The little girl was hiding in a basement when her mother was taken away. Her father, who was not Jewish also survived.
For the duration of the Nazi occupation, she was forced to go “underground” eventually taking refuge at a hospital where her father had her admitted.
In October 1941, the Germans executed between 9,000 and 16,000 Jews. And threw their bodies in ditches along the outskirts of Mariupol. This is the same area where Putin’s forces leave bodies in the street.
Mariupol was finally liberated in 1943. And Vanda Obiedkova gave an account of her life and Holocaust experience to the USC Shoah Foundation in 1998.
At 10 years old, Vanda Semyonovna Obiedkova survived the Germans by hiding in a basement in Mariupol.
81 years later, she died in a basement in the same city as a victim of the horrific war hiding from the Russians.Read more: https://t.co/6QPx6vahFh pic.twitter.com/TyjiyfK09A
— Auschwitz Memorial (@AuschwitzMuseum) April 19, 2022
Mariupol was one of the first areas to get shelled and bombed during Putin’s invasion. Vanda’s family moved into the basement of a neighboring heating-supply store. The only assistance the family received for a month came from Rabbi Cohen’s synagogue and community center.
