|
Link to letter on NYTimes site |
Published: February 11, 2004
To the Editor:
You quote Abraham Foxman, the national director of the Anti-Defamation League, as saying in response to a remark by Mel Gibson about the Holocaust, "He doesn't begin to understand the difference between dying in a famine and people being cremated solely for what they are" ("Gibson to Delete a Scene in `Passion,' " Arts pages, Feb. 4).
Mr. Gibson had said in an interview: "The Second World War killed tens of millions of people. Some of them were Jews in concentration camps. . . . In the Ukraine several million starved to death between 1932 and 1933."
Comments like Mr. Foxman's undermine the gravity of the atrocities committed against the Ukrainian people. Between 7 million and 10 million Ukrainians were systematically starved to death in 1932-33 simply because of who they were and because of their resistance to Soviet dominance.
To play down and deny that shows a blatant disregard and insensitivity to a nation that suffered under an oppressive regime.
Mr. Foxman should realize that all genocides should be reviled rather than categorized.
MICHAEL SAWKIW JR.
President, Ukrainian Congress Committee of America
Washington, Feb. 5, 2004