More than 30 campuses to hold events for Holocaust Memorial Day

Students across the UK and Ireland are to hold more than 30 events to mark Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD) this year.

Campuses ranging from Dublin to Exeter and East Anglia to Southampton will hold educational sessions to mark the international day of remembrance, held on 27 January.

Events include hearing from the grandson of an SS officer and the daughter of a renowned survivor, and are being supported by the Union of Jewish Students (UJS), who work with the Holocaust Educational Trust to bring speakers to universities.

UJS’ Sabbatical Officer Rebecca Lewis is leading HMD 2019 said: “I am proud to see a strong increase in the number of events surrounding this day. In a time of rising worry around antisemitism, it is important to ensure that we work together with our Jewish community and the wider student body to carry on the memories of the 1940’s, to increase awareness and carry on fighting antisemitism. Seeing Jewish students taking an active part in this initiative is very reassuring, and I look forward to attending the different campuses hosting these remarkable speakers.”

UJS has also embraced World Jewish Congress’s third annual ‘We Remember’ campaign to raise awareness about antisemitism and the causes of the Holocaust.

Among speakers being invited to events across the country are Dr Noemie Lopian, the daughter of Holocaust survivor Dr. Ernst Israel Bornstein, who spent 5 years translating her father’s memoir from German to English, and now works to carry on his memory.

Derek Niemann, the grandson of a Nazi SS Officer will also be speaking about his experience of having a family member who was a Nazi, which he has written book about.

In late 2018, senior leaders and student union sabbatical officers from UK universities learnt not to be bystanders as they visited the former Nazi concentration and death camp Auschwitz-Birkenau.

The intense visit was part of the Holocaust Educational Trust’s (HET) Lessons from Auschwitz Universities Project in partnership with the Union of Jewish Students (UJS).

Among those in attendance was NUS’s national president, Shakira Martin. She wrote about her experience for Jewish News here: Auschwitz trip inspires me to redouble efforts in antisemitism fight