Faith and Facts

When the Allied Forces, under the direction of Supreme Commander, Gen. D. Eisenhower, found the Nazi death camps, the General ordered photos be taken from every possible angle. He also ordered that local villagers be led through the camps so they might see the horror first-hand.  While his reason is variously quoted, it was essentially, “Get it all on record now – get the films – get the witnesses -because somewhere down the road of history some bastard will get up and say that this never happened”.

Our short-term memory is suffering on a global scale. Perhaps this is the natural result of post-modern thinking:  “Everyone has a right to create their own truth.”

This “personal truth” eliminates the historical fact that 5 million Jews, 20 million Russians, 10 million Christians and thousands of priests were “victims of ethnic cleansing” under the most brutal and barbaric circumstances imaginable.

They were murdered, beaten, gassed, shot, killed.  In modern political speech, they were victimized.

Recently, Britain removed teaching the historical details of the Holocaust because it offended Muslims. This despite the fact that denying the Holocaust is actually illegal in most European countries.

Brian Cuban, a new blogging friend, has an article that prompted my writing. He accurately points out the impact of social media, like Facebook, on defining truth. In his article, The Face(book) of Holocaust Denial, he writes

A British judge has dismissed a case against a South Australian man who is wanted in Germany for Holocaust denial. Fredrick Toben was arrested at Heathrow airport earlier this month while he was in transit from America to Dubai. He is wanted in Germany on charges that he is a Holocaust denier, after his Adelaide Institute website published claims that there was no mass murder of Jews by the Nazis.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has recently described the Holocaust as a “myth”  He has stated:

“They (Israel) have invented a myth that Jews were massacred and place this above God, religions and the prophets,”

The ugly face of Holocaust Denial is still smiling across the globe over 63 years after the last concentration camp was liberated at the end of World War II.  It has become especially virulent in the area of social media where anonymity protects deniers like a white sheet.  Facebook is a prime example. The following groups promoting Holocaust Denial are currently active on Facebook (as of the writing of this article).

Conspiracy theorists claim the destruction of the Twin Towers on 9/11 was an inside job. I wonder how long will it be until Muslims begin to deny that the Towers fell. Until they say of that day, like the Holocaust, “It Never Happened.“

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Filed under: Israel, Middle East