{"id":31159,"date":"2025-07-02T00:02:10","date_gmt":"2025-07-02T00:02:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/31159\/"},"modified":"2025-07-02T00:02:10","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T00:02:10","slug":"prominent-publisher-of-holocaust-memoirs-speaks-at-rodeph-shalom-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/31159\/","title":{"rendered":"Prominent Publisher of Holocaust Memoirs Speaks at Rodeph Shalom"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Liesbeth Heenk, founder and editor-in-chief of Amsterdam Publishers, which specializes in Holocaust memoirs, speaks at Congregation Rodeph Shalom in Philadelphia. (Photo by Darcy Grabenstein)<\/p>\n

By Darcy Grabenstein<\/p>\n

Antisemitism is on the rise, with a 340 percent increase in incidents globally compared to 2022, making it a \u201cpeak year,\u201d according to a report by the World Zionist Organization and the Jewish Agency for Israel. That\u2019s why Liesbeth Heenk says her work is more important than ever.<\/p>\n

Heenk is the founder and editor-in-chief of Amsterdam Publishers, which specializes in Holocaust memoirs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do believe that Holocaust stories are more important than ever,\u201d she said. \u201cGlobally, the knowledge of the Holocaust is minimal. People don\u2019t know the consequences of what happens if antisemitism goes unchecked.\u201d<\/p>\n

On June 29, Heenk was honored for her work at an event at Congregation Rodeph Shalom in Philadelphia, \u201cStories of Resilience in Times of Crisis.\u201d Echoing the event\u2019s title, Heenk told the crowd: \u201cHolocaust stories are not just about suffering. They are also about resilience, resourcefulness and an astonishing capacity for hope. They are powerful accounts of survival, struggle, strength and the choice to embrace life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Joining Heenk at the event were several of her authors \u2014 Roslyn Bernstein, Nechama Birnbaum, Robin Black, Max Friedman, Evelyn Joseph Grossman, Oren Schneider and Peter Wiesner \u2014 all of whom also participated in the 2025 American Library Association Conference in Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

The Rodeph Shalom event, which happened to coincide with Pride Month, was cosponsored by pRiSm, Rodeph Shalom\u2019s queer connection group; Tikvah, a Philadelphia-area organization devoted to improving the quality of life for adults with mental illness; the Holocaust Awareness Museum and Education Center of Elkins Park; and Sons and Daughters of Holocaust Survivors of Greater Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

\"\"The June 29 event at Rodeph Shalom. (Photo by Marina Zaticeva)<\/p>\n

Heshie Zinman, cochair of pRiSm, noted that other Rodeph Shalom connection groups also supporting the event included RS Women, Israel\/Palestine Discussion Group and Israel ConnectRS. Zinman said another author, Dr. Jake Newsome, spoke at Rodeph Shalom on the Pink Triangle Legacies Project, a grassroots initiative that honors the memory of the Nazis\u2019 queer and trans victims and carries on their legacy by fighting homophobia and transphobia today through education, empowerment and advocacy. Just as the Nazis forced Jews to wear yellow stars, queer and trans individuals were forced to wear pink triangles.<\/p>\n

Amsterdam Publishers will publish in September \u201cUnder the Pink Triangle,\u201d a book by Katie Moore. Although this gay love story is fiction, Moore spent five years on research.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Holocaust was such a huge, devastating event,\u201d she said, \u201cthat I felt I had to get it right.\u201d<\/p>\n

Moore is not Jewish, nor does she identify as LGBTQIA+, which made her ask: \u201cIs it OK for me to tell this story?\u201d She decided, \u201cIt\u2019s about finding the humanity in the story.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like Moore, Heenk is not Jewish. And like Moore, she questioned her authority to publish Holocaust books.<\/p>\n

\u201cWho am I to publish these stories?\u201d she asked herself. As an ally, she said, \u201cI think it\u2019s just as well I\u2019m not Jewish\u2026I\u2019m proudly representing my mainly Jewish authors.\u201d<\/p>\n

Heenk explained how she became interested in publishing Holocaust memoirs. She attributes her passion to her mother\u2019s stories of growing up in Nazi-occupied Holland, helping her family hide\u00a0men from going to the Arbeitseinsatz forced labor camp\u00a0and distributing anti-Nazi pamphlets as part of the Dutch resistance.<\/p>\n

\"\"The June 29 event at Rodeph Shalom. (Photo by Marina Zaticeva)<\/p>\n

One of Amsterdam Publishing\u2019s books, \u201cThe Boy Behind the Door\u201d by David Tabatsky, is being adapted for film. The young-adult book tells the true story of Salomon Kool, a Dutch teenager who escaped the Nazis.<\/p>\n

Wiesner, author of \u201cBipolar Refugee,\u201d lives in Bucks County. The book is about his mother, a child Holocaust survivor who later battled depression and lived with bipolar disorder. As a result, Wiesner and his sister spent time in a Jewish children\u2019s home.<\/p>\n

\u201cI became very independent,\u201d he said. \u201cYou really have no choice when you grow up like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wiesner has shared his mother\u2019s story throughout the greater Philadelphia area, including at Congregation Tifereth Israel in Bensalem, Newtown Friends Meeting and Reform Congregation Keneseth Israel in Elkins Park.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very happy working with a publisher who really gets it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Nechama Birnbaum\u2019s book, \u201cThe Redhead of Auschwitz,\u201d is about her grandmother, Rosie Greenstein. Birnbaum, who teaches creative writing at the Manhattan School for Girls, said her grandmother spoke often about her experiences during the Holocaust.<\/p>\n

At Auschwitz, all prisoners\u2019 heads were shaved, and Greenstein was no exception. Birnbaum said when her grandmother happened to see her reflection in cracked glass she was horrified because her red hair was such a big part of her identity.<\/p>\n

Her redheaded grandmother\u2019s stubborn spirit served her well at Auschwitz, Birnbaum said. When her friends said they were going to heaven, Greenstein would retort: \u201cI\u2019m not going to heaven. I\u2019m going home from here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although Greenstein passed away three years ago, she lived to see her granddaughter\u2019s book. Birnbaum has another book in the works, this time a fictional novel about, coincidentally, a granddaughter with a grandmother who is a Holocaust survivor and Nazi hunter.<\/p>\n

For Max Friedman, author of \u201cPainful Joy,\u201d the research he conducted for his book revealed surprising secrets about his parents who survived the Holocaust. Unlike his father, who he said never talked about his past, his mother talked incessantly about the concentration camps.<\/p>\n

Friedman said his mother would stop people in the street \u2014 everybody she met \u2014 and tell them about the Holocaust. His diminutive mother would grab the person\u2019s arm and not let go until they heard her story.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery evening when I lie in bed,\u201d Heenk said, \u201cI wonder if I\u2019m closer to my goal\u201d of publishing Holocaust books on 6 million people, the number of Jews killed by the Nazis.<\/p>\n

Darcy Grabenstein is a freelance writer. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Liesbeth Heenk, founder and editor-in-chief of Amsterdam Publishers, which specializes in Holocaust memoirs, speaks at Congregation Rodeph Shalom…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":28551,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5132],"tags":[5229,24547,1448,2830,1311,24548,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-31159","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-amsterdam-publishers","10":"tag-pa","11":"tag-pennsylvania","12":"tag-philadelphia","13":"tag-rodeph-shalom","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-united-states-of-america","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","18":"tag-us","19":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31159"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31159\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28551"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}