On April 17, 2023, after many discussions with his family, friends, and colleagues my friend psychiatrist Dr. Robert Stern left his comfortable New Jersey home, his psychiatrist wife, and their three young adult sons, and boarded a plane. He was heading to Israel as a volunteer in a mental health center. While waiting for the takeoff of his original flight UA084 four days earlier, Robert and all his fellow passengers were suddenly ordered to disembark. Minutes before takeoff, Iran and Yemen had launched 300 ballistic rockets, cruise missiles, and drones towards Israel forcing Israel to close its air space and cancel all incoming flights.
But Robert was determined to get to Israel. The brutal Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, resurrected excruciatingly painful memories of the gruesome fates of his parents and family members during the genocidal Nazi Holocaust. For Robert, the phrase "Never Again," which has become a Jewish mantra, is not just a call for remembrance, it's a call for action. Although an annual observance, Holocaust Remembrance Day for many Jews, especially Holocaust survivors and their children, is every day. You will know why when you read Robert's message to his family, relatives, and friends on May 5, 2024, from the Abarbanel Mental Health Center in Bat Yam Israel:
YOM HASHOAH 2024 [Holocaust and Heroism Remembrance Day]
"I grew up without grandparents. I never met them, and they never met me. They do not have a grave site. My grandparents (Irene and Jakab Stern, and Miriam and Julius Weinberger) were murdered by the Nazis in the gas chambers of Auschwitz. So was my aunt Judith Stern, and many other members of my family.
Today, I remember my Holocaust survivor parents, my father Dr. Norbert Stern z'l, who survived Auschwitz, and my mother, Dr. Palma Stern z'l, who survived on the run from the Nazis and overcame deprivation and incarceration after fleeing from the Simleu ghetto in Hungary.
Today I also remember 19 members of my family who were murdered by the Nazis:
Irène Stern (nee Morgenstern), my grandmother on my father's side, who was murdered at the age of 45 in an Auschwitz gas chamber.
Ari Morgenstern, Irene's brother, gassed at Auschwitz at age 40.
Dr. Jakab Stern, my grandfather, my father's father, age 50, gassed at Auschwitz.
Josef-Hirsch Stern, Jakab's brother, gassed at Auschwitz.
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