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When Col. (Res.) Eli Konigsberg puts on his uniform at the age of 57, he carries more than the weight of command. He carries the story of two families nearly erased from the map of Europe.
As the world marks International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp in 1945, the deputy commander of Israel’s Jerusalem and Central District in the Home Front Command says the past is not distant history. For him, it lives in memory, in service, and in the urgency of defending a Jewish state he believes remains the only place where Jews are truly protected.
“Both of my parents are Holocaust survivors,” Konigsberg, whose picture is blurred for security reasons, told Fox News Digital. “My father came from a large Orthodox Jewish family in western Poland. Before the war, the extended family numbered around 700 people. After the Holocaust, only my father and two cousins remained; three people out of 700.”
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After surviving Auschwitz, his father joined the Betar movement and attempted to reach the Land of Israel in 1946 aboard the ship Theodor Herzl. He was detained by British authorities, imprisoned at the Atlit camp and exiled to Cyprus for nearly two years.
Only with the declaration of Israel’s independence did he finally arrive.
“He enlisted, fought in the War of Independence and four additional wars and served in the reserves for 55 years,” Konigsberg said.
On his mother’s side, the losses were no less devastating. Her parents and sisters were taken from their home in eastern Poland after neighbors informed on them.
“They were forced to dig their own grave beneath a pear tree and were executed by gunfire,” he said.
The Holocaust was rarely discussed openly in his childhood home, Konigsberg said, but its presence was constant. Now, he worries about a different silence.
“We are 80 years after the Holocaust, and the people who can say ‘I was there. I saw’ are disappearing,” he said. “Therefore, the duty of remembrance is our duty.”
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That sense of responsibility shaped his life. Konigsberg, a father of four daughters and a grandfather, has served more than 36 years in Israel’s reserve forces, completing more than 3,600 days of duty.
“Ten years of reserve duty in total,” he said. In Israel, reservists are legally exempt from duty at age 45. Konigsberg chose to continue, “When they call me, I will immediately arrive.”
Following Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack, he was mobilized once again.
“What we saw on Oct. 7 was killing for the sake of killing,” he said. “Not to conquer territory or change reality. It was hatred for the sake of hatred.”
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Since then, he has commanded rescue and heavy engineering units operating in the Gaza Envelope, inside Gaza, and in the north. His forces have carried out body identification, rescue operations and clearing missions aimed at eliminating terrorist hiding places.
“In the next few days we are going back into Gaza again for clearing and demolition,” he said.
Despite the trauma, he says the reserve system reflects something powerful about Israeli society. “What is beautiful about the reserves is that people can hold very different political opinions, and everyone still comes and works as one body,” he said.
Konigsberg reflected on what he believes history is teaching again. “We see now that antisemitism existed and will continue to exist in the future,” he said.
He pointed to the global reaction to Israel since Oct. 7. “There are terrible things happening in other places. For example, the Iranian regime crackdown on its own people, and you do not see demonstrations like this, but when it involves Israel and Jews, there is an outcry,” he said.
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For Konigsberg, remembrance is not only about mourning the dead. It is about protecting the living. “The place of every Jew is here in Israel,” he added. “And we must always remain united and strong. We must be here in our land, be strong and united and ensure that ‘never again’ truly means never again,” he said.
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