The PBS network recently aired a series of documentaries bundled under the title: “The US and the Holocaust.” Like all such works, it was said that this one too will contribute to the understanding of the past, which is a necessary condition for the horrible past never to be repeated again.
But is that true? Or is it a deliberate deception? Or is
it wishful thinking? Well, let’s examine the situation that impelled those
questions more closely to see where the truth may be hovering.
When an event as momentous as the defeat of the axis
powers takes place, which it did at the end of World War II, and when literally
the whole world is seen to sit at the start of an era during which the bitter
moments of the pre-war are unlikely to happen again – but they do – we are obligated
to demand the introduction of drastic changes to the way we’ve been thinking
about our ability to reason realistically.
The Holocaust was the genocidal practice of an era whose
aim was to exterminate the Jews and a few other undesirables from the face of
the Earth. It failed to accomplish its goal given that Jews are still around;
are still alive and kicking, as do members of the other undesirable groups. But
while this is an undeniable fact, it is also undeniable that the use of the
Holocaust as poster child for a campaign that seeks to eradicate its repetition
under the slogan: “Never again,” has been a failure.
Given that genocide has happened again and again in Asia,
Africa, Europe and Latin America, we are obligated to question our ability to
reason realistically. Doing so should force us to reject the old approach and
adopt a new one, even if the new seems on the surface to call for
counterintuitive measures that contradict what we’ve been doing up to now.
To be sure, what we’ve been doing, is that in recognition
of the fact that the Jews have suffered the most during the Holocaust, we
deferred to them all matters relating to the subject. This was a mistake
because a plaintiff can never be appointed to judge the defendant he is accusing,
and expect him or her to pronounce a verdict that will render justice to all
sides. In this case, the verdict will have had to address what caused the Holocaust
to happen in the first place, and make sure it will never happen again.
Since strong signs of antisemitism are now coming from
around the world (including America that was thought to be the safest place for
Jews to live in and thrive) thus indicating that a return to the conditions which
brought about the first Holocaust, is upon us again – we would be derelict in
our duty to ourselves as a human race if we did not reverse our mode of
thinking, and did not work to find a permanent solution to that repetitive
occurrence.
But where do we go from here?
The first thing we do is tell the Jews they did the best
they could, we thank them for their effort, and we add as politely as we can
that their best wasn’t good enough. We let them know that we understand, even
feel the pain that must have been felt by the hundreds of people who were
thrown into wagons and sent to concentration camps where they worked hard and
left to starve before being poisoned and incinerated.
But in all fairness, it must be said that we also feel as
strongly if not more so for every little girl that’s kidnapped by a monstrous
pedophile who would drag her into the woods as she screams her lungs off:
“mamma, mamma, help me mamma,” knowing that she is alone, that no one hears her
and that mamma will not help. The holocausted little girl knows she’ll die
alone and in hiding at the hands of a merciless monster, having done nothing to
merit this fate.
The holocaust that’s suffered by these girls, and the one
suffered by all those who realize they will not be saved, and that no one will
know what happened to them, touches us more than does the Holocaust of Jews
that had each other for company, and knew that their story will be told, as amply
demonstrated in the series: The US and the Holocaust.
For that reason, we need to make it a rule that to draw a
comparison between the Holocaust of Jews and the others, does not lead to the
blacklisting of a writer, the cancellation of an actor, the demand for a judge
to resign, the firing of a teacher or any such act as have been documented to
happen time after time when the Jews had a monopolistic control over the history
of the Holocaust.
We also need to make it so that there shall be a strong
suggestion for the Jews to refrain from discussing their Holocaust for at least
one year, a moratorium that will give the rest of humanity a much needed
breather.
Will that dampen the spirit of antisemitism? If yes, how
and why will this happen? Honestly, we won’t know the answer to these questions
until we try the approach.