And There We Wept

Wednesday morning we headed down to Yad Vashem, which is the Israeli Musuem for the Holocaust. Ian stressed, in his briefings, that the Museum’s focus is on remembering the lives of the people, so it tells their story of life pre-Holocaust, and the tracks the rise of Hitler and the corresponding rise of /Anti-Semitism.

Of the six million Jews killed in the Holocaust, they have the names of roughly 3-4 million. But, when whole villages or whole families were wiped out, it’s hard to remember all. Tom Sawicki told of his father, a Holocaust survivor whose biggest regret in life is that he couldn’t remember the names of all of his 30-40 cousins who were murdered, so some of their names are lost forever.

The museum is amazing well put together, telling the story of the Holocaust with incredibly rich detail, but not in an overwhelming fashion (in terms of information – it’s certainly overwhelming emotionally.

A separate building, the Children’s Memorial, was perhaps the most compelling memorial I have ever been to. After that, I could hear the sniffles of my fellow consultants (me too). It's a very moving experience.

It would be easy for me to say, never again. But we know that there have been other similar situations since – Darfur, Rwanda, and Kosovo are more recent examples that come to mind. However, that does not mean we shouldn’t make it a national (and international) priority to say never again. That should be our goal. Never again.