Renate Lasker-Harpprecht
Journalist and Eyewitness to History
Renate Lasker-Harpprecht was born in Breslau in 1924, the second daughter of the lawyer Alfons Lasker and the violinist Edith Lasker, née Hamburger.
Together with her sister Anita Lasker Wallfisch, Renate Lasker-Harpprecht survived the Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps. They were both liberated from Bergen-Belsen on 15 April 1945.
Their memories of the Shoah were recorded in the 2015 book Mich hat Auschwitz nie verlassen. Überlebende des Konzentrationslagers berichten (Auschwitz Never Left Me: Reports by Survivors of the Concentration Camp).
After the war, Renate Laske-Harpprecht worked as a journalist, first for the BBC, then for the WDR broadcasting network in Cologne, and finally for ZDF television in the United States.
In November 2016, the Jewish Museum Berlin awarded her and her sister Anita Lasker Wallfisch the Prize for Understanding and Tolerance. The Jewish Museum has also hosted the two of them as eyewitnesses to history.
Renate Lasker-Harpprecht passed away on 3 January 2021 at the age of 96.
Renate Lasker-Harpprecht (left) and Anita Lasker Wallfisch with the Prize for Understanding and Tolerance, 2016; Jewish Museum Berlin; photo: Svea Pietschmann/André Wagenzik
Renate Lasker-Harpprecht (left) and Anita Lasker Wallfisch with the Prize for Understanding and Tolerance, 2016; Jewish Museum Berlin; photo: Svea Pietschmann/André Wagenzik