Holocaust Memorial Day Events 2022
On Holocaust Memorial Day 2022 we mark 77 years since the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau and mark also subsequent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur.
For our Cambridge Civic event our Cambridge Guildhall will be lit up in purple, and Cllrs will mark the event with a candle-lighting ceremony. We invite the public to register in order to watch the national ceremony for Holocaust Memorial Day which will be streamed online from 7pm to 8pm. This is a free event and anyone who registers can view the ceremony.
We then ask Cambridge households to light a candle from 8pm onwards to display if you can do so in safety in your front window. #HolocaustMemorialDay #LightTheDarkness
The invitation for the civic candle-lighting ceremony on Holocaust Memorial Day itself will be outside the Guildhall and limited because of safety in covid times. Our public marking of Holocaust Memorial Day as an indoor civic event has been postponed to be on Sunday 26th June when we will also be aptly marking Refugee Week. This will be an invite inspired by the HMD theme of 'One Day' and the Refugee week theme of 'Healing' and will involve participants from a wide range of schools and community and faith groups.
The event will be free for participants at the Cambridge Corn Exchange on Sunday 26th June from 4pm to 5.30pm where key speakers will be Holocaust Survivor, Eva Clarke, and the Poet in Residence at HistoryWorks, Michael Rosen. There will be moving speeches and poems and songs illustrated by dance, drama, artworks, involving artists from a large range of Cambridge schools and colleges, supported by faith and community groups.
HMD theme & how to join in national ceremony online
The theme for marking Holocaust Memorial Day 2022 is 'One Day' and to join in to watch the national ceremony online you can register to see it streameld online here:
Register
The Ceremony will run from 7pm to 8pm. If you miss the online streamed event, you can watch it afterwards as an online film via the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust website:
https://www.hmd.org.uk/take-part-in-holocaust-memorial-day/ukhmd/
At 8pm, get ready to Light the Darkness with us. Households across the UK will be lighting candles and safely putting them in their windows to:
- remember those who were murdered for who they were
- stand against prejudice and hatred today
Light a candle and put it in your window at 8pm on 27 January 2022 (if you are able to do so safely).
#HolocaustMemorialDay #LightTheDarkness
The national theme for 2022 has been selected and structured by the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust (HMDT), and information and educational resources which you can use in addition to those we are providing in Cambridge bespoke to our programme with schools. There are many ways to interpret the theme ONE DAY some of which are outlined by HMDT below.
Scope of the theme
One Day for Holocaust Memorial Day
Holocaust Memorial Day is One Day – 27 January – that we put aside to come together to remember, to learn about the Holocaust, Nazi Persecution and the genocides that followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur, in the hope that there may be One Day in the future with no genocide. We learn more about the past, we empathise with others today, and we take action for a better future.
One Day in history
To mark HMD, you could pick One Day in history and learn about that day.
What happened in Warsaw on 19 April 1943? Nazi Germany had entered Poland four years earlier in 1939, and started establishing ghettos in spring 1940, to segregate, dehumanise and control the Jews. The largest of the ghettos was in Warsaw, where more than 400,000 Jews were crowded into 1.3 square miles of the city with poor sanitation, limited food and cramped conditions. It is estimated that more than 92,000 people died in the Warsaw ghetto because of the squalid conditions. On 19 April 1943, the Jewish inhabitants of the Warsaw Ghetto fought back against the Nazi Regime.
Or 12 July 1995 in Bosnia? Against the backdrop of a war, after Bosnia declared independence from Yugoslavia, Bosnian Serb troops descended on the town of Srebrenica. They began separating Bosniak men from women and children despite the area having been designated by the UN as a ‘safe area’. Over the next couple of days more than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys were murdered in and around Srebrenica. 12 July 1995 was the last day that many women saw their husbands, fathers, sons and brothers.
Or 17 April 1975? On this day the Khmer Rouge entered the Cambodian capital and
Mardi Seng noted ‘on that same bright, warm, glorious and victorious day, a new era began: not of peace and tranquillity, nor of hope and prosperity, but of suffering, torture, hunger, diseases, work camps, re-education, and systematic killing’. The arrival of the Khmer Rouge on 17 April 1975 brought five years of terror, with more than two million people murdered.
How many lives changed on each of those dates, and what happened to the people involved?
You could also choose the same date in different years and look at what was happening in different countries and different years:
27 January – what was happening in Berlin in 1941, in Cambodia in 1976, in Rwanda in 1994 in the lead up to the genocide? And 27 January 2022, what is happening around us in the world today?
One Day when life changed
Survivors of the Holocaust and of genocide often talk about the One Day when everything changed, sometimes for the worse and sometimes for better.
Iby Knill feels that from One Day to the next, everything changed and yet nothing had changed:
One day Gretl, my school friend…greeted me with an embrace. The next day she ran across the road and turned her head away so as not to acknowledge me.
Franziska Schwarz Mikus was sterilised by the Nazis because she was deaf, as part of their process of persecuting anyone who did not fit their ideal – in this case, because they believed that disabled people were imperfect and worthless. On that One Day, the Nazis took control of Franziska’s body, of her life choices. The Nazis wanted to prevent people they deemed ‘unfit’ from being able to procreate. It has been estimated that between 1933 and 1939, 360,000 individuals were subjected to forced sterilisation, because they had physical or mental disabilities – or were perceived to have disabilities.
For Faiza, there was a defining day. Following a civil war in 2003, which has left millions of people displaced, the Sudanese government has supported Arab militia who have destroyed hundreds of villages, and murdered thousands of people. Faiza was targeted by the Sudanese Government for supporting victims of the genocide, and so, she says:
One Day I decided to leave my country. It was a hard decision, but there was no other way. I left my home, my friends, my people; I left all my belongings. There is a book on a table near my bed open to page 49 waiting for me.
One Day at a time
It may be hard to pick out just One Day, as for many, to keep going through each and every day was a huge struggle, with no end in sight and no glimmer of hope that the next day would be any better.
The genocide in Rwanda lasted 100 days, beginning after the plane carrying the President was shot down on 6 April 1994. The genocide followed decades of tensions between Hutus and Tutsis. Beatha Uwazaninka recalls how, having watched fellow Tutsis around her being murdered, and on many occasions thinking she was going to be murdered, ‘every one of those hundred days was dangerous’.
For many, one day was grindingly and dully like all the others, with no chance of improvement or change. One Day seemed to last for years, and ‘every day of their life was a day of suffering and torment’ (Chil Rajchman, The Last Jew of Treblinka).
One Day in the future
Those who were targeted and persecuted held out for the One Day in the future when all their suffering would be over, hoping they would ‘all see the day of liberation’ (Elie Wiesel, Night).
On Holocaust Memorial Day we learn from genocide for a purpose – to build a better future. When we look ahead to ‘one day with no genocide’, what do we need to do today to achieve this? We can use this theme to motivate us to speak out when we see injustices, prejudices and identity-based violence.
On Holocaust Memorial Day 2022, this One Day, we will all come together in our communities, to learn from the Holocaust and genocides – for a better future.
One Day is a snapshot
One Day is just a snapshot in time and therefore cannot give the full picture, the context, the background that is needed, but it can help bring a piece of the full picture to life. The age or gender of the victim, or their geographical location ensured that no One Day during the genocide was typical. The same date would be experienced very differently by Jews hiding in France, Jews incarcerated in Auschwitz, Jews awaiting their fate in Hungary, for example. For those who suffered for days, weeks, months, years focussing on just One Day is a starting point, a way in for us to learn more about what happened during the Holocaust and the genocides that followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur.
One Day
One Day
The national theme for 2022 has been selected and structured by the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust (HMDT), and information and educational resources which you can use in addition to those we are providing in Cambridge bespoke to our programme with schools. There are many ways to interpret the theme ONE DAY some of which are outlined by HMDT below.
Scope of the theme
One Day for Holocaust Memorial Day
Holocaust Memorial Day is One Day – 27 January – that we put aside to come together to remember, to learn about the Holocaust, Nazi Persecution and the genocides that followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur, in the hope that there may be One Day in the future with no genocide. We learn more about the past, we empathise with others today, and we take action for a better future.
One Day in history
To mark HMD, you could pick One Day in history and learn about that day.
What happened in Warsaw on 19 April 1943? Nazi Germany had entered Poland four years earlier in 1939, and started establishing ghettos in spring 1940, to segregate, dehumanise and control the Jews. The largest of the ghettos was in Warsaw, where more than 400,000 Jews were crowded into 1.3 square miles of the city with poor sanitation, limited food and cramped conditions. It is estimated that more than 92,000 people died in the Warsaw ghetto because of the squalid conditions. On 19 April 1943, the Jewish inhabitants of the Warsaw Ghetto fought back against the Nazi Regime.
Or 12 July 1995 in Bosnia? Against the backdrop of a war, after Bosnia declared independence from Yugoslavia, Bosnian Serb troops descended on the town of Srebrenica. They began separating Bosniak men from women and children despite the area having been designated by the UN as a ‘safe area’. Over the next couple of days more than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys were murdered in and around Srebrenica. 12 July 1995 was the last day that many women saw their husbands, fathers, sons and brothers.
Or 17 April 1975? On this day the Khmer Rouge entered the Cambodian capital and
Mardi Seng noted ‘on that same bright, warm, glorious and victorious day, a new era began: not of peace and tranquillity, nor of hope and prosperity, but of suffering, torture, hunger, diseases, work camps, re-education, and systematic killing’. The arrival of the Khmer Rouge on 17 April 1975 brought five years of terror, with more than two million people murdered.
How many lives changed on each of those dates, and what happened to the people involved?
You could also choose the same date in different years and look at what was happening in different countries and different years:
27 January – what was happening in Berlin in 1941, in Cambodia in 1976, in Rwanda in 1994 in the lead up to the genocide? And 27 January 2022, what is happening around us in the world today?
One Day when life changed
Survivors of the Holocaust and of genocide often talk about the One Day when everything changed, sometimes for the worse and sometimes for better.
Iby Knill feels that from One Day to the next, everything changed and yet nothing had changed:
One day Gretl, my school friend…greeted me with an embrace. The next day she ran across the road and turned her head away so as not to acknowledge me.
Franziska Schwarz Mikus was sterilised by the Nazis because she was deaf, as part of their process of persecuting anyone who did not fit their ideal – in this case, because they believed that disabled people were imperfect and worthless. On that One Day, the Nazis took control of Franziska’s body, of her life choices. The Nazis wanted to prevent people they deemed ‘unfit’ from being able to procreate. It has been estimated that between 1933 and 1939, 360,000 individuals were subjected to forced sterilisation, because they had physical or mental disabilities – or were perceived to have disabilities.
For Faiza, there was a defining day. Following a civil war in 2003, which has left millions of people displaced, the Sudanese government has supported Arab militia who have destroyed hundreds of villages, and murdered thousands of people. Faiza was targeted by the Sudanese Government for supporting victims of the genocide, and so, she says:
One Day I decided to leave my country. It was a hard decision, but there was no other way. I left my home, my friends, my people; I left all my belongings. There is a book on a table near my bed open to page 49 waiting for me.
One Day at a time
It may be hard to pick out just One Day, as for many, to keep going through each and every day was a huge struggle, with no end in sight and no glimmer of hope that the next day would be any better.
The genocide in Rwanda lasted 100 days, beginning after the plane carrying the President was shot down on 6 April 1994. The genocide followed decades of tensions between Hutus and Tutsis. Beatha Uwazaninka recalls how, having watched fellow Tutsis around her being murdered, and on many occasions thinking she was going to be murdered, ‘every one of those hundred days was dangerous’.
For many, one day was grindingly and dully like all the others, with no chance of improvement or change. One Day seemed to last for years, and ‘every day of their life was a day of suffering and torment’ (Chil Rajchman, The Last Jew of Treblinka).
One Day in the future
Those who were targeted and persecuted held out for the One Day in the future when all their suffering would be over, hoping they would ‘all see the day of liberation’ (Elie Wiesel, Night).
On Holocaust Memorial Day we learn from genocide for a purpose – to build a better future. When we look ahead to ‘one day with no genocide’, what do we need to do today to achieve this? We can use this theme to motivate us to speak out when we see injustices, prejudices and identity-based violence.
On Holocaust Memorial Day 2022, this One Day, we will all come together in our communities, to learn from the Holocaust and genocides – for a better future.
One Day is a snapshot
One Day is just a snapshot in time and therefore cannot give the full picture, the context, the background that is needed, but it can help bring a piece of the full picture to life. The age or gender of the victim, or their geographical location ensured that no One Day during the genocide was typical. The same date would be experienced very differently by Jews hiding in France, Jews incarcerated in Auschwitz, Jews awaiting their fate in Hungary, for example. For those who suffered for days, weeks, months, years focussing on just One Day is a starting point, a way in for us to learn more about what happened during the Holocaust and the genocides that followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur.
Candle-Lighting
Cambridge will be joining in the 8pm National Candle-lighting on 27th January 2022 which follows on after the Holocaust Memorial Day ceremony. The Mayor & Councillors will be lighting candles, as will the households from the schools and colleges, faith and community groups we've been working with this year. Please do join us in lighting a candle!
Use social media to spread the word, to tell people about your intention to light a candle to mark Holocaust Memorial Day, and then share a photo of your lit candle afterwards
#HolocaustMemorialDay #LightTheDarkness
At 8pm, get ready to Light the Darkness with us. Households across the UK will be lighting candles and safely putting them in their windows to:
- remember those who were murdered for who they were
- stand against prejudice and hatred today
Light a candle and put it in your window at 8pm on 27 January 2022 (if you are able to do so safely) and share if you can on your facebook, twitter, tiktok, instagram, website #HolocaustMemorialDay #LightTheDarkness
Cambridge Equality Pledge
For Holocaust Memorial Day we will share a short film of the Cambridge Mayor and Mayoress lighting a candle with a commitment to renew the 'Equality Pledge'
“We believe in the dignity of all people and their right to respect and equality of opportunity. We value the strength that comes with difference and the positive contribution that diversity brings to our community. Our aspiration is for Cambridge and the wider region to be safe, welcoming and inclusive.”
Mayor of Cambridge, Cllr Russ McPherson' words lighting a candle on HMD:
"For those who are elected to serve the people of Cambridge as City Councillors, there are many civic duties to perform, but for me, this event is particularly poignant and important. It marks the start of the calendar year in Cambridge when we renew our 'Equality Pledge' to affirm the dignity of all people, their right to respect and their right to equal opportunity.
As a city, we seek to create One Cambridge, Fair for All. We value and celebrate the strength that comes from difference and the positive contribution that diversity brings to our community. Our aspiration is for Cambridge and the wider region to be safe, welcoming and inclusive, and I confirm this commitment to you today.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
In Cambridge we are underlining the respect for the UN Declaration for Human Rights which was drawn up in response to the horror of the 17 million systematically murdered with the persecution of groups by the Nazi regime: Jews, Roma and Sinti, Disabled people, Homosexuals, Political and Faith Activists.
At the HMD Civic Ceremony we will be foregrounding the Cambridge City Council Equality Pledge and the UN's 1945 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. If you scroll below you can read the 30 rights and freedoms set out in the UDHR, with links if you would like to find out more about how you can sign-up to the Cambridge City Council Equality Pledge, and further information about human rights activism linking to the Amnesty International Website.
What is the Equality Pledge?
https://www.cambridge.gov.uk/equality-pledge
Cambridge City Council announced their Equality Pledge and invite other groups, be they faith groups or arts organizations or commercial companies to all join in The Equality Pledge:
"We believe in the dignity of all people and their right to respect and equality of opportunity. We value the strength that comes with difference and the positive contribution that diversity brings to our community. Our aspiration is for Cambridge and the wider region to be safe, welcoming and inclusive"
What is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights?
The traumatic events of the Second World War brought home that human rights are not always universally respected. The extermination of almost 17 million people during the Holocaust, including 6 million Jews, horrified the entire world. After the war, governments worldwide made a concerted effort to foster international peace and prevent conflict. This resulted in the establishment of the United Nations in June 1945.
In 1948, representatives from the 50 member states of the United Nations came together under the guidance of Eleanor Roosevelt (First Lady of the United States 1933-1945) to devise a list of all the human rights that everybody across the world should enjoy.
On 10 December 1948, the General Assembly of the United Nations announced the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) - 30 rights and freedoms that belong to all of us. Seven decades on and the rights they included continue to form the basis for all international human rights law.
Eleanor Roosevelt was heavily involved in championing civil rights and social activism. She was appointed chair of the UN Commission on Human Rights which drafted the UDHR. On the tenth anniversary of the UDHR, Eleanor gave a speech at the United Nations called ‘Where Do Human Rights Begin?’. Part of her speech has become famous for capturing the reason why human rights are for every one of us, in all parts of our daily lives:
'Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home - so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person; the neighbourhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.'
Eleanor Roosevelt, 1958
The UDHR marked an important shift by daring to say that all human beings are free and equal, regardless of colour, creed or religion. For the first time, a global agreement put human beings, not power politics, at the heart of its agenda.
The 30 rights and freedoms set out in the UDHR include the right to asylum, the right to freedom from torture, the right to free speech and the right to education. It includes civil and political rights, like the right to life, liberty, free speech and privacy. It also includes economic, social and cultural rights, like the right to social security, health and education.
A summary of the 30 articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Article 1: We are all born free. We all have our own thoughts and ideas and we should all be treated the same way.
Article 2: The rights in the UDHR belong to everyone, no matter who we are, where we’re from, or whatever we believe.
Article 3: We all have the right to life, and to live in freedom and safety.
Article 4: No one should be held as a slave, and no one has the right to treat anyone else as their slave.
Article 5: No one has the right to inflict torture, or to subject anyone else to cruel or inhuman treatment.
Article 6: We should all have the same level of legal protection whoever we are, and wherever in the world we are.
Article 7: The law is the same for everyone, and must treat us all equally.
Article 8: We should all have the right to legal support if we are treated unfairly.
Article 9: Nobody should be arrested, put in prison, or sent away from our country unless there is good reason to do so.
Article 10: Everyone accused of a crime has the right to a fair and public trial, and those that try us should be independent and not influenced by others.
Article 11: Everyone accused of a crime has the right to be considered innocent until they have fairly been proven to be guilty.
Article 12: Nobody has the right to enter our home, open our mail, or intrude on our families without good reason. We also have the right to be protected if someone tries to unfairly damage our reputation.
Article 13: We all have the right to move freely within our country, and to visit and leave other countries when we wish.
Article 14: If we are at risk of harm we have the right to go to another country to seek protection.
Article 15: We all have the right to be a citizen of a country and nobody should prevent us, without good reason, from being a citizen of another country if we wish.
Article 16: We should have the right to marry and have a family as soon as we’re legally old enough. Our ethnicity, nationality and religion should not stop us from being able to do this. Men and women have the same rights when they are married and also when they’re separated. We should never be forced to marry. The government has a responsibility to protect us and our family.
Article 17: Everyone has the right to own property, and no one has the right to take this away from us without a fair reason.
Article 18: Everyone has the freedom to think or believe what they want, including the right to religious belief. We have the right to change our beliefs or religion at any time, and the right to publicly or privately practise our chosen religion, alone or with others.
Article 19: Everyone has the right to their own opinions, and to be able to express them freely. We should have the right to share our ideas with who we want, and in whichever way we choose.
Article 20: We should all have the right to form groups and organise peaceful meetings. Nobody should be forced to belong to a group if they don’t want to.
Article 21: We all have the right to take part in our country’s political affairs either by freely choosing politicians to represent us, or by belonging to the government ourselves. Governments should be voted for by the public on a regular basis, and every person’s individual vote should be secret. Every individual vote should be worth the same.
Article 22: The society we live in should help every person develop to their best ability through access to work, involvement in cultural activity, and the right to social welfare. Every person in society should have the freedom to develop their personality with the support of the resources available in that country.
Article 23: We all have the right to employment, to be free to choose our work, and to be paid a fair salary that allows us to live and support our family. Everyone who does the same work should have the right to equal pay, without discrimination. We have the right to come together and form trade union groups to defend our interests as workers.
Article 24: Everyone has the right to rest and leisure time. There should be limits on working hours, and people should be able to take holidays with pay.
Article 25: We all have the right to enough food, clothing, housing and healthcare for ourselves and our families. We should have access to support if we are out of work, ill, elderly, disabled, widowed, or can’t earn a living for reasons outside of our control. An expectant mother and her baby should both receive extra care and support. All children should have the same rights when they are born.
Article 26: Everyone has the right to education. Primary schooling should be free. We should all be able to continue our studies as far as we wish. At school we should be helped to develop our talents, and be taught an understanding and respect for everyone’s human rights. We should also be taught to get on with others whatever their ethnicity, religion, or country they come from. Our parents have the right to choose what kind of school we go to.
Article 27: We all have the right to get involved in our community’s arts, music, literature and sciences, and the benefits they bring. If we are an artist, a musician, a writer or a scientist, our works should be protected and we should be able to benefit from them.
Article 28: We all have the right to live in a peaceful and orderly society so that these rights and freedoms can be protected, and these rights can be enjoyed in all other countries around the world.
Article 29: We have duties to the community we live in that should allow us to develop as fully as possible. The law should guarantee human rights and should allow everyone to enjoy the same mutual respect.
Article 30: No government, group or individual should act in a way that would destroy the rights and freedoms of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
To find out more about Human Rights issues in the world today and how you can get involved as an individual in the UK to support universal human rights go to: https://www.amnesty.org.uk/what-are-human-rights
