Kiwa Zyto
Kiwa, 1942 Kielce, Poland
Kiwa Zyto grew up in a Jewish family in Kielce, Poland, with his parents and three older brothers. When Poland was invaded, the Nazis immediately began persecuting Kielce’s Jewish population. Kiwa’s family fled to the forest and hid. Then the family was forced to split up, and Kiwa and his mother Zelda ended up in the Kielce ghetto.
In August 1942, the Nazis began emptying the ghetto of children, the sick, and the elderly. But no one discovered Kiwa in his attic hiding place. He managed to sneak into the area where the Nazis had herded the Jews destined for forced labour. Among them was Kiwa’s mother, Zelda, who managed to conceal her son.
One day in 1944, Kiwa and Zelda were taken to the Kielce train station together with the other Jewish prisoners. Guards forced them into railroad cars. Zelda was sobbing, and Kiwa tried to comfort his mother. He was too numb to cry. After only a few hours, the train ground to a halt. They had reached their final destination – the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp.
