THE HOLOCAUST IS OVER WE MUST RISE FROM ITS ASHES

those who believe in the expediency and morality of death as a legitimate humanverdict, it is unlikely that killing the most prominent Nazis was a wise decision. Wouldit have not been better to leave them in prison until their death, thus serving as livingexamples of the consequences of their deeds? Indeed, the moment their souls lefttheir bodies, the process of amnesia began. But why did we have to accelerate it? Isit surprising that the young Prince Harry, who may become king of Great Britain oneday, wore an SS uniform to a costume party because he did not know that “the Naziskilled like Hitler”? They died long ago and the past belongs to old people; the future,and the world, belongs to the young.We, too, tried and killed Adolf Eichmann in great haste—so quickly that evenacademics and researchers had no time to interview and study the last availablesenior Nazi. They lost the opportunity to shed some light on the incomprehensibleinhumanity of those days.The Israeli media were outraged by the publication of a British survey, accordingto which only some forty percent of the British public knew about Auschwitz. Ilooked at the data and wondered—not about the sixty percent who did not know thehistory of Europe, of their own people and mine, but about the others, who didknow. It is probably thanks to the British media that consistently report and debatethe subject. So much so that Joschka Fischer was quoted once referring to thewonderful British TV satire Fawlty Towers in which comedian John Cleesemimicked the Nazi goose step. Fischer said that in order to learn the goose step youhad to watch British television because none of the new generations in Germany, noteven his own, knew how to do it. The mass media, as superficial and problematic asit may be, preserves modern memory. Television is today’s tribal fire, where we sittogether, watch the same show, and exchange ideas. News anchors and the hosts ofTV shows are the modern-day storytellers, and this is the new face of historicalawareness and consciousness. The absence of the criminal Nazi faces from thescreens is fatal to the memory and facilitates amnesia and denial. Eventually theywould have died a natural death, but in the meantime, the generation that came afterthem would have been molded differently. As always, revenge and rage are badstrategic advisers.Eichmann was a major criminal who contributed to the destruction of one-third ofthe Jewish people and many others. Yet we hurried to prosecute, sentence, and hanghim. He was a different type of criminal: a desk villain, a destruction bureaucrat of