Final answer:
Elie Wiesel was traumatized upon witnessing the murder of children at Birkenau, an experience reflective of the broader psychological impact of the Holocaust on survivors and liberators. Discussing these events was often difficult for survivors, which contributed to a delayed understanding of the Holocaust's full scope by the general public.
Step-by-step explanation:
When Wiesel first saw children murdered at Birkenau, he experienced profound horror and a traumatic shock. This initial encounter with death in concentration camps is emblematic of the psychological trauma endured by many survivors of the Holocaust, who witnessed unimaginable atrocities. While accounts like Wiesel's highlight the ghastly scenes, the impacts of such experiences were long-lasting, haunting survivors and liberators alike for decades after the war.
Survivors often faced a reluctance to discuss their experiences, contributing to a broader lack of awareness about the extent and organized nature of the genocide among non-Jews. It was not until much later that the full scope of the Holocaust became more widely understood, in part due to the testimonies of survivors and the evidence collected by Allied forces upon liberating camps such as Buchenwald and Dachau.