IsraPost - 770

ו' תמוז התשע"א 7/8/2011 9 B&W - 9 “NEVER AGAIN” - A PERSONAL REQUEST TO KEEP BAD MEMORIES ALIVE By: Cantor Moshe Fishelm By: Chana Ya’ar By: The Embassy Of Israel Washington - Leaders of the United States Congress gathered to pay tribute to Shuvu Return, an Israeli school network that provides a stellar education to Jewish children who emigrate from Russia to Israel. The event featured the most powerful members of the current Congress including both House Whips, Democrat Steny Hoyer and Republican Kevin McCarthy, Assistant Democratic Leader James Clyburn, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chair Darrell Issa, House Homeland Security Committee Chair Peter King, House Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Dutch Ruppersberger, House Ways and Means Committee Ranking Member Sandy Levin, as well as Representatives Jerrold Nadler, Eliot Engel, Ted Deutch, Marcia Fudge, and Nan Hayworth of New York State who graciously hosted the luncheon. The keynote address was delivered by the Israeli Ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren. The event paid tribute to the memory of Congressman Charles Vanik, whose commitment to the cause of Soviet Jewry, allowed for millions of Russian Jews to make Israel their home. In 1974, Charles Vanik sponsored the Jackson-Vanik Act in the House of Representatives which helped refugees, particularly minorities and Jews, to immigrate from the Soviet Bloc to Israel. The Jackson-Vanik amendment was credited with pressuring the Soviet leadership with allowing immigration to Israel. The late Congressman’s wife Betty Vanik, and daughter Phyllis Vanik, attended the luncheon. Shuvu Chairman Abe Biderman, said “By Shuvu now educating tens of thousands of children in the spirit of our forefathers, this brings full circle the great humanitarian leadership of the late Congressman Vanik and for that the Jewish people will be eternally grateful”. According to Ezra Friedlander, CEO of the Friedlander Group which coordinated the event, “this event was an extraordinary opportunity for members of Congress to pay homage to one of the architects of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment, an act of Congress that literally brought the Soviet Union to its knees, a theme that was echoed throughout the program, by Congressional leaders who expressed their deep admiration to the late Congressman and felt privileged to do so in the presence of Mrs. Vanik and her daughter Phyllis.” “I want to congratulate Shuvu for all their hard work in educating thousands of children who otherwise would not have a Jewish education—kudos to the congress for recognizing this and what a kiddush Hashem to remember the chesed of charles Vanik during the Cold War” said Friedlander. Dear Friend, The Dachau Death Camp Museum in Germany, a place where 65 years ago, evil ruled and where ordinary people killed nearly one million Jews died for no other reason but for being JEWISH.. The Holocaust was history’s single biggest act of genocide. It is personal for me, as from 1935-1945, hundreds of people from my family were killed in Germany, Poland and Hungary by Nazi murders and their local collaborators. Others survived to tell the story which has been etched in my mind. All told, by the time World War II ended, some 1.5 million Jewish children and 4.5 million Jewish adults were murdered JUST BECAUSE THEY WERE JEWISH. In the process of killing all these people, they were dehumanized, dispossess of their property and led to horrific deaths, often times entire families died together. “NEVER AGAIN” is more than a slogan for me. It is also a battle cry that I carried in my heart during my military service (77-80) when ever I crossed the boarder with my special forces unit on a mission to prevent, or avenge, the death of Israeli citizens. From 1942-1945, nearly a million people were murdered in the Dachau death camp which is situated in a suburb of Munich. Most people in the city never knew about what took place in the camp, except for smoke and white ash that kept raining on the nearby town 24/7. The smoke and ashes came from the camp crematorium that burned mostly Jewish victims who prior to being reduced to ashes, were gassed to death en mass. Entire families perished in this most cruel manner. Needless to say, they never had a proper ritual burial. As those who had lived through the ten darkest years of modern history die away (my German born father was born in 1930 and passed away last year) its seems that this tragic event fades away from the collective memory.. The Holocaust is being trivialized and Holocaust deniers have taken center stage. It is the duty of enlighten men and women to ensure that this tragic event is remembered, so that it does not happen EVER AGAIN. May God bless the souls of those who died in the Holocaust. May God bless members, and the decedents, of the U.S. 7th Infantry that liberated the Dachau death camp 65 years ago. May the world FINALLY stand up to persecution of Jews in its modern form of AntiZionism and Anti-Israeli policies. CONGRESSIONAL LEADERSHIP HONORS ‘SHUVU’

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