Tomi Reichental, a Holocaust survivor who devoted decades of his life to educating global generations about the atrocities of Nazi Germany, has passed away at the age of 90. Reichental leaves behind a decades-long legacy of remembrance that transformed how communities across Ireland understood the horrors of the Holocaust.
Born in 1935 to a Jewish farming family in Czechoslovakia, Reichental’s childhood was shattered by the Nazi occupation of Europe. In 1944, when he was just nine years old, he and his entire family were rounded up and deported to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in northern Germany. The genocide stole 35 of his close family members, one of nearly 70,000 lives lost at the camp – including that of diarist Anne Frank, one of the most famous victims of the Holocaust.
When British troops liberated Bergen-Belsen in April 1945, Reichental emerged as a young survivor carrying deep trauma that would shape the rest of his life. After decades of building a quiet life, he chose to step into the public eye to share his story, driven by a growing fear that the world was beginning to forget the catastrophic costs of hatred and prejudice. In a 2019 interview with BBC News NI, he explained his motivation: “I started to speak because I thought I owed it to the victims and that their memory is not forgotten.”
Reichental resettled in Ireland in 1959, raising his family in Dublin and becoming a beloved and respected member of the country’s Jewish community. Over his decades of advocacy, he reached tens of thousands of young people across Ireland and Northern Ireland, speaking in schools, community centers, and public events ahead of annual Holocaust Memorial Day. In 2011, he cemented his story in published history with the release of his autobiography *I Was a Boy in Belsen*, and his life and experiences were the focus of two feature documentaries about his time in Bergen-Belsen. One of his most notable public engagements came in 2019, when he spent two weeks touring Northern Ireland alongside fellow survivor Susan Pollock, sharing their first-hand accounts with hundreds of school students to ensure the next generation would never repeat the mistakes of the past.
In the wake of his passing, leaders across Ireland have paid tribute to Reichental’s extraordinary contribution to public life. Irish President Catherine Connolly highlighted that he brought intimate, personal knowledge of the suffering his family endured at Bergen-Belsen to widespread public attention, leaving an indelible mark on Irish society. Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister) Micheál Martin said he was deeply saddened by the news of Reichental’s death, noting that the survivor dedicated his entire post-war life to teaching new generations about the evil of the Holocaust. “As a cherished member of Ireland’s Jewish community, Tomi leaves a lasting legacy of dignity, courage and enlightenment of others about the dangers of hatred and antisemitism,” Martin said.
The Jewish Representative Council of Ireland also released a statement mourning Reichental’s passing, describing him as one of the country’s most remarkable voices for remembrance, education, and humanity. “Having survived the horrors of Bergen-Belsen as a child, he dedicated much of his later life to ensuring that future generations would learn from the Holocaust and understand the dangers of hatred, prejudice, and indifference,” the council said. The Holocaust, the systematic genocide carried out by Nazi Germany during World War II, claimed the lives of approximately 6 million Jewish people, including nearly 70 percent of all Jewish people living in Europe at the time.
