In August 2022 the Ride 4 Solidarity motorcycle tour organized by the Motorcycle Club, and supported by the International Auschwitz Committee, took place after having been postponed in 2020. The Ride 4 Solidarity was dedicated to the memory and in honour of the liberators of Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp.
The ride was originally planned with 20 bikers from Germany, the Netherlands, Hungary, Romania, Israel and the USA, but the date had to be rescheduled twice because of the COVID-19 pandemic. And following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in violation of international law on 24 February 2022, we decided to carry out the ride, but on a much smaller scale.
On 5 August the group of bikers gathered at the International Youth Meeting Centre Oswiecim/Auschwitz, with Maximilian Marco Katz (Bucharest, Romania), Jozsef Horvath (Budapest, Hungary) and André Goldstein (Berlin, Germany) – all 3 representatives of the second generation – as well as Michelle Lee Cummins from Brussels, Belgium.
On 6 August we visited Krakow, including the factory of the famous industrialist Oskar Schindler, and the 70 empty chairs on Ghetto Heroes Square.
On 7 August we visited the Main Camp. There we met the Deputy Director of Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum, Mr Andrzej Kacorzyk, for an informal talk in which Marco Katz reported on current projects aiming to combat anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial in Romania. He told about the Remembrance Marches, initiated by the Center for Monitoring and Combatting Anti-Semitism and Holocaust Denial in Romania in co-operation with the Zionist Association of Romania and the National Strategy to combat Anti-Semitism and Holocaust Denial in Romania, initiated and implemented by the Romanian government.
We paid tribute to the victims at the Death Wall, visited the new exhibition about ‘sport’ in Auschwitz concentration camp, the redesigned exhibition by the Republic of Austria and the Book of Names, where Jozsef Horvath found the names of some of his relatives.
On the afternoon of 7 August we travelled together with Jérôme Déodat from the IYMC to Birkenau.
We began by visiting the memorial where we laid flowers and a Kaddish was spoken.
After this, Jérôme led us to the so-called Sauna, to the Ash Pond, and past the ruins of the ‘Showers’ to the camp where the Hungarian Jews were incarcerated in the summer of 1944.
It was a long and very intense tour, which as always deeply moved us and gave us cause to contemplate…
On 8 August we continued our journey – to Theresienstadt.
Here we visited the Ghetto Museum and the Memorial at the former concentration camp, and we also paid tribute to the victims of the Holocaust.
Our thoughts went especially to Professor Felix Kolmer, the Vice President of the International Auschwitz Committed who passed away on 5 August this year.
This is where our ride of remembrance as a group ended.
On his return journey to Bukarest, Marco Katz visited the memorial for the 82 children who were murdered in Lidice.
We are very grateful to the museum at Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial, especially Mr Andrzej Kacorzyk, the colleagues at the International Youth Meeting Center Oswiecim/Auschwitz, and above all Jérôme Déodat, who spent much time with us. And, last but not least, our thanks go to the International Auschwitz Committee for supporting our mission.
Download "Travel report of the Ride 4 Solidarity motorbike club" (pictures with German text)