Maribor school excursion flyer Photo: Mario Profaca
A producer on Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List, Croatian born Branko Lustig, was boycotted in Croatia after telling Zadar primary school children (of Catholic faith who also have Religion as part of school education curriculum) – God doesn’t exist. A Minister in the current Croatian government, swiftly picked up on this boycott with subtle but oppressive and calculated denial of religious freedom that would ultimately benefit the cause of taking the focus away from Communist crimes (WWII and throughout the duration of Former Yugoslavia) and mass murders and ethnic cleansing perpetrated by Serbs against Croatian people between 1991 and August 1995.
On Wednesday 26 September, as part of “Modern Jewish Film Festival Zagreb”, Lustig appeared in the coastal city of Zadar to show to primary school children his film “The Last Flight of Petr Ginz” ( Petr Ginz was a Czechoslovak boy of partial Jewish background who was deported to the Terezín concentration camp during the Holocaust. He died at the age of sixteen when he was transferred to Auschwitz concentration camp and gassed).
Prior to showing the film, Lustig delivered a lecture to the seventh and eighth graders during which he said: “God does not exist for me, I do not believe in God. If God existed he would not have allowed the Holocaust to occur, the horrible torture and murders of Jews in Nazi camps, as in Auschwitz camp where I ended up at the age of 11. He wouldn’t have allowed the Srebrenica massacres during the recent war…”
Lustig’s words shocked the school children, and their parents. After all, as Catholics, as Christians, they have been taught to accept God’s will without rebuke, without denying His existence, no matter how harsh His will may at times fall.
Then Lustig told these school children that the film blames the Christian church for the Wars of the Crusaders and that if schools don’t teach their pupils that there were in history Crusader Wars then these schools are very bad schools.
Lustig’s final message to Zadar’s school children that there mustn’t be hatred and divisions between them seems to have, justifiably, fallen on deaf ears or considered bigoted as on Thursday 27 September, in Knin (the town cleansed of Croatians during Serb aggression against Croatia in the early 1990’s), school children boycotted his appearance and the showing of the same film.
Well, Lustig threw a doozy of a tantrum regarding the boycotting of his film in Knin. He expressed profound disappointment and accused, seemingly without any evidence whatsoever, the Principal of Knin’s school of telling his pupils not to attend. Croatian media picked up swiftly; scandal of big proportions erupted as some paddled and wielded their evil tongues in the direction of WWII persecution of Jews by some parts of Croatian population. At the same time parents of school children in Knin were heard, and reported by the media, saying words to this effect: I don’t want my children hearing this blasphemy that occurred in Lustig’s lecture in Zadar.
Lustig, in his bitterness and wounded pride of an Oscar winner, went so far as saying “if in my country I cannot say what I think and feel then fuck democracy.”
To this I would normally say “Hoorah! Bravo, Lustig!” But I cannot; I must not because he does not in this case deserve it!
Lustig gives himself the right to preach and practice democracy and yet denies the same to the Christian children and families who refused to hear his offences against their God.
Also, politically wired undercurrents swelled in this whole affair and there were those who associated the Knin’s school children’s film boycott with the World War II Ustashi collaboration with Nazi Germany. Suggesting that roots of antisemitism are still crawling about Croatia in the form of President Ivo Josipovic’s metaphoric “Ustashi snake”.
The Croatian government did not lift a finger in the defense of religious freedom of their citizens in this whole affair. In fact, oppression and fear mongering became the order of the day, as journalist Mario Profaca writes on Dnevno.hr portal:
“Caught at the very dawn of 2nd October 2012, in the net of Marija Gerbec Njavro’s Croatian Radio First Program, who bashed fear into their bones with her interview with Ivo Goldstein, Davor Gjenero and the minister for sciences, education and sport, Zeljko Jovanovic, especially as the Minister repeated his assessment that the Knin boycott of Branko Lustig’s film was a ‘second holocaust’, the parents of fourth grade High School children from Zagreb took their children to the bus terminal in silence …
From there, buses took their children, at their own cost, to a compulsory ‘field lesson’ to Maribor where they will visit the Jewish Square and the synagogue. That excursion costs 205 Kunas per person, including health insurance for eventual ‘accidents within Croatia’, and they have insurance beyond Croatia’s borders if they’ve paid an extra 30 Kunas per person.
Parents’ response is totally understandable, given that a boycott of this excursion would be marked as absence from (field) school lessons, and in line with the already known opinion of minister for sciences, education and sport, Zeljko Jovanovic, for Jews this would be – a third Holocaust.”
The politically and anti-democratically calculated content of this school excursion to Maribor shocks even more when we realise that it does not include a visit to Tezno, a suburb of Maribor where a mass grave from Communist crimes is! The mass grave holds the remains of more than 15,000 Croatian innocent people and Home Guards who perished there in the post WWII Communist purges. In their multitudes mass graves of Communist crimes, across the territory of Former Yugoslavia, compared by population magnitude, put the Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime crimes to minor categories; and Tezno mass grave twice the size of Srebrenica 1995!
On his Facebook page Mario Profaca also comments on the Croatian Radio Program episode, referred to above, that “Ivo Goldstein was embittered by the Knin boycott of Lustig’s film who said that watching the film ‘would be an opportunity for the children to learn something about their own history, not only the one from 1941 to 1945 but also the one from 1991 to 1995’.
With that, ‘historian’ Ivo Goldstein has scandalously drawn an analogy between the WWII Holocaust of Jews with the Serbs in the so-called Serb Republic of Krajina during Croatia’s Homeland War.”
Giving a just dessert to the swept-and-mesmerised-by-left-winds journalists of Slobodna Dalmacija newspaper, who in their write-ups on Lustig’s “Godless” existence ask when one should reveal to Croatian children that God doesn’t exist, Dnevno.hr journalist Zvonimir Hodak skilfully extricates a sobering thought:
“If it’s normal for Lustig to force his atheistic views upon children, why would it be abnormal for the Catholic majority in Croatia comprising of 85% of people to react to that”.
The fact that Goldstein thrust his twisted, anti-Croatian, pro-Communist finger into this twisted pie which accompanied Lustig’s film doesn’t surprise me at all. It just saddens me for the fact that it suggests justice for victims of Communist crimes is still far, far away. I know, everyone knows, that Goldstein justifies Communist crimes and sees them as acceptable ways of dealing with WWII woes and foes regardless of the fact that just like Jews, millions of innocent men, women and children were exterminated (by the Communists). Judging from his book “A History”, where Goldstein talks of Serb revenge upon Croatians and Muslims for Serbs perished in the Holocaust, it’s easy to see that his justification of mass murders committed by Serbs in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina during 1990’s could be viewed (without due condemnation?) as “Serbian revenge for the killings of Serb during WWII”. The fact that Serbs attacked and brutally murdered Croatians and Muslims during 1990’s because they did not want democratic regimes splitting Yugoslavia, the fact that they tried to murder in its bud the democracy that feeds him, means nothing to him.
Not OK. Not acceptable. Not Just. Not humane.
With all respect to Lustig’s film and its message, the humane world must see that Knin boycott of the film was, as journalist Miro Matesic from Dnevno.hr says, simply the exercise of choice that democracy guarantees, or should guarantee. No more, no less. Ina Vukic, Prof. (Zgb); B.A., M.A.Ps. (Syd)
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I can’t believe you wrote this, incredulously, it seems you believe what you’ve written. This is a pure one-sided pro-catholic/christian/believer rant.
Croatia is already a land blinded to any truth not sanctioned by the catholic church, even to the point where well intentioned parents withdraw their children from a school due to one person extolling an anti believers position. Forgetting all the red herrings about ustache, partizans etc etc, this was merely an educated and experienced man who made and justified (to his satisfaction one presumes) why he does not believe in god. Against this position are the huge resources of organised religion but, despite this massive imbalance, he is condemned. We need more people like him, we must challenge the default position about religion and rely on reason and evidence to make up our minds individually. There is no such thing as a catholic country, or any other religion, unless we are a nation of sheep.
Pavao, it is the civilised practice of every civilised nation that parents of children have a right to bring up their children according to their own family traditions and beliefs. I’m certain Lustig would have reacted the same way as the Knin parents were he in a situation where someone tried to rubbish his Jewish religion to his own underage child. The post is not about Catholic religion or protecting it generally, the post is about lack of respect for peoples’ rights and the failure in some Croatian leaders to honour personal choices people make when it comes to seeing films or hearing lectures. Why should people be forced to see something or hear someone they don’t want to hear? Lustig and anyone can believe in whatever he wants, that is a private matter but to blame God, or Abraham, or Alah … for crimes committed by men is taking it too far when it comes to children who simply do not have the intellectual, the reasoning capacity to properly process such information without feeling distress and confusion. No one says that Croatia is a Catholic country, but the children who boycotted were Catholics and their (or their parents’) belief is just as valuable as those of any other religion. I think you’re a bit confused – the parents in question were indeed well intentioned – their intention was to protect their children from what they personally perceived as blasphemy.
It’s pretty obvious Pavao that the problem is not with what Lustig said but the reaction parts of the media and some politicians had to the withdrawing of children from hearing his lecture. It is simple, Lustig has a right to say what he wants and he did. Then knowing what his lecture was about and what he would say to their children, parents in Knin decided to abstain their children from hearing it to which they are rightfully allowed to do. Both Lustig’s freedom to say what he felt and the parents’ freedom not the let their children hear it based on relgious grounds are what democracy is about.
What was not democratic was the reaction of those who started to make connections with this action and Ustase, recent or past war related matters etc. Especially insulting is to hear a minister use terms like ‘second holocaust’ in terms of parents expressing their democratic right to freedom of religion.
Lustig can say what he wants and those who want to listen are allowed to listen, those who do not should not be forced to. If the media and politicians simply left it at that then there would be no issue. So no Pavao, this has nothing to do with being a christian/catholic/believer rant, it is a rant on the right to democratic freedom.
Right on Felix. Somehow the young people and grown ups in Croatia are expected to give up their democratic rights because someone has a different religious belief to them. The idea of having to “grovel” to someone one disagrees with because of historical events that occurred without our input or influence is quite oppressive to me.
Pavao, you’re obviously not pro-Croatian, pro-Catholic/christian etc and that’s OK. Each to his/her own. But to call this post a rant as you do reeks of idiocy and bias only found in people who actually do not see the truth but push their own muddy wheels wherever they can. Look up the word “rant” in the dictionary.
If you read this article properly you would have seen that it is NOT one-sided, it puts out facts from the media who said what, who did what in a balanced way and the author of the post gives her own opinion, to which she has a right. One does not need to take on board her opinion but when you look at the facts (from other sources, not the author) then it’s hard not to agree with the author. If that makes me according to your criteria one-sided too, so be it. At the end of the day when you tally up everything Lustig said, everything the minister of education said, everything Goldstein said, everything the journalists quoted in the article said you can only come up with one side anyway. No buts, no ifs! That one side wins because of the indisputable facts shown.
Just because Lustig, or anyone, has achieved great success in some walks of public life that does not give them the right to impose their personal beliefs on other peoples’ children. That’s the stuff the Communist totalitarian system was made of, and I don’t mean to place Lustig among Communists at all, I’m just drawing parallels.
Pavao, I’ll take this article’s “rant” anytime and leave yours where it belongs – in the school of religious rights of all people equally.
Pavao, I actually think Ina Vukic was rather kind towards Branko Lustig in her article. She didn’t mention Lustig’s “rant” against Knin’s Mayor and head of education in Zadar and the children’s fathers published in Novi List. That is Lustig, as another of his reactions to the Knin boycott of his film in a derogatory manner said/alluded that the Mayor of Knin, the head of education in Zadar, and the fathers of the children have no qualifications to judge his film as a film that’s not good. He said that the film was recommended by UN, so, who are these people who don’t allow it. The fact is that the boycott was NOT for the film but for Lustig’s talk against God, and the Mayor of Knin made that explicitly clear. So, according to Lustig, it’s not an acceptable qualification if someone says they don’t like a film, they don’t have the right? What rubbish. Well, box office ratings dependent on tickets sold are the stuff critics of films look at, as well.
In the end, Lustig is hiding his own personal mistakes and tries to make it as if him film, not him, was boycotted. That stinks and reeks of unfairness and political agenda.
http://www.novilist.hr/Scena/Film/Branko-Lustig-Drzavni-vrh-morao-je-reagirati-na-sramotu-u-Kninu-i-Zadru
Perhaps Lustig should have left the PR and introduction to the showing of his film to those more capable and sensitive in that field.
You could look at this from another angle. If Lustig really wanted to illustrate the need to educate these children to take the stand that they can never allow such horrible things to take place in their society, he could have chosen a much more familiar, more intimate, closer to home example with which to make that same point. Between Zadar and Knin lies Skabrnja, the site of an atrocious Serbian wartime slaughter of civilians. Also, in the same area, many other such sites can be found, almost anyone that you talk to there lost property and loved ones. Or maybe Lustig believes that Oluja was in fact a JCE like the ICTY says. It’s too bad – I really had respect for the man but at this point I have only slightly more respect for him than I do for Rade Serbedzija. And for Rade I have none.
I am 100% pro Croatia, I just disagree with you. My heart, my home and my soul are here in Varaždin.
” their intention was to protect their children from what they personally perceived as blasphemy.”
– Then they are selecting only the parts they like from a range of views, you think this is good?
“in the school of religious rights of all people equally.”
– Then keep your hands over your ears (and your childrens’) and la la la through views with which you disagree.
Listen, think and decide, then listen some more…. Don’t close your mind.
Pavao – it’s in human nature, and a basic right, to personally agree or disagree. It’s not a matter of opening or closing ones ears to differing views. At the end of the day that is the right of all if they choose to do that. The parents of the Knin school children are aware, I believe, that when their children mature and grow older they will be exposed to various views – if not already through various avenues. However when a prominent personality like Lustig sets out to impress upon vulnerable children his/her personal religious belief that touches and negates the very core of the children’s beliefs or teachings then we enter a territory of parental censure, just as we censure any other films or books etc. Countries have the system of censuring material for moral upbringing and maintenance of morality to the level traditionally set. That has been like that for centuries and in today’s day that system is not as effective due to internet and access to global and very different views. All the more, the parents of children to my view have the ultimate rights as guardians to bring up their children as they see fit (within the laws, of course).
Pavao, you live in a beautiful town that I visit often as I’m from Zagreb myself. I think that what you’re saying is that it’s impossible to shield our children from the world, and to an extent I agree with you. However, consider the argument for airing television content not suitable for young viewers. In such cases, society (and law) makes it the parents’ responsibility to control what their children watch. How is this any different from keeping your child out of school in order not to be exposed to content which contradicts your beliefs?
Dear Ina, Knowing your stand of always searching for truth and justice, I’m sure that everything you wrote about Branko Lustig is correct. I think that he had no right to discuss religion in a classroom or his feelings towards God. I just object bringing his Jewish religion into this context. By pointing out his Jewishness,
you are introducing an element of “hate” between the Catholics and Jews. Unfortunately, I think that you made a bad situation even worse.
Esther Gitman
Dear Esther, thank you. I am one of the people who would have loved not to write about the issue of boycotting Lustig in Knin, however the issue blew out of all proportions in Croatia and beyond with a nasty and undeserved slant against the parents of children who have an absolute right to allow or disallow their children to be faced with religious views imposed onto them by an influential person such as Lustig. Besides their moves have been associated with antisemitism which is wrong. The issue had somehow spread into attempts to suggest that Croatians in general have not come to terms with WWII Holocaust and that is the wrong view and the one pushed by pro-Communist politicians and politically slanted journalists who seem to be unable to separate personal views of parents from collective national conecience. Completely wrong.
The magnitude of the situation come clear when one sees that even the President of Croatia gave himself the need to make public statements about it; he too interferes with parents’ rights in bringing up their own children when it comes to faith.
Follows Facebook comment by Mario Profaca regarding this, and I translate it for the benefit of those that cannot read Croatian:
“Comment from Vecernji List website: 03.10.2012 @ 14.25 h
Mario Profaca wrote: the President of the Republic of Croatia Ivo Josipovic deceives the public when he says that ‘boycott of the film due to Lustig’s beliefs in undemocratic!’. On the contrary, it was a democratic boycott. That it, those who boycotted that film did so from their own, and ‘not from Lustig’s beliefs’. It’s a democratic right of everyone to have their own beliefs, just as it is a democratic right of everyone to decide which film they will watch, and which they won’t, regardless of whether the author ‘carries in his heart the snake’, like Ivo Josipovic at the time of his visit to the Israeli Knesset, or democratically spreads and preaches in Croatia his boundless love towards Palestinian brothers”.
Translated comment in Croatia from Facebook:
Komentar na webu Večernjeg lista:
03.10.2012. u 14:25h
MarioPro je napisao:
● Predsjednik Republike Hrvatske Ivo Josipović obmanjuje javnost kad kaže da ‘Bojkot filma zbog Lustigovih uvjerenja je nedemokratski!’ .
Naprotiv, bio je to demokratski bojkot. Naime oni koji su bojkotirali taj film bojkotirali su ga zbog svojih, a ne “zbog Lustigovih uvjerenja”.
Demokratsko je pravo svakoga na svoje uvjerenje, kao što je isto tako demokratsko pravo svakoga odlučiti koji film će gledati, a koji neće, bez obzira da li autor “u srcu nosi zmiju”, poput Ive Josipovića u vrijeme svoje posjete izraelskom Knesetu, ili u Hrvatskoj demokratski širi i propovijeda svoju bezgraničnu ljubav prema braći Palestincima.
http://www.facebook.com/l/WAQHEextrAQGLBPs2XlXnuZRr1DQaoDQ_x_f9yUueU4Advw/www.vecernji.hr/komentar/459899/
Komentari: ‘Bojkot filma zbog Lustigovih uvjerenja je nedemokratski!’
http://www.vecernji.hr
Predsjednik je osudio bojkot nastavnika u Kninu koji su odbili ugostiti oskarovca Branka Lustiga koj…
Dear Ms. Gitman,
I’m not sure how Ina or anyone else for that matter could have brought Mr. Lustig’s Jewish ‘religion’ into question if he himself says that he does not believe in God, and belief in God is a necessary condition for defining a religion. Perhaps it is not correct to introduce race or lifestyle or perhaps some other definition of Judaism into an open criticism of an individual that you don’t agree with, but religion in this case should not be an issue.
Having said that, we all need to realize that we are sensitive to having our identities challenged, and I hope that Mr. Lustig realizes that also. Especially being both Croatian and Jewish. Croatia is still getting used to the transition from atheism by decree to freedom of religion, so I think that we deserve a mulligan or two, but I really hope that Mr. Lustig realizes how much good he could do by apologizing for causing the problem in the first place. I’m sure that would be an olive branch that most Croatians would accept and return with gratitude.
Shalom
I agree bringing up Jewishness or Catholicness is irrelevant and only causes distress and prejudice. It’s just two different points of view. The issue is one of freedom of speech and democracy. Lustig is free to have his ideas and the parents of the children can have theirs. Both can express it freely if it is done in a non-violent way and not about hatred. However, Lustig nor the parents have the right to condemn each others actions as anti democratic and anti free speech because they were in fact both democratic and free expressions. Should Lustig have kept his views about God to himself…maybe, maybe not…it is part of his life experience and context of his being. Education is about learning, exploring, questioning and ultimately answering. To think that no one in that class or among those parents never questioned the existence of a God or the motives of his/her behaviour is absurd. I personally think it is a great learning experience for the children and an excellent opportunity for the teachers and parents to better teach their religion and explain their beliefs so the children truly understand their faith and not just dogmatically recite what they has been told.
And for the communists in the crowd…you fear free thinking because it fully exposes the feebleness of your ideology.
Antisemitism abounds in every corner of the world and for just reasons for many as does does racism, sexism etc. I oppose and always have opposed any teachings of the holocaust,religion, race relations in any schools for many reasons and the above article is a perfect example of why. It is not the schools place to teach our children about these topics. I support teaching our children our own countries history by historians who do not mix biased or non religion or propaganda into the subject. No adult has the right to express to children their religious beliefs as children are vulnerable to changes in what they are taught at home and by their church. As a child and being raised a devout catholic there were many times I would leave a classroom if someone challenged my beliefs in which my parents taught me and my church. Croatia is a majority catholic country ( I thank god for that and hope it remains that way ) and a for a just reason. Croatians believe in their god and wanted it that way. Does the catholic church wield great influence? of course it does as do many other countries who religion wield just such powers. It is up to each of us to decide our faith and what we believe. My problem is not that someone is deemed to be an atheist or other but the issue is one of confronting vulnerable children with such beliefs. I also see failure here by the educational department for not pre- screening any dialog of the topic before it was allowed to be expressed to our children. As a fascist and protectionist of our country I would never have allowed any of this to begin with. We need to protect our children from trash such as this as we know from our history that many distortions are made against our people and our church. This does not mean that we are not or can not be a real democracy if there even is such a thing as a real democracy. We must always put Croatia and it’s children and future first before anything and this is the responsibility of our parents and church and not goverment as we can see they are not capable of doing so.
Michael to repeat your quote: “children are vulnerable to changes in what they’re taught …” Exactly my point. Lustig should have had the wisdom not to attempt attacking/demeaning the children’s religious beliefs as part of his project to show the film and educate children about the Holocaust. Children of today have nothing to do with the Holocaust and they should not be made to feel guilty for it by association of their God to the horrors of the Holocaust.
You say “children’s religious beliefs” … they are children, they only believe what they’ve been told, they are too young to question it. As Michael wrote,they are vulnerable. I agree with you that they should not be subjected to everything at such a young age but this must also include religion, any religion. Let’s raise them to think for themselves and give them equal access to all the conflicting views.
Ina I agree. It is not that I do not believe that the holocaust existed but it always seems to be a one sided pity story, exaggerated at times, with many people left out . It always brings into discussion religion. What really annoys me with this is that people question our freedoms and democracy because of the uproar by parents that refused to have their children attend lustigs propaganda. Freedom does not give anyone the right to morally corrupt our children’s views with regards to religion or their upbringing. what even annoys me more is that our children are being introduced to the holocaust story.I understand that people do not want to forget the holocaust for many reasons( mostly economical,political ) and I disagree with them.It is time for the pity party story to move on. We have our own history to be taught and it should be taught with the truth. Our own history is more important then the history of the holocaust. Teaching our children our families religious beliefs is paramount to our culture and up bringing.
Michael, the Holocaust must be remembered and taught as part of history that must never be repeated. However, it is unforgivable for humanity that other same, if not greater crimes have been perpetrated in the same part of the world (Europe) and around the same time (Communist purges and mass murders) and these still after so many decades stand in shadows behind the Holocaust, unattended to. The world including Croatia have accepted and “paid” for the crimes of Holocaust but not the other and precisely it is politics that are to blame, and this needs to be corrected. That’s perhaps the reason why issues with the Holocaust frustrate many – especially those who perished and were exterminated by Communism, or other totalitarian systems.
I wholeheartedly agree that the holocaust has been hijacked by one group of victims to the detriment of so many others, it is important that our children receive a balanced view of those years and understand the big picture.
Consequently, it is incongruous to then believe that “Teaching our children our families religious beliefs is paramount to our culture and up bringing.” is in any way different. A one sided argument is a one sided argument, whether you agree with the subject or not..
To a degree I agree with you. I do not believe our young children need to be exposed to the history of the holocaust. This subject should be taught and debated on the university level in which world history is mostly studied. In order for anyone to understand the holocaust they must learn of their own history to be able to equate the two. It is the same for discussion of religion. Age appropriate must be taken into consideration when such vulnerable subjects are taken into account. I have explained to my children the history of Croatia, my grandparents and great grandparents history of war and culture when they were old enough to understand , research and decide for themselves what to ask of me. War is a terrible and frightening subject to children if it is not discussed in a sensitive way. It is the same with religion. Clearly these children were in no way prepared to debate lustigs propaganda again our religion.
Lustig, in his bitterness and wounded pride of an Oscar winner, went so far as saying “if in my country I cannot say what I think and feel then fuck democracy.”
This is so funny, now if anyone said something “against” the jews, ( and when I say “against”, I mean the truth and not something exaggerated) there would be chaos, they would be called anti-semetic
Agreed Joso, the trouble is that by saying true things about catholics in the Croatia or against muslims anywhere has the same effect.
Religion is a personal choice but the fact remains that no one has a right to alter the upbringing of a child’s belief other then the parents. That is the whole point to the article.
The Holocaust should be remembered and taught. Not to spread guilt, but to learn and to NEVER allow such a terrible thing to ever happen to any group of people. It’s not about guilt, but our dear communists in Croatia/Yugoserbia have made it be about guilt and accusation – one group is guilty (Croatians) and one group is valiant (Serbs). Odd, how Croatians are thought of as worse than the Germans, when it is they who forced the Holocaust on the world. Wow, talk about effective propaganda by the Serbs! Folks, had the lessons of the Holocaust and the suffering of all people in war been truly metabolized in the human mind and body, the atrocities of the Homeland war would never have happened, the war itself would never have happened. Plus the great Allied powers of the WWII would have stopped the the Serbs and the War in Croatia on first account of any concentration camps and mass murder. We still have lots to learn. As for Lustig expressing his views, the school should have pre-screened the speech, but really how can you blame him for expressing that for him their is no God, after what he experienced and witnessed. Plus our faith and teaching in God should be stronger and more resilient than fearing one man’s views. And yes children in grade 8 should have messages delivered in more controlled manner. But I still feel this is a learning opportunity for all.
Bravo!
Thank you Borna