Your report (Westminster council opposes plan to build Holocaust memorial, 11 February) was disturbing. The council’s concerns about the loss of public green space in a busy location are misplaced. The power of a Holocaust memorial near institutions and icons of the government imparts the message that needs to be heard. The heritage we should pass to future generations is that genocide is inhumane and unacceptable. The US Holocaust Memorial Museum is on the mall in Washington DC, near the Capitol, the Smithsonian and other major national structures. (I was a member of the President’s Commission on the Holocaust and of the first US Holocaust Memorial Council that created the museum in Washington, DC.)
I understand the desire for open spaces but the moral vacuum created by not locating the Holocaust memorial near the pulse and heart of government defeats our goal to maintain civilization. Remembrance of the Nazis’ crimes against humanity should not be hidden from maximum public view. The massive Holocaust memorial in Berlin demonstrates the power of location and the statement that it makes.
Steven A Ludsin
East Hampton, New York
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