FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

January 27, 2011

New York, NY—Today marks International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which pays tribute to the estimated eleven million Jews, homosexuals, handicapped, and other minorities murdered as part of the Holocaust. January 27 marks the anniversary of the Soviet liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, a Nazi concentration camp where over one million people were exterminated.

On this day the nations of the world should unite to mourn the loss of those innocent men, women and children who died as a result of their religion, nationality, sexual orientation, or physical appearance. As sensible students and members of the Columbia community, we cannot allow for the desensitization of this sacred day. However, there are those within our community who wish to exploit this day of mourning by drawing disgusting and despicable comparisons between the Nazi Holocaust and the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. While LionPAC does not seek to belittle Palestinian suffering, the notion that the deliberate and systemized mass extinction of the Jewish people by the Nazis is comparable to Israel’s ongoing war with Hamas—a widely recognized terrorist organization funded in part by Iran—is not only offensive to the Jewish people, but to humanity as a whole.

LionPAC would like to remind the Columbia community to keep the millions massacred by the Nazis in your thoughts today, and to never forget the true meaning and purpose of this day of remembrance.

By Michael Shapiro

President, LionPAC