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Sunday, June 07, 2009

PRESERVE THE MEMORY OF THE MASSACRED SIX MILLION JEWS 

Assemblyman Dov Hikind (D-Brooklyn), a child of Holocaust survivors, is leading the charge to prevent the Mayor and the Parks Department from moving forward with their plans to install additional markers at Brooklyn’s Holocaust Memorial Park in memory of other groups persecuted by the Nazis during World War II. The City is expected to implement these changes soon.

Located in Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn, the Holocaust Memorial Park was the brainchild of the Holocaust Memorial Committee which formally dedicated the Memorial in 1997. The Park consists of 234 upright granite markers, eighty percent of which are inscribed with historic and literary text specifically relating to the uniquely Jewish experience of the Holocaust. The other twenty percent of the stones were intentionally left blank for symbolic reasons.

Advocates for the new markers contend that homosexuals, “Gypsies” (Roma and Sinti), the physically and mentally disabled, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and political prisoners should also be represented in the Park with their own distinct marker. The Holocaust Memorial Committee has repeatedly voted against this proposal since it was first suggested in 1997. Hikind, who represents the largest contingent of Holocaust survivors in New York State, is also strongly opposed to this proposition.

“The Holocaust is a uniquely Jewish event,” Hikind wrote in a letter to the Mayor and the Commissioner of the Parks Department. “Only the Jews were targeted by the Nazis for utter and complete annihilation. Only the Jews were subject to the Nazi’s Final Solution. Only the Jews were provided with the least amount of caloric intake compared to other victims in order to hasten their deaths by starvation. No one disputes the fact that the Nazis murdered tens of thousands of others as well. But the intent of this Park was to preserve the memory of those who perished in the Holocaust. It is a tribute to them, to how they lived and died. The addition of these markers diminishes that memory. It diminishes the magnitude of the Holocaust. If the City changes the stated intent of the Holocaust Memorial Park, then the City should also change the name of the Park to Victims of Nazi Persecution Memorial Park to reflect its new character. The term Holocaust should only be associated with the Jews.”

In his letter, Hikind also referenced Holocaust survivor and Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel regarding this issue:

“Truly I must tell you when I hear certain extrapolations, I am worried. For instance, we used to speak, when we spoke – we didn’t dare speak too much – about six million Jews. Then some friends, some people, began reminding us, “True, but after all there were others as well.” It is true; there were others as well. So they said, “eleven million, six of whom are Jews.” If this goes on, the next step will be eleven, including six, and, in a couple of years, they won’t even speak of the six. They will speak only of eleven million. You see the progression: six million plus five, then eleven including six, and then only eleven (Source: Elie Wiesel and the Politics of Moral Leadership by Mark Chmiel, p. 120).”

The Assemblyman will be joined by rabbis and local community leaders at the conference.

PRESS CONFERENCE

DATE: Sunday, June 7, 2009
TIME: 11:00AM
LOCATION: Holocaust Memorial Park: West End Avenue between Shore Boulevard and Emmons Avenue in Sheepshead Bay/Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn – view map

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