Olivier Lalieu in Toulouse: “The Shoah teaches us the mechanics of all genocides”
Historian at the Shoah Memorial in Paris, Olivier Lalieu will present Monday, January 24 at Ombres Blanches, in Toulouse, the book “The Shoah – at the heart of annihilation”.
A historian at the Shoah Memorial, Olivier Lalieu is also a member of the International Center for Auschwitz and Holocaust Education at the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum.
Was your book of great iconographic richness conceived as a “visual history” of the Shoah?
It is exactly that. There was an educational and transmission desire: to bring historical information to the widest possible public, to embody this history, this Shoah that is said to be unspeakable, through the eyes of the executioners, of the victims – how they lived, perceived , went through that – and finally analyzed the way the world looked, of humanity faced with what was in the process of being accomplished. The documents we have chosen are rare, sometimes unpublished: they are drawings, caricatures, letters, objects… We wanted to embody the Shoah. Historical iconographic documents generally support or illustrate analyses: in our book, the historians, among the most competent on the Holocaust, have put themselves at the service of these documents.
In your introduction, you quote Isaac Schneeshon, founder in 1946 of the Center for Contemporary Jewish Documentation: “Now the universe is warned”. A strong message, which will ring in the ears of Holocaust deniers today…
This is what the survivors said first, it is their message to the world about the tragedy that was unfolding. With the passing of time, the Holocaust and the history of the Jews concern us all. The Shoah teaches us the mechanics of all genocides, the springs of racism, including at the heart of Western modernity. It alerts us to threats to humanity.
The historians who, under your direction, have contributed to this work, offer a reading that is as sober and accessible as it is precise and designated…
Nothing can make me happier than this comment. Our desire was to make the reading of these texts accessible across generations. We found both very well-known documents, such as the Wannsee Protocol [qui théorise en 1942 la terrible « Solution finale, NDLR], which is published for the first time in its entirety, and testimonies of people much less known, like Marianne Cohn, who wrote the poem “I will betray tomorrow”, but also extracts from newspapers, children’s drawings.. .
The people of Toulouse discover a moving letter written in August 1942 by Monsignor Saliège, Archbishop of Toulouse, on “the human person”…
This is the first public protest by a French bishop against anti-Semitic measures; others will follow, including that of Monseigneur Théas, Archbishop of Montauban. Jules-Géraud Saliège writes: “France, beloved Fatherland, France which carries in all the consciences of all your children the tradition of respect for the human person…”