Monday, November 10, 2008

Historical Note: Kristallnacht

I just wanted to note that this is the 70th anniversary of Kristallnacht, the massive pogrom carried out by the Nazis in Germany on November 9th and 10th, 1938. It was a significant indication of what was to come under the Nazi regime.


"Indifference is the first step towards endangering essential values," said Chancellor Angela Merkel at a memorial ceremony yesterday. From Ha'aretz article.

David Harris:
''Kristallnacht reminds us of the lurking capacity for inhumanity that resides in the human spirit.

Kristallnacht reminds us of nations that prided themselves on advanced levels of civilization, yet had a capacity for barbarism that exploded in ways never before witnessed.

Kristallnacht reminds us of the dire consequences when a targeted people is utterly without recourse to any means of self-defense.

Kristallnacht reminds us of the fertile soil of anti-Semitism, cultivated for centuries by religious, racial, and political ideologies obsessed with murdering, exiling, converting, segregating, or scapegoating the Jews.

Kristallnacht reminds us that there is a slippery slope from the demonization of a people, to the dehumanization of a people, to the destruction of a people.''

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