Yom Hashoah community memorial event evokes tears, gratitude

The Yom Hashoah Community-Wide Holocaust Memorial event held this past Sunday night at the Uptown JCC was another spectacularly planned and extremely well executed program. The Yom Hashoah Memorial Committee composed of Holocaust survivors, children of survivors, community leaders and religious advisors showed remarkable insight in inviting the Honorable Stuart Eizenstat, who has been involved on the federal government level representing the interests of Jewish survivors in one capacity or another since the 1960s. His commentary on the state of reparations to Holocaust survivors and the need for the American Jewish community to be proactive in dealing with anti-Semitism and hate were never more appropriate.

The memorial service at which the names of the deceased survivors who had been a part of the New Orleans Jewish community were read was even more moving this year knowing that several more names – Pola Borenstein, Inge Elsas, Felicia Fuksman and Henry Galler – had been added to that list.

The most hopeful part of the evening dealt with education and the opportunity to impress the younger generation of the importance of showing how hate can lead to genocide. The students at Robert Mills Lusher Middle School and their teacher, Susan Ary, received high praise for their work in studying the Holocaust from Anti-Defamation Leage regional executive director Cathy Glaser as well as Rabbi Ed Paul Cohn in his introductory remarks.

Congratulations to Debbie Pesses, Jewish enrichment director under whose supervision this event has fallen for the past eight years . Her tireless work with the committee in executing their designs has been a major reason why these events have gone so well. This was her last Yom Hashoah event with the committee in her current position and, while she treasures the time she has spent with the committee members, she anticipates taking off at least a year to make the transition move smoothly with her replacement. We wish her well in her future endeavors and congratulate her on another job well done.