| City Clerks Office |
**********PRESS RELEASE**********
Date:
Re: City Budget Work Sessions
Contact: Cheryl Patton, Assistant City Manager (406-455-8417)
Melissa Kinzler, Budget Manager (406-455-8476)
8 to 12 To be scheduled
Welcome … Alechem Shalom.
We come here today in this symbol of our State’s authority to remember the systematic, bureaucratic annihilation of 6 million Jews and 3 to 5 million others; including the gypsies, the mentally or physically disabled, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Communists and political dissidents, trade unionists and Freemasons, among others; by what was at the time the German authority, the Nazi regime and its collaborators. Today is Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day.
The Nazi’s made the Shoah, or Holocaust, their central act of State during the Second World War. Theirs was a crime unique in the annals of human history, different not only in its quantity of violence but in manner and purpose as a mass criminal enterprise organized by the State against mostly defenseless civilian populations.
The Shoah was not simply a throwback to medieval torture, but a thoroughly modern expression of bureaucratic organization, industrial management, scientific achievement and technological sophistication. The Nazi’s spared no expense in their effort and kept meticulous records of their murders on the most sophisticated computer equipment in the world, ironically using technology developed for the newly formed U.S. Social Security Administration.
However, we are not solely here to mourn the dead. After the war, there was much debate about when, or even if, to set a date to remember this great crime. After all, the Jewish faith, one that was no stranger to sorrow, already had Tisha B'av, a date set to commemorate its griefs.
We are here today to honor those that fought back; those that resisted. Yom HaShoah falls on the Jewish date of Nisan 27, the anniversary of the beginning of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
On this date 63 years ago, Nazi troops and police entered the Warsaw ghetto to deport its 60,000 surviving inhabitants to the camps. 23-year-old Mordecai Anielewicz led 750 resistors who fought back against a full division of 12 thousand heavily armed and well-trained Germans with a few smuggled weapons and whatever else they could scavange.
These outgunned and starving ghetto fighters held its own against the German war machine for almost a month, but on May 16, 1943, the resistance’s was broken by superior Nazi armament. The Ghetto was “liquidated.” We must remember their courage.
You will also hear today of Jews who fought bravely as partisans in resistance groups that operated under cover of the dense forests of Eastern Europe. An estimated 20 to 30 thousand resistors were surrounded by captive populations which frequently collaborated with what should have been the common enemy, and were often betrayed by those who were in essence their fellow victims. It was a resistance by an army without arms, by the old and sick, the frail and the young.
In many areas of Nazi-occupied Europe, resistance took the form of aid and rescue. Bystanders transformed themselves into rescuers, and in the process became outlaws against the Nazi’s. They faced real risk of death and torture themselves, following a code of right and wrong which was simply out of fashion. Rescuers, who before the war were strong backbones of their communities, found themselves isolated since their neighbors viewed people who harbored Jews as selfish and dangerous because they risked the lives of those around them.
A rescuers life was intricate and terrifying. A careless word, a forgotten detail, one wrong move could lead to the death of both themselves and their charges. The home atmosphere was disrupted; husbands and wives gave up their privacy and children found themselves sleeping with strangers they had to learn to call brother, sister, aunt or uncle because if you were raided at night, you couldn’t have the wrong number of beds unmade.
You had to be careful about buying too many groceries at one store, as groceries could become suspicious. You couldn’t talk out loud because neighbors would hear voices. In some cases, neighbors reported you if they thought you had too much garbage for the size of your family. The Nazis offered rewards for information that led to the capture of Jews. Informers were everywhere.
If we are to realize our goal of “Never Again,” we must remember the tragedy of this great crime. We must also rise up against genocide anywhere, as is now occurring in Darfur.
In our faith, we have a prayer that seems appropriate for this occasion. It is the “Shechiyanu” a prayer of thanksgiving:
(Baruch Ata Adonai Elohanu Melech Ha-olam, Shechiyanu v’keyamanu v’hegeyanu lazman hazah)
Blessed are you, our Lord our G-d, Ruler of the universe, for giving us life, for sustaining us and enabling us to reach this season.
Amen
I received this information the other day.
For many years, the Jerusalem Post has published a cartoon called "Dry Bones" by Yaakov Kirschen. It always succeeds in being topical, relevant and HILARIOUS.When Christian kids are little they are taught about the Easter Bunny who comes hippity hoping down Bunny Trail, bringing baskets of colorful Easter Eggs, and jolly Santa Claus,who slides down the chimney, bringing his sack of Christmas toys.
When we grow up, the Christians discover that their tales were charming deceptions, and the Jews discover that their childhood "fairytale" is indeed an historic truth.
A couple of months ago, I bought my first bicycle since I was a kid. The prospect of gas staying in the mid $2s finally got to me, and I have been having a great deal of fun cycling all aroung our fair city.It bears repeating that the two defendants, Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman, are not accused of being agents of Israel or any other foreign power. The government has stipulated that they are not. Although they are charged under "the Espionage Act," this is not an espionage case.
What makes the whole affair more peculiar still is that the defendants did not even request the disclosure of the information they are accused of mishandling.
"Nowhere is it alleged that Dr. Rosen or Mr. Weissman stole, paid for or even solicited the information that they allegedly received," the defense noted in a January 19 motion to dismiss.
A theory of the law that would penalize such informal transactions between citizens and government officials is obviously susceptible to extreme abuse.
Regular readers of this blog may recall that I regularly swim during my lunch hour at the Moroney Natatorium in downtown Great Falls.
Well, to make a long story short, my high-school (and jr. high; and grade school) swim coach has also begun swimming during the noon hour at the Nat. The Nat was very crowded this afternoon, and we shared a lane.
I haven't been that self conscious in a very long time. In my mind, I could very clearly hear him, at the top of his lungs; "Hustle, Hustle Weissman! Get that head down Weissman! Stretch on those kick-offs Weissman! Why so Pokey, Weissman?" He wasn't actually saying any of this, mind you. I don't know if he was even thinking it.
Coach Bob was a very large influence on my life. However, I don't know that I need to relive the past so quite so intimately ...
