Categories
Commentary

Anti-Vaxxers Promote Loathsome Holocaust Comparisons

Individuals who adamantly refuse to get vaccinated to protect themselves against the deadly coronavirus are simply beyond the pale. These anti-vaxxers are not only utterly selfish and illogical, but a clear and present threat to the community at large.

The unbiased scientific evidence at hand conclusively shows that Covid-19 has more or less become a pandemic of the unvaccinated since the development of vaccines.

Nearly five million people around the world have died after being infected by this virus. In the United States, 718,000 Americans have succumbed to it. In Canada and Israel, the figures are respectively 28,300 and 7,900.

The Covid-19 virus

The death toll is sure to rise unless the unvaccinated come to their senses and submit to a full course of vaccinations, which were designed to curb its spread and prevent hospitalization.

Stupidly stubborn to the core, anti-vaxxers falsely claim that public health measures, mandates, green passports and lockdowns are unconstitutional and a violation of human rights.

Nonsense.

These simpletons do not realize that the health of a nation trumps whatever rights, freedoms and liberties it offers its citizens.

Worse still, some anti-vaxxers have compared Covid-19 restrictions to the suffering European Jews endured during the Holocaust. This is an unconscionable, disgusting and obscene comparison, completely devoid of the historical truth.

Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Remembrance center in Jerusalem, has denounced such comparisons. In a statement, it “strongly encourages individuals and public organizations to refrain from using the Holocaust and images associated with it to further their agendas and causes that are totally unrelated to the Holocaust. Manipulating the Holocaust in this way trivializes the horrific atrocities that were perpetrated and denigrates the memory of victims and survivors.”

In their haste to sway fickle public opinion in their favor, anti-vaxxers have resorted to various tricks and gimmicks to win hearts and minds.

An anti-vaxxer protests Covid-19 restrictions outside the Holocaust memorial in Berlin

At their rallies, they have taken to wearing the yellow star that the Nazis forced Jews in Germany and across Europe to attach to their clothing during the Holocaust.

And they have invoked the sacred memory of Anne Frank — the Dutch Jewish teenager whose diaries were published posthumously after World War II — by displaying images of her at their demonstrations.

Anne Frank

These tactics may appeal to the ignorant and the gullible, but they will presumably be rejected by those with even an inkling of knowledge of the Holocaust.

It is not really surprising that some of the most vocal opponents of vaccines have compiled a history of antisemitic rhetoric. According to the Canadian Anti-Hate Network, an agency that monitors and researches hate groups, one such person is Chris Saccoccia, otherwise known as Chris Sky.

On his Facebook page, he has reportedly praised parts of Adolf Hitler’s memoir/manifesto Mein Kampf, calling it “bang on,” as if “he had a crystal ball into the future.” Sky, too, has cast doubt on the number of Jews murdered during the war, thereby aligning himself with notorious Holocaust deniers like David Irving and Ernst Zundel.

Propagandists such as Sky and his ilk cannot be allowed to set the tone and parameter of the debate currently swirling around the efficacy of vaccines and the utility of mandates, passports and lockdowns.

They are selling their supporters and would-be supporters a load a stinking excrement. To be sure, they are entitled to their views, however wrong-headed they are. But in life-and-death matters, when the lives of so many people are potentially at risk, a red line must drawn.

A Holocaust survivor in France objects to the use of the yellow star to promote the anti-vaccine campaign

It is galling and upsetting that they are exploiting the Holocaust to publicize their misguided and dangerous cause. This is truly shameful and unacceptable.

Anti-vaxxers cannot be permitted to circumvent or sabotage public health measures and thus endanger the vaccinated population. Their stupidity and selfishness must be kept in check.

At the very least, they should be banned from public places ranging from restaurants, cafes and gyms to sports stadiums, spas and barbershops. And they should be made to pay for their full medical expenses should they contract Covid-19.

Hit them in the pocketbook.