This morning, I went to the Dallas Holocaust Museum with my parents.  It is currently housed in temporary quarters a block behind the old Book Depository which houses the Sixth Floor (JFK) Museum.  Due to the temporary nature of the exhibits, the space is relatively small.  Nevertheless it is extremely well done, catering mostly to high school classes who come there for field trips.  I was personally familiar with most of what was on display, but there was one part of the exhibit relating to a "The Bermuda Conference" with which I wasn't familiar.  The  conference was a futile effort by the Allies to come up with a plan for rescuing Jews from Europe during the war (held at a luxury resort of course).

We were lucky enough to be present for a lecture and slide show presentation given by the museum's founder, holocaust survivor Mike Jacobs. At first, I was interested in going more to see the reaction of the hundred or so mostly gentile high school students than to hear Mr. Jacobs' personal history.  I had recently read several fiction and non-fiction books relating to the Holocaust, aside from learning extensively about the subject since I was little, and didn't really feel the need to hear more right then and there. I am now incredibly embarrassed that I even entertained those feelings.

It's one thing to read an account of Nazi torture and barbarism in a book.  It's quite another to listen to a man as he tells the story of German soldiers throwing babies out of top-floor windows and shooting at them on the way down as he was forced to watch, helpless to do anything.  You could see Mr. Jacob's eyes move up towards the ceiling as he began the story, obviously reliving the scene in his mind at that very moment.

The students were extremely well-behaved (aside from the one girl who couldn't figure out how to put here phone on "vibrate"). Of the few questions offered up at the end, two students just commented on how much respect they had for Mr. Jacobs while thanking him for sharing his story with them.  I'll never know what the majority of the kids were thinking, but I left feeling good about the future after leaving the lecture.  As a Jew, it is sometimes hard to imagine that anyone could grow up in this country not knowing much about the Holocaust given the significant media attention given to the subject.  And yet.....

Below is a rendering of the new building that the museum is hoping to erect, with the large yahrzeit-candle style detail on one corner.



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I meant to post this awhile ago, but never got around to it.

Hate crime charges have been dropped against the five Jewish teens arrested for attacking a Pakistani man outside a Midwood Dunkin’ Donuts late last year.  Several of the teens are still up on assault charges though that can bring a sentence of up to 15 years in jail.