If Auschwitz and Dachau concentration camps are not unique then Nazi crimes are no different from other twentieth-century crimes.
Follow Israel Hayom on Facebook and Twitter
The correct description for Yair Lapid's speech before the Global Forum for Combating Antisemitism can be found in the poem by the Israeli poet Alexander Penn: It was or it wasn't? Naivety or stupidity? Even in the left-wing press they said: "It is doubtful if Yair Lapid thought about the significance of his speech before he delivered it. Had he thought about and understood its significance beforehand, it is doubtful that he would have delivered it." (Nir Guntaz, Haaretz, Feb. 17). In any event, the harm done by this speech is serious, and is liable to have far-reaching ramifications for the Jewish people.
Why did he say these troubling things at all? The Alternate Prime Minister and Foreign Minister "normalized" antisemitism and its most serious consequence in the twentieth century – the Holocaust. In a single breath, Lapid dismantled the idea of antisemitism's uniqueness, which led in the modern era to the Holocaust for European Jewry, almost completely eliminating them from the face of the earth. He transformed the most violent hunt and cruel murder that was ever carried out against any group into something similar to any violent conflict. And if the Lapid who leads the camp today thinks like this, why silence those who, for political purposes, seek to dismantle the Holocaust's meaning and turn it into one of many banal violent episodes, thus draining it of its significance.
Yair Lapid, perhaps inadvertently, has entered the Historikerstreit ('Historians' Dispute), which took place in Germany in the 1980s, when a historical approach developed which focused on the interpretations and meanings of the Holocaust, without descending to the level of Holocaust denial. Its advocates sought to diminish the uniqueness of the Holocaust, claiming that it was similar to other genocides.
The aim was to "normalize" German identity and to remove the burden of guilt that hung over the country decades after these horrific crimes were committed. These same German historians insisted that other victims of the Second World War should be highlighted alongside the Jews, and that of course it was forbidden to forget the suffering of the German people itself and the suffering of the Wehrmacht soldiers fighting the Red Army on the Eastern Front. Their goal was to revive German patriotism and to save Germany from the darkness of the Nazis' conduct, declaring that the mass murder by the Germany army and the extermination camps' factory of horrors were, overall, a "preventative measure" that was taken by the Germans out of fear of the Soviets.
The historian Saul Friedlander responded to this approach by arguing that the Nazis and the antisemitism they carried with them were a negation of all life and a sort of death cult. According to him, the Holocaust was such a horrific event that it was nearly impossible to articulate in everyday language. Friedlander views Nazi antisemitism as historically unique, since he claims that Nazi antisemitism was unique in being a "redemption antisemitism," that is, a type of antisemitism that could explain the whole world and offer a kind of "redemption" to its followers. He subsequently concluded that Nazi antisemitism was unique when compared to Jew-hatred from time immemorial because it was comprehensive and "redemptive," and in this sense, it solves its believers' problems. In light of this, he argued that Nazi Germany and its adoption of genocidal politics was not and could not be understood as a normal historical episode.
There is a decision at the heart of Yair Lapid's speech to call an end to the Historikerstreit, with unimaginable success for those who have sought to diminish, to minimize and to normalize antisemitism and the Holocaust in comparison with other crimes and injustices which took place throughout history. Antisemitism's normalizers are now rejoicing: if Auschwitz and Dachau concentration camps are not unique then Nazi crimes are no different from other twentieth-century crimes.
Our view is different: the antisemitism which broke out in the heart of Europe and engulfed everywhere the Germany army and Hitler's emissaries went is unlike anything in history.
Subscribe to Israel Hayom's daily newsletter and never miss our top stories!
