One life, two wars: 10 stories of Ukrainians who survived World War II and saw russia's attack on Ukraine

More than two months have passed since the day a full-scale war broke out in Ukraine. Constant brutal bombings and strikes on infrastructure and residential areas indicate that russia wants to turn Ukraine into a deserted scorched ground, a concentration camp among the ruins.

Before the war, the russians happily shouted, "We can repeat," recalling World War II. But they were apparently going to "repeat" the atrocities of the Nazis—the "brown plague" of the twentieth century: Mariupol, Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Bucha, and Irpin. After the de-occupation of Ukraine's center, the entire world saw what russians are capable of—they're freaks, murderers, looters, and rapists.

The Ukrainian Army and People continue to fight desperately against the russian aggressor, for whom nothing is sacred. Eighty years ago, the Nazis committed genocide against the Jewish people. ruscists are currently committing genocide against the Ukrainian people.

You can often hear from people who've managed to evacuate to safer places: "Even the Nazis didn't do that." For some of them, these words are not just a metaphor. Ukrainians who survived the German invasion and now are surviving the russian horde attack are the living witnesses to the new tragedy of the 21st century. Not all of them survived the second invasion.

Survive Nazism, survive ruscism

Elvira Borts, Mariupol

Elvira Borts survived the Holocaust and World War II. And in the spring of 2022, the woman barely escaped from the siege of Mariupol with her husband, 94-year-old ethnic russian Nikolai Petrov. The couple lived under continuous shelling for more than a month. They managed to leave Mariupol for Kyiv thanks to caring volunteers.

Elvira Borts, 86 years old, from Mariupol, still doesn't believe that the war has returned to her life. Staying in German-occupied Mariupol during World War II was a verdict. The Nazis shot 38 members of the Borts family, and Elvira hid at good people's.

Elvira recalls the murdered relatives: "There is no hint of where they were killed and buried." Elvira waited for the end of the war with Nazi Germany in the basements of Mariupol. As an adult, she left the city to study and work and, in the 70s, returned to her hometown. She saw with her own eyes how Mariupol was developed and rebuilt until the russian invasion.

Elvira Borts calls the day of evacuation from the besieged city her second birthday. The woman recalls:

"It was April 14, there were five of us in the car and a dog. We drove and didn't understand what was left of the home town, the Mariupol, close to heart? The ruins."

Elvira's husband survived an 870-days siege of Leningrad during World War II. He says: "The blockade of Mariupol is much worse than the blockade of Leningrad."

The elderly couple still can't understand why we were so insidiously attacked by russia, which fought side by side with Ukraine against fascism.

"Why is this happening?"

Wanda Obiedkova, Mariupol

Elvira Borts was able to withstand the onslaught of racists in the basement of Mariupol, but her friend since childhood Wanda Obiedkova was not. A Holocaust survivor could not survive the russian blockade.

80 years ago, on the outskirts of Mariupol, Wanda's family, along with other Jews in the city, were shot dead by Germans – according to various estimates, from 9,000 to 16,000 Jews were killed at that time. Wanda remained in Mariupol until the liberation of the city in 1943. A 10-year-old girl survived hiding in the basements of Mariupol from the German occupiers. But 81 years later, she died in the same city, hiding from russian troops. Under the shelling, it was impossible to even hold a dignified burial ceremony. Wanda Obiedkova was buried by her daughter's husband in a park in Mariupol near the coast of the Sea of Azov.

After Wanda's death, her daughter Larisa and her family managed to leave the city. "There was no water, no electricity, no heat, it was unbearably cold. We lived like animals," she said of the horrific days she spent with her mother in the Mariupol basement. When she was dying, she wanted to know only one thing: "Why is this happening?".

"Everything burned down"

Boris Romanchenko, Kharkiv

russia killed another witness to Nazism. In March 2022, a 96-year-old former prisoner of several Nazi concentration camps, Borys Romanchenko, was killed in a bombing in Kharkiv. He lived in Northern Saltovka, an area that has been under fire from the Russian military since the first days of the war. On March 18, a shell hit his apartment.

Borys Romanchenko was a vice-president of the International Committee of Former Buchenwald-Dora Prisoners in Ukraine. In 2015, at one of the events, he read the Buchenwald Oath, which reads: "The destruction of Nazism and its roots is our motto. Building a new world of freedom without war is our goal." Could he have known at that time that the heirs of the Nazis and his killers would be the russians?

Borys Romanchenko had lived in his apartment in the North Saltivka district for over 30 years. "I proposed to him to leave, but he refused. He walked badly, heard badly, did not agree to leave," the granddaughter Julia said. After the shell hit the apartment, "everything burned down" – according to Yulia Romanchenko, "there were only bones left on the grid of the bed, as he laid."

"War again, bombing again, evacuation again"

Doba Hubergritz, Kyiv

Last year, Doba Yefimivna Hubergritz from Kyiv celebrated her 100th anniversary. A year later, she miraculously managed to evacuate to Israel. During World War II, she had to flee Ukraine to Central Asia.

"At that time we knew we had the enemy – Hitler, Germany invaded our country, and now, it turns out, we are at war with a country that has always called itself our 'older brother'," says the centenarian. "Of course, I said: my God, what a horror! Again war, again bombing, again evacuation. Again leaving my home. So, of course, I would like peace between the two peoples. But I'm not a politician, I'm just a grandmother who survived the war."

Doba Hubergritz hopes that someone will bring putin to his senses and he will resign.

"I'm sorry I lived to see this"

Alla Senelnikova, Kharkiv

Ironically, Holocaust survivors are being evacuated from Ukraine not only to Israel but also to Germany to save them from racism.

90-year-old Alla Senelnikova, evacuating from Kharkiv to Germany, took with her only the essentials: a travel bag, a small amount of things, photos, an address book and a mobile phone. As well as a lack of understanding of how yesterday's nearest neighbor and a "brother" could so fiercely flatten the land of her hometown.

It came as a shock and trauma to the woman that the war she had endured as a child had again so brutally invaded her life. According to her, this is a "catastrophe". "I really regret that I lived to see this, because I have to go through all this military action for the second time," Alla said.

Now the woman is just happy that she was "so humanely accepted" in Germany. This can be confirmed by other evacuees who escaped from the hell of war for the second time in their lives.

"I just can't believe it"

Lilia Waksman, Dnipro

A Jewish woman from Ukraine who survived the Holocaust is met in Berlin by Thomas Böhlke, head of a nursing home. It happens without festivities and unnecessary noise, "because now everyone is just exhausted," Belke says. To get to a safe place, the older women overcame a very difficult path, where some obstacles constantly arose. For them, this path is an odyssey to survive and overcome the trauma of the second war that came to their lives. Their new temporary home is the Erfülltes Leben (Germ. – full of life) in Berlin. Full of life!

82-year-old Holocaust survivor Lilia Waksman was evacuated to Berlin from the Dnipro. When she was a child, she had to go through war, persecution and escape. And now the war has come to her life again. Until recently, Lilia (pictured in the center), as in World War II, hid from the racist raids in the basement of the Dnipro.

"I'm just shocked by what's happening in Ukraine now. I just can't believe that the same thing is happening again now as it did when I was a child," the woman said.

Remained to save the paintings

Evdokia Nedashkivska, Chernihiv

Another Ukrainian, a 91-year-old woman from Chernihiv, refused to evacuate and did not leave the city so as not to leave the paintings of her husband.

Evdokia Nedashkivska survived the Second World War bombing at the age of 10, and now the former librarian from Chernihiv has had to endure the cold, hunger and horror of war again. It was very difficult, but the woman did not want to go to a safe place to save dozens of paintings by her husband, who painted Chernihiv and landscapes of Ukraine all his life.

In a small three-room apartment in the center of Chernihiv, almost everything is covered with paintings. Their owner tells how she survived when russian troops shelled her city. "I was sitting in the bathroom. I've survived such a time, for so many years I've never sat like that, I wasn't afraid, I didn't worry," the woman says. She celebrated her 91st birthday in her bathroom.

Nedashkivska remembers her childhood in the Second World War. "During the war we suffered, there was nothing to eat, we went to the fields, harvested rotten potatoes, sorrel," – recalls the old woman. For the second time, experiencing hunger, cold and more than a month of siege in her apartment, she said goodbye to life. "I was very exhausted, very ill. My head was spinning, I thought I wouldn't get up, it's over, I've said goodbye, my legs were numb. There was no bread, no beets, no potatoes, nothing. It was awful," the woman said of her daily life.

Now that the russian troops have retreated from her hometown, despite the ruins and fires around, Evdokia Nikolaevna is happy that the paintings have survived. And she dreams of the most important thing: "I am waiting for the victory in Ukraine," she says.

"Ukrainians finally want to live their lives"

Olena Luhova, Kyiv

Out of concern for her health the relatives of 93-year-old Olena Luhova from Kyiv have been hiding from her for more than a month that russia invaded Ukraine. In her youth, the woman survived repression, her father's execution, and the occupation of Kyiv in 1941-1943. They've managed to keep everything a secret for 33 days.

To hide the news of the war, a TV set and a radio suddenly broke in the pensioner's apartment. Olena Illivna is hard of hearing, so she was not bothered by the rocket explosions.

The truth was revealed by accident – the woman's friend spoke out in a telephone conversation.

The 93-year-old woman was very offended by her relatives, who hid the truth from her: "I believe it is a sin," the woman said. Now Olena Luhova is constantly up to date with the news. She compares the massacre in Bucha to the atrocities of the Nazis during World War II. "I can't say that the Germans loved us," the woman recalls, "but they did not rummage through our closets and rob us. Because culture plays an important role. And they – the russians and the Germans – are completely different. "

russia has been considering Ukraine as its property for a long time, but Olena does not think so. According to her, russia has no right to Ukrainian land: "Ukrainians finally want to live their lives, and it is absolutely conditioned and legal," she said. The woman is also confused by the fact that some EU countries will continue to trade with russia. She calls such trade "terrible things". And we agree with her.

"The Germans did not do such things"

Zinaida Makishaiva, Borodyanka

"I survived the Patriotic War, but the Germans didn't do such things," said Zinaida Makishayeva, an 82-year-old resident of Borodyanka. An elderly woman experienced the horrors of the racist occupation in her own house with her chickens, dogs and a cat. There was no water or gas. Out of food – only last year's potatoes, which miraculously remained in the cellar.

russian troops arrived in three waves, she said, the first were the most brutal. The woman shows the walls in the rooms beaten by the "Hail". The fragments of shells pierced two walls in a row. She remembers how the Russian occupiers came to the house and broke down the door: "Go to the cellar, old b**ch!" And I said, "Kill me, I won't go there!" The unarmed woman was threatened, forced to raise her hands and then wear a white bandage. They did it with the elderly in many other occupied towns and villages.

Zinaida was lucky enough to survive, but her neighbor was killed in the bombing. "My destiny is to survive. I survived the Patriotic War and this war as well. I pray for it to pass for real, and for the fighting not to return," said Zinaida Makishayeva, a resident of the liberated Borodyanka.

"I don't remember such a war, such a horror as now."

Kulakova Olga, Odessa region

Kulakova Olga Sergeevna is 94 years old. She is the oldest inhabitant of the village of Povstanski in Odessa region. She comes from Kharkiv region – she spent her childhood and youth there, and also there she met the Second World War. Her father went to the front, and in the 43rd he died. The mother was left with three children.

"After the war, there were such poor people, angry people," the woman recalls. And now – just live and be happy. But these russian executioners don't let us do it. It was scary at that time. But I do not remember such a war, such horror as now. So many cities and villages are shot, bombed, so much destruction. Children and the elderly are being killed, schools and hospitals are targeted. No. Innocent people were not killed like that then. The Germans in the village needed chickens, pigs, milk, eggs. They ate and it was it. And children were playing as children. Nobody touched them. The russians are ruthless."

The woman says she would never believe that russia would attack Ukraine and we would fight with the russians. Because all our lives "we have been taught to be fraternal peoples." "And what now? They started the war against us. They are climbing and climbing in Ukraine. So what to say, we will never be brothers again."

Olga Sergeyevna can't watch the news on TV calmly: "They say we are guilty, that we are wrong. And what have we done to them? Are we wrong with the fact that we want to live and do everything, as we know? They just want our blood. That putin can not calm down. How much power he needs. But my opinion is: he has nothing to do here with us. Because Ukraine is for Ukrainians. We lived wonderfully without him for many years, and we will continue to live. Let him deal with everything and bring the order in his own place. It was all in order in our place.

I'm sorry for young people and children. What have they seen in this life? Will they have to have such a horrible experience? But Ukraine will win, I believe. The only question is when. How many more people have to die? "