The 27th of January marks the International Holocaust Remembrance Day every year. In 1945, this was the day when the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, where more than 1 million people were sent to gas chambers to their agonising deaths, was liberated at last.
During World War II, approximately 44,000 concentration camps and ghettos existed across Nazi-occupied Europe. Adolf Hitler used these horrifying sites as a mechanism to terrorise and eliminate the non-Aryan groups aka those not part of the pure, white Germanic race. One of these camps was Auschwitz, where more than 1.1 million people died or were forced into labour.
Read More: Gaza Ceasefire Closer than Ever
80 Years Later
It is self-evident that the holocaust should be remembered in the way it was- horrifying, terrifying and an extreme case of genocide. Auschwitz inmates were employed on huge farms. They were forced to work in coal mines, stone quarries, fisheries and armaments industries. If this wasn’t bad enough, upon being too sick or weak, they were transported to Auschwitz-Birkenau and killed.
The Importance of Remembering
The holocaust will not be forgotten, for it comes with the responsibility of remembering. The mass murder of six million people might be a statistic to many but each dead person had a name, an identity. The Quran says in verse 5:32, “Whoever kills a person, it is as if they have killed all mankind; and whoever saves a life, it is as if they have saved all mankind.”
However, it makes me sad to think that despite the horrendous events of World War II not very long ago, we might have already forgotten about them.
No one is safe until everyone is safe. In October of 2023, Palestinians became subjected to a war that continued for 15 long months, killing 46,600 people according to the official Palestinian Health Ministry. These were just the deaths documented; how many remain under the rubble, undocumented, is still not known to the world.
“I have experienced what the children in Gaza are experiencing now,” Marione Ingram, an 88-year-old holocaust survivor said, adding, “So it is something when I see what is going on in Gaza, it has an immediate identification with my life as a child.”
So, Have We Really Progressed?
On this day, the day that marks the liberation of Auschwitz, it’s time we question ourselves- Have we really progressed as humans? If the heinous murder of six million Jews is considered genocide then why is the same happening to the Palestinians called a war? How is creating a graveyard of 17000 plus children considered an act of self-defence? Who is being defended and from who? And worst of all, where are the world leaders when they’re needed the most? Why does the deafening silence get louder with every passing day? So, I ask you again: Have we really progressed as humans in the past 80 years?
Stay tuned to Brandsynario for the latest news and updates.