Kámen na mém srdci - O přežití holokaustu a dalším životě v Německu – Birnbaum Shlomo (2017)

This moving Czech-language memoir documents survival and life in the country of the former enemies. Shlomo Birnbaum, born in 1927, grows up in an Orthodox Jewish family in Częstochowa, Poland. After the Nazis invade Poland in September 1939, his family is moved into a ghetto where daily life is marked by death and fear. He witnesses his mother being sent to her death and his siblings being killed, and loses his faith. Shlomo survives together with his father, who repeatedly saves his life. After his supposed rescue, he is forced to perform slave labor in an armaments factory, and after the war he again encounters murderous hatred of Jews, this time from the Polish side. Eventually, Shlomo and his father, Aryeh, flee to the country they never wanted to enter: Germany. In Munich, Shlomo starts a family, has four children, becomes a businessman and finds friends. Although he can never completely close the past, he manages to build a new life that he once considered impossible. Rafael Seligmann, born in Tel Aviv in 1947, is one of the best-known Jewish writers living in Germany, and has written numerous books, commented on current events for various media and served as publisher of Jewish Voice from Germany.