“The need for vigilance is still very real”

“The need for vigilance is still very real”

Representatives of the Jewish community spoke of the importance of memory on Monday evening, while also referring to current events. This was during a ceremony to commemorate 70years since the liberation of the concentration camps. The ceremony took place in the main Synagogue in Brussels. “That Auschwitz will never happen again is never a certainty”, said Pr Julien Klener, President of the Israeli Consistory in Belgium.

“The community is faced with a real existential question. Today, Jews are again a target simply because they are Jewish. I was born in 1939. I was on the list of those to die. And 70 years later, we have started seeing “Death to Jews” again”, he added.

 According to the Grand Rabbi of Antwerp, David-Moshe Lieberman, “Auschwitz is a symbol, a horrible symbol”, that needs to be remembered.

For the Grand Rabbi of Brussels, Albert Guigui, “it is imperative that the Shoah event has its place in the European historical conscience. We must pass the European values down to future generations: democracy and respect of human beings”.

“Anti-Jewish acts have multiplied: synagogues are shut, Jewish children are harassed in public schools”, he said. “The Middle Eastern context, ignorance, or the economic crisis are not extenuating circumstances. Europe has a duty to stop things degenerating. The need for vigilance is still very real for Europe”, he said. “Will our past will become the future of our children? We really should ask ourselves this question today”, he concluded.

(Source: Belga)


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