Third Pre-Trip Session 02/20/14

          We are roughly two months away from our departure date and we just completed our third pre-trip session.  To start off the meeting, we read statements and decided if we agreed or disagreed with them.  For example, one of the statements was, “Any criticism of the State of Israel today is antisemetic.”  Most, if not all of us, disagreed with that statement because for instance, a criticism of the Israeli government is not antisemetic.  It is not attacking the Jewish religion; it is commenting on the way the Israeli government operates.

            Al Miller led the second half of the meeting.  He grew up in Germany and was there during the Holocaust, but does not consider himself a survivor because he was never sent to a camp.  He fled Germany and eventually came to the United States, but had he stayed just a few more years, his fate would be much different.  He shared many interesting things with us about Germany.  My favorite story was when Berlin held the 1936 Olympics.  Jesse Owens won many gold medals, but Hitler refused to shake Jesse’s hand because he was black.  Now, many years letter, there is a street in Berlin named Jesse Owens Street.  Al joked, “Hitler would roll over in his grave if he knew.”  We are all realizing and appreciating how special it is to have speakers, like Al Miller and Stephanie Marks, to tell us how things were first hand.