Holocaust denial / Holocaust distortion | #TranslateHate
Holocaust denial / distortion
theme \ hō-lə-,kost di-'nī(-ə)l di-ˈstȯr-shən \
: an attempt to negate the facts of the Nazi genocide of the Jewish people; a belief that the Holocaust did not happen or was greatly exaggerated
WHY IT’S ANTISEMITIC:
Despite endless historical facts, Holocaust denial and distortion spread the false idea that Jews invented or exaggerated the Holocaust, including the diary of Anne Frank, Nazism’s intent to massacre Jews, the use of gas chambers in concentration camps, and the murder of millions of Jews. Denying the Holocaust, including denying the scope or methods used by the Nazis and their allies during the Holocaust, is antisemitic.
And even when antisemites don’t deny the Holocaust, they have used it to attack Jews by accusing them of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust or by comparing its horrors by the Nazi regime to defensive actions taken by the State of Israel. Claiming that the State of Israel, home to the largest number of living Holocaust survivors, behaves like the Nazis in its treatment of Palestinians is a personal attack on survivors and trivializes the meaning of the Holocaust. Likening the Gaza Strip, governed by the terrorist organization Hamas, to the Warsaw Ghetto, where Jews were confined by the Nazis before being transported to death camps as part of the systematic massacre of six million Jews during the Holocaust, or comparing the Israel Defense Forces to the Nazi army (Wehrmacht), is Holocaust distortion. There is no legitimate comparison between defending the State of Israel and ensuring the safety of its citizens to the systematic destruction and liquidation of an entire people.
Lastly, October 7 denial is used in the same way as Holocaust denial — to deny atrocities against Jews to exonerate the perpetrators of responsibility. The October 7 terrorist attack against Israel by Hamas, in which over 1,200 Israelis were killed and hundreds more taken hostage in Gaza, was the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust. Yet, pro-Hamas supporters and antisemites continue to deny the attack. Accusing Jews of making up what happened inappropriately places the blame on the victim and legitimizes antisemitism.
