Strasbourg, 28 January 2010

We live in difficult times. The History challenges our minds every minute. It is true that the planet is threatened, the economic crises decimate the most vulnerable, and we have difficulty in responding to the violent events that affect us. At the same time, there are areas which can not accept flexibility. Regardless of convictions or beliefs that are ours.

The desecration of the memory exceeds our supposed divisions. The Holocaust is seen as a lesson absorbed by each person who shares the territories where we live and which convey universal values. The Holocaust is a resurgence of the darkness of the human soul responding to the xenophobic instincts that are exists in every people and unfortunately which are never disappeared from our societies. This is a blatant failure of pedagogy in this area while the rise of discourse of intolerance resonates each passing day. This situation needs an urgent review.

The desecration of Jewish cemetery in Strasbourg on 27 January 2010, at a time when we commemorate the Holocaust on the forecourt of the Council of Europe is a strong message towards our fellow citizens and their leaders. The Jew is a symbol in Europe when we talk about racial and religious hatred. In fact, despite substantial educational efforts to counter anti-Semitism, it is more than ever the main target of extremists of all stripes. This does not reassure us, nor for social cohesion neither for social peace.

In recent years, the Muslim has joined the Jew in this unenviable condition by the restriction of his fundamental rights and freedoms. The right-wing extremism is based on ignorance, legends and fears. Sometimes extremism is fed by other extremisms. For example, extremism perpetrated in the name of Islam is systematically relayed by an extremist reaction in our society. Extremists of all stripes formed one family.
Today we are wounded and we are bleeding by the attack towards the Jewish cemetery of the capital of Europe. We assure this community of our solidarity because we know their injuries through our experience of such attacks repeatedly.

FILIZ Veysel
Vice-Chair