Reminder of the Holocaust

Kenneth Zammit Tabona's otherwise excellent description of his tour of Berlin (October 5) was marred by his criticism of the Memorial to the Murdered Jews. His understanding of the need of such a monument in Berlin is poor to say the least. The monument is not being erected to remind present day Germans of their ancestors' sins but, rather, to remind the whole of humanity that six million Jews (together with two million non-Jews) were brutally murdered by a regime that placed racial and political hatred at the very core of its evil and murderous existence.

It is ironic that Mr Zammit Tabona asks whether any other nation (other than the Germans) has been "forced to not only remember but pay for the sins of its ancestors" since the answer to his question stood before him in the form of the Star of David. Have not the Jews, for the past 2,000 years, been constantly accused of being the descendants of god-killers? Deicide, Mr Zammit Tabona should know, is one of the prime movers of anti-Semitism.

As for Mr Zammit Tabona's comparison between the modern Israeli-Palestinian issue and the Holocaust, I dare not comment. I cannot believe that a person of his intelligence can ever even come to within a wisp of comparing them.

It is because of people who would like to bury the hideous acts of Nazism under a deeply mistrustful cover of "The Past" that the monument is being erected. It is because anti-Semitism is once again rearing its ugly head in Europe that we all need a reminder of the Holocaust. Those who wish to forget the past either live in a world of deceit or consent to evil.