[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 58 (Thursday, May 5, 2005)]
[House]
[Pages H3035-H3042]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       HOLOCAUST REMEMBRANCE DAY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Wasserman Schultz) is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, today is Holocaust Remembrance 
Day, Yom Hoshoa.
  Today is a day of reflection and remembrance, not just for Jews, but 
for everyone who needs to learn from the world's injustices in order 
not to repeat them. Today we need not just say, ``never again.'' We 
must live our lives by this mantra.
  A few weeks ago, I attended a solemn ceremony to remember the 60th 
anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. As I reflected upon the 
horror of the death camps where at least 1.5 million innocent people 
from many different nations died, 90 percent of whom were Jews, I asked 
myself the following question: how far have we come as a civil society 
and a world in the last 60 years? How much have we learned? Have we 
honored their memory by not allowing these atrocities to be repeated?
  Unfortunately, my answer had to be not far enough. In the last 15 
years, we have seen genocide raise its ugly head in Bosnia, Rwanda and, 
most recently, in the Darfur region in Sudan, where at least 180,000 
people are dead and over 2 million people displaced from their homes.
  On Yom Hoshoa, let us recommit and reaffirm our vigilance against 
acts of horrific inhumanity. Let us make sure that the lost souls from 
the Holocaust did not die in vain.
  Mr. ROTHMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate Yom Hashoah, 
Holocaust Remembrance Day, the annual observance of the mass genocide 
perpetrated in the mid-twentieth century by Nazi Germany, the most evil 
tyranny in the annals of human history.
  On Sunday, May 8th, we mark the sixtieth anniversary of V-E Day, when 
the combined might of the Allied Forces finally ended forever the 
murderous regime of Adolf Hitler and his brutal henchmen and brought 
the curtain down on the European theater of World War II. Nevertheless, 
the Nazi dictatorship already had succeeded in deliberately murdering 
more than six million Jews and countless other people, in particular 
gypsies, persons with mental or physical disabilities, and those 
perceived to have a different sexual orientation or set of political 
beliefs. They achieved this terrible end through a nefarious network of 
secret police, a perverted legal process, a barbarous system of 
concentration camps that doubled as human extermination factories--and 
the tacit and often active participation of many, many others from a 
wide variety of backgrounds and national origins.
  We observe Holocaust Remembrance Day in part to honor the memory of 
those men, women, and children who perished in this tragedy 
unparalleled in the course of human events. We observe Holocaust 
Remembrance Day to pay tribute to the courage and suffering of so many 
who lost their lives. But we also observe Holocaust Remembrance Day for 
an all too practical, and unfortunately still necessary, purpose: 
because we must never forget.
  The six decades that have intervened since the Nazi regime was 
forcibly ended may make the Holocaust seem like a chapter in history 
from a bygone era. Yet each succeeding generation has a moral 
obligation to remember the Holocaust and its lessons for humanity: that 
mankind has an enormous capacity for evil; that, if left unchecked, 
evil can and will prevail; and that in order to overcome a massive 
concentration of power in the hands of those who would achieve evil 
ends, we have a moral obligation to act and to intervene on behalf of 
those without the capacity to resist such evil. These lessons, we must 
never forget.
  For the unfortunate truth is that each succeeding generation in the 
decades following the Holocaust has been obliged to grapple with mass 
murder on a geopolitical scale. From the tyranny of Josef Stalin's 
Gulag Archipelago; to the Cultural Revolution of Communist China; to 
the killing fields of Cambodia; to the ``ethnic cleansing'' in Bosnia 
and Kosovo; to the senseless slaughters in Rwanda, the Sudan, and 
Darfur; to the tumbling twin towers at Ground Zero; and in countless 
other corners of the earth, man's capacity to inflict grievous harm on 
his fellow man continues to rage on, all too often unchecked.
  Mr. Speaker, my distinguished colleagues, that is why we must never 
forget. We must never forget the more than 6 million victims, their 
grievous suffering, and the tremendous loss experienced not only by 
their loved ones who survived them, but by all of mankind. We must 
never forget the names associated with that greatest of all human 
tragedies, names which still to this day all too readily roll off the 
tongue, drenched in a thousand tears: Auschwitz, Dachau, Treblinka, 
Babi Yar--the Shoah.
  But above all, we must never forget, because we must continue to look 
forward, as well as behind us. Man must never again allow his fellow 
man to stand by while the wholesale extermination of entire peoples is 
attempted under our very noses. We must never forget the maxim offered 
by Edmund Burke centuries before the Holocaust: that the only thing 
necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.
  Mr. CROWLEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate the Holocaust 
Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, known in Hebrew as Yom Hashoah.
  This is the day that not only the Jewish people should mourn the loss 
of the six million people stolen from this earth, but a day recognized 
by all.
  We must never forget the attempted extermination of the Jewish people 
but we must also never forget so we can ensure that is never happens 
again.
  We still see these mass slaughters around the world whether it's in 
Sudan or what we saw in the 1990's in Rwanda.
  The world community must take immediate action so the murder of so 
many Jews never happens again to any of our brothers and sisters around 
the world.
  This day has a bit more of a special meaning to me this year; 2005 
marks the 60th anniversary of the end of the concentration camps that 
stole the lives of six million innocent human beings in ways that are 
still unfathomable to me.
  I had the unique opportunity this year to attend the United Nations 
General Assembly Special Session on the 60th anniversary of the 
Liberation of the Nazi Death Camps.
  It was a very emotional day listening to the speeches made by many of 
the world's leaders who were in attendance.
  Also this was the first time that I know of that the United Nations 
convened to commemorate the Holocaust, and the first time that the 
United Nations convened a special session at the request of Israel.
  Along with many of my colleagues, I contacted foreign embassies I 
have close relationships with to urge them to encourage their home 
governments to write a letter to Secretary General Annan to allow the 
general assembly to hold the special session.
  Over 135 countries responded to make sure that the special session 
got underway.
  My day at the U.N. also brought me to a special breakout session 
sponsored by B'nai B'rith International with several Holocaust 
survivors to talk about their experiences and how they survived the 
death camps.
  One of the speakers was my good friend from California, Mr. Lantos. 
When we speak about Yom Hashoah in Congress we should remember that we 
have a survivor among us and should listen and respect his words when 
he speaks about the current humanitarian crisis like he has done most 
recently with Sudan.
  At the end of the day a special exhibit was held by the Vad Vashem 
Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority about the 
Auschwitz death camps.
  It's impossible to describe the overwhelming feeling you get when you 
see the visuals of the condition the victims of the concentration camps 
were in. It still troubles my heart that one human could do this to 
another.
  We must never forget and never allow this to happen again in the 
world to any group of people.
  Ms. BEAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to a constituent 
and friend of mine who has visited hundreds of classrooms and spoken to 
thousands of students about his life in German concentration camps 
during the Holocaust. Sam Harris--born Szlamek Rzeznik--has taken his 
remarkable life story and made it a driving force in his effort to help 
America's children learn the value of tolerance.
  In September 1939, when Sam was 4 years old, he and his siblings were 
taken from their home and confined in the Deblin Ghetto in Poland. 
Three years later, they were sent to the concentration camp at Deblin 
and then at Czestochowa until that camp was liberated by Soviet troops 
in 1945. Only Sam and 2 of his sisters survived their time in the 
camps, and Sam is among the youngest remaining survivors of the 
Holocaust.
  Currently, Sam volunteers with the Holocaust Memorial Foundation of 
Illinois, discussing genocide and the Holocaust with elementary, middle 
and high school students to

[[Page H3036]]

ensure that history does not repeat itself. Part of their effort is the 
creation of the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center, due to 
begin construction in the near future.
  It is important to note that this will not be simply a museum. It 
will also focus on education as a means to prevent hatred and bigotry. 
So it is fitting that Sam Harris and his Holocaust Memorial Foundation 
colleagues remain focused on the future, not only with their museum but 
also on using the classroom as a forum to help understand and deter 
genocide.
  Sam said to me that if children were to take one thing from him, it 
should be this: ``When there is a bully in the play yard, they should 
step forth and stop the bully.'' That is advice that we all can live 
by, whether we are in the schoolyard, in the boardroom or in Congress.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join with me today, Holocaust 
Remembrance Day, not only to honor the memory of the 6 million people 
killed during the Holocaust, but to thank people like Sam Harris and 
the Holocaust Memorial Foundation of Illinois for their tireless work 
in the promotion of tolerance and understanding.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, ``Take care and watch 
yourselves closely so as neither to forget the things that your eyes 
have seen nor to let them slip from your mind all the days of your 
life; make them known to your children and your children's children . . 
.'' (Deuteronomy 4:9)


 =========================== NOTE =========================== 

  
  May 5, 2005--On Page H 3036 the following appeared: Mr. PRICE of 
Georgia. Mr. Speaker,.
  
  The online version should be corrected to read: Mr. PRICE of 
North Carolina. Mr. Speaker,.


 ========================= END NOTE ========================= 

  On this day of remembrance we confront stark, unmitigated evil, evil 
that could impose and did impose starvation, torture, unimaginable 
cruelty, and--for 6 million human beings--death. We also confront the 
evil that let this happen, the evil of indifference. It is indifference 
that Elie Weisel describes as the ``epitome of evil.'' ``The opposite 
of love is not hate,'' he says, ``it is indifference. . . . The 
opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference.''
  It was indifference that enabled millions to avert their gaze as the 
Nazis undertook genocide on a scale never before imagined. Remembrance 
of the Holocaust affects us deeply as we empathize with the victims and 
what they endured but also as we recognize: the scourge of 
indifference, the temptation to indifference, are all too familiar to 
us today.
  Indifference often prevents us from expressing love, achieving 
justice, or realizing community. And it still operates on a global 
scale. Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has termed the 
failure of the United States and other nations to intervene to prevent 
the genocidal massacres of 1994 in Rwanda as her ``deepest regret'' 
from her years of public service. Every public servant should see Hotel 
Rwanda; in fact, I think every citizen should see the film, which 
drives home painfully the effects of the world's indifference.
  And now researchers at the Holocaust Museum in Washington have issued 
a Genocide Emergency for Darfur in western Sudan, where some 300,000 
people have died at the hands of violent men, or from the devastation 
left in their wake, in the past 2 years. Indeed the Holocaust--and the 
indifference and inaction that permitted the Holocaust--have been 
frequently invoked as Congress has struggled to shape our country's 
response.
  ``Simply saying `never again' does not save lives,'' one colleague 
wrote recently. Our country's diplomatic efforts and the initiatives of 
the United Nations and the African Union have thus far fallen woefully 
short. The international community needs to impose far more stringent 
economic and diplomatic sanctions on Sudan and to muster a much larger 
peacekeeping force--and our country needs to invest a great deal more 
in getting this done. In this connection, I commend to colleagues 
Nicholas Kristof's column in the April 17th edition of the New York 
Times.
  Today is a solemn day of remembrance. But given the persistence of 
evil and the perils our world faces, it must also be a day of resolve 
and action. We keep faith with those we remember by vowing ``Never 
again'' and not stopping at that, but overcoming the indifference and 
inaction that would allow unmitigated evil--the ultimate atrocity of 
genocide--to continue.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Holocaust 
Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, known in Hebrew as Yom Hashoah, 
to memorialize the 6 million Jews murdered by the Nazi regime during 
the Holocaust.
  In 1933, Europe's Jewish population was over nine million. However, 
by 1945, almost two out of three European Jews had been killed as part 
of the Final Solution, a policy to murder the Jews. However, the Nazis' 
cruelty was not just limited to Jews, they also murdered gypsies, the 
mentally and physically disabled, homosexuals, and those deemed 
religious dissidents, like Jehovah's Witnesses.
  We must remember the lives of those who were subjected to unspeakable 
atrocities, targeted simply because of their religious beliefs. We must 
remember those mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, daughters, and sons 
who perished so brutally in the camps, in the ghettos, and in the gas 
chambers of Nazi Germany.
  This year, Yom Hashoah comes as we mark the 60th anniversary of the 
end of World War II. We must never forget what can happen to civilized 
people when bigotry and hatred rule.
  We all share the responsibility to combat ignorance, intolerance, and 
prejudice no matter what the form. And 60 years later, it is still 
entirely unbelievable that individuals contemplated in seriousness the 
systematic destruction of over 6 million people. On this anniversary, 
as we honor lives lost, I extend my condolences to those who lost loved 
ones in the Holocaust. They will always be remembered.
  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate Yom Hashoah, 
Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, which memorializes the 
6 million Jews murdered by the Nazis during their campaign of genocide 
in World War II. We mourn the innocent lives lost and vibrant 
communities destroyed while the world shamefully stood silent, and 
honor those heroes of the Warsaw Ghetto who faced certain death when 
they refused to submit to the Nazi's planned extermination of their 
community.
  To this day, Mr. Speaker, many European countries have failed to 
right the past wrongs of the Holocaust by failing to adequately redress 
the wrongful confiscation of property by the Nazi and communist 
regimes. These seizures took place over decades; they were part of the 
modus operandi of repressive, totalitarian regimes; and they affected 
millions of people. The passage of time, border changes, and population 
shifts are only a few of the things that make the wrongful property 
seizures of the past such difficult problems to address today.
  While I recognize that many obstacles stand in the way of righting 
these past wrongs, I do not believe that these challenges make property 
restitution or compensation impossible. On the contrary, I believe much 
more should have been done--and can still be done now--while our 
elderly Holocaust survivors are still living.
  Today I also want to sound the alarm about a disturbing trend that 
Jews face today: a rising tide of anti-Semitism throughout the world.
  I serve as the Ranking Member of the Commission on Security and 
Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), commonly known as the Helsinki 
Commission. Last year I traveled as part of the U.S. Delegation, with 
former Secretary of State Colin Powell, to attend a special conference 
in Berlin addressing anti-Semitism, held under the auspices of the 
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). The OSCE is 
a 55-nation regional security organization which promotes democracy and 
human rights in Europe, Central Asia, and North America.
  Before traveling to Berlin, I made a point to visit Auschwitz for the 
first time. I was shocked and stunned to see how efficient the Nazi 
operation was: they wanted to maximize the number of individuals that 
could be killed.
  Seeing the remains of that factory of intolerance, hate and death, it 
reaffirmed how we must continually stress the importance of advancing 
understanding throughout the OSCE region and the entire world. We must 
tirelessly work to build understanding and respect between different 
communities to prevent future acts of prejudice and injustice.
  At the Berlin Conference, I had the privilege of participating as a 
member of the U.S. delegation, and I gave the official U.S. statement 
in the session on tolerance. The meeting ended with the issuance of the 
Berlin Declaration of Action.
  The Berlin Declaration laid out a number of specific steps for states 
to take to combat the rising tide of anti-Semitism, including: striving 
to ensure that their legal systems foster a safe environment free from 
anti-Semitic harassment, violence or discrimination; promoting 
educational programs; promoting remembrance of the Holocaust, and the 
importance of respecting all ethnic and religious groups; combating 
hate crimes, which can be fueled by racist and anti-Semitic propaganda 
on the Internet; encouraging and supporting international organizations 
and NGO's; and encouraging the development of best practices between 
law enforcement and educational institutions.
  As we commemorate Yom Hashoah, let us honor the memory of those who 
perished in the Holocaust by pledging to fight intolerance, hate 
crimes, and violence in our community and around the world. We shall 
never be silent again.
  Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate Holocaust 
Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, a day on which we recall the 
atrocities committed during the Second World War, celebrate the 
liberation of these horrific concentration camps, and call for 
continued efforts to fight anti-Semitism around the world.
  While 60 years have now passed since the end of World War II, and our 
Jewish brothers

[[Page H3037]]

and sisters from around the world have managed to become a remarkably 
successful and innovative people despite the horrors they were forced 
to face, it is imperative that we continue to remember the events of 
the Holocaust to ensure that future generations remain aware. The crime 
of genocide, which continues to be committed today as we have seen in 
Armenia, Rwanda, Sudan, and elsewhere, is one of the most reprehensible 
acts that can be committed by man. To attempt eradication of an entire 
population based on a misguided prejudice is absolutely vile, and the 
United States should do everything in its power to try and prevent such 
atrocities from happening in the future.
  Today, we call to memory the atrocities of the Holocaust, while at 
the same time honoring those individuals that persevered despite them. 
The success of such Holocaust survivors as our dear colleague, 
Congressman Tom Lantos, serves to remind us that while the crime of 
genocide can take our lives and our freedom, it cannot and must not 
break our will and determination.
  Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate Holocaust 
Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, marking the 60th anniversary of 
the beginning of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising.
  Today, as those who witnessed the horrific crimes perpetrated during 
the Holocaust are becoming fewer, great effort must be taken to ensure 
that both we and generations to come will never forget this, the most 
monstrous event in the history of the modern world.
  This year, we mark this solemn day by reflecting on the liberation of 
the Jews of Europe and the pursuit of those responsible for committing 
these heinous offenses. Sixty years ago as allied forces pressed 
farther into reaches of Nazi-occupied Europe, the names of places such 
as Auschwitz-Birkenau, Dachau, and Mauthausen had yet to be seared into 
our collective conscious. As allied soldiers broke down the doors of 
the camps, they were overwhelmed by the sights of human suffering that 
confronted them. The scale of that suffering was unimaginable.
  The allied powers, faced with the enormous task of bringing to 
justice the perpetrators of this genocide, together established the 
International Military Tribunal. The legacy of Nuremberg lives on in 
the tribunals held for perpetrators of war crimes in Rwanda, Sierra 
Leone, and the former Yugoslavia among others.
  Today we remember those destroyed by the Nazis, but unlike sixty 
years ago, we cannot stay silent when confronted by such crises as the 
genocide now occurring in Darfur. We must renew our commitment never to 
remain indifferent in the face of such assaults on innocent human 
beings.
  Mr. BISHOP of New York. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in solemn 
observance of Yom Hashoah, commemorating the commencement of the Warsaw 
Ghetto uprising.
  Today the Gateway Monument in the Warsaw Ghetto serves as a fixed 
memorial to the victims who were herded onto railroad cars for 
deportation to Treblinka, one of many death camps scattered throughout 
the European countryside. The Gateway Monument has etched upon its 
stone the names of four hundred Jews who martyred themselves for the 
cause of saving the lives of their neighbors and their own children, 
and to defend their religion from annihilation. However, another great 
monument exists, but in the form of the retelling of the heroic story 
of the uprising, one generation at a time.
  Mordecai Anielewicz, a young man of twenty-three years, led an army 
of beleaguered men and women against their oppressors, the Nazi war 
machine. On this day, Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, 
we celebrate and honor those who offered resistance in a valiant 
attempt to defy deportation to death camps. Mordecai Anielewicz wrote 
in his last letter to Yitzhak Cukierman, friend and co-founder of the 
Jewish Fighting Organization, ``The fact that we are remembered beyond 
the ghetto walls encourages us in our struggle.''
  In our united causes to `Never Forget', nor to repeat the senseless 
atrocities of the Holocaust, we must be ready to confront similar 
genocidal slaughter throughout the world. Mr. Anielewicz's heroism and 
the courage of the over four hundred resistance fighters of the Warsaw 
Ghetto resistance have earned more than words as their legacy. Our 
nation and those of the developed world must offer our own resistance 
to despot leaders who seek to commit murder on the basis of religion or 
race.
  Mr. Speaker, Mordecai was correct in his assessment of the Warsaw 
Ghetto uprising's impact outside the ghetto walls. Indeed, the 
resistance has been remembered beyond the ghetto walls, as it has 
become a testimonial to the human spirit that will be remembered 
throughout all humanity, for all time.
  Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate Holocaust 
Remembrance Day.
  The Chief U.S. Counsel to the Nuremberg Military tribunal said of the 
Holocaust: ``The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been 
so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization 
cannot tolerate their being ignored, because it cannot survive their 
being repeated.''
  Today, Jews around the world take a moment to pay tribute to the 
heroes that were lost. In Israel, where they refer to the day as Yom 
Hashoah, the ceremony began yesterday with survivors and their families 
gathering together for a memorial ceremony at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. 
During the ceremony, six torches were lit, representing the six million 
murdered Jews, and wreathes were laid.
  Today's ceremony in Israel began with the sounding of a siren for two 
minutes throughout the entire country. For the duration of the sirens, 
work was halted, people walking in the streets stopped, cars pulled off 
to the side of the road and everyone stood at silent attention.
  Mr. Speaker, genocide is a horror that has touched many cultures and 
religions. Just a few weeks ago, I joined several thousand Armenians in 
Times Square for a commemoration of the 90th Anniversary of the 
Armenian Genocide. The date marks the beginning of a genocide that took 
the lives of more than one million Armenians in three years during 
World War I.
  Even Hitler exploited the Armenian Genocide to justify his atrocities 
against the Jews, asking ``Who, after all, speaks today of the 
annihilation of the Armenians?'' just before Germany's invasion of 
Poland. Today, the Armenians are still fighting for recognition of the 
genocide from the Turkish government.
  But Mr. Speaker, despite our attempts to shed light on the horrors of 
the Holocaust and the Armenian Genocide, the sad truth is that genocide 
is not a crime of the past.
  Since February 2003, the Sudanese Government has used a combination 
of Arab ``Janjaweed'' militias, its air force, and organized starvation 
to kill more than 380,000 Darfurians and displace almost 3 million. 
Estimates suggest that the Sudanese continue to kill at least 15,000 
more Darfurians each month.
  The Sudanese government, like the Turkish government, denies any 
evidence of genocide. Even the United States government seems to be 
unwilling to label the crisis as ``genocide.''
  Mr. Speaker, we as Americans have a moral obligation to stop genocide 
wherever and whenever it occurs. Americans can never again show the 
same lack of interest that F.D.R. showed toward the genocide of the 
Jews during World War II. No world leaders should ever be able to stand 
and justify their crimes by asking if anyone remembers the annihilation 
of Darfur?
  Today, we commemorate one of the darkest periods in human history in 
the hopes that it will never be repeated. Future generations--not just 
Jews, but all people--must learn the history of the Holocaust so that 
the lives that were taken were not lost in vain.
  Mr. FARR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition of the Holocaust 
Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, known in Hebrew as Yom Hashoad. 
Although 60 years have passed since the end of World War II, not a day 
should go by without the world remembering the important lessons we so 
painfully learned from the Holocaust.
  The Day of Remembrance was established by Congress as our nation's 
annual commemoration of the victims of the Holocaust: 12 million people 
died in concentration camps throughout Europe, including 6 million 
Jews. Numbers only tell a small part of the story though. Numbers don't 
reflect the utter devastation that European Jews faced after the end of 
the war. Numbers don't describe the personal and very individual 
tragedy of whole families and communities that were destroyed by the 
hate of places like Auschwitz, Dachau and Flossenburg. The Day of 
Remembrance pushes us to think beyond the numbers; it forces us to 
remember that each of these numbers represents a person--someone's 
father or mother, son or daughter, niece of nephew, or grandchild--a 
precious life that was never lived to its fullest.
  Each of us--the next generations--must rededicate ourselves to 
speaking out for religious tolerance, peace and justice. We must keep 
this sentiment within our hearts and minds each and every day.
  Mr. HONDA. Mr. Speaker, today, communities in the United States, 
Israel, and around the world will gather to observe Holocaust Martyrs' 
and Heroes' Remembrance Day, known in Hebrew as Yom Hashoah. This 
solemn day commemorates the beginning of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, 
and this year it coincides with the 60th anniversary of the end of the 
War World II. On this day, we remember the six million Jews murdered 
during World War II.
  I join all those here today in mourning the innocent lives and 
vibrant communities lost, destroyed by Nazis while the most of world 
silently and shamefully watched. We must combat anti-Semitism and 
intolerance wherever it exists in the world today.

[[Page H3038]]

  It is vital that we remember this dark period in history. The 
Holocaust made clear man's capacity to do evil. We remember this tragic 
event and firm our resolve that history will not be repeated. As human 
beings, we have a responsibility to keep the Holocaust at the forefront 
of our collective historical memory.
  I thank all those who have put today's program together to 
commemorate the Day of Remembrance and I appreciate all those who 
participated.
  Mr. Speaker, the Day of Remembrance reminds us that we as people, we 
as nations, must take action against hatred and incitement targeted 
against any group; we saw how failure to take action over 60 years ago 
turned to mass devastation and murder.
  Mr. Speaker, by taking the time to remember Yom Hashoah here in our 
Nation's Capital, we are keeping our promise that we will never forget 
the past and will fight to protect our future, a future that we hope is 
one step closer to the goal of ``never again.''
   Ms. LORETTA SANCHEZ of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in 
remembrance of and in mourning for the millions who perished in the 
Shoah, the Holocaust, the most systematic and brutal persecution of a 
people ever perpetrated in human history.
  We grieve for all human suffering and misery. The death of one is not 
more significant because of his or her race or their creed. But there 
were so many ones lost in that time. And not just individuals, whole 
families, whole villages, an entire way of life in many cases. Poland, 
Hungary, Ukraine, these countries will never regain the vitality they 
lost when they lost their Jewish people.
  We grieve today not just for the Jewish deaths; Jews were not the 
only ones to perish in the Holocaust. This atrocity was visited upon 
Gypsies, homosexuals, the disabled, Catholics, Africans, trade-
unionists, Jehovah's Witnesses, Protestant Pastors and anyone who 
opposed the Reich.
  The Holocaust was and is an offense, not only to the victims, their 
families and their friends, but to humanity. Some demonize the Nazi 
brutality, calling it inhuman. But I think the fact that the Holocaust 
was a human event makes it all the more terrible. And it makes our 
obligation to prevent such a thing from ever happening again even more 
essential and pressing.
  Pastor Niemoller famously reflected on his inaction at the time of 
the Holocaust:

       First they came for the Communists, but I was not a 
     Communist, so I said nothing. Then they came for the Social 
     Democrats, but I was not a Social Democrat, so I did nothing. 
     Then came the trade unionists, but I was not a trade 
     unionist. And then they came for the Jews, but I was not a 
     Jew, so I did little. Then when they came for me, there was 
     no one left to stand up for me.

  On this day of remembrance, let us pledge that this will not be our 
legacy.
  Ms. MATSUI. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate Yom Hashoah, a 
day of remembrance for Holocaust Martyrs and Heroes.
  Between 1939 and 1945, over 12 million innocent people--including 
over 6 million Jews--were murdered because of their religion, their 
race or because of where they were born. Even today, after the passage 
of 60 years, it is difficult to fully comprehend the intense hatred and 
intolerance that so consumed this dark period in human history.
  On this day of remembrance we cannot think of just those who died, 
but also of those individuals who embodied the triumph of the human 
spirit, who bravely acted in the face of overpowering hatred, and of 
the lessons of their actions. Rather than succumbing to the despair of 
their situation, the Jews fought against their oppressors in the Warsaw 
Ghetto uprising in April and May of 1943. In a defiant declaration, the 
Jews of Terezin proclaimed a theme of liberation each time they sang 
Verdi's ``Requiem.'' The thread of hope continued despite the hopeless 
moments. As such, when we remember the Holocaust, we remember not only 
the needless death of so many, but also the heroic voices which 
continue to inspire us today.
  Sadly, we still struggle as a human race to stamp out the evils of 
anti-Semitism, racism and xenophobia. Several years ago in my hometown 
of Sacramento, we saw the ability of good to overpower intolerance 
during an act of arson on three area synagogues. We witnessed the 
heroics of average citizens who rushed into these burning buildings to 
save precious books, manuscripts and a Torah which had already survived 
the Holocaust decades earlier.
  While Yom Hashoah is a somber day of remembering those who were 
killed in the Holocaust, it is also a day that offers hope. Hope that 
the strength and courage in all of us will overcome injustice and 
intolerance.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate the 
60th anniversary of the end of the Holocaust. This year's anniversary 
is particularly compelling not only because it marks six decades since 
the liberation of the Jewish people from history's darkest hour, but 
also because our world has failed to heed the universal message of the 
Holocaust. Crimes against humanity anywhere are an affront to all 
people everywhere.
  Indeed, I would be doing a disservice to the Holocaust survivors 
throughout South Florida if I do not address that most unconscionable 
crime of genocide. Sixty years ago the world failed to aid the victims 
of the Nazi regime. We conveniently dodged our duty by claiming 
unsubstantiated evidence, a lack of effective resources to respond, and 
the existence of more pressing concerns elsewhere in the world.
  Today, we are remembering the Holocaust while again evading taking 
the necessary steps to end the genocide in the Darfur region of the 
Sudan. Hundreds of thousands of people have been killed and millions 
displaced from their homes by a bloodthirsty militia backed by the 
Sudanese military and government. Yet we insist that our resources are 
spread too thin, that events elsewhere in the world command our 
attention, and that deciding upon the strict definition of these crimes 
should determine whether we respond forcefully or not. Mr. Speaker, 
shame on us for using the same old excuses.
  Elected officials often speak about spreading freedom, establishing 
democracies, and ensuring minority rights around the world. These are 
noble endeavors indeed, Mr. Speaker. But what about spreading the 
saving of human lives? The sacred Jewish text the Talmud reminds us 
that to save one life is to save the whole world. How many worlds are 
dying every day in Darfur? I am sure that the Holocaust survivors here 
in the Capitol Building today can tell us because they witnessed 
firsthand the cataclysmic annihilation of their families, their 
neighbors, their friends, and their people. Their memories are still 
fresh, their thoughts still lucid, and their commitment to educating 
the world about the Holocaust is more than admirable.
  Sixty years ago, without rhyme or reason, an entire nation of people 
were murdered, wrenched from the Earth by an unholy evil. This 
malevolence persists today in the form of bigotry and intolerance, 
torture and genocide. Every instance that we ignore and every crime 
that we brush off feeds the incipient hatred that compels the 
concentration camp, the slave labor force, the disdain for human life, 
and the ease with which it is taken.
  Mr. Speaker, we owe it to those whose names have since been lost to 
refuse to condemn the genocide in Darfur with only our words. We have 
come too far in 60 years to slide back again. If we have learned 
anything from the Holocaust it is that it must not be allowed to happen 
again. Today is Holocaust Commemoration Day, but it is not enough for 
us to simply remember. We must also never forget.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in order to honor the 
millions who lost their lives during the Holocaust as we observe Yom 
Hashoah, Holocaust Martyrs and Heroes Remembrance Day.
  Each year, I am confronted with so many emotions as we commemorate 
this day. It brings great pain to my heart as we remember the victims 
of one of history's darkest and most murderous eras. To try and grasp 
the significance of the death toll that resulted from the Holocaust is 
both a saddening and frustrating exercise. Six million Jews not only 
lost their lives, but were murdered on the basis of nonsensical, 
inhumane reasoning--reasoning that dictated action through hate on the 
basis of religious discrimination. The end result, sadly though, was 
much worse than what is our conventional idea of religious 
discrimination. The end result in this tragic situation was genocide.
  And though my heart weighs heavily as I reflect on the injustices 
suffered and the lives lost, there is a part of me that sees an 
opportunity to celebrate human resilience as we commemorate this somber 
day. In the face of some of the most intense hatred and inhumanity that 
this world has ever seen, it gives me great hope to think of the many 
who seized upon the greatest power that any individual human-being can 
posses, and in fact, a power that each and everyone of us posses. That 
power is the power to choose.
  And in the face of oppression, persecution and destruction, there 
were so many who chose to resist, whether it was through physical 
action, words written and spoken, or in spirit. Some of these people 
were heroes whose names we celebrate, some were heroes only to those 
who knew them and some were simply heroes in and of themselves.
  To these people we owe a debt of gratitude and respect. Now, more 
than ever, as the world continues to wrestle with violence spawned by 
religious and cultural intolerance, we cannot forget or underestimate 
our own power to choose to act out against this type of hatred and 
oppression. Let us never forget that silence and inaction provide 
fertile breeding ground for grave injustices. We all have a moral 
obligation to choose to act.

[[Page H3039]]

  Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in observance of 
Holocaust Remembrance Day, to honor the memory of the six million Jews 
who died in the Nazi concentration camps during World War II.
  As the dedication in the United States Holocaust Museum's Hall of 
Remembrance so thoughtfully observes:

     . . . guard yourself and guard your soul carefully, lest you 
     forget the things your eyes saw, and lest these things depart 
     your heart all the days of your life, and you shall make them 
     known to your children, and to your children's children.

  Sixty years ago, in 1945, World War II ended and Allied soldiers 
liberated the survivors of the Nazi concentration camps. Through the 
survivor's stories and other documented evidence, the full extent of 
the atrocities committed by the Nazi soldiers became known and we 
learned of the bottomless depths of mankind's capacity for cruelty.
  Observing Holocaust Remembrance Day is vitally important. As time 
passes, our tendency is to disbelieve that people could be so monstrous 
as to commit such horrific deeds. That is why we have to remain 
vigilant, to remember what happened so that we can guard against it 
ever happening again.
  Mr. Speaker, thank you for this opportunity to honor the memory of 
those who were killed in the Holocaust, and the courage of those who 
survived.
  Mr. CANTOR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today, on Yom Hashoah, Holocaust 
Memorial Day, to honor the memory of the victims who perished in World 
War II during the Holocaust.
  This year marks the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Europe from 
the evil hands of the murderer Adolf Hitler. Hitler's shadow caused 
darkness to fall upon the earth.He slew the innocent and pure, men and 
women and children, with vapors of poison, and he burned them with 
fire. When the light of freedom shined again, tens of millions were 
dead, cities and nations were in ruin, and a world stood awestruck at 
the horrors that had occurred.
  Justice Robert Jackson, a justice on the International Military 
Tribunal at Nuremberg in 1945, said:

       The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so 
     calculated, so malignant and so devastating that civilization 
     cannot tolerate their being ignored, because it cannot 
     survive their being repeated.

  We in the United States, the birthplace of Thomas Jefferson and 
Martin Luther King, enjoy a great deal of freedom. We must not take 
these freedoms for granted. We must not forget that genocide and human 
rights abuses have occurred and continue to occur around the world. We 
must not remain silent. We must dedicate ourselves to continuing to 
educate people around the globe about the horrors of the Holocaust. We 
must be forever mindful of the danger of such intolerance and ensure 
that it never happens again.
  Let us stand here today and affirm our obligation to civilization 
that we will never forget. 
  Mr. CRENSHAW. Mr. Speaker, I rise to lend my voice to the cause of 
remembrance. Today is Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day. This is a 
day aside on the Jewish calendar to remember the murdered Six Million 
of the Holocaust and to remind us all what can happen when bigotry, 
hatred, and indifference are allowed to permeate a society.
  It has been 60 years since the end of the Holocaust. We mark this 
passing of time because while the Holocaust serves as a vivid reminder 
of the worst mankind has to offer, we must remain vigilant so that all 
might learn its lessons.
  Its horror demands that we fight tyranny.
  Its victims show us the dangers of ignorance.
  Its lesson is that we must never embrace indifference if we are to 
advance in peace.
  Yom HaShoah is the occasion to pay tribute to the lives lost and a 
time to rededicate ourselves to work together toward greater 
understanding so that this unspeakable horror never visits our 
societies again.
  Mr. Speaker, I have been to Jerusalem. I have been to Yad Vashem and 
the Western Wall. The emotional power of these places moved me to a 
greater belief in two things that the power of faith is unbreakable and 
that hard work and patience can achieve the goals of peace. Let us 
today allow Yom HaShoah to remind us of both faith and peace.
  Mr. ROSS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to acknowledge the Holocaust 
Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, known in Hebrew as Yom Hashoah. 
May 5th marks the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, and this 
year is especially important as the world marks the 60th anniversary of 
the end of World War II.
  From 1938--1945, 6 million Jewish people, young and old alike, were 
systematically murdered as a result of ignorance and hatred. Nazi 
Germany also targeted gypsies, the handicapped, Political dissidents, 
and others because they were different.
  In Jewish communities around the world, there is a simple saying in 
regards to the Holocaust, ``Never Forget.'' Let us never forget the 
atrocities committed against a people based on nothing more than their 
religious beliefs. Let us never forget the 6 million mothers and 
fathers, sons and daughters, sisters and brothers, grandfathers and 
grandmothers who were systematically murdered just 6 decades ago.
  I join my colleagues in remembering wonderfully vibrant communities 
that were senselessly destroyed across Europe. I would also like to pay 
tribute to the thousands of Holocaust Survivors in the United States 
and around the world who continue to educate us on the atrocities of 
the Holocaust.
  I implore all of us to take this Remembrance Day one step further and 
stand up against anti-Semitism, intolerance, ignorance, and 
discrimination in our nation and around the world today.
  Let us never forget.
  Mr. JEFFERSON. Mr. Speaker, today, Thursday, May 5, 2005, the people 
of the world memorialize Yom HaShoah--a special day of remembrance 
honoring the martyrs and heroes of the Holocaust. Holocaust Remembrance 
Day is a day that has been set aside to remember the victims of the 
Holocaust and to remind each of us what can happen when bigotry and 
hatred are not confronted.
  Mr. Speaker, I am humbled as I rise today with my colleagues to honor 
the memories and the lives of the more than 6 million victims of Nazi 
hatred and aggression during the pogrom known to us as the Holocaust. I 
am also humbled to stand in this cathedral of freedom and honor the 
lives of the many heroes who fought so bravely against unimaginable 
odds to defeat a genocidal madman.
  More than 60 years ago, Adolf Hitler and his Nazi regime set out to 
eradicate European Jewry. So committed were they to the accomplishment 
of this goal, their so-called ``Final Solution,'' that even in the 
waning days of World War II, when defeat was imminent, the Germans 
continued even more urgently rounding up Jews all over Europe and 
sending them to their deaths.
  Mr. Speaker, driven by a radical and uncompromising anti-Semitic 
ideology, the Nazis redoubled their efforts to reach every last Jew 
before the war ended. They were in a rush; time was running out. 
Depleting sorely-needed resources from the war effort, German forces 
swept across Europe, assembling and annihilating community after 
community, individual after individual, from their homes, ghettos and 
hiding places.
  Mr. Speaker, during the last year of the war in Europe, German defeat 
was all but accomplished, and yet their hatred and bigotry survived and 
thrived. Consequently, the Nazis murdered more than 700,000 Jews in 
that last full year of the war, including most of the Jews of the last 
large community in Europe, Hungary. There, in one of the most efficient 
deportation and murder operations of the Holocaust, the Nazi and 
Hungarian regimes deported 437,000 Jews to Auschwitz-Birkenau in just 
eight weeks and killed tens of thousands more later that year.
  Six decades have passed since Allied troops liberated the labor and 
death camps, and yet the memory of the horrors perpetrated against the 
Jewish people is seared into the collective conscious of the world. 
However, Mr. Speaker, sadly, we cannot undo history, and we cannot 
reverse the atrocities carried out by a barbarous German regime.
  What remains for us is to honor and preserve the memories and lives 
of both the victims and the survivors of the Holocaust. Out of the 
great tragedy of the Holocaust emerges a tremendous object lesson for 
humanity: hatred and bigotry can never be taken for granted or left 
unchecked. We must never forget.
  Mr. Speaker, memory is critical--our own and that of the victims of 
unprecedented evil and suffering. The Holocaust is a horror we must 
remember, but not only because of the dead; it is too late for them. 
Not only because of the survivors; it may even be too late for them. 
Preserving memory is a solemn responsibility, aimed at saving men and 
women from apathy toward evil, if not from evil itself. We must never 
forget.
  Mr. Speaker, sixty years ago, much of the world overlooked the deadly 
plight of an entire people until it was almost too late. We have a 
sacred obligation--in order to truly keep faith with the principles 
upon which our great nation was founded--to remain vigilant, to 
remember the horrors of the past, to learn from them, and to protect 
against them for all eternity. We must never forget.
  Mr. Speaker, Nobel laureate and Holocaust survivor, Elie Wiesel, 
perhaps summed it up best when he said, ``to remain silent and 
indifferent is the greatest sin of all.'' As Americans, we must heed 
his call and embrace his challenge. We must never forget.
  Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition of Holocaust 
Remembrance Day. On this Yom Ha'Shoah, we honor those whose lives were 
lost in the atrocities of one of the darkest periods in human history.
  We pay tribute to all who lost their lives during World War II and 
reflect on the loss of more than six million Jewish lives. We honor

[[Page H3040]]

the heroes who perished in the one of the most valiant battles for 
liberty and justice the world has ever known.
  The most fitting tribute that we can offer to the countless heroes 
who suffered under the Nazi regime is to work to ensure that they did 
not suffer in vain. As we reflect on the unfathomable loss suffered 
during the Holocaust it is also important that we vow to build a more 
peaceful world. Today, more than fifty years later, we must teach our 
children about the horrific events that transformed the world so that 
the mistakes of the past are never repeated. It is important that we 
fight ignorance on a daily basis through a dedication to learning about 
the origins and realities of the Holocaust.
  With examples of malice and terror everpresent in today's society, we 
are reminded of the strength and courage of the Jewish people. Their 
dedication to begin anew in the aftermath of the Holocaust serves as an 
example of steadfast determination. Through their example, we learn how 
the human spirit can triumph over the hollowness of vengeance and 
anger. On this day we celebrate that spirit.
  Mr. Speaker, I am proud to join the commemoration of Yom Ha'Shoah and 
I hope that all Americans will join me.
  Ms. LINDA T. SANCHEZ of California. Mr. Speaker, communities will 
gather in the United States, Israel, and around the world today to 
observe Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, known in Hebrew 
as Yom Hashoah. This solemn day commemorates the anniversary of the 
beginning of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. This year, the day comes as 
the world marks the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II.


 =========================== NOTE =========================== 

  
  May 5, 2005--On Page H 3040 the following appeared: Ms. LINDA T. 
SANCHEZ. Mr. Speaker,.
  
  The online version should be corrected to read: Ms. LINDA T. 
SANCHEZ of California. Mr. Speaker,.


 ========================= END NOTE ========================= 

  In order to prevent the unspeakable horrors of the Holocaust from 
ever being repeated, we all have a responsibility to educate younger 
generations. We must take time to remember the atrocities suffered by 
countless Jews during' the World War II era. The martyrs gave their 
lives for their beliefs, protected their own people, and stood up for 
their most sacred principles. The heroes did everything in their power 
to stop the spread of evil across the globe. It is the stories of these 
martyrs and heroes that need to be repeated, so that young people can 
better understand this dark period in history.
  One resource to help us teach the next generation is the United 
States Holocaust Memorial Museum. I recommend a trip to this landmark 
whenever someone from my district is visiting Washington, D.C. There is 
so much worth to what this museum has documented for the world to see. 
The documents, photographs, and films offer an appropriate way of 
remembering such a serious subject matter.
  Despite the lessons of the Holocaust, discrimination, persecution, 
and even genocide still persist around the world. Today, it is 
imperative to renew our commitment to fighting injustice in all its 
forms. In doing so, we recognize the sacrifices and suffering of the 
Holocaust. Let us all work to educate the next generation, so that they 
never forget the martyrs and heroes who fought to protect their Jewish 
traditions, and never gave up in the face of evil.
  Mr. ACKERMAN. Mr. Speaker, today is Yom Ha-Shoah, Holocaust Memorial 
Day, and I rise to honor the memory of the 6 million Jewish souls 
extinguished in the greatest act of organized depravity in history.
  There have been many barbaric regimes and there have been many other 
vicious campaigns of annihilation undertaken both before and after the 
Holocaust. Some even produced more victims. The Shoah, however, is 
unique and is thus deserving of special attention, not because the 
victims were Jews--many millions of innocent non-Jews were murdered by 
the Nazis--but because the Holocaust revealed a painful and abiding 
truth about humanity that remains with us. In squalor of the camps, in 
the ashes of the crematoria, and in the fires of the ovens, it was 
demonstrated that the norms of civilization, the boundaries of 
morality, and the protections of society and government are no more 
protection than a fragile tissue of behavior, one torn aside with 
shocking ease to reveal the latent bestiality in human beings.
  The imperative of Holocaust for us today, as legislators and 
participants in American government is the same for all Americans and, 
in truth, all humanity. That imperative is to remember. There are many 
reasons why: To remember all those people murdered for the crime of 
their birth and rededicate ourselves to preventing such a crime from 
being repeated. To remember that bigotry and ignorance can metastasize 
in politics with horrific consequences. To remember that whole 
communities can be wiped out with the power of the modern state and to 
recommit ourselves to the protection of the weak and powerless. To 
remember all those men and women and children who were cremated and 
dumped into mass graves, not just to end their lives, but to deny their 
very existence.
  But most of all we must remember because it can happen again.
  It is happening again. It is happening in Sudan. Right now. Today. 
Some 400,000 Sudanese have already been killed and, if today is a 
typical day, 500 more will join them as the world wrings its hands and 
wonders what to do. This lassitude, this fecklessness, this disgraceful 
toleration of genocide is nothing new either. We saw it when there was 
slaughter in Southeast Europe. And we saw it as a genocide was 
perpetrated with machetes in Rwanda. And even before the Holocaust, it 
happened to the Armenians and today we debate whether it ever happened 
at all.
  We must remember the Holocaust because genocide is real. It is not 
history, it is reality.
  Today, genocide is a reality in Sudan. Tomorrow, when Iran acquires 
nuclear weapons, will we see the mullahs attempt to finish Hitler's 
barbaric work? Impossible? Incomprehensible? Sophisticated people will 
ask, ``Who would harness the power of a modern state to the absurd goal 
of killing Jews? Who would risk their state over it?''
  We must remember. A world that doesn't keep Auschwitz fixed in its 
mind will see it rebuilt. We must remember.
  Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate Yom 
Hashoah, Holocaust Martyrs and Heroes Remembrance Day, and to remember 
the 6 million Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust.
  Sixty years ago, as American, British, and Soviet soldiers moved 
across Europe in a series of offensives on Germany, they encountered 
and liberated concentration camp prisoners. Advancing from the west, 
U.S. divisions freed the major concentration camps of Dora-Mittelbau, 
Buchenwald, Flossenbuirg, and Dachau in Germany, and Mauthausen in 
Austria.
  In northern Germany, British forces liberated Bergen-Belsen and 
Neuengamme.
  In the east, Soviet divisions liberated Auschwitz in Poland in 
January 1945. Just a few weeks before the German surrender in early May 
1945, they liberated the Stutthof, Sachsenhausen, and Ravensbruck 
concentration camps inside Germany.
  In liberating the Nazi camps, the Anglo-American and Soviet soldiers 
exposed to the world the horror of Nazi atrocities.
  Today, we must rededicate ourselves to fighting intolerance, racism 
and apathy so that future generations do not experience the suffering, 
terror and ultimate death endured by the victims of the Holocaust.
  Remembrance Day serves as a reminder that we must never forget the 
appalling tragedy of the Holocaust, and the six million Jews who lost 
their lives.
  Unfortunately, the struggle against anti-Semitism continues today, as 
recent reports indicate an increase in violence against the Jewish 
community around the world. Last year alone there were reports of anti-
Semitic desecration and vandalism of about 40 schools, 140 statues and 
cemeteries, 60 synagogues and 60 businesses around the world. The 
number of anti-Semitic incidents in the United States also rose by 17 
percent in 2004.
  Sixty years after the end of the Holocaust, it is important that we 
strengthen our fight against anti-Semitism and religious intolerance.
  It has been said that those who cannot remember the past are 
condemned to repeat it. Yom Hashoah reminds each of us where racism, 
bigotry and religious intolerance can lead, so that something as 
horrific as the Holocaust is never repeated.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to bear witness to the 
millions who perished in the Holocaust.
  From 1933 to 1945, a dark cloud descended on Europe and death rolled 
like thunder across the Continent. Six million Jews died unspeakable 
deaths at the hands of the Nazis. Thousands of homosexuals, political 
dissidents, blacks and gypsies were corralled into concentration camps, 
tortured, and killed. Righteous Germans gave their lives to protect 
their neighbors, and millions of civilians succumbed as bombs fell like 
rain during air raids.
  Mr. Speaker, we hear the screech of sirens piercing the night, and we 
say ``Never Again.''
  We see shattered glass littering the streets and we say ``Never 
Again.''
  We feel bodies pressed against each other in cattle cars--no room to 
move, no air to breathe--and we say ``Never Again.''
  We hear the hiss of gas pouring from shower spigots and see 
fingernails scratching at concrete walls, and we say ``Never Again.''
  We remember the curl of smoke reaching toward a white winter sky and 
ashes drifting down amidst snowflakes. Never Again.

[[Page H3041]]

  Mr. Speaker, in the 60 years since the liberation of Auschwitz, 
Holocaust survivors across the world have borne witness to the 
atrocities of the Shoah. They have taught us about the dangers of 
prejudice and ignorance.
  They have shown us by their shining example the power of strength, 
education and activism. I rise today to thank these survivors for all 
they have taught us, and to express my sympathy for the loved ones they 
lost long ago.
  But, Mr. Speaker, I also rise today because, somewhere in Darfur, 
Sudan the electricity has gone out in a small town, signaling that an 
attack is imminent. Soon, a village will be burned to the ground with 
only scorched earth to testify to the lives once lived there. When the 
sun sets on this day, 500 more innocent Sudanese will have died at the 
hands of Janjaweed killers, bringing the death toll to over 400,000.
  Meanwhile, the rainy season is fast approaching in Sudan. In the 
coming weeks, it will become even harder for aid workers to reach those 
most desperately in need. Three million Sudanese have already been 
displaced, and children are dying in refugee camps from illness and 
malnutrition.
  Mr. Speaker, innocent people are being killed because of their 
ethnicity, and I ask, ``Never again?''
  Children are starving in relocation camps, and I ask, ``Never 
again?''
  Homes are being burned, women raped, and men mutilated. Is this what 
we call Never Again?
  Voices rise from the ashes at Auschwitz, the killing fields in 
Cambodia and the hills of Rwanda, begging us to intervene. It is time 
we answer their cries, not with words, but with action. It is time to 
pass the Darfur Genocide Accountability Act, H.R. 1424. We must 
increase our aid to refugee camps, halt the spread of disease, and 
provide food where there is famine.
  Towards the end of her life, Anne Frank wrote, ``I feel the suffering 
of millions. And yet, when I look up at the sky, I somehow feel that 
everything will change for the better, that this cruelty too shall end, 
that peace and tranquility will return once more.''
  Mr. Speaker, today, on this Day of Remembrance, let us make Anne 
Frank's vision our own, and ensure that this cruelty too will end.
  Mr. UDALL of Colorado. Mr. Speaker, today is Holocaust Martyrs' and 
Heroes' Remembrance Day, known in Hebrew as Yom Hashoah.
  This is an appropriate date for this purpose because it is the 
anniversary of the beginning of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. But in 
reality, Americans and all other civilized people should consider every 
day a Holocaust Remembrance Day because forgetting the evils of the 
past can too easily be the prelude to their recurrence.
  And never was this truer than this year, as we mark the 60th 
anniversary of the final days of the Second World War when Allied 
soldiers moving across Europe encountered and liberated concentration 
camp prisoners.
  Advancing from the west, U.S. divisions freed the prisoners in the 
Dora-Mittelbau, Buchenwald, Flossenburg, and Dachau concentration camps 
in Germany and the Mauthausen camp in Austria. In northern Germany, 
British forces liberated Bergen-Belsen and Neuengamme. And Soviet 
troops, after liberating Auschwitz in Poland in January 1945, in May, 
1945 liberated the Stutthof, Sachsenhausen, and Ravensbruck 
concentration camps inside Germany.
  We now understand that many people in Allied countries had known, in 
greater or lesser detail, about what had occurred in the camps. But it 
was these Allied soldiers who fully exposed the full horror of Nazi 
atrocities--and the combat-hardened soldiers were unprepared for what 
they found.
  There were stacks of dead bodies, and barracks filled with dead and 
dying prisoners, while the stench of death was everywhere. And the 
camps still housed thousands of emaciated and diseased prisoners who 
resembled skeletons because of forced labor and lack of food. Many were 
so weak that they could hardly move. Disease remained an ever present 
danger and the liberators had to burn down many of the camps to prevent 
the spread of epidemics.
  General Dwight D. Eisenhower made a deliberate visit to the Ohrdruf 
camp in order to witness personally the evidence of atrocities that 
``beggar description.'' Publicly expressing shock and revulsion, he 
urged others to see the camps first-hand, lest ``the stories of Nazi 
brutality'' be forgotten or dismissed as merely ``propaganda.''
  In the years that have followed, our memories of these atrocities 
have sometimes dimmed. But they have been refreshed by new histories or 
exhibits such as those in the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum here in 
Washington, while new barbarities in other parts of the world have 
reawakened some of the horror that was felt by Eisenhower and the other 
liberators of Europe.
  And the sights and sounds of the liberated camps, so fresh in 1945, 
helped shape the laws and institutions that arose from the ashes of 
war.
  Military tribunals prosecuted captured Nazi officials under a variety 
of charges, many of which paralleled what were later defined as 
``crimes against humanity.'' The best-known of these prosecutions, of 
course, were those in Nuremberg, Germany, between November 1945 and 
August 1946 under the auspices of the International Military Tribunal 
(IMT). Prosecutors and judges from the 4 occupying powers tried some of 
the leading officials of the Nazi regime on four counts, including a 
newly defined count of ``crimes against humanity,'' in which 
significant evidence relating to the Nazi effort to murder the European 
Jews was introduced. Several prominent Nazis were sentenced to death, 
others received prison sentences, and a few were acquitted.
  The Nuremberg trials, and others that followed, have had a major 
impact on international law over the last 60 years. The International 
Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, the Special 
Court for Sierra Leone, and the recently created International Criminal 
Court are all part of the legacy of Nuremberg and of ongoing efforts of 
the world community to prevent and punish the crime of genocide.
  Today, on this Day of Remembrance, we should all look back to the 
horrors of the Holocaust. But we must also look at the world around us 
and ahead to what is to come.
  If there had been any doubt, the 2001 terror attacks on New York and 
Washington, like the killing fields in Cambodia and so many other 
terrible events, made it clear that we have not reached the end of 
history--or the end of violence driven by fanaticism. As we struggle to 
respond to the challenges of our time, we must remember the need for 
eternal vigilance against those who are prepared to sacrifice others in 
the name of what they perceive as some transcendent cause.
  Our fate, and the fate of humanity, depends on our remembering and 
our understanding.
  Mr. OWENS. Mr. Speaker, that 6 million innocent souls should not die 
in vain is the noble purpose of Yom Hashoah, the Holocaust Martyrs' and 
Heroes' Remembrance Day. This is a day to remember the horror and 
solemnly swear that we will never let it happen again. This is a day to 
celebrate the resistance of the heroes of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. 
We must remember the horror and we must remember to resist. A civilized 
nation with the most deadly war machine in history, descended to a 
level below any known beasts. A clear lesson to our civilization is 
still relevant: Decent citizens should never stand by passively and 
allow such atrocities to take place. And vigilant citizens should 
actively resist any erosion of their rights by a powerful few. 
Unfortunately, Rwanda and Darfur are present day examples of our 
failure to take the profound lesson of Nazi tyranny seriously. At the 
same time, submission to the U.S. government actions which arrest large 
groupings such as the Pakistanis without due process; and acquiescence 
to an administration which launches a massive and expensive war based 
on lies; these positions demonstrate a deep-seated failure to 
understand the need to resist immoral and dangerous government acts.
  There is a need for our generation to make greater sacrifices and 
take greater risks if we truly want to honor the six million souls 
annihilated by the Nazi monsters.
  Mr. TOWNS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate Yom Hashoah, 
Holocaust Remembrance Day. I join the Jewish people in the State of 
Israel and across the globe in remembering the 6 million Jews that were 
brutally murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust.
  Today is a time for all of humanity to reflect upon that most horrid 
period of history. The Holocaust demonstrated the mass atrocities that 
a supposedly civilized society could tolerate. We must keep in mind, 
that the Nazi genocide against the Jews was not the action of a lone 
individual. It was a carefully thought out plan which sought the 
support of an entire nation. The Holocaust reflects the worst of 
international relations highlighting a time global politics was plagued 
by inaction and indifference. The complacency of the United States of 
America to the cries of those being slaughtered in Nazi death camps 
will forever tarnish our nation's history. The willingness of the 
Roosevelt administration to turn back 937 Jewish refugees on the St. 
Louis to their subsequent deaths in Europe will also not be forgotten.
  I am privileged to represent a diverse portion of Brooklyn. In my 
district there is a large but dwindling population of Holocaust 
survivors. Many of these survivors rebuilt their lives with nothing 
more than the shirt on their back. Today, based on the strong 
foundations of those Holocaust survivors, the beautiful Jewish 
communities in Brooklyn of Williamsburg, Midwood and Canarsie were 
built. These communities represent the best of Jewish life and have 
been instrumental in resurrecting religious life in the aftermath of 
the Holocaust,

[[Page H3042]]

by creating synagogues, yeshivas, and other religious institutions.
  When I see and hear tragic stories from these heroic individuals it 
provides living testimony to an event that is hard for many today to 
phantom. Educating people especially the young, about the events that 
transpired in Europe over 50 years ago is critical to halting the 
recent spread of anti-Semitism around the world.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to recognize the 
efforts of organizations in my district that have taken extraordinary 
steps in servicing and caring for the Holocaust survivor population: 
The Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty; The United Jewish 
Organizations of Williamsburg; The Council of Jewish Organizations of 
Flatbush; The Jewish Community Council of Canarsie; The Conference of 
Jewish Material Claims Against Germany; Peasch Tikvah and all the 
Bikkur Cholim organizations. Their selfless work for Holocaust 
survivors continues to serve as an inspiration to me and I am honored 
to recognize their hard work.
  Mr. Speaker, I join my colleagues here today in remembering the 
Holocaust. Because there are still Holocaust non-believers today it is 
imperative that we never forget and continue to learn from this 
terrible chapter in history.
  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. Speaker, today, I join my friends and colleagues 
around the world in commemorating the horrors inflicted during the 
Holocaust.
  Today, we bear witness to the millions of Jews and countless other 
innocent people who were brutally murdered in Nazi concentration camps.
  We bear witness to the horrors of genocide that shocked the world, 
and ask ourselves if we have truly upheld the promise of ``never 
again,'' when we hear the echoes of the Holocaust in the rising threat 
of anti-Semitism today.
  We bear witness to the millions of people who were persecuted and 
enslaved for their political or religious beliefs, or their mental 
handicaps in the name of social cleansing.
  But we also remember amazing acts of courage and kindness, when those 
with everything to lose risked their lives and freedom to help those 
most in need, and the bravery of those who would not go willingly to a 
certain death.
  There is a reason why we call this day not an anniversary, but a 
remembrance. Every day, but especially today, we must remember not only 
the horrible acts committed by the Nazis but also the actions, and the 
lack of action, that led to those horrors.
  In remembering, we honor those who suffered--but our memories must 
also serve as a constant reminder of the vigilance required from each 
of us to prevent it from happening again, or to take action if we see 
it happening.
  Never again should the innocent be left to languish. For those who 
perished, for those who survived, for those who fought and for those 
who liberated, we must not falter and we must not fail. We must learn 
from history so that we are not doomed to repeat it.
  We must bear witness.
  Mrs. MALONEY. Mr. Speaker I rise to join people around the world who 
are commemorating Holocaust Remembrance Day, Yom Ha-Shoah, and mourning 
the six million people who were murdered simply because they happened 
to be Jewish. It is important that we take time each year to remind 
ourselves of the devastating horror of a world in which insanity ruled 
and it was possible for the Nazis to try to eradicate an entire people 
from the face of the Earth.
  The horror of the Holocaust comes not merely from the fact that 
massive numbers of people were murdered--in truth the total civilian 
body count in World War II was enormous, including roughly 20 million 
Russians and 10 million Chinese. There have been other conflicts in 
which vast numbers of civilians have died. The true horror of the 
Holocaust is that a modern nation used organized, efficient, 
systematic, scientific methods to try to wipe out a minority 
population. What compounds the horror is that the Nazis brought their 
peculiar brand of death with them as they swept through Europe and 
rounded up Jews in occupied countries. We must not forget that the 
world watched silently and allowed the Holocaust to happen.
  The Nazis could never have been as effective at targeting Jews if it 
were not for the collaboration of local populations. Tens of thousands 
of people assisted the Nazis in identifying Jews and herding them to 
the concentration camps and gas chambers. The Nazis succeeded in large 
part because hatred of Jews was already well entrenched throughout the 
countries they conquered.
  There were always people of good heart who were willing to risk their 
lives to save Jews. Their bravery and selflessness must also be 
remembered on this Holocaust Remembrance Day. Jews were hidden in 
basements and attics. Jewish children were taken into friendly homes or 
transported to safety elsewhere. Diplomats issued visas, sometimes in 
violation of their country's policies. Most famous among them is Raoul 
Wallenberg who saved 100,000 Hungarian Jews. Few nations protected 
their Jewish populations as effectively as Denmark. The Danes saved 
virtually all of their Jewish population first by refusing to join the 
Nazis in singling out the Jewish minority and later by uniting to 
smuggle them to safety in Sweden.
  One of the principal reasons we remember the Holocaust is to ensure 
that it never happens again. Anti-Semitism is an old hatred, and every 
generation seems to have a new version. Television and the internet 
provide new avenues for spreading hatred. Recently, Middle Eastern 
citizens' nations such as Egypt have been able to watch ``Horsemen 
Without A Horse,'' a television serialization of the vicious czarist 
hoax Protocols of the Elders of Zion.
  Attacks on Jews and Jewish targets around the world are rising. The 
U.S. Department of State recently released a report on anti-Semitism 
around the world that found: ``Beginning in 2000, verbal attacks 
directed against Jews increased while incidents of vandalism (e.g. 
graffiti, fire bombings of Jewish schools, desecration of synagogues 
and cemeteries) surged. Physical assaults including beatings, stabbings 
and other violence against Jews in Europe increased markedly, in a 
number of cases resulting in serious injury and even death . . . 
Holocaust denial and Holocaust minimization efforts find increasingly 
overt acceptance as sanctioned historical discourse in a number of 
Middle Eastern countries.''
  Mr. Speaker, the Holocaust could not have occurred without the 
complicity of governments and individuals who tolerated stark hatred of 
Jews. I am hopeful that by reminding ourselves of the horrors of that 
time, we will remain vigilant about preventing a recurrence of the 
widespread anti-Semitism that helped the Nazis rise to power.
  Mrs. McCARTHY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate Yom Hashoah, 
Holocaust Martyr and Heroes Remembrance Day. I join the people of 
Israel and those around the world to memorialize the 6 million Jews who 
were murdered by the Nazis during World War II. The world is still 
feeling the Holocaust's effects.
  In 1933, there were over 9 million European Jews. By 1945, nearly two 
of every three had been killed as part of the Nazis' Final Solution. 
European cities have never recovered the diversity and way of life they 
had prior to the war. The Jewish people killed were teachers, lawyers, 
doctors, musicians, parents, and children, and were killed only because 
they were Jewish and targeted for no other reason.
  We must also remember the others who were murdered. Gypsies, the 
handicapped, and Poles were also targeted for destruction or decimation 
for racial, ethnic, or national reasons. Millions more, including 
homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, Soviet prisoners of war, and 
political dissidents, also suffered grievous oppression and death under 
Nazi tyranny for no specific reason except they were different than 
their captors.
  As time moves forward, there are few Holocaust survivors still with 
us and it is important for them to share their stories and educate 
people about their experiences. Nearly 60 years have passed since the 
Holocaust but anti-Semitism still exists. However, I believe passing on 
the lessons learned from this horrible time from generation to 
generation will someday destroy the hateful attitudes and ignorance 
that resulted in the evil of the Holocaust.
  The Holocaust was not an accident. It was a planned attempted 
extermination. Individuals, organizations and governments made choices 
that not only legalized discrimination but also allowed prejudice, 
hatred, and ultimately, mass murder to occur. The human race must 
constantly be reminded of the Holocaust and how the world stood idly by 
for too long. We must remember these painful events in order to prevent 
another Holocaust from ever occurring again.
  We will never forget.

                          ____________________