The Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany (known as the Claims Conference), in partnership with the Museum of Jewish Heritage–A Living Memorial to the Holocaust, announces its first-ever, global film series in commemoration of Holocaust Remembrance Day. All films are supported by the Claims Conference and focus on Holocaust-related topics.
The film series will be hosted from April 13 through April 20, with screenings in Frankfurt and Berlin, Germany, as well as all five boroughs of New York City.
Gideon Taylor, president of the Claims Conference, stated that “film has a unique power to reach people where they are, across borders, languages and generations, and to translate history into something deeply human and immediate. As there are fewer and fewer Holocaust survivors, we must meet future audiences with tools that resonate. Film allows us to do just that. It brings viewers into the emotional truth of these stories, not as distant history, but as lived experience. Through film, we are able to engage broader audiences in meaningful ways, ensuring that the lessons of the Holocaust remain visible, relevant and impossible to ignore.”
Global screenings include Holocaust-related films that profile strength, courage and resilience during and after World War II. Individual films feature some of the most well-known names associated with the Holocaust, including Holocaust survivor and Nobel Prize laureate Elie Wiesel, German and American historian and philosopher Hannah Arendt; and Polish-American cartoonist and author Art Spiegelman, among others.
The theme for this inaugural global film series, “Strength of Courage,” reflects the indomitable spirit of individuals whose resilience shone through in humanity’s darkest times. The films being screened illuminate stories of bravery—whether in survival, resistance or rebuilding. The series highlights the level of courage found not only in grand gestures but in the small choices and decisions made through individual fortitude to stand up for human dignity.
In New York, each screening will be hosted by a different moderator, including Andrew Silow-Carroll, editor at large for 70 Faces Media, the parent company of the New York Jewish Week and the Jewish Telegraphic Agency; former NBC News’ chief political analyst Chuck Todd; NBC 4 New York anchor Adam Kuperstein, New York Times editorial director of newsletters Jodi Rudoren; and Neil Rosen, host of “Talking Pictures with Neil Rosen.”
Panel discussions at the various screenings will include the directors of the films, well-known Holocaust historians and Holocaust survivors, including historian, author and film producer Michael Berenbaum; film historian, author and interviewer and host of Reel Pieces Annette Insdorf; Roger Berkowitz, founder and academic director of the Hannah Arendt Center for Politics and Humanities; Jennifer Rich, executive director for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide and Human Rights at Rowan University; and Catherine Winters-Michaud, learning and operations coordinator at Kean University’s Holocaust Resource Center.
Holocaust survivors include Alice Ginsburg, Halina Birenbaum, Gabriella Major and Asher Matathias.
In Berlin, the program will feature the producers of “The Most Precious of Cargoes” and “Black Honey: The Life and Poetry of Avraham Sutzkever,” Patrick Sobelman and Yair Qedar. Also on the panel will be Oren Rudavsky, the filmmaker of “Elie Wiesel: Soul on Fire,” alongside Holocaust survivors, including 92-year-old Assia Gorban.
In Frankfurt, the film event has been organized in cooperation with the Jewish Community of Frankfurt and will feature Reinhold Boschki, who appears in the film, “Elie Wiesel: Soul on Fire.”
The panel discussion will also include media scholars Lea Wohl von Haselberg and Doron Kiesel, as well as the president of the Jewish community, Marc Grünbaum. The event will be attended by Holocaust survivors from the local community, including Eva Szepesi, who survived Auschwitz as a child and continues to share her testimony with hundreds of students across Germany.
Greg Schneider, executive vice president of the Claims Conference, said: “We are living in a moment of profound responsibility. With each passing year, we lose more survivors who can share their stories firsthand. Preserving their voices is not only an act of remembrance; it is a moral obligation. Every testimony, every story carries the weight of history and the responsibility to bear witness. By capturing and sharing these experiences through film, we ensure that future generations will not only learn what happened but will understand the human cost of hatred and the enduring strength of those who lived through it. This is how memory becomes legacy.”
President and CEO of the Museum of Jewish Heritage, Jack Kliger, said that “this series uses the power of film to deepen understanding of the Holocaust at a moment when memory is fading, and antisemitism is on the rise. By taking place here at home in New York and across the globe, this series affirms a shared responsibility to confront hatred, honor survivors and ensure that the lessons of the Holocaust remain urgent, human and impossible to ignore for generations to come.”
The global event will kick off at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City on April 14, with a screening of three film shorts, followed by a panel discussion moderated by Silow-Carroll. Participants include Sabina Vajraca (director of “Sevap/Mitzvah”), Jennifer Skarbnik (director of “See You Soon”) and Dara Bratt (director of “Inked: Our Stories Remarked”), with an event introduction by Holocaust survivor Gabriella Major.
Similar events will be held globally throughout the series.
For more information about the film series and for free registration to specific screenings, see: www.claimscon.org/strength.
