Secretary of State George Shultz and Elie Wiesel, chairman of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, made the same point during a ceremony last night opening a conference called “Faith in Humankind: Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust.”
“What a terrible indictment that hardly any rescuers are to be found among the statesmen and leaders of the period,” Shultz told more than 1,100 persons at the Kennedy Center. Wiesel noted that among those who had the “courage to care” there were few superior officers, few renowned writers, few influential politicians.
Shultz, who pointed out that Nazi Germany ended the belief that high education and culture will prevent a country from falling into racism and barbarity, said: “It may be that our real bulwark against tyranny and evil is not high culture but the good sense and humane instincts of average citizens who know the difference between right and wrong.”
‘A SMALL LIGHT IN A VAST DARKNESS’
The ceremony last night, which included musical performances by violinist Erick Friedman and pianist Emanuel Ax, and readings by Carol Kane and Wemer Klemperer, honored the rescuers of Jews during the Holocaust. Dr. John Silber, president of Boston University, called them a “small light in a vast darkness.”
A two-day conference sponsored by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council opened today at the State Department in which rescuers, survivors and scholars will remember the events of World War II and discuss why a few people acted to save Jews and most people did not.
Dr. Yitzhak Arad, chairman of the Directorate of the Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, said the Yad Vashem has discovered more than 5,000 rescuers and trees have been planted in their honor at the Holocaust Memorial as “the righteous among the nations.”
Seventy-five of the rescuers were present last night and they stood to loud applause while the chorus sang “Ani Maamin.”
Lillinian Gaffney of Belgium, whose parents rescued 30 Jews, said they had believed it was “not only the right thing but the only thing to do.” Her mother, Germaine Belinne, is participating in the conference.
Bayard Rustin, the civil rights leader and a member of the Holocaust Council, noted that to rescue Jews required a “small act.” Wiesel added that nations also could have taken small steps, saying the State Department could have given more visas to Jews.
Wiesel stressed that “Jews also tried to save Jews” and that the State of Israel demonstrates to the world how a country can “save communities from persecution and death.”
UNIVERSAL IMPLICATIONS OF THE HOLOCAUST
Wiesel said that while the Holocaust was a “unique Jewish tragedy, it has universal implications.” The same point was made by Shultz. He said the principles of the rescuers are being upheld today by Andrei Sakharov who gave up a high position in the Soviet Union to protest human rights violations; Soviet citizens who are administering the Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Fund for families of dissidents even though it means jail; the
While the Nazi genocide was “unique in the annals of human depravity,” Shultz said, “in every generation the capacity for evil in the human spirit can be confronted and eventually defeated by justice and by sacrifice.”
Whether it is “state-sponsored terrorism, genocide in Cambodia or anti-Semitism masquarading as anti-Zionism in the United Nations, the legacy of the rescuers admonishes us all to stand up and fight back,” Shultz declared.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
