Israel and the Holocaust

By Rabbi Ed Romm
Director, Center on Campus Program in Israel

Shalom,

We are living through difficult times. Literally, as I write this article, missiles are falling on the Galil and the radio announces that two more people have been killed in Haifa and scores injured. Since the beginning of the "war", which is yet to be named, there have been over 2000 rocket attacks on Israel from Lebanon. Israel is calling up the reserves.

What we are witnessing in Israel impacts directly on KOACH's theme of the month. It is not coincidental that the President of Iran, the patron of Hezbollah, is a Holocaust denier. He had been provoking Israel for months. Not too long ago Iran held an international conference whose purpose was denial of the Holocaust and Israel's right to exist. It is more than coincidental that denying the Holocaust and Israel's right to exist come as a matched set. Ironically, these deniers are the same people who are quick to invoke Holocaust terminology by comparing the Israelis to those who victimized the Jews. How sad to see the short-term memory of the world. . All this sadly leads me to believe that the world has not learned much from the Sho’ah except to use it as a polemic against Israel and the Jewish People today.

[Posted 7/25/06]