A diary notebook in which the writer - a Jew who witnessed the events as they took place, documents the abuse of members of his family and other Jews and the deportation of Jews from Kiizeh (probably Kitzbühel) in Austria, when it was occupied by the Nazis. Passover 1938. The writer (as he details his origins on the second page) is from the descendants of the Gaon Rabbi Zvi Perles, the descendants of the Gaon Rabbi Yitzhak Perles - the descendants of the Maharal of Prague and the Gaon Ba'al HaTshuva MeAhava.
He opens with the words: "These things will be fulfilled, and as a sign of events I write them to the best of my memory... Here you have a bundle of events... I gathered the tears... Tears from eyes that have not tasted sin..."
The writer describes the occupation of Austria by the Nazis, and how quickly the streets were filled with swastikas at every corner: "In the Parasha of Zachor Shabbat Kodesh Parashat Tzav 1938, German soldiers came to Austria... Every Jew in Austria did not believe that they would come, here they came.... In an instant, all the streets took on a new shape with the swastika. And everywhere an eye can look, there is a big and small swastika on the windows of houses everywhere. Only the houses of the Bnei Israel were not..." . He writes how in a short time in less than two months the fate of the Jews became bitter from day to day: "Every single day brings troubles that the day that passes by hasn't known, and the face of the Jews has become the edge of a cauldron..." In response, the Jews shared their concerns with each other, and did everything in their power to help each other: " All day long they run back and forth how a certain person can be helped and saved from his troubles from the prosecution of the wicked who imposed a fine and punishment on them... And a voice calls Ana Hashem Hoshia Na...".
He describes how the Nazis took the Jews without distinction between old and young into forced labor, and expresses a wish that this would end the suffering of the Jews: "Father and sons, rabbis and students were taken in kidnapping, presumed to clean vehicles and machines, and the heart is bustling, may it be all that the evil one lusts for, that he may be satisfied with such humiliation and not add to the prayer.'
Within the words, the writer describes the entry of the Nazis into Kiizeh, the mistreatment of its Jews, and their brutal deportation. The Nazis arrived at Kiizeh on the second night of Passover, Nisan 16, 1938, and gathered about 52 Jewish souls to the Gestapo station - including his grandfather and grandmother. At that time, the head of the village came to defend some of the Jews because they had never done anything wrong, but the Gestapo did not accept his words and pleaded with him that all Jews are haters of Germany, and as a punishment that gentile was fired from his position as head of the village. He tells how the Nazis took those 52 Jews to the basement and beat them until their screams were heard far away, and tells about one of them - Rabbi Yaakov Shapira Schreiber - a young man who was beaten in front of his wife and children. The next day, the group was transported in trucks to the Czechoslovak border by the Danube River. When they arrived there, the Nazis warned the Jews: "Woe to whoever dares to return to the place you were deported of today...". and describes the cries of grief of the Jews who stood by the river and did not know what would happen to them. Shouts that reached far away. After an unsuccessful escape attempt, the group was taken to a prison in Petar Zhelka near Pressburg. There they were severely beaten. Towards the end of writings, he points out an instructive fact. That despite the difficult situation of his grandfather, who was 75 years old at the time and was one of the same group of Jews who were deported, he overcame his situation to write a letter of greeting to the family, and specifically asked about each family member. Even for himself, who was engaged at the time, he asked for the wellbeing of his fiancée. The writer ends his words with the fact that the deportation of that group of Jews was published the next day in the newspaper headlines. On Passover Hol HaMoed, the Gestapo divided the group into two. One part was transported by truck to the Hungarian border, and the rest were transported back to Kiizeh. And ends his words with a verse from Parshat HaTochecha (Parasha of Rebuking): "And you have become addicted... and there is no buyer...'. It is not clear what happened to his grandfather.
After the Reich regime was instituted in Austria after its annexation (the Anschluss), Nazi ideology prevailed everywhere and the Jews became victims of persecution and forced emigration. Before us a rare and only Documentation of the deportation of 52 Jews from Kiizeh, of which we have found no mention elsewhere.
[5] written pages. Clearly writing. Good condition.
