TIMES OF ISRAEL
‘Inner Nazi’ or ‘Never Again’ Jew — Which Are You?
by Yishai Fleisher
May 5, 2016

…Many Liberal Jews believe the main lesson of the Six Million is that we Jews should never do to others what was done to us. We know first hand what the horrors of hatred look like, and therefore, we must distance ourselves in every possible way from behaviors which are like those of the Nazis. This way of thinking posits that every mortal person has the potential to be a Nazi and when given power, every human and even every Jew can become abusive. But after the Holocaust, we Jews were tasked with being more ethical and virtuous than the barbarians. We took it upon ourselves to be the archetype of restraint, lest our very human Inner-Nazi is unleashed and we end up mirroring the tormentors we escaped. I call the folks in this camp Fear-of-Inner-Nazi Jews. The other perspective is very different. It posits that the main lesson of the Holocaust is that Jews, having survived the hell of the Holocaust as a people, should Never Again allow anyone to do that to us again. READ MORE