[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 5]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 6475]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




               COMMEMORATION OF HOLOCAUST REMEMBRANCE DAY

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. CAROLYN B. MALONEY

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                       Wednesday, April 26, 2006

  Mrs. MALONEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in honor of Holocaust Remembrance 
Day, Yom HaShoah, to pay respect to the millions of Jews who perished 
as a result of the Holocaust. Today more than ever, it is important to 
recall the insanity that swept through Europe and allowed ordinary men 
and women to become mass murderers or to permit others to turn a blind 
eye to the killing. We need to remember the six million Jews whose 
lives were cut short because of a concerted effort to annihilate an 
entire people. Their deaths were not the natural result of war and 
deprivation. They were killed intentionally and for no other reason 
than that they were Jews. We should also celebrate the brave 
individuals who sheltered, cared for and protected Jews despite the 
danger to themselves.
  It is shocking to find that a mere 61 years later, Iran's President 
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is openly denying the very existence of the 
Holocaust. President Ahmadinejad stunned the world last December when 
he made a speech declaring that the Nazi's mass murder of Jews during 
World War II was a myth. Foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki affirmed 
that Holocaust denial is now the official Iranian government position. 
``The words of [President] Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on the Holocaust and on 
Israel are not personal opinions, nor isolated statements but they 
express the view of the [Iranian] government,'' Mottaki said.
  In March 2006, at the initiative of Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah 
Ali Khamenei, state-run Isfahan University sponsored a conference to 
`re-examine the scientific evidence for the Holocaust.' More 
conferences are expected, as Iran tries to wrap its insupportable views 
in scholarship. Unfortunately, these Iranian leaders are giving voice 
to a view that is becoming all too common.
  After President Ahmadinejad spoke, the vast majority of world leaders 
immediately condemned his irrational claims. UN Secretary-General Kofi 
Annan urged all UN members to ``combat such denial and to educate their 
populations about the well established historical facts of the 
Holocaust, in which one third of the Jewish people were murdered along 
with countless members of other minorities.'' I believe we need to take 
affirmative steps in the United States to make sure that our young 
people understand the horrors of that evil time. That's why I 
introduced the Simon Wiesenthal Holocaust Education Assistance Act of 
2005, to ensure that programs are developed throughout the country to 
teach young people about the millions who died and the terrible 
repercussions of unfettered hatred. I am pleased that Senator Menendez 
introduced a companion bill in the Senate today.
  As the generations who survived the Holocaust pass away, we need to 
make sure that new generations know the horrors of that terrible time. 
We need to make sure that those who would deny the existence of the 
Holocaust do not have the ability to rewrite history. The pain of those 
who perished at the hands of the Nazis is all too real. We have an 
obligation to remember a time when pure evil swept the globe, millions 
were swallowed up in the gas chambers and the Jewish people were nearly 
wiped out of existence. As Simon Wiesenthal said, ``For your benefit, 
learn from our tragedy. It is not a written law that the next victims 
must be Jews. It can also be other people. We saw it begin in Germany 
with Jews, but people from more than twenty other nations were also 
murdered.''

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