Mayor Femke Halsema spoke this afternoon during the National Holocaust Remembrance Day in the Wertheim Park in Amsterdam. During her speech, Halsema emphasized that the horrors of the Holocaust serve as a warning to all humanity. “Now and in the future, about the consequences of hatred, exclusion, racism and discrimination, against anyone.”
The commemoration started this morning with a silent procession from the town hall to the Never More Auschwitz monument in the Wertheim Park. Wreaths were also laid. This was followed by several speeches, including chairman of the Dutch Auschwitz Committee Jacques Grishaver, outgoing Prime Minister Mark Rutte and Mayor Halsema.
‘Don’t forget us’
In her speech, Halsema quoted Auschwitz survivor Primo Levi, known for his book ‘Is this a human being’. “Auschwitz is outside of us, but it hangs all around us, in the air. The plague is gone, but the contagion remains and it would be foolish to deny it.” According to the Amsterdam mayor, Levi would not take back a single word of this today and referred to his words: “Rejection of human solidarity, stupid and cynical indifference to the suffering of others and above all, at the basis of everything, an overwhelming wave of cowardice, a colossal cowardice that disguises itself as fighting virtue, love of country and faith in an idea.”
A few months ago, Halsema himself, accompanied by 17 young people from Amsterdam, visited Auschwitz. There, she says, all her previous knowledge was stripped of all abstraction. “Mountains of human hair, piled up pans, tangles of glasses and piles of shoes and suitcases: face to face with the remains of people who have been destroyed. Even after almost eighty years, the search for the right words continues. Words that do justice to the suffering of the victims. The very last belongings kept there cry out to us: ‘don’t forget us’.”
Increasing anti-Semitism
Halsema also cites the flaring anti-Semitism in our country, and the city: “The genocide of Jews, Roma and Sinti is comparable to nothing in history. But it is a warning for all humanity, now and in the future, about the consequences of hatred, exclusion, racism and discrimination against anyone.”
According to the mayor, there is only one moral compass: “That compass is that in our relationship with others, we must always keep asking ourselves that one question: Is this a human being?”