Response on receiving an award.

• Position: McGill/InterAmicus Robert S. Litvack Human Rights Memorial Award - Hate, Genocide and Human Rights Fifty Years Later: What Have We Learned? What Must We Do ? - Transcript

Thank you very much, Irwin. After this wonderful address by Judge Goldstone, there isn't very much left to say, but let me explain how I got here. I received a call from Israel where Irwin Cotler was at that rime. I was down in Florida. I hadn't seen Professor Cotler for several years, and he began by asking, "Ben, how are you?", which I interpreted to mean, "Are you still alive?"

I'm quite sure that he had canvassed more important Nuremberg prosecutors, but they were unfortunately dead so they couldn't come, and--even in their present condition--if they heard about the freezing weather in Montreal, they wouldn't have come anyway. I asked, "What am I supposed to do there?"--I heard he might be planning to give me a "plaque" that I'd have trouble getting into a plane. He explained, "Well, I want you to make a speech. I want you to make a statement. You've had fifty years of experience, so please tell us everything that you have learned, and what we have to do. Take as much time as you want--up to three to five minutes!"

Since I don't mess around with Irwin Cotler, I'm going to do just that. You've heard something about my background, and how I got involved in combatting genocide. It was pointed out by Silvia Litvack that I began by landing in France; "J'ai fait le debarquement de Normandie" (since I am in Montreal, I'll show off my French). Other soldiers landed in water up to their waist; for me it got up to my chest. That was the beginning of my education for peace. Since I don't have an unlimited amount of time, the jokes are on your time, Irwin. Let me just tell you briefly what happened in the last fifty years to me, and see what lessons it leaves for you. I won't pay attention to your instructions to talk about "What have we learned? What are we going to do?". I can tell you what I have learned, and what you are going to do.

My wartime experiences led me into the concentration camps, which were so vividly described by Judge Rosalie Abella. (1) I was a liberator. I saw the crematoria while they were still burning. I arrested criminals, I dug up bodies with my hands. That led me to a career as a war crimes prosecutor at Nuremberg, where I got to know the murderers--the remorseless killers--personally. The trial in which I was a chief prosecutor was the Einzatsgruppen case, (2) in which the twenty-two defendants were convicted of murdering over a million people, mostly Jews and Gypsies, in cold blood men, women, and children. Thirteen of...