Dotkniecie aniola

Henryk Schoenker:
I walked until I saw a poster in German and Polish that read: "Wieliczka will be free of Jews. If you hide a Jew, if you help a Jew - the penalty is death."

Henryk Schoenker:
Todestrafe. For anything at all - Toderstrafe.

Henryk Schoenker:
I kissed his hand. I remember exactly that I kissed his hand.

Henryk Schoenker:
I have to say, to this day, I believe he wasn't a man.

Henryk Schoenker:
It was an angel! It was a miracle, a miracle that happened, a real miracle!

Henryk Schoenker:
It was salvation, but only temporary. The Tarnow ghetto turned out to be hell

Henryk Schoenker:
People who worked outside the ghetto returned from the workshops.

Henryk Schoenker:
This is where the nightmare took place!

Henryk Schoenker:
Scenes of tears straight from Dante!

Henryk Schoenker:
People screamed to the heavens, "My mother! My children! Where are my children?"

Henryk Schoenker:
It took place at night. There were barracks, rows and rows of barracks and lamp poles with flood lights.

Henryk Schoenker:
They began sending the first transports out of the camp.

Henryk Schoenker:
We were sure they were going to be allowed emigrate.

Henryk Schoenker:
Everyone envied them.

Henryk Schoenker:
It turned out the emigration was halted. No country would accept Jews. Instead, the transports were sent directly to Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Senior officer at Bergen-Belsen:
What are you talking about?

Senior officer at Bergen-Belsen:
Nobody in the world is interested in you.

Senior officer at Bergen-Belsen:
No one has the slightest interest.

Henryk Schoenker:
My hometown did not have to become a symbol of the extermination of the Jews. It could have become a symbol of rescue.

Henryk Schoenker:
The Jews of Auschwitz had a good chance to emigrate.

Henryk Schoenker:
It failed. No one wanted to take them. They were alone.

Henryk Schoenker:
It was a great irony. Where there was supposed to be a collection point of Jews to emigrate: that site became a collection point for their destruction.

Henryk Schoenker:
The whole world was watching. Don't let anybody say today they didn't know. That they didn't hear. That it wasn't known.

Henryk Schoenker:
Everyone knew. Everyone heard and no one did anything to help us.

Henryk Schoenker:
Every Polish Jew who survived the war wouldn't have been saved if, somewhere, somehow, some Pole didn't help him.

Henryk Schoenker:
We are forever grateful to those ordinary people who saved us. Those people are the light of humanity.

Henryk Schoenker:
They were the silent heroes of this war.