Amid record levels of antisemitism across the country, the FBI office in Los Angeles invited centenarian and Holocaust survivor Joseph Alexander to recount his life story of surviving 12 concentration camps, and to educate agents.
Alexander, now 101, was crowded by dozens of agents on Wednesday, April 17, eager to hear his story of surviving the Holocaust as well as get a better understanding of law enforcement’s role in preventing it from happening again.
“Millions were persecuted because of their perceived racial and physical inferiority, or their political, ideological or sexual identity,” said FBI Assistant Director in Charge Mehtab Syed. “At the FBI, our mandate is to uphold the law and to safeguard the civil rights and civil liberties of every citizen.”
“Just as we must never forget the atrocities of the Holocaust, we must never forget the responsibilities we hold as a law enforcement and national security organization,” Syed said.
Alexander was 16 years old living in Poland among a European Jewish population of more than 9.5 million people when the Nazis invaded in 1938. Soon after, his family was forcibly relocated to the Warsaw Ghetto, and then Alexander was sent off to what would be his first concentration camp.
“My parents, my two sisters and my brother,” Alexander said. “I never saw them again.”
Despite the uncertainty of ever seeing his family again, he made it his goal to maintain hope and to stay alive.
Across 11 more concentration camps over a five-year period, Alexander faced many life or death moments, including an encounter with Josef Mengele, a German officer nicknamed the “Angel of Death” at Auschwitz. When Alexander arrived, captives were being sorted in two lines, with one group being led off to be put to work while the others were led to their death in the gas chambers.
Alexander was sorted into the latter group, and as he approached his likely death, he snuck into the work line.
The last camp Alexander would visit against his will was in the German town of Landsberg am Lech.
“We had to march across the mountains to get there, and we could hear the fighting with the Americans behind us,” he said.
In 1945, the Americans liberated his camp and for the first time in a long time, Alexander was free.
He remained in Germany for another five years before immigrating to the United States. When asked by a member of the crowd why he chose to remain in Germany and whether that was scary for him, Alexander replied “No.”
“The Americans were there, and I was safe,” he said. ” I survived. Hitler didn’t.”
In the decades that followed, Alexander made it his mission to visit schools and organizations to educate and remind others of what happens when antisemitism, or other forms of discrimination, are allowed to flourish.
In 2023, there was a total of 8,873 incidents of antisemitism across the country – a 140 percent increase from 2022, according to the Anti-Defamation League. It was the highest level recorded since the ADL started tracking incidents of antisemitism in 1979.
“We have to stand for those who are not here today by standing up to antisemitism, and by speaking out against any form of bigotry,” said Special Agent Corey McFadden.
At the end of his talk, Alexander, who still makes regular educational visits across the country, was presented by agents with a certificate of exceptional service in the public interest, as well as a yarmulke embroidered with the FBI logo.
“The only way to stop this from happening again is education,” Alexander said.
