33,771 33,771 33,771

      "I am in blood
      Stepped in so far that, should I wade no more,
      Returning were as tedious as go o'er."
                     (Shakespeare, Macbeth)
     These were the emotions of one who killed only one person. Guilt wracked this being. The play became and remains a springboard to discussions about guilt, innocence, evil, the sanctity of a state and the vile stain of murder.
       33,771. September 28-29, 1941. Wind blowing over a desolate topography, whilst the screams of humanity, of Mama, Papa, Kinder, ripped the air and atmosphere apart,  the blood soaking the ground, the cold faces of the murderers unmoving, as men, women, children, babes in arm, the elderly, all were mowed down in a brutal two day attack, even as the human vultures then rummaged through their shed clothing , searching for usage, for hidden treasures, for profit, even as the ground heaved under its inadequate covering of earth, the dirt of G-d mixing with the blood of His People.
     This was Babi Yar, a place of gruesome murder which took decades - decades - to acknowledge, guilty murderers, most of whom escaped punishment of any meaningful consequence, and a poem, a poem that moved the world, caused its poet much aggravation and punishment, Yevtushenko, a hero of the world.
     In the totality of it all, 33,771 does not seem so large a number, does it? 1.1 million Jews in Auschwitz, millions in Belzec, Treblinka, Sobibor, Dachau, the ghettoes of the conquered countries, the slaughter and torture of the camps, and the echoes of this horror down the ages, never, we hope, to fade out of mind, out of ear, out of hearts and souls. If it were to happen that way, then the evil begins again, picking up on the evil that is around us, Jersey City, Poway, Pittsburgh, anywhere where people are looked at as animals for sacrifice, as vermin, denied of all rights to life, a good life, a productive life, a family life.
     This evil happened because man let it happen. Period. That is all it takes for poison to spew out of control and for millions to die. Genocide did not and will not stop at the Jews, and genocide has happened and is happening today, in this very same world. And that word same is used on purpose, for how much have we changed? Think it would be difficult to find people willing to stand there and shoot others, mow them down like bowling pins? Well, think again and quickly too, for the evil reek is once again permeating the very air we breathe, steeped in the coppery odor of blood as we let, as we allow, as we even encourage, yes, encourage, this evil to flourish again and make no mistakeabout it. Hatred, murder go hand in hand and there is no stopping it as that hatred spreads, consumes group after group until finally, your group is reached. There is no immunity. There is no humanity.
    Today, on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, we mourn the slaughtered, the lives never to be lived,the generatons unborn. We cringe and cower and close our eyes at the graphic pictures. We speak as if we mean this to truly be Never Again, as we remember the victims, the tortured, the brutalized, and yet, listen to some comments as this day is marked. It is 75 years to the day of liberation of Auschwitz, even as only the dead and dying were left behind, the rest on a Death March toHell, dying along the way. What have we learned? Nothing. A great big nothing.
     We tolerate the same nastiness, the same crudity, the same hatred, the same pamphlets and now streams of putrid murderous garbage over our computers and phones, into our very homes and into our minds, turning our souls dark and shutting down the mind and the heart, all the better to kill, to denigrate,to celebrate evil.
     And make no mistake about it. That is what we are doing right now, all over the world, Europe, Asia, South America, and right here in the good old USA. We have an administration that actively engages in spreading this evil as its leader threatens his opponents, threatens to shut down media, to close NPR, to warn others of punishment awaiting them should they cross him, who uses cruel tactics to get his way and never mind the harm to our country, the country he is worn to serve and defend above all else.
     So why again? Why has this grown so deeply rooted once more, with its dark, mottled and ugly blossoms overcrowding and shutting down the beautifully colored flowers of love and peace, of humanity, of brother and sister hood? Why,becasuse we LET. IT. HAPPEN. Plain and simple, three words which lead again to 33,771.
    It leads to my family and others, cousins and aunts and uncles, grandparents, being shot down into mass graves in Lithuania, of being cruelly shipped off to death in Belzec or marched through the Ponary Forest to be dumped into gasoline holding pits, or buried in mass graves in the Ninth Fort. And my family was not alone. There were so many other families, families which are never remembered for their names are gone, wiped out to the last member.
     Is this what we are allowing to happen once again? Are we to allow another Hitler to arise, this one in our own backyard, one who threatens, who torments others in his madness, in his cruelty, in his total unfitness for his job and worse. The worst, the fact that the whole ugliness is right out there for all to see, yet turncoat adherents to the law, to justice, Senators and lawyers meant to uphold this honor and decncy of this country, to punish those who would and indeed have harmed it and plan more, who would turn our president into a monarch above the law, an absolute monarch such as we rebelled against in 1776, and all have gone sour, have sold their souls to the living devil, and sold our country down the road. 
     Do not think that these perpetrators and enablists of evil are immune to this evil they encourage and live every day. No, for they, too, will receive their dues. It will not be pretty. I fear for this country. I fear for its people. I fear for the world and I fear for the planet. All I can see ahead is danger, flashing in big, bold, glaring letters of warning, and all we do is make excuses as we play deaf, dumb and blind to it all, even as we are in it up to our miserable necks.
       Jumped the shark? Over the top? Just read the papers, listen to  unbiased news. Listen to truthtellers. Read the facts for yourself. Ask the question as to what is being hidden other than the proof of guilt. Ask yourself why the Senators of the GOP, the moral worms, feel they must do this turncoat action on their country? And finally, ask yourself, why we let this, why we allow this, why we suborn this, why we sanction and provide implicit and explicit support for this?
     It is often asked where G-d was during all this time, how He allowed this to hapen.Well, He did not, for He has given His Creations, humans, free will and the consequences that ensue. He hopes for the best and when the Creations go insane, when they murder, rape and pillage, when they turn the world into a growing mass of evil, then He cries, and He sits there surrounded by the new angels, those who became such as others slaughtered them. He cried. He wept. And we killed and were killed.
    Do we want this to happen again? Evidently many do and others are too busy, eschewing politics and the news, think they are immune and their lives will continue on. Well, it will not. 
     The Jews of Germany did not believe it would or  could happen. The Jews of the Netherlands believed the same. The Jews of France believed the same. The Jews of Poland knew it could for they were always in the midst of this.And the Jews of America? The decent people of America? 
     Today, after all this, still, we do not believe it. We did not then and we do not believe it now. Even after all the proof of history.
     We are fools. Oh, there are those that know, that do believe, but we are overwhelmed by those who do not, or worse, those who wish it once again. So who are the fools?