Jizchak Schwersenz

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Memorial plaque on the house, Königstrasse 4B, in Berlin-Wannsee

Jizchak Schwersenz (born May 30, 1915 in Berlin as Hans-Joachim Schwersenz ; † June 1, 2005 there ) was a teacher and a Jewish resistance fighter against National Socialism .

Life

Schwersenz was born the son of Jewish merchants. He had been in the Zionist youth movement since childhood, first in the religious-orthodox youth association Esra , then from the age of thirteen in the Jewish scout association Kadima .

Shortly before graduating from a secondary school, he found himself with a youth group in Holland , where he was surprised by the Nazi seizure of power . Fearing the Gestapo , he stayed in Holland to learn how to grow vegetables for Palestine.

Schwersenz returned from Holland to Germany in 1935 at the request of Josef Burg, the head of the “Association of Religious Pioneers”, and took on leadership roles in Jewish youth groups. He looked after a Jewish youth welfare home in Cologne and, at the same time, attended the Jewish Religious Academy, a former teacher seminar, until the end of 1936.

In January 1937 Schwersenz went to the Jewish rural school home in Herrlingen as a substitute teacher for a teacher on leave . He was enthusiastic about the person of Hugo Rosenthal , the Zionist atmosphere of the institution and the progressive educational spirit of the institution. “As a traditional Jewish person, the efforts to get a modern religious education made a special impression on me.” Rosenthal advised him to leave the school again to go to Berlin, to do the Abitur there and to go to the Jewish one Teacher Training Institute to acquire the teaching qualification for the elementary school.

Schwersenz followed this advice and made up for the Abitur at the Adass-Jisroel-Gymnasium in order to then study at the Jewish Teachers' Training Institute. At the end of February 1939, he passed the teacher examination.

Parallel to school and studies, Schwersenz was active in the organizations of the child and youth Aliyah and in the Zionist scout association Makkabi Hazair from 1938 . In 1939 he became the director of the Youth Alijah School at Choriner Strasse 74 in Berlin. “At the end of 1941, at a joint celebration of Simchat Torah, the last festival of the autumn holidays, Jizchak Schwersenz had the difficult task of informing his students that the deportations were about to begin. When the deportations began, the school closed. However, he succeeded in teaching some of the students in the school's branch, disguised as the 'Wannsee Horticultural School', until 1942. Thereafter all classes for Jews were banned. Both students and teachers were obliged to do forced labor. "

Jizchak Schwersenz worked in the large kitchen of the Jewish community and transported the food to the assembly camps and factories where Jews had to do forced labor. When he was threatened with deportation in August 1942, he went underground at Edith Wolff's urging . In February 1943, the two gathered young Jewish people from his former group of students and the Zionist youth movement to prepare them for a life in illegality. “This group, which will soon have forty members, is called Chug Chaluzi (pioneer group). It is the only known Zionist underground group that exists in this form in Germany and can survive for more than a year. The members are united by the will to 'hold out', to support the deportees in the camps in the east and to try to save themselves by fleeing abroad. "

On February 23, 1944, with the support of Luise Meier and Herbert Strunck , Schwersenz managed to escape from Singen (Hohentwiel) to Schaffhausen in Switzerland ( Singen escape route ). The two escape helpers are later heavily punished for these and other support actions: Herbert Strunck was sentenced to death and executed, Luise Meier was arrested and only freed by the Americans.

Schwersenz was initially imprisoned in Switzerland on suspicion of espionage. However, the Schaffhausen Jewish Community was able to obtain his release. He was sent to a refugee camp near Zurich. In February 1944 he supported Zionist youth groups from there who were working underground in Germany. During his time in exile in Switzerland he was given the name Zick . With the support of Nathan Schwalb , Schwersenz was able to study history, geography and education in Zurich and in this way also leave the refugee camp. After graduating in 1949, he worked as a teacher at the Israelitische Kultusgemeinde Zürich. During his studies he built up the Zionist "Association of Jewish Scouts of Switzerland". From 1946 he looked after orphans of the Shoah .

In 1953 he emigrated to Israel and worked there with the boy scouts . He worked as a teacher and was involved in the German-speaking community in Haifa and in the club of the Jeckes , as the Jewish immigrants from Germany were called. He taught Jewish and Arab young people, so that his house developed into a meeting place for young people of all origins and religions.

In the mid-1970s a German scout group landed with him looking for a place to stay. Initially not very happy about the uninvited visit, Schwersenz perceived these young people as “other Germans”. As a result, German scouts and youth groups visited him again and again. In 1979 he traveled to Berlin at the invitation of the City of Berlin and gave lectures at schools there. He then began lecturing at other German schools. The solidarity with Germany, the "old homeland", and the German language and culture made him return to Germany. From 1991 Jizchak Schwersenz lived in Berlin again.

He was an honorary member of the “Hand in Hand International” association. The VCP tribe in Reutlingen was named after him.

Works

  • Jizchak Schwersenz, Edith Wolff, Shaul Esh: Jewish youth in the underground. A Zionist group in Germany during the Second World War , Meir and Shem-Tov Printing Press, Tel-Aviv, 1969 (?).
  • The hidden group. A Jewish teacher remembers Germany. Berlin 1994. 4th ex. Ed., Wichern, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-88981-122-1
  • Escape from Hohentwiel , in Ferdinand Kroh : David fights. On the Jewish resistance against Hitler. Rowohlt, Hamburg 1988, ISBN 349915644X , pp. 126-142
  • Moderate religious education , in: Lucie Schachne: Education for spiritual resistance: The Jewish country school home in Herrlingen 1933–1939 , dipa-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1986, ISBN 3-7638-0509-5 , pp. 119–120.

literature

  • Gregor Pelger: Between the homes. Jizchak Schwersenz, a German-Israeli educator, in Kalonymos , no . 3, 18th year 2015, pp. 1–4
  • Alfred Georg Frei: From Singen to Switzerland. The cinematic reconstruction of Jizchak Schwersenz's escape and the post-history of National Socialism , in: House of History Baden-Württemberg (ed.): Helfer im Verborgenen. Savior of Jewish People in Southwest Germany , Laupheim Talks 2009, Universitätsverlag Winter, Heidelberg, 2012, ISBN 978-3-8253-6048-1 , pp. 79–91.
  • Wilfried Löhken and Werner Vathke (eds.): Jews in resistance. Three groups between the struggle for survival and political action, Berlin 1939-1945 , Edition Hentrich, Berlin 1993, ISBN 978-3-89468-068-8

Movie

  • From Singen to Switzerland - the reconstruction of the escape by Jizchak Schwersenz , a film by Alexander Krause and Peter Peters, Germany 1987.
  • Should I stay or should I go? Jizchak Schwersenz , a film by Andrea Schmeltzer and Christian Gramstadt, Germany 1991.

Web links

Commons : Jizchak Schwersenz  - collection of images, videos and audio files


Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Jizchak Schwersenz biography in the German Resistance Memorial Center
  2. ↑ a b c Moderate religious education , in: Lucie Schachne: Education for spiritual resistance , pp. 119-120
  3. ↑ In the text Modern-Religious Education (see below) Schwersenz speaks only "of the federal government", while in the biography on the GWD side it says that he was "from the federal management of the Zionist world organization Hechaluz (The Pioneer) [..] recalled to Germany ”.
  4. ↑ For the history of this Berlin Jewish teacher training institute see: Jörgh H. Fehrs: Von der Heidenreutergasse zum Roseneck. Jewish Schools in Berlin 1712-1942 , Edition Hentrich, Berlin 1993, ISBN 3-89468-075-X , pp. 207-208
  5. ↑ The History of the Adass Yisroel High School
  6. ^ Jewish Boy Scouts: Freedom versus Hitler Youth
  7. ↑ Biography of Jizchak Schwersenz in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
  8. ^ Exhibition of the youth history workshop about Jizchak Schwersenz
  9. ↑ In an article from November 7, 1986, the Stuttgarter Zeitung Zeitung reported on how Schwersenz had previously followed this route of his escape again. Another Jew on his way to escape. 42 years ago from Berlin via Singen to Switzerland - The horror catches up with the old man ...
  10. ↑ The story is documented in the essay by Alfred Georg Frei: Von Singen in die Schweiz . The book by the authors Gad Beck and Frank Heibert also reports on Herbert Strunck's escape and other rescue operations: An underground life. The memoirs of a gay Jew in Nazi Berlin , The University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, 1999, ISBN 9780299165000 , pp. 109-112
personal data
SURNAME Schwersenz, Jizchak
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Schwersenz, Hans-Joachim
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German teachers and resistance fighters against National Socialism
DATE OF BIRTH May 30, 1915
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH June 1, 2005
Place of death Berlin