Inge Deutschkron, who was a Holocaust survivor and hid in Berlin during Third Reich to avoid deportation to Nazi death camps, has passed away. She was 99.
Deutschkron died Wednesday in Berlin, her foundation said in a statement. There was no cause of death.
Inge Deutschkron Foundation released a written statement saying that “a long life of fighting justice and against antisemitic or right-wing tendencies within our society has ended.” “We are losing an aggressive friend.”
Deutschkron was first known to a wider audience in 1978 when she published “I Wore the Yellow Star”, her autobiography about her tragic survival as a Jew living in Berlin. To tell the younger generation of the horrors she suffered under Nazi rule, she visited many schools in her old age.
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier expressed his sadness over Deutschkron’s death.
Steinmeier released a statement saying that Inge Deutschkron’s death fills her with sadness. She also said that she had “rendered outstanding service to our country, and to her country.” We will never forget her.”
Inge Deutschkron refused to leave Germany despite all that she was subjected to by the Germans. Steinmeier stated that she worked tirelessly to make sure we learned the right lessons from the crimes of National Socialism. “She was a contemporan witness and helped preserve the memory of the persecuted, murdered and to form a generation.
Deutschkron was a child of 1922 in Finsterwalde (a small town located about 100 km (60 miles) south-east of Berlin). When she was 5, she moved to Berlin.
Ella, her mother, told Ella when she was 10 years of age that she was Jewish.
Her mother told her to “Don’t give up on anything, fight back,” and that slogan was Deutschkron’s motto for the rest of her life, according to her foundation.
After 1933’s Nazis took power, it became more difficult for Jews to find work. Inge was placed in Otto Weidt’s 1941 brush workshop for blind people. She used forged papers.
Weidt was a supporter of mostly deaf and blind workers, many who were also Jews. Deutschkron was able to avoid deportation thanks to Weidt. Inge was living illegally in Berlin and the surrounding areas since January 1943. She hid with her mother to survive.
According to Germany news agency, dpa, they had to flee from Nazis by moving from hiding place in hiding place — including a former goat shed or a boathouse on Havel river.
She watched as other Jews were forced onto wagons by Nazi secret police at one of her hiding spots.
“That was horrible. You will never forget the guilt. It makes you wonder, “How could you let others go, and you tried hiding,” she later recalled.
During the Holocaust, more than six million European Jews were murdered by the Nazis and their henchmen. Berlin was home to around 120,000 Jews before the Nazi era. By 1945, Berlin’s Jewish population had fallen to 8,000. Many of these people survived hiding.
After many years of hiding and running, Deutschkron finally collapsed after the Soviet Red Army took over the German capital.
In her autobiography, Deutschkron said that she couldn’t rejoice anymore. “We cried for days.”
After the war, Deutschkron moved first to London, then to Tel Aviv to work for Maariv, a daily newspaper. In 2001, she returned to Berlin where she remained until her death.
Details on the funeral arrangements and survivors weren’t immediately available.
