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Sidney Zoltak

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Sidney Zoltak (b 1931 in Siemiatycze Poland), is a Polish-Canadian author, Holocaust educator and the subject of several films. Zoltak has been featured on CBC in a special done by the channel.

Early life

When Nazi Germany invaded Poland in the invasion that launched the Second World War, Zoltak's hometown of Siemiatycze was occupied by German troops. However under the terms of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet-German non aggression agreement, much of Poland was divided into the Soviet sphere of influence. Then a surprise invasion by Germany on June 22, 1941 saw the Germans once again occupy Siemiatycze. The town's Jews were rounded up, forced to live in a ghetto, and by November, those left alive were shipped to Treblinka.[1]

Film: Reunions

The documentary, produced in co-operation with The March of the Living Digital Archive Project,[2] is about Zoltak's return to Poland to meet the people that saved his life.[3] The film was screened at the Hamilton Jewish Film Festival,[4] the Vancouver Jewish Film Festival, and the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival.

His memoir, My Silent Pledge: A Journey of Struggle, Survival and Remembrance, was published by Guernica Editions, in 2013.[5] In his book Witness: Passing the Torch of Holocaust Memory to New Generations[6] author Eli Rubenstein recounts a scene from the film, told in the presence of the son of his rescuer and hundreds of March of the Living student and recorded at Treblinka, where nearly one million Jews were murdered. "When we got back to our hometown, less than one percent had survived. Less than 70 from a community of 7,000. The most difficult part for me was that none of my classmates, none of my friends survived. I am the only one. I think about it. The only reunion I can have is in this place among the memorial stones," Zoltak is quoted as saying.

References

  1. ^ "Sidney Zoltak returns to Poland with Montreal students to revisit horrifying 14-month ordeal". CBC News.ca. Retrieved June 4, 2014.
  2. ^ "Sydney Zoltak: Reunions". The March of the Living Archive Project. Retrieved June 4, 2014.
  3. ^ "Montreal man reunites with Polish rescuer who saved him from Nazis". CBC News.ca. Retrieved June 4, 2014.
  4. ^ "Jewish Film Festival Kicks Off". The Hamilton Spectator. Retrieved December 2, 2011.
  5. ^ Nashen, G. J. "Sidney Zoltak's Silent Pledge". Nashen Notes. Retrieved 27 November 2013.
  6. ^ Rubenstein, Eli (September 8, 2015). "Witness: Passing the Torch of Holocaust Memory to New Generations". Second Story Press. ISBN 1-927583-66-7.
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