"How My Brother and I Celebrated Bar and Bat Mitzvahs During the Holocaust"

Bella Shaffer was born in Germany and emigrated with her family to the Netherlands after Kristallnacht. With the German invasion of the Netherlands, her family attempted to escape to England. When this failed, they were sent to Westerbork camp and later transferred to Bergen-Belsen. Their lives were spared through a prisoner exchange, allowing them to emigrate to Israel via Turkey.

Shaffer recounts her memories of her Bat Mitzvah 'celebration' and her brother's Bar Mitzvah: "Throughout our time in Westerbork, we received packages from my brother who was with the Dutch underground. These parcels contained various items, things that were preservable like canned goods, a jar of jam, and a bar of chocolate. When we learned of our transfer to Bergen-Belsen, tea and bread with runny jam, which later became our staple food there, were distributed. My mother suggested, 'Let's gather by the bed and have something to eat.' The family gathered, and we sat down. Then my mom reached into her bag and pulled out a jar of strawberry jam that I loved. Sometimes, my brother would send the jam in a package, but we had not received one for a while. Everyone was surprised to see the jam, and she said to me: 'Happy Bat Mitzvah, happy birthday.' I was 12 at the time. My mom remembered to make an event out of it, and she had saved that jar in her bag. That was my Bat Mitzvah celebration. It happened the day we arrived at Bergen-Belsen.

"Then came the time when my other brother, Meir, turned Bar Mitzvah age. My father made sure that someone would teach him what a boy needs to know for a Bar Mitzvah - how to be called to the Torah, to bless, and even to read a bit from it.
People who left the camp often abandoned their backpacks. People looked through them, and that's how my father found an abandoned set of *tefillin* that someone who had been sent away had left behind. He decided to take it, and found someone to check if they were still kosher. I even managed to arrange a gift for my brother. A woman in our area had forgotten her prayer book. My mother said, 'Take it, keep the prayer book from getting lost.' It was a beautiful prayer book. I inscribed a dedication to my brother, and that was my Bar Mitzvah gift to him.

"My brother outside of the camp sent a parcel with a bottle of wine, and my mom baked a cake from old bread. That was her trick, though I don't know exactly how she did it. She took it, crumbled it with jam, and baked a cake on the big stove that each barrack had. And so, we celebrated a Bar Mitzvah! My brother was called to the Torah and even read a little from it. He began to put on *tefillin* and they drank *l'chaim* and ate cake! That was my brother's Bar Mitzvah."

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