Perrottet to attend Holocaust talk
NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet will make the opening address at Holocaust survivor Eddy Boas' Parliament event.
NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet will deliver the opening address at Eddy Boas’ sold-out Holocaust talk at NSW Parliament House next week.
“From Bergen-Belsen to Sydney” is the extraordinary story of Boas, a child Holocaust survivor, and his family.
Boas was three months old when Germany invaded his home country of the Netherlands on May 10, 1940, and at the age of three he was sent to Bergen-Belsen along with his family.
“I was in the concentration camp between the age of three and five,” Boas told The AJN.
His memories of being in Bergen-Belsen are based on what his mother and older brother told him.
“My father had been in the Dutch cavalry, so he knew horses and in the camp his job was to have a horse and cart and go around picking up the dead bodies,” Boas said.
“We survived because my father had this job. The Germans fed horses better than they fed Jews, so my father was able to steal a carrot here, a potato there, to feed us. My mother used that (food) to get shoes and clothing for us.”
Their story of survival is unique. According to Yad Vashem and Red Cross records, the Boas family of four entered Bergen-Belsen together and, incredibly, emerged after 14 months as an intact family unit.
In 1954 the family moved to Australia. Boas was 14, spoke very little English, and is sure he was “the only Jew at Maroubra Junction High School”.
“There was one Jewish girl in my street, she was also a survivor, but I never mixed much in the Jewish community. I picked up more Jewish friends when I wrote my book, but I give away more copies than I sell.”
Boas is passionate about Holocaust education and his memoir, I’m Not a Victim, I am a Survivor, has enabled him to talk at schools.
“The horrors of the Holocaust I avoid,” Boas said.
“I don’t tell stories that are really horrible, I tell stories like Where did I get shoes from? What did I eat? I didn’t go to school, no one ever read me a story. They can relate to that and that’s the part I feel good about.”
Boas is urging the Jewish community to continue to speak out about antisemitism and says the fact his event is sold out shows there is plenty of interest in the subject.
A number of schools will attend the event, and Sky News journalist Caroline Marcus will conduct “In Conversation with Eddy” followed by the opportunity for the audience to ask him questions directly.
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