In more and more places in Amstelveen you ‘stumble’ over small monuments that have been placed to commemorate Jewish Holocaust victims. Most stumbling blocks are requested by relatives, but researcher Linda Dekhuijzen ensures that victims without relatives also receive a personal monument. “In Judaism you have not died until your name is no longer mentioned.”
Stumbling stones are laid for houses where Jews who died before and during the Second World War lived. It is a project by the German artist Gunter Demnig, who wants to keep the memory of these victims alive throughout Europe.
Anonymously
Amstelveen doctor Linda Dekhuijzen was present at several laying of stumbling stones in Amsterdam. “What struck me is that there are so many more victims who have no surviving relatives and if it is not by chance a resident requests the stone, these people remain anonymous,” she explains.
Dekhuijzen made a list of more than forty names of untrimmed Amstelveen victims and found out where they lived. The municipality of Amstelveen thinks this is a great idea and granted a subsidy for the project. She also reconstructed their life stories as completely as possible from various archives. She shares those stories during the laying of the stumbling stones.
‘It does something to me’
“Feodor Hurwitz and Bertha Hurwitz-Schloss lived here”, researcher Linda Dekhuijzen begins one of the speeches after a lecture at the Oosterhoutlaan. Interested local residents have gathered around the monument. The current residents are also present.
“I myself am of Jewish descent,” says Guy Soesan, who currently lives on Oosterhoutlaan. “So it makes me so happy that these stones were laid in front of our house. Coincidentally, we were talking about who would have lived here during the Second World War around May 4/5.”
The names of those residents are now immortalized in the sidewalk. “Linda has urged me to clean the stones regularly,” Guy says with a laugh. He is going to set up a cleaning pool with the neighborhood, because Guy is proud of the monument in front of his door.
“The current residents have of course not asked for a Second World War and what happened”
But not everyone is waiting for a World War II monument in front of the door, according to resistance from some residents. “I understand that too,” says Linda Dekhuijzen. “The current residents have of course not asked for a Second World War and what happened, so if they say: ‘because of my personal life story or that I want to be free and not burdened by the past’, I understand.”
In the coming period, Linda and the municipality will talk to these residents in order to find a solution. She hopes that all 167 killed Amstelveen Jews will eventually receive a stumbling stone.
In addition to keeping victims ‘alive’, the stumbling blocks also have an educational value. “I think schoolchildren can identify with this much better than with a monument,” says Linda. The stumbling blocks are included in the curriculum of various Amstelveen schools.