Whoopi Goldberg and ADL: Holocaust was about Nazism - Edith Shaked Perlman
 

Whoopi Goldberg and Jonathan Greenblatt of the ADL: The Holocaust was about Nazism, which comprised not only racism, but also totalitarianism and expansionism

SHE said, HE said

The Whoopi Goldberg Holocaust Affair reflects the need for “a teaching moment” about a sensitive, and complex topic. Whoopi Goldberg, a co-host of “The View” talk show returned to work on Monday, February 14, 2022. ABC suspended her because she stated that the Holocaust was not “about race.” Goldberg sincerely apologized, mentioning the definition of the Holocaust by Jonathan Greenblatt, the head of the Anti-Defamation League: “The Holocaust was about the Nazi’s systematic annihilation of the Jewish people – who they deemed to be an inferior race – slaughtering 6 million Jews.”

Stating that “the Holocaust was about the annihilation of the Jewish people” eliminates the possibility of anyone being a Holocaust survivor such as Elie Wiesel, and my grandfather, who had to wear the yellow star in 1943. And it contradicts honest history of the Holocaust based on the prevalence of primary sources.

There is no cause to doubt that the Holocaust was driven by Nazism, and referred to the systematic, state-sponsored persecution of “millions of innocent persons” by Nazi Germany and its collaborators, “for  racial, political, ideological, national, ethnic and behavioral reasons,” resulting in the murder of” 6 million Jews alongside millions of others.”

Acknowledging that “others” are also Holocaust victims does not diminish the centrality of “the Holocaust of the Jewish people, the Shoah, the Nazi attempt to annihilate the Jewish people” (Avner Shalev, Director of Yad Vashem) in a global “Final Solution” to the Jewish Question.    At Auschwitz, the infamous killing center, the ashes of the Roma and others mingled with the ashes of the Jews. And,“Nazi ideology and the Holocaust [is a book which] provides a framework for understanding why and how the ideology of the Nazi regime led to the murder of …Jews and the destruction of millions of others.”  (I received the book while training at the ushmm).

The Holocaust is about Nazism, National Socialism

It is irrefutable that everything about the Holocaust was about Nazism. Nazism or National Socialism was the national, movement that ruled Hitler’s Germany from 1933 till 1945, and which comprised not only racism, including racial antisemitism, but also totalitarianism with obedience to the Führer and expansionism.

The Holocaust, motivated by all the tenets of Nazism, was about the murderous wars against the Jews and other undesirables. This is an irrefutable historical fact. “Nazism was the ideology behind the Holocaust. Therefore, the racist national domestic, and international goals of the main perpetrator, Nazi Germany led by Hitler, and the characteristics of Nazism determined the definition of the Holocaust and its victims. … The main precepts of the Nazi ideology that conceived and motivated the Holocaust must be used to identified its victims… Ideology is central.” – Yehuda Bauer, academic advisor at Yad Vashem, Dean of Holocaust Studies, Rethinking the Holocaust, p. 44.
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That’s why we use “Nazi Germany” and not racist Germany.

That’s why Nazism became an ideology that is now outlawed in Germany

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Anti-nazi_logo.svg    “Thank you for dumping Nazism” icon” (picture of man dumping swastika in garbage)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strafgesetzbuch_section_86a
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strafgesetzbuch_section_86a

Nazism’s Holocaust victims: “6,000,000, alongside millions of others”

It is indisputable that in the Holocaust driven by Nazism, the Nazi regime targeted not only Jews “deemed inferior” but also others for racial and other reasons. “From their racism, the Nazis concluded that ‘inferior peoples’ had to … be eliminated completely …Jews, Roma, persons with disabilities living in institutions, and German residents of African descent…” (Racism in depth, the ushmm) “The Nazi regime persecuted different groups on ideological grounds. Jews were the primary targets … The Nazis also identified political dissidents, Jehovah’s Witnesses, homosexuals, and so-called asocials … because they … opposed the Nazi regime or some aspect of their behavior did not fit Nazi perceptions of social norms.” – https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/mosaic-of-victims-an-…

That’s why, in 1979, the American Congress law urges the nation to honor the memory of those who perished in the Holocaust, “6,000,000 Jews, alongside millions of others,”  during our national Holocaust Days of Remembrance. This law was enacted after Elie Wiesel wrote in his report to the American Congress: “It is vital that the American people come to understand the distinctive reality of the Holocaust… While not all victims were Jews, all Jews were victims.”

That’s why, a month ago, the United Nations adopted an Israeli resolution that condemns distortion of  the Holocaust “which resulted in the murder of one-third of the Jewish people along with countless members of other minorities.”

There is no reason to doubt that that the Holocaust was about Nazism, which goals were “an ambitious program of world domination, elimination of undesirable persons,” even unwanted “Aryan” and the creation of a utopian world. That’s why Saul Friedlander, a prominent Holocaust scholar, wrote “National Socialism tried to determine who should and should not inhabit the world.”

A meaningful Holocaust history and education is rooted in a critical understanding of all the tenets of Nazism. Let’s hope that many will benefit from this “teaching moment” article.

Edith Shaked Perlman, Retired Holocaust Educator

Advisory Board Member, H-Holocaust, an international academic consortium/H-Net’s Network for scholars of the Holocaust

Certificate of  Appreciation, National Council for History Education -NCHE.
About the Author
Edith Shaked Perlman is an Advisory Board Member of H-Holocaust, an international academic consortium/H-Net's Network for scholars of the Holocaust. Certificate of Appreciation, National Council for History Education -NCHE. Retired Holocaust Educator trained at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.