Loss Of Identity In Night By Elie Wiesel

Many people have heard of the Holocaust but have never thought about how it affected an individual who went through it. The Holocaust is the most well-known genocide, although there are many other instances of mass killings, including the Bosnian Genocide. Bosnian Serb forces, with the backing of the Serb-dominated Yugoslav army, targeted both Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) and Croatian civilians for wicked crimes resulting in the deaths of some 100,000 people (80 percent Bosniak) by 1995. It was the worst act of genocide since the Nazi regime’s destruction of 6 million European Jews during World War II. In the memoir, Night, Elie Wiesel reveals the negative impact the Holocaust had on his identity. Likewise, Hasan Hasanović is a survivor of the

As soon as Elie got off of the train he was separated from his mother and sister and he had no idea it would be the last time he would see them. “‘Men to the left! Women to the right!’ Eight simple words spoken quietly, indifferently, without emotion. Eight short, simple words. Yet that was the moment I parted from my mother. I had not had time to think” (Wiesel 28). Elie wasn’t prepared to say goodbye to his mother because he had no way of knowing it would be the last time he would see her forever. This is something that sticks with him forever, not being able to say goodbye or I love you to his own mother because she's being taken away. The same type of situation occurred with Hasan. He was headed toward Tuzla, the nearest Muslim territory, when he lost his dad and uncle. He lost track of them when running into the woodland, and he could not turn back to look for them because he risked the chance of being killed. To this day his father and uncle are still on his mind. “The worst thing is the anguish that comes with thinking about Husein and my father — wondering how they were killed, whether they were tortured or not, and how long it took them to die. That pain is almost unbearable” (Hasanović). Nevertheless, the dehumanization both Elie and Hasan faced due to the loss of their family members by oppressive forces caused them to be mentally