Today, Rep. Wasserman Schultz made the following statement recognizing Yom Ha’Shoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day, and in honor of our nation’s Holocaust survivors:
“Every year, we come together to honor the solemn memory of the six million Jews who perished at the hands of Nazi Germany. The horrors perpetrated on the Jewish population of Europe and so many millions of other innocent victims are seared in our history as some of the most heinous atrocities of all time. On Yom Ha’Shoah, we remember this horrific brutality. However, this is not merely a day to remember the past, but one during which we honor the memories of the victims and the lives of the survivors to ensure that the world never forgets.
“It is a little known fact that there are 127,000 Holocaust survivors living in our nation today, many of whom are aging in utter poverty and destitution. As a nation that so strongly upholds the values of freedom and justice, we have a moral obligation to acknowledge the plight of these survivors and ensure their well-being in their remaining years. These brave survivors faced the terror of concentration camps, the trauma of fleeing Nazi occupation, and the grief of losing countless loved ones. Now, more than seventy years later, there is more we can and must do to ensure that those who survived such atrocities live out their remaining years with the self-respect and self- esteem that they so rightfully deserve. Soon I will introduce legislation that will provide our aging survivor population with the assistance that they need to age in place with dignity. Though we cannot even begin to redress the violence of the past, it is our moral responsibility in the spirit of tikkun olam - to repair the world -to do all we can for these brave survivors to find peace.
“Today, like every day, it is imperative that we unite to honor the memories of the victims and work together to create a more just and peaceful world. Days such as this serve as a powerful reminder of the deadly consequences of intolerance. They demonstrate the importance of speaking up for those who cannot speak for themselves.
“My children’s generation will be the last to personally know Holocaust survivors. It is more vital now than ever before that we teach our children the importance of honoring those who survived such unspeakable tragedies, so that we as a people and as a nation will never forget. With fewer survivors alive to tell their stories, we cannot simply keep repeating ‘never again.’ We must absorb the lessons of the past and speak out against hatred. As Elie Wiesel said in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, ‘I swore never to be silent whenever, wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation… Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.’
