The millions of Jews and others killed during the Holocaust are being remembered in services across the UK, as part of Holocaust Memorial Day.
Prime Minister David Cameron said, “Memorial Day is a day to remember the innocent victims of the Holocaust, and re-commit to combat all forms of racism & prejudice.”
David Ward, the Liberal Democrat MP said, “I am saddened that the Jews, who suffered unbelievable levels of persecution during the Holocaust, could within a few years of liberation from the death camps be inflicting atrocities on Palestinians in the new state of Israel and continue to do so on a daily basis in the West Bank and Gaza”.
David Ward later apologized for ‘unintended offence’ after suggesting ‘the Jews’ had not learned the lessons of the Holocaust.
Why is it not politically correct to criticize Jews even if they do something wrong? If you criticize Jews you are called ‘anti-Semite’, it is exactly like you are called ‘Islamophobe’ when you criticize Muslims.
What about freedom of expression? It is not good to keep our mouth shut because we all are scared of being called anti-Semite or Islamophobe. If you do not believe in freedom of expression, you do not believe in human rights and democracy. Like Nazi.
Holocaust- is not the sole property of the Jewish ppl- Romani, disabled, gays, communist also
Gassed by Nazis.
What about other holocaust- world conveniently forgot-
1. Hindu holocaust- millions got massacred by Muslim invaders- millions died of Calcutta famine –created by Churchill- million butchered because of – partition Indian history hide and lie because of appeasement
2. Red Indian holocaust- highest in the world- over 50-112 millions ( not a single memorial or a day for them)
3. African holocaust
4. Armenian Holocaust
5. Russian holocaust
6. Vietnamese holocaust
If we want to observe a holocaust day – all the above and others which no one wants to talk about should be included.
Holocaust denial should not be a crime
It is perfectly legitimate to take issue with the Government of Israel vis a vis its beastly attitude toward the Palestinians. However, comparing that with the Holocaust in any way, shape, form, or regard is preposterous. If the Government of Israel acted like Frankienberger, there wouldn’t be any Palestinians around to be beastly toward.
Re Agni_B @ #1
Red Indian holocaust- highest in the world- over 50-112 millions
Citation needed. Had there been that many Native Americans around during the 19th century, they would have won.
I did not count- and I expected that query.
Americas (North & South) – huge continent
Minimum 50 million populations living in that big continent before European arrived-does not look being exaggerated. It is an educated guess by many relevant sources & I am happy to go along with this estimate
Add population of all the states of North and South America now- Fig of 50million Red Indian living in the Americas at that time seems scanty
You may differ with the exact figure but fact is – whole (99%) Red Indian race has been wiped out and the most unfortunate and neglected victim of genocide/Holocaust
Ask yourself, how the world knows and so sure that ‘six million Jews were killed’, who counted them?
Indians (Bharat) are lucky. Columbus got lost and ended up in America instead of India- Otherwise we all be speaking Spanish and pray to POPE now
Oh, I do believe they learned a lesson, and went back to the ancient ways of their predecessors. I think they, like so many other people and groups, learnt the wrong lesson.
“Why is it not politically correct to criticize Jews even if they do something wrong?”
Would you like to be criticized for what the atheist Lenin has done wrong?
The Jews are not responsible for whatever the Israeli government does wrong.
David Ward was guilty of a hasty generalization. The painful emotional problem is that those who organized the Holocaust were guilty of the same hasty generalization.
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Yes, there have been quite a few holocausts where some group was attacked with genocidal hate and violence. But it has to be noted that while many groups have suffered it seems to e that the Jews have suffered a near endless series of attacks, pogroms, and near genocidal actions. The genocide by the Germans was just the latest and most celebrated of their travails.
For several thousand years Jews have been the whipping boy for every hardship and ruler needing to unite their community or distract away from their own incompetence. If a crop failed, or a disease struck the Jews were blamed. Most nations in Europe and the Middle East have at some time disenfranchised, murdered, and/or expelled some or all of their Jews and when mass execution or expulsion wasn’t on the menu there was usually a strong undertone of discrimination, brutality and violence.
The Spanish experience is not untypical with cyclical waves of near acceptance, exploitation, discrimination, exclusion, expulsion, forced conversion, and at least one inquisition so brutal that it remains a historical reference point 500 years after the fact. Persecution of Jews doesn’t begin with, or end with, Hitler.
Yes, there are many holocausts. No group has had it easy. All are walking wounded. But the Jews have had a nearly endless series of beatings. The Jewish identity is rooted in a series of defeats, bloody persecutions, exterminations, and forced dispersions. I don’t know of any other group that has had a tougher time of it in both intensity of suffering and duration. Their survival, and optimism – next year Jerusalem – is a testament to human endurance.
None of that excuses Jewish persecution of others nor should it protect them as a group from honest criticism. But it is never honorable to kick someone when they are down and the Jews have spent most of their existence as a people down. It isn’t good or just when they dip into petulant aggression and act like they are owed special rights to persecute and use excessive violence, but they come by these character defects honestly. Six thousand years of systematized, sometimes industrialized, persecution and running has left its mark.
The Jewish people are as capable as any other of violence, persecution, even terrorism, it is always a shame when they resort to those means, but it is remarkable that they haven’t become more vicious and violent. That having used, and succeeded in using, underhanded means they don’t do it more often.
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There is a big difference between criticising ‘Jews’ and ‘the Jews’, as Mr. Ward did. In fact, there is a further difference between ‘Jews’ and the government of Israel, which is responsible for these crimes- and horrible though the behaviour of the government of Israel and members of its armed forces has been, it certainly hasn’t been exterminatory or genocidal. There is a continuum even in atrocity and atrociousness.
There is also a difference between ‘Jews’ and ‘Muslims’. Muslims by deginition accept a particular set of teachings as god’s word. Jews include atheists, agnostics and an enormous range of beliefs and nonbeliefs. If we say ‘Muslims believe…’ it may be true of nearly all muslims, if we say ‘Jews believe…’ it is probably true of only a small percentage both of Jews defined by religion and Jews defined by ancestry.
Most Muslims do not know the meaning of the Koranic verses. Muslims interpret Islam in many different ways. In a Muslim community you will get sufis, agnostics, liberal,tolerant, intolerant, mild, moderate, fanatics, terrorists. They all claim to be Muslims. Only the radical atheists say, they are not Muslims, they are ex-Muslims or atheists, or non-believers. Most of the times they do not reside in Muslim countries when they declare that they believe in atheism.
You can be an ex-muslim fairly easily- if painfully in the wrong place. It is much harder to be an ex-jew. The British politician David Milliband is often describes as a “jewish atheist”. Benjamin Disraeli, a member of the church of England, was famously a Jew/
@ sc_770d159609e0f8deaa72849e3731a29d
You say: ‘Jews include atheists, agnostics and an enormous range of beliefs and nonbeliefs’.
I am sorry, but this is incorrect. Jews share a common religion. They are not a race. End of.
I supposed him to be very clever but he was in fact a fool.He walks with a quick pace.She had a bad cold.I have a lot in common with my sister.I am busy.The brothers differ from each other in their interests.The brothers differ from each other in their interests.We are all busy with work.No one knows .Can you recognize that woman，Mary?