International Holocaust Remembrance Day - History, Theme, Celebration this year
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| Holocaust Remembrance Day 2021 |
International Holocaust Remembrance Day 2021 is on Wednesday, January 27, 2021
International Holocaust Remembrance Day is celebrated every year on 27th January since 2006 after the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution for the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust on the 60th anniversary of the release of Jews from the Nazi concentration and death camp Auschwitz -Birkenau in Poland, who had been arrested and tortured during the 1930s and 1940s till 1945 when the Soviet Union invaded Germany and dismantled Concentration and Death Camps.
History of International Holocaust Remembrance Day
The Holocaust is also called Shoah (Shoa) which refers to the organized ethnic cleansing of Jews in Germany and Poland. Adolf Hitler assumed power in Germany on January 30, 1933, and thus started the persecution of Jews.
They were arrested under different charges like disability, homosexuality, and politico-religious disagreement with the German regime, Soviet association, and Polish ethnicity. In fact, they all were Jews and the German regime used different tactics to arrest and hold them into places more horrible than prisons called Concentration Camps. Many concentration camps were created with names like Auschwitz-Birkenau, Belzec, Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald, Chelmno, Dachau, Ebensee, and Flossenbürg. Auschwitz-Birkenau was assumed as the most horrible camp of all. Reports reveal that more than a million Jews succumbed to death in this camp before the Soviets dismantled it on January 27, 1945, in German-occupied Poland. The UN also associated the date of the day to the dismantling of Auschwitz-Birkenau
Approximately 6 million Jews were consumed by the Holocaust. German Nazi Chancellor Adolf Hitler was defeated by the Soviets in 1945 and he committed suicide on April 30, 1945, in his underground bunker after learning about the death of Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini who was killed by Firing Squad on April 28, 1945. Nazi Germany was captured by the Allied Forces and the United Nations Organization was formed on October 24, 1945, to decrease the anarchy which was penetrating the international structure. The world leaders showed intentions to reach a world order where no one would be punished or persecuted on the basis of his/her ethnicity, sexual association, political ideology, or religion.
The 60th anniversary of the liberation of the concentration camps was commemorated by the UN on January 24, 2005. The happening of the Holocaust was also denied before this year because people used to think that to remember such painful experiences by a community would increase the pain of the victims and their descendants. The UN General Assembly rejected such denials and suggested that we should commemorate the incident so the coming generations can learn the consequences of supporting an extremist person or group of people to reach power. The UNGA adopted a resolution on November 1, 2005, which would encourage people to commemorate the victims of the Holocaust and learn what shameful acts their ascendants were experiencing during the Great Wars especially WW-II. The first International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust was celebrated on January 27, 2006, under the resolution adopted by the UNGA.
Theme of International Holocaust Remembrance Day 2021
“Facing the Aftermath: Recovery and Reconstitution after the Holocaust”
is the Theme of International Holocaust Remembrance Day for the current year 2021. This Theme of 2021 foreshadows the fact that the whole world together may work to erase the painful stains of the holocaust so that the survivors of that era may be encouraged to be optimistic and may not live in the memory of disastrous past which is though difficult to forget but the theme may fulfill the purpose and to show that the what has been done must be repeated neither in society nor in the minds.
The victims of the holocaust who lost their lives, but the people remaining behind, into the radical phase not to engage in the revengeful bloody wars but to establish a system of social justice and equality where humanity may flourish. It also urges to remind that the victims faced the actual era of the holocaust but we as survivors have to face the consequences of the reality before us. We must be unitedly resistant towards inequality and brutality in such a way that it should be observed that the world really acknowledged the victims and the painful wound of the holocaust is not healing.
The day is to promise that real recovery is only when liberty, tolerance and happiness prevail and a system will be reconstituted with much space and broadmindedness.
Celebrations of International Holocaust Remembrance Day in the UNO
Calendar of Events for Holocaust Remembrance 2021
The official page of The United Nations Organization (UNO) reveals the calendar of events for Holocaust Remembrance for the current year 2021. According to this calendar, a series of events will take place,
1.Thursday, 21 January 2021,
Panel Discussion on Women and Genocide.
2. Wednesday, 27 January 2021,
United Nations Holocaust Memorial Ceremony
United Nations Holocaust Memorial Ceremony will be held in the General Assembly Hall of the United Nations Organization on January 27, 2021, from 1200 hours to 1300 hours with the Panel Discussion “Holocaust Denial and Distortion”
The Holocaust Remembrance Day is a milestone in the history of both the Holocaust survivors as well as the United Nations Organization (UNO) itself as both have completed the journey of three quarters since the Great War ended, the concentration and death camps dismantled and the UN formed to make the world prosper, peaceful, and against the atrocities which were committed during the Great Wars. The United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Global Communications Ms. Melissa Flemingwill host the ceremony. The United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres, the President of the seventy-fourth session of the United Nations General Assembly, the Permanent Representatives of Germany, Israel, Russia, and the United States to the United Nations, Mr. Castro Wesamba
3. Thursday, 28 January 2021,
Panel Discussion on Nazi Rise to Power and the Weimar Constitution
4. Thursday, 4 February 2021
Civil Society Briefing “Childhood after Atrocity Crimes: Hope for Peace, Dignity and Equality”
5. Thursday, 11 February 2021
Film screening discussion “The Windermere Children”
Public Activities Holocaust Remembrance Day
Holocaust Remembrance Day is commemorated with respect for the Holocaust survivors throughout the world whereas the regions like North America, Europe, and Israel mark this as an international day to commemorate the Jewish people who experienced one of the cruelest tortures humanity has ever experienced. Yom e HaShoah, a day to mourn the victims of the Holocaust is celebrated in Israel on this day. Moreover, as mentioned above, the UN has also added this day to its list of International Days which are attributed to different events throughout the year.
Apart from that, public ceremonies are held in schools, NGOs Offices, and some Public offices to commemorate the Holocaust Survivors and to recall what kind of inhumane acts human beings can commit if we allow the people with extremist values and ideologies to assume power.
Public ceremonies are held and the speakers either recall their experiences being victims of the terrible Holocaust or they argue on the ways we can save humanity from another Holocaust.
Symbols
Logo of International Holocaust Remembrance Day
The United Nations has a proper platform to commemorate the survivors of the Holocaust with the title “Holocaust and the United Nations Outreach Programme” which have four elements on a solid black background as the symbols. “Remembrance and Beyond” are the two symbols depicted in white color as two symbols. The globe centered on the North Pole surrounded by two olive branches is projected as the UN symbols.
A piece of barbed wire which ends in the form of two white roses is projected as two other elements. The concentration camps, the loss of Jewish people’s freedom, and the sufferings they experienced along with many other groups are represented by the barbed wires whereas the peace, freedom, and remembrance are represented by the roses. Some scholars also argue that these roses refer to a non-violent resistance movement that was active in Germany from June 1942 till February 1943.
Significance of the Logo
The white rose symbolizes the investigation, remembrance, and prevention of genocide in the United States and the United Kingdom. Rose is a beautiful flower and it has its glamor in almost every society, but it appears in pain when it is colorless (white).
