Let Us Commemorate Only Jewish Suffering

Spanish Mayor`s Decision to Commemorate `Palestinian Genocide` On
Holocaust Memorial Day `Shameful`


New York, NY, January 26, 2007 ... The Anti-Defamation League (ADL)
strongly condemned the decision of the Mayor of a Spanish city to hold
a "commemoration of the Palestinian genocide" on the day of Spain`s
official Holocaust memorial ceremonies, and called it "shameful."

In a letter to Susana León Gordillo, the Mayor of Ciempozuelos, a city
near Madrid, and a member of the ruling Spanish Socialist Workers
Party (PSOE), ADL leaders, Glen S. Lewy, National Chair and Abraham H.
Foxman, National Director said, "Your attempt to equate the
industrialized mass murder of six million Jewish women, men and
children, as well as millions of others, with the situation of the
Palestinian people is shameful. It reflects an extremely disturbing
tendency, which is particularly visible in Europe, to dishonor the
memory of the victims of the Holocaust and de-legitimize the State of
Israel by seeking to eradicate the clear moral difference between the
Holocaust and the loss of Palestinian lives as a result of the Arab-
Israeli conflict.

"Applying the term `genocide` to the Arab-Israeli conflict encourages
hatred toward the State of Israel and deliberately insults those of
us, both Jews and non-Jews, who seek to solemnly commemorate the
victims of the Nazi campaign of slaughter."

The League urged the Mayor to issue an apology for this "deplorable
decision and to stand with the people of Spain in their commitment to
respecting Holocaust commemoration day in the future."



The Anti-Defamation League, founded in 1913, is the world`s leading
organization fighting anti-Semitism through programs and services.

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