Political Fiddling on the Rooftops of Hatred

January 25th, the White House released their statement honoring Auschwitz’s liberation 60th anniversary. The President proclaimed Auschwitz a reminder “when we find anti-Semitism, we must come together to fight it.”

One day earlier, January 24th, the United Nations General Assembly convened in a 28th special session to mark the liberation from death camps, Israel’s initiative for the first ever special session dealing with issues relating to their Middle East democracy. Saudi Arabia, financier of terrorist attacks on Israeli and American citizens had supported Israel’s UN initiative. The world witnessed who refused one minute of their time, sixty seconds of silence, ten for each million murdered. Arab countries exited en masse during the tribute to Auschwitz’s dead. All except Jordan, Transjordan, established as Palestine during the British Mandate of 1948.
Kofi Anan remained silent as did representatives for the rest of the world, resonating six decades ago as 6 million burned alive, victims of their birth, culture, deformity, genetics, religious persuasion and sexual predilection. Six months earlier, UN Secretary General, Kofi Anan, spoke up denouncing Israel’s security fence.

The Special Session asking the international community to remember those who fought and defeated the Nazis was made two days before Israeli Prime Minister Sharon ordered disbanding the Israel Defense Force all-religious troops objectors to his disengagement plan for the West Bank. Israel, proud of the fact it succeeded in convening this event called this one moment historic.

Holocaust Week’s Memorial events included a State Ceremony in Poland. US Vice President Cheney wore a green parka. Rimmed in white fur, the Vice President stood out in the sea of black on a day intended to strengthen international awareness of the Holocaust continuing the fight against all religious intolerance. An adult version of the little girl in red on the poster for Steven Spielberg’s movie “Schindler’s List,” Cheney, criticized for his fashion faux, gave the world something to remember on the day too many would rather forget, the day marking the turning point for Israel’s birth, a Middle East haven for Jews and Arabs choosing to live together free from hate. The world will always remember America’s Vice President in green. And white fur.

President Bush said, “May God bless their memory and their families, and may we always remember.” Until we forget. The following week there were 29 UN condemnations of Israel.

Rebbetzin Esther Yungreis, founder of Hineni, “I am here, God,” founded in memory of her murdered in concentration camps, told her weekly Upper West Side Torah study group, a reporter asked her to comment on the 60th memorial for the murdered. A unique voice unwilling to chorus on “never should have happened, must never happen again,” Jungreis refused comment on the Holocaust dead instead commented on anti-semitism still destroying Jewish living.

Two weeks preceding Russia’s President Putin’s plan to participate in Poland’s State Ceremony attended by world leaders honoring the Russian liberators of the Nazi death camps of sixty years ago, Auschwitz-Berkenau, twenty members of Russia’s lower house of Parliament demanded Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov demanded “prohibition in our country of all religious and ethnic Jewish organizations as extremist," outlawing all Jewish organizations, punishing officials who support them.

Disseminating hatred within seconds, lawmaker Alexander Krutoc faxed news service Associated Press a press release stating Russian lawmakers from the nationalist Rodina, Liberal Democratic as well as the Communist Parties were accusing Jews of “fomenting ethnic hatred” saying “they provoke anti-Semitism.” Russia’s chief Rabbi Berel Lazar argued Putin’s government is “failing to prosecute perpetrators of anti-Semitic and racial violence.” Russia's Holocaust Foundation head Alla Gerber said the situation is horrible “ripe for the re-emergence of anti-semitism.“ Gerber said the enemy needed “is well-known, traditional.” Russia’s Holocaust expert said, “We can speak again of the danger of fascism in the countries that defeated fascism."

The words of Eva, one of the few remaining survivors, resonate loudest.
She recalls when she was liberated from the Camp, fourteen, she walk through a park enroute to family she hoped was alive. Eva’s irony noted, “life was actually continuing normal while she was away in the camp.”

I looked out my hotel window, up Pico, towards Los Angeles Museum of Tolerance. Words from the musical inspired by Sholom Aleichem’s 1905 short story “Tevye and His Daughters” interrupted my thoughts. A day earlier, passing through New York, I noted the musical that defied rules of Broadway song and dance success, dealing with issues of persecution and struggle to keep religious beliefs a midst a hostile environment, was experiencing yet another revival. “Fiddler On The Roof,” for a while, the longest running production in the history of Broadway was back, along with the highest reported rise in anti-Semitism globally.

I hummed Tevye the Milkman’s Sabbath Prayer, “May the Lord Protect and defend me. May He always shield me from pain….”

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