May 15, 2025
“Today is the final day of a week-long commemoration of the Holocaust, known as the Days of Remembrance, established in 1980 by Congress as the country’s annual commemoration of the Holocaust,” said Sheryl Bronkesh, past president of the Phoenix Holocaust Association (PHA), to the crowd of more than 1,000 at Phoenix’s Symphony Hall on April 27. It was the largest audience to attend a Holocaust Remembrance Day program in PHA’s 40-year history.
It was also the 80th anniversary of the ending of World War II and Bronkesh gestured to the local Holocaust survivors sitting on the stage, thanking them for sharing their stories to educate today’s youth.
She stressed the importance “because of the resurgence of antisemitism, which I, the daughter of two Holocaust survivors, never expected to see in my lifetime. As more time passes, public knowledge about the Holocaust diminishes.”
Bronkesh was one of the recipients of the evening’s Shofar Zachor Award for “outstanding contributions to the teaching of the Holocaust and genocide awareness.”
She testified in front of legislative committees for House Bill 2241 to pass, ensuring that students are taught about the Holocaust, and other genocides, at least twice between seventh and 12th grades. She also brought several high-profile public programs to the Valley, chaired the inaugural community advisory board for “Genocide Awareness Week” at Arizona State University and currently co-chairs the content committee for the Hilton Family Holocaust Education Center.
The other individual honored was Heather Roehl, a teacher at Ridgeview College Preparatory High School in San Tan Valley. Roehl is the founder of JourneyThroughtheHolocaust.org, which maps Holocaust survivors’ journeys and is currently pursuing a doctorate in education to create a nationally adaptable curriculum around the Holocaust.
The diverse audience included students and faculty from middle schools, high schools and universities and members of the interfaith community, Arizona legislature and city and state leaders.
Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs spoke to the assembly and referenced Arizona’s Holocaust education requirement. “As our students age and mature, it’s important that they receive an education that fully reflects history,” she said.
The state has also provided $7 million in funding to the Hilton Family Holocaust Education Center.
“This is a demonstration of our shared commitment to making sure these stories are never forgotten,” Hobbs said.
She spoke about the passing of survivor Esther Basch, the “Honey Girl of Auschwitz,” who was scheduled to be the featured speaker at the event, as well as the honor she felt when she met with another survivor, Charlotte Adelman.
“She just turned 93, and it was an honor to host her at my office,” said Hobbs. “She reminded me that we have a responsibility to make sure that nobody forgets what happened and that continued education about the Holocaust is pivotal to honoring the lives that were lost.”
Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego said that she was looking forward to the groundbreaking of the Hilton Family Holocaust Education Center in June. She also said how it came about was unique because it was decided by a public vote.
“I find great hope and inspiration that the people of Phoenix said this is something we want to invest millions of dollars in, and I hope that brings all of our residents a source of light and hopefulness,” she said.
She hopes this renews a commitment to stand up against hate in all forms. “When I was sworn in as Phoenix’s first Jewish woman to serve as mayor, my first official act was to join with the Anti-Defamation League, and partners across all religious faiths, to sign a proclamation and say that we will stand up against hate,” she said. “Proclamations do not solve the great challenges that we are facing right now, but the more we can have these conversations and remember, I think the more we can have a path forward.”
Hanna Zack Miley, whose parents put her on a train as part of Kindertransport on July 24, 1939, shared her story of survival. The train, crowded with children, carried them from Germany, through Holland and across the English Channel to arrive at Liverpool Street station in London, where she was received by a foster family in Coventry.
“Five weeks later, World War II began, I never heard from my parents again,” she said. “I had been rescued, my life saved, but my culture, my language, my parents’ love, a sense of security, all vanished. I took on a new identity; I tried to be a nice British girl.”
It wasn’t until March 27, 2009, while visiting Cologne, Germany, where she was put on the train, that she learned her parents’ fate. They were killed in Chelmno, Poland, on May 3, 1942.
She had a thought to follow her mother and father on their last journey, from beginning to end, which in 2010, brought her to a clearing in a forest two-and-a-half kilometers from Chelmno, next to an excavated incinerator.
“With us are eight close friends. There are 10 of us. We are a minyan,” said Miley. “We have traveled together to say Kaddish for my parents. We have followed them to their last breath in the back of a sealed grey truck, suffocating by a redirected exhaust pipe. They died with so many others on the road from Chelmno to this prepared pit in the forest. We are there on May the third, the anniversary of my parents’ death.”
She wondered aloud, with such a dark story, is there any flicker of hope? And then she said that she lit candles and placed them in the earth at that clearing in the forest, much like “here this evening, our little group, representatives of migrants, will light candles saying, ‘Remember, never forget.’”
Then she added, “How fitting to honor my parents, to remember them, to say their names: Amalie and Markus Zack, here, in this place with you on the 80th anniversary of Yom HaShoah.” JN
