Holocaust Survivor Aron Gross, by his son Paul Gross

(Nov 9, 2021) Paul Gross works for the Malibu Canyon Wealth Management company. He spoke to us by Zoom about his father, Aron Gross, a Jewish Holocaust survivor who was interviewed in 1996 for the Visual History Archive of the USC Shoah Foundation Institute, an inspiring story of the resilience of the human spirit.

Aron Gross was born in 1921 in Rakszawa, Poland. When the Nazis invaded Poland and began destroying Jewish Ghettos, the Jewish population tried to conceal their Jewish identity. Many tried to hide on farms, in bunkers, and in forests but most of them were eventually executed. Paul spoke of Amon Göth, a Nazi officer who was involved in the destruction of Jewish Ghettos and deporting the inhabitants to death camps. He personally killed many children in the Ghettos.

Aron was captured and put into the Reichshof-PZL concentration camp in Rzeszow, Poland. Of his parents and 7 siblings, only Aron and his brother Sam survived. They were liberated by the Soviet Armed Forces invading Poland and Germany from the east towards the end of World War II. Before the Germans withdrew in July 1944, they burned down the Synagogue. Aron and his brother were able to come to the US after the war (photo of Aron & Sam & their spouses).