The “Days of Awe” of that year and what day was not one of awe, in the Swirzhne ghetto and labor camp? - were intolerably hot; even the weeds crumpled in the heat. Yom Kippur Eve was so scorching that the Ukrainian militia men didn't see to torture us as was their popular pastime.

Some of our people decided to hold services that evening. They pretended to be ill and later gathered in Block 11 for prayer. Still, they were too few to make up a minyan.

I went out to work as always, with Arele Shimanowitz and Yekutiel Kosmoi. The three of us had been transferred about two months earlier from the sawmill to the Nieman River inlet, to take apart the rafts as they came in and tow the logs ashore - a backbreaking task but the open space and the nearby forest bore the promise of freedom. We soon found a way to ease the job, by forming a V-shaped barrier in the water which forced the logs ashore on their own. It took us but a few hours to fill our daily labor quota and when the German supervisor, satisfied with our work, went away, we would lie on the grass and rest, each one taking turns standing guard.

Some distance there was a house occupied by a military unit. We could see the soldiers moving about the yard, cleaning their weapons. To our relief we discovered that they were merely convalescing before returning to the front. They didn't bother us; in fact, one of them came to us with scraps of food which we avidly devoured, and a fragrant cigarette, the tast of which we had all but forgotten.

On Yom Kippur Eve our supervisor didn't appear. Arele decided that he would hide and at night go into the forest. The three of us felt a sense of exhilaration. We suddenly remembered what day it was and we began singing “Kol Nidre”, suiting the rhythm t the movement of the logs as we towed them in.

Suddenly the friendly German soldier appeared. We were

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startled but he reassured us. Then, after looking about, he asked us to sing the “Kol Nidre” again; his grandmother, he said, was Jewish. As we sang, the German joined in, ever more loudly. The Jewish spark was still there….

Sonia and Reuven Lubetzky

We didn't see many Germans, at first. They appointed a former official of Mir, Sarfimowics, as head of the local police. He immediately set about organizing a police force - young men from the local population.

One day we received a message from the Jewish community in Mir, asking for financial help. Several of us, after obtaining permission from Sarfimowics, went to Mir. There we found that a Judenrat had been formed, headed by a Jew named Berman; he was sure that the Jews of Mir would not be massacred, since “we are giving the Germans everything”.

In the gendarmerie of Mir there was a man named Josef Oswald, a former resident of Tooretz. He was a young Jew and his real name was Shmuel Rufeisen. He had no documents, but

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being fluent in German he presented himself to the authorities as a “Volksdeutche” and found work as a guard at the local school. Sarfimowics took a liking to him and appointed him police translator. When the police commandant went to Mir, Rufeisen-Oswald went along, and in time became the head of the gendarmerie.

One day Oswald was recognized by Shlomo Harkas, once a fellow worker on the hachshara farm. Oswald begged him not to reveal his identity, and in turn promised to help the Jews. This promise he kept, passing information on to them and providing twenty young Jews with arms. One evening he sent word to us in Tooretz to flee, because a massacre was awaiting the Jews on the next day.

We didn't believe it - until the next day, when some of us were taken to dig huge pits in the cemetery; the others were lined up at the edge of the pits and murdered. that was the beginning of the end.

Those of us who escaped from the Swerzhne labor camp, late in January 1943, reached a village near the Yawiscze forest, controlled by the partisans. We were quartered in the peasants' houses, ten to a home. After breakfast, Commander Gilchik (a Jew from Minsk) arrived with another partisan and led us about ten kilometers to a burnt-out village named Kolki. we were asked to turn in whatever gold we had for the use of the Red Army.

In the partisan camp we were set to digging bunkers in the frozen earth. then we were told that if we wished to remain with the partisans we would have to provide our own weapons. We split up into groups and headed for the farms. We stopped at a farm house and I went in, leaving the others to stand guard. The farmer told me that the Russian soldiers stationed in the area, before withdrawing under German pressure, had thrown their weapons away in a nearby well. On examining the well we saw that it was quite deep and filled with debris of wood and stone.

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We decided to make a try. the farmer brought us two ladders. We fastened one to the other and lowered them into the well. For hours we cleared away the debris,t hen suddenly we beheld the butts of rifles and machine guns. We cleaned and polished the weapons, and later we put them to good use in acts of vengeance against the murderers of our people.

We came out of the forest as soon as the Red Army came into the region. I was at the front until the end of the war. I decided to go back to Tooretz and Yeremitz to see what was left of the Jewish communities which had lived there for hundreds of years. All I found was desolation and ruin; not a single member of the community was left. The Christians told me how the last of the Jews had been murdered. They invited me to spend the night in the town, but I felt that I was walking on ground drenched with the blood of our dear ones. I left immediately and headed for Lodz, where I joined the “lchud” group made up of a handful of survivors. We were able to make our way to Italy from whose ports “illegal immigrant” (Aliya Bet) ships were departing for Eretz-Israel.

In the camp in Italy I met a young woman from Russia and we decided to build a new home in the land of our fathers. Eventually we were put aboard the vessel Modei Haggitaot (“Rebels of the Ghettos”) and headed for Haifa, but the British intercepted the vessel and forced it to continue to Cyprus where we were put in a camp behind barbed wire. When our first son was born, the Queen of England issued a permit for all children born in the camp to proceed to Eretz-Israel together with their families. We arrived there in September of 1947 and eventually became members of Kibbutz Lohamey Haggitaot.

The greatest moment in my life came when the Government of Israel awarded me a citation for my activities as a partisan and front-line fighter against the Nazis during the Second World War. I fought for a world which never showed us any kindness, but the reward came from the Jewish State.

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Those of us who managed to find their way to the partisans in the forests were disheartened by the antisemitism which we found among them - even though we were fighting a common deadly foe.

One of the ways in which this antisemitism expressed itself int he forests had to do with the civilian camps of the partisans. The later were divided into two groups, the fighters and the non-combatants. The two were some distance apart from each other, so as to give the fighters greater maneuverability, but this left the civilian camp unguarded and a sure victim if found by the enemy. Understandably, the non-combatants were the families of the Jewish fighters.

We were assigned to the Zhukov unit (Jews and non-Jews combined). Third Company. Our first task was to dig bunkers in the frozen ground with very inadequate tools. The next was to go out and acquire arms from the Ukrainians; all we had when we escaped from the ghetto was one rifle, one pistol and several hand grenades. The others in the camp made no attempt to hide their antisemitism. “The Jews,” they taunted, “came to fight with gold, not with weapons.”

In March of 1943 the high command of the unit ordered that the civilian camp be left behind as the combatants moved to another area; the Jewish fighters were assigned to remain with the families. Since we were too few to offer resistance to an enemy attack, we decided to follow the others. They had several hours head start on us because several of them remained until nightfall to see that we shouldn't make the attempt.

We made our way to the road intersection. Which way? Most of us went along with Freiman, an experienced tracker; he claimed that we would have to follow the road covered over with water. A short distance farther we discovered that Freiman's sixth sense didn't betray him; there were definite tracks of many feet. (A small group which didn't accept Freiman's opinion went off in another direction and was killed by the police near the Hanczewicz-Pinsk road.)

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When dawn came we left the highway and prepared to spend the daylight hours in a glen off the road. We had hardly stretched ourselves out on the grass when we heard dogs barking. We found that we were some 300 meters away from a large farm. It was deserted. We took the risk and hid in the barn. there we made a small fire and roasted the few potatoes we managed to save. Toward evening we set out again, but no sooner did we reach the road than a group of armed men in police uniforms ordered us to halt. After the first moments of doubt (we expected them to shoot right away), we found that the “policemen” were patrols from another partisan group. More than that, they told us that our unit had made camp near theirs, and they would take us there.

The commander of the unit was none too happy to see us. A few days later we were ordered to leave and make our way to another forest - without weapons. We were about five kilometers away when we heard heavy firing from the area we had just left. The shooting went on all night. Toward morning several of us went back to see what had happened. On the outskirts of the forest we almost ran into a German force returning from the camp area. When we came there, we found that the Germans had staged a surprise attack: the cooking fires were still burning and pots of food were still steaming.

There were about twenty of us in the group: Karlchok and his family, Shkliar and his family, the Lutvin couple, Rahel, Hasha-Dena, Fruma, the two Schwartz brothers, Aharon Harkavi and his son Joseph, Avraham Hayyim Slutzky and his son Mulik, Uri Yalowsky, Shlomo Sapozhnik, Moshe Bunimowitz, Shepal Yankelevitz, Zelka Fisotzner, Ehrlich and I.

We had to find food. Without arms, we had to resort to scavenging, mainly in the potato patches of the farms - at night. This diet soon showed its ill effects on us. We knew we had to get other food. There was no way but to make contact with the farmers themselves and hope for the best. We split into two groups, so as not to frighten the farmers. Fisotzner found an old rifle barrel, fitted a “butt” to it, and slung it over his shoulder; in the dark, it looked like a genuine rifle. We knocked on doors in the middle of the night and the farmers were quite generous - no so much, perhaps, because of Fisotzner's “rifle” as because of their fear of the partisans.

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Some time later we were informed by the villagers that the police from the Shemishoba post had learned about our presence and were preparing to attack us. Some of us were sure that the information was a trick to get us out of the area. We decided to take no chances;t he police post was only 7 kilometers away. but where should we go? We knew that all the partisan groups had left the region and were encamped in the Kapula forests on the other side of the Moscow-Warsaw highway. The way there was fraught with danger since the Germans had posted ambush points along the routes. We moved farther into the marshes for greater safety.

Now we ran into a new threat. It was late summer. For several nights now we had been hearing wolves howling in the marshes. We gathered dry faggots and made ready to kindle a fire to scare them away. But the fires were too small and one night we could see the glowing eyes, no more than 200 meters away. We added more fuel and the growth caught on fire, driving the wolves away. But now our hiding place could easily be discovered. We knew that we would have to leave the area. It wasn't until mid-November that we finally reached the Moscow-Warsaw highway and but one kilometer inside the forest we met a partisan who directed us to our unit.

Again we found that the command of the partisans was determined to be rid of us. We were even accused of stealing food from the partisans and threatened with execution if we didn't “confess”. What happened was that the partisans had stored meat in two barrels. We came upon the barrels after they had been emptied, took them to our camp and later exchanged them for food in the Malinovka village. We were beaten in good Nazi fashion; later it was found that others had stolen the meat and accused us of the theft, basing their charges on the tracks leading from the pit where the barrels had been lying to our camp.

Early in 1944 the Germans opened a concerted drive against the partisans. We were saved in the nick of time by the opening of the second front which drew off the German troops. Only the disabled and the policemen were left, and they were afraid to engage the partisans in battle.

On July 10, 1944 we made our first contact with the Red Army. We welcomed the Soviet soldiers with wild acclaim but on the next day we faced the fateful questions: where were we to go? The

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able-bodied men were immediately recruited by the Russians to fight on the front. Most of the others went back to the home towns, not because of sentiment but to take vengeance on those who helped in the roundups and also to take back the possessions left with neighbors.

On returning to Tooretz, I roamed about its streets like a dark shadow. Where Jews once lived, I found mounds of rubble, skeletons of houses, stove frames sticking out of the scrap, twisted bedsteads and other items which the scavengers ignored.

These demolished homes, I said to myself, had kept faith with their annihilated owners and crumbled of their own will so that no others would occupy them. The few houses left standing - Berl Slutsky's, Joseph Zagursky's and others, here and there - had new occupants, neighbors who improved their standard of living without too much effort.

Here is our house, its falling roof hanging on to the red-brick walls. The pear trees in the garden are scorched and barren. The cellar with its meter-thick walls is whole, but the door has been torn off and the entrance crossed with cobwebs. I thought of the cobwebs which saved David when he was fleeing from before Saul. Why did no such miracle happen here? Not a single Jew was able to save his life by hiding here in Tooretz. I went down into the cellar, burrowed into the scrap - perhaps somewhere a bit of my mother's handiwork had survived. I found nothing, not even an echo of the destroyed Jewish community.

Behind our house I saw the home of our neighbor Rihorka Zabawski. Untouched. This Rihorka had led the Germans to the hiding place of his good neighbor Moshe Yankelevsky. His sons enlisted in the police and served the Nazis. Now he himself was in hiding, waiting for things to blow over.

Outside the church, children are playing. I would swear that some of them are wearing the clothes “left behind” by the slaughtered Jewish children.

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I felt myself driven to the cemetery. The headstones had been taken away, probably for the construction of new homes. The two huge common graves at the end of the rise overlooking Korelitz Street are clearly visible. Two graves, one containing the 55 from the first roundup and the other more than 500 from the second liquidation. Both mounds are covered with verdant green, evidence of the rich soil beneath them.

How could those other human beings been capable of doing such a thing?

I went to the grocery market. It was full of customers, as usual. I met people I knew; they wanted to know how I managed to survive. I had other questions: were they not shocked by what they had done to us? Were they assailed by feelings of remorse? Did they feel the absence of the Jews, even in such prosaic matters as business and trade?

I found no trace, no answers, no regrets. All the roles the Jews had played for centuries were now in the hands of their neighbors. Nothing had changed, except for the two giant graves at the edge of the cemetery where my family and my town lie dead.

In the tragic situation which Tooretz's Jews found themselves after the roundup and massacre, the “fortunate” ones were those assigned to forced labor in the Swerzhne sawmill. The men selected from the Swerzhne ghetto which was soon liquidated, worked along side the others. But even under the horrible circumstances which leveled all Jews to a single status in which old and young, rich and poor became no more than human shadows, two distinct categories soon developed. The Swerzhne Jews could meet secretly with their Christian friends and get from them extra food. We, the Tooretz Jews, without this privilege, constantly felt the pans of hunger.

We decided to try the same tack with our Christian friends in Tooretz with whom we had left all of our earthly possessions. We arranged with a Christian fellow-worker to go to Tooretz and bring

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back food. The arrangement worked sufficiently well to ease the famine.

Our quarters were changed from time to time. Every day, as the number of Jews in the ghetto decreased, the empty houses were “moved” into the Aryan section. I was shifted twice before being pushed together with about sixty other Jews into the Bet-Hamidrash.

In the summer of 1942, the Germans decided to close down the factories in the area, except the sawmill. The workers of those factories were to be sent to Baranowitz, where it was said, certain death would be awaiting them. These workers kept pressing on the Judenrat to arrange for employment in the sawmill. This depended on the local Christian foremen, rather than on the German administration. The Swerzhne workers who still managed to hide a few gold coins were able to bribe the foremen and get on the rolls. The rest were taken to Baranowitz and murdered there.

Life in the shul quarters was next to unbearable. We slept on cots spaced two feet apart, with a thin layer of straw for a mattress. In one corner there was a large stove with a tin plate. The “prosperous” among us - those who were able to smuggle a bit of flour in from the outside - made “latkes” by mixing the flour with water (there was no shortening of any kind), pouring the mixture on the hot plate and scraping the finished product off the “grill”.

The smuggling often led to tragic consequences. One of the Swerzhne Jews crept through the barbed wire surrounding the ghetto and came back with food which his old time Christian friends gave him. He was caught by the Byelorussian police and taken to the Gestapo. On the next day he was brought to the sawmill, flogged in public and shot.

In December of 1943, as news filtered in about German reverses on the battle-front, particularly in Russia, some of us came up with the bizarre idea of celebrating New Year's Eve in the Bet-Hamidrash - a reflection of our grim and desperate hope for a good year. The refreshments were to be the same “latkes” and the flour was to come from the private stores of the inmates.

Came the night and all the inmates of our block were there, plus others who were quartered elsewhere. We put the few little tables together and served the refreshments.

I was asked to “say a few words”, but after the first few

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sentences, all of us were crying. Suddenly the door burst open and a voice called out in German, “The cursed Jews are holding a secret meeting!”

We were petrified. We managed to remove the crumbs from the tables,t hen took a look at the newcomers. They turned out to be our fellow-Jews from other blocks; they were playing a practical joke on us…one which I shall never forget.

Innumerable discussions during the past three decades have tried to come up with an adequate answer to the question as to whether there had been decent Germans among those assigned to “handling” Jews.

We who spent fifteen months on the borderline of life and death in the Swerzhne camp had the unique experience of meeting a decent German soldier with a human heart and conscience. To us, he was a point of light in the blackness around us.

Our task in the sawmill was to load the flat cars with the cut up trunks and take them along the narrow tracks to the nearby Nieman River. Every time we passed through the plant gates, guarded by German soldiers, we trembled with fear - lest that would be our last trip.

I was working in the sawmill (after the lime plant where I had been working was closed down), thanks to the efforts of a Swerzhne Jew named Israel Zelkowitz. Knowing that he had connections with Brigadier Perczyk, I gave him a new cotton shirt which I had kept from the Tooretz days to try bribing the Brigadier with it into putting me on the sawmill rolls. The Brigadier well knew that the favor deserved a much bigger bribe, but he agreed, in deference to Zelkowitz - to whom I doubtlessly owe my life.

Back to my story. I was passing through the gate aboard a flat car when suddenly a German soldier shouted “Halt!”. This meant the end; a German soldier usually stopped a Jew just before beating him, or worse. To my amazement I saw a soft look on his face. From his pocket he pulled out a chunk of bread and handed it to me, saying, “You're probably hungry”. I was. Our daily ration was half the size, plus watery potato soup which contained no potatoes.

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A week or so later, he repeated the act and said, “I'm one of Telemann's squad here and I'm warning you that your life isn't worth the ashes of this cigarette.”

I passed the words on to the others. We understood them to mean that soon the sawmill workers would face the fate of the others. This led to an organized movement to attempt an scape which was to take us to the forests and the partisans.

The death-dealing German machine - not the panzer corps nor the field artillery, but the Gestapo machine assigned to the task of murdering the Jewish civilian population in Europe - functioned according to a detailed formula. We of Tooretz witnessed it, as did thousands of other towns and villages where Jews were to be found.

The first Germans arrived in Tooretz on a Tuesday in July, 1941, a few weeks after the outbreak of the Soviet-German war. Their first move was to assemble all the Jews in the market place. Their commanding officer made a speech, the gist of which was, “The Jews of Tooretz must be obedient, work diligently, and carry out the orders of the administration exactly and precisely. Anyone disobeying a command will be shot.”

Having made this formal statement the officer yelled, “Now get out of here, cursed Jews!” The Jews began to flee, pursued by the other Germans with whips and canes in their hands.

On the same day, the Germans set up a police post in Tooretz for the Byelorussian militia. The members of this local force consisted of the worst hooligans and criminals from the surrounding villages. Their appointed commandant was one of them, Sarfimowicz, as bloodthirsty an animal as one might see in human guise. The machinery for the liquidation of the Jews was now ready to function

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A few days after the arrival of the Germans in Tooretz, I took my wife and four daughters to work on the estate of a Polish landowner. We thus avoided the first roundup, but then we were forced to return to town and my entire family was murdered. As we were being herded together, my youngest daughter Leah said to me, “Father, I am not afraid of death. Our neighbor Hava Gitl has taught me the 'Shma Yisrael' ”.

The German commandant ordered about a hundred of us to be separated from the others, for forced labor. My devoted wife pushed me toward the group. “At least you remain alive,” she said. As I moved there, my cousin Reuven joined me. We were the only ones of our family of seventy to survive the Holocaust.

We were put to work in Swerzhne. As were were working, I was covered by a sandslide. My cousin extricated me and took me to the hospital in Stolptze. Four weeks later my cousin came and took me back to the camp; rumor had it, he said, that the Germans were going to put to death all the patients in the hospital.

As soon as I recovered somewhat, I asked the Judenrat to get the permission of the camp commandant for me to go to Tooretz and bring back a cache of potatoes I had hidden there. The commandant approved. We came to Tooretz escorted by four soldiers. Our former neighbors were astounded to see us back, alive. They flatly refused to return the clothes we had left with them. Only one woman was ready to give back the clothes of my children.

We were in the camp for along time and finally escaped to the Pinsk swamps until we were liberated by the Russians. Several of us made our way from Poland to Italy, where we were visited by S.L. Hoffman, a close friend of the family. He encouraged us and gave us some money to tide us over; three years later, with Mr. Hoffman's help, I came to America.

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My story, from the Holocaust to the wonderful day of my arrival in the United States of America, is very much the same as that of the other few survivors of our town. The Nazi slaughter swept away my wife and four children, mother and father, three sisters and a brother. In all, seventy members of my family were murdered.

One of my first preoccupations in America was to help those of our townsmen who were able to get to Israel. I met with S.L. Hoffman and the Elimovitz brothers, Dov and Morris, to discuss the founding of the Tooretz Relief Society. In the same year, we called together all the survivors in the area to a memorial meeting. At the time, I was the chairman and the Elimovitz brothers served as secretaries.

During the first years, we sent Passover packages and some money to Israel, thanks to S.L. Hoffman's generosity. In 1956 we established the Loan Society, to which I have been devoting myself ever since. When the Elimovitz brothers moved to Florida, Gabriel Simonovitz has been doing the job.

The Hoffman family and friends

Gabriel Simonovitz Secretary		Mordecai Yalowsky Chairman

S.L. Hoffman (dec.) President

Dov Elimovitz Treasurer		Dov Elimovitz Treasurer

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We were still felling our way in our homeland. The dust of the endless wanderings still clung to us, as each of us wrestled with the problems of absorption, housing, job and life in the new land. Yet we came together, the handful of survivors and the few who had come before the destruction of Polish Jewry, to hold a memorial meeting for the martyrs of our towns. The meeting was held on Heshvan 13, 5708 (1947), several months after my arrival and six years after the liquidation of Tooretz-Yeremitz.

The long wandering along Europe's highways and byways, and the contact with the different ethnic populations whom fate placed in our path, strengthened within us the yearning for a renewal of the community life we once enjoyed in our town. It was natural, therefore, that the gathering should have taken place in the home of Rabbi Zvi Markowitz, who symbolized the continuity of leadership of our community.

The meeting bore none of the trappings of formal memorialization. The stories of the atrocities poured out from the people, eager to listen and to be hear, to take stock of themselves and to eulogize the departed. The hearts overflowed with tears and mourning. For the first time since the destruction we sensed an atmosphere of a family “yizkor”.

Making contact with the townspeople was not an easy task. Most of them had not as yet found a permanent address and were shifting from olim hostels to homes of relatives. Only a handful were there for the first meeting. We decided to persevere seeking out townspeople in Israel and abroad. This task was assigned to me, and I undertook it very willingly. On the second memorial day (1948) we again met in the home of Rabbi Markowitz, and again the gathering was relatively small; the third, in Heshvan 5700 (1949), attracted more. I was able to make contact with more than 40 of our townspeople. I obtained the used of the Yesod Hama'ala Street synagogue in Tel-Aviv, at no cost, and for the first time in eight years Tooretz and Yeremitz Jews joined in the evening prayer and the group of four minyanim recited kaddish. One of us conducted the memorial ceremony, after which others spoke, straight from the heart.

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On that same evening, in the synagogue, we founded the Tooretz-Yeremitz Society. A 9-member committee was formed: Rabbi Zvi Markowitz, president; Aharon Harkavi, vice-president; Abraham Gesik, secretary; Dr. Gabriel Zagursky (zal), treasurer; Israel aharon Svirenovsky (zal) and Avraham Haim Slutsky (zal), controllers; Lipa Bernstein (zal) and Avraham Ben-Zvi Gershowsky (zal), board members.

We gathered funds on the spot and used them to establish a Free Loan fund for our townspeople. The fund grew with time, particularly thanks to the generosity of our townsman Zalman Hoffman (zal). The Fund has been an important economic feature for our townspeople to this day.

We are greatly obligated to our townsman Modrecai Yalovsky (U.S.) for his dedication and zeal. Her persevered in keeping Zalman Hoffman informed about the Fund and in maintaining his ties with us. At a meeting of the Board in 1955, it was decided to call the Fund “The Mr. and Mrs. Zalman Hoffman Memorial Free Loan Fund, in memory of the Martyrs of Tooretz and Yeremitz”. In 1960 the Society's constitution was approved by the District Administration. Two years later a memorial plaque was dedicated to these martyrs in the Holocaust Cellar on Mount Zion. In recent years our Society received from the townspeople living in the U.S., shipments of food and clothing which were distributed to members.

In recent years the Board underwent several changes. It now consists of Rabbi Zvi Markowitz, president; Aharon Harkavi, vice-president; Avraham Gesik, secretary; Yehuda Yalaowsky, treasurer; Arye Svirenovsky, Yosef Harkavi and Yosef Ben-Zvi, controllers; Pinhas Mendelewitz, avrahm Lubetsky and Yehude Wolfowitz, members. At this stage the Society is making loansof us to IL. 4,000 for a two-year period to any member in need; it provides aid for emergencies, arranges the annual memorial gatherings, maintain correspondence with national branches, holds get-togethers and receptions for townspeople from abroad on their visits to Israel (among them have been Zalman Hoffman (zal), Mordecai Yalovsky, and his wife, Arye and Shlomo Schilling (Sapozhnik) and Tuvia Rozowsky.

Our main effort in recent years has been to prepare for publication a memorial volume of our communities. At the memorial meeting in 1971 it was decided to publish the Tooretz-Yeremitz Book of Remembrance. Nine members were chosen to serve on the Editorial

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Board: Rabbi Zvi Markowitz, Magistrate Arye Slutzky (zal), Dr. Yerahmiel Markowitz (zal), Aharon Harkavi, Lipa Bernstein (zal), Avraham Gesik, Yehuda Gesik, Yosef Ben-Zvi and Malka Polozhuski. We made contact with Michael Walzer-Fass to enlarge and edit the volume, together with Mr. Moshe Kaplan, who undertook to be in charge of the Yiddish section. Other volunteers, mainly my brother Yehuda, devoted much time and effort to bring the volume to publication.

I believe that our undertaking is of great significance, faithfully reflecting as it does the atmosphere of the towns and the spirit of their Jewish communities prior to the Holocaust, when their social and spiritual manifestations greatly exceeded their numerical strength. The Society still has many social tasks to perform on behalf of the townspeople of Tooretz and Yeremitz.

Memorial meeting for the martyrsof Tooretz and Yeremitz (R. to L.) Rabbi Zvi Markowitz, Motl Yalowsky, Avrahm Gesik, Yaacov Samek, Ida Yalovsky, Arye Svirenovsky

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We have lost a rare personality, a man of great initiative and enterprise whose good spirits communicated themselves to everyone and everything about him.

His friendliness toward Tooretz dates back to 1921 when he first visited our town. The Jews of Tooretz were then in dire circumstances. The World War had left most of them destitute. He extended financial help to individuals and institutions, saving them from utter ruin. This friendliness grew to a deep love, during the period between the two wars, as he and his beloved wife, may she live long, established free loan funds in Tooretz and Mir, to which they kept contributing many thousands of dollars.

S.L. Hoffman was a man of rare judgment and infallible memory. He possessed marvelous attributes, some innate and others which he developed over the years. In America, he generously aided the Jewish Teachers Union and other organizations, non-Jewish as well. He also enjoyed the affection of the hundreds of workers in his textile plants. Life taught him a great deal, and he was always ready to share its lessons with others to help them weather difficult situations.

He was one of the foremost contributors to the United Jewish Appeal. His identification with Israel was complete and unequivocal. He was deeply interested in our townspeople wherever they might be.

Already in his lifetime he reaped the fruits of his labors in his own family, his children and grandchildren, all of whom have attained high intellectual and humanistic levels in professional fields of endeavor.

May these few lines of eulogy bring some measure of solace and comfort to his widow and grieving family, and, to us, may his memory be a blessing and inspiration.

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He was the first in or midst to break through to the outside world in quest of the higher education which led him to the legal profession, all the way to the post of legal counsel to the Histadrut in the early 1950's and the magistrate's bench in Haifa's Court of Common Pleas and the District Court where he was outstanding in his lucid thinking, his familiarity with jurisprudence and its application.

He often attributed the development of his intellect to those early hears in Itche Sapozhnik's heder and the hours spent pouring over the Talmud.

His sense of values reflected his personality - liberal, friendly, respectful, always ready to give of his time and attention to help others. he was the address to which our townspeople turned for advice - personal or in the interest of our townspeople, including the publication of this volume. He was particularly helpful in the legal work connected with the establishment of our society.

Fate has willed it that Arye be taken from our midst before the publication of the Tooretz-Yeremitz Book of Remembrance, but he was able to contribute to it an article of major interest and importance which he wrote after a good deal of research on the history of our town since its founding some seven centuries ago.

With Arye Slutsky's passing, our society has lost a noble personality of rare quality and character. We shall always remember him, not only for his own worth, but also as one who transplanted the best that was in our shtetl to the homeland soil of the State of Israel.

[English page 110]

Rabbi Dr. Yerahmiel Markowitz, born in Tooretz, was one of the five children of R. Shmuel Markowitz, Rabbi of Tooretz, who, together with his wife, two sons and a daughter, perished in the Holocaust. Yerahmiel and another brother, Ramat-Gan's Rabbi Zvi Markowitz, escaped this fate, having gone to Eretz Israel before the Second World War.

The deceased was a descendant of many generations of distinguished rabbis and scholars, and his children were likewise reared in the ways of Torah, tradition and national consciousness.

He was a man of noble spirit, a philanthropist in the human sense of the word, a universalist in human relations as much as a true lover of his people and land. His aspirations were rooted in worthy values, and from these roots came forth his unique personality. A holder of the Rabbinical Diploma, he earned the degree of Doctor of Hebrew Literature several years ago for his work in historical and literary research. His warmth and his readiness to be of help to all endeared him to all the circles with which he came in contact. My talks with him always thrilled and inspired me; little did I think when I met with him for the last time that ten days later he would no longer be among the living.

As a townsman and old friend of the deceased and as vice chairman of the Tooretz and Yeremitz Townspeople Association, I am voicing the grief of all of them, the remnants of the two towns, over the sudden passing of one of our luminaries, Rabbi Dr. Yerahmiel Markowitz. We have suffered a great loss. We shall always recall him with deep affection and may his memory always be a blessing to us.

[English page 111]

The recently deceased Yom Tov Lipa Bernstein appeared in our town's public life shortly after the First World War. Life had not been kind to him. His first wife died in her youth, leaving an infant to be reared. Yom Tov pulled himself together. He married Lola Svirenovsky, the sister of Yisrael Aharon, and joined his brother-in-law in textile manufacturing in Lodz. Soon he became expert in mixing colors for fabrics and in time he established a partnership enterprise which employed 150 workers. Periodically he visited Tooretz and inspired all of us with his energy and enterprising spirit.

When the Nazis came, he lost his older daughter in the first roundup in Swirzen. His wife Lola and younger daughter were murdered in the second roundup, and his twin sons perished in the third, after an unsuccessful attempt to get them out of the Lodz ghetto. Broken but determined to survive, he was hidden by a friendly goy for two years.

Among the others in the shelter was Hava Goldin, whom he married and together managed to get to Paris after the war and later to Israel. Here he established a plant for combing cotton and his home again became the center of friends, some of them from Lodz of bygone days. He was one of the pillars of our society, the treasurer of our Free Loan Fund, and a most valuable adviser in all matters requiring acumen and experience. he scrupulously oversaw the finances of the society, and contributed generously from his own means. He adhered strictly to prayer, and arose from a sick bed to attend Yom Kippur services. His penchant for scholarship came from his kinship with R. Shimon Shkop, his maternal uncle.

Despite his poor health, R. Lipa reached the 80's, but his passing last winter nevertheless created a void. We shall always remember the image of this kindly, generous and understanding human being.

[English page 112]

The following obituary notice appeared in the London Jewish Chronicle on September 23, 1910:

“A distinct loss which will be felt far beyond the confines of French Jewry occurred on Sunday evening last, when Rabbi J. Lubetzki - the respected Rav of the Russian, Polish and Romanian Jews in Paris - breathed his last after a long and painful illness borne with fortitude and resignation. Whilst on an errand of mercy some three years ago he was without a moment's warning, seized with a paralytic stroke. He recovered sufficiently to enable him to attend to some of the more pressing business of the community, but he succumbed to a second attack which occurred a few weeks ago.

Rabbi Lubetzki was born in Turetz (Russia) on the 21st of Iyar, 5610, and had, therefore, just attained his sixtieth year. he was a descendant of many generations of well-known Rabbis in Russia. He received his early education from his father - an erudite scholar - and later on pursued his studies at the Yeshive of Mir. At a very early age he had the Rabbinical Diploma conferred on him by several eminent Rabbis including R. Itzchak Chariff and R. Shlomo Cohen. that he won the confidence of the authorities of his Alma Mater is evidenced by the fact that he was sent to England to enlist wider sympathies on behalf of the Yeshiva. In route he came into contact for the first time with the late Rabbi Itzchak Elchonon Spector, the world famous Rav of Kovno. The manner in which the aged Rav gauged the capacity of the young aspirant to Rabbinic office is worthy of record. Rabbi Spector, in asking him to wait, handed Lubetzki a complex brochure of his which he had just prepared and told him to while away the brief time of waiting by glancing through its pages, not expecting him to do more than merely follow the trend of the book. How great was his surprise and delight on his return to find that the young man had actually mastered its contents to be able to discuss with him the abstruse subject with which it dealt. A friendship was on that day formed which was only broken with the removal from earth of the famous Rav. the venerable rabbi gave Mr. Lubetzki a letter of introduction to the then Chief Rabbi of England (Rabbi Nathan Adler) and took the keenest interest in his future.

Rabbi Lubetzki's reminiscences of his first visit to London were at once sad and joyful. Sad, for he was seized with an illness which continued a considerable time; joyful, for he made the acquaintance which grew to friendship and some cases developed to intimacy, of a number of worthy members of the Anglo-Jewish community which he retained and valued throughout his life.

In 1881 he left England with the intention of returning to Russia and there taking up a position. He traveled via Paris and there he saw a state of affairs which induced him at least somewhat to prolong his stay. Foreign Jewry in France was then in a pitifully disorganized state. There were some five thousand Jewish families who had migrated from Russia, but they were without a leader after their hears, without a central place of worship, with no rabbis, no Shochetim, and no Talmud Torahs. What was needed was a man of unimpeachable orthodoxy, profound scholarship, earnestness of purpose and strength of will. these qualities the young rabbi possessed to a marked degree. he was persuaded to stay over the High Festivals and to preach; but ere he consented he took the wise course of visiting the late Grand Rabbin of France - Zadok Kahn - and consulting his feelings in the matter. The Grand Rabbin, with characteristic magnanimity and with a desire to serve the best interests of all sections of his community not only agreed to his remaining and ministering to his foreign brethren, but also promised to give him every assistance in his efforts to ameliorate their condition. The Grand Rabbin frequently deferred to the wishes of the deceased in withholding the introduction of far-reaching reforms, and when, in 1904, he organized the Tribunal Rabbinique on the lines of the London Beth Din, Rabbi Lubetzki was appointed one of its members and remained its mainstay to the end of his life. It was a member of the Beth Din, in cooperation with Rabbin Weiskopf and Grand Rabbin Netter, as well as in his own capacity as a powerful leader of orthodox principles, that he recently fought heroically against the introduction of reforms affecting the purity of Jewish family life. Through the instrumentality of the Grand Rabbin, and at his request, the deceased became associated with the work of the ICA. he was likewise closely connected with the colonization of Palestine of which he acted as correspondent for a period of ten years, and enjoyed the full confidence of Baron Edmond de Rothschild and the late Michel Erlanger. He thus became the intermediary between these two beneficent organizations and

the poor in Paris and abroad who sought their protection and help.

But his chief activities were directed towards assisting the provision for the religious, educational and physical needs of is foreign coreligionists in Paris. He strengthened the organization of Shechita. He brought the facilities of non-charity burials within the reach of men of moderate means. He was the founder of a number of local charities and benevolent societies. The “Asyl” - the Jewish Shelter, owes its origin to his initiative and untiring efforts. The Hevra Shas and the Talmud Torah are the work of his hands. In fact, there is no institution affecting the Russo-Jewish community in Paris, and more especially the poorer classes in which his organizing power and inspiring influence do not stand out in bold relief.

Rabbi Lubetzki also devoted a great deal of attention to the promotion of learning. Some of his Responsa and learned discourses are in preparation for the press. But he will be chiefly remembered as the editor from an unknown MS in the possession of the late Baron Gunzburg of the “Sepher Hashlomah”, an Halachic work complementary to the “Rif” and written by R. Meshullam of the Tosaphists period. He published the first part with critical introduction, commentary and notes in 1885. The second part appeared in 1908, and the third and last part extant, saw the light this year, when the author was already on the bed of sickness. He also published in 1896 the “Bidke Battim”, a treatise upon the literature of the period of the author of the “Hashlomah”.

He has been cut down at a comparatively early age, and his closing years were darkened by the sudden death, eight years ago, of his wife, a genuine help-mate, a model of deep Jewish piety, combined with the culture, the incarnation of self-sacrifice.

The deceased leaves behind his two sons and three daughters - Dr. Salomon Lubetzki, married to a daughter of M. Naphtalie Levy, President of the German Congregation in Paris; and Dr. Albert Lubetzki; Anna, married to the Rev. Harris Cohen, Minister of the Stoke Newington Synagogue; Marie, married to Dr. David Schapiro, of Paris; and Adeline alice, married to Dayan Feldman, of London.

The funeral took place on Tuesday amid many manifestations of grief.

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