Holocaust Memorial Day…As Rap
Francky Perez, a Morrocan-born Jewish singer known in France for his hip-hop version of “Hatikvah,” Israel’s national anthem, has struck again. On Friday, Perez released the English version of his French single, “N’oubliez Jamais” (Never Forget), a rap song about — you guessed it — the Holocaust.
In an interview with The Jewish Journal, Perez explained that he got the idea for the video while visiting Yad Vashem last year. While wandering the museum, he spotted a picture of a child in a concentration camp.
“I looked at the kid and he looked exactly like my second son,” he said. “I had a shock. I needed to do something that expressed what I was feeling, and I’m someone who uses rap music for therapy.”
“I am Sephardic,” he added. “But sometimes when I talk to other Jews, I feel they think that being Sephardic we don’t feel this hell they went through. That’s not true. Being Sephardic, I feel this is in my genes as much as an Ashkenazi. I suffer for my people, I feel it in my genes the same pain and suffering, not like the people who went through it, but like all Jews now.”
Perez hopes the song and video, which took him six months to write and make, will help educate both Jews and non-Jews about the horrors of the Holocaust.
Does it? See for yourself.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30