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Program on Women and the Holocaust

World Congress of Jewish Studies Special Panel

"World Without Genocide" Lecture

Onward and Upward, a Panel Discussion and Tribute to Women Trailblazers

Her Story: Conference on Women and the Holocaust -- The Sixth International Conference

Program on Women and the Holocaust
April 29, 2013, 8:00 p.m.
Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel interviewed by journalist Alberto Danon
Centro Judaico Bait
São Paulo, Brazil

Women and the Holocaust is the theme of an evening with Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel, interviewed by journalist Alberto Danon (in Portugeuse) at Centro Judaico Bait, São Paulo. The topics dicussed include research about women and the Holocaust, Jewish women in Ravensbrück concentration camp, integrating the experiences of Jewish women into history, sexual violence against Jewish women during the Holocaust, and searching for the voices of victims of sexual violence. The program is part of a series of programs on the Holocaust presented by Centro Judaico Bait.

Photo: Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel is interviewed by Alberto Danon at Centro Judaico Bait in São Paulo, Brazil on April 29, 2013. The audience also participated and asked questions about women and the Holocaust, either by writing on paper or sending tweets to Danon's tablet. Photo by Lilian Souza

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Special Panel on Sexual Violence against Jewish Women during the Holocaust
World Congress of Jewish Studies
Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel
July 28-August 1, 2013

Remember the Women Institute has organized a special panel on sexual violence against Jewish women during the Holocaust, which takes place at the World Congress of Jewish Studies July 28-August 1, 2013. Panelists are Israeli novelist Nava Semel, author of And the Rat Laughed; Israeli filmmaker Ronnie Sarnat, who has just completed a new film on sexual violence during the Holocaust for Israel's Channel One television; and Dr. Sonja M. Hedgepeth, co-editor of Sexual Violence against Jewish Women during the Holocaust. Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel, also a co-editor of this book, will serves as panel convener and chair.

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"World Without Genocide" at William Mitchell College of Law, Co-sponsored by Mt. Zion Temple, Congregation Shir Tikvah, and Temple Israel
Author talk by Dr. Sonja M. Hedgepeth: "Sexual Violence against Jewish Women during the Holocaust"
Monday, March 18, 2013, 7:00-8:30 pm
Event takes place at: Mt. Zion Temple, 1300 Summit Avenue, St. Paul, MN 55105
Read The American Jewish World's article (PDF)

Photo, right: Dr. Sonja M. Hedgepeth, left with Dr. Ellen J. Kennedy, Executive Director, World Without Genocide at William Mitchell College of Law, St. Paul, MN. (Photo courtesy of World Without Genocide, taken by Brigitte Norby)

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Onward and Upward, a Panel Discussion and Tribute to Women Trailblazers
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
12:30-2pm
The Church Center for the UN
Boss Room, 8th Floor
777 United Nations Plaza
New York City
Download the flyer (PDF)

On March 13, 2013, at an NGO ceremony connected with the deliberations of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW57), Dr. Sonja M. Hedgepeth and Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel were recognized for the work of Remember the Women Institute on sexual violence against Jewish women during the Holocaust. We were given Sojourner Truth/Eleanor Roosevelt awards as "Trailblazers," as part of a program dedicated to eradicating and eliminating violent acts against women and girls and empowering victims and survivors.

The event, which was sponsored by the New Future Foundation, and Harlem Women International, was co-chaired by Queen Mother Dr. Delois Blakely and Mama Gail Steward-Clouden. Other trailblazers who received awards included female heads of state, as well as Hillary Rodham Clinton, Madeleine Albright, Gloria Steinem, Eve Ensler, and Susan Brownmiller. Having our work on sexual violence during the Holocaust recognized alongside the accomplishments of these women is, of course, a great honor.

And it in not just an honor. It is acknowledgment that Jewish women suffered sexual violence during the Holocaust. They were raped, they were forced into prostitution, they were violated in many ways, including forced sterilization, often without their knowledge. Through the recognition of our work, the suffering of these women during the Holocaust is now on the record of the deliberations of the NGOs during the CSW57 meetings at the UN.

See a related article by Rochelle G. Saidel in The Times of Israel.

Above: Audience at the Trailblazer award ceremony (Photo by Rochelle Saidel)

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Conference on Women and the Holocaust -- The Sixth International Conference
"Her Story": Transference Methods of Women's Biographies and Autobiographies from the Holocaust
March 4-6, 2013
Held at Beit Berl College, Beit Terezin, Beit Lohamei HaGhetaot, Israel

Along with Beit Berl College, Beit Terezin, and Beit Lohamei HaGhetaot, the sites where the conference was held, Remember the Women Institute was an organizer and sponsor of this international conference on Women and the Holocaust, held March 4-6, 2013, in Israel. Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel served on the steering committee, and Dr. Batya Brutin, an Advisory Board member, chaired the conference. Dr. Sonja Hedgepeth, an Executive Board member, presented a paper entitled "Not Lost! Margit Bartfeld-Feller's Stories of Deportation from Czernowitz and Siberian Exile." Other Advisory Board members were involved with planning, chairing sessions, and presenting papers. In addition, Remember the Women Institute provided scholarships to two Polish scholars, enabling them to participate in the conference.

Remember the Women Institute was especially involved with the panel entitled Sexual "Violence against Women during the Holocaust: Ways to Consolidate and to Reveal Personal Narratives." Dr. Hedgepeth chaired this panel, and the following papers were presented:

Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel (USA and Israel). "Manya Horowitz's Testimony: Making Sexual Violence Part of Holocaust History"
Agnieszka Wesili (Poland). "No 'Statements' of their own. The use of memories in creating a discourse on forced prostitution at Auschwitz-Birkenau by former prisoners and camp staff"
Dr. Esther Dror (Israel). "'I didn't know what he was doing to me!'"
Dr. Mor Presiado (Israel). "Representations of Rape and Sexual Abuse in Women's Holocaust Art from 1945 to the Present."

As a result of our panel's presentation, several people have pointed us in new directions, as we continue our work on sexual violence during the Holocaust.

The following is a summary of Dr. Saidel's paper.

Manya Horowitz's Testimony: Making Sexual Violence Part of Holocaust History
by Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel

Holocaust survivor Manya Horowitz (file number 7301) is one of 52,000 Holocaust survivors who gave testimony to the USC Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education, Her testimony is one of about 1700 that mention sexual abuse. Along with the USC Shoah Foundation, we chose Manya's story to create a short clip reel that was shown at a public event in Los Angeles in November 2012, co-sponsored by USC Shoah Foundation, Remember the Women Institute, and Equality Now. This event was held in connection with a two-day groundbreaking international symposium of 20 invited scholars who discussed the subject of sexual violence during the Holocaust. This seminar was co-sponsored by the USC Shoah Foundation and Remember the Women Institute, which jointly produced this film clip (put together by USC graduate student Anissa Douglass). View a video of the public event, including Many Horowitz's testimony.

Manya Weizberg Horowitz was born in December 1918 in Sosnowiec, Poland, and her testimony was recorded in Denver, Colorado in October 1995. She was in the Sosnowiec ghetto, and in Auschwitz-Birkenau, Ravensbrück, and the Neustadt-Glewe work camp, as well as two other small work camps. She was liberated by the Soviet Army, was in the Landsberg DP camp in Germany, and then immigrated to the US; she married Leon Horowitz.

In the short excerpts from her 2 hour 15 minute long Shoah Foundation videotaped interview, Manya tells about being raped in Auschwitz-Birkenau. Most significantly, she stresses how important it is for survivors to tell the world what happened to them.

After showing the film clip, Manya's testimony was used as a springboard to briefly review what Remember the Women Institute has done to put sexual violence on the record of Holocaust history and memorialization. One major component of our work is the book, Sexual Violence against Jewish Women during the Holocaust (2010, eds. Hedgepeth and Saidel), One of the panel participants, Dr. Esther Dror, was a chapter author. Another urgent project is seeking living witnesses and victims of sexual abuse, and audience members' help was requested to identify witnesses. The November 2012 symposium and public event was reviewed, as well as plans for future programs and projects related to the issue of sexual abuse.

Manya's call to speak out is so important, especially as related to witnesses who have spoken out about sexual violence during other genocides. There has been some progress in finding witnesses, as well as some new interest from a few mainstream Holocaust scholars. The US Holocaust Memorial Museum just announced new research that accounts for some 500 brothels, and this new information needs further research.

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At the conference "Women and the Holocaust" in Israel March 4-6, 2013, a panel discussed sexual violence agains women. Panel members were: (l to r): Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel (USA and Israel), Dr. Sonja M. Hedgepeth (USA), Agnieszka Wesili (Poland), Dr. Esther Dror (Israel), and Dr. Mor Presiado (Israel). Photo: Gil Yefman

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