When Bergen-Belsen was liberated in April 1945, the camp gates became more than just metal and wood—they stood as a boundary between imprisonment and the unknown. For many years, the survivors had been held within barbed wire, their world shrunk by suffering, starvation, and silence. Freedom was a concept they had almost forgotten, something spoken of in whispers but never truly felt. In May, when the last gates opened, the survivors gathered hesitantly. The outside world was so alien, terrifyin