[Boston Globe] Michael A. Fletcher - President Obama addressed the annual memorial to the Holocaust at the U.S. Capitol Thursday: "We gather today to mourn the loss of so many lives, and celebrate those who saved them; honor those who survived, and contemplate the obligations of the living." "While the uniqueness of the Holocaust in scope and in method is truly astounding, the Holocaust was driven by many of the same forces that have fueled atrocities throughout history: the scapegoating that leads to hatred and blinds us to our common humanity; the justifications that replace conscience and allow cruelty to spread; the willingness of those who are neither perpetrators nor victims to accept the assigned role of bystander." "In the moral accounting of the Holocaust, as we reckon with numbers like 6 million, as we recall the horror of numbers etched into arms, we also factor in numbers like these: 7,200 - the number of Danish Jews ferried to safety, many of whom later returned home to find the neighbors who rescued them had also faithfully tended their homes and businesses and belongings while they were gone....We also remember the number 5,000 - the number of Jews rescued by the villagers of Le Chambon, France....Not a single Jew who came there was turned away, or turned in." "To this day, there are those who insist the Holocaust never happened; who perpetrate every form of intolerance...hatred that degrades its victim and diminishes us all. Today, and every day, we have an opportunity, as well as an obligation, to confront these scourges - to fight the impulse to turn the channel when we see images that disturb us, or wrap ourselves in the false comfort that others' sufferings are not our own. Instead we have the opportunity to make a habit of empathy; to recognize ourselves in each other; to commit ourselves to resisting injustice and intolerance and indifference."
2009-04-24 06:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive