As horrifying images of death and destruction in Gaza have flooded social media for over 10 months, many Jewish people across the world have risen up to disavow Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.
For Mark Etkind, the son of a Holocaust survivor, Tel Aviv and its allies, particularly the U.S. and the UK, are using what Jews went through during World War II to justify its actions in the Gaza Strip, so far killing over 40,000 Palestinians since Oct. 7.
Etkind was taking part in a pro-Palestinian rally in central London, held in the wake of a recent Israeli strike on a school in Gaza City where hundreds of Palestinians were taking refuge.
Over 100 people were killed in the early-morning attack.
According to Etkind, whose father survived the Lodz ghetto and multiple concentration camps including Buchenwald, it was particularly outrageous that the Israeli government and its backers — Britain and the U.S. — were using what millions of Jews went through in World War II “to somehow justify what Israel is presently doing in Gaza.”
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“In other words, they’re using a genocide from the last century to justify a genocide today. Now, it’s hard to think of anything more of an insult to the memory of the Holocaust than to justify more genocide on its basis,” he told Turkish media platform Anadolu Agency.
Criticising Western powers for “relentlessly” arming and supporting Israel while making empty calls for a cease-fire.
“If you want a crazy toddler to stop destroying things in your house, you don’t give them flamethrowers and machine guns,” he said.
