When I was in high school, we went on the customary trip to Poland. It’s a trip many young Israeli high school students take in 11th or 12th grade, depending on the school.
The trip to Poland is sometimes confusing. For some students it will be their first trip ever to Chutz La’Aretz – their first trip outside of Israel – as well as their first flight on an airplane. The journey starts at Ben Gurion Airport, with the Duty Free shops adding to the ambiguous feelings. Toblerone, liquor, Timberland shoes… Sounds like the beginning of a vacation. And then you arrive in Poland. And something changes.
Each group has a special guide. The guide’s main role is to get the high school students into the atmosphere. Sometimes the guide is a Holocaust survivor, which intensifies the experience. Obviously, that was more common in the past. I don’t remember if our guide was a Holocaust survivor, but I remember his name was Tuvia. I also remember that he did a great job.
One thing I do remember from the trip is the song he used to play throughout the journey. He repeated it again and again from the moment we landed in Poland, on the long rides on the bus, and when we visited the camps. He carried a small tape with speakers connected to a strap on his shoulder. And almost every place we visited he played this song. It suddenly became the hymn of our trip. We hadn’t heard it before, but soon enough, the whole group became familiar with the song. And we liked it. How could we not? Many weeks after returning to Israel, we still used to sing this song. It had an impact on us and really added to the experience of the journey.
The song was “B’shetzef – He’s Just Turned Around,” composed by Yoel Calek and performed by Avrumi Flam. It was released in 1995, a few years before our trip to Poland.
Since that journey in high school, the song has stuck in my head. A few years afterward, with the emergence of the Internet and YouTube, it was easy to find the song online, so I used to listen to it sometimes.
This week, beginning Wednesday evening, April 23 and continuing through Thursday, is Holocaust Remembrance Day – Yom HaShoah v’Hag’vurah, also known as Yom HaZikaron laShoah ve-laG’vurah.
For years there was a controversy in Israel about the date of Yom HaShoah. The suggestion was for it to be on the day that the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising started. The Rabbanut (Chief Rabbinate of Israel) opposed that because in the month of Nissan, we’re not allowed to say Tachanun or to have a taanit tzibbur (communal fast), and suggested instead to have the Tenth of Tevet, Asarah b’Tevet, as Yom HaShoah instead, but it wasn’t accepted, and the 27th of Nissan was set as Yom HaShoah.
But this was not the only controversy concerning the Holocaust. For years, we learned in school that the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising was led by Mordechai Anielewicz. We all learned about Anielewicz, the hero of the Jewish Combat Organization during the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Israeli students visit the Mordechai Anielewicz Memorial Monument in Kibbutz Yad Mordechai. Almost every Israeli learns about him in school. But was Mordechai Anielewicz the only leader of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising? Was the Jewish Combat Organization the only Jewish organization which fought in the Warsaw Ghetto? It turns out that’s not the whole story.
There were two organizations. The Jewish Combat Organization (ZOB), which was affiliated with Hashomer Hatza’ir, was led by Mordechai Anielewicz. Hashomer Hatza’ir was a left-wing organization which was influenced by Marxism and socialism. The other organization was the Revisionist Jewish Military Organization (ZZW), affiliated with the Betar Movement which was right-wing. Now you can understand why it was deleted from the history books.
My father has a Ph.D. in Holocaust studies. I asked him while writing this column if he had ever heard about Pawel Frenkel and the Revisionist Jewish Military Organization. He said he never had.
A few years ago, Moshe Arens, the former Israeli defense minister who also served as Israel’s ambassador to Washington and one of the Likud party’s elder statesmen, published a book called Flags Over the Warsaw Ghetto: The Untold Story of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. In his book, which is meant to set the record straight, he bewails the fact that the Revisionist Jewish Military Organization, led by its commander, Pawel Frenkel, receives little or no recognition in the historical works that recount the fight against the Nazis in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
Arens traces the bitter ideological differences between Ze’ev Jabotinsky, the founder of the Revisionists (the forerunner of today’s Likud), and the World Zionist Organization – differences which prevented the two armed networks from working together to face their common enemy as the Nazis commenced deporting some 365,000 ghetto Jews to the Treblinka death camp. The result, argues Arens, was that the surviving members of the ZOB who fought the Nazis refused to acknowledge the role of their rival organization, and excluded them from the memoirs and books that subsequently constituted the history of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. I highly recommend that you read this book.
Back to “B’shetzef.” The song begins with a dramatic strings intro which gets you into the mood of the song. Then comes a piano, and then the strings again. This gives it the feel of a Holocaust song.
The words of the song are from The Book of Isaiah. “B’shetzef ketzef histarti panai rega mimech, u’b’chesed olam richamtich, amar go’alech Hashem,” For a small moment I hid My face from you, but then I had kindness and compassion for you, says Hashem. “B’rega katon azavtich, u’b’rachmamim gedolim akabtzech,” After leaving you for a small moment, I’ll gather you in with great compassion.
One of the reasons I like this song, besides the tune, is the message. Over the years, I’ve heard people ask questions about the Holocaust. Some people claim that it harmed their emunah. For me it was never an issue of emunah – if you believe that everything is from Hashem, then so is the Holocaust. Yes, Hashem can punish Am Yisrael, but we know that He promises us a great ingathering. Yes, there was a Holocaust, but we all know what happened afterward: the miracle of the modern state of Israel. A week after Yom HaShoah, we celebrate Yom HaAtzma’ut.
The song continues with another verse in English containing very powerful words: “And even as the trucks rolled up, and even as the tears rolled down, the people cried, ‘Hashem Echad,’ He’s just turned around.”
Find the song on YouTube and listen to it.
