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Holocaust Remembrance: Fighting Hate

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Andrew Shodi
  • 820th Red Horse Squadron

Less than one hundred years ago the Holocaust claimed over eleven million lives in one of the most horrific events known to mankind.  During this time, about two-thirds of Europe’s and one-third of the world’s Jewish population were murdered by systematic ethnic cleansing. The Jewish victims made up about six million of the eleven million murdered.  Others were people of different ethnicities, political beliefs, sexual orientations, or anyone else that didn’t fit Adolph Hitler’s mold of a superior race.  Eleven million innocent men, women, and children were tortured, experimented on, and exterminated.

After such atrocities, one would think the world wouldn’t allow anything remotely similar to plague humanity again.  Unfortunately, this evil atrocity was not an isolated event.  Armenia, Darfur, Bosnia, Rwanda, Rohingya and others have experienced mass killings of innocents.  It is important to not only remember that these events happened, but to educate ourselves on how they happened, the extent of evil that some are capable of inflicting on world, and most importantly, that it could very easily happen again.

Nellis Air Force Base’s Holocaust Remembrance Committee is devoted to spreading awareness and education in an effort to prevent these vile acts of genocide from cursing society again.  

Las Vegas is home to a Holocaust Survivors group that graciously volunteers time to work with the Holocaust Remembrance Committee to provide speakers and to give a firsthand perspective of their experiences.  Many of these survivors are now in their nineties and are of a generation that is quickly fading.  There are only so many events in history that impacted the entire world with this magnitude, even fewer that caused this amount of inhumane suffering and death.  Preserving the stories of these survivors while we are still able to hear from them is crucial in ensuring the accuracy of not only our own education, but the education of future generations who will not have the opportunities we have. Opportunities that will shape the future history of mankind and cannot be duplicated by a textbook. Such opportunities must not be wasted.

Please come out and meet survivors and families of survivors at this year’s Holocaust Remembrance Luncheon on March 23, 11 a.m. at The Club.  The guest speaker is a Holocaust camp survivor and more witnesses to these events will be seated amongst the patrons of the luncheon.  NEVER FORGET!

For more information about events, or to sign-up for the luncheon or commemoration, contact Tammy Johnson at tammy.johnson.3@us.af.mil or 702 652-7669.