Op-Ed in Today's Houston Chronicle: State-Sponsored Anti-Semitism Must be Taken Seriously

On Jan. 27, 1945, the Soviet Red Army liberated the Auschwitz concentration camp. In 2005, the United Nations established Jan. 27 as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. 

The day’s official tagline, “Remembrance and Beyond,” denotes its dual significance. First is the obligation of the world body’s members to remember and memorialize the 6 million Jewish victims of Nazi genocide and, in those countries where it took place, to recall the particular circumstances of the tragedy. Second, venturing “beyond” remembrance, the U.N. explicitly rejects denial that the Holocaust took place, and mandates educational programs aimed at ensuring that nothing like it ever happens again.

This second theme faces a severe challenge in our time. While the world was shocked in the later stages of World War II to learn of the destruction of European Jewry, Adolf Hitler had never made any secret of his plan to carry it out. From the outset of his political career, Hitler blamed the Jews for Germany’s defeat in World War I, the worldwide economic depression and any other ills that had plagued the German people. As early as 1922 he promised his followers, “If I am ever really in power, the destruction of the Jews will be my first and most important job.” This principle, which figures prominently in his book Mein Kampf, was the rationale for the comprehensive anti-jewish laws enacted by the Nazi regime. After the outbreak of war it provided the opportunity to carry out the long-contemplated plan, forming the basis for genocide.

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This week, astronaut Bill McArthur is travelling to Israel to honor the memory of Ilan Ramon. He will participate in the The Seventh annual international Ilan Ramon Space Conference at the Fischer Institute for Air and Space Strategic Studies.  Our Consulars and visiting Ambassadors had the honor of meeting Colonel McArthur at the Space Center this week. The trip was timed with the January 26th, 2012 NASA Day of Remembrance for those who bravely and tragically lost their lives in pursuit of the endeavors of space.

Apollo 1 January 27th, 1967

Astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chafee perished when their capsule caught fire in a prelaunch test.

Challenger January 28th, 1986.

73 seconds after the Challenger launched, America watched as a booster engine failed and the Challenger broke apart before our eyes, killing all aboard. Astronauts Greg Jarvis, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Judith Resnik, Michael J. Smith, Dick Scobee and teacher Christa McAuliffe all perished.

President Reagan delivered one of the most powerful eulogies of our time, quoting the poem "High Flight" by John Gillespie Magee, Jr.,

"We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and 'slipped the surly bonds of Earth' to 'touch the face of God."

Columbia February 3, 2003

16 minutes before landing, Mission Control lost contact with Columbia. A piece of foam became loose, opening a hole in the wing, and causing the shuttle to break apart and disintegrate upon re-entry. Astronauts Rick Husband, William McCool, Michael Anderson, Kalpana Chawla, David Brown and Laurel Clark were all killed. Also on board was Israel's first astronaut, Ilan Ramon. Two countries, Israel and America, mourned together.

We honor these fallen heroes and their families for their bravery and accomplishments.

As we gather in this chamber, an alarm bell is ringing. Never has it been so clear that Iran is seeking to build a nuclear weapon. This is the single greatest threat to the security of the entire world.

Now is the time to act. Tomorrow is too late. The stakes are too high. The price of inaction is too great.

The latest IAEA reports prove beyond any doubt that Iran has a nuclear weapons program, which is advancing rapidly.

Iran recently announced that it will enrich uranium at a 20 percent-level at its nuclear facility in Qom. There is no plausible civilian justification for this action. It blatantly violates numerous resolutions of this Council – and will bring Iran significantly closer to producing weapons-grade, highly enriched uranium.

Each and every member of the United Nations – and particularly of this Council – should lie awake at night thinking about what would happen if the regime in Iran gets ahold of the most dangerous weapon on earth.

Only the pressure of a united international community can stop Iran from continuing its march toward nuclear weapons. The political and economic price that Iran will pay must be clear. Israel commends the recent steps taken by the U.S, the EU, and others in this regard. Although these are very important steps, we all must judge them based on their results. It is time for the rest of the international community – and this Council – to join these efforts.

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CABINET COMMUNIQUE  

(Communicated by the Cabinet Secretariat)  

At the weekly Cabinet meeting on Sunday, 22 January 2012:  

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made the following remarks:

"This week we will mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The UN decided to mark this day at the initiative of the Israeli government and then Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, and it was an important decision.  It created an international framework for discussion of the Holocaust, certainly in several countries – for example in Europe – for which it is important to do so.

I was in the Netherlands last week and I was impressed that while this issue is being dealt with, it must be dealt with on a deeper level.  Israel has decided to mark during the same week, the struggle against anti-Semitism, a struggle which is being led by [Public Diplomacy and Diaspora Affairs] Minister Yuli Edelstein, in new, creative and important ways.

Yad Vashem Council Chairman Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau and Yad Vashem Directorate Chairman Avner Shalev are here today.  Their work is making waves around the world, as is the assistance in the overall struggle given by the Jewish Agency led by our friend Natan Sharansky.

We are also marking 70 years since the Wansee Conference. Seventy years ago at a luxurious villa on the shores of a pastoral lake in one of the suburbs of Berlin, ten senior officials of the German Third Reich met and, over breakfast, decided to annihilate the Jewish people. They also decided on the ways to accomplish this.

Our friend Yossi Peled – a Holocaust survivor, former GOC Northern Command in the IDF and now a minister in the Israeli government – attended the ceremony this week.

Seventy years ago, the Jewish people were helpless.  They had no ability – neither political, nor military nor diplomatic – to organize their own defense, and one-third of our people were annihilated.  The difference between 1942 and 2012 is not the absence of enemies; that same desire to destroy the Jewish people and the State that arose – this desire exists and has not changed.  The difference is our ability to defend ourselves and to do so with determination.

The Jewish people and the Government of Israel have the obligation and the right to prevent another annihilation of the Jewish people or attack on its state."

(As reported by the Foreign Ministry Office)

Thank you, Mr. High Commissioner.

I would like to congratulate the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees on the 60th anniversary of the UN Convention relating to the Status of Refugees. Your office and the convention are vital tools in dealing with the global challenge of helping people in need who were forced for different reasons to leave their homeland and families and to find a better life somewhere else.

The State of Israel is a country that was established as a shelter for Jewish refugees from all over the world, including, survivors of the Holocaust and those forced from their homes in North Africa and the Middle East. Our society is a mosaic of people from around 100 countries who returned to their ancestral homeland escaping the horrors of persecutions and violence.

As a result of our experience, Israel was one of the initiators of the Refugees Convention and one of the first countries to join it. Israel is committed to all its articles.

In addition, we support the application of the general principles governing the treatment of refugees worldwide to apply universally, without exception, including those in the Palestinian context. While the UNHCR has found durable solutions for tens of millions of refugees, the agency created specifically for the Palestinian context has found durable solutions for no one.

This has meant that a peaceful solution to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians remains further away. This is morally and politically unacceptable.

The refugee issue is a core element towards finding a solution to our conflict and in its broader context would have to address both the Palestinian and the Jewish refugees forced to flee from Arab lands. Jewish refugees also require redress.

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