Recently I had the privilege of signing the Holocaust Educational Trust’s Book of Commitment to support Holocaust Memorial Day and honour those who were murdered during the Holocaust.
Holocaust Memorial Day falls on the 27th January every year, the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1945. Across the UK people will come together to remember the horrors of the past.
Each year’s Holocaust Memorial Day has a different theme as a focus for educational and commemorative events. The theme for 2024 is ‘Fragility of Freedom’.
This theme invites us to consider how easily and quickly a society, with all of its widely accepted moral and cultural norms, can fall apart – and how readily some fellow citizens will participate in that process.
This theme has only become more resonant following the shocking rise in antisemitism and extremist rhetoric following the Hamas terrorist attacks on Israeli citizens on the 7th October 2023 and the subsequent conflict in Gaza. At a time when Jewish communities around the world are feeling a sense of insecurity, the theme of fragility is timely.