A week after the controversial clearance of the so-called Calais ‘jungle’ began, the final 1,500 refugee children have been moved from the camp this morning. With this demolition, our attention has once again been drawn to the ongoing migrant crisis and yet another comparison to Nazi Germany has been made.
Last week, Clare Moseley, founder of the charity Care4Calais, became the latest addition to the growing list of those who have drawn the comparison between Jewish victims of the Holocaust and twenty-first century refugees. Indeed, her comment that “the way the French people treat the refugees sometimes can feel very much like cattle” seems to suggest that there are parallels between the French government’s treatment of migrants at Calais and the Nazi’s persecution of Jews. But such a comparison serves only to trivialise and offend.
Undeniably, the treatment of migrants and refugees at Calais has been less than ideal with them being made to sleep in shipping containers and randomly allocated beds without consideration of factors such as age, gender or religion. Likewise, regular outbreaks of violence between the French police and the camp’s inhabitants have made the camp an uncomfortable environment.
However, suggestions that the actions of French authorities are in any way equivalent to the Nazis’ systematic persecution and murder of six million Jews are unacceptable. Whilst the treatment of refugees ought to be criticised, such assertions are incredibly inaccurate, trivialise the Holocaust and cause offence to survivors, their families and the Jewish community. Certainly, this is evident in the response from Stephen Pollard, editor of the Jewish Chronicle, that “this comparison demonstrates astonishing ignorance as well as grotesque inhumanity”.
Unfortunately, these comparisons are not uncommon. Recently, singer Lily Allen made reference to Hitler in an article she penned for Vice Magazine. Of course, it’s understandable that she wanted to use a powerful comparison to encourage greater action to support refugees, but her casual reference is a horrific reality which survivors living in Britain today have endured and experienced first-hand.
But whilst direct comparisons between the Refugee Crisis and the Nazi Persecution are clearly inappropriate, the contemporary lessons from the Holocaust are certainly relevant. Survivors who came to Britain on the Kindertransport have repeatedly urged the government to support refugees. Furthermore, the government’s agreement to allow refugee children into Britain, under the recent Dubs Amendment, can be seen partly as a result of persuasion by Alf Dubs, a Kindertransport refugee.
Inaccurate and oversimplified comparisons to the Holocaust, not only in relation to the migrant crisis but also topics such as the US presidential election which has seen numerous comparisons of Trump and Hitler, must be avoided. That is not to condone the actions of the French in Calais, Britain for not doing more in light of the refugee crisis, or Trump’s xenophobic rhetoric, but simply because none of these is on the same level as the Holocaust or Nazi persecution. Suggestions otherwise are inaccurate, short-sighted and offensive.
Lessons Since Auschwitz 