Every story about the Holocaust has a survivor at its heart. That sounds ridiculous on the surface, but it’s true. And it’s why I can tell (and hear) these stories repeatedly despite the emotional reaction each one brings. Allow me to explain.

Many of the stories we tell are stories of survival. Despite the horror of the story itself, knowing the person whose story I am telling lived to tell their own story gives me a sense of pride in Jewish courage and resilience in the face of unimaginable obstacles. It’s as if we stand as a people, united, to say, “We’re stronger than you think, and we will not let you win!”

Some stories, though, end in tragedy – millions of them, in fact. But let’s think for a moment about how we come to learn these stories. After all, the perpetrators of these murders, for all their meticulous bookkeeping, did not write down the stories of their victims’ lives, their hopes and dreams, or their acts of courage, defiance, love, and basic humanity. That knowledge had to come from somewhere else.

Sometimes it comes from a diary or journal found by a relative, friend, or bystander. Sometimes it comes from a relative who survived, shared as part of a larger story. Sometimes the story comes from a friend, a would-be rescuer, or even a stranger. In some cases, the survivor lived because someone else died to save them. Stories come from Jews and non-Jews, from soldiers, diplomats, and witnesses.

Here’s the thing, though – every single one of these people was also a survivor. Everyone who witnessed these stories survived something – if not the Holocaust, then the war. Jews and other victims survived camps, ghettos, and killing pits. Soldiers survived battles; townspeople survived bombings. Some of the witnesses were rescuers or would-be rescuers, putting their own lives and the lives of their families at risk, and surviving to tell the story.

So, no, not everyone who went through the Holocaust survived it. But yes, every Holocaust story we can tell has, at its core, a survivor. Stories that do not include a survivor are lost to us.

When I tell a Holocaust story, or listen to one, it is the courage and resilience of the survivor at its core that gives me the strength to keep telling these stories. That, and the knowledge that, despite efforts to the contrary, this history was not, nor will it ever be, lost to time.