Small Riga Ghetto

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through the destruction of the largest Jewish centers. Perhaps this will be the
most tragic part of Jewish history after the churbn (destruction) of the Second
Temple. It is possible that the number of victims will be so great that for a
long time we will not be able to think clearly. Nonetheless we should avoid
panic. A historian who studies the pages of Jewish history will realize the following:
the deepest meaning of our history is hope, which becomes a reality
again and again, for tyrants will always drown in their own blood. I am convinced
that Germany will be destroyed, just as sure as I am of the fact that
snow melts in the spring. Perhaps the Jewish kibbutzim (communities) in
Europe will be destroyed for years, but we still have a powerful Jewish community
in the United States of America, in Latin America and in the other
English-speaking countries. Palestine may go through a great crisis in the coming
years, but I hope that the jischuw (settlement) there will grow and flourish.
We definitely need Palestine for our continued existence; even the non-Zionists
need it. In the English-speaking countries we have to become proficient in the
English language, but we should not neglect Yiddish. American Jewry will
have to grow spiritually and understand the great task that fate has bestowed
upon it."
Today, seven years later, we clearly realize the truth of his prophetic words.
The Germans occupied Riga and began, together with the Latvians, to destroy
the Latvian Jewish community. The old professor was hidden as well as
possible, but the Gestapo heard of his existence and he was arrested shortly
before the opening of the ghetto in September 1941.
His age and his imposing apperance did not prevent the murderers from
beating him. They were interested in the manuscripts he had written in Riga
and demanded that he hand them over. But he had hidden these manuscripts,
and he said he had left them in Kaiserwald, which he had left months before.
He was released, but arrested again later. Thanks to the head of the Jewish
Council, the Vienna Jew Schlitter, he was released again and this time was put
into the ghetto, now a broken man. For this, Schlitter was arrested by the Gestapo
and later killed.
In the ghetto the old professor received a small room in the shelter on
Ludzas Street. But even there he was not idle; he started to write an article
about the ghetto, using the same mechanical pencil that he said had served him
for thirty-seven years. During the days he spent in the ghetto – days that were
already counted – he once again created a small Jewish intellectual center. In
the first action, on 30 November 1941, he was transported to a second shelter
on Blech Square, and later in the second action, on 8 December 1941, he was