Today, on the anniversary ofKristallnacht - the 'Night of Broken Glass'  - we are in Berlin. A pogrom in 1938 against the Jews in Nazi Germany, Kristallnacht is widelyaccepted as the first step in the genocidal process that led to the slaughterof six million Jews in the Holocaust.

On this mission, in which memory plays such a central role, ourCanadian delegation recalls a time when our country shunned Jewish refugeeshoping to escape deportation to concentration camps. This memory makes Canada'ssupport for Israel in the face of overwhelming antisemitic bias at the UN thisweek all the more poignant, particularly as we walk the hallowed grounds wherethe Jewish people were so brutally destroyed.

Case in point: yesterday our Compassion to Action group leftKrakow for Berlin to tour Wannsee Conference House - the beautiful villa wherehigh-ranking members of the SS, the police force, the government administrationand the Nazi party  met to discuss the "Final Solution to the Jewishquestion." We also visited Track 17 - Grunewald Station - the pointof deportation for many of Berlin's Jewish population and which, from 1942 on,led to Auschwitz-Birkenau or Theresienstatdt concentration camps.

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

Today we will tour Sachsenhausen - a concentration camp thatbecame a training ground for the SS. We will also participate in a walking tourto learn about the Jewish history of Berlin, and stop at Bebelplatz - the siteof the infamous May 1933 book burnings. Finally, we will visit several museumsand memorials, and look forward to viewing the stolperstein - the"stumbling stones" which memorialize victims of the Holocaust outsideof their former homes, identifying their names and life dates.

On this daunting journey we remain haunted by the faces ofchildren whose photos are all that remain to remind us of their abbreviatedlives.

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

Click Here tosupport this exceptional Holocaust education program with a charitable gift.