Remembering the forgotten Jewish children and youth NDR.de – News – Schleswig-Holstein

by Astrid Wolf

Rosie Deitch, Joseph and Berthold Katz, Peter Mansbacher, Hanna and Hermann Mecklenburg – many of the names are somewhat unknown. The names of the Prenski siblings are somewhat more common – after all, a school in Lübeck is named after them. says retired history teacher Gunter Nebel of Rattkau in the Ostholstein district. As an example, he prepared the fate of five Jewish families in Lübeck for the lesson, paying special attention to their children.

Pupils must know the fates of their peers

What happened to Jewish youth and their families? How did you pass the time of discrimination, persecution and terrorism? Did you survive the holocaust? Günther Nebel pours the answers into the educational material. “Because I hope that it will enable students to identify with the children and young people of the time and that it will motivate them to reconstruct the stories themselves to some extent,” Knebel explains.

Students receive learning materials from Günter Knebel in cardboard boxes – just as you might find them in an attic.

Research material: ancient texts, pictures, entries in poetry album

Teaching materials are packaged in cardboard boxes – just like you might find in a grandmother’s attic. Contains family texts and photos. Pictures describing the lives of children and young people. A soccer ball or a page from a poetry album written by ten-year-old Margot Brynsky. Pupils from year nine onwards should research family stories, especially the stories of 17 Jewish children and young people themselves.

Terrible fates – but also stories of survivors

Former history teacher Gunter Nebel was inspired by his visits to Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. There, the horrors of the Holocaust are transmitted on the basis of individual destinies – Jews appear not only as victims, but also as survivors. He has adopted this approach for his teaching materials. “Of course there are horrible things that students go through,” says Gunter Nebel. “For example, siblings Hanna and Hermann Mecklenburg were deported to Auschwitz and killed. But there are also positive stories. Joseph and Berthold Katz, as well as Peter Mansbacher survived, wrote their experiences and passed them on to future generations.”

Student: “Frightening – you still have your life ahead.”

The former history teacher made many memorial trips with schoolchildren – including Auschwitz. There, too, young people faced the fates of Jews of the same age. Formative and impressive experiences of 17-year-old Käthe-Marie Wieseler, a student at the Ostseegymnasium Timmendorfer Strand: “Noting that you have fewer and fewer rights for no reason, I do not say, that would be the worst thing for me. She is allowed out into May. ” Her classmate, Lucja Nara Koll, 19, was also deeply affected by the trip: “They were our age, and their whole lives were ahead of them. We often ask ourselves: What should I do after high school? I think it’s scary that they haven’t had them.” chance to do so at all.”

More than history lessons: Preventing anti-Semitism

The Brynsky siblings, Rosie Deitch, Joseph and Berthold Katz, Peter Mansbacher, Hanna and Hermann Mecklenburg: They were all children and young adults at the time of the Holocaust, many of whom were deported and killed by the Nazis. Children and young people – like schoolchildren whom Günter Nebel wants to reach not only through joint excursions to memorial sites, but also in the future with his new teaching materials. He hopes they won’t just learn about the Holocaust. He wants them to wonder what the Holocaust has to do with their lives today. And they stand: against anti-Semitism, racism and right-wing extremism. “Unfortunately, it won’t be less, it will be more,” says Gunter Nebel. “The question is: What can you do about it? I hope the educational materials help a little.”

Additional information

At Itziho’s trial of a woman who was said to have worked at the concentration camp headquarters, witness statements were read on Tuesday. more

Helge-Fabien Hertz is behind the study of Schleswig-Holstein priests in the Third Reich. His supervisor is talking about a pioneering work. more

The Jewish community has opened a memorial in Bad Segeberg – to commemorate Kristallnacht 83 years ago. more