Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of Auschwitz-Birkenau, a concentration and extermination camp in Poland run by the Nazis during the Holocaust.
Auschwitz-Birkenau
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Fast Forward 95-Year-Old Auschwitz Guard Who Grabbed Jews’ Valuables Must Serve Prison Term
— Germany’s highest federal court upheld the conviction of a 95-year-old former Auschwitz guard for being an accessory to murder. Former SS member Oskar Groening was sentenced in July 2015 to four years in prison for his role in the murder of 300,000 Hungarian Jews in Auschwitz. Germany’s Federal Court of Justice upheld the conviction and…
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Fast Forward Tiny Forbidden Pendant Unearthed in Auschwitz Attic
– A tiny carved wooden clog that once belonged to a woman the Nazis deported to the Auschwitz death camp has been discovered after more than 70 years. Smaller than a matchstick, the pendant “is a real piece of art from Auschwitz,” Agnieszka Molenda, who runs the Foundation of Memory Sites near Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland,…
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Culture An Auschwitz Home Movie Scored by Eric Clapton
‘I’d always avoided Auschwitz,” Philippe Mora says near the beginning of his new documentary, “Three Days in Auschwitz.” “I was like, ‘Who wants to go to Auschwitz?’” Mora’s question is, at least on the surface, perfectly understandable. After all, with any number of exotic and enticing locations currently available for our visiting or vacationing pleasure,…
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Fast Forward Poland Wants To Jail Users of Term ‘Polish Death Camps’
The Polish government proposed a bill that would make the use of terms like “Polish death camps” a crime punishable by jail time. The bill, which the government put forward Tuesday but has not been passed into law, would prohibit assigning blame to Poland for the actions of Nazi Germany. Historians and artists would be…
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Fast Forward ‘Fred the Furrier,’ Who Drove Auschwitz Shul Restoration, Dies At 83
(JTA) — Fred Schwartz, a New York-area philanthropist and businessman who marketed affordable mink, sable and fox under the name “Fred the Furrier,” has died at 84. Schwartz, of Great Neck, New York, died Aug. 7 after an illness. Schwartz operated “Fur Vaults” at three Alexander’s department stores, earning praise and scorn for opening up a once-exclusive industry through…
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Opinion 4 Things To Remember About Pope Francis’s Visit to Auschwitz
Pope Francis made a visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau Friday. The spiritual leader of the world’s Catholics silently reflected, met with Jewish and Christian survivors of the death camp, and left a note in the guestbook, which read: “Lord, have mercy on your people! Lord, forgiveness for so much cruelty!” There’s a lot to be said about…
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Fast Forward Visiting Auschwitz, Pope Francis Asks God To Forgive ‘So Much Cruelty’
Seated on a bench near the gate to the Auschwitz death camp site in Poland, Pope Francis prayed in silence on Friday in tribute to the 1.5 million people, most of them Jews, killed there by Nazi occupiers during World War Two. The third pope to visit Auschwitz and the first not to have lived…
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Fast Forward Auschwitz Museum Bans Pokémon Go Amid Craze
(JTA) — The Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum is not buying into the Pokémon Go craze. On Tuesday, the Holocaust memorial site tweeted that it will not allow visitors to play the new smartphone game because it is “disrespectful on many levels.” New York magazine first reported Tuesday that some users of the Nintendo game, which allows players…
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In Case You Missed It
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Fast Forward ‘Unspeakable evil’: Vice President Vance tours Dachau on first international trip
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Books How a Jewish daughter’s search to find her parents became a book and a play and a movie
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