28 minute read
Seeing Hashem’s Guiding Hand
Advertisement
Dr. Moshe Katz Lived to Tell His Story
BY TAMMY MARK
Dr. Katz with the brush that helped him survive
“I’m not a Holocaust survivor per se, like everybody else. It’s one in a million how it happened.”
To hear his inspiring stories of survival and success, it is evident that Dr. Moshe Katz lived through the war not only to tell the story to the world but to help secure a future for generations to come. Speaking with the soft-spoken nonagenarian, he shares his astonishing anecdotes in the most matter-of-fact way, attributing his survival largely to Providence. From the stories he relates, it is clear that the Katz family was no ordinary family, and the tenacious and brave Moshe Katz is particularly extraordinary.
Dr. Katz lives in LawDr. Katz lives in Lawrence, New York, in the cenrence, New York, in the center of the Five Towns-Far ter of the Five Towns-Far Rockaway region that he helped foster into the vibrant Jewish community it is today. He received his degree in Holocaust and Jewish studies and is an historian who can discuss every aspect of the ear and each country’s involvement in the war, his bookshelves filled with books on World War II. Dr. Katz has even studied books about Adolf Hitler himself, in an attempt to possibly comprehend the incomprehensible.
Dr. Katz differentiates himself from those who survived the atrocities of the concentration camps and those who endured the devastation and hardships of life in war-torn Europe. Though he was spared from the camps, he had to hide his Jewish identity to survive.
“I wasn’t hiding; I was working as a Christian working in different places, but I never had to hide,” he says. “I was working in different places – on a farm, in a supermarket, a garage – I got jobs all over. I had to run from one place to another, changing my name a few times, until finally I was liberated by finally I was liberated by the Russian army.” the Russian army.”
The cover of Dr. Katz’s book. Moshe, Yankel, Surly, Josef, Louse, Sonny, Manca, Chana and Terry are depicted in the photo
History to Share
Of the ten Katz siblings, nine survived the war. Moshe Katz chronicles his journey in his 2006 biography Nine out of Ten, which he dedicated to his beloved parents, Chaya and Chaim, his adored older brother Pinchas, and his wife and daughters, his
aunts, uncles, hundreds of cousins and his revered rebbes and the six million souls who were murdered, as well as to the Righteous Gentiles who risked their own lives to save his. He estimates that over 200 members of his extended family perished in the camps. Written with the help of Nachman Seltzer, Dr. Katz’s book tells of life before, during and after the ghetto, and the numerous dangerous encounters and miraculous escapes he and his siblings experienced. As a young man before the war, Katz made a pact with his friends that if they lived to tell the story, they would. He was the sole survivor of his group, yet he couldn’t keep his word to tell his story for decades – sadly because nobody wanted to hear it. Dr. Katz explains that in the first years after the war, survivors were often dissuaded from sharing the atrocities, even among fellow Jews. It wasn’t until May 1960 that the horrific history became newsworthy. Adolf Eichmann, the architect of the “Final Solution” who had sent half a million Hungarian Jews to death in Auschwitz, was hunted down and captured in Argentina and brought to Israel to be tried lings, nine survived the for his crimes. Dr. Katz was determined to be war. Moshe Katz chron- there to watch it happen. The ever-resourceicles his journey in his ful survivor managed to procure a pass for the 2006 biography trial’s opening day. He praised G-d for the opof Ten portunity to see the vile Eichmann locked in to his beloved parents, Cha- a cage. When Dr. Katz returned home to the ya and Chaim, his adored States, people were ready to listen. older brother Pinchas, and Finally finding an interested audience, Dr. his wife and daughters, his Katz began chronicling his experiences by
writing “My Mission” in the Hamodia publication. He later went on to present his story to students of all demographics for the next several decades, even switching to Zoom when the live events were paused during the Covid pandemic.
A Family with a Mission
Moshe was the eighth child in his devout Jewish family. His father, Chaim, originated from Poland and his mother Chaya from Hungary; they raised their family in an idyllic existence in the Czechoslovakian city of Uzhorod. They were relatives of the Belzer rabbinic dynasty, and Torah permeated their lives. Chaim made a living as a brush maker and was highly regarded as an entrepreneur, baal chessed, and enthusiastic scholar. Chaya
was a generous pillar of chessed herself, and their home was always filled with guests. They selflessly provided for others however they could – cooking for weddings and providing resources and care to their community until the end. The Katz children were imbued with a sense of familial and communal responsibility from their earliest days.
Once Hungary took over the region and the winds of war blew in, life as they knew it had changed. The whole family learned aspects of the family brush business, with Moshe receiving extensive business training mandated through the government. The Katzes began to prepare Hungarian documents for Jewish refugees. Though they were under constant scrutiny by the government, enduring beatings and other hardships, the family remained steadfast and intact as long as possible, surviving longer than most Jewish families.
Though the Hungarian Jews were not taken to the concentration camps until the final years of the war, they faced equally horrible fates as their fellow Jews. The terror began with detainments and roundups, and eventually gave way to deportation and death.
“In spite of the newspapers and the radio, we never heard about Auschwitz – never, never, never,” explains Dr. Katz. “You weren’t allowed to listen to a foreign broadcast and the only way we would have found out would be listening to English stations from London. They had a way to find out who had a radio, and if you listened to a foreign broadcast, you were a spy. Even if you weren’t Jewish, you were eliminated.”
Dr. Katz relates the atmosphere on the streets. “Three people walking on the street – they were eliminated for conspiring – only two could walk, even non-Jews. This was a law. They called them conspirators – because what else do you have to talk about except the war? This was their mentality.” He adds, “The police had one thing in mind – catching a Jew.”
In March of 1944 Germany occupied Hungary, and the Nazi troops imposed harsh restrictions on the Jews, including curfews and the wearing of yellow stars. In April, the deportations began. Realizing deportation was imminent, Chaya and Chaim Katz made plans to disperse their family, sending each one in a different direction and keeping only their youngest, Yisroel “Sruly,” with them. Moshe was sent off last, specifically armed with emphatic directives to keep Shabbos and kosher until the end – Chaya told him that he would surely survive if he did. His parents were taken to Auschwitz by June 1944.
began to
Moshe when he was 18 each one in a different direction and keeping only their youngest, Yisroel “Sruly,” with them. Moshe was sent off last, specifically armed with emphatic directives to keep Shabbos and kosher until the end – Chaya told him that he would surely survive if he did. His parents were taken to Auschwitz by June 1944.
Moshe and Leah, a’h, with some of their descendants
On Their Own
Each of the Katz siblings forged their siblings forged their own journey. Most own journey. Most survived by working survived by working under gentile aliases. under gentile aliases. The Katzes were a The Katzes were a resourceful and determined family and well regarded wherever they went. They tried to stay in touch as much as possible throughout the war and took every opportunity to help one another whenever possible. whenever possible. Moshe ended up working on a farm. His working on a farm. His brother, Sonny, hid with brother, Sonny, hid with 19 others in an unHiding as a gentile at age 20 a gentile at age 20 derground wine cellar wine cellar not too far away. Moshe Katz attributes his survival to luck and his constant conversations and pleadings with G-d.
“I have more luck than anybody else,” he shares. “You could imagine that in Europe life was different than here. I was 20 years old, and I never made a decision in my life. Whatever my parents told me, that’s what it was – there was no ‘but, if, or how.’ It was like an order from the king. So when I left home and I had to make my own decisions – and it’s not because I was smart – I was lucky with all the things that I did.
“For instance, I worked on a farm where only the manager knew I was Jewish, of all of the workers – nobody knew. Not far from there was a wine cellar in the mountain hiding 20 Jews, and hiding there was one of my younger brothers.”
Though luck may have played a big part, his resourcefulness can’t be overlooked. Dr. Katz shares how he snuck bread and whatever else he could to Sonny and to the others and attempted to boost their morale as well. On one of the last visits, Moshe brought vegetables to cook soup for them. He put nails on the table in four corners, put the pot on top of the nails and placed candles underneath. “We cooked a soup – it took five hours – but you should see how happy they were!”
Moshe eventually smuggled Sonny and family friend Rivka out of the hiding spot right before the group was discovered. Rivka experienced her own miracles and narrowly escaped death to survive and raise a Jewish family.
After that near-death encounter, Moshe and Sonny stayed together. They were in touch with their sister, Chana, who was not too far away.
“We never wanted to be in one place with more than one or two of us,” Dr. Katz recalls. “We had a signal if somebody wanted to bring a message – the secret signal was ‘brush.’ If somebody approached any of the Katz siblings and said ‘brush,’ they knew they could trust them.
“In fact, it was one of the brushes that my sister sent me when I was on the farm, and she hired a Nazi soldier to pick me up with my younger brother and brought me to the capital city.”
Dr. Katz still has that very brush with the secret compartment.
“As soon as he showed me the brush, I was able to talk to him, and trust him and there was hidden money in there – and this is how we communicated through the signal of a brush. She helped me with the papers and, somehow or another, we survived.”
He remembers, “I had all kinds of jobs. One of the most important jobs was working in a German garage with a Nazi insignia on the label of the uniform. I was a king of kings for six weeks. Then they became suspicious of somebody, and they were examining everybody, and then I had to disappear from there – throw away my IDs and everything and start a new life.”
Moshe was 20 years old and experienced one of his first feelings of helplessness.
Fortunately, Chana helped procure new papers again, and Moshe procured a job in the supermarket.
Traveling together, Moshe and Sonny narrowly escaped danger so many times, yet not much deterred them from trying to help others when they could.
Along the way, the brothers encountered two children walking alone together, distant cousins who were now orphans. Moshe arranged for them to be taken care of in a monastery. He and Sonny would visit them as often as possible in attempts to ensure they remembered their Jewish identities, until it became too risky that they would all be exposed.
It was October of 1944, and the last months of the war proved to be some of the bloodiest, as the Hungarian Arrow Cross soldiers were determined to destroy the remaining Jews. By November, the Jewish men were deported to camps. Moshe had some immunity by working in the supermarket, and he and Sonny managed to stay out of sight and dodged several close calls. They witnessed the unfathomable horror of young Jewish children being dumped and drowned in the Danube River. This massacre continued for several days. A reported 20,000 children were killed, their blood flowing through the river.
“For them, it was more important to kill a Jew than win the war, because they were busy up until the end catching Jews,” Dr. Katz notes. “They didn’t mind using 10 soldiers in catching one Jew. That was their aim.” Mercifully, there were some heroic rescue efforts at the time, like those of Raoul Wallenberg, who rescued tens of thousands of Jews by issuing Swedish passports to them. “Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t work; nobody was sure until the last minute,” says Dr. Katz. By December, the brothers got word that the Russians were coming. Chana soon directed them to relocate move from Buda to Pest. “I was living on the other side of the Danube River, where very little Jews were,” Dr. Katz recalls. “My sister let me know that the Russians would come only on this side of the river and then they would stop, so I moved myself to the other side of the river. Since I was working at that time in a supermarket, I brought along a lot of canned stuff which nobody could get, even with tickets from the government – it wasn’t available. When you moved into an apartment you had to register with the super, and on every block, there was an investigator. You had to register with them to make sure you’re not a spy, you’re not a Jew, and that I couldn’t do – I would never have passed. I was putting out a few cans and the conversation was on the food…luckily, we survived there. Somehow we survived.”
somebody, and they were ings of helplessChana helped procure new papers again, and the last minute,” says Dr. Katz. brothers got word that the Russians were coming. Chana soon directed them to relocate move from Buda to Pest. other side of the Danube River, where very little Jews were,” Dr. Katz recalls. “My sister let me
Dr. Katz with his wife Hindy in front of his extensive library soldiers in catching one Jew. That was their aim.” some heroic rescue efforts at the time, like those of Raoul Wallenberg, who rescued tens of thousands of Jews by issuing Swedish
Moshe and Hindy with sister Chana
Picking Up the Pieces
In January 1945, the Russians had liberated the city. The Germans disappeared, and Hungarian Arrow Cross officers were obsolete.
“When the Russians came in at least we identified ourselves as Jews, and they were friendly,” Dr. Katz says. “They gave us bread and everything. They trusted the Jews, but they didn’t trust the population. They knew the Jews were oppressed by the Germans and by the Hungarians and by the Romanians – everybody hated the Jew.”
Moshe was looking for work and eventually ended up at the Russian military headquarters. He had a gift for languages, having been exposed to populations of Hungarians, Czechs and Russians. He became friendly with a few soldiers and eventually got a job translator and was given permission to move about the region freely. They supplied him with bread and other food, and Moshe and Sonny were able to join up with Chana and Terry.
The Russian officers tried their best to convince him to give up his religion but Moshe never relented, doing his utmost to keep his mother’s entreaties and holding onto a small set of tefillin and one string of tzitzis.
After a while, Moshe decided it was time to take leave once again.
The Katz siblings were determined to visit their home. Dr. Katz explains how his Czecho-
Dr. Moshe Katz with some of his brothers and some of their descendants
slovakian hometown city of Uzhorod was taken over several times in his lifetime: when he was born, it was Czechoslovakia; then Hungary invaded the region; then Russia came and took over; when Russia collapsed, Ukraine took over. It was once called Ungvar and today Uzgorod; his passport now says he was born in Ukraine.
When they finally arrived at their childhood home, the Katz siblings found it completely ransacked with barely a wall left standing. At this point, nobody realized the true extent of the destruction of the war and human devastation that had occurred.
The Russian communist government was taking hold in the city. Soon enough, the warnings came once again that it was time for Moshe to leave town, before he could be arrested, however, this time not for being a Jew. Ironically, as a former factory owner, he now risked arrest and deportation to Siberia as a capitalist.
Moshe was now 21, and he led a group of 20 people – his brother and 18 teenage boys and girls who had all lost their parents. He managed to get two oxen and a driver to deliver them to the international train station with a plan to leave Russia for Romania. They then boarded a train to Grosswardein, where the Vizhnitzer Rebbe and some of his chassidim had already established a shul. Upon arrival in Romania, the police informed the group that if they could find an apartment that was previously Jewish-owned they would evict the current residents. They found a place with six bedrooms to accommodate them, and the police kept their word. They then went to the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, and the organization promptly delivered beds, dishes and food and supplied the group with everything they would need for the apartment.
Each day brought new survivors to town, recalls Dr. Katz.
“Little by little, the Jews started to come back. My younger brother Sruly found out where I was. He came from Auschwitz. One Saturday morning, he knocked on the door. I didn’t recognize him. He came without hair, with two different shoes, with an American soldier’s jacket…”
Sruly had endured Auschwitz, suffering from the loss of his parents and later his brother Pinchas on the Death March. He came searching for Moshe after the liberation. The Katz family was slowly regrouping.
Sister Manca was nearby but was determined to track down their brother Louie, who had initially escaped town and passed for some time as a gentile brush maker. He ended up in Theresienstadt labor camp; Louie was tortured and left weak as an infant. Manca nursed him back to health.
“Then I met my oldest brother Eugene, Yankel, on the street,” Dr. Katz remembers. “Suddenly, a Jewish restaurant opened up in our city. We didn’t see a restaurant or a Jew for so long. It was advertised all over the region, and suddenly all the refugees and everybody came waiting for it to open. We were walking and he was also walking, and I didn’t recognize him. He smiled, but the way he was dressed, we were very uncomfortable – we were afraid even to touch people because they had lice. Then he smiled and walked over. At home, he was like an aristocrat – he had a fur coat and white shirts, black tie, a hat – he looked like a king, and now he looked like a beggar…”
It turned out that after being initially sent away by his parents before the deportations, Yankel, too, had eventually been caught and taken to Auschwitz.
Moshe had been acting as the eldest until this point, but his oldest brother now took the responsibility. Life started to feel a bit normal for the family. They soon understood how fortunate their family was to have each other amongst so much loss.
Soon enough, Romania was also taken over by the communists. The prior government was full of Jews; when the communists came in, they hanged them all. The group moved on to Prague, and Moshe helped them get settled. He continued to assist the incoming Jewish refugees however he could.
He shares, “Now we needed new papers again. The law was if you find your teacher from school, you could get papers and become a citizen. I found my teacher and he gave me a letter, and I got a passport and papers in Prague.”
Luck and resourcefulness kept Dr. Katz alive.
In December of 1945, Moshe received a letter from his brother Joe who had escaped through Switzerland. The Katz siblings set off for their next reunion.
“In France, I had a brother who had survived. He already had an apartment, he was in business and he took care of all his siblings in a one bedroom apartment – we were lying on the floor.” Joe was doing well for himself – he wore custom monogrammed shirts and tailored suits, and he gave them everything they needed.
There was not much religious Jewish life in Paris, and there was an almost two-hour walk to the synagogue.
“We had to get back to Jewish life,” Dr. Katz says.
The only answer for them was in America. But the United States wouldn’t let them in because the quota from Czechoslovakia was at a 6-8 years wait. Fortunately, they had an uncle living in the States who was able to secure papers for the three brothers, Moshe, Sonny and Sruly, as students.
In 1947, a Danish freighter set sail for two weeks landing at Ellis Island. Moshe was 23 when he came to America. He met his first wife Leah Rosenfeld, a”h, an American girl who married him despite him being “a greener” immigrant.
Leah and Moshe settled in Manhattan’s Upper West Side at a cousin’s apartment, along with Moshe’s two brothers. He started working in real estate with his uncle who was in the business. Moshe Katz was extremely successful in his new country; he landed on
mania, the police informed the group that if they could find an apartment that was previously Jewish-owned they would evict the current residents. They found a place with six bedrooms to accommodate them, and
the pages of the financial section of The New York Times as the youngest man in real estate to purchase a building. By age 24, he had resold that building for a large profit. Dr. Katz went on to manage various properties and continued working up until last February.
Moshe had purchased a small supermarket in the Bronx for his brothers to work in. They were the only ones closed on Saturday – not an easy feat since there were “blue laws” in effect at the time mandating closure on Sundays. The Katz family held their ground and eventually managed to pave their own way. They later started a new business importing electronics and grew it into a very big company. Moshe had many of his siblings working alongside him throughout the years.
The other Katz siblings were spread all over the world. Chana got married in Romania in the summer of 1945 – the first Jewish wedding after the war. One sister got married in Paris, and the youngest sister married a Swiss man and remained in Switzerland throughout her life.
Sruly was drafted to the U.S. Army. He was sent to Germany and was stationed in Nuremberg, a mere 10 years after he was in the German concentration camp.
“I went to visit him there…it was pretty hard,” Dr. Katz acknowledged.
Moshe was caretaking as always, and he was always focused on religion. He wanted to make sure Sruly didn’t bring back a German bride like many soldiers did. Sruly got married in Antwerp in the early ‘50s – it was a huge joy to have all of the surviving Katz siblings celebrating together for the first time.
“The rest is history,” Dr. Katz quips.
A Pillar of the Community
Leah and Moshe moved to Far Rockaway in 1954 and then to Lawrence in 1965. They had three daughters. They first davened at Rabbi Rubin’s Sulitza shul and then the Agudah on Sage Street. When the Katzes landed in Far Rockaway, the only yeshiva in the area was the Hebrew Institute of Long Island (HILI), a coed day school. Dr. Katz was determined to create more yeshiva options for Jewish families.
Dr. Katz got busy, working to help found the Yeshiva of South Shore and eventually Torah Academy for Girls. Though his first wish was to try to establish a girls’ school for his daughters, he didn’t have enough fami- lies who were interested. He focused his efforts on the boys’ yeshiva and held the inaugural meeting in his house.
He recalls, “I got $500 from seven people including me, so we had $3,500 – at time it was a lot of money.”
There were plenty of skeptics but Dr. Katz was resolute.
“I said by hook or crook there will be one.”
He went to Brooklyn to seek out Rav Binyamin Kamenetzky, zt”l, to convince him to lead the new yeshiva. They finally started out on Oak Street in Woodmere, with a girls’ school up the block. Eventually, the schools separated and both became thriving Torah institutions in their own right.
Jewish life in the areas continued to proliferate. Little by little, restaurants opened and more people moved here – schools and shuls sprouted and grew. Many people moved from Brooklyn since there was an eruv, which was a draw for young families to be able to bring children to shul. Dr. Katz had succeeded in contributing to Jewish life and continuing his family’s legacy.
Dr. Katz has countless other stories to tell. He helped people through the years whenever and however he could. He also stayed in touch with and helped support the Righteous Gentiles who had helped hide him through the war. He would send them his own daughters’ dresses later on from the States. He even provided materials for the families to start their own business, though it wasn’t simple for them to get on their feet.
Dr. Katz explains, “Under communism, people grew up dependent on the government for everything. You got married; ten years later, you’re entitled to get an apartment. You couldn’t hold on to two jobs because then you’d be becoming ‘a different person.’ So when communism ended, I send them a box of material for making blouses or skirts. The blouses were ready, and they didn’t know what to charge. They had no idea – I told them to go look in a department store and if they sell for $10, you sell for $7. They had no idea how to go into business – or how to think. They had no idea. The whole family had only worked as conductors or engineers for the railroad.”
Everyone had thought the successful “American Jew” would forget them, but Moshe Katz never did.
Leah passed away 23 years ago, and Dr. Katz is remarried to Hindy Diskind. Dr. Katz’s youngest daughter Debbie still lives nearby; the other two daughters are in Flatbush. He proudly shares that under him, from his three daughters, he has over a hundred descendants. His great-grandchildren are getting married now. He missed three weddings during the Covid period but he recently began attending simchos again and is blessed to say he has several more coming up in weeks ahead.
“I’m in touch with all of them – I know all their names,” he says. “One grandchild lives right here and she comes every day.” He wishes he could wake up Hitler just to show him…
Today, in his late 90’s, Dr. Katz admits it’s getting harder and harder to get out and around, but he thanks G-d for his children and that somebody is always here for him.
Dr. Moshe Katz is one of the last of his siblings still alive, along with youngest brother Sruly. Sonny died this past year, and Louie passed away a few years back at the age of 102.
Moshe is the only one of the Katz siblings who would speak about the Holocaust.
“I’m doing this for 40 years,” he says. “I taught for 30 years in one school here in Yeshiva of Far Rockaway and in TAG for maybe 10 years, and I’m still president at TAG.”
Dr. Katz also speaks in public schools to minority students, telling them that we can all fight bigotry together.
“We are not their enemies,” he tells them. “We both have to fight the same enemies.”
Dr. Katz’s story is far from over, but his biography close with these powerful words:
“Hitler’s aim was to wipe us out. My answer to him is to build future generations.”
Moshe and Hindy at a Hindy at a Names Not Names Not Numbers Numbers event at HALB event at HALB Elementary Elementary
$7. They had no idea how to
