The American actor of Austrian origin, Arnold Schwarzenegger, visited today the place where the Nazi death camp Auschwitz was located and, in a meeting with people who survived the Holocaust and their descendants, said that it is time to put an end to hatred, using the term "terminate" - from the Terminator film series who made him famous.
The aging actor, bodybuilder and former governor of California visited barracks, observation decks and remnants of gas chambers that survive as evidence of Nazi Germany's efforts to exterminate Jews and other peoples during World War II.
Schwarzenegger met with a man who survived the Holocaust, children of survivors, as well as a woman who, as a three-year-old child, was subjected to the experiments of the infamous Nazi doctor Josef Mengele.
"This is a story that must remain alive. This is a story that we must keep passing on," Schwarzenegger said in Auschwitz, during a speech he gave in the former synagogue, now the headquarters of the Auschwitz Jewish Center Endowment. Simon Bergson, whose parents survived Nazi atrocities in Auschwitz, stood next to him and told his family history.
"I am the son of a man who fought in the Nazi war as a soldier," said the 75-year-old actor, adding that he and Bergson, who is of a similar age, are united in their work.
"Let's fight prejudice together, and let's end it once and for all," said Schwarzenegger, whose father fought on the side of the Nazis.
Bergson added: "Arnold and I are living proof that within one generation hatred can be completely eliminated. Governor, thank you for joining us here today."
Auschwitz is located in the south of Poland, near Osjećin.
In June, Schwarzenegger received the "Fight Against Hate" award from the Jewish Endowment in Auschwitz for his views on social media. However, he could not receive the award in person because he was filming a TV series in Canada, and there was also a problem with the covid pandemic.
Schwarzenegger promised that his visit to Auschwitz today would not be his last.
"I'll be back," he said, using another line from the movie Terminator (1984).
In a video address last March, Arnold Schwarzenegger accused the Russians of lying to them about the war in Ukraine and accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of sacrificing Russian soldiers for his own ambitions.
In the same video, he told the sad fate of his father Gustav Schwarzenegger, who returned home from World War II physically and mentally broken after being wounded in the battle for Leningrad.
Historians estimate that the Nazis killed 1,1 million people in Auschwitz alone, one million of whom were Jews. The rest are made up of Poles, Roma, Russians and other peoples.
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