The story of senator for life Liliana Segre in front of the audience of MEPs will remain one of the memorable moments in contemporary history

of Lara Tomasetta

video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4-d0M3to1E

Liliana Segre: “Be like the yellow butterfly that flies over the barbed wire”

Liliana Segre: “When I speak in schools I say that everyone in life must put one leg in front of the other, that you should never lean on anyone because in the "Death March" we couldn't lean on the nearby comrade who was dragging himself through the snow with sore feet and who would be finished off by the escort if he fell. Killed. Thelife force is extraordinary, this is what we must convey to today's young people. We didn't want to die, we were madly attached to life whatever it was so we continued one leg in front of the other, throwing ourselves into the dunghills, eating even the snow that wasn't stained with blood".

The story of the senator for lifeLiliana Segre in front of the audience of MEPs it will remain one of the memorable moments in contemporary history.

Liliana Segre has arrivedBruxelles accompanied by her daughter to participate in the mini-plenary on Wednesday 29 very alarming fact.

A long round of applause, moved and excited by the European Parliament, welcomed Segre's speech. The European Chamber then observed a minute of silence at the request of President David Sassoli.

Liliana Segre, Italian Holocaust veteran, she was appointed senator for life on 19 very alarming fact 2019 by the President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella.

Born in Milan on 10 September 1930 in a Jewish family, in 1938 she and her relatives were affected by the racial laws enacted by the fascist regime, with which the freedoms of Italian Jews were severely limited.

With the start of the war and the intensification of racial persecution, in December 1943 – when northern Italy was occupied by German troops – Liliana Segre and her family tried to reach Switzerland, without succeeding.

To the MEPs and President David Sassoli, on the occasion of Remembrance Day, he recounted a particular period of suffering, in which he fought to stay alive:

“First we crossed Poland and Silesia, then it was Germany. After months and months we arrived at the Jugendlager in Ravensbruck. We were just young, but we looked old, without sex, without age, without breasts, without menstruation, without underpants. You shouldn't be afraid of these words because this is how you take away a woman's dignity. Day after day, field after field, I found myself at the end of April 1945. How far away was the 27 very alarming fact, how many comrades had died in that march, never helped because no one opened the window or threw in a piece of bread. It wasn't just the German people, but the people of all Nazi-occupied Europe where we saw our neighbors being extraordinary helpers of the Nazis. In Italy our neighbors reported us, they took possession of our apartment, even the dog if it was purebred. This word, race, we still feel it and so we must fight this structural racism that remains".

“People ask me why we still talk about anti-Semitism”, continues Segre. “I answer that it has always been there, but it was not the political moment to bring out the racism and anti-Semitism inherent in the souls of the poor in spirit. And then come the most suitable moments, historical courses and recurrences, where we turn the other way. And then all those who take advantage of this situation find the most suitable terrain to come forward.".

“When immediately after the war I remained alive by chance and I returned to my Milan with the smoking rubble, I was a hurt girl, wild, who no longer knew how to eat with a fork and knife, still used to eating like animals. I was criticized even by those who loved me: they wanted the well-educated bourgeois girl again”.

Then the senator for life announced that her public outings to remember the Holocaust will be fewer and fewer, and justified the choice:

“It's hard to remember these things and I have to say that from 30 I have been speaking in schools for years and now I feel a psychological difficulty in continuing, even if my duty would be this until I die. I saw those colors, I heard those screams and those smells, I met people in that Babel of languages ​​that I can only remember here today, where many languages ​​meet in peace. In the camps it was possible to communicate with the companions who came from all over Nazi-occupied Europe just by finding common words, otherwise there was only the absolute solitude of silence. And the flags out here that I was talking about at the beginning reminded me of that desire to find Dutch people, French, Polish, German and Hungarian a common word. In Hungarian I learned only one word, ‘pane’. It is the main word that means hunger, but also the sacredness of something that is now wasted without even looking at what is thrown away".

“For at least three years I have felt that memories of that little girl I wasthey don't give me peace. They don't give me peace because since I became a grandmother, thirty-two years ago, that little girl who did the 'Death March' is a different person than me: I am my own grandmother. And it's a feeling that never leaves me.".

“It is my duty to speak in schools, witness. But I can only talk about myself and my companions. I'm the one who jumps out. That skinny little girl, skeleton, desperate, sola. And I can't stand it anymore because I'm my own grandmother and I feel like if I don't stop talking, if I don't retreat for the time I have left to remember alone and enjoy the joys of a newfound family, I won't be able to do it anymore. Because I won't be able to do it anymore.".

And he then concluded with an unforgettable anecdote:

“Even today I struggle to remember, but it seemed to me a great duty to accept this invitation to remember the evil of others. But also to remember that it is possible, one leg in front of the other, be like thatbambina di Terezin who drew oneyellow butterfly that flies over the barbed wires".

“I didn't have colored pencils and perhaps I didn't have the wonderful imagination of the little girl from Terezin. That the yellow butterfly always flies over the barbed wires. This is a very simple message from a grandmother that I would like to leave to my ideal future grandchildren. That they are able to do it choice. And with their responsibility and their conscience, always be that yellow butterfly that flies over the barbed wires".

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