Frank Stangl's, Treblinka's head SS commandant, prime concern was to reduce the time it took between the arrival of the victims and their murder. At his trial after war, he bragged that Treblinka could murder 15,000 people in a 14-hour period. "I have done nothing to anybody that was not my duty. My conscience is clear" (Stangl).
Jews had NO idea that they would be dead within hours. Like the victims of Majdanek, Treblinka's Jews were lied to. Nazis made false promises that they would be rewarded if they worked hard. They needed to delouse first and get their heads shaved. The guards would beat them to run faster. There was a purpose to this madness. They wanted the Jews to get out of breath so they would breathe in the poisonous gas deeper and die faster.
There are no pictures of the 10 gas chambers because they were destroyed before liberation. All that is left of Treblinka is fields, grass, trees, and monumental rocks to remember the victims.
An Israeli group of teenagers journey to learn and to promise NEVER AGAIN! Sad part is they needed an an armed guard to protect them.... antisemitism still exists.
The long rectangular benches by the trees represent the railroad tracks that unloaded the cattle cars from Warsaw. The Nazis made sure the Jews could not see too far ahead.....
1% of the Jews were not killed so that the Nazis could have the slave labor needed to bring the bodies to mass graves. The mass graves were overloaded and the camp was small. So the Nazis reopened the graves, removed the bodies, and burned them on a grill. Then, the Nazis removed the fat from heavier corpses and placed it onto the bones of the skinnier ones, so they could burn more efficiently!
Like Belzac, Treblinka honored its victims by erecting rocks/stones, not of their names, but of towns and cities they were from. Look at the THOUSANDS of cities/towns represented.
Few butterflies here....Instead they had BEES everywhere! They followed us, circling our ankles during our walk down the Black Road, a trail that once led 300,000 Jewish people and Poles to forced labor and death. I believed they might be eating the dead remnants of corpses. I felt nauseous the entire time....UNTIL....
I was the last one to the bus. I was hesitant to leave. I don't know if it was because it was the last concentration camp we were to see or because this was the concentration camp closest to my grandparents. I decided to make one more round through these rocks before I left, asking my grandmother to give me a sign...some kind of sign she was watching. She did. Her tiny, unknown town...Janow Podlaski...caught my eye. She was there among the 17,000 stones and rocks, telling me she was watching. I hope I make her proud.
I left the Israeli flag on the stone held down by pine cones. I was told pine cones represent life ....How fitting that they surrounded the rock. What wrapped me in comfort now shall wrap the victims in comfort. Now the Jews don't have to wander or remain in a state of diaspora. They have a homeland, Israel, somewhere Jews all over the world can feel safe and protected. NO ONE will take that away from us again...NEVER AGAIN!
This was the last picture taken. My journey is complete.