Yom HaShoah, translated, means “Day of Remembrance of the Holocaust.” For more than four decades, this has been marked in the Quad Cities by a service of mourning and hope which unites persons of all faiths in remembrance of the great human tragedy of the Holocaust. As part of the annual observance, memorial candles are lit for the six million Jews – and millions of others – who were murdered by Nazi Germany and its allies before and during World War II. The Yom HaShoah Committee is comprised of community leaders and representatives from the Jewish Federation of the Quad Cities, Augustana College and St. Ambrose University and various faith groups.

The keynote speaker this year is Yvonne Aaronson. A child survivor, Yvonne was born in 1939. In May of 1940, Yvonne’s father and brother were taken to a labor camp in southern France. Yvonne remained in Brussels along with her mother, great-grandmother, and great-aunt. Ultimately, they went into hiding in a convent with a group of 25 people. Yvonne and her mother left the convent and returned to their apartment. There, Yvonne’s mother became extremely ill. Their local pharmacist had taken Yvonne and her mother in and hid them in his cellar. After her recovery, Yvonne’s mother found a widow in a suburb of Brussels who was willing to hide Yvonne. The kind widow hid Yvonne for over three years. The war ended on May 8, 1945, and Yvonne’s mom picked her up from the widow and registered Yvonne in school. Yvonne was reunited with her great-grandmother and great-aunt. Yvonne’s father perished in Auschwitz. Yvonne immigrated to the U.S. in March 1947.