The Elie Wiesel Foundation

Today, we proudly march! 🇮🇱

We owe a debt of gratitude to Haim Zohar, Dr. Alvin Schiff, Dan Ronen, and so many more phenomenal voices who worked to create a space for the Jewish community in NYC. But we are especially grateful to a lifelong friend of Elie’s who we lost just last year at the age of 100, the legendary Ted Comet. In his book All Rivers Run To The Sea, Elie described Ted as a “smiling young American Jew” who came to volunteer at the orphanage where Elie stayed after being liberated. Ted’s legacy lives on through this parade, and being able to attend gives us enormous joy.

Imagine having your cultural dances outlawed…
The Khmer Rouge regime tried to erase Cambodian culture. As Sophiline’s story shows, Cambodian traditional dance is an important medium for telling the stories that the regime tried to silence. Preserving these mediums of expression aids us in remembrance work.

Eid Mubarak!

Happy Shavuot to all who are celebrating! What do you hope to learn more about this year?

Before he became a Nobel Laureate and spoke to presidents, Elie Wiesel was an immigrant.

After World War II ended, he spent years living as a stateless refugee in France along with hundreds of thousands of other survivors. In 1956, he arrived in the United States as a journalist, and as you’ll see in the video, things were far from easy...

When Elie became an American citizen, he never forgot what it meant to arrive in a country as someone displaced, vulnerable, and dependent on the compassion of strangers. These memories shaped how he spoke about immigration throughout his life, and how he advocated for others.

This Cambodian Remembrance Day, we mourn the lives lost under the Khmer Rouge.

In 1980, Elie Wiesel visited refugee camps along the Thai border with Cambodia as part of a delegation called the "March for Survival". At that time, many people in the west remained ignorant of the horrors of the Khmer Rouge. Worse still were those who attempted to deny them. By visiting the refugee camps, Elie showed the world that this was a tragedy which required immediate moral action.

This Cambodian Remembrance Day, we mourn the lives lost under the Khmer Rouge.

In 1980, Elie Wiesel visited refugee camps along the Thai border with Cambodia as part of a delegation called the “March for Survival”. At that time, many people in the west remained ignorant of the horrors of the Khmer Rouge. Worse still were those who attempted to deny them. By visiting the refugee camps, Elie showed the world that this was a tragedy which required immediate moral action.