Simon Wiesenthal Center Analysis
In his speech, The Perils of Indifference, Elie Wiesel suggests that during the years of what was to become World War II, before America finally became involved in the conflict, that the people in power at that time knew about the plight of the Jewish people. “And now we knew, we learned, we discovered that the Pentagon knew, the State Department knew.” (Wiesel, 1999) Wiesel speaks of the deaths of millions of innocent victims at the hands of Adolf Hitler. They were, as Wiesel says earlier in the speech, “bystanders” (Wiesel, 1999) and were doing nothing to intervene.
It is important to know that the word Genocide did not exist in language and was coined in 1944 by a Polish-Jewish lawyer Raphael Lemkin, ancient Greek word genos (race, tribe) and the Latin cide (killing) and was finally recognized by the UN General Assembly as a crime under international law in 1946 (Power). Wiesel presents the historical acts of indifference by the U.S. during World War II, when the president turn a ship full of Jewish refugees away from New York harbor, showing the world leaders that this was a choice between right and wrong, and indifference was the choice that was made. Wiesel does not condemn the U.S. but appeals to the logic in this presentation and then presents the lesson learned in Kosovo, when he says “this time, the world was not silent. This time, we do respond. This time, we intervene” (“Perils of Indifference”).
When most people hear the term “Holocaust”, they immediately think of the millions of victims that were affected by Hitler’s Final Solution. However, they do not consider what happened to the survivors after the war. After the liberation of the Jews and other prisoners, the world turned to reuniting and relocating these victims of the horrors of the Holocaust. Under the guidance of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, America assisted displaced persons of the Holocaust and created the War Refugee Board. The War Refugee Board was responsible for helping many people looking for safety find a nice place where they could settle down after facing the challenges that Hitler’s followers brought upon them..
In the novel, Night, authored by Elie Wiesel, a true story about the oppression of non-aryan cultures by the Germans during The Holocaust is detailed in such an eye-opening read that no future generation will ever forget the events which occurred. The effect this persecution had on each individual victim of this traumatic time period will always be remembered. The trauma inflicted on the Jewish, Czechoslovakians, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, communists, and many more groups, resulted in not only the deaths of over 10 million innocents but also the persecution which occurred unwillingly forced the victims to question their intrinsic beliefs as humans. Out of the total number of victims persecuted by the Germans, only a select few survived.
On April 12th 1999, Elie Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor and Nobel Laureate, delivered a speech that would change the minds of citizens in America for generations to come. As part of the Millennium Lecture Series, Wiesel discussed his horrific experiences in the concentration camp of Auschwitz and turned them into numerous knowledgeable life lessons. The message of the speech, titled Perils of Indifference, portrays citizens around the world should discourage indifference being tolerated, and it is achieved by creating credibility (ethos in beginning ), by using strict logic and reason (logos used in middle), and by discussing the morality on being indifferent to victims of injustice and cruelty (pathos used in end). In the speech Perils of Indifference, Elie
Our memorial represents the five to six million innocent Jewish people that were murdered and degraded as humans. For more than six years, the Jewish population in Germany was racially discriminated and became a target by the Nazi party. From roughly 1939 to 1945 Jews and other ethnic groups were ripped from their homes and families and were put into death and concentration camps. The memorial we created presents a serious and moving mood. We hope to bring out the emotion in the individuals who view our memorial by recognizing all the innocent people who lost their lives during this tragic event.
Elie Wiesel, a Romanian-born Jew who was taken to Auschwitz at age 15, was an advocate for all Jews who had lost their lives during the Holocaust. On April 12, 1999, Wiesel was invited by President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton to speak at the White House as part of the Millennium Lecture series. Wiesel’s speech, titled “Perils of Indifference,” was meant to persuade the American people to not show
Karl A. Schleunes explains the way National Socialism began to rise in Germany during the years that followed World War I. His book was not meant to show how concentration camps functioned or what the Nazis chose to call the “The Final Solution to the Jewish Problem.” Schleunes, instead, wanted to come to grips with the reality of how and why these concentration camps, such as Auschwitz, came to be. He traces the relations of Germans and the Jews living in Germany between the time periods of Germany’s unification in the Second Reich to the Nazi regime that occurred in the Third Reich. Schleunes illustrates this through events and ideas.
This resolution and action on this type of conflict reveals the character of the person. Orders read, “As many Jews, especially rich ones, are to be arrested as can be accommodated in the prison (7).” This order derived from the German government, along with advocate Heinrich Himmler, worshipper of Hitler, Reinhard Heydrich,
Wiesel pinpoints the indifference of humans as the real enemy, causing further suffering and lost to those already in peril. Wiesel commenced the speech with an interesting attention getter: a story about a young Jewish from a small town that was at the end of war liberated from Nazi rule by American soldiers. This young boy was in fact himself. The first-hand experience of cruelty gave him credibility in discussing the dangers of indifference; he was a victim himself.
Elie Wiesel, who was an Auschwitz camp survivor and author, once said “Sometimes we must interfere. When human lives are endangered, when human dignity is in jeopardy, national borders are sensitivities become irrelevant. Whenever men or women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must- at that moment- become the center of the universe.” During the holocaust, human lives were endangered and human dignity was in jeopardy, yet this place, at the time, was not the center of the universe.
Also, known as Shoah, it witnessed the setting up of concentration camps and extermination camps in today’s Germany, Poland, Austria and Yugoslavia, where around 11 million people were killed based on their racial inferiority and many more enslaved and tortured. It was the ‘Final Solution’ to the ‘Jewish Question’( which was a well discussed topic for many years in Europe). Only 10 percent of Polish Jewry and one-third of all European Jews remained by the end of the Nazi regime in 1945. To today’s history students it would be surprising to know that an event as popular as the Holocaust was ignored by historians until the 1960s when the trial of notorious SS killer Eichmann and the publishing of Gerald Reitlinger’s important book The Final Solution’: the attempt to exterminate the Jews of Europe, 1939-45 created a lot of interest among the Western
Author and Holocaust survivor, Elie Wiesel in his speech, “The Perils of Indifference,” claims that indifference is “dangerous.” He supports his claim by first defining indifference and how it has impacted everything around us, then he illustrates his personal experiences. Finally, Wiesel gives us examples on how it has divided us. Wiesel’s purpose is to inform and create awareness in order to prevent the horrific experiences from repeating.
In which millions of Jews were innocently killed and persecuted because of their religion. As a student who is familiar with the years of the holocaust that will forever live in infamy, Wiesel’s memoir has undoubtedly changed my perspective. Throughout the text, I have been emotionally touched by the topics of dehumanization, the young life of Elie Wiesel, and gained a better understanding of the Holocaust. With how dehumanization was portrayed through words, pondering my mind the most.
Though it occurred nearly 75 years ago, the Holocaust’s horrors continue to relate to the global unrest, Anti-Semitism and genocide that still exists today. Adolf Hitler represents all the countries, religious groups and militant leaders that are fighting against the Jewish people and the State of Israel today. One vital lesson we learn from the Shoah’s events is the importance of remembrance, of zachor. In order to continue to grow as a nation, the Jews still standing today must never forget the six million that perished in the Holocaust. Similarly, we must alway remember the Israeli soldiers who died fighting for Israel, for the home of the Jewish people.
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