September 3, 2018: What were they thinking?

By Michael Regenstreif

I was recently reminded of “What Was I Thinking,” a clever piece written in the 1990s by New York City singer-songwriter Christine Lavin. In a series of verses, Lavin documents some dumb choices made by various people that lead into a chorus that variously asks, “What was I-he-she thinking?”

The song came to mind when news surfaced about a fashion photo shoot that was held here in Ottawa at the National Holocaust Monument.

On August 12, Montreal-based designer Michèle Beaudoin posted a photo on Instagram of a model at the National Holocaust Monument wearing a rather revealing dress. She credited the model, the makeup artist and the photographer, and promised more photos to come.

The Instragram post was deleted later that same day after several irate people who witnessed the photo shoot contacted the media. Community leaders – including Rabbi Reuven Bulka, rabbi emeritus of Congregation Machzikei Hadas, and Mina Cohen, director of the Centre for Holocaust Education and Scholarship at the Max and Tessie Zelikovitz Centre for Jewish Studies at Carleton University – spoke out about how absurdly inappropriate it was to do a fashion photo shoot at what must be regarded as a sacred place.

What, indeed, were the designer and her associates thinking? In response to an Ottawa Citizen enquiry, photographer Richard Tardif told the reporter via email, “After further consideration, we decided to end the session and discontinue the project. Also, all material has been deleted.”

That sad incident in Ottawa was not the only inappropriate event related to a Holocaust site that day. Two young Israelis, on a school trip to Poland to learn about the Holocaust, were caught on video dancing naked at the site of the Majdanek concentration camp, where an estimated 78,000 Jews were murdered during the Holocaust.

A statement from Israel’s Education Ministry said it views “with great severity any behaviour that could harm the status and values represented by the trips to Poland. In the case in question, due to the students’ improper and inappropriate behavior, disciplinary actions have been taken against them to the fullest.”

Surely, one would think that Jewish students, studying the Holocaust, would know better. What were they thinking?

Corbyn and Trump

Since the 2016 U.S. presidential election, observers have been attempting to understand the hold that Donald Trump has over his right-wing base. No matter how outrageous, offensive, or even racist Trump’s statements and actions have been, his base has remained fiercely loyal.

Watching the steady stream of revelations about antisemitism in the British Labour Party, particularly as it relates to party leader Jeremy Corbyn – who might well be the United Kingdom’s next prime minister if the polls are correct – one begins to understand the hold that Trump has over his base. Corbyn, whose left-wing populism seems to parallel Trump’s right-wing populism, has a similar hold over his base.

No matter how disturbing the revelations are about Corbyn’s associations with Hamas, Hezbollah or Black September terrorists. No matter the revelation that he has appeared on the Iranian government’s propaganda TV station to denounce the BBC for recognizing Israel’s right to exist. No matter the revelation that his principal secretary advised his supporters not to vote for candidates who have appeared in Jewish newspapers – the list of examples grows longer by the day – Corbyn’s base sticks by him with unwavering loyalty.

In late-July, the United Kingdom’s three Jewish newspapers jointly published front-page editorials declaring that a Corbyn-led government would pose an “existential threat to Jewish life” in their country.

Historically, most British Jews have found a political home in the Labour Party. But, now in 2018, Marie van der Zyl, president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, said, “It’s like Jeremy Corbyn has declared war on the Jews.”

It is a frightening situation for the Jewish community in the U.K.

October 30, 2017: Attacks on Justin Trudeau over plaque error are unfounded

By Michael Regenstreif

The front page story in this issue of the Ottawa Jewish Bulletin is Benita Baker’s report on the inauguration of the National Holocaust Monument in Ottawa. Although we published an issue after the September 27 event, the nature of our deadline and production schedule – complicated at that time of year by High Holiday work breaks – prevented us from running the story in our October 9 edition.

However, the story was published at online even before that issue was mailed to subscribers. A sidebar to the article on page 2 (which was also posted online) notes that a plaque at the entrance to the monument commemorating the inauguration was removed and will be replaced because it failed to specifically mention that Jews were the principal victims of “the millions of men, women and children murdered during the Holocaust.”

After visiting the National Holocaust Monument, looking at its various sections – all of them so powerful – and reading the other plaques and panels explaining the Holocaust, and also Canada’s shameful response to Jewish refugees desperate to escape the genocide, no one can be left with any doubt about the Nazi regime’s intention to wipe out European Jewry.

Still, it was a serious error that the plaque at the entrance to the monument did not specifically mention that the intent of the perpetrators of the Holocaust was the mass murder of Jews.

But it was an error that all the parties involved in the monument, including the government of Canada and the National Holocaust Monument Development Council, quickly acknowledged, quickly accepted responsibility for, and quickly set in motion a process to correct. The plaque was removed and will be replaced with appropriate wording.

But that was not enough for some Opposition politicians and media pundits who sought to put responsibility for the error directly on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau – as if the error was an expression of his personal feelings.

But, as Rabbi Daniel Friedman, the Edmonton-based chair of the National Holocaust Monument Development Council, explained in an op-ed published in the Ottawa Citizen and several other Canadian dailies, “On the big day, we suddenly realized that an egregious error had been made. In amongst the debates over wording and plaque positioning, somehow the one plaque that introduced the others – and made no sense outside the context of the plaques detailing the Nazi genocide of six million Jews along with homosexuals, the disabled and others – ended up mounted all on its own on a separate wall. Visitors to the site were rightly disturbed to encounter this major injustice to the memory of the six million Jews for whom the monument was built. All of the parties involved are deeply remorseful and we apologize unconditionally for the pain we have caused by this oversight.

“I want to thank the Trudeau government for acting expeditiously to amend the plaque as soon as the error was brought to its attention. Mistakes happen; most can be fixed quickly and decorously. Without questioning, the government did the right thing, which has been our experience with Trudeau’s government throughout.”

I agree with Rabbi Friedman.

I have personally heard the prime minister speak poignantly at Holocaust commemoration events and I have watched his sensitive interactions with elderly Holocaust survivors. And I have no doubt as to his knowledge of the Holocaust or his sincerity in talking about it. To suggest that he is personally at fault for this error, or that it was purposeful, is simply egregious.

I highly recommend a visit to the National Holocaust Monument. It is a profoundly moving experience. With winter quickly approaching, you’ll probably want to choose a nice autumn day to go as it is outdoors. I found that I needed to spend a good hour there when I visited, much of it in quiet contemplation.

October 9, 2017: The difference one person can make

By Michael Regenstreif

“Someday, when people gather around a national Holocaust monument in Ottawa, one person in particular will be proud of its establishment. She’s University of Ottawa student Laura Grosman. At 21 years of age, she has worked tirelessly for two years… to get the federal government to honour Holocaust victims by erecting a national monument in Ottawa.”

So wrote Benita Siematycki in the November 16, 2009 edition of the Ottawa Jewish Bulletin.

A decade after Laura first articulated a vision of Canada having a monument in the national capital, the National Holocaust Monument – as it is now officially known – was dedicated in Ottawa on September 27.

From its conception to its dedication, the National Holocaust Monument involved many people and organizations, elected officials and government bureaucrats. It took a decade, millions of dollars and much perseverance by so many to accomplish.

But it all started with a vision articulated by a determined teenaged student at the University of Ottawa. While we’ve told Laura Grosman’s story before in the Bulletin, it bears repeating at this important time as a reminder of the remarkable difference that one person – no matter how young they may be – can make.

Ten years ago, Laura took a course on the Holocaust taught by Professor Rebecca Margolis of uOttawa’s Vered Jewish Canadian Studies program. She learned that Canada was then the one Allied country that fought the Nazis during the Second World War that did not have a national Holocaust monument.

Two significant factors influenced Laura’s determination to see a national Holocaust monument built in Ottawa. “The first is her family history. Laura’s paternal grandfather was a Holocaust survivor who never spoke much about his past. When he died, says Laura, his story went with him. The second factor is Laura’s fascination with all things political. She is a self-professed political junkie and loves nothing more than being involved in the political system,” wrote Siemiatycki in 2009.

“It’s pretty embarrassing for someone like me who’s involved politically to know that Canada is the only Allied country that doesn’t have a national monument. We have a national Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremony that’s held where we can place them. That’s not acceptable to me,” she told Siemiatycki.

Laura came to uOttawa after growing up in Thornhill, a suburb north of Toronto, and as a politically aware young person she began to enlist federal politicians in supporting her cause. The first to come on board was her own MP, Liberal Susan Kadis, who began the process of drafting a private member’s bill to establish the monument.

Laura wanted the establishment of the monument to be a nonpartisan effort and other MPs she enlisted in the cause included Richard Marceau of the Bloc Québécois (who is now general counsel and senior government adviser at the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs), and Conservatives Peter Kent (who defeated Kadis in the 2008 election) and Tim Uppal.

Kadis’ private member’s bill to establish the monument died when the 2008 election was called. She was defeated in Thornhill by Kent who was subsequently appointed to cabinet. As a minister, Kent could not sponsor a private member’s bill but the torch was picked up by Uppal, an MP from Edmonton.

Uppal’s bill – Bill C-442, an Act to Establish a National Holocaust Memorial – was passed in 2011 and the National Holocaust Monument Development Council was created to work with the federal government to acquire the land for the monument across from the Canadian War Museum, commission the design, raise the millions of dollars necessary to build the monument funds (matched by government funding), and oversee the construction. All of that took another six years.

But it all started 10 years ago with Laura Grosman, a teenager who found it unacceptable that Canada did not have a national Holocaust monument; a teenager with an ambitious dream and the dedication to make that dream a reality.