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It's time to stop picking at the holocaust scab.

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It seems to me that jewish people are being fed a line about the uniquely horrific Shoah and the gentiles who might try to do it again at any time.

I suspect that AIPAC, the ADL. the JDL and similar hawkish groups are actively trying to provoke widespread enmity towards jewish people in general and simultaneously keeping The Holocaust as a front of mind issue for jews and gentiles every day.

I suspect they are doing this so that they can remain relevant to their own people. Groups surrounded by hostile forces see the need to band together, to contribute to the leadership and are prepared to apply a different moral standard to their persecutors.

If every non-jew is a potential persecutor, why behave morally with them? (him/her)

How is The Jewish Holocaust any more newsworthy on a daily basis than the bombings at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the carnage in the trenches at Verdun, the German and Russian deaths on the Eastern front, The Armenian Genocide, the Rawandan Horror, Stalin's purges, the Cultural Revolution in China, the extirmination of Tasmanian Aborigines, Wounded Knee...???

Yet it's rare for a week to go by without some high profile holocaust story in the press. There is clearly an effective PR campaign operating. I do admire its effectiveness.

One story that I will never forget ran in the late nineties. On the main morning radio bulletin in Australia I heard a person claiming they "had been stabbed in the heart emotionally all over again" by the terrible insensitivity of the French Synchronised Swimming Team.

What?

Yes, the French synchronised swimmin team had committed an unpardonable act of provocation towards jewish people.

Oh my God, what could they have done?

They had chosen a costume with grey and black stripes!! Obviously a reference to the prison uniforms the jews were forced to wear in the death camps.

The story ran on the four main radio stations that morning. It ran on the main TV evening news bulletins on every channel that night and was prominent on page 3 of the city's main newspaper the next morning. Later that week it was a full page story in the nations biggest business news magazine.

Now that's a PR success.

My other comment is about human nature. Sons of fathers who beat their wives often beat their own wives. Children from violent families are often violent. Israel's attitude and actions towards Arabs exactly parallels Nazi attitudes and actions towards jews in the decade leading up to the middle of the last century. Collective punishment, torture, zero recognition of their human rights, biased courts, unnecessary killings of women and children, 100 eyes for an eye, "they are not really people," forced relocations, and on and on.

But however sympathetic we are towards violent people when we find they had a violent childhood; we still punish them. Israel should be punished too. Lightly at first, and then with increasing severity if their leaders do not mend their agressive ways. First stop all aid to the country. If there are no signs of improvement, move to cultural boycotts. Then perhaps trade sanctions. If they still persist in holding illegally acquired land, I guess "all options should be on the table."

The Holocaust should be quietly forgotten except perhaps for a rememberance day once a year.

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John is an educator who asks "Is that true?" and "Why?" far too often.
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It's time to stop picking at the holocaust scab.

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