Utter depravity

Today I went to Yad Vashem, the national Holocaust memorial and museum. It's a very professional presentation (located in the prism shaped building hanging out of the mountain) and very sobering. I had only expected to be there for a couple of hours, but ended up getting kicked out at 5pm when it started to close.

Actually, the museum itself is only one of several buildings on the 45 acre park and the whole complex is very interesting. Part of it is dedicated as a memorial to those who lost their lives -- but they only have information on just over 3 million of the 6 million who perished.


Along with the photographs and black and white movie clips and some personal effects of the victims which were recovered, they have excellent written displays. The museum is arranged in chronological order, beginning with Hitler's rise to power after World War I and then the gradually strengthening of the discrimination and then persecution of the Jews and Gypsies and handicapped, through to the extermination camps. But what takes so much time, is listening to the video stories of some of the survivors -- they are very touching.

It's very touching and even embarrassing to see the history unfold in their displays and the way that the average German and Pole, and then the Western nations (including many Christians) refused to help the Jews, even denying them refuge. New Zealand wasn't mentioned, but of course Britain and America were, and also Australia.

It is also ironic that even now, holocaust denial has a hold in some Western universities when one sees the massive documentary evidence that has been preserved. Of course, one expects the Iranian president might deny the holocaust, but what's in it for Western liberals?

The story gets slightly more encouraging towards the end when the Jews actually realized where all their friends and relatives were being shipped -- not to another homeland but to death camps! Once that became known, some groups began to resist and to organize attacks on the Germans although it didn't save many -- too little too late.


The park also has a Path of the Righteous Gentiles, where trees are planted with placards naming the various non-Jews in different European countries who risked their own lives and often the lives of their own families to conceal or help Jews. It took me a while, but I eventually found the name of Corrie ten Boom (although I had expected the whole family to be named -- not just Corrie).

So I didn't get home until almost 6pm. Oh well, there's always tomorrow to learn some Hebrew. Today was a "history" day.