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When Will the Need to Proclaim, ‘Never Again’ Ever End?
People with Israeli flags attend the International March of the Living at the former Auschwitz Nazi German death camp, in Brzezinka near Oswiecim, Poland, May 6, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Kuba Stezycki
The familiar mantra “Never Again” echoes through the ages as often as Jews have been set upon by their enemies. Will the need to proclaim, “Never Again” ever end?
Let us scroll back to the era of the First Temple in Jerusalem, 2,600 years ago. The Babylonians, under the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, destroyed the holy temple and drove the Jews from the Kingdom of Judea into exile. Forty-eight years later, during the reign of Cyrus the Great, the Jews returned to Jerusalem and under King Solomon’s sovereignty were able to build the Second Temple. Then in 70 CE, the Jewish people suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of Titus of Rome, and — except for a remnant who managed to remain in Israel — Jews were exiled, enslaved, or murdered by the conquerors.
The surviving Jews found themselves a landless people, sometimes welcomed or begrudgingly tolerated by the inhabitants of foreign lands. The First Crusade erupted in 1096 in Western Germany along the Rhine River, a thousand years after the Jews lost their homeland. The Crusade led to the mass slaughter of Jews who had settled in Rhineland, and the same fate awaited them later in the Holy Land.
One of the worst antisemitic massacres of the Middle Ages took place in England in 1190; it is known as the York pogrom. The city’s entire Jewish community was trapped by an angry mob inside the tower of York Castle. Members of the Jewish community were forcibly baptized or murdered by the attackers. The survivors of the carnage were summarily expelled from England.
For over two millennia, we Jews have suffered a long and woeful history of oppression, expulsion, and murder. What began in Babylonia, continued in Rome as a never-ending stream of persecution that persisted during the Crusades which flowed into the infamous Spanish pogrom of 1391, when Sephardic Jews were given the option of conversion to Catholicism or death. By 1492, any Jews fortunate to survive, were expelled from Spain.
Following those dark and dangerous days, the remaining Jews scattered throughout the world in what is called the Diaspora. Unfortunately, instead of receiving a friendly and neighborly welcome, they were greeted by Eastern Europe populations with a succession of attacks and massacres in their small villages, known as shtetls. Most notable was the uprising of Cossacks in what is known as the Khmelnitsky pogrom that swept through Poland, Lithuania, and Ukraine. Tens of thousands of Jews were brutally murdered during the massacres between the years 1648 and 1667.
Two-hundred years passed before Europe’s festering antisemitism once again erupted into violence. Beginning in 1881, the renewal of pogroms plagued the Jewish communities in southern Russia, when thousands of shtetls and their inhabitants were eliminated, culminating in the murder of 250,000 Jews in Ukraine between the years of 1918 and 1920.
Then came the Holocaust. From 1933 to 1945, Germany, with the assistance of all too willing European collaborators, embarked upon the state-sponsored persecution and industrialized murder of six million European Jewish men, women, and children.
Three years after the end of World War II, the modern State of Israel was established. But only one day after Israel’s declaration of Independence in 1948, five Arab armies sought to purge the region of Jews. This time it was different; the Jews once again had a homeland to defend. They successfully defeated the existential threat of annihilation posed by the neighboring Arab countries.
The question of, will “Never Again” ever end, was abruptly and savagely answered again on the morning of Oct. 7, 2023, when approximately 1,200 people were murdered and 250 others abducted into Gaza, including children and infants. Today, the vulnerable Jewish shtetls of yesteryear no longer exist because the IDF (Israel Defense Forces), world Jewry, and morally driven Gentiles, have Israel’s back.
The Oct. 7 jihad occurred because of the genocidal aims of Hamas and its supporting cast of radical Islamist terrorists to rid Israel of its Jews. After thousands of years of being murdered simply for who we are, a vital lesson has been learnt. Elie Wiesel expressed it best: “I learned to trust the threats of enemies before the promises of friends.”
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Israel to Send Delegation to Qatar for Gaza Ceasefire Talks
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a news conference in Jerusalem, Sept. 2, 2024. Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg/Pool via REUTERS
Israel has decided to send a delegation to Qatar for talks on a possible Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal, an Israeli official said, reviving hopes of a breakthrough in negotiations to end the almost 21-month war.
Palestinian group Hamas said on Friday it had responded to a US-backed Gaza ceasefire proposal in a “positive spirit,” a few days after US President Donald Trump said Israel had agreed “to the necessary conditions to finalize” a 60-day truce.
The Israeli negotiation delegation will fly to Qatar on Sunday, the Israeli official, who declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter, told Reuters.
But in a sign of the potential challenges still facing the two sides, a Palestinian official from a militant group allied with Hamas said concerns remained over humanitarian aid, passage through the Rafah crossing in southern Israel to Egypt and clarity over a timetable for Israeli troop withdrawals.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is due to meet Trump in Washington on Monday, has yet to comment on Trump’s announcement, and in their public statements Hamas and Israel remain far apart.
Netanyahu has repeatedly said Hamas must be disarmed, a position the terrorist group, which is thought to be holding 20 living hostages, has so far refused to discuss.
Israeli media said on Friday that Israel had received and was reviewing Hamas’ response to the ceasefire proposal.
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Tucker Carlson Says to Air Interview with President of Iran
Tucker Carlson speaks on July 18, 2024 during the final day of the Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Photo: Jasper Colt-USA TODAY via Reuters Connect
US conservative talk show host Tucker Carlson said in an online post on Saturday that he had conducted an interview with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, which would air in the next day or two.
Carlson said the interview was conducted remotely through a translator, and would be published as soon as it was edited, which “should be in a day or two.”
Carlson said he had stuck to simple questions in the interview, such as, “What is your goal? Do you seek war with the United States? Do you seek war with Israel?”
“There are all kinds of questions that I didn’t ask the president of Iran, particularly questions to which I knew I could get an not get an honest answer, such as, ‘was your nuclear program totally disabled by the bombing campaign by the US government a week and a half ago?’” he said.
Carlson also said he had made a third request in the past several months to interview Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who will be visiting Washington next week for talks with US President Donald Trump.
Trump said on Friday he would discuss Iran with Netanyahu at the White House on Monday.
Trump said he believed Tehran’s nuclear program had been set back permanently by recent US strikes that followed Israel’s attacks on the country last month, although Iran could restart it at a different location.
Trump also said Iran had not agreed to inspections of its nuclear program or to give up enriching uranium. He said he would not allow Tehran to resume its nuclear program, adding that Iran did want to meet with him.
Pezeshkian said last month Iran does not intend to develop nuclear weapons but will pursue its right to nuclear energy and research.
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Hostage Families Reject Partial Gaza Seal, Demand Release of All Hostages
Demonstrators hold signs and pictures of hostages, as relatives and supporters of Israeli hostages kidnapped during the Oct. 7, 2023 attack by Hamas protest demanding the release of all hostages in Tel Aviv, Israel, Feb. 13, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Itai Ron
i24 News – As Israeli leaders weigh the contours of a possible partial ceasefire deal with Hamas, the families of the 50 hostages still held in Gaza issued an impassioned public statement this weekend, condemning any agreement that would return only some of the abductees.
In a powerful message released Saturday, the Families Forum for the Return of Hostages denounced what they call the “beating system” and “cruel selection process,” which, they say, has left families trapped in unbearable uncertainty for 638 days—not knowing whether to hope for reunion or prepare for mourning.
The group warned that a phased or selective deal—rumored to be under discussion—would deepen their suffering and perpetuate injustice. Among the 50 hostages, 22 are believed to be alive, and 28 are presumed dead.
“Every family deserves answers and closure,” the Forum said. “Whether it is a return to embrace or a grave to mourn over—each is sacred.”
They accused the Israeli government of allowing political considerations to prevent a full agreement that could have brought all hostages—living and fallen—home long ago. “It is forbidden to conform to the dictates of Schindler-style lists,” the statement read, invoking a painful historical parallel.
“All of the abductees could have returned for rehabilitation or burial months ago, had the government chosen to act with courage.”
The call for a comprehensive deal comes just as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepares for high-stakes talks in Washington and as indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas are expected to resume in Doha within the next 24 hours, according to regional media reports.
Hamas, for its part, issued a statement Friday confirming its readiness to begin immediate negotiations on the implementation of a ceasefire and hostage release framework.
The Forum emphasized that every day in captivity poses a mortal risk to the living hostages, and for the deceased, a danger of being lost forever. “The horror of selection does not spare any of us,” the statement said. “Enough with the separation and categories that deepen the pain of the families.”
In a planned public address near Begin Gate in Tel Aviv, families are gathering Saturday evening to demand that the Israeli government accept a full-release deal—what they describe as the only “moral and Zionist” path forward.
“We will return. We will avenge,” the Forum concluded. “This is the time to complete the mission.”
As of now, the Israeli government has not formally responded to Hamas’s latest statement.
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