Merkel expresses her 'deep sorrow and shame’ during historic Dachau visit

[bananas]

Source: Telegraph

Angela Merkel has become the first German chancellor to visit the former concentration camp at Dachau where she expressed “shame” at the crimes of the Nazi regime but faced criticism over the timing of her trip.

Ahead of an evening election rally in Dachau, the nearby Bavarian town, she toured the memorial site at the camp and spoke with Holocaust survivors. Max Mannheimer, a camp survivor who invited the German leader to visit, described the gesture as “historic”.

Describing the Nazi era as “a horrible and unprecedented chapter of our history”, Chancellor Merkel linked her act of remembrance to concerns over the rise of new far-Right extremism in Europe.

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“At the same time, this place is a constant warning: how did Germany reach the point of taking away the right of people to live because of their origin, their religion ... or their sexual orientation?.”

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Read more: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10255833/Merkel-expresses-her-deep-sorrow-and-shame-during-historic-Dachau-visit.html

[onehandle]

1. Never let Teabaggers dictate your politics again, Chancellor Merkel. That's how.

Sadly, the United States is currently letting Teabaggers carry out their night of the long knives.

[derby378]

2. Since the First Crusade, at least?

I understand where Merkel's coming from - Germany, as a conglomeration of smaller kingdoms, principalities, duchies, and city-states, can't help but embrace a certain degree of multiculturalism. However, there has been religious intolerance against the Jews in parts of Germany for nearly a thousand years.

[Jenoch]

3. What I got from this story is astonishment

that Merkel is the first German Chancellir to visit Dachau.

[thucythucy]

4. Same here.

I visited Dachau many years ago. It was an incredibly emotional experience. Afterwords I couldn't talk, simply couldn't talk, for hours.

Only one barracks building remains inside the walls and wire fences, the rest were burned after the liberation to prevent the spread of typhus. Where the barracks once stood are now these enormous rectangles filled with gravel. It was raining when I was there, and the sound of the rain on the gravel sounded eerily like something burning. Or a million footsteps. It gave me the chills.

"Arbeit Macht Frei"--the emotional impact of seeing that gate, for real, is indescribable.

As someone of German heritage myself, I find it absolutly stunning that no German chancellor has been there until now.

[JDPriestly]

7. I also visited many years ago. I will never forget the experience.

[branford]

5. I was stunned as well.

However, I'm very glad that Merkel made the trip.

She is a very interesting individual. A chemist by training, born and raised in East Germany, and the first female Chancellor of Germany. Now the first to visit a concentration camp. Except for her apparent dislike of dogs, she seems quite admirable.

[David__77]

6. But East Germany's Erich Honecker was the first German leader to visit.

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1988&dat=19870911&id=8F0iAAAAIBAJ&sjid=76kFAAAAIBAJ&pg=1269,849293

Of all the more import since Honecker was himself a prisoner to the Nazis. East Germany had many shortcomings indeed, but it can at least be said that it was relentlessly anti-fascist.