JERUSALEM — It was the most somber of reunions, a commemoration of a long-ago horror, that drew more than 3,000 people Sunday to Israel's first public gathering of Auschwitz survivors.
Mingling in the cavernous foyer of this city's largest convention hall, gray-haired men and women searched for long-lost friends or relatives and waited patiently in long lines to record their names and the numbers tattooed on their arms in a memorial book.
They came to mark the 50th anniversary of the liberation of the most notorious Nazi death camp, to bear witness for the estimated 1.5 million who died in Auschwitz's gas chambers or from its deprivations or at the hands of its guards.
For many, the pain reawakened by the gathering was deepened by the morning news--two suicide bombers had blown themselves up near the coastal town of Netanya, killing 19 people and wounding more than 60. Hundreds of those who came to the reunion had traveled by bus past that junction after the attack.
"Today too we lost dear sons," Education Minister Amnon Rubinstein said at another Auschwitz commemoration, held at Yad Vashem, the national Holocaust memorial. "Today too we were hit by death. Today too human monsters try to take our lives here and destroy the chances of peace. To our enemies, to our killers we say: 1,000 terrorist attacks won't defeat us."
Some of the survivors who attended the reunion at the Binyanei Haooma convention center--outside which 12 people were injured Dec. 25 in a blast that killed the suspected bomber, a Palestinian policeman--brought their children or grandchildren to the gathering Sunday. Some brought spouses, but most came alone. They sat at tables drinking coffee or huddled in front of bulletin boards plastered with notes in various languages that pleaded for information on long-lost relatives.
"Anyone who knew Leon Orner, who died in Auschwitz on July 29, 1942, please call his daughter, Esther Pen," read one note. "Martha Kleiman, number A4931," read another. "Born in Prague. Anyone with any information, please call Greenfeld Kleiman."
Slipping back into their native Yiddish, Hungarian or Russian as they exchanged stories, the survivors reconnected--however briefly--with the only people on Earth who can fully understand what it means to know that under your crisp white shirt or soft silk dress, a number is tattooed on your left forearm.
