One day in 2006, in a noisy café in Ukraine, Mike thought he had just
met a survivor of the Holocaust massacre that destroyed his mother’s family. He turned out also to be a veteran of Israel’s War of Independence, now bitterly rejecting Israel’s occupation of Palestine, telling his family there was no hope and they should leave.

This incident, captured in sound, sums up the contradictions Mike discovers in this epic journey. Working to uncover his Holocaust inheritance, he is led relentlessly to discovering his Nakba inheritance. It turns out the two different catastrophes are very connected. But can they both be heard and understood?

With unique personal testimony, recordings, letters and memories by those who survived and those who did not, this challenging audio series is devised, dramatised and narrated by broadcaster Mike Joseph.

PLACE NAMES

When the place names in Keys get confusing, these notes will help.

Mike’s grandparents came from Galicia, a part of eastern Europe on no
modern map. Today some of Galicia is southeast Poland, another part is western Ukraine. Galicia no longer exists.

In the last century, many of Galicia’s Jews, Ukrainians and Poles also ceased to exist, violently, as their province was repeatedly ruptured by the front lines of two World Wars, genocide and ethnic cleansing.

Before 1918, Galicia was the Austro-Hungarian Empire’s most eastern province. Its capital was Lemberg (German) = Lwów (Polish) = Lviv (Ukrainian).

Three names, but one city.


Further south, Mike’s grandfather grew up in Stanislau (German); left
Stanislaviv (Ukrainian) in 1918 for a better life in Germany; deported back to Stanisławów (Polish) in
1938, which became Stanislaviv (Ukrainian) in 1939; killed in Stanislau (German)
in 1941.



Before Mike first visited that city in 1999, the Soviet Union renamed it Ivano-Frankovsk (Russian). Today the place where he found his grandfather’s surviving colleagues and allies is called Ivano-Frankivsk (Ukrainian).

Five names, but one city.

Fatima Abu Salem grew up in the thriving Palestinian village of Burayr, at
crossroads leading to Gaza, Hebron and Beersheba. Today a few ruins of Burayr are surrounded by the fields of kibbutz Bro’r Hayyil.

Two names, but one place.

Place names matter. How we name places reveals our own histories,
identities and yearnings.

CREDITS

Testimony

Testimony and commentary by Mike Joseph, Amnon Neumann, Fatima Abu Salem, Sami Abu Salem, Lilli Gold, Rose Gold, Henryk Luft, Moshe Kolesnik, Yehudah ben Baruch, Itamar Shapira, Asha Phillips.

Interpreters and Translators

Dina Brandt, Alex Dunai, Markus Hartmann, Burkhardt Kolbmuller, Svitlana Kovalyk, Itamar Shapira, Nadia Slobodyan

Video sources

Lilli Gold, © 1998 USC Shoah Foundation. From the archive
of USC
Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual History and Education  http://sfi.usc.edu/

Israel and West Bank locations by agreement with Boom Cymru
TV Cyf.

Batorego Cemetery, Ivano-Frankivsk; Henryk Luft; Yad Vashem
viewing platform; handmade Israeli flag © Mike Joseph

Zochrot Truth Commission session with Amnon Neumann by
agreement with Zochrot

Images

Lilli
Gold

Mike
Joseph

Sami Abu Salem

PRODUCTION

Mike Joseph                     Producer

Zac Ware                          Sound Editor

Jesse Lawrence                Video Editor

Micha Wink                       Keys Theme & Variations on a Bach Prelude in B minor

Pamela Koehne-Drube      Audience and Web Advisor

Michelle Alderson              Graphic Designer

PRESENTERS

Mike Joseph & Asha Phillips

CAST in programme order

Peter Kirsten as Leipzig Policeman

Werner Bauer as Ralph Dippmann

George May as Israel Gold

Andrea Brondino as Henryk Luft