VOA新闻杂志2024--245,000 Holocaust Survivors Are Still Alive

245,000 Holocaust¹ Survivors² Are Still Alive

Almost 80 years after the Holocaust, about 245,000 Jewish survivors are still living across more than 90 countries.

A new report found that 49 percent of them are living in Israel. Eighteen percent live in Western Europe, 16 percent in the United States, and 12 percent in countries of the former Soviet³ Union.

The Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, also called the Claims Conference, which is based in New York City, carried out the study.

Before the publication of the report, there were only general estimates about how many Holocaust survivors are still alive.

Their numbers are quickly falling. Most are very old and often in poor health, with a median age of 86. Twenty percent of survivors are older than 90, with more women (61 percent) than men (39 percent) still alive.

The report is called "Holocaust Survivors Worldwide. A Demographic Overview⁴." It says 96 percent of survivors are "child survivors." That means they were born after 1928. Information in the report is based on numbers collected up until August 2023.

"The numbers in this report are interesting, but it is also important to look past the numbers to see the individuals they represent," said Greg Schneider. He is the Claims Conference's executive vice⁵ president.

Six million European Jews and people from other minorities were killed by the Nazis⁶ and their supporters during the Holocaust.

It is not clear exactly how many Jews survived the Holocaust. But their numbers were far smaller than the Jewish population in Europe before World War II. 3.3 million Jews lived in Poland in 1939. Only about 300,000 survived.

About 560,000 Jews lived in Germany in 1933, the year Adolf Hitler came to power. At the end of World War II in 1945, their numbers had fallen to about 15,000 — through emigration and murder.

Germany's Jewish community grew after 1990. More than 215,000 Jewish migrants and their families moved to Germany from countries of the former Soviet Union. Some of them were also survivors. The report said that 14,200 survivors still live in Germany.

One of them is Ruth Winkelmann. She survived by hiding with her mother and sister in a garden shed in northern Berlin. Her father was killed in the Auschwitz death camp. Her younger sister Esther died of illness, hunger, and exhaustion⁷ in March 1945, just weeks before the Soviet Red Army entered Berlin.

Winkelmann is 95 and still lives in Berlin. She said there has not been a day in her life when she did not remember her father.

For its new report, the Claims Conference said it defined Holocaust survivors "based on agreements with the German government in assessing eligibility⁸ for compensation programs."

For Germany, that definition includes all Jews who lived in the country from January 30, 1933, when Hitler came to power, to May 1945. That is when Germany surrendered in World War II.

The group deals with claims for Jews who suffered under the Nazis and negotiates compensation with Germany's finance ministry⁹ every year. Since 1952, the German government has paid more than $90 billion to individuals for suffering and losses resulting from the Nazis.

The Claims Conference has also launched several educational projects to pass on survivors' stories to younger generations.

Gideon Taylor is president of the Claims Conference. He said the data the group gathered "not only tells us how many and where survivors are, it clearly indicates that most survivors are at a period of life where their need for care and services is growing."

"Now is the time to double down on our attention on this waning¹⁰ population. Now is when they need us the most."

Words in This Story

emigration –to leave a country to live somewhere else

shed — n. a small building mainly used for storage

exhaustion — n. a condition of being very tired

eligible¹¹ — adj. to be able the receive or do something

compensate¹² — v. to provide something of value especially for someone's hardship or difficulty

double down — v.to continue to do something in a more determined¹³ way

wane¹⁴ — v. to become less, smaller, or less strong over time

1 holocaust   

n.大破坏；大屠杀

参考例句：

• The Auschwitz concentration camp always remind the world of the holocaust.奥辛威茨集中营总是让世人想起大屠杀。
• Ahmadinejad is denying the holocaust because he's as brutal as Hitler was.内贾德否认大屠杀，因为他像希特勒一样残忍。

2 survivors   

幸存者，残存者，生还者( survivor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The survivors were adrift in a lifeboat for six days. 幸存者在救生艇上漂流了六天。
• survivors clinging to a raft 紧紧抓住救生筏的幸存者

3 Soviet   

adj.苏联的，苏维埃的；n.苏维埃

参考例句：

• Zhukov was a marshal of the former Soviet Union.朱可夫是前苏联的一位元帅。
• Germany began to attack the Soviet Union in 1941.德国在1941年开始进攻苏联。

4 overview   

n.概观，概述

参考例句：

• The opening chapter gives a brief historical overview of transport.第一章是运输史的简要回顾。
• The seminar aims to provide an overview on new media publishing.研讨会旨在综览新兴的媒体出版。

5 vice   

n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的

参考例句：

• He guarded himself against vice.他避免染上坏习惯。
• They are sunk in the depth of vice.他们堕入了罪恶的深渊。

6 Nazis   

n.（德国的）纳粹党员( Nazi的名词复数 )；纳粹主义

参考例句：

• The Nazis worked them over with gun butts. 纳粹分子用枪托毒打他们。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The Nazis were responsible for the mass murder of Jews during World War Ⅱ. 纳粹必须为第二次世界大战中对犹太人的大屠杀负责。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 exhaustion   

n.耗尽枯竭，疲惫，筋疲力尽，竭尽，详尽无遗的论述

参考例句：

• She slept the sleep of exhaustion.她因疲劳而酣睡。
• His exhaustion was obvious when he fell asleep standing.他站着睡着了，显然是太累了。

8 eligibility   

n.合格，资格

参考例句：

• What are the eligibility requirements? 病人被选参加试验的要求是什么？ 来自英汉非文学 - 生命科学 - 回顾与展望
• Eligibility for HINARI access is based on gross national income (GNI). 进入HINARI获取计划是依据国民总收入来评定的。

9 ministry   

n.(政府的)部；牧师

参考例句：

• They sent a deputation to the ministry to complain.他们派了一个代表团到部里投诉。
• We probed the Air Ministry statements.我们调查了空军部的记录。

10 waning   

adj.（月亮）渐亏的，逐渐减弱或变小的n.月亏v.衰落( wane的现在分词 )；（月）亏；变小；变暗淡

参考例句：

• Her enthusiasm for the whole idea was waning rapidly. 她对整个想法的热情迅速冷淡了下来。
• The day is waning and the road is ending. 日暮途穷。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

11 eligible   

adj.有条件被选中的；(尤指婚姻等)合适(意)的

参考例句：

• He is an eligible young man.他是一个合格的年轻人。
• Helen married an eligible bachelor.海伦嫁给了一个中意的单身汉。

12 compensate   

vt.补偿，赔偿；酬报 vi.弥补；补偿；抵消

参考例句：

• She used her good looks to compensate her lack of intelligence. 她利用她漂亮的外表来弥补智力的不足。
• Nothing can compensate for the loss of one's health. 一个人失去了键康是不可弥补的。

13 determined   

adj.坚定的；有决心的

参考例句：

• I have determined on going to Tibet after graduation.我已决定毕业后去西藏。
• He determined to view the rooms behind the office.他决定查看一下办公室后面的房间。

14 wane   

n.衰微，亏缺，变弱；v.变小，亏缺，呈下弦

参考例句：

• The moon is on the wane.月亮渐亏。
• Her enthusiasm for him was beginning to wane.她对他的热情在开始减退。