Marian Turski, a Holocaust survivor who later became a journalist in Poland and led an international committee of Auschwitz survivors, has passed away at the age of 98, as reported by the Polish weekly magazine Polityka, where he worked as a columnist.
Described by Polityka as "an exceptional guardian of memory" and "an outstanding man whose voice was heard all over the world," Turski, born as Moshe Turbowicz on June 26, 1926, in Druskieniki (now in Lithuania), was sent to the Lodz ghetto at 14.
In 1944, Turski was taken to the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland, where his father and brother perished. Surviving two death marches in 1945, first from Auschwitz to Buchenwald in Germany and then from Buchenwald to Theresienstadt, he was liberated by the Soviet Red Army.
Having lived in Lower Silesia post-World War Two, Turski settled in Warsaw, working as a historian and journalist. Joining Polityka in 1958, he authored several books.
Awarded honorary citizenship of Warsaw in 2018 for his role in setting up the Polin Museum of the History of Polish Jews, Turski dedicated his life to remembrance and warning against growing antisemitism.
In his speech marking the 80th anniversary of Auschwitz's liberation, he cautioned, "We see in the modern world today a great increase in antisemitism, and it was antisemitism that led to the Holocaust…Let us not be afraid to convince ourselves that we can solve problems between neighbors."
During World War Two, over 3 million of Poland's 3.3 million Jews were killed by the Nazis, part of the systematic genocide that claimed the lives of 6 million Jews across German-occupied Europe and other targeted groups.