Halina Birenbaum

Halina Birenbaum (Hebrew: הלינה בירנבאום; nee Grynsztajn, born 15 September 1929) is a Polish-born Israeli Holocaust survivor, writer, poet, translator and activist.

Life Born in Warsaw, to Jakub Grynsztajn and Pola formerly Perl, née Kijewska, she was the youngest of three and the only daughter. After the occupation of Poland by Germany, the family's home was in area that was part of the Warsaw Ghetto. After its destruction in July 1943 they were briefly transferred to Majdanek, then on to Auschwitz. She survived forced evacuation of the camp, the Death March of January 1945, from Auschwitz to Wodzisław Śląski, from which she was transported to Ravensbrück and in February on to Neustadt-Glewe, from where she was liberated by the Red Army in May 1945. Her mother was murdered in Majdanek while her father and brothers were murdered in the Treblinka extermination camp.

In 1947, due to antisemitism, she emigrated to Israel, where she married Chaim Birenbaum and had two sons. Until the end of 1950 she worked on a kibbutz. She spends much of her time talking about her early experiences with Israeli, Polish and German youth.

Writing Life and death during the German occupation of Poland and the martyrdom of Polish Jewry in ghettos and extermination camps are the salient themes of her prose and poetic output. Her works, which are partly written in Polish and partly in Hebrew, have been translated into many languages, including, English French, German, Japanese and Spanish.

Awards In 1999 the Polish President, Aleksander Kwaśniewski awarded her the Order of Officer of Polonia Restituta In March 2001 she was named Person of Reconciliation 2001 by the Polish Council of Christians and Jews. In 2015 she was recognized for her services to Warsaw, Zasłużony dla Warszawy. In 2018 she was granted the "Freedom of the City of Warsaw", Honorowi Obywatele miasta stołecznego Warszawy.