A sobering fact 81 years on.

I watched "Zone of Interest" this afternoon and still feel both shocked and numbed by the experience. It brought home to me that by completely dehumanising the Jews they murdered, they could treat mass murder as a logistical problem rather than what it was allowing normal life to go on completely unaffected. Could it happen again? Sadly I think it could which is why we need to challenge every attempt to "other" people as IMO it is the first step in starting to dehumanise them.

I went to see a friend who was working in Munich and she took me to visit Dachau. We parked on the road opposite the camp and there were trees lining the road and all the birds were singing in the trees. We went into the camp/museum and it was silent. There was no bird song, no bird landed in the grounds . It was really unnerving. The birds must have sensed that something terrible happened there. When we went back to the car the birds were singing in the trees.

It's horrifying.
But the reality is that it has happened again, in the West and many other places. Bosnia, Rwanda, Myanmar to name just a very few. Indigenous populations in many countries. Women in some countries.
What can we actually do? We watch on tv, we look away.

foxie48

I watched "Zone of Interest" this afternoon and still feel both shocked and numbed by the experience. It brought home to me that by completely dehumanising the Jews they murdered, they could treat mass murder as a logistical problem rather than what it was allowing normal life to go on completely unaffected. Could it happen again? Sadly I think it could which is why we need to challenge every attempt to "other" people as IMO it is the first step in starting to dehumanise them.

Yes we must always call out the demonisation and dehumanisation of groups in society. Sadly human nature has a habit of repeating the same mistakes. But we must never just take the easy route of agreeing with the mob because the mob shouts loudest. We have to try to be better than that.

The resurfacing of a general anti Semitism today has been an unexpected horror. How could anyone forget? And then, after the 7th October bloodbath, to be uncaring about the suffering unleashed on the victims and their families defies belief.

We were a forces family living in BAOR in the 1960s. My father visited Belsen and told us that no birds sang there either. Uncanny. And somehow fitting.

Sarnia

This day in 1945 Auschwitz was liberated. A rabbi has worked out that if a minute's silence was observed for every Holocaust victim, we would be silent for 11.5 years. It really throws it into focus for me.
On this topic, the film Zone of Interest is available on Channel 4. It centres on the Kommandant of Auschwitz dividing his time between the camp and his family. I don't think I have ever seen a more disturbing film. Worth seeing if you can.

Is the 11.5 hrs for the Jewish victims or all the victims, gypsies, communists, Jehovah's Witnesses etc.

Lostmyglassesxx

It was the sheer efficiency of it all that is so incredible and how any human could dream up such atrocities and then how the Nazis seemed so convinced this was the right thing to do .. it beggars belief even today that such a plan could be masterminded and carried out with almost a sense of pride .

There was a made-for-TV movie called Conspiracy (2001) starring Kenneth Branagh, Stanley Tucci, Colin Firth and David Threlfall. It was the Wannsee Conference of 1942. It was utterly chilling to see them gathered around a table discussing the final solution, and how some were not keen at first.

Unfortunately it is rarely seen on TV. I think it's on Now if you have that, or it has to be a DVD. It should definitely be shown in schools and maybe it is.
Trailer on You Tube

I've just seen it has a score of 100% on Rotten Tomatoes which I don't think I've ever seen before. I'd say it is in the top five war movies.

Sorry 11.5 yrs not hrs.

I fear we still have evil people like Putin. committing atrocities, they give orders for imprisonment, torture, killing and people do their bidding , The bad learn nothing from history, they have no heart, the rest of us wouldn't dream of it, so. knowing doesnt stop some people.. I cannot watch such programmes it is too much to take in, the suffering caused and lives lost. Amongst all that evil were extra ordinary brave people risking their own lives trying to help, just the opposite.

Chestnut

I also watched Zone of Interest and it was unlike anything I've seen before. It covered the same subject as Boy in the Striped Pyjamas but in a completely different way. Both were disturbing and I wouldn't want to see them again.

There was a programme about children of Nazis and one was a boy who had lived in such a house next to a camp. There was even a wrought iron gate in the wall, and this gateway had haunted him throughout his life. It was the thought of what was behind it. Eventually, as an adult we saw him visit the house and go through the gate. This meant so much to him.

I've seen 'The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas' more than once while warking as a teaching assistant in a secondary school where it was shown in history lessons. Shocking and sad as it is it is essential that our children are taught about this shameful history.

I’m planning a visit to Auschwitz later this year with friends. It’s a compulsion I’ve felt for a while, and seems like a duty, a pilgrimage for anyone who is aware of what happened there.
I agree with those who fear it could happen/is happening again. Human nature doesn’t seem to have evolved at all….all rather depressing

I'm currently reading a book called The Last Train to London, by Meg Waite Clayton, which is based on a true story about the organization rescuing thousands of children from Germany via the Netherlands to England.

It documents the fight of a selected few people who fought to help transport these children, but also of the governments that didn't want to accept them, nor even help them settle in (then) Palestine.

The story starts well before the start of the war and follows two teenage friends, one from a wealthy Jewish family, and the other from a Christian but liberal family, whose mother is a newspaper journalist. Both families are in danger. I'm still reading, but it is heartbreaking to hear of the struggles to try to leave the Reich.

One of the victims of the Bondi massacre survived Auschwitz as a three year old. After the war he and his mother were interned in Russia for years until they managed to move to Ukraine. He met his wife there and they moved to Australia in the early 1980's and had two daughters.
I go to exercise classes with his wife and was horrified when I realised he had been shot in the back, protecting her.
This event still feels raw for me and I have never met her husband. She is such a funny, warm-hearted and clever woman whose life has now changed irrevocably.
The perpetrators were Muslim, a father and son and the father was killed by police, the son is now in jail.
A friend was so offhanded about this tragic event, she is very pro Palestinian, that I ended the friendship.
Humanity must prevail and ideology should never cloud our judgment.

theworriedwell

Sarnia

This day in 1945 Auschwitz was liberated. A rabbi has worked out that if a minute's silence was observed for every Holocaust victim, we would be silent for 11.5 years. It really throws it into focus for me.
On this topic, the film Zone of Interest is available on Channel 4. It centres on the Kommandant of Auschwitz dividing his time between the camp and his family. I don't think I have ever seen a more disturbing film. Worth seeing if you can.

Is the 11.5 hrs for the Jewish victims or all the victims, gypsies, communists, Jehovah's Witnesses etc.

I'm not sure on that. The rabbi who gave the figures said it related to Holocaust victims. 6 million Jews were killed which would be 11.5 years in minutes for each one so it looks like the other victims you mentioned are not included.

It’s the Jewish community who focussed on making sure the Holocaust isn’t forgotten. They don’t exclude remembering the gypsies, communists, Jehovah’s, gays, people with lratning difficulties from Holocaust Remembrance Day.

I’ve been disgusted by comments eg on Facebook, in response to posts commemorating Holocaust Memorial Day. Denial, accusing Jewish people of painting themselves as victims and references to Israeli/jewish people as Nazis. Anti semitism is growing again

The BBC has apologised after multiple presenters failed to specifically mention in the corporation’s coverage of Holocaust Memorial Day that six million Jews had been murdered by the Nazis, referring to them merely as “people”.
Jewish News

Anniebach

The BBC has apologised after multiple presenters failed to specifically mention in the corporation’s coverage of Holocaust Memorial Day that six million Jews had been murdered by the Nazis, referring to them merely as “people”.
Jewish News

It's quite shameful, isn't it. There were many other people killed but this push against Jews in general is frightening.

It is appalling that Jewish children get targeted by young so called Muslim dickheads in Australia and have to have guards outside their schools. I doubt they are really religious people at all, just thugs who should be jailed for a long time.

Aldom

JoJo refers to the post regarding an armband bearing the Swastika.
Basgetti please see the post above by Keepingquiet.

Off course, der! Apologies, wasn’t sure what Jojo was replying to.
I agree. Outside of museums, these things have no place in society.

Not even in museums. I now think that maybe I should have bought it myself and burned it as someone suggested...

You are probably right there*keepingquiet*. Let ‘s hope someone else had the same thought

Some idiotic people wear them as a ‘laugh’….think Prince Harry at a fancy dress party.
Other strange people collect Nazi memorabilia.

nanna8

It is appalling that Jewish children get targeted by young so called Muslim dickheads in Australia and have to have guards outside their schools. I doubt they are really religious people at all, just thugs who should be jailed for a long time.

The same happens here Nanna8 Jewish schools have to pay for security services.

Oreo

nanna8

It is appalling that Jewish children get targeted by young so called Muslim dickheads in Australia and have to have guards outside their schools. I doubt they are really religious people at all, just thugs who should be jailed for a long time.

The same happens here Nanna8 Jewish schools have to pay for security services.

Very upsetting that Jewish children have to attend school - and, presumably, other activities, in that atmosphere of fear; which is obviously heightened after a terror attack.

I doubt they are really religious people at all

I suspect this applies across the board - religion, be it Islam or Christian, can be hijacked to suit the agenda of individuals bent on the destruction of a society, for whatever evil reason.

I am an atheist, but I know there is a difference - and the true adherents of any religion, at least the ones I've personally met, which is not many but - they are usually civilised and decent, and quite gentle, individuals.