January 10, 2008
The pictures look like something out of a news report of a tornado or tsunami: Hundreds of gravestones, cracked off their pedestals and tumbled like dominoes, row after row of violence and desecration. Last week’s twin attacks on Poile Zedek Cemetery in New Brunswick were no natural disaster, however, but deliberate acts by vandals who were as methodical as they were mindless. For Jews throughout the state, the pictures also bring to mind scenes of another era, when their enemies attacked the Jewish dead as a warm-up to destroying the living.
It is too early to say whether the vandalism was carried out by those with a deeply anti-Semitic agenda or by those too shallow to understand the grotesque symbolism of their act. Either way, the cemetery vandalism suggests that we cannot waver in our commitment to teach and act upon the lessons of Jewish history.
In an ironic juxtaposition, the New Jersey Legislature last week passed legislation that would expand the state’s definition of hate crimes to include bias aimed at gays and lesbians. In supporting the measure, Jewish leaders declared that “never again” is a universal impulse.
A few issues back, an article in this newspaper quoted Jewish educators who worried about what they were calling “Holocaust fatigue.” They were worried that too many of their colleagues were ready to “move on,” to downplay the Holocaust in their classrooms and institutions. They challenged the Jewish community to fight this trend and search for ways to keep Holocaust education relevant and compelling.
The New Brunswick attack shows why it is necessary to meet that challenge, and constantly reinforce the lessons of the Shoa. NJ lawmakers showed how that knowledge can be put into action to inspire a living memorial to its victims.