Tell Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez that 1.1 million Jews were murdered at Auschwitz
I wonder what AOC would think if she had actually read the Senate report on human trafficking of immigrant children during the Obama administration?
By H. A. GOODMANThe former concentration camp Auschwitz(photo credit: KACPER PEMPEL / REUTERS)
It’s all fun and games when US Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez marvels at her garbage disposal or opposes Amazon from building a headquarters in her district, but the freshman Democrat’s latest outburst is essentially revisionist history. Aside from the fact president Barack Obama deported more immigrants than any president ever, and the detention facilities that exist today were also utilized under Obama’s administration, it’s important to remember the Holocaust resulted in the murder of 6 million Jews and millions of other innocent human beings. These victims never made a long trek to any concentration camp looking for asylum like today’s immigrants at America’s southern border. Hiding behind semantic naivety under the guise of wanting to help marginalized people, AOC has tried to redefine the meaning of the Holocaust in her attempt at critiquing the Trump administration.Representative Ocasio-Cortez essentially made the most antisemitic and blasphemous comparison between detention facilities and extermination camps like Auschwitz, Dachau, Treblinka and other places where families were shoved into gas chambers, medical experiments were conducted on children and dead bodies were piled higher and higher every day for years. AOC’s defenders make the irrelevant distinction between the phrase “death camps” and “concentration camps” or “labor camps,” blatantly ignoring the fact that human beings perished in camps like Theresienstadt and Dachau through executions, starvation, forced labor, exhaustion or other forms of barbarism.The words “concentration camp” have always meant the Holocaust, industrialized slaughter and genocide, and AOC has used the Holocaust to sensationalize an immigration crisis that Democrats helped create at our southern border. Furthermore, when the Obama administration allowed human traffickers to abduct immigrant children, few Democrats expressed outrage. As described in this January 9, 2016 article titled “Report: Obama Administration Handed Child Migrants Over to Human Traffickers,” by Eric Levitz in New York Magazine, Democrats aren’t absolved of guilt from today’s crisis at the border:“The United States government placed an unknown number of Central American migrant children into the custody of human traffickers after neglecting to run the most basic checks on these so-called ‘caregivers,’ according to a Senate report released on Thursday.”I wonder what AOC would think if she had actually read the Senate report on human trafficking of immigrant children during the Obama administration?ULTIMATELY, THE horrors of the Holocaust have been revised into a bizarre and Orwellian narrative by Democrats, similar to when Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib expressed a “calming feeling” at the belief Palestinians helped create the State of Israel to help Jews after the Holocaust, possibly out of the goodness of their hearts, or perhaps by losing numerous wars to Israel. Combine Tlaib’s quote with Congresswoman Ilan Omar’s tweet stating “Israel has hypnotized the world, may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel,” and anyone can see how Democrats view Israel, and to a larger extent, Jewish Americans who support Israel. What AOC and others in the Democratic Party need to accept is that absolutely nothing about US President Donald Trump’s administration – from detention facilities that Obama also utilized, to Trump’s quote after Charlottesville (that had nothing to do with praising neo-Nazis or Klan members) – is reminiscent of the Holocaust or Nazi Germany. Why? AOC likely hasn’t read Yad Vashem’s lengthy research of Auschwitz and its diabolical role in the murder of millions. Since it’s safe to assume many Democrats aren’t versed on the true horrors of the Holocaust, the following excerpt from Israel’s national Holocaust museum must be read by anyone equating detention centers to concentration camps:“The largest of the death camps where over 1,100,000 Jews were murdered, Auschwitz-Birkenau was both a labor camp and a center for the rapid murder of Jews by means of Zyklon B gas. It was equipped with several extermination facilities and crematoria.“…Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest of the concentration and extermination camps established on Polish soil, served concurrently as a labor camp and as a center for the rapid extermination of Jews. Chosen as the central location for the annihilation of the Jewish people, it was equipped with several extermination facilities and crematoria. Extermination was carried out by means of Zyklon B gas, a substance that had previously been tested on Russian prisoners of war.“…Repeat selections took place several times during the day in roll calls. Inmates who had become weak or ill were separated from the ranks and sent to the gas chambers. A brutal regimen based on a set of punishments and torture was invoked in the camp. Few managed to survive. In Auschwitz-Birkenau, more than 1,100,000 Jews, 70,000 Poles, 25,000 Sinti and Roma (Gypsies) and some 15,000 prisoners of war from the USSR and other countries were murdered.”
The unspeakable evil of what happened at Auschwitz can’t be utilized as yet another Democratic Party attempt to redefine semantics, simply to appease Trump-haters on the Left. While AOC brazenly circumvents the reality that 1.1 million Jews were murdered at Auschwitz with her comments, it’s important to remember why her latest statement is so absurd and why it’s an example of revisionist history. Although the Justice Democrat-endorsed congresswoman will be shielded from any political consequences, Americans should realize what’s happening with Democrats. The Democratic Party’s attempts at altering and redefining historical record would be viewed as dangerous if these techniques were displayed by Holocaust revisionists. In fact, AOC’s latest nonsensical comparison is indeed an attempt at revisionist history through irrational comparisons, and the world should never let the gross revision of historical record masquerade as alleged caring for immigrants or any other marginalized group. Thankfully, Yad Vashem and various Jewish organizations have condemned AOC’s remarks, and it’s time for the rest of the country to voice similar opposition to the Democratic Party’s outrageous and dangerous revisionist rhetoric.The writer is an author, columnist, and journalist published in The Hill, The Huffington Post, The Daily Caller, The Jerusalem Post, and other publications.
