By Martine Wolfe-Miller, Communications Officer
MOUNT PLEASANT, SC (April 13, 2016) - At yesterday’s Town Council Meeting, Mount Pleasant Town Administrator Eric DeMoura read a Days of Remembrance Proclamation that will be observed May 1-8 to remember the victims of the Holocaust, which was the systematic persecution and annihilation of European Jewry and others by Nazi Germany during World War II.
Rabbi Yossi Refson offered remarks and Mount Pleasant Town Council lit yellow candles in remembrance of the victims of the Holocaust.
The proclamation reads:
WHEREAS, the Holocaust was the state-sponsored, systematic persecution and annihilation of European Jewry by Nazi Germany and its collaborators between 1933 and 1945. Jews were the primary victims – six million of whom were murdered; Gypsies, the handicapped, and Poles were also targeted for destruction or decimation for racial, ethnic, or national reasons. Millions more, including homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Soviet prisoners of war and political dissidents, also suffered grievous oppression and death under Nazi tyranny; and
WHEREAS, the history of the Holocaust offers an opportunity to reflect on the moral responsibilities of individuals, societies, and governments; and
WHEREAS, we the people of Mount Pleasant should always remember the terrible events of the Holocaust and remain vigilant against hatred, persecution, and tyranny; and
WHEREAS, we the people of Mount Pleasant should actively rededicate ourselves to the principles of individual freedom in a just society; and
WHEREAS, the Days of Remembrance have been set aside for the people of Mount Pleasant to remember the victims of the Holocaust as well as to reflect on the need for respect of all peoples; and
WHEREAS, pursuant to an Act of Congress (Public Law 96-388, October 7, 1980) the United States Holocaust Memorial Council designates the Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust to be Sunday, May 1 through May 8, 2016 including the Day of Remembrance known as Yom HaShoah, Thursday, May 5, 2016
NOW, THEREFORE, I, Linda Page, Mayor of the Town of Mount Pleasant, do hereby proclaim the Week of Sunday, May 1 through Sunday, May 8, 2016 as Days of Remembrance in memory of the victims of the Holocaust, and in honor of the survivors, as well as the rescuers and liberators, and further proclaim that we, as citizens of Mount Pleasant, should promote human dignity and confront hate whenever and wherever it occurs.
I encourage you to join the community in remembering the victims during the Community-wide Yom HaShoah Commemoration on the evening of Wednesday, May 4th at Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohim (KKBE), 90 Hasell Street, Charleston, South Carolina.
Mayor Linda PageTown of Mount Pleasant, SC