Last year, on Holocaust Remembrance Day, I was in a meeting with the CEO of a high-profile firm and when the memorial siren sounded, I stood still. When it ended, he said, "This is the first time I've even seen an Arab stand at the siren." I replied, "It's not because I'm here but because I respect the memory of more than six million people."
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Holocaust Remembrance Day is a significant event not only for the Jewish people nit also for Arabs and Palestinians, and especially for the two million Arabs who live in Israel.
Some live with the feeling that the Holocaust has had a profound effect on their lives and their future, mainly because of the perception that the Holocaust has led the Zionist Movement and the State of Israel to take steps based on fear against them, out of the need to guard against them.
Arabs in Israel are first exposed to the subject of the Holocaust in high school, as part of the curriculum. From the way the Holocaust is perceived among Israeli Arabs, it is clear that one element is missing from the curriculum – the Holocaust is not taught or studied as a significant historical event, one of the cruelest events in human history. To illustrate – the memorial siren can't even be heard in some Arab localities.
Whoever it was in the Education Ministry who decided to include the subject in the curriculum was clearly simply going through the motions vis-à-vis the Arab students, because they need to check it off their list en route to their high school diploma, and it is better not to delve into the issue too much so as not to provoke too much sympathy.
The latter stems from the concern – perhaps the biggest fear – of an Arab demand, which is in fact is already present, for recognition of the Palestinian narrative of which Arab citizens are an integral part.
The Holocaust is a human issue – not just a Jewish one and certainly not only an Israeli one. But Israel appropriates it almost exclusively thereby creating antagonism among Arab Israelis. So much so, in fact, that there are those who see Israel's activities with regard to the Holocaust as the exploitation of the issue to promote a political agenda.
Proper public diplomacy on the issue as well as activities in the Arabic language could potentially make the memory of the Holocaust something easier for the Arab public to deal with. Or perhaps it is the military rule under which Arab lived during the first two decades after Israel's inception, the sense of discrimination they experience in all spheres of life or the constant statements by all political officials that Israel is a Jewish state that makes them want to shun this nationally observed day.
The key here is first and foremost for the Jewish public to shed its paranoia and daily fear that any non-Jew is an enemy out to destroy the Jewish people.
Ostensibly, over 70 years of coexistence were supposed to create a sense of actual historical partnership, even on the level of Holocaust remembrance. After all, on a personal level, many Holocaust survivors who chose to live in areas where with a considerable Arab population, especially in the Galilee, maintained and developed good and even excellent personal ties with their neighbors.
But these ties remained at the superficial level and did not develop to one where a Holocaust survivor told his personal story to his Arab friend – perhaps to prevent the Arab from voicing his narrative and confronting the pain that separates him from his land, or between him and his refugee brother who lives in Lebanon, Jordan or Syria.
Another reason for this is the fact that the Arab public also brings with it a very heavy emotional charge, and a narrative that conflicts to some extent with the Jewish one, according to which Holocaust survivors sought a national home, and thus the Arabs lost the chance to form a state here after the British Mandate ended.
However, even had the UN Partition Plan had been accepted, the lessons of the Holocaust should be learned as it should now be taught in every school around the world, regardless of nationality or religion, and even regardless of the State of Israel. Humanity must understand that a people, a language, and a culture cannot be obliterated.
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