By Dorian de Wind
Boris Romantschenko, 96, was laid to rest March 24 in a simple funeral held in haste during a lull in the bombing of his hometown of Kharkiv and attended only by four loved ones — one of them his granddaughter, Julia Romantschenko.
The Los Angeles Times has a moving article about his funeral.
A survivor of the Holocaust, Romantschenko was not a Jew, but he “found solace in remembrance…was active in memorial organizations dedicated to ensuring that Nazi cruelties were not forgotten.”
And it was one of those organizations, the Buchenwald Memorial, that mourned his death noting how “the horrific death of Boris Romantschenko shows how threatening the war in Ukraine is for the concentration camp survivors…”
Romantschenko’s life story so tightly knitted to the Holocaust and his tragic death in yet another genocide, prompted this author to ask if we can respectfully (of the Holocaust) say ‘”Never Again.”
Romantschenko was killed by indiscriminate Russian bombing of the Ukrainian town of Kharkiv.
His death is the direct result of the murderous invasion by Russian President Vladimir Putin perversely alleging that one goal is to “denazify” Ukraine.
You see, Romantschenko is a Holocaust survivor.
Romantschensko, born in 1926 on a farm near the Ukrainian city of Sumy, survived years of Nazi hard labor and imprisonments at four Nazi concentration camps during World War II.
Several news sources have mourned his death.
Reuters “headlined” it as “WWII Holocaust survivor killed in Ukraine’s Kharkiv”; the Huffington Post as “Russian Strike Kills Holocaust Survivor In Ukraine.” The Times of Israel wrote “96-year-old Holocaust survivor killed in Russian shelling of Kharkiv.” The Times immediately makes it clear that “Boris Romantschenko…was not Jewish.”
The Buchenwald Memorial, commenting on Mr. Romantschenko’s death, said, “The horrific death of Boris Romantschenko shows how threatening the war in Ukraine is for the concentration camp survivors…” noting that “there are still approximately 42,000 survivors of Nazi crimes living in Ukraine.”
Others had more pointed references to the Holocaust.
“Putin managed to ‘accomplish’ what even Hitler couldn’t,” Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said on its Twitter account.
Ukraine’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dmytro Kuleba, called it an “unspeakable crime” and wrote in a Washington Post op-ed, “For decades, world leaders bowed their heads at war memorials across Europe and solemnly proclaimed: ‘Never again,’ adding, “The time has come to prove those were not empty words.”
A week ago, Zeleneskiy – who is Jewish — indirectly invoked the Holocaust in an emotional address to the German Parliament. “‘Never Again’ has been the slogan but now it looks like it doesn’t mean anything…” he said.
In what may be an understatement, the Jerusalem Post wrote: “Invoking the Holocaust era in Germany is touchy: The country’s elites are loath to liken any post-Holocaust event as equivalent to the World War II era, fearing that they would be seen as seeking to diminish the unprecedented scope of the genocide.”
But when, a few days later in an address to the Israeli Knesset, Zeleneskiy once again drew comparisons between Russia’s invasion of his country and the Holocaust, all hell broke loose.
Jewish politicians and Jewish groups were especially outraged by Zeleneskiy “seemingly ignoring some Ukrainians’ complicity in the Nazi-led genocide.”
“War is always a terrible thing…but every comparison between a regular war, as difficult as it is, and the extermination of millions of Jews in gas chambers in the framework of the Final Solution is a complete distortion of history,” Yuval Steinitz, who serves as part of Israel’s Likud Party, said in a statement.
There were, however, a few conciliatory and understanding reactions among Jewish officials, some even supportive of the “distressed” president.
Among them, Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Foreign Minister Yair Lapid. They have both indicated that while they do not agree with Zelenskyy’s characterization of Holocaust history, they are “prepared to cut him slack because of the desperate situation his country faces.”
Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid said in a statement: “I reiterate my condemnation of the attack on Ukraine and thank President Zelensky for sharing his feelings and the distress of the Ukrainian people with members of the Israeli Knesset and government….We will continue to provide assistance to the Ukrainian people in any way that we can and will never turn our backs on the plight of people who have experienced the horrors of war…”
Jews and good people everywhere cringe when the worst genocide in history, the Shoah, and any of its almost sacred references, such as “Never Again,” are misused, distorted, “trivialized.” And rightly so, as such can diminish the horror and inhumanity of the slaughter of over six million human beings.
Much has been written on invoking the Holocaust in its “universal sense” and in its “particular” or “unique sense.” The latter focusing on the specific impact on and lessons for Jews and Israel.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who tends toward the unique sense when invoking the Holocaust, used the phrase “Never Again” in its universal sense when, in 2010, referring to the Rwanda genocide, he wrote, “We are deeply moved by the memorial to the victims of one history’s greatest crimes — and reminded of the haunting similarities to the genocide of our own people. Never again.”
Just one year later, then-U.S. president Barack Obama, marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day, also used “Never Again” in its universal sense.
He said: “We are reminded to remain ever-vigilant against the possibility of genocide, and to ensure that Never Again is not just a phrase but a principled cause…And we resolve to stand up against prejudice, stereotyping, and violence – including the scourge of anti-Semitism – around the globe.”
In a 2018 Jerusalem Post piece, “‘Never Again’: From a Holocaust phrase to a universal phrase,” Emily Burack, explained how “Never Again” continues to “evolve.” At the time of her writing, the phrase was used after the horrific Parkland, Florida, school shootings.
Burack notes how even Elie Wiesel, Holocaust survivor and Nobel Laureate, used “Never Again” in its universal sense in 2012.
Today, twelve years later, as thousands are being murdered and millions displaced in Ukraine and as the tragedy takes on more and more the semblance of genocide and diaspora, one should — without trivializing or diminishing it — be able to respectfully and with urgency, refer to the Holocaust
Boris Romantschenko was not a Jew.
Roman Romantschenko was captured by Nazis during the Holocaust and imprisoned in Hitler’s death camps.
Roman Romantschenko’s country has been invaded by Russia, falsely claiming Ukraine must be “denazified” and he was murdered by Russians using Nazi-like tactics.
The Ukrainian president is a Jew. He says his great-grandparents were killed when their village was set on fire by the Nazis during the Holocaust.
Is it so wrong for Romantschenko’s granddaughter and for the thousands of others whose loved ones have been murdered by Putin, to tug at the world’s conscience with sincere reminders of the Holocaust?
Is it so wrong for the leader of a nation whose people are about to be decimated to implore for help with every rhetorical persuasion tool that could help save one more man, woman, child?
Rachel Sharansky Danziger, a Jerusalem-born author, whose grandfather’s mother and grandfather’s siblings “are ashes in Ukraine,” captures my thoughts on this issue best.
In a piece about how Zelenskiy “misspoke” when imploring Israel for help “in the name of those few Ukrainians who saved Jews… while ignoring the others, so many more others, who, directly and indirectly, helped Jews, including [Danziger’s] family, to their deaths” she sees in the Ukrainian leader “a man who is fighting for his people…a man who is moved by despair…a man whose ancestors are ashes too, victims of the same Holocaust, so it’s not as though he is shamelessly appropriating other people’s tragedy.”
She concludes: “It is so easy to argue over details, over rhetoric, over the past. But it’s the present that demands our attention right now. And in the present, we are not called upon to debate history. We are called upon to decide what is good and what is evil. What is right and what is wrong.”
Amen!
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Dorian de Wind is a retired U.S. Air Force officer and a writer. This article appeared initially on The Moderate Voice website, with which San Diego Jewish World trades stories under auspices of the San Diego Online News Association.
Some may say what is happening in the Ukraine is cruel. Yet it does not compare the cruelty of Ukrainian people’s collaboration with the Nazis on the children of Israel. Hashem chooses the time and place to punish those who engage in bad measures. Who is to say … middah k’neged middah … that Hashem has not chosen Ukraine in 2022?
What we see today are unspeakable horrors being perpetrated on innocent human beings – some perhaps children and grandchildren of Ukrainian collaborators during World War II. However, I do not believe that Hashem would want to see the cruelty and savagery we see committed in Ukraine today being unleashed on children and grandchildren, even on descendants of the Nazis. But that’s just my view.