Meinezirk.at, February 12, 2020

German original: https://www.meinbezirk.at/guessing/c-lokales/guessinger-schueler-hielten-holocaust-gedenken-hoch_a3912051

Some 100,000 were killed by the Nazis in the Mauthausen concentration camp, which was liberated on this day 75 years ago. In order to make the horrors comprehensible for today’s generation, the Gymnasium (High school) Güssing and the HBLA Güssing (École) joined the initiative “Talking About It.”

“Looking away is worse than the hate,” appealed Barbara Glück, head of the Mauthausen Memorial Site during a discussion with with youths from both schools. The events that took place in the concentration camp have been empirically documented since the 1980s, including the collection of memories of contemporary witnesses. A traveling exhibition that was shown at Güssing’s School Center and will soon travel to Markt Allhau, offers youths insights into Mauthausen’s death machine and its historical background.

The National Socialists in the Burgenland were not only after killing the Jewish population, but also after destroying houses, synagogues and cemeteries, the historian Gerald Lamprecht reminded during discussion at the school. “It was about completely erasing any memory of the Jews.” He also recalled the destruction of gypsy settlements by the Nazis in many places in the Burgenland.