October 7, 2023 Through The Prism Of The Holocaust

At 10 a.m. on April 14, 2026, sirens sounded throughout Israel. Instead of running toward the closest safe room, Israelis stopped whatever they were doing, stood tall, and bowed their heads in reflection on the murder of millions of our brothers and sisters. Yom HaShoah, also known as the Day of Remembrance and Heroism, had officially begun.

The evening before Yom HaShoah, many people attended a variety of ceremonies marking this tragic period of Jewish history and the attempt by Nazi Germany to eradicate the Jewish people. At a virtual reality presentation, we followed the life of Avigdor Neumann, a Czechoslovakian Jew born in Velká Sevljuš in 1931. Avigdor, then a 12-year-old son of a prominent Hasidic leader, was separated from his family and survived Auschwitz, Mauthausen, cattle cars, and death marches. He rose from the ashes and established a family that now numbers nearly 60 individuals.

During the telling of Avigdor’s story, photos of piles of shoes, eyeglasses, and hair flashed before my eyes in virtual reality. These images reminded me of the piles of burned and bullet-ridden cars left behind by Hamas terrorists at the Nova festival on October 7, 2023. On that day, 378 people were brutally and gleefully murdered at Nova, and another 50 were taken into the dark dungeons of captivity. Only half returned alive. In all, on October 7, 2023, Hamas succeeded in killing more than 1,200 people, capturing more than 250, and wounding over 5,000—mostly civilians.

The Holocaust and the Hamas massacre are not comparable in scale. Yet their underlying goal is the same: the destruction of the Jewish people. The Nazis, in word and deed, planned, initiated, and carried out a genocide against the Jews under their dominion. Similarly, the Hamas charter of 1988 specifically states: “The Day of Judgment will not come about until Muslims fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say, ‘O Muslims, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him.’” This article in the Hamas charter has never been repudiated. Indeed, in a sermon on April 7, 2023, Hamas official Hamad El Regeb prayed for the destruction of Jews as an entity.

Thank G-d, due to Israel’s resilience and superior military power, Hamas was unable to fulfill its genocidal ambitions. However, one cannot ignore their writings and rhetoric. Given the opportunity, there is no doubt they would kill as many Jews as they could. Genocide of the Jewish nation remains their aim.

Yom HaShoah begins a week of introspection in Israel that culminates in Yom HaZikaron (Israel Memorial Day), when the nation remembers those who fell in our wars and from terrorism. The nation honors sons and daughters who gave their lives to protect our freedom and independence. Such sacrifice is not new to the Jewish people. We remain determined to prevail over all enemies, and we will not submit to those who seek our destruction.

Avigdor Neumann survived against all odds and evil forces and replanted his seed in the Holy Land. He will stand tall this Yom Haatzmaut, knowing that with Hashem’s help, he and his fellow Jews will continue to thrive—while those who seek our destruction will ultimately be erased from history.

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Dr. Fred Naider is a former Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs at the College of Staten Island and a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Biochemistry and Chemistry at the City University of New York. He lives in Rehovot. The views expressed are his own.