Shoah, Nissan, and the Memory the Nations Impose

by Ram ben Ze’ev

Shoah, Nissan, and the Memory the Nations Impose

There are moments in the life of our people when silence is appropriate, and there are moments when it is necessary to speak with clarity. I was not going to write on the day itself, because the day—יום הזכרון לשואה ולגבורה (Yom HaZikaron LaShoah VeLaGevurah – Day of Remembrance for the Shoah and the Heroism)—deserves dignity, not distraction.

But there are times when remaining silent serves no purpose, and this is one of them. Even as the day unfolds, we are obligated to examine not only what we remember, but how and why we remember it.

The modern State of Israel formally established this day in 1951, fixing it on the 27th of ניסן (Nissan). The intention was clear: to commemorate both the destruction of European Jewry and the acts of גבורה (Gevurah – heroism), particularly the uprising in Warsaw. The desire to emphasise Jewish strength alongside suffering is understandable. It is even admirable. But the question that must be asked is whether such a day should ever have been fixed within Nissan at all.

The Torah already defines the spiritual character of time. Nissan is not a neutral month. It is the month of גאולה (Geulah – redemption), the month in which our nation was taken out of מצרים. It is a time in which mourning is restricted, not expanded. This is not a matter of preference or politics; it is a matter of alignment with the Torah itself. The greatest Torah authorities of the previous generation understood this clearly and objected accordingly. Their opposition was not rooted in indifference to the suffering of our people—G-D forbid—but in a deeper understanding: that we do not reshape sacred time to accommodate history; we understand history through the framework of sacred time.

To establish a formal day of mourning within Nissan is to introduce a contradiction into the very fabric of the calendar. It places grief where the Torah has placed redemption. It replaces the eternal rhythm of our people with a modern, state-driven construct. That is why those גדולי התורה objected, and it is why that objection remains valid today.

But there is a second issue, one that is rarely spoken about openly.

Across the world, nations have created their own “Holocaust Remembrance Days.” These are presented as acts of solidarity, as if the nations are standing with us in memory. But one must ask a simple and uncomfortable question: why do they feel the need to do so? If this were truly about support for the Jewish people, then where is that support in the present? Why, in a time of unprecedented global communication and awareness, is antisemitism not declining, but rising? Why do we see hostility, distortion, and hatred re-emerging in the very societies that claim to remember?

The answer is not found in their words, but in their actions.

These days of “remembrance” often function not as acts of unity, but as instruments of narrative. They universalise what was uniquely Jewish. They transform the Shoah into a general lesson about humanity, rather than a specific, targeted destruction of the Jewish people. And more troubling still, they serve as a subtle warning—a reminder of what was done, and, perhaps, what could be done again.

Even the language imposed upon us reveals something deeper. The insistence on the word “Holocaust”—a Greek term meaning a burnt offering—is not incidental. It reframes the Shoah in terms that are foreign to Torah, foreign to Jewish understanding, and deeply inappropriate.

Our people were not an offering. They were victims of a calculated, industrialised attempt to annihilate Am Yisrael. The correct word is שואה, a term that conveys devastation without theological distortion. To insist on another word is to impose another framework.

We must be honest with ourselves. Memory is not neutral. The way something is remembered shapes the meaning that is drawn from it. When the State fixes remembrance in Nissan, it risks conflicting with the Torah’s definition of time. When the nations establish their own days, they risk reshaping the narrative to suit their own purposes. And when foreign language is imposed, it risks distorting the very nature of what occurred.

None of this diminishes the importance of remembrance itself. On the contrary, it strengthens it. Because true remembrance must be rooted in truth, in Torah, and in the identity of our people—not in the frameworks of others.

We remember the שואה as Jews.

We define it in our own language.

We place it within the structure that G-D gave us.

And we do so not because it is popular, but because it is true.

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Bill White (Ram ben Ze'ev) is CEO of WireNews Limited, Mayside Partners Limited, MEADHANAN Agency, Kestrel Assets Limited, SpudsToGo Limited and Executive Director of Hebrew Synagogue