Holocaust, History, and Yom HaShoah

Today is Yom HaShoah, or Holo­caust Remem­brance Day – when Israel and Jews around the world remem­ber Holo­caust his­tory and those who died.

On this day, “time stops, lit­er­ally stops, in the Jew­ish State for two min­utes. This, in my opin­ion, is one of the most unique aspects of Israel. Every year on Holo­caust Remem­brance Day (Yom Ha’ Shoa), a siren rings in every cor­ner of the coun­try for two min­utes. Dur­ing the siren, every­one, no mat­ter what they are doing (unless they are sav­ing a life) stops com­pletely and stands in silence. Every dri­ver stops dri­ving, every pedes­trian stops walk­ing, and it is as if every clock stops tick­ing. The moment cre­ates a remark­able sense of com­plete col­lec­tive unity and mourn­ing across an entire nation, some­thing I have only expe­ri­enced in Israel.”

I will just add the fol­low­ing points:

• The num­ber of phys­i­cal attacks against Jews world­wide dou­bled from 2005 to 2006. Britain had the high­est num­ber of anti-Semitic inci­dents in 20 years last year.
• Anti-Semitism is a grow­ing prob­lem –even in Israel.
• Not just a war crime: The Holo­caust was unique because of the ide­ol­ogy behind it.
• The world didn’t learn its les­son: geno­cide still occurred in the Balkans and Rwanda — and it’s still hap­pen­ing today in Dar­fur.