Event April 14, 2010 MJH

In 1942, four-year-old Irene Levin was one of 1,200 Norwegian Jews who escaped to Sweden. Irene Berman recounted her family's story of rescue, was joined by Bruland, who was instrumental in the post-war restitution of Jewish assets. Norway's current tensions with Israel was also discussed.

The Resistance movement in Norway grew as much because of the Norwegian collaborators with the Germans. In other words the Germans tried to stay in the background and leave it to the Quisling regime.  This was done systematically throughout the entire process. Many people see the Holocaust as an event. Mr. Bruland suggests it is more like a process, drawing everything to a final conclusion.  And the conclusion in Norway was the deportation of the Jews

Irene Berman’s very moving personal story “We are going to pick potatoes” and the history of her family interviewed by Museum curator Bonnie Gurewitsch, a story and another testimony to the survival that testifies that it did happen, yet another little piece of puzzle that we today 70 years later are trying to put together and to try understand and to remember that it did happen. This was a story with a happy ending as far as Irene’s closest family is concerned, a story that amid all the tragedy one of the stories that had a good ending and that enabled Irene despite her young age to reconstruct and retell the story of what happened then.

A welcome by Sissel Breie, Consul General of Norway whose beautifully told personal story about her own father rescuing a Jew during the war, gave the perfect context for a historical overview.

Bjarte Bruland, chief curator, Oslo Jewish Museum, interviewed by Danish journalist and author Samuel Rachlin explored the role of the Quisling regime and supporters of German during the war.

To read the full interview with Bjarte Bruland, click here:

This program was made possible in part by Ingunn and Michael Bassock, Eva and Richard Hudlow, and Jacquin Fink.