Has Mankind Learned Its Lesson From Auschwitz?

Franklin Graham: Has Mankind Learned Its Lesson From Auschwitz?

Rev. Franklin Graham

While I was preaching the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ in Kraków, Poland, this spring, I visited the infamous Auschwitz concentration camp, where 1.3 million people, mostly Jews, were held captive, tortured, raped and murdered almost 80 years ago. Multitudes were gassed to death with cyanide, and their bodies then put into ovens and incinerated. In total, the brutal Nazi regime slaughtered more than 6 million Jews across Europe during the Second World War.

Auschwitz made me wonder if mankind has learned a lesson. Could such virulent antisemitism ever erupt again? 

It didn’t take too long to find out.

I had planned to visit some missionary friends in the Middle East following the Festival in Kraków, but those plans were interrupted when airspace in the region was closed in the aftermath of Iran’s April 14 attack on Israel. Iran, a terrorist state, launched more than 300 missiles and drones against Israel. Thanks to defensive assistance from the United States, U.K., and regional forces, most were shot down. Otherwise, many Jewish citizens might have perished—perhaps even more than the 1,200 who died last October when Israel was attacked by Hamas, Iran’s agents on Israel’s border. 

After returning home, I was stunned to see the surge of raucous anti-Israel demonstrations across this nation. From coast to coast, loud protesters filled streets and took over college campuses, not only claiming to support Palestinians but also raging against Israel. The protesters seemed oblivious to the brutality of Hamas, which butchered men, women and children; decapitated babies; and ripped women’s wombs open in the Oct. 7 raid on Israel.

Incredibly, college campuses such as Columbia, NYU, Harvard, MIT and Yale—supposedly where America’s best and brightest are educated—were filled with hateful rants and deadly threats from pro-Hamas supporters. It was hard to fathom, given the fact that radical Islam rules the entire Gaza strip, where women are oppressed and demeaned. Do you suppose the young women who demonstrated so fervently for Hamas would actually want to live under their rule? 

A poll of Generation Z voters—which encompasses today’s college students—found that nearly half believe Israel’s campaign against Hamas is unjust. One-third of Gen Z thinks Israel does not have the right to exist as a country.

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