Good evening, everyone, and welcome. Im rita lerner, a daughter of Holocaust Survivors and trustee of the museum of jewish heritage, a living memorial for the holocaust. It is my pleasure to introduce this special evening. Before we begin tonight i would like to say a few words about the museum. The museum of jewish heritage is the leading New York Institution dedicated to fighting antisemitism and bigotry. For more than 20 years the museum has challenged visitors intellectually, rigorous to understand the ways in which dehumanization of the people can evolve to deeply destructive ends. Engaging with history, people of all ages and backgrounds inherit our mission to never forget and to combat intolerance that endures to this day. If youre interested in receiving any information of Upcoming Events please join our mailing list. A sign in sheet can be found at the admissions desk. I also invite you to become a member of the museums vibrant community. We are honored to have you with us tonight to celebrate the holocaust survivor author max eisen. At 15 he was saved from certain death at auschwitz by a polish physician who employed him as the cleaner in this operating room. Mr. Eisen 2016 memoir by chance alone chronicles remarkable, persistence, liberation and continued healing after miraculously surviving auschwitz. By chance alone received canadas top literary award in 2019. Tonight we celebrate the launch of the books american edition. We have the privilege of hearing mr. Eisen in conversation with the veteran producer of 60 minutes, Shari Finkelstein. Lesley stahl was held up tonight in washington for the impeachment coverage. At the conclusion of two Nights Program we invite you to join mr. Eisen her book signing in the lobby. By chance alone, it is available for purchase in our museum shop. We are honored to be joined tonight by khawar nasim, mark gordon, executive Committee Member of the Usc Shoah Foundation board of councilors, Eli Rubenstein, National Director, march of the living in canada, Phyllis Greenberg heideman, president of international march of the living,. We would like to thank our partners in planning and presenting two Nights Program international march of the living, the counselor general of candidate in new york, Hanover Square press, and the Usc Shoah Foundation. Before we begin please take a moment to silage or cell phones to avoid any disruptions during the program. Thank you. Now please join me in welcoming our first speaker tonight acting Canadian Council general, khawar nasim. [applause] thank you, rita. Gracefully, i was not held up by the impeachment hearings in washington. [laughing] what an incredible honor it is to be a with all of you tonight to pay tribute to a truly remarkable man and an extraordinary canadian, mr. Macks eisen. Since we learned of his incredible story my team at the consulate general has been seek an opportunity to bring out mr. Eisen to new york. I have to say for a man of his age he has a very busy schedule and it was not easy to get him here. Thank you, max, or joining us and thank you to hanover press, Usc Shoah Foundation, the international march of the living and that jewish heritage for bringing max here this evening to tell his story. As a diplomat either to many incarnations. I spent time a lot of time in europe and one of the most memorable opportunities for me as a famine was to visit poland and to travel to auschwitz with my family, with my wife, with my son, and to see and to share with them the tragedies, the horrors and alexi of auschwitz. I am deeply and profoundly inspired by the courage and strength of Holocaust Survivors who, despite the depth of the evil they faced and despite the complexity of their emotions, understand that the holocaust needs to be real for those who were not there. To reconcile the unspeakable horrors of the showa with the enduring faith in humanity. Canada has been profoundly shaped by the approximate 40,000 Holocaust Survivors who resettled in our country after the holocaust. And i must add, candidate has acknowledged the devastating result of her own in action and apathy towards jews in the nazi era. When in 1939 jewish refugees on board the msa those were turned away and for which are primers issued a formal apology in our house of commons in November November 2018. The lessons of the holocaust are clear, but need to be repeated. As Prime Minister trudeau has said, never again is not a phrase. Its a promise, promised to stand up to the dangers of hatred and discrimination and irreversible consequences of inaction and indifference. As a new yorker we know all too well and recent horrific antisemitic attacks right in newark has made all too clear. Hatred has not run its course on this earth. We must be vigilant because we also know is that the modern tools to promote hate are infinitely more sophisticated than radio, newspaper in film. Speaking with my colleagues and learning, i am inspired by the sink and whoever saves a single life save an entire world. And given the Ripple Effect of maxis and using commitment to educate younger generations about the dangers of racism and bigotry, i think we can say by saving max, this surgeon saved much more than one. The opportunity to hear a firsthand account from a survivor is becoming increasingly rare. I am so honored to be with you all here this evening to your macs share his story. I hope we will all leave here tonight with a heightened sense of duty to condemn intolerance and defend human rights in our everyday lives. Please join me in welcoming aviva rajsky, daughter of a holocaust edison you cant tour at toronto congregation have nin. Aviva traveled with mr. Eisen on the 2015 march of the living where she conducted the choir at the Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremony in auschwitz. Aviva will be joined and accompanied by a grammy awardwinning guitarist whose parents were Holocaust Survivors and who lost many members of his family in the holocaust. I think you all and i look forward to a wonderful evening. [applause] good evening. It is such an incredible honor for me to be here this evening and to sing at this wonderful event intricate to max eisen. One of the most remarkable people ive ever met. I had the privilege of traveling with max on the 2015 march of the living when i led the march of the living choir that year. And so this evening i would like to share with you a few of the songs that the students and i sang on that very moving trip. I would like to invite my colleague and different Eli Rubenstein to introduce and give context to the songs that im going to sing. [applause] good evening. The first song were going here is a song called illegally. As she walked along the shores of the medics in sea and land of israel in the 1940s. She was born in hungary in 1921 but because of the fsm and his him she experienced a history emigrated to palestine in 1939 to help build the jewish state. She would return to fight against the nazis but was caught, tortured and executed by the nazis november 7, 1944. She left she left us with remarkable poem whose words remind us of the beauty of nature, the sand and a sikh in the rush of the waters, the thundering of heavens that she was robbed of far too early in her young life. Eli eli. They note [applause] every time we sing the song you like the life with the the march of the living, in the very place where sought to destroy the jewish people we know the spirit, the values, the lessons that life represents continues to live on. And that we were making a statement. Hitler, you did not win. We return your year after year reciting the words of the very people you try to annihilate. Our next song is called and it reflects a similar sentiment of hope and defiant. Defiance. Written in the 12th century, the words express and undying belief that one day retention will come to you meant it. Many jews recited these very words with her last breath before they perished in hitlers gas chambers still believing that a better day would get arrive. [applause] thank you, aviva. It is now my pleasure to invite to the stage mark gordon was in the executive committee of the Usc Shoah Foundation. He will now share with us and innovative joint project between the Usc Shoah Foundation in the march of the living involving the testimony of max eisen. [applause] thank you, eli. A bit of Usc Shoah Foundation im grateful to be here tonight to honor and celebrate max eisen and the release of his memoir here in the u. S. I want to thank our colleagues at hanover press for publishing and making this work so widely available. I want to thank the museum of jewish heritage for hosting tonight event and to the Council General of canada for the long support and involvement. We want to thank the international march of the living for the partnership between the international march of the living and the Usc Shoah Foundation and for including us industry auspicious event tonight. The Usc Shoah Foundation begin working with max and his family in 2019 2019 through this partp with the international march of the living, and together these organizations have a joint project to gather the testament of Holocaust Survivors and a 36e authentic original locations. Together, we are working to fill at least ten survivors as they take us on a journey from their hometowns to the sites of liberation sharing their unique and personal stories in the places where they experienced them. Eventually these testimonies will be deeply integrated into the programs and experiences created by the march of the living. A once vibrant prewar Jewish Community that now exists only through him. This community will not be forgotten thanks to his 360 on location interview and a loving details he so generously included in his memoirs. This is all in addition to the Usc Shoah Foundation having not one but two life history interviews of max in our visual history archive, both record in the the 1990s, once taken by the Usc Shoah Foundation and one filled by the seer and hien newberger Holocaust Education center, both , both accessible h the visual history archive. That testimony is among the 55,000 survivor testimonies that are not accessible or available through over 160 universities and museums on Six Continents around the world and there is of course his booklet which is what we are here to celebrate today. Now, as i understand it max did not always wish to tell his story. In the prologue to the book, he talks about the fact that we first spoke publicly about the holocaust and his experiences at st. Josephs high school in toronto he was very nervous and said he would not do it again. And i think, i think those was very common reaction among survivors at that time. If i may tell a personal story, i, too, i have an uncle max or had an uncle max who survived auschwitz and immigrated to toronto where he built a family and lived a life. I visited my uncle max in the summer of 1990, shortly after maybe a month or two after i had been on a trip to Eastern Europe and i had visited auschwitz. And over dinner i told him my travels and he asked me maybe two or three questions about our shorts and what i had seen there. And after dinner his son, harvey, my cousin who was 34 at the time said to me, you know in my entire life that is the most ive ever heard my father talk about his experiences. And i said, why do you think that is . He said, his attitude is, what would be the point . Who would listen . It would just be complaining to our children, or to my children. So i think we are as individuals all here incredibly indebted frankly to organizations like the Usc Shoah Foundation, like the international march of the living, like the museum of jewish heritage, and organizations like the hanover press who have created outlets or a forum and a structure around hearing and learning the stories of the survivors so that they could be passed down so that we can learn from them and so that hopefully never again. Most importantly of course no, we are indebted to survivors like max who did speak again and again at countless colleges and universities, high schools, public events. I think he has led 21 trips to auschwitz where he is educated both students and adult and shared his experiences in addition to giving his testimony, or to submit and a 360 degrees video with the international march of the living, and, of course, publishing this memoir. I would like to share with you a short video that shows a behind the scenes of our time with max and his son when we filled the 360degree video that will be incorporated into the march of the living is programs. In it you can see the intensity with which max has committed himself to telling this story. Somebody play the video. [applause] now i would like to invite back Eli Rubenstein, the National Director of the march of the living in canada. [applause] thank you, mark. I am honored to be able to introduce the main part of our program, the part we are about to hear from max eisen himself. Ive been traveling with max and the march of the living for well over 20 years and each time continue to be inspired by his courage, wisdom and elegance. I recall in the early 2000s 200s being with max at Queens University near the thousand islands. For a weekend conference training our educators and chaperones traveling with us to poland in the march of the living. As we were building about the reception area of the conference center, a group of queen students passed by if they notice one of our staff was carrying a scroll of the law, the age of five books of moses written by hand on parchment, which jewish people had read publicly for thousands of years. Observing teachers look on the students faces, max patient explained to them what these scrolls represented. He concluded his impromptu speech by informing during holocaust the nazis burned thousands of sacred jewish works just like this for they will get now. He also reminded the students of the code where they burn books, they also burn people. The spellbound students were mesmerized during his short speech and only reluctantly toward themselves way to return to the schools activities. It was at that moment i realize that max was a born teacher, a natural educator with both the desire and ability to share his story and the lessons of holocaust with the most diverse audiences in the most clearest manner. In that moment of teaching as u heard, its something max is replicated countless times as his criss cross canada sharing his sort of love and loss with thousands upon thousands of people for the last 20 or more years. Eli mozilla comes from the same part of europe as max once said something along the following lines. To be jew after holocaust is to have every reason to give up your belief in god, to give up on the jewish people and to abandon your trust in all of humidity. You have every reason to give up your faith in god to give up on the jewish people and to abandon your trust in all humanity but still not to do so. And max like so many other survivors we know perfectly example of eyes that sentiment. Despite having every reason to do so, max did not abandon his faith or give up on community. Instead, he continues to dedicate literally every day of his life around the clock to teaching lessons of the show up to young and old alike so it will never ever happen again. In that effort max reminds us of a quote, if you believe the world can be broken, also believe it can be fixed. If you believe the world can be broken, also believe it can be fixed. So thank you, max kemp from the bottom of all of our hearts for not give in into despair, for t giving up on our world even though you had every reason to do so. Indeed, we are all the better for it. [applause] enema i would like to invite to the stage might teach him my hero, my mentor, max eisen. Max of the edited by Shari Finkelstein of 60 minutes. 60 minutes is going to produce a segment on max his life and share is very familiar with axis story. Max and shari, please. [applause] so i am the substitute. I dont do this for a living so be understand, please. Leslie is really sad not to be here. She is a huge fan of maxes and really wanted to do this and was unable to get on a flight back early enough to be here. So youve got me. So, max, tell us, why do we start by talking a little bit about your life, and why dont we start with the beginning of your life before these horrors. Tell us all a bit about your family, where you lived. I noticed czechoslovakia then became part of hungary but pubr lifelike, your home, your family before the war . Czechoslovakia was a democratic country. We jews have plenty years and czechoslovakia. Our president , we considered him as our grandfather, and i live in a town of about 5000 people. We jews were 10 of the towns population. Approximately 90 jewish families, and i was 99 of the families were traditional orthodox. Jews and, they were Small Business people, farmers. In my town there were two jewish doctors, there was a jewish adventist. A jewish butcher, a baker, and we had a beautiful jewish synagogue, and we had a school, a jewish school. We had a can tour, a rabbi. Its amazing looking at towns in toronto where it gets all the juice squeezed together and this was a beautiful Jewish Community. And i live in a large dwelling my paternal grandparent, uncle and aunt. And many jew