Jake Fradkin
The Blogs
Jake Fradkin
Apply for a Blog

AOC & the De-Judaization of the Holocaust

A group of child survivors behind a barbed wire fence at the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau in southern Poland, on the day of the camp’s liberation by the Red Army, 27th January 1945. Photo taken by Red Army photographer Captain Alexander Vorontsov during the making of a film about the liberation of the camp. The children were dressed in adult uniforms by the Russians. The children are (left to right): Tomy Schwarz (later Shacham), Miriam Ziegler, Paula Lebovics (front), Ruth Webber, Berta Weinhaber (later Bracha Katz), Erika Winter (later Dohan), Marta Weiss (later Wise), Eva Weiss (later Slonim), Gabor Hirsch (just visible behind Eva Weiss), Gabriel Neumann, Robert Schlesinger (later Shmuel Schelach), Eva Mozes Kor, and Miriam Mozes Zeiger. (Photo by Alexander Vorontsov/Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images)
A group of child survivors behind a barbed wire fence at the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau in southern Poland, on the day of the camp’s liberation by the Red Army, 27th January 1945. Photo taken by Red Army photographer Captain Alexander Vorontsov during the making of a film about the liberation of the camp. The children were dressed in adult uniforms by the Russians. The children are (left to right): Tomy Schwarz (later Shacham), Miriam Ziegler, Paula Lebovics (front), Ruth Webber, Berta Weinhaber (later Bracha Katz), Erika Winter (later Dohan), Marta Weiss (later Wise), Eva Weiss (later Slonim), Gabor Hirsch (just visible behind Eva Weiss), Gabriel Neumann, Robert Schlesinger (later Shmuel Schelach), Eva Mozes Kor, and Miriam Mozes Zeiger. (Photo by Alexander Vorontsov/Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images)

Freshman Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D- NY) has generated controversy after referring to migrant detention camps along the U.S. southern border as “concentration camps” while employing the Holocaust phrase “Never Again”.  Although many media figures have attempted to hold Ms. Ocasio-Cortez accountable for her reprehensible comments, Democrats have largely stood by her.

The situation at the border is a humanitarian crisis that necessities an urgent remedy, yet comparing it to the Shoah disrespects six million Jewish martyrs and debilitates pro-migrant activism.  The Holocaust was a uniquely horrifying event in human history, a systematic dehumanization and extermination of millions of human beings. It was presumably the conclusion of millennia of Jewish suffering, although recent developments indicate otherwise.

Ultimately, Ocasio-Cortez’s comments are not only offensive to the Jews and others who perished in Nazi Europe, but they are also indicative of a growing left-wing campaign to universalize the Shoah and to attack at the heart of modern Jewish identity.  The Jewish people have endured expulsions, exile, massacres, pogroms, and genocide for 3,700 years of our existence as a people. Antisemitism did not begin with Hitler’s rise to power, and it did not end when Berlin fell seventy-four years ago.  Following the rebirth of Jewish sovereignty in Eretz Yisrael, antisemitism mutated into a visceral hatred of Israel and Zionism, the Jewish national liberation movement. The failure to acknowledge the abiding subjugation of the Jewish people by those evoking the Shoah today is nothing short of a mockery in the ears of the slaughtered.

Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez fails to grasp the eternality of Jewish suffering and the inherent Jewishness of the Shoah.  The scars of genocide and exile are forever ingrained in the Jewish national psyche. Jews, not migrants or people of color, were rounded up into ghettos by the Nazis.  Jews were transferred in cattle cars to concentration and extermination camps, and six million Jews were exterminated like pests in the gas chambers and ovens of Nazi Europe.  All we can do now is to remember their suffering and to ensure that it never happens again.

The Congresswoman’s most concerning remarks were in response to a tweet from Representative Liz Cheney (R-WY).  When Mrs. Cheney acknowledged that the Nazis exterminated the Jews of Europe, Ocasio-Cortez replied in a fury of self-righteousness and historical illiteracy:

To Ocasio-Cortez, acknowledging the suffering of Jews in full is unacceptable because it exposes the inherent truth about the Holocaust: it was a Jewish genocide.  The Jews of Europe, a wandering people left without a home for two millennia, were rounded up, gassed, and burned. They were, in the eyes of Europe and the world, pests unworthy of life itself.  

Today, nearly three-quarters a century since the Shoah, far-left allies of Ocasio-Cortez (along with the far-right) view Zionist Jews––Israelis and pro-Israel Americans––as pests and the most immoral, inhumane people on Earth.  That is why many on the hard-left do everything possible to ignore the Jewishness of the Shoah, because acknowledging it would be an admission of the enduring eternality of Jewish suffering. It would negate the claims that Jews and Israelis are a privileged, elite people, the enemies of leftism and the obstacle to peace.  When the Holocaust is reduced to merely a trite genocide of people, rather than an unprecedented extermination of the Jewish people, it becomes possible to simultaneously exploit “concentration camps” and ignore the persecution of Jews today.

In defense of the de-Judaization of the Shoah, far-left reporter CJ Werleman tweeted:

CJ said the quiet part out loud. The left views Jews today as a privileged people and the Holocaust as a tragedy to everyone, not just to Jews. To many, the Jewish nature of Holocaust remembrance is proof that Jews exploit the Holocaust for personal gain.  Of course, this accusation in itself rebrands ancient tropes about Jewish greed and duplicity.

In truth, the term “concentration camp” should only be used when describing the Holocaust.  A third of the Jewish people were gassed to death in the span of six years, yet we cannot even keep that term to remember their suffering?  Shame on those who exploit the suffering of slaughtered Jews and minimize their pain. Never again.

About the Author
Jake Fradkin is a rising senior at the Hun School in Princeton, New Jersey (Class of 2020). Growing up in a secular Jewish household, Jake has long felt connected to his Jewish heritage and identity. He enjoys tennis and writing in his free time and plans on studying economics and international relations at college.
Related Topics
Related Posts
Comments