In a moving event, Hanukkah candles were lit Monday in the presence of German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier by a descendant of the last rabbi of the city of Keil, who fled the Nazi Germany in 1933.
Rabbi Akivah Posner and his wife Rachel had taken the family menorah with them when they left Germany for Israel, and their relatives had continued to use it since. Now, 91 years since their departure, their grandson Yehuda Mensbach brought the family heirloom back to Germany and lit its candles at the presidential residence at Berlin's Bellevue Palace.
Steinmeier said during the event at Berlin’s Bellevue palace that the Holocaust must not be forgotten. "We must never let go of the memory of the Holocaust. We are in need of powerful and clear means of commemoration, in order to understand and explain what had happened in those times," he said.
According to the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Center, Doctor of Philosophy from Halle-Wittenberg University Rabbi Dr. Akiva Posner had served as the last rabbi of the community of Kiel before the Holocaust.
After he had publicized a protest letter in the local press expressing indignation at the posters that had appeared in the city - which read, “Entrance to Jews Forbidden” - he was summoned by the chairman of the local branch of the Nazi Party to participate in a public debate. The event took place under heavy police guard and was reported by the local press.
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A photograph taken in 1931, by Rachel Posner, shows the candle-lit Hanukkah menorah against the backdrop of the Nazi flags on a building across the street for their home
(Photo: Yad Vashem)
A photograph taken in 1931 by Rachel Posner, shows the candle-lit Hanukkah menorah against the backdrop of the Nazi flags on a building across the street from their home.
When the tension and violence in the city intensified, the rabbi responded to the pleas of his community to flee with his wife Rachel and their three children in 1933.