The Left Lost Its Logic On Israel

Support for Israel among Democrats has plummeted in recent years, a new Pew poll shows, with about as many – 31 percent – saying they sympathize more with the Palestinians than with Israel, which garnered 33 percent support. By contrast, 74 percent of Republicans surveyed sympathize more with the Jewish state. That is the widest partisan gap since 1978. A similar poll last year found a A similar poll last year found a deep divide within the party, with conservative and moderate Democrats favoring Israel over the Palestinians by 53-19 percent. This trend has accelerated during President Barack Obama's tenure. During Israel's 2014 war with Hamas, 61 percent of Democrats sympathized with Hamas and hundreds of left-wing historians openly sided with the terrorist group. Bernie Sanders, whose liberal support nearly won him the 2016 Democratic primary, sought to empower anti-Israel figures like Cornel West – a supporter of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement – and James Zogby of the Arab American Institute. President Obama's refusal to veto an anti-Israel U.N. resolution last month was ranked as the most anti-Semitic incident of 2016 by the Simon Wiesenthal Center. When Congress condemned that resolution, U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison, a leading contender to run the Democratic National Committee, voted against it. This hostility toward Israel is not limited to the American Left. In the UK, it often coincides with anti-Semitism. As Jonathan Tobin observed, Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn has been "openly sympathetic with Hamas and Hezbollah," has "campaigned for the release of terrorists convicted of attacking Jewish targets," and "praised vicious anti-Semites." The co-chairman of the Oxford University Labour Club resigned after the organization voted to endorse Israel Apartheid Week. The club has a growing record of anti-Semitic and anti-Israel incidents. Last May, Britain's Labour Party secretly suspended 50 of its members for anti-Semitic and racist comments. France's left-wing government just convened a 70-nation "peace conference" that was hostile to Israel . France has summoned far less international pressure to the exponentially bloodier conflict next door in Syria. Moreover, the French government funds French, Israeli, and Palestinian organizations that support and promote BDS campaigns against Israel, a report by NGO Monitor shows. Such boycotts are illegal under French law. France also funds several other NGOs with alleged ties to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terror group, the report notes. In the West, the political left considers itself "progressive," yet it increasingly targets the only Mideast country that actually embraces progressive values such as the rule of law, gender and sexual equality, and freedom of religion and speech. "Progressives" attack the only Mideast country making progress for all of humanity in science, technology, and medicine – from a crowdsourced solution to traffic (Waze) to breakthrough research on melanoma and leukemia. Yet, on university campuses, where the minds of future politicians are formed, hatred of Israel and Jews has become endemic. The AMCHA Initiative, a non-profit organization that tracks BDS and anti-Semitic activity on U.S. campuses, reported more than 600 instances of such activity in 2016. So why do liberals embrace illiberal players in the Arab-Israeli conflict? Double standards, underdog favoritism, media bias and group think, and prejudice at institutions like the United Nations. Because Israel is a country of laws and Western values, Western critics often hold Israel to a standard that no democracy could meet. Alan Dershowitz captures the standard that should apply: "Name a single country in the history of the world faced with internal and external threats comparable to those faced by Israel that has ever had a better record in human rights; a better record with compliance of the rule of law; a better record of concern for civilians?" In addition, media coverage often is skewed by Palestinian intimidation and deception, by reporters who uncritically favor underdogs, and by sloppy journalism and outright bias. Hamas physically intimidates journalists who dare to defy its propaganda goals, thus distorting both the "facts" and the photos distributed to the world. "Pallywood" – the practice of staging casualties and defaming Israel – has been deceiving journalists for at least 16 years. A particularly galling Pallywood example from 2015 was the inflammatory lie – by "moderate" Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas – that Israeli forces "executed" a 13-year old after an attempted terrorist attack. The truth: the child was treated in the same Israeli hospital as the boy he tried to murder. Even Amnesty International acknowledged the unreliability of "eyewitnesses" in the conflict. By contrast, during the 2014 war, Hamas executed 23 Gazans and tortured dozens of others. In September 2015, Hamas imprisoned Gazans for protesting over a lack of electricity, causing some Gazans to admit that they prefer Israeli rule to Hamas. Consistently sloppy journalism also poisons public opinion against Israel. News organizations often fail to identify the terrorist and the victim when reporting on Arabs killed by Israelis trying to defend themselves from a terrorist attack. Such missing context creates the false impression that Israelis wake up every morning asking how they can hurt Arabs. The BBC's distortions often turn terrorists into victims. Its bias is so egregious that even its former chief complained: "Regrettably, this is not the first time the standard of reporting and impartiality has been unsatisfactory in recent weeks. On Saturday 3rd October, I was disappointed to see the BBC News website publish a misleading and counter-factual headline: 'Palestinian shot dead after Jerusalem attacks kills two'. I note reports that this headline underwent four revisions following public criticism." The BBC's horrible headlines continue, describing the terrorist in last month's Jerusalem track-ramming attack as a "Driver of a lorry...allegedly ramming pedestrians." Worse still, mainstream political figures sometimes promote anti-Israel calumnies. Last April, Sanders claimed that Israelis killed "over 10,000 innocents in Gaza," an estimate nearly seven times higher than Hamas's propaganda estimate of civilian deaths. Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes falsely claimed in a recent PBS interview that Israel has built "thousands of new settlements" (rather than about 200). PBS never corrected this falsehood. Thus, the "free press," which is supposed to act as a check on the government, ends up abetting its misinformation campaign against Israel. The Obama administration and most of the political left promote a kind of anti-settlement religion that blames the lack of peace with the Palestinians on settlements. This position ignores the last century of Arab Muslim attacks on Israelis, starting decades before any settlements existed. The anti-settlement religion axiomatically affirms that settlements are illegal, even though legal scholars have concluded otherwise. The same religion also ignores Israel's removing the settlement of Yamit for peace with Egypt in 1982, and its unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005. Those actions did nothing to persuade Palestinians to pursue peace, as they responded with more than 10,000 jihadi rocket attacks aimed at Israeli civilians. Liberal support for illiberal players is illogical and counterproductive. If "progressives" choose only to blame Israel and never ask Palestinians to embrace liberal values, stop their incitement to violence, renounce terror, and accept Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, then such "liberals" have mislabeled themselves while making peace less likely.

Heroes of the Holocaust

Seventy-two years after the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army on January 27 1945, Britain and other nations are acknowledged Holocaust Memorial Day at a time when anti-Semitism is once more on the rise.

Israel itself, which has since risen from the ashes of that dreadful scourge that wiped out six million European Jews, is under dire threat from enemies on all sides while attacks on synagogues and other Jewish centres are still being carried out in the ‘civilised’ West. Only this last weekend in north-west London, a swastika-daubed brick was hurled through a Jewish family’s window while others were pelted with eggs.

The fragile borders to which the United Nations expect Israel to agree (just nine miles wide in places) have for good reason been described by politicians as ‘Auschwitz lines’ because they leave the Jewish state highly vulnerable to attack from neighbouring states who have repeatedly threatened to wipe them off the map.

It was also in January 1945 that one of the most heroic accounts of the war took place. But the incredible story has only just surfaced because the hero concerned never spoke about it.

The truth was finally unearthed by his granddaughter when asked to focus on a family member as part of a college assignment. Her widowed grandmother gave her the diary kept by her husband during his time in a prisoner-of-war camp which revealed the astonishing fact that, by standing up to the German commandant, Master Sgt Roddie Edmonds, of Knoxville, Tennessee, had saved the lives of 200 American Jews.

As the highest-ranking officer there, Edmonds was made responsible for the camp’s 1,292 American GIs, 200 of whom were Jewish. Then one day the Germans ordered all Jewish POWs to report outside their barracks the following morning. Knowing what awaited them – being moved to a slave labour camp at the very least – he decided to resist the directive, ordering all his men to fall out the following morning.

The commandant, Major Siegmann, duly ordered Edmonds to identify the Jewish soldiers, to which the sergeant responded: “We are all Jews here.”

Holding his pistol to Edmonds’ head, the commandant repeated the order. But the sergeant – a devout Christian – refused.

“According to the Geneva Convention, we only have to give our name, rank and serial number. If you shoot me, you will have to shoot all of us, and after the war you will be tried for war crimes,” Edmonds had said, according to one of the men saved that day.

Edmonds’ pastor son Chris regards all of them as heroes as they could easily have identified the Jews among them to save their skin. But they all stood together. Late last year Roddie Edmonds was posthumously awarded the Yehi Or (Let there be light) Award by the Jewish Foundation for the Righteous. He has also been honoured by Jerusalem’s Holocaust Museum Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations.[2]

But as Jews were herded into cattle trucks for transporting to death camps, there weren’t many Roddies about who dared to speak up and stand up on their behalf. 

These days, where controversial issues are concerned, leaders still prefer to keep their heads below the proverbial parapet while remaining ‘impartial’. But there is a time when we must take sides. We must choose between life and death, between God and evil. If we claim to be Christian, we have no option.

“Neutrality is only an illusion,” writes Robert Stearns. “Those who are not for God are against Him. (Matthew 12.30a) “The German public’s unfortunate legacy during World War II lies not in what they did in response to their despotic leader and his horrendous practices, but in what they did not do.”[3]

This did not apply, however, to Hans Scholl and his sister Sophie, young Christians who led the White Rose leaflet campaign of resistance for which they paid with their lives. Prophetically, they asked the question: “Who among us has any conception of the dimensions of shame that will befall us and our children when one day the veil has fallen from our eyes and the most horrible of crimes… reach the light of day?”[4]

Stearns also points out that, when the Nazis invaded European nations, many monarchs vacated their thrones and fled. But King Christian X stayed in Denmark as he defied the bullies. And thanks to his example, most Danish Jews survived the war.[5]

Princess Alice, the Queen’s mother-in-law, has also been recognized by Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum as ‘righteous among the nations’ for saving a Jewish family during the war, and is buried on the Mount of Olives.

As Princess of Greece, she hid Jewish widow Rachel Cohen and two of her five children in her home. Rachel’s husband had in 1913 helped King George I of Greece, in return for which the king offered him any service he could perform, should he ever need it. When the Nazi threat emerged, his son recalled this promise and appealed to the Princess, who duly honoured her father’s pledge. Prince Charles last year fulfilled a longstanding wish to visit his grandmother’s grave.[6]

It’s interesting in this respect that Prince Charles has compared the dangers facing minority faith groups across the world today with the “dark days of the 1930s”.[7]

The Queen herself is a wonderful example of someone who is prepared to make an uncompromising stand for faith and truth, declaring in her latest Christmas message to the nation: “Jesus Christ lived in obscurity for much of his life and was maligned and rejected by many, though he had done no wrong. Millions now follow his teaching and find in him the guiding light of their lives. I am one of them…”

Are we, like the Queen, courageous enough to tell the entire world that we are followers of Jesus and, as such, will do all we can to stand up to the evil that lurks in every dark corner of our land?

Roddie Edmonds was prepared to die for 200 Jewish men. Abraham was prepared to sacrifice his son Isaac. But the greatest sacrifice of all was when Yeshua (Hebrew for Jesus), “though he had done no wrong”, laid down his life for both Jews and Gentiles on a stake outside the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City after being “led like a lamb to the slaughter” during the Passover feast (Isaiah 53.7). He bought our pardon; he paid the price.

IRAN CARRIED OUT A TEST LAUNCH OF A MEDIUM-RANGE BALLISTIC MISSILE ON SUNDAY

IRAN CARRIED OUT A TEST LAUNCH OF A MEDIUM-RANGE BALLISTIC MISSILE ON SUNDAY WHICH EXPLODED AFTER 630 MILES, A US OFFICIAL SAID ON MONDAY.

The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the test launch was carried out from a site near Semnan, approximately 140 miles east of Tehran. The last time this type of missile was test launched was in July 2016.

Iran defense minister Brigadier Gen Hossein Dehqan said in September that such missiles would be produced by the country.

The Obama administration previously said that Iran’s ballistic missile tests had not violated the nuclear agreement, but President Donald Trump has said he will stop Tehran’s missile program.

Under the UN resolution approving the nuclear deal that was made in 2015, Iran is ‘called upon’ to refrain from work on ballistic missiles designed to deliver nuclear weapons for up to eight years.

THE DEAL WAS BROKERED BY THE UNITED STATES, RUSSIA, CHINA, BRITAIN, GERMANY AND FRANCE.

This month, Iranian lawmakers approved plans to increase military spending, including expanding the long-range missile programme.

On Sunday, Trump spoke with King Salman of Saudi Arabia, and the two ‘agreed on the importance of rigorously enforcing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran and of addressing Iran’s destabilizing regional activities,’ the White House said in a statement.

Launching a ballistic missile could fall under ‘destabilizing regional activities’.  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday he planned to push Trump to renew sanctions against Iran during a visit to Washington next month.

Text calls Anglicans to accept Pope's primacy

The pope has been recognised as the overall authority in the Christian world by an Anglican and Roman Catholic commission that described him as a "gift to be received by all the churches." 

The assertion is contained in a 43-page document entitled The Gift of Authority, prepared by the 18-member Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission which operates under the auspices of the Anglican Consultative Council and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. 

Completed after five years of debate, the statement it is not binding on either church. 

Disagreement about the extent of the pope's authority was one of the main causes of the English Reformation in the 16th century, and has been a constant obstacle to the two churches reuniting. 

However the statement, released May 12 at Lambeth Palace, accepted that if a united church were created it would be the Bishop of Rome who would exercise a universal primacy. 

Dr. George Carey, Archbishop of Canterbury, admitted that the text is controversial but called for a debate in both the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches on its findings. 

"In a world torn apart by violence and division, Christians need urgently to be able to speak with a common voice, confident of the authority of the gospel of peace," he said. 

The commission has proposed that the world's Anglicans accept the papal authority of the Bishop of Rome even before the two traditions achieve full communion. 

It also said the Bishop of Rome - more commonly called the pope - has a "specific ministry concerning the "discernment of truth," and calls this "a gift to be received by all the churches." The commission further accepted that only the pope had the moral authority to unite the Christian denominations. 

Publication of the statement, however, does not necessarily mean that Anglicans are about to accept the authority of the current Pope, John Paul II, as further discussions - possibly lasting many years - will be needed within and between the two traditions if the proposals in the statement are to be implemented. 

ARCIC's co-chairmen at the time were Bishop Mark Santer (Anglican) and Bishop Cormac Murphy-O'Connor (Roman Catholic). Commission members come from Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Britain, the United States, Switzerland and the Vatican. 

Referring to the 16th-century Anglican split from Rome, ARCIC claims that present-day Anglicans are "open to and desire a recovery and re-reception under certain clear conditions of the exercise of universal primacy by the Bishop of Rome." However, ARCIC did not go as far as to confirm the Pope's infallibility. Instead, it said: "This form of authoritative teaching has no stronger guarantee from the Holy Spirit than have the solemn definitions of ecumenical councils." 

The document does not specifically address the issues that divide the two Churches, such as the place of the Virgin Mary and women's ministry. 

The report stresses that it envisages that the Pope's primacy should "help to uphold the legitimate diversity of traditions" and that it will help the church to express a fellowship in which "unity does not curtail diversity, and diversity does not endanger but enhances unity." 

Archbishop Carey said: "No doubt there will be several issues in the Gift of Authority which will be questioned, critically evaluated and examined by both communions. This is how it should be. But polemical theology has now been replaced by convergent theology." 

ARCIC was set up more than 30 years ago by Pope Paul VI and the then-archbishop of Canterbury Michael Ramsey. It has already issued statements on the Eucharist, and ministry and ordination. 

The last report, much of it about the issue of authority, was published in 1981. The Anglican Communion responded in 1988 and the Roman Catholic Church three years later. 

The Gift of Authority is the result of further work on authority requested by both churches. Primates of the Anglican Communion and presidents of the Catholic Bishops' Conference will discuss the document when they hold their first-ever summit next May in Toronto. 

The document suggests that "Anglican and Roman Catholic bishops should find ways of co-operating and developing relationships of mutual accountability in their exercise of oversight." One area for joint activity would be teaching and acting together in matters of faith and morals. 

In a new united church, decisions would be made by consensus through councils, not based solely on the opinion of one man. The document remains ambiguous about what would happen when no agreement could be reached. 

But the universal primacy of the Pope, ARCIC maintains, will "be an effective sign for all Christians as to how this gift of God builds up that unity for which Christ prayed." 

The proposals are expected to shock many Anglicans, particularly within the evangelical wing of the church, which remains wary of an extension of the Bishop of Rome's authority. 

Mark Birchall, a member of the Church of England Evangelical council, said: "It speaks as if the Bishop of Rome has always been on the side of the angels while it is well known that for several centuries past the Bishop of Rome was certainly not." 

Many Anglicans, not just evangelicals, he added, would find it hard to accept papal primacy as it could be understood from the ARCIC report. 

"Evangelicals and Catholics have been getting closer, but papal primacy as it has been exercised for the last 100 years is probably the greatest gap," he said. "Another understanding of papal primacy might be a different matter, and perhaps this document will open the way to that." 

In London's Guardian newspaper, Margaret Hebblethwaite, a commentator who describs herself as a "liberal (Roman) Catholic," called the ARCIC statement "either a stunning breakthrough, or an act of lunacy" for Anglicans. She suggested it was nearer the latter. 

"Knowing from experience that Rome is not ready to compromise, (ARCIC) has gone for appeasement. Everything most obnoxious to Anglicans about the (Roman) Catholic view of authority is here." She added: "Even Catholics are alarmed by the current abuse of authority in the Vatican. The high point of papal domination is not the moment for freezing current positions, for setting them in the stone of a written agreement." 

However, one of the Church of England's leading ecumenists, Michael Nazir-Ali, Bishop of Rochester and a member of the commission, said that the agreed statement made "the Bible the ultimate test for determining the authenticity of any aspect of the Church's tradition. 

"It is fidelity to the Holy Scripture which enables both teachers to teach with authority and the faithful to receive this teaching from them," he said, according to the London-based Church of England Newspaper. 

Geoffrey Kirk, national secretary of the UK-based traditionalist Anglican group Forward in Faith, said he had no difficulty with the idea that "in moments of controversy the primate (the Pope) decides what is the tradition." 

However, Bishop Santer said: "To understand our conclusions you have to follow how we got there. One faith was given by Christ and his apostles and what we are trying to do is rediscover that one common faith." 

Holocaust Survivors

Ahead of Holocaust memorial day and the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, survivors speak of how they still live with the pain 

“Bergen-Belsen was the last camp we went to and it was the worst. There was one tap with water but we had no food. I remember digging around in the ground for roots to eat and people around me who collapsed and died with hunger. Cannibalism was rife. I would never do that but I saw it. I still remember the moment we were liberated, one month after we arrived. I was lying on my bunk and somebody shouted, ‘Look, there are Jeeps outside’. I went out and saw British soldiers coming into the camp. It was so wonderful.” 

Freddie Knoller is now 93 years old and living in Totteridge, London, but during World War Two he survived the worst horrors of the Holocaust. The then 22-year-old Jewish Austrian spent more than a year in Auschwitz concentration camp before he was sent on the notorious Death March, to walk 20 miles through snow and ice to another camp in Gleiwitz. After his liberation in 1945, he refused to tell even a word of his story. For the next 35 years, the horrors he saw went unsaid, but were ever present in his life. 

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Knoller suffered from nightmares and often woke in the night with great fear and panic, believing he was back in Auschwitz. He tried to ignore the nightly horrors, until one night, his two daughters finally persuaded their father to speak about what happened. They stayed up until 4 o’clock in the morning, as he related every detail of his tragic youth. From that night on, the nightmares stopped. 

Knoller’s resolute stoicism after the brutality of the Holocaust is not uncommon. After the war, Jewish refugees were freed from concentration camps or places of hiding, and often found themselves in strange countries with half their family missing or murdered. Many coped by adopting a stiff upper lip approach, and those who were displaced worked hard to make a living and integrate into their new nations. Therapy was unheard of and few survivors had the time or inclination to reflect on the cruelty they’d suffered. 

But ignored trauma does not disappear and Jamie Hacker Hughes, a psychologist and Anglia Ruskin University professor who specialises in traumatology, says that many Holocaust survivors suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, which wasn’t a recognised condition until 1980, but supressed the symptoms. 

“There wasn’t the culture of openness and psychotherapy that we have now. They may have had nightmares and horrifying dreams but they didn’t speak about it, which delays treatment and makes the trauma more resistant,” says Hacker Hughes. 

The Holocaust isn’t simply an event from the past, however: its horrors have tapped away at survivors’ subconsciouses for the past 70 years – leaking out when they started a family of their own, or when a terrorist attack in Paris sparks waves of crippling anxiety. Even in old age, survivors can’t escape, as bad memories start to break past failed attempts to forget. 

While Knoller coped by refusing to talk, others went a step further and managed to block out their experiences entirely. Hacker Hughes explains that, in times of extreme stress or horror, people dissociate and create a mental block to guard against reality. “Everything goes into a mental box that remains unopened,” he says. “Of course you can’t remember it, because the experiences never went through the circuits that normal memory would go through.” 
Eve Kugler was born in Germany and lived through Kristallnacht as a child. In the late 1930s, her parents sent her to a children’s home in France, hoping she would be safer there, and eventually Kugler sailed to the United States in 1941, aged 11. But Kugler can remember nothing of the SS guards who stormed her house, the misery of saying goodbye to her mother, or the two week-long voyage across the Atlantic. All she remembers is getting off the ship and arriving in America. 

“I didn’t feel whole,” she says. “Hitler robbed me of my memory and he robbed me of my childhood. I knew that things happened before I turned 11 and I used to look over my shoulder, looking for that child. Where was she?”

Despite having no recollection of life in Nazi Germany, Kugler’s childhood experiences have shaped her existence since. The area where she stayed outside Paris was heavily bombarded, and for decades, Kugler would hear the sound of falling bombs in her head. Once, during her 40s, she hallucinated that she had a number tattooed onto her arm, just as Auschwitz prisoners did. 

Amazingly her parents survived the war, but Kugler was almost 50 when she finally asked her mother to explain what had happened. “I felt like a fraud,” she says. “I felt like I was hearing the story of someone else’s life.” 

Kugler is now 84 years old, and in the past few years she’s visited the places in Germany and France where she spent the first decade of her life. “I can feel the trauma and the terror of the Nazis, who were everywhere,” she says. “It is important. It took a large number of years but I’ve started to feel like I was there, and I feel better for it.” 

Those like Knoller and Kugler, who are able to talk about their experiences, are among the mentally strongest Holocaust survivors who are still alive today. Many others, who have suppressed the horrors so fiercely that they still cannot tell their stories, suffer far more from the trauma of what they saw 70 years ago. 

Old age can be a particularly difficult time, as retirees finally have the leisure to reflect on what they went through. Dementia is an added fear, as sufferers lose their short term memory but maintain their long term memory, and so have a renewed focus on childhood experiences. 

“Dementia is quite often when the mechanisms used to supress trauma break down and people suddenly start remembering distressing things from a long, long time ago,” says Hacker Hughes. “I’ve seen cases where people reach a great age and cognitive decline sets in, and that’s when they really start having symptoms and feeling distressed.” 

Aviva Trup, who runs the Jewish Care Holocaust Survivor’s Centre in London, says that nightmares, anxiety and depression are common. Many believe they have a duty to tell their story before they die, so that future generations never forget. But the burden of retelling their trauma can also re-ignite feelings of anguish. 

“The coverage this week has created quite a few triggers for a lot of people,” says Trup. “They say, ‘Did you see the Eichmann show on TV? Did you see those bodies? I remember waking up and using bodies to keep me warm’. Here that would be a normal conversation.” 

Susan Pollack, who was sent to Auschwitz 70 years ago aged 14, was the only member of her family to survive the Holocaust. 

“The experience is always with me,” she says. “Were we human beings, were they human beings? Why did they make us so inhuman and create such devastation? I’ve been able to relegate it to a more manageable place in my psyche but I’ve never lost it. I’ve learnt to live with it.” 

On Tuesday, Pollack will visit Auschwitz for the first time. She faces the trip with great trepidation. 

“I try to remain strong,” she says. “I cry out when I think about it. When I allow myself to get emotional I could cry non-stop, even now.”

The Holocust: Facts and Figures

The Holocaust began in January 1933 when Hitler came to power and technically ended on May 8, 1945 (VE Day).[9]

Over 1.1 million children died during the Holocaust.[3]

Young children were particularly targeted by the Nazis to be murdered during the Holocaust. They posed a unique threat because if they lived, they would grow up to parent a new generation of Jews. Many children suffocated in the crowded cattle cars on the way to the camps. Those who survived were immediately taken to the gas chambers.[5]

The most intensive Holocaust killing took place in September 1941 at the Babi Yar Ravine just outside of Kiev, Ukraine, where more than 33,000 Jews were killed in just two days. Jews were forced to undress and walk to the ravine’s edge. When German troops shot them, they fell into the abyss. The Nazis then pushed the wall of the ravine over, burying the dead and the living. Police grabbed children and threw them into the ravine as well.[1]

In 1946, two partners in a leading pest control company, Tesch and Stabenow (Testa), were tried before a British military court on charges of genocide. It was argued that the accused must have realized that the massive supply of Zyklon B they provided to concentration camps was far above the quantity required for delousing. They were convicted and hanged.[5]

Between 1933 and 1945, more than 11 million men, women, and children were murdered in the Holocaust. Approximately six million of these were Jews.[6]

Over 11 million people were murdered during the Holocaust, including 6 million Jews

Prisoners, mainly Jews, called Sonderkommando were forced to bury corpses or burn them in ovens. Because the Nazis did not want eyewitnesses, most Sonderkommandos were regularly gassed, and fewer than 20 of the several thousand survived. Some Sonderkommandos buried their testimony in jars before their deaths. Ironically, the Sonderkommandos were dependent on continued shipment of Jews to the concentration camps for staying alive.[5]

The “Final Solution” was constructed during the Wannsee Conference in January 1942. Fourteen high-ranking Nazis met in Wannsee, a suburb of Berlin, and presented a program to deport all Jews to Poland where the SS would kill them.[6]

Kristallnacht or “Night of Broken Glass” occurred throughout Germany and Austria on November 9, 1938, when the Nazis viciously attacked Jewish communities. The Nazis destroyed, looted, and burned over 1,000 synagogues and destroyed over 7,000 businesses. They also ruined Jewish hospitals, schools, cemeteries, and homes. When it was over, 96 Jews were dead and 30,000 arrested.[5]

In the initial stages of the destruction of European Jews, the Nazis forced Jews into ghettos and instigated a policy of planned, indirect annihilation by denying them the basic means of survival. In the Warsaw ghetto in Poland, the largest ghetto, about 1% of the population died each month.[6]

An estimated 1/3 of all Jewish people alive at that time were murdered in the Holocaust.[5]

In his memoirs, Rudolph Hess described the process of tricking the Jews into entering the gas chambers. To avoid panic, they were told they had to undress to be washed and disinfected. The Nazi guards used a “Special Detachment Team” (other Jewish prisoners) to help keep an air of calm and to assist those who were reluctant to undress. Children often cried, but after members of the Special Detachment team comforted them, they entered the gas chambers, playing or joking with one another, often still carrying their toys.[2]

Over one million people were murdered at the Auschwitz complex, more than at any other place. The Auschwitz complex included three large camps: Auschwitz, Birkenau, and Monowitz.[2]

Over 1.1 million prisoners died at Auschwitz, of which 90 percent of those murdered were Jewish

The word “Holocaust” is from the Greek holo “whole” + kaustos “burnt.” It refers to an animal sacrifice in which the entire animal is burned. It is also known as the Shoah, which is Hebrew for “destruction.” The terms “Shoah” and “Final Solution” always refer to the Nazi extermination of the Jews and “the Holocaust” refers to the overall genocide caused by the Nazis, while the general term “holocaust” can refer to the mass killing of any group by any government.[5]

The term “holocaust” became a household word in America when in 1978 NBC television aired the miniseries titled Holocaust. However, Holocaust survivor and author Elie Wiesel called the miniseries, “untrue and offensive.” Wiesel objected to what he thought were historical inaccuracies, German and Jewish stereotypes, “too much drama and not enough documentary.” He also argued that television was an inappropriate medium to portray the Holocaust.[5]

Approximately 220,000-500,000 Romanies (Gypsies) were killed during the Holocaust.[1]

Unlike other genocides in which victims are often able to escape death by converting to another religion, those of Jewish descent could be spared only if their grandparents had converted to Christianity before January 18, 1871 (the founding of the German Empire).[5]

Of the nine million Jews who lived in Europe before the Holocaust, an estimated 2/3 were murdered. Millions of others, including those who were disabled, political and religious opponents to Hitler, Romanies, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and homosexuals, were also murdered.[10]

The majority of people who were deported to labor and death camps were transported in cattle wagons. These wagons did not have water, food, a toilet, or ventilation. Sometimes there were not enough cars for a major transport, so victims waited at a switching yard, often with standing room only, for several days. The longest transport of the war took 18 days. When the transport doors were open, everyone was already dead.[2]

The Holocaust would not have been without mass transportation

Those who survived Dr. Josef Mengele’s experiments were almost always murdered and dissected. Many children were maimed or paralyzed and hundreds died. He was known by children as “Onkel Mengele” and would bring them candy and toys before personally killing them. He later died in a drowning accident in Brazil in 1979.[5]

Twins fascinated Nazi doctor Josef Mengele (known as the “Angel of Death”). According to one witness, he sewed together a set of twins named Guido and Ina, who were about 4 years old, from the back in an attempt to create Siamese twins. Their parents were able to get some morphine and kill them to end their suffering.[5]

Hitler introduced the Nuremberg Laws in 1935, which made it illegal for Germans to marry or have sex with Jews. It also deprived Jews of their German citizenship and most of their civil rights.[6]

The 1940 Nazi pseudo-documentary The Eternal Jewattempted to justify the extermination of Jews from Europe. The movie claimed that Jews were genetically destined to be wandering cultural parasites.[6]

On November 11, 1938, Germany enacted the “Regulations Against Jews’ Possession of Weapons,” which made it illegal for Jews to carry firearms or other weapons.[6]

Gas in the chambers during the Holocaust entered the lower layers of air first and then rose slowly toward the ceiling, which forced victims to trample one another in an attempt to breathe. Stronger victims were often found on top of the pile of bodies.[5]

Muselmann (German for “Muslim”) was slang for concentration camp victims who gave up any hope of survival. They would squat with their legs tucked in an “Oriental” fashion, with their shoulders curved and their head dropped and overcome by despair. Jewish writer and Holocaust survivor Primo Levi stated that if he could “enclose all the evil of our time in one image, I would choose this image.”[7]

Carbon monoxide was originally used in gas chambers. Later, the insecticide Zyklon B was developed to kill inmates. Once the inmates were in the chamber, the doors were screwed shut and pellets of Zyklong B were dropped into vents in the side of the walls, releasing toxic gas. SS doctor Joann Kremmler reported that victims would scream and fight for their lives. Victims were found half-squatting in the standing room only chambers, with blood coming out their ears and foam out of their mouths.[2]

It took between 3-15 minutes to kill everyone in the gas chamber

Hitler was able to build a network of over 1,000 concentration camps in several ways. First, he established a legal basis for acts of brutal inhumanity by creating the Enabling Act, which allowed him to do whatever he wanted. Second, he used propaganda and media to dehumanize Jewish people and, finally, he used a system of brutality to terrorize the people into submission.[5]

Approximately 100,000 Jews died during “death marches.”[10]

The first concentration camp was Dachau. The first arrivals to Dachau were political opponents of Hitler who were placed there in protective custody, including communists, socialists, and political Catholics. Later, it was used as an extermination camp for Jews.[2]

The soldiers who patrolled and operated concentration camps were known as Totenkopfverbande, or “Death’s Head” detachments. They wore skull-and-crossbones insignias on their uniforms to reflect their namesake.[5]

As Jews fled Europe under Hitler’s rule, representatives from 32 countries met in Evian, France, in 1938 to discuss the growing refugee crisis in Europe. Representatives from Great Britain said it had no room to accommodate Jewish refugees. The Australians said, “We don’t have a racial problem and we don’t want to import one.” Canada said of the Jews that “none was too many.” Holland and Demark offered temporary asylum, but only for a few refugees. Only the Dominican Republic offered to take 100,000 Jews, but their relief agencies were so overwhelmed that only a few Jews could take advantage of the offer. A German foreign officer wrote a letter essentially saying that, in light of such responses, the world could not blame them [the Nazis] for not wanting the Jews.[5]

Soviet soldiers were the first to liberate the death camps. On July 23, 1944, they liberated Majdanek. Most of the world initially refused to believe the Soviet reports of the horrors they found there.[1]

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Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse sculptures appear in the River Thames

Sculptures of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse have been placed in London’s Thames river, but are visible only twice a day at low tide. The pieces were created by artist Jason deCaires Taylor, who created the underwater sculpture park in Cancun, Mexico, in 2009. Entitled The Rising Tide, the new London work is sited near Vauxhall bridge and aims to tackle issues of climate change. Four life-sized horses with riders are shown, though horse heads have been replaced with oil pumps to reference pollution and destruction from fossil fuels. The work was commissioned as part of the Totally Thames festival, which takes place at various London venues throughout September.

Who are the 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse ?

The four horsemen of the Apocalypse are described in Revelation chapter 6, verses 1-8. The four horsemen are symbolic descriptions of different events which will take place in the end times. The first horseman of the Apocalypse is mentioned in Revelation 6:2: “I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest.” This first horseman likely refers to the Antichrist, who will be given authority and will conquer all who oppose him. The antichrist is the false imitator of the true Christ, who will also return on a white horse (Revelation 19:11-16). The second horseman of the Apocalypse appears in Revelation 6:4, “Then another horse came out, a fiery red one. Its rider was given power to take peace from the earth and to make men slay each other. To him was given a large sword.” The second horseman refers to terrible warfare that will break out in the end times. The third horseman is described in Revelation 6:5-6, “...and there before me was a black horse! Its rider was holding a pair of scales in his hand. Then I heard what sounded like a voice among the four living creatures, saying, ‘A quart of wheat for a day's wages, and three quarts of barley for a day's wages, and do not damage the oil and the wine!’” The third horseman of the Apocalypse refers to a great famine that will take place, likely as a result of the wars from the second horseman. The fourth horseman is mentioned in Revelation 6:8, “I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth.” The fourth horseman of the Apocalypse is symbolic of death and devastation. It seems to be a combination of the previous horsemen. The fourth horseman of the Apocalypse will bring further warfare and terrible famines along with awful plagues and diseases. What is most amazing, or perhaps terrifying, is that the four horsemen of the Apocalypse are just “precursors” of even worse judgments that come later in the tribulation (Revelation chapters 8–9 and 16).

Vice President YEMI Oshinbajo with other Nigerian past presidents sings 'oh God our help in ages past'

YouTube

Some are calling it Nigeria's new "boy band." An "old boy band" would be more like it.

A new singing group that burst onto the Nigerian musical scene over the new year consists of senior citizens — a chorus of prominent past political and military leaders from Africa's most populous nation. And they're singing about peace, unity and goodwill in 2017.

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, also once a military ruler of Nigeria, has a distinctive voice, which is enthusiastic but probably better suited to galvanizing the masses than carrying a tune.

Their music video features the vintage hymn, "O God, Our Help In Ages Past" sung in English and local Nigerian languages. The slick package zooms in on the individual singers, the conductor and the pianist interspersed with patriotic images of Nigeria. Singing alongside Obasanjo is Nigeria's current vice president, Yemi Osinbajo. He's the sort of tremulous tenor.

The video also features retired Gen. Yakubu Gowon, who was in power during the Biafran civil war of the late 1960s. He's got the quavery voice. In the red cap is another former military man and baritone, Commodore Ebitu Ukiwe, and, in the black hat, retired Gen. Oladipo Diya, who was a de facto military vice president during the brutal regime of Sani Abacha in the 1990s.

Then there are a couple of Nigeria's former civilian leaders — a vice president, Alex Ekueme with his distinctive white hair, and an interim president, gravelly voiced bass Ernest Shonekan.

The hymn, which was adapted from Psalm 90 centuries ago by "the father of English hymnody" Isaac Watts, includes the lyrics:

O God, our help in ages past,

our hope for years to come;

be thou our guide while life shall last,

and our eternal home. 

After their performance, the leaders called on divine intervention to keep Nigeria peaceful and united.

Obasanjo said: "God created Nigeria as we are and God does not make any mistake. We should thank God for that."

"In spite of the mess we try to make of the country, [God] manages to rescue us when we get to the edge of the precipice and we thank him for that," said Ekueme.

Vice President Osinbajo, who posted the recording on his Twitter feed, told the assembled group: "God has done us a great turn by providing everything that we need to live abundantly and to live prosperously."

It's not clear whether these Nigerian singer-leaders have come together to raise money for charity or just to wish their compatriots goodwill and unity for a peaceful 2017. But they've certainly grabbed the headlines — some good, some bad.

While some people say they've been moved to tears watching Nigeria's former leaders and vice president sing lustily, many others were not impressed.

One social media comment described the video as "disgusting to behold — evil men who deceived Nigerians and are now trying to deceive God."

Another derided a "rogues' gallery," while another commenter asked — "What did they want God to help them for??? When they were [in power], they mess up dis country, corrupt #past leader @corrupt music group of Nigeria."