In the powerful yet gruesome memoir Night by Elie Wiesel, several opportunities to elude the Nazi’s wraith were scoffed at and ultimately ignored by the Jews of Sighet and Wiesel and his family. In the time and age people just didn’t believe that the genocide of a people could actually happen. So the Jews of Sighet and his family chose to ignore them.

I am writing on this topic for the mere fact that I am baffled at how these people let themselves become the perfect prey of the Nazis. Even though there was not much physical evidence that these unspeakable things were happening (AKA the holocaust), there were many plain-to-see hints of the horror coming their way. Moishe the Beadle warned, the Germans moved into the town of Sighet and the Jews were forced to give over all valuables and wear a yellow star. Then came the ghettos and yet they still thought nothing of it. I don’t understand why they didn’t at least look into the old man’s stories or try or try and find out why the Germans were moving into Sighet. Many, many chances to escape appeared before the Jews, their golden ticket out of the night mare they were about to be plunged into, but they chose to reject the idea of their own extirpation. Why?

Moishe the Beadle was one of the victims of the holocaust, a poor man who was an avid believer of the Judaist faith. One day in the year of 1942, he and many other Jews were deported out of Sighet because they were foreigners. However he was able to escape and later returned. Moishe told everyone about where he and the others were taken. He told stories of mass murders, where Jews had to dig their own graves and were shot, and even where babies were used for target practice for the Nazis. “Without passion or haste, they shot their prisoners, who were forced to approach the trench one by one and offer their necks.” (Wiesel 6) This quote is important because it shows one of the stories Moishe told. People had thought he’d gone off the deep end and didn’t heed his words. They scoffed at the impossible of the extinction of a people. “But people not only refused to believe tales, they refused to listen.”(Wiesel 7) Even Wiesel and his family didn’t believe the old man “Even I did not believe him. I often sat with him, after services, and listened to his tales, trying to understand his grief.” (Wiesel 7) This is important for it shows how at least Elie tried to understand Moishe. Elie was probably the only one who tried to see why Moishe was telling the stories. For Elie and his family, Moishe was the first chance of saving themselves from their own demise. And as time went on and people refused to listen, Moishe the Beadle fell silent.

Years passed and life went on as usual. Some interactions with the Nazis happened here and there but mostly they left the Jews alone. The Germans made the Jews do “little things” like wear yellow stars give up all valuables but “no problem” they thought, “Wearing one little star isn’t going to kill us!” The Jews willingly did what the Nazis told them or faced death. Time passed until Night fell… It was the night Elie Wiesel describes as the night his life fell to pieces. The Jews of Sighet were forced into ghettos. People were murdered and slaughtered. There was confusion and blood. The genocide of the Jews had begun. Their golden ticket to escape had shriveled and died in the sun. Their nightmare had begun.