Licht. When Licht herself was deported to Auschwitz, Weidt traveled to the concentration camp, alone, to try to save her. A unique story of love and determination!
Lisbon — Harbor of Hope
11 AM LOS ANGELES • 2 PM NEW YORK
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View Pavel Schnabel‘s award-winning film, Lisbon — Harbor of Hope, then join us for the discussion. The film follows several Jewish families who escaped Nazi Germany to Lisbon from 1933-38, before the outbreak of war. For those families it was still permissible to settle in Portugal, and the film interviews several of these survivors. The Sousa Mendes story is also told, through the diplomat’s son, Pedro Nuno de Sousa Mendes, who was a witness and participant in his father’s rescue action.
Return to Life! The Story of Lena’s 100 Children
11 AM LOS ANGELES • 2 PM NEW YORK
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The film My 100 Children tells the story of Lena Kuchler-Silberman, a Holocaust survivor and teacher in Poland who established an orphanage for 100 Jewish children in Zakopane, Poland in 1945 and later brought them to Israel. Lena was a surrogate mother to these children — she clothed them, fed them, listened to their stories and gave them hope again.
Among the Righteous — Arab Rescuers of Jews
11 AM LOS ANGELES • 2 PM NEW YORK
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*** PLEASE NOTE DATE OF NOVEMBER 12 (CHANGED FROM OCTOBER 15) ***
Not to be missed! Few people know that the Holocaust extended beyond the European continent, into the North African countries of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya. There, Nazi Germany, Vichy France and Fascist Italy sent thousands of Jews to forced labor and set up dozens of concentration camps for both local Jews and Jewish refugees from Europe. For 20 years, Dr. Robert Satloff has been on a quest to find Arabs who rescued Jews from this persecution. The result is the powerful film, Among the Righteous: Lost Stories from the Holocaust in Arab Lands, and a companion book.
Who Shall Live and Who Shall Die
1 PM LOS ANGELES • 4 PM NEW YORK
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Who Shall Live and Who Shall Die? is a 1982 documentary film that asks whether the United States could have stopped the Holocaust. The film combines previously classified information, rare newsreel footage, and interviews with the politicians who were in office at the time, to tell a behind-the-scenes story of secret motives and inane priorities that allowed for the deaths of millions.
KLARSFELD — A Love Story
11 AM LOS ANGELES • 2 PM NEW YORK
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Serge and Beate Klarsfeld are best known to the public as Nazi hunters. Thanks to their heroic efforts, Nazi criminals Klaus Barbie, Alois Brunner, Kurt Lischka and many others were brought to justice in Germany and France. In parallel with this effort is their tireless work to document the names, faces and lives of the murdered Jews of France. They also continue to speak up for an inclusive multi-ethnic Europe and against the rising tide of extremist right-wing political figures and parties. The new documentary film, KLARSFELD — A LOVE STORY, documents their extraordinary partnership for justice. They will be interviewed on this program by Peter Hellman. Not to be missed!
Who will write our history? … and Other Heroic Tales of Jewish Resistance
1 PM LOS ANGELES • 4 PM NEW YORK
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This program features the award-winning film Who will write our history? on the true story of the resistance fighters of the Warsaw Ghetto who, in the face of certain death, systematically and heroically assembled and buried an archive to preserve the memories of their lives. In conjunction with the film screening, the Holocaust scholar Dr. Jud Newborn will put this inspiring story in the context of the wide variety of forms of Jewish spiritual and physical resistance practiced all across Nazi-occupied Europe. (more…)
Curious George Escapes the Nazis
2 PM LOS ANGELES • 5 PM NEW YORK
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This is a film-and-discussion program about the movie version of Louise Borden‘s book The Journey that Saved Curious George. The delightful film Monkey Business: The Adventure of Curious George’s Creators explores the extraordinary lives of Hans and Margret Rey, the authors of the beloved Curious George children’s books. See the film, then join filmmaker Ema Ryan Yamazaki and historian Dr. Susan Zuccotti for a lively discussion. (more…)
Hannie Schaft — Dutch Resistance Hero
1 PM LOS ANGELES • 4 PM NEW YORK
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Hannie Schaft, the “girl with the red hair,” was a university student when Nazi Germany occupied the neutral Netherlands in 1940. Over the next five years she risked everything — her education, her safety, her family, and her life — in order to shelter her Jewish friends and become, along with her young comrades, the Oversteegen sisters, one of the Most Wanted resistance fighters in the country. (more…)
Journey to Freedom
11 AM LOS ANGELES • 2 PM NEW YORK
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Filmmaker Tanja Dammertz followed the Sousa Mendes Foundation’s pilgrimage tour Journey on the Road to Freedom in 2023 and produced this wonderful documentary film for the European cultural television channel, ARTE. It chronicles both the physical and emotional journeys of the participants as they confront childhood memories and long-buried family secrets. (more…)