Humanity learned little from the horrors of war

On the occasion of the International Holocaust Remembrance Day, it is important to recall the horrors and suffering that war, any war, inevitably brings. The Second World War resulted in the extermination of six million Jews across German-occupied Europe – in concentration camps, gas chambers, pogroms and mass shootings, etc. – as well as millions of others who died directly or indirectly as a consequence of the war. January 27 marks the day when the Auschwitz concentration camp – a major site of the Nazis' "final solution to the Jewish question" – was liberated in 1945.

After the war, many hoped that the atrocities that the world had witnessed would result in the end of all conflicts, leading to some dubbing it as "the war to end all wars." Unfortunately, in the subsequent years, such lofty hopes have been dashed repeatedly by self-serving world leaders, whose greed and quest for power – and, in some cases, hatred for others – have led to millions of more deaths, displacement, and other forms of atrocities.

During the Nuremburg trials, the world tried to establish the idea that following orders to commit atrocities is itself an unpardonable crime. Yet, there has been little change in that regard, as the orders of so-called leaders to commit atrocities are still mostly blindly followed. Therefore, as disappointing as it may sound, the reality is that the lessons that the world should have learned following the tragedies of World War II, and World War I before it, have been mostly ignored.

In fact, we have even seen the state of Israel and its Western allies use innocent Jewish people once victimised by the Nazis to persecute the people of Palestine for more than seven decades. Peoples' legitimate concern for human rights violations has been weaponised to make way for other wars of aggressions to victimise millions of more people, all, ironically, in the name of upholding human rights. The international community, meanwhile, has failed to protect the legitimate victims of wars and atrocities.

We have seen that happening in the case of the Rohingya also. Even though more and more countries are recognising what the Myanmar army, along with religious extremists in the country, have perpetrated against the Rohingya people as genocide, the world is yet to take any meaningful action to hold the perpetrators to account, or stand beside the victims.

According to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, the world today is closer to doomsday than ever before. The main driving force for that is the ongoing war in Ukraine, which is drawing Russia and the West ever closer to a direct conflict. So, while paying homage to the memory of the Holocaust victims, we must renew our pledge to end the madness of wars and conflicts. It is time to ensure that such horrors are never visited or indulged under any pretext whatsoever.