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Dear friends, chaveirim y'karim,
This year, what does it mean to mark Yom HaShoah v'Ha'Gveurah - Holocaust and Resistance Remembrance Day? In the words of one of my Israeli friends, "I won't be able to focus on Yom HaShoah this year, it's just too much." October 7th was the darkest day of disaster for Jewish lives since the Shoah. The war drags on; hostages remain in Gaza ... We are in the midst of witnessing the greatest rise in antisemitism since the Second World War. Holocaust Education has been a marked failure ... not for content but for impact and is being removed from various school districts (including my own in Longmeadow, MA). Israelis are equated with Nazis and Jews are told we are "weaponizing antisemitism" for our own benefit. And then there are the campus protests.
It is - in many ways - "just too much."
Every year, when I have marked Yom HaShoah v'HaGveurah, I have thought of how different a world we live in since the time period of 1933-45. And while I am loathe to say this era is the same as that - there are eerie threads of connection. One thing we know of antisemitism - having lived with it for over 2,000 years - it shapeshifts and morphs to fit each era. The core of its strength is always pinpointing the Jew as the worst that a society has to offer. In our day and age, colonialism, genocide, and being "the oppressor" are the ultimate hallmarks of evil. Jews and threfore Israel, as our people's national embodiment, are tagged as being the trifecta of evil. We are seen as an oppressor colonial nation committing genocide.
So what does it mean to mark Yom HaShoah this year? It means we need to dig down into the second half of the day's full name: v'HaG'veurah, which refers to the Resistance. Just as there were Jews and Gentiles who stood up against the Nazis and their millions of sympathizers, so too must we advocate on behalf of Jews and Judaism, Israel and Israelis - and more broadly: Liberalism. Note: my reference to liberalism is as a political philosophy, not to be confused with progressive politics.
For Jews to feel safe, we need to encourage and advocate for a society which allows for complexity of thought, diversity of opinion, and intellectual honesty and integrity. What has changed in the last decade is the limiting of exactly those concepts coupled with technological changes (i.e., social media) that prevent rigorous debate and rational thinking.
Join our local community in marking Yom HaShoah this evening at the campus of Congregation B'nai Israel and the Jewish Federation of Western CT (444 Main Street North, Southbury) at 6:15pm.
To see one of the ways Yom HaShoah is commemorated in Israel, have a look at this video from Tel Aviv. Though the video is a few years old, it is how things will be done today as well.
YOM HASHOAH SIREN (2021) at Dizengoff Fountain in Tel Aviv.
For two meaningful videos to serve as a part of remembering today, consider these films by Unpacked:
Did Jews fight back against the Nazis?
How did a Chinese Diplomat save 10,000 Jews in WW2?
May the memory of the righteous be for a blessing and may we work with one another to create blessing for our world,
Rabbi Mark Cohn
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