Convenient Compassion against Holocaust

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visited a facility of memorizing holocaust in Israel. What he learned was how discrimination could make people brutal. However, some may want him to learn from Japanese history, before getting wisdom from European history. It is necessary for Abe to directly face what the Japanese did in the war and what is going on in current Japanese society.

Abe had one-hour tour in Yad Vashem, the national museum on holocaust history in Jerusalem. “I could learn how discrimination on a specific ethnicity and targeting it as an object of hatred make human cruel,” told Abe after exploring in the museum. He also expressed his determination to work for the world without discrimination and war, in which human rights would be protected.

He also raised a legendary diplomat in the wartime, who issued visa approval to the Jewish who escaped from holocaust in Japanese Consulate in Lithuania. “We have Chiune Sugihara for our ancestor. There were not a few people who helped Jewish refugees to go to Japan with visa issued by him. I would follow their braveness,” emphasized Abe. He appealed his peaceful idea to the Jewish community. Chief Cabinet Secretary, Yoshihide Suga, explained that Abe’s speech was addressed for Japan’s contribution to peace and prosperity of the world.

Abe has not agreed with the argument that three hundred thousand people were killed in Nanjing Massacre in 1937. He and his colleagues see some exaggeration in the argument, showing no apology for the historical event. In the first Abe administration, he launched Joint Committee on Historical Study by experts of Japan and China. In this second administration, he showed no attempt to communicate with China on history issue. Did he learn nothing from history in Nanjing?

Looking inside Japan, hatred against Korean residents has been growing. People in hate speech keep on hurling cruel words to Korean students in front of their schools. United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Radical Discrimination delivered a recommendation requiring Japan to legislate preventing measures against discriminative demonstration. Nevertheless, Abe administration does not make any effort to abide by it. His colleagues tried to take advantage of the recommendation to prevent demonstration against nuclear power generation around Official Residence of Prime Minister.

Abe has extremely been reluctant to recognize inconvenient truth of history. That attitude also appears in comfort woman issue. Holocaust might be convenient for him to appeal the legitimacy of his positive pacifism. But, if he is serious in eliminating discrimination, he at least needs to explain his viewpoint on Nanjing Massacre and regulate hate speech in Japan.