The facts are, wrote Hannah Arendt in 1946, “that six million Jews, six million human beings, were helplessly, and in most cases unsuspectingly, dragged to their deaths”. Human history, she added, “has known no story more difficult to tell”. In the years since those facts first became known, the story of the Holocaust has been told and retold, yet it still remains obdurately difficult to tell.
Scholarly inquiry, the search for causation, the most meticulous reconstruction, the grave questions of theologians and of thinkers like Arendt herself, the wrenching accounts of survivors, the discovered testimony of victims like Anne Frank – it all goes only so far. The unknowability of the Holocaust was famously, if inadvertently, expressed by the guard at Auschwitz who curtly told Primo Levi: “There is no why here.” We cannot in the end explain the Holocaust: it is beyond explanation.
The converse is not true. We cannot explain the Holocaust, yet, in large measure, it explains us. The Holocaust set the moral, ethical and geopolitical parameters within which the western world lives, influenced international institutions, sits balefully on the shoulders of writers and artists, and is never entirely absent from our minds.
Nor should it be, even though new horrors and new problems have inevitably emerged. If we were ever to lose our consciousness of the Holocaust, we would lose the moral fresh start that victory over the Nazi state gave us, the determination that such a thing should never be allowed to happen again and that we should always be on the watch for early signs of the disease that led to it. That is one reason why many in the last generation of survivors of the camps, or those who escaped to Britain or America in the nick of time, are making a final effort to imprint on the minds of the young some sense of the enormity of what happened.
They are speaking now because soon they will not be able to speak. They are speaking, also, to a Europe where minorities once again feel themselves at risk: Jewish communities gripped by a new insecurity, Muslim communities that sense the slow swell of hostility in the wake of jihadist outrages like the massacre at Charlie Hebdo. True, a sprinkling of far-right parties, from Golden Dawn in Greece to Svoboda in Ukraine, is far from constituting a fascist revival. We are not on the road to another Auschwitz. But that is, in part, because we remember what happened there.
Those who are gathering there for the 70th anniversary of the camp’s liberation by Russian troops, particularly the handful of elderly survivors, are determined that we should continue to remember. Some other aspects of the occasion give cause for concern. This is one time when the current difficulties with Russia should have been overlooked, yet Vladimir Putin has not been formally invited and is not coming.Of course, Russia has been playing politics with its charges that neo-fascists are on the march in Ukraine. All the more reason to recall the ideal of wartime unity. And there will be countries represented at Auschwitz on Tuesday, especially from central and eastern Europe, that have not faced up to the participation of their own citizens in the death camps in the thoroughgoing and agonised way in which Germany itself finally faced up to its Nazi past.
The Holocaust was a murder in the European family, a shame from which Europe will never entirely recover. It is seen differently outside the old continent. America, rightly or wrongly, has less sense of responsibility for that shame, but a great determination to preserve Israel, a determination that has profoundly changed the Middle East. Israel itself, coming late to its own reckoning with what happened in Europe, has sometimes been led by those ready to exploit its vulnerability, but that does not mean the vulnerability is not viscerally felt: a people who came close to extinction cannot be blamed for not wanting to put their fate ever again in other hands. The Arabs, meanwhile, cannot be blamed for feeling that Europe’s blood debt to the Jews was paid with what they see as their territory. Beyond Europe, what was once a terrible but distant event in the colonial metropolis has seemed more relevant after Cambodia and Rwanda. Auschwitz now belongs to us all.
It has been critical for the survivors to tell their stories. Who would believe such a world horror actually happened if those survivors didn’t tell their stories over and over again.
This will probably be the last major reunion, if we can call it that, of the Auschwitz survivors. The ones still alive today were teenagers and young adults when the camp was liberated. They are now in their 90’s for the most part. Say no more.
Nor should we forget the 5 million other souls lost in these terrible death machines or the near 30 million Russians who died while Russia bore the brunt of the wR in Western Europe. The U.S. and many Eastern European countries, including Great Britain and France were tangentially involved in the death of the Jews by failing to recognize what was happening, refusing to admit refugees and, in some cases actually helping export Jews to the death camps. There is plenty of shame to spread around.
Wow… Great article Moon.
Having said that, what do you thing of the current administrations actions with Israel and Netanyahu? They have said things along the lines of “it’s out of the norm” to worse. This is the same admin that someone was quoted as saying Netanyahu was “a chicken shit PM”.
What say you?
I say turn off the mic before calling someone a chicken shit anything.
Netanyahu and Obama will probably never be best friends.
I don’t think everything Israel does is ok, just for the record.
I thought it was a very good opinion piece. I don’t agree with every single word of it but over all, great article.
How culpable do you think the United States is?
Sorry, that was in reference to Netanyahu speaking to congress…
Very unwise of whichever WH staffer it was to use the term JB referred to when speaking of Netanyahu. Very unwise of Netanyahu to validate it by accepting Boehner’s invitation to speak to Congress. Completely inexplicable, entirely disrespectful of both the Constitution and the Office of the President (not to mention the person who currently occupies the Office, and totally unpatriotic of Boehner to have extended the invitation.
Richard Cohen’s view in the Post yesterday is very close to mine on this extraordinarily damaging move by Boehner and Netanyahu.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/richard-cohen-benjamin-netanyahus-contempt-for-president-obama/2015/01/26/40e
@Jackson Bills
Please point out where inviting someone to speak to Congress is unconstitutional.
Disrespectful of the Office of the President? Merely for inviting the leader of a nation to address Congress? While that same Office LIES about why they refuse to meet with said leader? While that same Office is actively working against said leader in Israel, assisting in the campaign against him?
That Office?
Not to defend Jackson, but he didn’t say it was.
Scout did. Yes, disrespectful. but that’s Boehner for you. Elena and I have our private name for Netanyahu. It’s not printable. substitute ya for something else that goes with YOU.
@Jackson Bills
Oops….the last reply was supposed to be to Scout
Clicked on the wrong “reply”. Need more coffee.
@Scout
@ Cargo: I didn’t say that extending speaking invitations is unconstitutional. You’re either distorting intentionally or not paying attention to what has happened.
The lack of respect shown by Boehner and whichever other short-sighted Rs thought this stunt up is for the Constitution and for a strong tradition in America that is at the heart of our national security. We can be partisan on domestic issues, but we don’t allow foreign leaders to enter into our intra-family political squabbles on domestic issues to push their foreign agendas. Looking outward and managing our security issues is something that we placed in the hands of the Executive Branch, and we influence that policy respectfully, discreetly and among ourselves. We don’t speak with many tongues externally. We don’t use foreign leaders to poke sticks in the eyes of the President, whoever that might be at any given time.
I would have felt the same way if a Democrat majority in the House had invited a French or British PM to speak during the Suez crisis.
This kind of thing always ends badly for the U.S. and for the people that members of Congress think they’re carrying water for.
@Moon-howler
That’s why I put that correction.
Agree completely with Scout. Boehner and his smirking sidekick (they seem to be joined at the hip these days) have broken new ground here and further undermined our system of government.
But it appears to be backfiring on them AND on Nutandyahoo. Even many Israelis and Israel supporters in congress are taking a step back because of this. Nutandyahoo is playing to his extremist base, just as Boehner is, but there’s a LOT more moderates out there in both countries.
When I wrote the above, I was thinking of McConnell as the sidekick, but as I re-read it Nutandyahoo also fits the bill!
As to the Holocaust, have we really learned any lessons from it? The world is standing by as tens of thousands of people all over the globe are massacred because of their religion or ethnicity. America has recently tortured prisoners. We continue to hold prisoners without charges or any way to gain release. Propaganda still drowns out the truth in many places in the world.
What have we learned?
I was thinking similar thoughts when I put the post up. Yes we have learned, no we haven’t learned.
I think we know that people we can identify with, people who are like us, are capable of committing horrible atrocities. “Otherness” still accounts for a great deal. I think that had a lot to do with our intervention in the Balkans back in the 90’s. The Bosnians were like us.
There is much more of a chance of dismissal of genocide if the victims are seen as “tribal.” Localized strife is often ignored.
Conversely, do you think we would have applied as much pressure to South Africa if the ruling government we black rather than white? I don’t think so.
@middleman
Funny how the President is all upset about this visit…but had to lie about being blindsided. He was informed of the invitation before it went out.
Funny how he’s upset about this visit and lied about why he refused to meet with Netanyahu while meeting with OTHER politicians within days of their respective election/reelections.
Funny how he’s upset about this visit while having an organization in Israel, run by the White House, working for Netanyahu’s defeat.
@Moon-howler
“Conversely, do you think we would have applied as much pressure to South Africa if the ruling government we black rather than white? I don’t think so.”
Completely agree. Add in the caveat that in many of the case such as Congo or Burundi…there is no way to apply pressure. Furthermore, the lack of infrastructure and comfort lends itself to isolation.
Reporters go where the hotels are. That’s one of the reasons you see so much Israel conflict and not so much Congo conflict. Over 5 million people have died in the Congo since the Hutu/Tutsi conflict started in Rwanda and jump started the various civil wars around it.
Define blind-sided. I am sure Boehner didn’t call Obama and ask his permission. Netanyahu is playing games and it is biting him in the ass also. It’s really against all protocol I am aware of for him to accept that invitation.