Last Friday was the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by Allied forces, which in recent decades has come to be marked as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Nicole Lampert reflects on how quickly this day, especially in the United Kingdom, has been divested of all meaning:
The Tory MP Andrew Bridgen, for example, compared the vaccine rollout to the Holocaust, while “trans rights” activists frequently and consistently abuse the memory of the genocide—the most recent example being a Scottish councilor a few days ago.
In addition to Bridgen’s comments, the Welsh government minister Julie Morgan intended to hold a Holocaust Memorial Day (which falls on the January 27 each year) vigil for “Gypsy, Roma, and Traveler” victims. Nowhere did Morgan’s plan mention Jews. Why? It should be an “inclusive” event, apparently. Elsewhere, the University and College Union and an official from the National Union of Students have both previously marked HMD by referring to every group targeted by the Nazis except one: Jews.
The new fashion for anti-colonialism adds another layer to these issues because there are some who like to call Jews the new Nazis—a particularly nasty form of anti-Semitism called Holocaust inversion, whose practitioners legitimize it by pointing to the injustices committed by the modern state of Israel. According to this reading, Jews should have learned a lesson from the Holocaust which was, apparently, to be nicer people.
Read more on UnHerd: https://unherd.com/thepost/holocaust-memorial-day-is-for-everyone-except-jews/