My mother and grandparents survived the Holocaust. When I was growing up, I resented how often they read anti-Semitism into seemingly innocuous exchanges. \u201cThey will always hate us,\u201d they warned. I naively dismissed their anxiety as paranoia, and questioned their capacity to move beyond their own pain. Now I recognize how wrong I was.<\/p>\n
Anti-Semitism is hardly a thing of the past; it\u2019s a constant, vicious drumbeat\u2014and it\u2019s louder today than it has been in decades. Anti-Semitism\u2014cloaked and overt, polite and crass\u2014has permeated discourse for millennia. The recent rise in anti-Semitic violence should force us to reevaluate not only the way non-Jews regard Jews, but also the way Jews have come to see themselves through the eyes of those who despise them.<\/p>\n
The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., displays a \u201cScroll of Hitler\u201d\u2014Megillat Hitler, in Hebrew. It tells of the rise of Hitler, the requisition of Jewish property, and the Nazi attempt to deport Jews from North Africa. The Megillat Hitler was written by Prosper Hassine, a scribe from Casablanca. There is a copy of the scroll on display at Yad Vashem, Israel\u2019s Holocaust museum in Jerusalem. This copy, according to the museum\u2019s archives, was once owned by the Corcos family. They fled to Casablanca from Florence in 1939, hoping to escape the fate of other European Jews.<\/p>\n
The scroll is modeled after the Scroll of Esther, a biblical story that has its own Hitler: the Persian courtier Haman.<\/p>\n
Read it all<\/a>.<\/p>\n Anti-Semitism is hardly a thing of the past; it\u2019s a constant, vicious drumbeat\u2014and it\u2019s louder today than it has been in decades.https:\/\/t.co\/KI4Llg6hE8<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 First Things (@firstthingsmag) February 1, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n