I am very proud to be here at the Massuah Institute for
the Study of the Holocaust on International Holocaust
Remembrance Day. I would like to thank the leadership
and staff of the centre and Minister of Justice Ayelet
Shaked.
One of the most distressing conversations I have had in
my time in Israel was in my first couple of weeks. I
was visiting Cafe Britannia, a meeting place for
Holocaust survivors, in Eshkol Regional Council. I
spoke to several survivors that day, but one
conversation really stuck with me. A lady in her 90s
who had lived through the Holocaust in Romania told me
how, in old age, the memories had got worse. In her
youth, as she came to Israel and built a family, a home
and a country, she had been able to contain those
memories and look to the future. But now, with time for
reflection and perhaps some loneliness, the memories of
that terrible time – of family members lost and lives
devastated - had come flooding back.
It was a stark, terrible reminder of the continuing
human cost of the worst crime in history.
As time passes, there are fewer survivors. We must
cherish them while we can. The responsibility becomes
even greater for all of us – governments, civil
society, individuals – to preserve the memory. In the
UK, Holocaust Memorial Day has been marked each year
since 2001. In 2016, around 6,000 different events took
place across the UK. The Holocaust Memorial Day Trust,
whose patron is HRH The Prince of Wales, has chosen as
its theme for this year – How can life go on? They will
ask audiences to think about what happens after
genocide and our own responsibilities in the wake of
such a crime.
, when he was Prime
Minister, launched the UK Holocaust Commission to
ensure the preservation of the memory. I was with him
and the members of the Commission when they met at Yad
Vashem in April 2014. One of their main recommendations
was that a new Holocaust Memorial should be created.
The British Government has since announced that it will
be built right next to The Houses of Parliament by the
River Thames. The design competition is underway and
the memorial should be completed within a couple of
years.
The Holocaust Memorial Foundation undertakes many other
activities, including ensuring that Holocaust education
is a compulsory part of history education for 11-14
year olds; taking 28,000 students and teachers to
Auschwitz-Birkenau; and helping the Anne Frank Trust
work with more than 50,000 students in British schools.
Holocaust remembrance is vital. But it is also futile
if we do not tackle contemporary anti-Semitism. We make
a grave mistake if we think this is only a problem of
the past.
The UK is one of the safest places in the world to be
Jewish. The Jewish community in the UK is stable in
terms of numbers, and thriving in every other sense. It
makes a precious contribution to Britain. Levels of
anti-Semitism are low as measured by international
surveys. But we cannot ignore the fact that the number
of anti-Semitic attacks has increased in recent years.
, both when we
she was Home Secretary and now as Prime Minister, has
been clear in her determination to fight anti-Semitism.
The Government works closely with the Community
Security Trust to protect the Jewish community in the
UK. And Prime Minister May announced last month that
the UK would be one of the first countries formally to
adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance
definition of anti-Semitism, and that the British
Government would confront all those who seek to
undermine the right of Jewish people to live free of
fear and harassment.
I pay tribute to the work of the International
Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, which has done so much
over the last 20 years to rally international support
for Holocaust education, remembrance and research. This
cannot just be a national responsibility – it requires
effective international leadership. Sir leads this work for
the UK. Other organisations such as the OSCE also have
a vital role to play. We would like to see the OSCE
adopt the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism as soon as
possible. And are working with European partners to
share best practice, for example from our own Community
Security Trust. The CST’s Police Officer’s Guide to
Judaism is being translated into several European
languages.
For someone of my generation, the Holocaust was one of
the central moral facts of our education. Sometimes, as
I look at the appalling anti-Semitism and Holocaust
denial that can be found so easily online, I wonder if
that is still the case today. But then I think of the
meeting I have with the Holocaust Education Trust’s
young ambassadors. Each year, around 20 of them come
from the UK to Israel – none Jewish, but all committed
to understanding and preserving the memory of the
Holocaust and learning its lessons for our own
societies today, as well as getting to know Israel and
Judaism. The conversation is profound and inspiring. It
gives me hope.
Thanks you again for inviting me to speak here today.
It has been a great privilege.
