We must never forget
Today, the 65th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz/Birkenau murder camp, is Holocaust Memorial Day.
It is a day when we should remember both the depths of horror to which human beings can descend, and did descend during the Holocaust, and the heights which were reached by those who tried to rescue the victims of Nazi mass murder, sometimes losing everything in the process.
It is a day when we should remember the victims of all genocides, whether Jewish or Armenian, Serb or Croat, whether native American or African, whether Christian or Muslim or of any other religion, whether they came from Berlin, Rwanda or Nanking.
The oldest record of genocide I have recently read was contained in Thucydides "History of the Peleponessian war" while the most recent concerned events this year in the Sudan. Those who forget or deny the sort of mass murder which has happened far too often in human history have made the first step which can lead to such crimes happening again.
That's why we must never forget the Holocaust.
In the words of the famous poem, believed to have first been used by Pastor Martin Niemöller in a speech in 1946:
First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out — because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me — and there was no one left to speak out.
It is a day when we should remember both the depths of horror to which human beings can descend, and did descend during the Holocaust, and the heights which were reached by those who tried to rescue the victims of Nazi mass murder, sometimes losing everything in the process.
It is a day when we should remember the victims of all genocides, whether Jewish or Armenian, Serb or Croat, whether native American or African, whether Christian or Muslim or of any other religion, whether they came from Berlin, Rwanda or Nanking.
The oldest record of genocide I have recently read was contained in Thucydides "History of the Peleponessian war" while the most recent concerned events this year in the Sudan. Those who forget or deny the sort of mass murder which has happened far too often in human history have made the first step which can lead to such crimes happening again.
That's why we must never forget the Holocaust.
In the words of the famous poem, believed to have first been used by Pastor Martin Niemöller in a speech in 1946:
First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out — because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me — and there was no one left to speak out.
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