Holocaust survivor Vanda Semyonovna died of cold and thirst while hiding in a basement Mariupolamid intense attacks by Russian troops on the eastern port city Ukraine.
“Mom didn’t deserve such a death,” Obedkova’s daughter Larissa said in an interview with Chabad.org. After the death of her mother on April 4, Larissa and her husband risked their lives to bury the victim’s body in a park near the Sea of Azov.
According to the portal’s report, the Ukrainian was ten years old in October 1941 when the Nazis arrived in Mariupol. The officers broke into the family home and took her mother away. Obedkova was able to flee because she once again hid in a basement.
On October 20, 1941, the Nazis executed between 9,000 and 16,000 Jews in graves on the outskirts of Mariupol, including Obiedkova’s maternal family. When she was arrested, the Germans were convinced that she was Greek and not Jewish. The girl’s father, who was not Jewish, managed to house her in a hospital until the city was liberated in 1943.
Vanda Semyonovna even gave a great account of the Holocaust in 1998 to a foundation that collected several testimonies about the genocide.