Holocaust Ignorance Risks Repeating History

January 27, 2026

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Holocaust Remembrance Is Under Threat

International Holocaust Remembrance Day honors the 6 million Jews murdered by Nazi Germany and confronts the historical realities of the Holocaust. Amid alarming trends, this commemorative day preserves historical truth in the face of rising ignorance, distortion and denial that place society at large – and the Jewish community in particular – at risk of repeating history.

Declining Knowledge

January 27 marks the observance of International Holocaust Remembrance Day – that honors the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau – the largest Nazi killing center and a site that has come to symbolize the culmination of a genocide. The UN established the commemoration on Nov. 1, 2005 – more than 60 years after the end of the Nazi genocide.

As the Holocaust recedes further into history, public understanding of what happened – and how it happened – is weakening, if not altogether disappearing. Recent surveys in the U.S. and Europe reveal significant gaps in basic Holocaust knowledge, particularly among younger generations:

• Half of Millennial and Gen Z Americans could not name a single one of the more than 40,000 concentration camps or ghettos.
• 63% of Millennials and Gen Z Americans did not know that 6 million Jews were slaughtered.
• Only 37% of U.S. adults recognized that a significant portion of ordinary people across Europe helped the Nazis and their collaborators.

The Nazi government spread propaganda about Jews, excluded them from universities, confiscated their businesses and forced them into ghettos. Death followed through disease, mass shootings and gas chambers.

Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime pursued a deliberate plan to eliminate Jews – formalized at the 1942 Wannsee Conference – where officials coordinated the systematic extermination of Europe’s Jewish population as a first step toward murdering Jews worldwide.

Entire family lines were erased, communities destroyed and future generations never born. The number of Jews in the world today is about 16 million – slightly less than before the Holocaust – despite a global population that has more than quadrupled. This demographic reality is a direct consequence of the genocide.

Erasing Jews from Holocaust Education

As the number of Holocaust survivors continues to decline – from 3.5 million in 1945 to only 197,000 today. Memories from history are mainly passed down to future generations through education. Despite the concerning knowledge gaps, large majorities of Americans and Europeans support Holocaust education. There are growing concerns, however, that some teachers’ unions and educators now minimize the Holocaust – or outright refuse to teach the topic.

America’s largest teachers’ union “promotes the celebration of International Holocaust Remembrance Day to recognize the more than 12 million different victims of the Holocaust from different faiths and other targeted characteristics.” As prominent Holocaust scholar Dr. Rafael Medoff noted, “The ‘12 million’ figure was calculated by combining the fatality numbers among various people who suffered in the war, but who were not targeted by the Nazis for mass annihilation – and without mentioning Jews.”

In the UK, the number of schools commemorating the Holocaust has declined by nearly 60% since the brutal Oct. 7 Hamas massacre and the ensuing war. A Jewish teacher reported that students at her school tried to insert a reference to the ‘Gaza genocide’ into a Remembrance Day statement last year. Some teachers cancelled their Holocaust lessons because they lack confidence in addressing certain issues, while others only commemorate it under certain conditions – including condemning the Israeli government.

The removal of Jewish identity from Holocaust history is not limited to classrooms. It is increasingly reflected in cultural and media portrayals. The BBC recently aired a show about the Kindertransport that rescued 10,000 children from Nazi territory – bringing them to the UK, without mentioning that nearly all the children were Jewish. British-American actress Dame Helen Mirren mentioned Jews in her interview for the show – but it was edited out.

Holocaust Distortion: Denial, Inversion and Politicalization

As public understanding weakens, the Holocaust is increasingly forgotten or even worse: denied, trivialized or repurposed to shock, accuse or delegitimize political targets – rather than to explain history.

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance has identified 10 forms of Holocaust distortion, including intentional efforts to minimize the Holocaust, excuse the role of collaborators, blame Jews for their own persecution and apply Holocaust language and imagery to unrelated political, ideological or commercial purposes.

Alarmingly, some groups – including radical Muslims and white supremacists – promote conspiracy theories that deny the Holocaust happened while simultaneously claiming that Jews exploited their own trauma for political gain. Antizionists routinely use Holocaust inversion to recast Jews as the new Nazis – portraying Israel as equivalent to Nazi Germany. They also falsely equate Nazism with Zionism – the right of Jews to have a country in their ancestral homeland.

Holocaust language has repeatedly been politicized across ideological lines. COVID policies were compared to Nazi laws – some protesters wore yellow stars imposed by the Nazis on Jews, Maryland Rep. Daniel Cox invoked the Nuremberg Trials of Nazi war criminals for his opposition to a children’s mental health bill, critics condemned a migrant detention center in FL as Alligator Auschwitz and MN Gov. Tim Walz recently compared some children in his state to murdered Jewish teen Anne Frank.

Holocaust analogies are not new. In 2018, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum historian Edna Friedberg cautioned that labeling political opponents as Nazis or invoking Hitler for moral condemnations exploits Holocaust memory as a rhetorical weapon – at the expense of productive discussions on real societal issues. The ADL also has condemned the use of analogies in the public square.

1. Holocaust remembrance is urgent in an age of ignorance: Holocaust knowledge is declining as the last survivors pass away. Surveys show significant gaps in basic understanding – particularly among younger generations – leaving many unaware of the causes, scale and consequences of the Nazi genocide. As knowledge erodes, Holocaust distortion and misinformation spread more easily. Preserving survivor testimonies and ensuring they are passed to future generations is crucial to ensure that the solemn vow of “Never Again” is kept alive. Remembrance demands sustained commitment to education that protects historical truth, resists distortion and ensures that what happened is neither forgotten nor misused.
2. Erasing Jewish identity undermines Holocaust understanding: The Nazi genocide was a targeted campaign against Jews – rooted in anti-Jewish ideology and carried out with intent. When education or public narratives blur that reality, they obscure why the Holocaust happened and how it unfolded. Israel’s Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Center has recovered the names of 5 million of the 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust. Preserving historical accuracy requires identifying who was targeted, why they were targeted and the tragic consequences that followed.
3. Politicizing the Holocaust distorts history: Holocaust language increasingly is used to shock, accuse or delegitimize political debates – often through direct analogies that collapse complex history into simplified moral claims. Holocaust history is weakened when it is used as a political weapon rather than studied as history. Preserving historical truth requires resisting rhetorical shortcuts that turn one of history’s gravest crimes into a tool for today’s heated confrontations.
4. The Holocaust was a systematic process – not a sudden atrocity: The Nazi genocide was not spontaneous. Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime pursued a deliberate plan to eliminate all Jews – starting with the systematic extermination of Europe’s Jewish population. This plan unfolded over years of inflammatory news coverage and outright propaganda, discriminatory laws, economic dispossession and forced isolation – long before gas chambers were used for mass murder. Understanding this intent and process matters because it reveals how societies slide into catastrophe gradually – through policy choices and public acceptance – rather than through a single explosive act of violence.
5. Learning from the Holocaust is a moral obligation of humanity: The Holocaust is not distant history. Its consequences are carried by Jewish families and communities still living today – many of whom exist only because someone survived – only one or two generations removed from annihilation. When societies minimize or ignore what happened, they risk repeating the same patterns of exclusion, dehumanization and silence. Learning from the Holocaust protects our shared humanity by recognizing where unchecked hatred can lead.
6. Other genocides deserve recognition on their own terms: Acknowledging other genocides is important. The Armenian, Bosnian, Cambodian and Rwandan genocides had distinct causes, perpetrators and consequences. Few know that Germany committed the first genocide of the 20th Century against the Herero and Nama peoples in southwest Africa. Treating all genocides as interchangeable flattens history and obscures responsibility. Honest remembrance requires precision. Recognizing each genocide on its own terms allows those crimes to be fully understood.

Holocaust remembrance requires deliberate engagement with accurate history, survivor testimony and educational resources that preserve its meaning rather than dilute it.

• Prioritize credible Holocaust educational resources: Read and watch content from organizations that teach the Holocaust with historical accuracy – including the documented progression of anti-Jewish hate – rather than flattening it into generalized narratives. Urge your local school administration to ensure that Holocaust education is included in basic curricula.
  • Yad Vashem, The World Holocaust Remembrance Center: Education & E-Learning
  • U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum: Teaching Materials on the Holocaust
  • Anne Frank House: Educational Materials
• Listen to survivor testimonies and share their stories: Amplify survivor accounts and histories that convey the facts of the Holocaust and its human consequences – especially for younger audiences and individuals with limited historical knowledge.
  • Yad Vashem: 28,396 testimonies
  • USC Shoah Foundation: 57,876 testimonies
  • U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum: 81,975 testimonies
• Watch survivor documentaries: PBS’s American Masters premiered Elie Wiesel: Soul on Fire, on Jan. 27 at 9 p.m. Eastern, an intimate documentary on the Nobel laureate that explored how his survival of Auschwitz and Buchenwald shaped his lifelong fight against indifference and injustice.

Stories Impacting American Jews

• Antizionist activists protest Jerry Seinfeld comedy show in Chicago to “Free Palestine”
• Pope Leo XIV condemns “every form of antisemitism” on Holocaust Remembrance Day
• LA Fine Arts Theatre cancels Israeli comedian’s show after Guy Hochman refused to sign political statement. In same statement announcing cancellation, theatre’s president states that “we do not ask the political beliefs of performers,” later admits “litmus test mistake” after consultation with ADL
• Children’s entertainer Ms. Rachel liked “Free America from the Jews” comment, apologizes, then supports Instagram post saying Jews made the comment
• Social justice therapists – who see themselves as activists first, healers second – weaponize therapy against Jews
• NYC campus activists promoted Hamas propaganda encouraging violence against Jews – How U.S. Anti-Israel Activists Amplify Terror Propaganda on Mainstream Platforms (ADL)
• NYC vendors sold terrorist group merchandise at Muslim American Society’s fundraiser – including Hamas, Hezbollah
• City Univ. of NY purged Jews from leadership positions in “deliberate plan”
• Antizionist, former Columbia student activist Mahmoud Khalil to be deported to Algeria
• NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani working to stop city’s investment in Israel Bonds after 50 years
• Joe Rogan thinks there are 1 billion Jews worldwide – actual number is about 16 million

Stories Impacting the U.S. and Israel

• Christian organization Eagles Wings hosted nationwide Solidarity Sunday event on Jan 25 to unite Christians in combatting antisemitism.
• Columbia PhD student: I did not report my rape because I oppose prisons and believe rape narratives are used to justify genocide – the victim also dismissed reports that Hamas “soldiers” sexually assaulted Israeli women on Oct. 7
• Days after Oct. 7, British teachers union shared lesson plan asking pupils if they would “fight back” if they lived in Gaza
• U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee responds to letter condemning Christian Zionism “My Christian faith is built on the foundation of Judaism and without it, Christianity would not exist. Without the Judeo-Christian worldview, there would be no Western Civilization and no America.”
• U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz cites 470% Israeli Christian population growth, calls antisemitism “brain rot”
• IDF finds final slain hostage Ran Gvili, brings his body back to Israel for burial, soldiers sing Hatikvah while saluting his body

Stories from Around the World

• France: Muslim woman spits on Jewish man holding Torah at airport: “I am a Muslim, leave France. You’re a Jew, don’t touch me.”
• Turkey: Turks make death threats against family of Turkish Muslim student studying in Israel after she identified herself as a “Zionist”
• Australia: Government cancels visa of British Israeli Jewish influencer who was scheduled to speak to local Jewish community

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