RESOLUTION
WHEREAS, January 27 is designated by the United Nations General Assembly as International Holocaust Remembrance Day; and
WHEREAS, The purpose of International Holocaust Remembrance Day is two-fold: to serve as a date for official commemoration of the victims of the Nazi regime and to promote Holocaust education throughout the world; and
WHEREAS, The 2022 theme for International Holocaust Remembrance Day is "Memory, Dignity, and Justice," exploring how preserving the historical record and challenging distortion are elements of claiming justice; and
WHEREAS, The Holocaust, also sometimes referred to as "the Shoah," the Hebrew word for "catastrophe," was the systematic, state-sponsored persecution and murder of six million European Jews, alongside millions of other innocent victims including persons with disabilities, LGBTQ+ individuals, and Roma, by the Nazi German regime and its allies and collaborators that took place between 1933 and 1945; and
WHEREAS, The City of Chicago is home to a vibrant Jewish community that is among the largest in the United States; and
WHEREAS, We stand in solidarity with the Jewish people and remember the victims, survivors, and liberators who, having borne witness to the depths of evil, remind us of the vital refrain: "Never Again;" and
WHEREAS, We must ensure the horrors of the Holocaust can never be erased from our collective memory in order to prevent a tragedy like the Holocaust from happening again; and
WHEREAS, Each new generation should never forget the urgency to speak out whenever they witness antisemitism or any form of ethnic and religious hatred, racism, homophobia, or xenophobia; and
WHEREAS, Remembering the Holocaust is critically important to combat the false narratives of those who deny that it occurred; and
WHEREAS, We should actively rededicate ourselves to the principles of equality, human rights, individual freedom, and equal protection under the laws of a just and democratic society; and
WHEREAS, We must work to eradicate the Nazi-inspired hate that made its appearance at Charlottesville, Virginia, where people wore and displayed Nazi symbols and chanted slogans associated with the Third Reich, to name only the most famous recent example; and
WHEREAS, It is appropriate to work against antisemitism, which has resulted in too much terror and death here in the United States, including in Pittsburgh and recently in Colleyville, Texas; and
WHEREAS, We take advantage of this moment to grieve for those who did not survive the Holocaust and hold dear the Holocaust survivors who made Chicago home; and
WHEREAS, The City of Chicago declares that prejudice, intolerance, bigotry and the discrimination occasioned thereby threaten the rights and proper privileges of the City's inhabitants and menace the institutions and foundation of a free and democratic society; and
WHEREAS, We hold dear our friends in the Jewish community and remember their pain both on this International Holocaust Remembrance Day and on Yom Ha-Shoah, which this year will begin on April 27; now, therefore,
BE IT RESOLVED, that we, the Mayor and the Members of the City Council, assembled this twenty-sixth day of January, 2022, recognize January 27, 2022, International Holocaust Remembrance Day.