40 Holocaust Survivors Condemn Israel for Gaza War
Some 40 Jewish Holocaust survivors and more than 200 direct descendents of survivors signed a public letter condemning Israel’s military operation in Gaza.
“As Jewish survivors and descendants of survivors and victims of the Nazi genocide we unequivocally condemn the massacre of Palestinians in Gaza and the ongoing occupation and colonization of historic Palestine,” reads the letter, which was published Saturday in The New York Times as an advertisement. “We further condemn the United States for providing Israel with the funding to carry out the attack, and Western states more generally for using their diplomatic muscle to protect Israel from condemnation. Genocide begins with the silence of the world.”
The signatories come from 26 countries representing four generations of survivors.
About 50 other relatives of survivors also signed the letter, which was sponsored by the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network. The network calls for the “liberation of the Palestinian people and land,” as well as “an end to U.S. economic and military dominance in the region, in which Israel plays a crucial part.”
In a statement, the network said the letter was written in response to an ad campaign in which Elie Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor and Nobel Prize laureate, compares the murder of children during the Holocaust to Hamas’ actions in Gaza.
“We are disgusted and outraged by Elie Wiesel’s abuse of our history in these pages to justify the unjustifiable: Israel’s wholesale effort to destroy Gaza and the murder of more than 2,000 Palestinians, including many hundreds of children. Nothing can justify bombing UN shelters, homes, hospitals and universities. Nothing can justify depriving people of electricity and water,” the letter reads.
It concludes: “’Never again’ must mean NEVER AGAIN FOR ANYONE.”
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
