IN THIS LIFE

In the millions of years this World has witnessed, there have been quite a perilous times often referred to as the Dark Ages. However for every culture, country and religion, there are some specific endangering times which are highlighted and retold as folk legends and horror stories. Every single race has at least once been threatened, either because their culture was shunned or because of racism.
Often, these were the times which raised up great personalities; Heroes, Founders, Generals etc. During the period of 1933 to 1945, give or take a few years marked the emergence of one of the greatest politician, Adolf Hitler. He had beliefs, he was opinionated and although he was not a man with a rich and nourished background, he had a way with words which eventually made him the leader of the Germany’s. And also the cause of HIS misery.
6 years a child. 8 years a scapegoat. 12 years a slave of people. 40 years the slave of life. This is the story. This is the story of suffering, misery, imprisonment and in all the kind of life the Jews lived for a decade.
This is the unheard story of a Jew’s life….​
A glimmer, like a broken torch feeble in the heavy dark air, that memory shines. A girl skipping, her hand enclosed in his slightly larger brown hand. His little sister. A mere child, who like all the women in the village, was taken way when the first Nazi wave struck. The men in the cells around him were brothers too. Brothers, fathers, uncles and never were we more united than when they held onto each other’s hands, reaching in through the bars, frail and weak as they formed a desperate circle, hoping that they loved ones were dead so that they would not be sentenced to this terrible fate that we await.
But that was only the beginning; stage one of the tortures of their lives….
They lost their dignity, what little was left of it, when their hair was cut by Jewish women while they stood naked, head bent under the shamed eyes of their own women.
Then the Nazi’s started to reduce their numbers. Twenty to fifty men, trapped in one room as they sprayed mustard gas in the closed quarters. This is where they lost more than half of their brothers. Listening to their painful gasps of their companions as they themselves, struggled for a breath of fresh air. Those who survived were randomly shot or starved to death while the less fortunate, who were starved, injured and alone had to face the prospect of living in slavery. No matter how much they longed to escape it, yielding was never an option.
The word "Untermensch", "Untermensch", "Jewsow" became indifferent words rather than the words which once caused them to alight with fury and resentment. Finally the once shameful walk in the square among the huddles of Nazi supporters became exhausting chores. Nothing more.
They lost their freedom, their dignity, their spirit, fire, loved ones, heirs, daughters, mothers and finally their will to live.
The war passed. The Nazi’s were defeated, the Jews freed. But the cost of their freedom was too high. Those years of trauma, the ones which had revealed the darker aspects of life had taken away their will to survive, to live so they found themselves once again slaves. This time, the slaves of life.
They were the damned.
They were the wronged.
They were the slaves of LIFE.