|
Trending Topics
|
Source: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/818067.html
A Helpless World
[Ha'aretz] Editorial - On January 27, International Holocaust Remembrance Day will be observed for the third time. Fixed on the date of the liberation of Auschwitz, it is a memorial for the destruction of the Jews of Europe, which was first established by European countries and later adopted by the United Nations. This welcome initiative is seemingly the climax of a process in which the Holocaust of the Jews has come to be perceived not only as a disaster for our people, but as having universal significance: a reminder of the horrors that people are capable of inflicting on other people, and also a warning - if not an alarm bell - that summons humanity to fight determinedly against present or future dangers of this kind. For all the denunciations and the shock, it seems that the international community is also standing by helplessly, doing nothing, in the face of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who denies the Jewish Holocaust and threatens the very existence of the State of Israel. His open threats of destruction are backed by Iran's efforts to arm itself with weapons of mass destruction that would be capable of carrying out this threat. Yet the international community is not excited. It has not gone into overdrive in order to at least deny Iran nuclear weapons. It sometimes seems as if this community is more concerned with ceremonies and memorial days to cleanse its conscience over its inaction in the face of past catastrophes than it is with dealing with the catastrophes that are occurring now, or that are on the horizon.