PROMOTING AWARENESS ABOUT THE HOLOCAUST

and ITS HORRENDOUS CONSEQUENCES in 2022

 As a third of Europeans said they knew just a little or nothing at all about the Holocaust, the genocide of six million Jews in lands controlled by Adolf Hitler’s Nazi regime in the 1930s and 1940s (according to the CNN/ComRes poll of November 2018 based on interviews with more than 7,000 people across Europe, with more than 1,000 respondents each in Austria, France, Germany, Great Britain, Hungary, Poland and Sweden).

According to the same survey, two-thirds of Europeans said that commemorating the Holocaust helps ensure that such atrocities will never happen again.

Half of Europeans said commemorating the Holocaust helps fight anti-Semitism today (CNN survey) but according to the European Commission Eurobarometer survey, only 4 in 10 Europeans, on average, think the Holocaust is sufficiently taught in schools. (December 2018 – January 2019)

According to the same Eurobarometer survey, 53% of Europeans perceive Holocaust denial as being a problem in their country and according to the FRA survey,  62% of European Jews have seen or heard non-Jewish people suggest that the Holocaust is a myth or has been exaggerated, at least occasionally (FRA survey 2018).

Therefore, we proposed to organize on top of the Annual March of the Living, other National/local Marches of the Living on the National Holocaust Remembrance Days (or other Commemoration Days related to the Holocaust) in cooperation with our partners of the European March of the Living Network in order to raise the awareness about the Holocaust and its horrendous consequences (especially focusing on the young generation) in the following countries, as a priority:

  1. Greece (Thessaloniki) – March of the Living on Tuesday 15/03/2022

Initiated in recent years by Mayor Yannis Boutaris to mark the anniversary of the departure on the 15th of March 1943 of the first train taking members of its Jewish community to the Auschwitz death camp.

We are co-organizing a Joint March of the Living in Thessaloniki in cooperation with our two EMOTL partners: The Central Board of the Jewish Communities in Greece and with the Jewish Museum of Greece.

  1. Hungary – Annual March of the Living on Sunday 17/04/2022

Hungarian Holocaust Memorial Day, established in 2004, to commemorate the 16th of April 1944 when Jews were forced into ghettos in Carpathian Ruthenia prior to their deportation.

Usually the March of the Living Hungary is gathering a huge number of participants, around 12,000 marchers.

And in 2020, the YouTube trailer video of the 13/2/2020 announcing the march and its itinerary was viewed by 3,478 people.

  1. Poland – Joint Commemoration of the Ghetto Warsaw uprising on Tuesday 19/04/2022

National Commemoration Day of the Uprising of Ghetto Warsaw.

The EMOTL partner in Poland TSKZ is one of the official organizers of the main Ceremony at the Ghetto Warsaw monument and they already agreed to organize a Joint March of the Living in the streets of Warsaw up to the Monument.

  1. Annual March of the Living in Poland on Thursday the 28/04/2022 (according to the Covid situation)

The main theme of the 2022 Annual March of the Living will be: “Passing the Torch of Holocaust Remembrance to the young generation”.

Some 1,500 European High School students with their teachers and educators are schedule to participate from Austria, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Lithuania and Belgium.

  1. Germany – Joint March of the Living with the German Marsch des Leven (March of Life) on the Yom HaShoah (28/4/2022) in Berlin

Since the movement of the March of Life began in 2007, marches have taken place in more than 20 countries and over 400 cities and towns in collaboration with Christians from a wide variety of churches and denominations, as well as many Jewish communities.

This year, we will organize the first of its kind joint March of the Living in the streets of Berlin from the Anhalter train station from where Jews were deported to the concentration camps and up to the Bradenburg gate.

  1. Austria – Joint Light of Hope March on Sunday the 6/11/2022

The traditional Light of Hope March in partnership with the Jewish Community of Vienna (IKG) is scheduled to take place on the Sunday before the commemoration of the Kristallnacht/ November pogrom (9-10/11/2022).

The National Day against Violence and Racism in Memoriam  of the Victims of National Socialism on the 5/05/2022 was established in 1997 to commemorate the liberation of Mauthausen concentration camp and the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, as well as the extermination and the persecution of Roma and Sinti.

According to the CNN survey of 2018, 12% of young people in Austria said they had never heard of the Holocaust.

Austria also had the highest number of people in the survey saying they knew “just a little” about the Holocaust, four out of 10 Austrian adults said that.

  1. Latvia – Joint Step of Life March on Monday 4/07/2022

Official Commemoration Day of Genocide against the Jews, established in 1990, to commemorate the burning of the Choral Synagogue in Riga on July 4th, 1941 and to commemorate the Jews killed during the Nazi occupation of Latvia.

In 2019 at the Step for Life march organized by our EMOTL partner, the Vice-Prime Minister of Lithuania attended. 

  1. Slovakia – March of the Living on Friday 9/10/2022

National Commemoration Day of Victims of the Holocaust and Racial Violence, established in 2000, to mark the day in 1941 when a  government decree on the legal status of Jews (the so-called Jewish Codex) was issued, signaling the start of Slovakian Jews ‘persecution during World War II.

The Jewish Codex contained some of the strictest anti-Jewish measures in all of Europe.

The official ceremony in Bratislava is usually attended by the Slovak Prime Minister. And this year, we will engage our EMOTL partners in Slovakia to be more pro-active and reach out High School students to take part in the March of the Living.

  1. Lithuania – Joint March of the Living and Memory Road on Friday 23/09/2022

National Holocaust Day, established in 1994, to commemorate the liquidation of the Ghetto of Vilna on the 23rd of September 1943.

The joint March of the Living and Memory Road of 2019 and 2021 were attended by the Lithuanian Prime Minister. In 2020, both Ministers of Culture and Education attended.

  1. Romania – March of the Living – on Sunday 9/10/2022

Day Commemorating the Victims of the Holocaust in Romania, established in 2005, to mark the day in 1941 when Bucovina was returned to Romania’s administration and the deportation of Jews from Bucovina begun.

  1. Italy (Rome) – March of the Living – on Sunday 16/10/2022

On the morning of 16 October 1943, 365 German security and police forces (the Italian police were considered too unreliable) sealed off the Ghetto, which held a large part of the Jewish community at the time, turning it into a virtual prison.

In the raid, 1,259 people were detained, comprising 363 men, 689 women, and 207 children. Afterwards, non-Jewish prisoners were released while 1,023 Jews were taken to the Collegio militare in in Trastevere. Two days later, at least 1,035 prisoners were loaded onto Holocaust trains at Tiburtina station and deported to Auschwitz. Only 16 survived.

The Jewish Community of Rome and Il Treno Della Memoria, our EMOTL partners in Italy will partner  with EMOTL to organize the March of the Living from the Ghetto to Collegio Militare on the 16/10/2022.