Today, in the year 2002, there are still those who use fear to turn groups against each other. All men and women have a chance to defy hatred and reject those who would terrorize others - by building solidarity and strengthening our beliefs in community. To illustrate the rejection of hatred, the focus of Thursday's Holocaust remembrance at the restored Lincoln Theatre, 1215 U Street N.W., is Escape through Turkey.

• The program will include Bernard Turiel, a survivor from the island of Rhodes. Bernard is one of 42 Jews saved from deportation by the Nazis to one of the death camps by Turkish Consul Selahattin Ulkemen. Bernard was forced to check in with Nazi frequently so that they could closely monitor him. His amazing rescue is not well known.
• In 1933, the Nazis began to dismiss, persecute and kill Jewish professors, architects, musicians, scientists, and physicians, and established the first concentration camp, Dachau, for political prisoners. Peter Engelmann and Matthias Newmark escaped the Holocaust when their fathers, recently fired in Berlin, were hired by the President of Turkey, Kemal Attaturk. They taught his citizens Western Civilization and along with their families lived in safety in Turkey and were saved from the Holocaust.
• The final guest speaker will be Flora Singer, born in Antwerp, Belgium in 1930. She was one of 300 Jewish children protected from annihilation in the concentration camps by a Benedictine monk, Father Bruno Reynders. Flora and her two sisters were hidden in convents and looked after for 2 years until they were able to come to the United States.

These fascinating eyewitness accounts remind us of a time when millions of innocent men, women and children were murdered - and the small numbers of individuals with the courage to defend the universal values of human decency. HUD staff and others in the Washington D.C. area are invited to attend.