Yom HaShoah ‘low on the list’

The head of Yom HaShoah UK has issued a rallying cry ahead of the annual remembrance day, saying commemoration was “low on the list” for the British Jewish community and that remembrance had grown “stale”.

The organisation’s chairman Neil Martin, making his case in this week’s Jewish News, described seeking a shift in attitude but of feeling a state of “inertia” with the status quo.

“While the Shoah may be high on the list of collective Jewish identity, it is very low on the list of practical, tangible application for the UK Jewish community,” he says.

“There has been no internal spotlight on Shoah remembrance and commemoration, which to many has become stale, nor has there been a community-wide review on new ways of teaching and engaging the next generation,” Martin added.

Asking “where does the narrative go next,” he said that the Prime Minister’s Holocaust Commission, headed by Jewish Leadership Council chairman Mick Davis, may generate a “vital change”.