The Book Prize was initiated to encourage groundbreaking research related to the Holocaust period. The winners are selected by an international panel of judges presided by the Head of the Research Institute and Incumbent of the John Najmann Chair for Holocaust Studies Prof. Dan Michman. Other judges serving on the panel this year included Prof. (Emeritus) Konrad Kwiet (Sydney Jewish Museum, Australia) and Dr. Susanne Heim (Institute for Contempary History, Germany) together with Yad Vashem Senior Academic Advisor Prof. Dina Porat and Research Institute Director Dr. Iael Nidam-Orvieto.
The event was held on the Zoom online platform in English in the presence of award donors Brian and Lee Joffe and their families, and included greetings from Yad Vashem Chairman Dani Dayan and remarks from Brian Joffe, as well as an overview of their publications from each of the prizewinning authors.
Dedicated to the complex subject of the Polish refugees who survived the Holocaust in the Soviet interior, Prof. Adler's book takes a detailed look at the process through which Polish Jews found themselves in the USSR and which probably saved many of their lives. "The book makes a significant contribution to Holocaust research by presenting a comprehensive and moving picture of the fate of who survived at the Soviet margins from their point of view," Prof. Michman explained. "It is the first book to provide an in-depth study of how Polish-Jewish refugees survived the war in the Soviet Union, and tells their story from a personal perspective."
"As a result of their decision to flee to the Soviet interior, which was often made in haste and always without foresight, the majority of Polish-Jewish survivors of the war essentially disappeared from both history and memory," stated Prof. Adler in her presentation. "But the time they returned and were reintegrated into what remained of Polish-Jewish society, their own stories of survival were marginalized by those of the Holocaust. What would it have looked like to include their experiences in our historical and memorial projects? What would it mean to expand the compass of survival to include this group?"
Dr. Saltiel's book makes a significant contribution to the understanding of the Holocaust in Thessaloniki in particular and in Greece more broadly. The book examines the attitudes and behaviors of authorities – the Church, the courts, the local university, professional associations and the Red Cross representative – as well as the Jews themselves both locally in Thessaloniki and in Athens. "After the methodological introduction, Saltiel opens the narrative with a description of the destruction of the Jewish cemetery," commented Prof. Michman. "This was an expression of dehumanizing the dead in general, but was more symbolically an act of erasing the memory of Jewish presence in a central site in the city."
"This book is a result of ten years of research stemming from a personal project to understand what happened in my native town of Thessaloniki during WWII, especially regarding its numerous and historic Jewish community," explained Dr. Saltiel. "I wanted to investigate how the city's primary institutions reacted as the drama of the Jews was unfolding. The results were not at all encouraging. While there was accurate reporting of the events and analyses of the tragic consequences, the usual stance was one of silence. Their moral compass was rather disoriented; other myopic interests were put ahead as a priority."
Dani Dayan thanked the Joffe family for making this prize possible, and for their multifaceted friendship with Yad Vashem. "The two books are different, and yet hold a common theme," stated Dayan.
"One deals with an Ashkenazi population, the other with a Sefardi one; one looks at the fate of survivors, the other with a community that was totally decimated during the Shoah – but both show that we are talking about one event, one phenomenon, one tragedy with many manifestations, united by the diabolical design of Nazi Germany to exterminated the entire Jewish community."
In their presentations, the two prizewinners thanked Yad Vashem for the central role it played in the development of their academic studies. "A year of research at Yad Vashem was critical for this project," said Prof. Adler. "This makes it particularly meaningful for me to receive this prize." "Yad Vashem was crucial in my research," commented Dr. Saltiel, who was a doctoral scholarship recipient in 2012. "During the two weeks I spent at the campus in Jerusalem, taking advantage of its vast library and archival resources, I also had the unique opportunity to seek advice from and discuss the main arguments of my thesis [on which the book is based] with Profs. Michman and [Yad Vashem Senior Academic Advisor Dina] Porath, as well as [Yad Vashem Senior Historian] Dr. David Silberklang, all of which motivated me to continue my research."
"The Yad Vashem Book Prize makes current the events of the past," expressed donor Brian Joffe.
""New information and factual stories continue to breathe life and hope in to the tragedy of the past. It renews the reasons for the establishment of Yad Vashem… The past is the present, and its continued memory is the future, too. I thank the writers for bringing Yad Vashem and what it stands for to life."
This article originally appeared in the "Yad Vashem Jerusalem Magazine," volume 97.
