CHAIM is a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing an experiential teaching center that can be brought to communities to help their efforts to increase awareness of the Holocaust, to learn ways to fight hate, and to promote tolerance.
Our Vision
Iris Bendahan had two vivid childhood memories of the Holocaust.
One was her grandmother’s repeated mention of the phrase “Yimah Shemo”, which means ‘may his name be erased’, every time she spoke about her family. Iris eventually understood that she was referring to Adolf Hitler and that her grandmother had lost her entire family (her parents, and 6 siblings and their children) at his hands. Around that time, Iris was living in Israel and her elementary school put together a small make-shift museum in honor of Yom HaShoah; this gave her another insight into the Holocaust.
30 years later, these memories inspired her to begin the creation of a small Holocaust museum to help teach about the Holocaust to the students of her synagogue religious school. Students and parents were so taken by the exhibit, that she enlarged it a bit every year. Eventually, she started inviting other groups to visit. However, many found it difficult to set up a field trip so only those schools walking distance from the synagogue were able to come.
This sparked the idea that a travelling exhibit might be the best way to bring a museum experience to the many communities who could not afford a field trip to a Holocaust museum.
Iris decided to put together a group of people who had interest in Holocaust education to help bring the idea to fruition. Many of us are children of survivors and, like Iris, would love a way to honor the memories of our families. The creation of a mobile, Holocaust education exhibit would be a wonderful, and important memorial. In addition, in 2017 Iris was awarded the Morris Weiss Award through the JFCS Holocaust Center in San Francisco. This gave her some seed money to purchase some simple display pieces that helped convert the temporary, stationary exhibit to a more mobile one. We are now working to get grants to professionalize the exhibit so it can travel to local Bay Area communities, and eventually beyond, and perform its important mission of using the Holocaust as a lens for teaching TACT: Treating others with Acceptance, Compassion, and Tolerance.
Our Motto
Our call to action is the acrostic “WAKE UP”
W - WITNESS Be a witness to the atrocities of the Holocaust by remembering survivor accounts and telling their stories. “As the Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel warned years ago, to forget a holocaust is to kill twice.” ― Iris Chang, The Rape of Nanking
A - ACT with TACT Being tactful, not only means to be sensitive to the feelings of those who’ve suffered hardships, but also being a role model to those in your community on how to Treat with Acceptance, Compassion and Tolerance. As Lady Gaga once said “ I think tolerance and acceptance and love is something that feeds every community”.
K - KNOW Arm yourself with the facts about the Holocaust and genocides, so you can counteract those who might try to deny or minimize the magnitude of the atrocities committed during the Holocaust, and those who dismiss the possibility that even in the United States, electing a cunning candidate more interested in being a dictator to a position of dismantling democracy IS possible if we are not careful. As Helen Keller said - “The highest result of education is tolerance”
E - EMPATHIZE Show empathy (sensitivity) for those who are suffering. Understand both sides of a story to make better moral choices. “Empathy is the starting point for creating a community and taking action. It's the impetus for creating change.” -Max Carver
U -UPSTAND An Upstander stands up against injustice and intolerance. Heed Albert Einstein’s warning “The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil, but by those who watch and don’t do anything”
P - PREVENT The persecution of ANY minority is the first step towards all out genocide. Work to make the world a better place; support genocide prevention and tolerance education programs. “We can make a difference. We can save lives. We can stop the genocide.” - Kendrick Meek