TORONTO — Visiting Israeli tourists were apparently not impressed to find misting stations set up outside the gates of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum, the site of the former Nazi concentration camp where more than one million people were killed during the Holocaust.
An article published by Ynetnews, the English-language edition of Ynet, Israel’s largest news website, stated “anyone who saw the showers could not help get past the gas chamber connotation.”
“As soon as I got off the bus I walked into the shower contraption,” said Israeli visitor Meyer Bolka to Ynetnews. “I was in shock. It was a punch to the gut. I walked up to the reception and asked the worker there about the showers, she said it was a hot day. I told her: ‘With all due respect it reminds me of the gas chambers,’ she told me she is very sorry.”
Poland has been experiencing a scorching heat waves this summer. In a Facebook post Monday, museum officials said the misting stations had been temporarily set up in an area where people often have to line up for long periods of time where there is no shade.
Infographic: Auschwitz remembered
“Among visitors there are many people who come from countries where such high temperatures as we have this summer in Poland do not occur. Something had to be done, as we have noticed cases of faints among people and other dangerous situations,” said the statement.
“Therefore we had to do everything we could to [minimize] the risks connected with the heat and high temperatures. The safety and health of visitors are our priority during the period of extreme heat.”
The statement goes on to fire back at those who would suggest the cooling stations resemble the fake showers in gas chambers where many thousands went to their deaths. It’s estimated between one and 1.5 million people died at the camp from the time it opened in 1940 to the day it was liberated, Jan. 27, 1945. As many as 1.35 million of those killed were Jewish.
“And one more thing. It is really hard for us to comment on some suggested historical references since the mist sprinkles do not look like showers and the fake showers installed by Germans inside some of the gas chambers were not used to deliver gas into them. Zyklon B was dropped inside the gas chambers in a completely different way – through holes in the ceiling or airtight drops in walls.”
The museum said the misting stations would be removed once the temperature dropped.
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