The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) issued a statement on April 24 calling for David Hogg, a survivor of the Majorie Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, to re-name his book.
Hogg, who has become well-known for his gun control advocacy, is writing a book with his sister Lauren titled #NeverAgain: A New Generation Draws the Line to further his advocacy. It is the term “Never Again” that ZOA Presidnet Morton Klein took issue with in the book’s title.
“This inappropriate title displays an unkind and shocking insensitivity to Holocaust survivors, Jews, and all decent, human-rights-loving people around the world,” Klein said. “Any attempts to compare the genocide of the Holocaust to modern domestic political issues in the US today is shameful and wrong.”
Klein added that the “Never Again” slogan is used to ensure that such a horrific and unique genocide never happens again and it should only be used in that context.
“Combating anti-Semitism today – the irrational Jew hatred that is being preached, especially by radical Muslims, and is rearing its ugly head in too many parts of the world- necessarily involves remembering the Holocaust, and assuring that the Holocaust’s lessons, expressions and symbols are not twisted or used for non-germane political purposes,” Klein said. “Co-opting Holocaust imagery and expressions for such other purposes trivializes and minimizes the Holocaust’s unique terrors and the memory of the slaughtered six million innocent Jewish men, women and children.”
Klein felt that this was especially true in light of the fact that nearly two-thirds of millennials didn’t know what Auschwitz was.
While the ZOA is not taking a stance on the gun control debate and is naturally horrified by the Parkland shooting, the organization is calling on Hogg to change the title of his book to ensure that “Never Again” stays associated with the Holocaust and not with “domestic political issues.”
“ZOA thus urges David Hogg to immediately rename his book title,” Klein’s statement concluded “It’s the right and moral thing to do.”
Neither Hogg nor Penguin Random House, the publisher of the book, have responded to the Journal’s requests for comment.
