Recommendations of the Editorial team
The dead trousers reacted to the death of Margot Friedländer with a moving statement. The Holocaust survivor and committed contemporary witness died on May 9, 2025 at the age of 103.
The band wrote on Instagram: “We bow to an extraordinary woman. Margot Friedländer, Holocaust-surviving and tireless warnings against hatred and violence died at the age of 103. It was an honor to have met her and got to know her.”
This is how the dead pants got to know Margot Friedländer
The dead trousers and Margot Friedländer met on November 27, 2023 at the solidarity evening “Against silence. Against anti -Semitism” in the Berlin ensemble. In addition to Friedländer and the Toten Hosen, personalities such as Igor Levit, Michel Friedman and Katharina Thalbach also performed at this event. At the time, Friedländer emphasized: “There is no Christian, no Muslim, no Jewish blood. There is only human blood.”
Campino also expressed itself against anti -Semitism and emphasized the importance of engagement against hate. The encounter with Friedländer made a lasting impression on the band.
To the life of Margot Friedländer
Margot Friedländer was born in Berlin on November 5, 1921. After the National Socialists took over in 1933, the persecution of Jews increasingly worsened. In 1943 her mother was arrested by the Gestapo with her younger brother Ralph after he had tried to escape the deportation by escaping. Shortly afterwards the family was deported to Auschwitz and murdered there. Her mother left Margot a note with the words: “Try to make your life.”
Margot Friedländer then dived and lived for 15 months in the Berlin underground – with fake papers, blond -colored hair and at constant risk of being discovered. In April 1944 she was revealed, arrested and finally deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp. There she experienced the liberation from the Red Army in May 1945.
Your fight against forgetting
After the war, she emigrated to the United States in 1946, where she later married her husband Adolf Friedländer, also a survivor of Theresienstadt. The two lived in New York for over 60 years. Only after the death of her husband and the publication of her autobiography “Attempts to make your life” did Margot Friedländer permanently return to Berlin in 2010 – with the declared goal of passing on her story as a contemporary witness and fighting against forgetting.
In numerous schools, memorial sites and public events, she spoke with impressive clarity and warmth about what she had experienced – and always warned of the dangers of hatred, exclusion and indifference. Her voice became one of the most urgent in German -speaking countries.
She was awarded many times for her commitment, including the Federal Cross of Merit first class, the European Citizens ‘Prize, the Beatrice-Stryker Medal and the Honorary Citizens’ Dignity of the State of Berlin. She was still active in old age – with readings, discussions and television appearances, in which she always appeared with her own clarity and dignity.