Exclusive screening of the film “Nobody Told Me” in Johannesburg, South Africa
03.05.2022
The Holocaust and Genocide Centre in Johannesburg organized an exclusive screening of the documentary "Nobody told me" directed by Sean O'Sullivan, based on the story of Wanda Albińska and her brave mother, Dr Halina Rotstein, who was murdered in Treblinka in 1942, after deportation from the Warsaw ghetto.
The screening was attended by, among others Wanda Albińska and Luc Albiński, Stephen Smith, representatives of think-tank and academic circles, the Embassy of the Republic of Poland in Pretoria, the Polish and Jewish diaspora.
Tali Nates, director of the Holocaust & Genocide Centre moderated the event. She also gave an introductory speech on the genesis of the film and talked about the shocking and dramatic experiences of Jewish people imprisoned in the Warsaw ghetto.
The Ambassador of the Republic of Poland to South Africa, Andrzej Kanthak, gave an occasional speech in which he introduced the audience to the history of World War II, occupation, war damage and the suffering of the nation. He spoke about the tragic history of Polish Jews in German-occupied Poland during World War II and the Warsaw ghetto.
After the screening, the participants had the opportunity to share their impressions of the film, and also had the opportunity to talk to the authors of the documentary.
About the film:
Dr Halina Rotstein came from a medical family. She graduated in medicine in 1930. Her daughter, Wanda Albińska, was born on May 11, 1936 in Kutno. In 1940, the German authorities started establishing ghettos for the Jewish population in the occupied Polish territory. It is estimated that there were about 1,000 doctors of Jewish origin in the Warsaw ghetto, including Dr Rotstein with four children. Most of them worked in two hospitals and clinics located there. Conditions in both types of facility worsened week by week due to the huge shortages of medicines and food. Over time, treatment was limited to basic nursing care while hospitals and clinics were gradually closed. Despite all the adversities, Jewish doctors managed to build an efficient health care system, taught medicine in secret courses, and even conducted research. Few of them managed to escape from the ghetto and hide after the so-called the Aryan side. The rest died in the ghetto or in extermination camps. Dr Halina Rotstein, despite the possibility of escaping from the ghetto, stayed with her patients until the end. She gave the documents that would have allowed her to escape to someone else. In 1942, along with 900 patients and 50 employees, she was displaced from the ghetto to the German Nazi death camp and labour camps in Treblinka, where she was murdered. Wanda Albińska and her siblings were successfully smuggled out of the ghetto and taken to a Catholic orphanage. The memories and post-war accounts of the survivors are now the main source that allows us to trace the history of doctors on the example of the fate of the Jewish population in Poland during World War II.
