RelatioNet KL NO 26 ST FR
Full Name: Noah Kliger

Interviewer:

Nitzan Erez
Email: nitzan101@yahoo.com
Address: Kfar Saba, Israel.

Survivor:

Code: RelatioNet KL NO 26 ST FR
Family Name: Kliger First Name: Noah Middle Name: Middle Name
Father Name: Father Name Mother Name: Mother Name
Birth Date: 1/01/1925
Town In Holocaust: Strasburg Country In Holocaust: France

Survivor details:

I was born in 1926 in Strasburg, France, to a mother called Ester "Takale" and a father called Avraham Bernard Kliger. I had an older brother called Jonathan, whom my father sent in 1935 to be a rabbi in a Yeshiva in Britain, as he foresaw the anti-Semitic chasings and the war. My parents and I were sent to Auschwitz, the biggest extermination camp of all, and we were the only complete family that survived.
In 1939 we moved from France to Brussels, Belgium, because my father thought Hitler would spare Belgium considering his good relationship with the Belgium king, Leopold the 3rd. This turned out to be a mistake obviously, when the Germens conquered Belgium in the "Blitz" of May 1940.
In 1942 a decree was sent to our house ordering us to come to the train station with minimum equipment, in order to be sent to another area. None of us wanted to go because we didn’t believe that they were really going to send us to "another area", but we were more afraid of what would happen if we didn’t show up considering the Germens had our addresses. We traveled up-state in a train, and we were put in little towns near the city of Genk. In these small towns there were neighborhoods of abandoned houses, in which 2 families lived together. Soon we found out that the Germens were not going to provide us with any heating or food and that we had to manage ourselves. After my parents and I sold everything we had, I found myself a job which allowed me to be able to get back in time for the Germens' orders. I worked in one of the coal mines in the "Andre Dimon" area, in which I worked during the night shifts. After a few weeks my father came up with a new idea. Considering the 9 hours in-between the orders, we could go out of the neighborhood and to the ranches in the area and ask for some food. In order to do this we acquired two pairs of bicycles and we rode hundreds of miles each week. We usually got back with enough "treasure" for us and the neighbors as well. Later on we were transferred to Genk, to a building which was once a hospital. After a while we found that the Germens had already wanted to start the Jewish transports to the east, but for some reason the plan failed and we were left under some sort of "house arrest". While we were In Genk my father met some Polish and Zech men with whom he started a secret organization. They printed and spread papers against the Germen conquerors, they organized help for foreign workers who hid from the Germens, and they even made contact with the Belgium secret organization called The White Brigade- "La Brigade Blanche". Our situation left me with no choice but to be the organization's messenger, even though my father disapproved. Slowly, families began to escape back to Brussels and Antwerp, but as we planned to make such a move my father was captured by the Gestapo on suspicion of running a secret organization. Thanks to his bravery and courage he did not admit to anything and therefore he was not killed, but he was sent to the concentration camp in Rendonk. My mother and I left Genk and moved back to Brussels, where a man who spent many months in the camp with my father tracked us down and told us about his situation. When I heard about my father's bad situation I felt I had to help him in any way I could. I was 15 and still naïve enough to believe that if I sent a letter to the General requesting my father's release – it would work. And so I wrote him a letter in which I explained that my father was innocent and my mother was sick and therefore I asked for mercy. I sent the letter to General Fon Folkenhouzen, the army commander of Belgium and the north of France. After many weeks I got summoned by the Gestapo head quarters about the letter I had sent the General. My mother didn’t want me to go, she was afraid of losing me in addition to my father. I insisted and I convinced her I had to go and talk to the General in order to release my father. I walked into the Gestapo head quarters. I arrived at the front desk and gave the letter. The two Germans that were sitting behind that desk looked at the letter, looked at me, and laughed. "Are you Norbert Kliger?" (Norbert is my name in French). After a series of guards laughing at my young age, I arrived at the General's door. He ordered me to enter. I walked over to the giant table, behind which was a senior S.S. officer sitting and looking at me with amazement: "Are you really the man I ordered to come?" I confirmed, he laughed and asked me to sit. After I sat down he began shouting "How dare you write a letter to the area's superior General and ask for mercy for your father who committed crimes against Germany? I'll teach you a lesson". When he finished, I explained to him that I was still a child, my mother was sick and my father was not a criminal at all. I explained that I thought the Germens would understand my reasons and would spare us. After looking at me for a while, he turned to me in a language I couldn’t understand. When he noticed I didn’t understand him he asked me in German "What, you don’t even understand your people's language, and me, the Germen officer speaks it?" I managed to mumble a little and confirmed, "Yes, it is odd." I replied. Soon he threw me out of his room and as I stood up I politely said "Thank you" and noticed a small a small sign that was on the table saying "Stormben Fuehrer Yoachim Ardman." As I left the building my mother came running towards me from across the street hugging and kissing me. About two weeks after the strange visit at the Gestapo building, I came home one night and I saw my father sitting by the table. He had lost a lot of weight and he was completely bald. The General had accepted my request and had my father released.
Before I had even turned 16, in the spring of 1942, I rode my bicycle from a neighborhood in south of Brussels to the neighborhood I lived in at that time, in the north part of the city. I was coming back from my Jewish friend and we didn’t notice the late hour and the curfew had already started. I didn't panic, and much like on other occasions I took my yellow patch off and started riding home. Considering I didn’t look like a Jew according to the "higher race", I thought that there was no danger. I was riding peacefully when I suddenly noticed the Germens stopping every vehicle and checking every person who was there. I knew that I was in great trouble if I got caught without a patch and after curfew. Although I didn’t know about the extermination camps in Poland yet, I realized I would pay heavily if I got caught. I looked around in order to find some way out, and I noticed a crowd in the center of one of the gardens nearby. I was hoping that by the time the Germens got to me I would find another way out. And so I got through all the people and made it to the front row. I saw a sport's court in front of me on which players were running, but to my surprise the ball was in their hands and not between their legs! That’s how I first met the game of basketball. I had no choice but to follow the game and as a sports man I started understanding the basic rules. And so many minutes passed without the Germens getting to me. Slowly, I also started to enjoy the game, and suddenly I realized that the Germens had left. I stayed until the game was over and as it ended, the home team "La Smaille" won. I was thrilled along with the other fans, though for different reasons. Ever since I have become a great fan of this sport and I take every opportunity to go to games.
In 1942 people began getting letters ordering them to arrive at "Kazern Dosen", in which I spent about 3 months. In the letter it also said to bring blankets, warm clothing and personal equipment because it was a working camp. Therefore, at first people thought that was the case and they followed the orders. In addition, there were postcards from the people who had left in the first transports sending calming and simple messages. I was personally saved from two transports like these thanks to Grife, the camp commander's dog. Grife was a very bright German dog and it seemed as if he understood human language. It was enough to explain to him once or twice what he had to do, and he would do it. The commander kept a professional trainer who worked with the dog a few hours every day. I knew the trainer from another place, and one day he asked me to help him with the dog's training. Obviously I said yes because I thought I might use one of the outings with the dog to escape the camp. And so I began working with the dog, with the approval of the General of course. After about two weeks with Grife, I was again saved from a transport because I was considered "a good Jew". Then, the trainer got ill. He ordered me to continue training the dog because "you mustn’t stop a dog's training in progress because he might forget everything and act wildly." Now, I was the dog's trainer. Every day I left with two guards and Grife to the space between the camp and the train rail, and I worked with him for a few hours. As I was training the dog, I also started to plan my escape. In my outings I noticed that every half an hour an electric train drove along the edge of the camp. As I was working with Grife on the ground, the train blocked the camp for a few seconds, with three cars between us and the camp. After that the problem of the guards still remained. Throughout the time I was lucky that the trainer's health didn’t get any better, and so I stayed longer than expected. The Germens started to get used to me and treated me a lot better. Slowly, I began to go with only one guard, and finally I went out alone as the guards sat in their heated room watching me from the camp tower facing the grounds. All of these things helped me to plan my escape. I decided that I would jump on to the train's first car because the guard's point of view was blocked for a few seconds as the train went by. Until I passed completely, the Germens would take some time to understand what had happened, go down and look for me, and by this time I would be on the street corner hiding somewhere. With Grife there would be no problems, it was clear to me that if I commanded him to sit down and stay he would do as I said and wouldn’t bother me. I set myself a date for the big escape: January 16th 1943, if, of course nothing unusual happened. I which case I would put off the escape for one day. On January 14th, two days before my big escape, there was another transport. Since the Germens had close to 1600 Jews, the normal number, I thought my place in camp was safe for now. But on that day the commander ordered me to come to his office and he let me know with great sorrow that I must go with that transport as well because that time they had to send everybody, without any exception. At dawn on January 15th I was put along with about 60 other Jews into one of the train's cars, which stopped after about three days in Auschwich Birkenau.
In spring time of 1944 I was in the death camp Auschwich Monowich, working for the "Commando 93"- a working unit that made blocks. One day I was transferred by a beating and kicking S.S. guard, from my usual job to another job. Now, I had to push a train car filled with concrete to the working unit that made the blocks. I had a partner, which I first saw when they made us partners. We didn’t introduce ourselves. In the death camps there were no acquaintance ceremonies, a nod was the usual thing to do. We pushed the car together, under the Germens whip, but we didn’t say a word one to the other until the fourth day in which my partner turned to me in a traditional Jewish question: "Where do you come from Jew?" (In Yiddish). I mumbled "From France". He kept asking me questions. "Where in France?" "Strasburg" I answered. I could see that the man was overwhelmed. "I have been there too. What is your name?" he asked. When I told him my name, he stayed quiet for a little while and as I looked at him I saw that he was crying. I asked him what the matter was and he told me that he knew my parents and me, and that he had known me ever since I was a little boy. I asked him for his name. I could see a small grin surfacing his face as he answered: "My name probably won't tell you anything, but I am sure you remember my nickname- Yona's brother". We worked together for several weeks, and one day he just disappeared from the Commando. I met him again two months later. I was very sick and the camp's General decided to transfer me to one of the primitive wooden hospitals in the area, which was of course not a sensible thing to do considering that they usually just killed sick prisoners instead of curing them. Before I got back to work, after I had healed, I was transferred to a recovery shed for three days. On the second day of my staying, the most terrifying word passed among us, "Selection". We faced Dr. Mengale, naked and thin as skeletons, waiting for him to decide our fate with a simple hand movement. In that line I saw Yona's brother again, he stood behind me. I looked around to find a way out, "There's nothing to do, we just need luck" he said. It was my turn to face the Dr. and after the examination he sent me to the right side, the "second chance" side. Yona's brother was sent to the left side. As we stood, him on the left side- the side that went to the gas chambers, and me on the right side- the side that got a "second chance", our eyes met. He seemed to nod his head goodbye and smiled. His name I do not know to this very day.
On January the 18th, when all of the Auschwich camps were released as a result of the Soviet forces, there were two names left on the manifest. One of them was mine. On April 29th 1945 I was released from Raunsbrick camp by the Soviet army. After three months I made It to Paris. Without any hope I searched for my parents, but hope was found again as the miracle occurred. Both of my parents made it back from Auschwich. We were the only family that came back whole from Auschwich.

Town details:

Strasburg
Strasbourg is the capital city of the Alsace region in northeastern France. The citizens are mostly Alsatian-speaking, and are also called Stratisburgum or Strateburgus in Latin, Strossburi in Alsatian and Straßburg in Standard German. Strasbourg was evacuated as early as the 1st of September 1939. The citizens had to leave their houses and their belongings, and they were welcomed in Dordogne and in Indre. . During World War II the city was annexed by Nazi Germany. In October of 1940, most of the Strasbourgeois were resigned to return. After the war, Strasbourg was returned to France, after Anglo-American bombers caused extensive destruction in 1944 in raids of which at least one was allegedly carried out by mistake. The war caused mass destruction in the city, and the American aviation destroyed part of the center of the city in August and September of 1944. On November 23rd 1944 Strasbourg was liberated by General Leclerc, that received authorization from the Americans to attempt to take Strasbourg. Today, the Jewish communities in Strasbourg live in the area near the main synagogue, and they are an integral part of life in the city.