Polish-Jewish Relations: 1,300 Keyword-Phrase-Indexed Book Reviews (by Jan Peczkis)

Rain of Ash: Roma, Jews, and the Holocaust, by Ari Joskowicz. 2023. Princeton University Press, Princeton & Oxford

Roma-Jewish Dialogue? Holocaust Supremacy Governs Financial Restitution and Disempowers Non-Jews. Dialogue is Futile

This book strongly emphasizes Roma-Jewish dialogue. However, the true colors of Holocaust supremacy come through, and that is my focus in this review.

JEWS COPY NAZIS. GERMANS AND JEWS EFFECTIVELY COPY NAZI “RACIAL WORTH” IN ORDER TO DENY FINANCIAL COMPENSATION TO NON-JEWS!

Anybody who thinks that Holocaust supremacism is an abstract and irrelevant issue is about to get a rude awakening. Read on:

A West German court, in 1956, used an amazing and Jewish-serving reasoning to brush off the Nazi racism directed against non-Jews, and thereby to deny financial compensation to the Gypsies (and Poles), “According to the court’s judgment, racial stereotyping based on policing efforts did not amount to persecution based on race; only if the original motive lay purely in theories of ‘racial biological insights’ could claimants get compensation. A selective interpretation of Jewish measures might have led to similar conclusions, yet the court was not eager to pursue its argument in that direction.” (p. 140). Of course not. Only Jews count.

The irony is palpable! The Nazis had created a meritocracy based on the contrived “racial worth” assigned to peoples. And now the Jews and Germans are effectively doing the same thing! They assign an arbitrary “racial worth” to peoples based on the presumed “authenticity of racism” that they had experienced. That way, Jews (surprise) get compensation, while Gypsies (and of course Poles) do not.

For more on how Holocaust supremacy blocks the full recognition, and full compensation, of all non-Jewish genocides, see:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2022/07/22/roma-compensation-holocaust-industry-jews-get-paid-and-other-victims-of-nazi-genocide-do-not-german-repentance-insincere-only-to-jews-gypsies-and-gypsy-genocide-knesebeck/

EUROPEAN UNION PUSHES HOLOCAUST SUPREMACISM

The author comments, “Right after the fall of communism [Communism], recognition of the Holocaust became the unofficial benchmark for readiness to join the European Union.” (p. 193).

This was no one-time fluke, “On the one hand, Jewish victimhood has a special status in postwar Germany as well as the European Union as a whole.” (p. 203).

YES, VIRGINIA, HOLOCAUST SUPREMACY DOES CREATE A ZERO-SUM GAME

Joskowicz writes, “With depictions of the Jews as the paradigmatic victims of Nazism, other victims found themselves in the categories of ‘forgotten victims‘ or ‘non-Jewish victims’. (p. 171). They certainly have. And note the Holocaustspeak about so-called “paradigmatic victims”, which can only mean that non-Jewish victims are not.

HOLOCAUST DOMINANCE DISENFRANCHISES AND DISEMPOWERS THE NON-JEWISH VICTIMS OF NAZI GERMANY

Anyone who would have us believe that the over-attention to the Jews’ Holocaust does not diminish other genocides should ponder the following statements of Joskowicz, “In some respects, the fight for recognition of the Romani genocide is a familiar one. Many other groups who have suffered genocide and mass violence have similarly struggled to ensure that their own experiences of atrocity be granted political recognition, media and curricular attention, and space in our monument landscape equal to what the Holocaust has received.” (p. 47). Exactly right. But now we can go back to pretending that Jewish privileges, as in terms of the expansive signification of the Holocaust, make no difference.

For more on how the over-attention to the Holocaust disempowers all other genocides, see:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2022/09/15/roma-holocaust-jews-holocaust-supremacy-slights-all-non-jewish-genocides-example-gypsies-and-gypsy-genocide-doublethink-on-who-owns-the-term-holocaust-reparations-favor-jews-metache/

BERLIN HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL: HOLOCAUST SUPREMACY IS JEALOUS OF ANY POTENTIAL THREAT TO ITS PRIVILEGED STATUS

Ari Joskowicz discusses the plan in Germany, about 1991, to build a monument that would include the Sinti and Roma (Gypsy). The Jews had a conniption. He writes, “In the conflict that ensued leaders of the Jewish community rejected the proposal. This group included Heinz Galinski, head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, who had addressed Jews and Sinti and Roma as fellow victims in Bergan-Belsen in 1979. Fears that the gravity of the Holocaust as the defining event in German history could be diminished by conflating the experiences of different victim groups fueled these heated debates about the monument. The ultimate symbol of Germany’s commitment to acknowledging its responsibility became a debate about whether adding the Romani genocide was an act of relativizing, and thereby trivializing, the Holocaust.” (p. 195. Emphasis added).

So, the Jews’ Holocaust is “the defining event in German history”, while of course the Nazi German genocides of non-Jews are not. I just love it! Notice also, from the quote above, that the same Jew (Galinski), who had spoken so warmly of Jews and Gypsies as fellow victims has suddenly dropped his mask and showed his true Holocaust supremacist face. He was putting on an act.

The Berlin Holocaust Memorial came about when the Jews demanded a Jews-only memorial, thwarting a proposed joint Jewish-Gypsy memorial. The German authorities agreed to this circus. For details, see:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2023/09/29/gypsies-vs-jews-racist-jewish-monument-chauvinism-berlin-holocaust-memorial-throws-out-gypsy-genocide-german-repentance-insincere-only-to-jews-victim-hierarchies-jewish-cemetery-bogus-argument/

In the end, the Gypsies got to build their own monument. But so what? The Jews knew very well that a Gypsy monument was “safe”, because the Jews knew that they would still get the lion’s share of attention.

POWER DISPARITY. DIALOGUE OF JEWS WITH NON-JEWS, EVEN IF IT IS SINCERE, DOES NOT CHANGE ANYTHING ABOUT JEWISH DOMINANCE

Consider the power disparity that favors the Jews. Author Joskowicz deconstructs the fruits of Roma-Jewish dialogue. He makes these sobering comments, “None of this undoes the history of the uneven resources that members of the two groups have before them. Good intentions and a will to learn do not change access to expertise or economic and political capital. Growing numbers of Jews have agreed to say that Roma suffered ‘like us’, whereas Roma often continue to seek to make their suffering visible by claiming that they suffered like Jews. One is an act of solidarity with those who are not similarly recognized, the other a demand for justice. This makes full reciprocity unlikely, or at least costly.” (p. 201. Emphasis added).

Clearly, Holocaust supremacy is unaffected by dialogue. Talk is cheap. This, of course, applies to Polish-Jewish dialogue as well as to Roma-Jewish dialogue. However, all this does not mean that dialogue is totally useless. It enables the Jews to create the favorable illusion that they are “reaching out” to other victim groups, while they actually are not.