Israeli Student Faces Charges For Stealing Auschwitz Artifacts For College Art Project
Image by getty images
An Israeli art student is in hot water after she admitted stealing artifacts from Auschwitz for a senior art project.
Rotem Bides, 27, a student at Beit Berl College in Kfar Saba, told the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper that she stole the objects, including glass shards and soup bowls, in the course of six trips to the camp. She defended her actions by saying that she was the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors.
“I felt that that this was something I have to do,” she told the Israeli newspaper. “Millions of people were murdered because of the moral laws of a particular country, under a particular regime. If these are the rules, I can come and act according to my rules.”
After the news report, the Auschwitz museum vowed to pursue a criminal complaint against Bides, and Beit Berl College said it would stop displaying her artwork and put her through a disciplinary hearing.
“This is a painful and scandalous act. This is a protected site and proof of the tragedy of the Holocaust that needs to be preserved for future generations,” read a statement from the museum.
Contact Daniel J. Solomon at [email protected] or on Twitter @DanielJSolomon
A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
