What Our Fathers Did: A Nazi Legacy Page #6

and continue to happen today?

It's the point

because they continue everywhere

and we have no means to stop them,

we have to accept them.

Well, that's where you and I disagree,

that's where you and I disagree.

I think.

There are things that can be done

to stop things from happening and it's about

in part individual responsibility.

It's where you and I. You and I disagree.

We have this small... We are smaller...

Just like points in the whole history.

It's like the soldiers who fought here,

they can't stand up and say,

"Oh, I don't want to fight. "

They... They would be executed immediately.

So there's no option

but to kill and carry on killing?

There are options... I mean, there's other ways

which are in your power to do something.

But this was inevitable.

- Your father had no option.

- For him he had no option

to change this thing.

And because it was inevitable

he had no responsibility?

Well, that's a difficult question,

about responsibility.

Well, I don't think that he...

He ordered to burn down this room.

I mean this, hmm, I refuse to say that

he gave orders to burn down here.

Pam...

I don't see my father in here, I mean...

I can't see walking, my father here,

around here with his uniform

and saying, "Oh, well... Well done"

and things like that.

I can't see him like this.

It's done.

But you.

I mean, in this room you have to have ideas,

great ideas, I'm not pessimistic,

and you have to see,

what was really going on

building this up and...

Because for me this is built for eternity,

you can see the enormous walls there.

The columns, the thickness, and for me

this idea is much stronger

than destroyed surfaces.

300 years filled

with people and singing and prayer and life

and color and hair and jewellery.

- Yes, that is my...

- And it's all gone.

- It all went in a single day.

- No, it's not gone.

It's still there.

It isn't gone because that is my main

interest, why I agreed to come here,

to go back to 300 years ago,

not be stuck in what happened 70 years ago.

It'll never be...

it'll never be filled again, this place.

You don't know.

Maybe it'll, I'm not so pessimistic than you.

Ah...

This will be filled up.

I can tell you because it's so great

that this period will be gone

and there will be a new period coming up

which can, hmm.

Can see it again, now it's,

hmm, only a few people who can see this.

But I think... I can see it.

See, I don't want to get stuck somewhere.

Full of shame and full of...

Full of...

I'm proud to be here.

I always imagine when was

the last Shabbat celebration before they all

were killed.

What if they talked to each other?

"How can we hide?

How can we go into the woods?"

or "Do we have any relatives who can hide us

somewhere in the countryside?"

All this kind of stuff, always running

through my brain... The only thing.

And this makes me furious

and I will never forgive this.

So it was the synagogue

of my family.

- Yeah?

- Yeah.

- This was...

- Here your family was?

Yeah.

- You didn't know that?

- No.

You always ask me what about my feeling,

you know,

what's your feeling standing here in this

synagogue where your family used to be?

It's a very heavy feeling.

- It's a very, very heavy feeling.

- What means heavy?

It means that my imagination

is running very strongly.

I imagine the moment in July, 1941,

that the Germans came into the town,

and like you, I imagine the fear,

the mayhem and the certainty

that they knew what was coming

because they had contacts with Vienna

and with Germany and they knew

what was on its way,

and so for me it boils down to a number of

individuals that I never met.

I don't even have photographs

of these people.

Nothing, nothing remains, nothing,

but this would have been the place...

Yeah, where they would have been

the last time you have heard about this,

about those family? When...

My grandfather never talked to me about it.

- He refused to talk to me about it.

- You also didn't dare to ask.

I didn't dare to ask.

So, and when they perished,

so they were still living around here

using this synagogue.

Yes, well, the synagogue was burnt down

in July '41.

The ghetto was created, hmm, in the autumn

and they lived in the ghetto in '42

and they were then rounded up,

taken to a wood, where there were sand pits

that were used to repair the road

from Zolkiew to Lemberg

and they put a plank at the end of the sand pit

and each of the 3,500 walked along the plank,

they were shot and they fell in.

But the story doesn't end there.

That's a kilometer from where we are

standing now, they're still there.

Nothing's changed'

All the bodies are in the spot

that we are going to right now.

This our fathers did.

So everyone remains here.

Nothing has been moved.

- Horst, you've seen the date over here?

Yeah.

The 25th of March, 1943.

So I'm afraid there is no escaping

that this action took place on the territory

and with the support of your father.

And it contains 3,500 people.

Including my family.

Horst, please accept it.

Recognize it.

It's also the responsibility

of my father in first,

but your father was as well involved

in this horrible crime.

Here in this place.

Please.

He was involved in the system I know,

this is why we're here.

The system was very, very obstructive.

- This is...

- I never...

...the place of a mass killing,

our fathers have been responsible for.

I want to have the exact date and who were,

was responsible,

who was present here and the name

of the police officers and I will.

Why you always want to flee?

I dont want to flee.

I want to see the...

The reality.

And we are standing in the midst of a death,

that is all deaths around us.

There must be tens of thousands of Austrians

lying around here.

But, Horst, we're not talking...

We're talking about these 3,500 people.

We're talking about these...

I see all of them around here,

it's not only those.

Well, I'm talking about these.

I'm asking you to focus on these people

who on the 25th of March, 1943,

walked from the place

where we have just been to this place,

with the support of the auxiliary police

under your father's authority.

They were made to walk

to the end of the plank,

each person got a single bullet to the head

and they are in there now.

There's simply no escaping

the issue of responsibility.

Not your responsibility,

never your responsibility.

The responsibility of Otto von Wchter.

There is no escaping,

you simply cannot run away from it.

You are confronted here with the reality.

And then I want the exact following

of the orders

from the smallest soldier

up to the civil government.

Do you know who paid the salary

of the auxiliary police?

Your father.

That was paid by your father.

He signed off on it,

that's called command responsibility.

Doesn't matter

who did the individual act of killing,

doesn't matter who put the individual

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