By: Fern Sidman

As Israel paused to remember the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust, the nation mourned the loss of two extraordinary survivors whose lives were living testaments to resilience, remembrance, and the indomitable spirit of survival. According to a report at The Times of Israel, Israel’s oldest known Holocaust survivor, Nechama Grossman, passed away on Thursday at the age of 109, and Eve Kugler, a tireless Holocaust educator, died the same day in London at the age of 94.

Born in 1915, Nechama Grossman lived through some of the darkest chapters of human history. As The Times of Israel reported, she fled Europe amidst the terror of the Holocaust and eventually found refuge in the southern Israeli city of Arad, where she lived for most of her life. There, she built not just a home, but a legacy—one grounded in survival, continuity, and family.

Her funeral was held on Friday in Arad, a day after the nation stood in silence for Yom HaShoah, Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day. Grossman is survived by an expansive family: two children, four grandchildren, eight great-grandchildren, and two great-great-grandchildren, according to Kan broadcaster, as cited by The Times of Israel.

In a poignant moment earlier in the week, her son, Vladimir Schwatz, honored his mother’s legacy during a Holocaust memorial event. “My mother is one of the oldest Holocaust survivors in the world,” he said. “She experienced the worst and she survived. We must all remember her Holocaust story, remember her survival, so that her past never becomes our future.” His words resonated across the country as Israelis reflected on the lessons of history, and the fragile thread connecting past trauma to present memory.

Also passing on Thursday was Eve Kugler, who died in London at age 94. Her story, as detailed by The Times of Israel, began in Germany, where she was born in 1931. As a child, she witnessed the infamous Kristallnacht pogrom of November 1938—an orchestrated Nazi rampage that destroyed thousands of Jewish homes, businesses, and synagogues. She was only seven years old when her world changed forever.

Fleeing persecution, her family managed to escape to France in 1939, and by 1941, Eve had secured passage to the United States, where she and her siblings lived in foster homes in New York. It wasn’t until 1946, after the war had ended, that the rest of her family was able to reunite with her.

Kugler later graduated from the University of Pennsylvania and worked as a photojournalist, a career that allowed her to tell stories through images—a powerful medium for someone whose childhood was defined by loss and displacement, as was noted in The Times of Israel report.  Later in life, she moved to London, where she emerged as a leading voice in Holocaust education.

Her death came just as she was scheduled to participate in the March of the Living, the annual memorial walk from Auschwitz to Birkenau that draws thousands of people from around the world. Though she was unable to attend this year’s march, she had participated in previous years, including in 2023, using her voice to guide generations in understanding the catastrophic impact of hatred and indifference.

The deaths of Grossman and Kugler call attention to the urgent reality that the generation of Holocaust survivors is rapidly diminishing. Each year, as The Times of Israel has frequently documented, more survivors pass on, taking with them first-hand memories of a genocide that reshaped the course of Jewish and world history.

Their lives serve as sacred bridges between the past and the present—reminders of the pain endured, the lives lost, and the triumph of survival. On Holocaust Remembrance Day, their stories echoed alongside the sirens that wailed across Israel, urging the world not just to remember, but to never forget.

As Grossman’s son so aptly put it: “Remember her survival, so that her past never becomes our future.”

And as the world now bids farewell to two pillars of memory, their voices are not silenced by time, but amplified through testimony, teaching, and the unyielding promise of “never again.”