Repeating history?

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” — George Santayana. Are we in the United States trying to repeating history?

On Jan. 27, many countries around the world celebrated International Holocaust Remembrance Day, commemorating the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camps. U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said “We are seeing a deeply troubling rise in extremism, xenophobia, racism and anti-Muslim hatred. Irrationality and intolerance are back,” and “History should be a lesson, warning and incentive all at the same time.”

The roots of the Holocaust go back to the early 1930s, when Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany. Laws were passed for Jews to register; Jews and other undesirables were stripped of their rights and many were deported or sent to concentration camps long before the death camps were created in the 1940s.

President Donald Trump issued an executive order to suspend admission of refugees from select, predominantly Muslim countries. His goal – to screen out “radical Islamic terrorists” and give priority to Christians.

In the 1930s, Germany moved first to screen out Jews, but then in the 1940s to eliminate the Jews. Are the Jews of the 1930s the Muslims of today?

Tom Dauer

Spokane