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In acknowledgement of Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day, MS and US students heard from Gabe B. ’27—his powerful remarks connected his family’s Holocaust history to present-day experiences, emphasizing how small acts of exclusion can grow into harm and the importance of choosing kindness and speaking up.

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Good Morning!

For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Gabe B., a junior here at ÂÌñÉç, and I want to talk to you today about something that isn’t just history to me.

Today is Yom HaShoah, the day of mourning and remembrance for the 6 million Jews that were murdered by the Nazis in the Holocaust.

When most people think of the Holocaust, they think about death camps, violence, and millions of lives lost.  

And although this is true, It didn’t start that way. It started with jokes, with words, with people being treated as if they were different. At first it was jokes about Jewish people—things people brushed off. Then, those ideas turned into discrimination, into laws—laws that separated Jews from the rest of society: Jews couldn’t go to certain schools, public parks, and libraries. They couldn’t own a business, and they were forced to wear stars on their body to show everybody they were different. Step by step, these changes became normal. Hatred didn’t appear all at once. It grew slowly—until people stopped questioning it.

And for my family, this wasn’t just history. It was real life.

My great grandfather, Harry, was just a kid when the Nazis came. His mother tried to protect the children in their community. She had hidden them: orphans who had nowhere else to go. But the Nazis found her. Harry watched them drag her outside. And then, they shot her. He ran towards her, screaming, until his father tackled him, held him down, and pressed a hand over his mouth. Because if he made a sound, they would have killed him too. 

Later, his brother became one of the first partisans, resisting the Nazis from the forest. He would bring in weapons and hide them under Harry’s bed. Imagine that: sleeping every night, knowing that if those were found, it would mean death. At one point, Harry was taken by the head guard at the camp. The guard didn’t know about the weapons, so before they could be found, they were passed out to others in the ghetto. Harry, his brother, and his father were able to escape to the forest. He stayed close to his father, doing everything he could to keep him alive. And somehow, they survived, made it all the way to Italy, and rebuilt their lives from there after the war.

Stories like this feel like they should belong in the past. But the truth is, the way it started—with small acts of exclusion—still happens today.

Last month, men broke into my brother’s fraternity and punched one of his brothers. Not because of anything he did. Just because he was Jewish. My brother called me and my parents after it happened. I didn’t really know what to say. Because what do you say when something that feels like history suddenly shows up at your family’s door?

And when I think about Harry—hiding weapons under his bed, watching his mother get shot, running toward her before his father pulled him back—I realize the distance between then and now isn’t as wide as we’d like to believe. It didn’t start with death camps. It started exactly like this: with people being singled out, with silence from bystanders, with hatred that was allowed to grow because nobody stopped it early enough.

That’s why Yom HaShoah matters. Not just as a day to mourn, but as a reminder that we still have a choice. The same choice people had then. To speak up or stay silent. To include or exclude. To treat someone as a person, or make them feel like they don’t belong.

Most of us will never face what Harry faced. But we will face what the people around him faced. Every time someone is excluded, or mocked, or made to feel different—we feel that pull. The instinct to say something, and the fear of what it costs. That moment is smaller than what Harry lived through. But it’s the same choice.

I know that’s not easy. Speaking up costs something—sometimes your comfort, sometimes a friendship, sometimes more. But kindness isn’t just a feeling—it’s a decision. And sometimes it’s the most important one we make.

In Israel, at 10am on Yom Hashoah, sirens sound for two minutes. Traffic stops. People stand still, together, in silence. Everyone pauses at the same moment to say: we remember, and we take responsibility.

That’s what I’m asking of all of us today. Remember Harry. Remember the six million. And remember that the way we treat each other right now is how we write the next chapter of history.

Thank you.