When Neighbors Were Real Human Beings - Eli Tauber

By the author:

In 2004, I started conducting research on the topic of Jews saved during WWII. This was a personal exercise - my own mother, Ester, was snuck out of Sarajevo disguised as a young Muslim girl. Decades after my own mother's escape I found myself in Israel, after my own family sought refuge from the bombing of our city, Sarajevo. It was during this time period that I met the woman who saved my mother's life. Decades later she was coming to Israel to be recognized by Yad Vashem. When she called I knew who she was right away. It is safe to say this meeting changed my life.

In 2004 my wife Mirjam and I moved back to Sarajevo. One afternoon I was visiting the Jewish Museum and realized there was nothing written about people who saved Jews during World War II. I spoke with the manager who told me if I collected materials they would make a permanent exhibit. Working with Yad Vashem we finally opened the exhibit in 2008; at the same time Sarajevo hosted a conference about genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina and around the world.

I chose the title Kada Su Komšije Bile Ljudil When Neighbors Were Real Human Beings because the acts portrayed in the stories that follow reflect the meaning of the Bosnian neighborhood as it existed for centuries.

The word komšiluk (pronounced kom-shee-look) originates from the Turkish word komşuluk and most closely translates to neighborhood. However this translation is inadequate because in Bosniaand Herzegovina komšiluk is not limited to a shared space but encompasses sharing one's life - as in one's worries, hopes, fears, meals, rituals of birth and death, and of course coffee drinking! Komšiluk functions as local community and is governed by voluntary decisions of individual persons to participate in it or not.

University of Sarajevo Publishing, 2016 large format, hardcover