There is so much bad news to make our world outlook feel very grim these days. It just seems that the world is getting worse, not better, with each passing year sometimes.
Every now and then, though, you hear some positive news, and this can feel good, like the first warm beam of sunlight after a long and particularly dreary rainstorm or snowstorm. Suddenly, the world looks and feels a lot less grim, if only for a short while.
A few days ago, I posted three blog entries about the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, a date which is now recognized as Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Yet, I missed this particular article by Tim Wyatt, which was published on the 24th, by The Independent. Here, Muslim leaders got together with Holocaust survivors on the grounds of the former Auschwitz death camp to pray together with Jewish advocacy groups and children of the survivors of the Holocaust.
The delegation was led by Mohammad bin Abdulkarim Al-Issa, the secretary general of the Saudi Arabia-funded Muslim World League, and is thought to be the most senior group of Islamic faith representatives to ever visit a Nazi death camp.
“To be here, among the children of Holocaust survivors and members of the Jewish and Islamic communities, is both a sacred duty and a profound honour,” Mr Al-Issa said during the ground-breaking visit.
“The unconscionable crimes to which we bear witness today are truly crimes against humanity. That is to say, a violation of us all, an affront to all of God’s children.”
During a time when many young people seem to be forgetting that there even was a Holocaust, we should
The extent of the Holocaust, and especially of the horrors at Auschwitz in particular, are still unbelievable. Here is another snippet from Wyatt's article that illustrates this point:
The network of concentration camps in Auschwitz, situated in southern Poland – then occupied by Germany during the Second World War - held 1.3 million people, of whom 1.1 million were killed.
Most of those who died in the camps were Jews, including 865,000 who were immediately gassed to death on their arrival.
David Harris from the American Jewish Committee said the trip led by Mr Al-Issa was “the most senior Islamic leadership delegation to ever visit Auschwitz or any Nazi German death camp”
At a time when hatred seems to be on the rise all over, and when there also appears to be a forgetting of history that is, frankly, not all that long ago, it is an encouraging sign that there are leaders among groups of people who traditionally have not gotten along who nevertheless put aside their differences in order to recognize just how important it is to remember this history in an effort not to repeat it.
Muslim leaders join Holocaust survivors to pray at Auschwitz in ‘groundbreaking’ visit Muslim World League chief says marking anniversary of liberation of death camp ‘sacred duty and profound honour’ Tim Wyatt, January 24, 2020:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/auschwitz-holocaust-muslim-jewish-pray-a9299941.html?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwAR3mc-ed_yjHQwz9nUNXuITAgDp_AO9r8zlu3DwlxxfnxSWxMT80WLCgCog#Echobox=1579872803
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