Holocaust charity lead speaks of 'common humanity'

The co-founder of a Holocaust education charity has spoken of different people having "a common humanity" as she sought to inspire young people to "create a world in which people are not prejudiced".

The message from Helen Stone, an associate director at Generation 2 Generation, comes as Jersey has been marking Holocaust Memorial Day.

The island remembered the six million Jews murdered under the Nazi regime in World War Two, in a wreath-laying ceremony in St Helier earlier.

The Channel Islands were the only part of the British Isles to be occupied by the Germans during the conflict.

In a talk at Les Quennevais School, Stone related a story from the war in which a Jewish symbolic candelabrum was restored to the community from which it came.

In it, an 11 year old German girl named Maria Klee rescued a hanukkiah from the burnt remains of a synagogue in Kommern, Germany after seeing "something glinting in the rubble".

The girl lived in the same village as Emmy Golding, Stone's mother, who worshipped at the synagogue.

Stone said Maria "bent down, picked it up, checked nobody was looking because she knew it was dangerous to be in possession of Jewish artefact, hid it under her skirt and ran home to her mother".

Stone said the family hid the candlestick under their mattress, with plans to return it to one of the Jewish members of their community "but they'd all fled or been taken away".

Stone recalled that 70 years later, Maria had moved and met a non-Jewish teacher who had "made it his life's work to make sure the Jews of that area were not forgotten".

"He was in touch with my mother in London and he told Maria that he knew Emmy and she said, "I remember Emmy, I've got something for her".

"So at the age of 81, she travelled with this teacher to London, to my mother's flat, and I was there when she returned to this wonderful hanukkiah.

"She'd polished it and put beautiful yellow candles in it and she said, "Emmy, I've waited 70 years to give this to you, now it's yours"."

Stone said a year later Maria died from a stroke, then three years later her mother died at the age of 96.

"There was only that little window of opportunity when she could return that item.

"It has a very special place in our family history and we use it every year when we celebrate Hanukkah."

Stone said the story was intended to encourage young people to remember the Holocaust and use the memories "for good".

She said: "They have the power to change our world in the future and they don't have to repeat the mistakes that past generations have made.

"They can create a world in which people are not prejudiced, in which there is not racial hatred and religious hatred and discrimination but one in which we can all respect each other.

"I think it's even more important today that we get this message across because the worst thing one can do is to other people, to treat them in a different way because they are in some way different from you.

"At the core, we all have a common humanity."

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