Do Jews have horns?

As much as my mother couldn't stop talking, my father could hardly even begin to talk.

Not about his past family, and not about his war experiences. That's why the few stories that he did tell us are precious and I want to preserve them.

My father also became a Russian Partisan. Here's how.

How my father became
a Russian Partisan

My father was a young Jewish man from a small village. He and the other able-bodied men of his village were rounded up and taken to a work camp during WWII. His work camp wasn't as heavily guarded as the concentration camps. There are many unanswered questions about his life before and during the war which will remain unanswered forever. I don't know what sort of work was done in a work camp.

The prisoners had an escape plan. They had secretly dug a hole under the fence to escape. Everyone except the "kappas" (the spies) knew about this plan. I still find it remarkable that everyone knew who the kappas were.

But they didn't escape at first because they had been threatened that if anyone tried to escape, the women and children who had been left behind would be killed.

But one day, they learned that their families had already been murdered. That very night, every man (except for the kappas), escaped. Part of their plan was to split up into groups so that not all of them would be caught. Sadly, about half of them were caught and killed. My father's group got away. He too managed to join a group of Russian Partisans, both Jewish and non-Jewish fighters who resisted the Nazi's.  It was not the same unit as my mother's Partisan group. It was coincidence that both my parents were in the Russian Partisans. Or maybe it was fate.

The question:
   Do Jews Have Horns?

After fighting bravely for 3 years, alongside his comrades, my father rose through the ranks to become a Partisan Commander.  He pronounced it comandeer with the accent on the last syllable. I don't know exactly how high the ranking of a comandeer actually was. I don't know what he had to  do to earn that status. And I'll never know.

 There is only one story he told. It happened at the end of the war. His comrades were joyously looking forward to reuniting with their families. My father told them quietly that his own family had been murdered.

So Many Unanswered Questions

One comrade, astonished, not with ridicule but with the greatest respect, asked him, "Commandeer, you are Jewish? May I feel your horns?"

I once asked my father, "Daddy, what did you say? What did you do?" He didn't answer. He never told me. I've imagined many versions. Maybe he cries as he starts to punch his fellow Partisan and the other comrades had to pull him away. I imagine another scenario where he yells, crying in hopeless frustration and rage, "Feel! Feel! Can you find my horns?" Or maybe he simply turned pale in a dignified silence -- bearing the weight of centuries of antisemitic myths and misunderstanding.

So many unanswered questions remain, but this story, this question, captures a lifetime of Jewish identity, resilience, and survival.