Graffiti Art in Berlin. Photo by Elise Thompson.
The Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust is an 8-day period designated by Congress to remember and to educate Americans about the Holocaust. The dates are determined by the Hebrew calendar, and normally the remembrance “begins on the Sunday before the Israeli observance of Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Memorial Day, and continues through the following Sunday, usually in April or May (Wikipedia).”
Recently, the United Nations designated January 27 as International Holocaust Remembrance Day, but the United States still observes the week designated by the Hebrew Calendar. According to The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, “Days of Remembrance will be commemorated on Tuesday, April 21, 2020. Observances and remembrance activities will occur nationwide between Sunday, April 19, and Sunday, April 26.” Due to Covid-19, events will be virtual.
Today at 8 a.m. PST The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum will be presenting a series of speakers, including a message from Benjamin Ferencz (the last living Nuremberg prosecutor). You can watch it here on Facebook, even if you don’t have an account.
L.A.’s Museum of Tolerance provides virtual tours, survivors’ stories, and lesson plans for those of you home schooling.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center is presenting daily Zoom testimonies from survivors, where you will be able to ask questiona via Zoom.
Here is a complete, if overwhelming list of movies about the Holocaust. For children, “The Diary of Anne Frank,” “Paper Clips” or “The Hiding Place” might be the best introduction. The films run the gamut from actual concentration camp footage, films that will break your heart like “The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas,” to satisfying revenge flicks like “Inglourious Basterds.”
Here is a shorter, curated list from IMDB.
You can also check out The Spielberg Jewish Film Archive on YouTube.
Of course the horror of the Holocaust must not be forgotten but too little study is devoted to conditions in Germany that created it. We face a similar situation here, now.
It’s been heavily studied, but perhaps not circulated much other than in places like The Museum of Tolerance. I think we are on stage 4 with immigrants and people seeking to immigrate. Oh, we hit it in June of 2018 when “President Donald Trump on Tuesday equated migrants and refugees to the United States with vermin who will “pour into and infest our country.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight_stages_of_genocide