“I believe the Holocaust was a unique event. For the very first time in history…a Jew was condemned to die not because of what beliefs he held…but because of who he was. For the very first time, a birth certificate became a death certificate.”
– Elie Wiesel

Last week, the Jewish community of Connecticut convened in the Senate chambers at the State Capitol for the annual event dedicated to the remembrance of the 6 million consumed by the flames of the Shoah.
Every year, this Yom HaShoah event sets exactly the right tone for what we and others feel is a sacred duty, the commemoration of the Holocaust. But there was a departure in this year’s program-one we feel should not go unnoticed.
The focus of all previous Holocaust commemorations (and there have been 28 before this one), is its singular dedication to the victims of the Shoah. We come together and remember the Six Million by recognizing those survivors and their families who are still with us. This year’s program was expanded to include the honoring of the Tuskegee Airmen, an all black flying unit of distinguished service during the war, and also to mention the victims of one of today’s most tragic ongoing events, the murderous slaughter in the Darfur region of the Sudan.
Both of these additions to the program are worthy of note in and of themselves. However, we feel they do not have a place in this program. Any diversion from the central focus on the Shoah, no matter how small, takes our attention from what we are charged to remember.
The Tuskegee Airmen served our country in the face of a terrible prejudice that afflicted this nation. But there were 15 million Americans in uniform during the war, and a good number of them also suffered prejudice. More than 600,000 Americans lost their lives in that war. One could say they all deserve mention and honor for helping to end the Shoah, but the Holocaust commemoration is not the right place.
Darfur to some is today’s Holocaust, but so was Rwanda in the 90’s where the rate of murders even exceeded the killing pace of Auschwitz during its time. Or Cambodia in the 70’s where more than 1.5 million Cambodians (out of a total population of 14 million) were ruthlessly slaughtered. If we didn’t know it before we are all learning that “never again” is but a slogan, but prolific killings and brutality are more the norm in the world than a rare event.
The Shoah stands apart from so much else in world history and certainly is at the center of recent Jewish history. A civilized, cultured nation set out to culminate two millennia of antisemitism by eliminating the Jewish people from the face of the earth. It is genocide in its purest form and ought not to be universalized and blended into other events that bear resemblance to it in one way or another. This is not an exercise of pitting one victim against another, but is the recognition of a historical act aimed at the Jewish people, and as Jews we are charged with remembering. Conflating it with other events lessens the intensity of the memory of the Shoah for Jews as it does for the rest of the world.
Imposing contemporary agendas on the Shoah dims the memory of the Six Million and lessens the significance of the event. Commemorations should be about specific things we choose to remember, not about analogies some wish to draw from them.

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Next year is a very important year for the annual Holocaust memorial event. It will be the 30th time that Jewish Connecticut comes together to remember and mourn. The year 2008 is also the 70th anniversary of the year many believe the Shoah began: 1938, the year of Kristallnacht, the Night of Broken Glass.
We suggest that before this important anniversary event, a Mission Statement be drawn up giving us all guidance for next year and future commemorations. Soon all the survivors of the Shoah will be gone, and survivor families will be further and further removed. The challenge we face is how to keep the flame of memory burning brightly for this most important of commemorations not only for our generation, but for those that follow.
May their memories continue to be for a blessing.
-nrg

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