With the squeeze of a hand, two partisans’ stories come to life

The cold, bitter winter of 1942 was a long way from the balmy San Francisco evening of Dec. 4, 2006. Despite the best efforts of Holocaust historian Michael Berenbaum, who exhorted the audience at a panel discussion to feel the “cold” and “hunger” of that winter, when Jewish partisans waged guerilla warfare against the Nazi war machine, the disconnect was palpable.

Here, within the intimate, climate-controlled confines of the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco’s Kanbar Hall, the well-heeled and well-coiffed audience listened to the recollections of Sonia Orbuch and Martin Petrasek, two Jewish partisans who risked their lives to fight the Nazis more than half a century ago.

But even the voices of Orbuch and Petrasek, now tempered by age, yet still permeated with rage and sorrow, didn’t quite make those sensations manifest. And even when famed actor Edward Asner read a love poem from a teenage boy to Orbuch that had survived for over 60 years, the disconnect remained.

But as is usually the case, the epiphany came in a completely unexpected way.

Just as Berenbaum was about to turn over the floor to the audience for questions, Orbuch said that she and that boy had spent many hours discussing Tolstoy, Pushkin, and many other things unconnected to the horrors of genocide — stuff that teens might discuss when they are young and enamored of each other.

The Polish-born Orbuch asked Berenbaum if she could make a quick comment before the audience asked questions. The moderator nodded, and Orbuch said she “never saw” the boy again after he went on a partisan mission one night. If her voice was wistful and nostalgic, her words were matter-of-fact. The moment might have passed unencumbered by emotion, and Berenbaum began addressing audience questions.

But in those moments, something small and extraordinary happened: Edward Asner reached out for Sonia Orbuch’s hand and gripped it firmly. And it was only then that the disconnect was finally bridged.

At first glance, the baritone-voiced actor might seem an odd choice to be a conduit for thousands of Jewish partisans who had perished fighting the Nazis. After all, most people associate Asner with taking Mary Tyler Moore to task rather than rectifying historical oversights. And yet, as the evening wore on, it became abundantly clear that Asner was cast perfectly in the role of telling a tale of forgotten Jewish heroes.

To begin with, Asner’s cousin, Abe Asner, is one of the Jewish partisans honored by the Jewish Partisan Educational Foundation, who co-sponsored the event with the Taube Center for Jewish Life. Edward Asner’s father grew up in a Polish town along with the father of Abe Asner. The actor’s father subsequently relocated to Kansas City.

When pronouncing the names of the Polish towns of his ancestors, Asner’s enunciation was perfect, but it was obvious that phonetic concerns were tertiary. Asner showed that he clearly cares about where he has come from — and his heritage.

When Asner talked about growing up in Kansas City on his “fat duff” while his cousin Abe fought the Nazis, it was quite clear the amount of reverence he had for his cousin’s courage. When Asner looked at Orbuch and the Czech-born Petrasek on stage, it was also clear that he held them in equally high regard.

And so when Asner commenced the evening by asking how the horrors of the Holocaust could have unfolded largely unheeded — and how it was that Jews were often portrayed as not fighting back — it remained a rhetorical question ... until that moment when Asner gripped the hand of a relative stranger in need of support.

So perhaps Asner answered his own question. The man who spent the winter of 1942 in Kansas City, Mo., instead of Eishyshok, Poland, showed that doing the right thing sometimes involves the smallest of gestures.