[Washington Post] Anne Applebaum - Surely Iran's denial of the Holocaust cannot be serious. Unfortunately, Iran's president is deadly serious: Holocaust denial is his personal passion, not just a way of taunting Israel, and it's based on his personal interpretation of history. Questioning the reality of the Holocaust has long been another means of questioning the legitimacy of the State of Israel. If the Shiite Iranians are looking for friends, particularly among Sunni Arabs, Holocaust denial isn't a bad way to find them. Yes, we think we've institutionalized the memory of the Holocaust, we think this particular European horror has been put to rest, and yet the near-destruction of the European Jews, in a very brief span of time, by a sophisticated European nation using the best technology available, was, it seems, an event that requires constant reexplanation.
2006-12-12 01:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive