Looking Back in Disbelief.

Recent pro-Palestinian protest

 

Some of the original 750,000 Palestinians during their
journey in the Nakba [catastrophe] on May 15th 1948,
vacating their homeland.

In a recent tidIn a recent tidying up/winnowing of my folders and files, I came across one in which I had collected various items of news and current affairs commentary. I was astonished to discover a newspaper cutting from the Guardian Readers’ Letters page, dated 16/08/2014, of the following letter. I quote in full:

The current annihilation of Gaza.

“As Jewish survivors and descendants of survivors and victims of the Nazi genocide, we unequivocally condemn the massacre of Palestinians in Gaza and the ongoing occupation and colonisation of historic Palestine. We further condemn the United States for providing Israel with the funding to carry out the attack, and western states more generally for using their diplomatic muscle to protect Israel from condemnation. Genocide begins with the silence of the world.

We are alarmed by the racist dehumanisation of Palestinians in Israeli society which has reached fever pitch. Politicians and pundits in the Times of Israel and the Jerusalem Post have called openly for the genocide of Palestinians, and right wing Israelis are adopting neo-Nazi insignia.

Arrest for stone-throwing

Furthermore we are disgusted and outraged by Elie Wiesel’s abuse of our history in these pages
[advertisement August 11: Report August 11] to promote blatant falsehoods used to justify the unjustifiable. Nothing can justify bombing U.N. shelters, homes, hospitals and universities. Nothing can justify depriving people of electricity and water,

We must raise our collective voices and use our collective power to bring about an end to all forms of racism. We call for an immediate end to the blockade of Gaza. We call for the full economic boycott of Israel. ‘Never again’ must mean ‘Never again for anyone.’

Signatories:

Hajo Meyer: Survivor of Auschwitz: The Netherlands.

Henri Wajnblum: Survivor and son of an Auschwitz victim from Lodz, Poland: Belgium.

Norbert Hirschhorn: refugee of Nazi genocide and grandson of three people who died in the Shoah: London.

Suzanne Weiss; survived in hiding in France, whose mother died in Auschwitz: Canada.

Felicia and Moshe Langer: survivors from Germany. Moshe survived five concentration camps. His

Liberation of Auschwitz, Jan. 27th 1945

family members were exterminated: Germany.

Michael Rice: child survivor; son and grandson of survivors: United States.

Plus 30 Jewish survivors of the Nazi genocide and 260 children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and other relatives of survivors. 

See full list at ijsn.net/gaza/survivors-and-descendants-letter/

Children liberated from  Auschwitz, Jan 27, 1945

                           Comment.

This letter is re-printed without permission although its publication in a British national newspaper would suggest that such an item might well be reproduced, ten years after its original appearance, as freely-available data.

The word ‘disbelief’ in my title, indicates my horror at finding this letter from 2014 which is so entirely relevant to the present Israeli pounding of Gaza and its relentless killing of Palestinians since the horrendous Hamas attack on October 7 2023. How has anything changed? Surely, the only                                                                                                solution is to establish the long-awaited, long-                                                                                              promised independent Palestinian state?

The signatories of the 2014 letter are chiefly survivors of the horrifying Shoah or descendants of such and their eloquent protest is all the more powerful for that fact. It can be safely assumed that no one could dismiss their views as anti-Semitic.

Elie Wiesel 1928-2016
Auschwitz survivor; Nobel Peace Prize Laureate