Yad Vashem

On Monday, Lesley and I toured Yad Vashem, the Holocaust museum in Jerusalem. We had both been there a few times in the past, but we had heard awesome (I use that word in its original, literal meaning and not the common surfer sense) things about it. Also, it was the day of the Fast of Esther, on which we were remembering how madman Haman tried to destroy the Jewish people.

The only suggestion that I have for touring Yad Vashem is to do so with a guide. There is so much, both informational and emotional, to digest that you need someone to point out and explain the highlights, for lack of a better word.

Yad Vashem is undoubtedly a place that I would encourage every person of every religion to visit, not just once in a lifetime but with some frequency. In addition to educating its visitors on everything that we should all know about history's worst crime against humanity, it shows the faces of both the victims and the killers. As I looked into the photographed faces of some of the murdered or viewed their belongings, all I could think was that these were people, just like you and me.

At the same time, I also found it necessary to look in the eyes of the Hitler and his Nazis to see how they were people too. No, I am not some bleeding heart who believes that it is necessary to "understand why they hate us" or cut a sadist, whether he killed one person or millions, any slack because he was the victim of physical or sexual abuse as a child or what not. I am saying that, like their victims, the Nazis were also people who, had I lived in another time and place, may have been my neighbors and friends.