On January 27th 1945, the Nazi concentration and death camp Auschwitz-Birkenau was liberated by Soviet forces. In 2005, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution which designated January 27th as “an annual International Day of Commemoration in memory of the victims of the Holocaust” known as International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
The Holocaust, or the Shoah (“the catastrophe” in Hebrew), describes the World War II genocide of European Jews. By the end of the deadliest conflict in human history, 6 million Jews (two-thirds of the European Jewish population) had been murdered by Nazi Germany and its collaborators. In addition, 11 million other people deemed inferior by the Nazis were murdered.
As is usual on any day of national or international commemoration, public figures took to social media to reference International Holocaust Memorial Day. Ironically, in the most macabre fashion imaginable, some posts lacked an important level of self-reflection.
The first such Tweet came from Ilhan Omar, the Congresswoman from Minnesota.
“On International Holocaust Remembrance Day, we mourn the lives of 6 million Jews who were systematically murdered," she wrote. "Today and every day, we must redouble our efforts to confront anti-Semitism and all forms of religious discrimination and say #NeverAgain.”
After stating that we “must redouble our efforts to confront anti-Semitism,” it seems that Omar should consider taking some rudimentary mathematics lessons. After all, if we multiply two by zero, we are still left with zero.
Ilhan Omar, as we have shown time after time, is a despicable anti-Semite. It is truly disgusting that Omar, who was voted as 2019’s anti-Semite of the year, has the audacity to reference the Holocaust when she repeatedly and willingly spreads the very tropes which were weaponized by the Nazis in their attempt to eradicate the Jewish people. The fact that Bernie Sanders claims to have an iota of respect for his Jewish heritage while continuing to associate so closely with Ilhan Omar is further insult to injury, and should cause “progressive” Jews to rethink their intersectional support of the culturally Jewish Sanders.
Across the Atlantic Ocean, one of Bernie Sanders’ Communist comrades also displayed an equally unbelievable lack of self-awareness.
“Today we mark Holocaust Memorial Day," Jeremy Corbyn wrote in a tweet. "This is a time for us all to reflect on the horrors of the past, the evils of Nazism, genocide and antisemitism, and indeed all forms of racism, which we must always be determined to root out, wherever they appear.”
It seems like the disgraced soon-to-be-former leader of the UK Labour Party Jeremy Corbyn suffers from the same delusion as Ilhan Omar. Corbyn was single-handedly responsible for the virulent spread of anti-Semitism throughout his own party, and was even condemned by Britain’s Chief Rabbi as “unfit for office.”
Surprisingly, two other leading members of the Democrat’s (unofficial) anti-Semitic caucus have not yet directly recognized Holocaust Memorial Day. Rashida Tlaib (fresh from spreading an anti-Semitic blood libel story) made no reference at all, and Linda Sarsour only referenced posts from other politically aligned (i.e. anti-Israel) figures...including Ilhan Omar).
The fact that characters who actively promote a slew of anti-Semitic tropes are welcomed at the highest levels of the radical Left demonstrates that they have failed to understand even the most basic lessons of the Holocaust. For political figures like Omar and Corbyn, anti-Semitism is an entirely right-wing issue, and they intentionally ignore that anti-Semitism spans the entire political spectrum in order to defend their own rampant bigotry.
Anti-Semitism didn’t spring into existence in 20th century Germany. Anti-Semitism has existed for millennia and will continue to exist if we fail to fight it on all fronts. Until the Left hold their own accountable for repeated and blatant anti-Semitism, any recognition of International Holocaust Remembrance Day should ring hollow.
On International Holocaust Remembrance Day, we must remember the potential outcome of inaction in the face of anti-Semitism.
When anti-Semites like Ilhan Omar say “Never Again” while repeatedly using the same anti-Semitic language used by the Third Reich, do they truly mean it?