By Prof. Sami Repishti
“SURGITE, MORTUI”! – LET THE DEAD RISE!
Memorie.al / Recently, the German press has addressed the “problem” of a 93-year-old Nazi, Oskar Gruening, “accountant in Auschwitz” (1944). The echo of this campaign has included Europe and has also reached the USA. In an opinion article by the journalist Anna Lauerbeck, editor of the newspaper ‘Tagespiegel’, the “Gruening” case is treated for its effect on the German population, for the way the Nazi past has affected German public opinion, and for the possibilities of a new meaning better, of the Nazi period in Germany.
Sue Gruening is accused of; “…participant” in the murder (murder) of at least 300,000 internees, mostly Jews from Hungary. During 1944, he witnessed the disembarkation of the columns from the train, the entry of the internees into the camp, their division into two groups: the strong for forced labor, and the unfit for death penalty. He did not react. He did not testify about the terror he saw with his own eyes. He was covered in complete silence…from shame, from the weight of guilt, from fear of punishment.
Gruening is thus another example of the so-called phenomenon of the “banality of Evil” (as defined by Hannah Arendt); monstrous, massive crimes, beyond our ability to understand and explain – as was the case with the “holocaust” – during the Second World War, committed by mediocre individuals, without any intellectual or moral value, robotic elements acting as if following orders from above, without asking, without the need to clarify the content of the order, without the desire to predict the devastating effect of the murderous action…!
The German people’s interest in this trial grew even more because, in his entire testimony, Gruening did not utter the word “murder” (murder), but stated that the elimination of the internees was “regular” and “clean”, a routine act that I consume with precision; 5,000 victims per day”. Only one day he was touched when an SS guard killed a starving child with a stick. Gruening was touched…! In his explanation he stated: “Remember that in the end, this is how it was done in the concentration camps…”! The trial against Gruening is still ongoing. The German population reflects on the past….!
This trial has a special significance, because it may be the last. From 1945 to today, 70 years have passed. But the appearance of criminals before the German courts, forces our generations to reconsider: “what do yesterday’s crimes remind us of, how do we react today, in order not to repeat them tomorrow”?
Our political life today depends on the reaction as a result of the past. From the lessons learned, we determine the trajectory of our children’s education. Germany has been and remains one of the most cultured countries in the world. But the Nazi experience also accuses German culture, and shows us that even a cultured society makes mistakes and slips into the pool of collective crime.
The culture that raises our level as human beings, the culture that plants in our hearts, the ideal of the free and dignified man, as the epicenter of all our actions and attitudes, fails before the brute force of the legions of the devil, which represent the “culture of death”. , as we see today, especially in the Middle East, in the center of the former Arab civilization…!
Before the names, figures and stories of our past sufferings, take on abstract connotations, before they become objects of academic discussions and propaganda tools by the “quixotes” of the political classes – whoever they are – we must undertake with multiple determination – and without the sentimentality of man/citizen, in this case Albanian – the discovery of the essence of our character, and of the mentality that we have formed and that guides us today. We need to know ourselves when we say; “I am Albanian!”
It is not enough to read the stories of suffering under the dictatorial regime – we who have experienced Italian fascism, German Nazism and “internationalist” communism (mask of aggressive pan-Slavism). We are fed up with their poisonous food. Yes, we fought it! Yes, we have supported it, and especially we have accepted it with our heads down, for long decades. Before such a situation, we are morally obliged to show our gratitude to all those, brothers and sisters, who found the courage to fight for the freedom of the country during foreign invasions, and for democracy, during the decades of communist terror. These heroes and heroines of our days have saved the honor and dignity of our nation!
Those who took the shameful path of collaboration with the occupier, or who served faithfully in the murderous legions of the “dictatorship of the proletariat”, are to be despised. Even our history, a small country, is a coin with two sides; along with the glory we have gained, we must blush from the shame of inhumanity, where we have fallen in several ages. Together with the applause, we must find the moral strength, by condemning our humiliating past, by condemning all those who brought our nation down to the ponds of subjugation and political crime. The crime must be punished, the responsibility must be accepted, and we must work towards moral reconstruction… if we want to prevent our moral death, which can come from the complete amnesia of the past.
Today, victims of terror of every color, pray: “Don’t forget us”! Today, the criminals, the ustalars of hell and communist terror, threaten to repeat the terror, instead of seeking forgiveness for the crime committed. From reading the process of the Nazi criminal Gruening, I remembered the explanation of the commander of the communist concentration camp in Saver, Lushnje, (I don’t remember the name), the black pond where hundreds and hundreds of children lost their lives, especially children, women and the elderly – all innocent citizens.
Today, he lives peacefully (if he still lives), he is where he has been before, and he speaks, without a trace of shame or conscience, about the suffering and torture inflicted on the victims of the camp: “That was the time…! We had orders…! What should I do? I opposed you”?! This is the height of the banality that characterized the mediocrity of the reign of terror. And “evil” develops “normally”, up to collective massacre, up to extermination. The impossible is made possible by the banality of indoctrinated robots, mindless and heartless in internment camps, for the innocent for 45 years in a row, to be locked in mud huts with straw walls…!
No, brother Catilius: do not object! Strictly follow the orders from on high, kill, convert, beat with wood, starve, deny medical services, do not allow children’s education, prevent family visits, … and do not forget to “fill the norm” daily and the punishment of crushing, to get tired of age and illness that did not meet the “norm”, …instead of working in a farm or factory, where bread is earned with sweat and honesty…! Criminal!
No, brother Catilius: do not object! For your shame and the nation you belong to…! Because you, together with the chief criminals of the state pyramid, live a quiet life today… not in a mud hut. Nothing was the same in the past! “Past past, past…! Forget it, let’s start again…! And maybe we become MPs and ministers, why not? We are Albanians… the sons of this land…”, instead of working in construction, in education, in health, where bread is earned with sweat and honesty! Grotesque! Today, secret and open threats are made to the victims, who are still afraid of the difficult life for decades, to the victims who do not have the courage to ask for their homes, seized 70 years ago…! Absurd!
All this crap cannot be cured by words and speeches. Action is needed! In European countries where the “cleansing” of criminals has been successfully completed, the freed population takes the second step, the attempt to calm troubled consciences with acts of charity, help for others: orphans, immigrants, political asylum, opportunities to start a new life new, etc. But the Albanians who have been left behind by the rapid European development (and are satisfied with the “ideological soup”), for a moral reconstruction, the society needs to be “cleansed” of the toxic criminalized elements and the fear that they still spread.
The “Law on files and lustration”, as it was presented to the Parliament on April 30, 2015, does not seem to aim at “cleansing”, the main condition for a process that calms us down; a necessity for a new period in our history, and we enter the second phase of the process, the humanization of our Albanian society and the question; “why did our disaster look like this”? With the explanation of the reason for the disaster comes the understanding and calming of our souls, who today in Albania still live in turmoil.
The new “files” law for “lustration” does not fulfill this mission. With powers in the hands of appointing and accusing them of absolutism, immersed in crime and corruption that control the public life of the country, neither the state nor the pure Albanian civil society can be built. The new law confirms the rule of the “person”, the “holder”, a department that decides which “official” can be investigated and which cannot – without legal justification! – This is a shameful blackmail, open, that to turn the “officials” into loyal servants of the “owner”… just as the party members of the Assembly are today, “puppets” of the leaders of the respective parties… and not elected by the people… individuals who are sold and bought, like sheep in the village market …!
It is pathetic to read in the Albanian press that the Assembly of the Republic of Albania is defined as a gathering where “…half of the Assembly, if not more, consists of people without any political or public contribution, but there are some merchants, smugglers, businessmen who they also come from the world of crime, pure criminals, who still haven’t cleared their files and don’t yet know which name to use as officials, because of the badges they wore when they trafficked drugs and prostitution”! National disaster!
Years pass. Most of the former persecuted have died, without seeing the “files”! Their families continue the life of misery, poverty and oblivion from the “new world”, a life that began in 1945 and continues today 70 years later. Many of those who survive have neither the necessary power nor the practical ability to impose the opening of files and honest lustration, an elementary requirement for national healing…!
Thus, they are “condemned”, with an existence without direction, without means, without hope for a future with dignity, for themselves and for their children. While those who “rule”, who run our state institutions, – wrote the journalist Luljeta Progni – …are afraid of the past, they are afraid of losing their inherited power, they are afraid of the collapse of their businesses built without right, on national assets, they are afraid of democracy, they are afraid of the truth…!
Today, I also have my fears. On April 30, 2015, in the streets of Durrës, pro-fascist Falangists tried to obstruct the peaceful electoral campaign of the opposition candidate, an activity that reminds us of Saint-Petersburg in 1917, Rome in 1922, Nuremberg in 1932-’33. Fascism as a cult of government violence, regardless of color, will not pass in Albania. I do not believe that they will succeed these groups of thugs who seek the return of the dictatorial past. Yes, they can succeed in preparing a new Albanian tragedy!
Then, maybe the dead will rise from the graves – and the living that died today will be saved…! Memorie.al
