Germany, the Holocaust and Israel

Japan and Germany have shown antithetical attitudes toward World War II. Japan is mostly unrepentant, but Germany apologized to the Jews and adopted a special relationship with Israel. Cameron Sawyer writes: "With regard to our former opponents in WWII facing the past -- I am amazed and I guess pleased at the extent to which the Germans continue to flagellate themselves over the Holocaust and other atrocities committed by Germans in WWII. I started travelling to Germany again last year after a long hiatus (I was a DAAD fellow in Munich in the mid-80's) and several times after a long day's travelling switched on the television in my hotel room to a random channel to see -- yet another morbid, gloomy, German-made documentary on the Holocaust or some other atrocity (one on a massacre of Polish civilians, one on the reunion of a Jewish family separated after Germans invaded Lithuania, etc.). I suppose this is meet and just, but it has indeed been 57 years (next week) since that war was over! "

Jenin has changed all that. The refusal of Israel to admit an inspection team has confirmed the belief of Germans that Jenin was like Oradour. They have demanded that Germany end its special relationship with Israel. The Jews are no longer seen as victims. The Economist (4/27/02) has an article on the Jews in Arab countries, entitled "Jews in the Arab World. Memories, mostly. The few who remain face new uneasiness, perhaps danger".There were once one million Jews living contentedly in the Arab world. The few remaining, mostly in Morocco, live in greater danger since Jenin This confirms the.growing belief that the creation of Israel was a mistake from the viewpoint of the Jews themselves.

Ronald Hilton - 5/3/02