Who Do You Honor On Holocaust Remembrance Day?

This year Yad Vashem has created a special online "I Honor" event on their Facebook Page to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The virtual event connects people through Facebook to the name and story of a Righteous Among the Nations. People can also post to the Facebook wall and share the names of people they honor, well-known figures like Irena Sendler and others who may not have name recognition but whose intervention literally meant life and death for Jewish people attempting to escape Nazi persecution.

Remarkable courage by ordinary people is what was--and still is-- required to do the right thing in the face of injustice. A Kar-Ben book, Marcel Marceau, Master of Mime, recently named a National Jewish Book Award Finalist and Sydney Taylor Notable Book, honors the little known biography of the famed mime Marcel Marceau. Originally born Marcel Mangel, the son of a kosher butcher, he survived the Nazi occupation and actively aided others as a member of the French Resistance. A talented artist, he forged documents to make children appear younger than they were. He also led children across the border into Switzerland several times, posing as scout troops pretending to be on their way to camp. After Paris was liberated from the Nazis, Marcel joined the Free French Army and served as a liaison to the U.S. forces under General George Patton, all while holding fast to his dream to be a performer.

This International Holocaust Remembrance Day, with its focus on children in the Holocaust, we honor all those to acted righteously, for the reasons Marcel himself once explained:

“Among those kids [killed at Auschwitz] was maybe an Einstein, a Mozart, somebody who [would have] found a cancer drug. That is why we have a great responsibility. Let us love one another.”

Who do you honor on International Holocaust Remembrance Day?