To work towards the treatment of the disease, doctors are organizing talks on faith. Psychiatrists have disclosed a kind of obsession which Jews and Muslims are afflicted with. It is a mild form of madness that may also be called the “compulsive prayer syndrome,” a form of obsession that takes students of rabbinical colleges, as well as Muslim madrassas, to engage in recitation of prayers the whole day.

For those who fall into a certain confusion between excessive zeal and mental disorder, this is the case of the faithful who repeats the same prayer several times for fear of not having acted with the requisite conviction. It may also be like the one who goes to the bathroom dozens of times to wash and purify himself. These patients are haunted by questions such as ‘Is God pleased with how I pray?’

Muslims showing the type of disorder reread many times the same page of the Koran, become afraid of not kneeling properly, or continuously moving the carpet for fear of not exactly following the way to face Mecca.

Those afflicted are treated in a “homeopathic” manner or with the same thing that afflicts them: religion. Talks on faith are organized to try to change the perspective of patients. Some efforts include removing the fear of divine punishment if one does not pray as he should.

Via Zionism and Israel – Encyclopedic Dictionary

In his first statement since the controversy arose from his Holocaust negation, Williamson said he will focus on evidence of the historical existence of gas chambers before considering a correction. “There should be historical evidence, not emotions. And if I find the evidence, then I stand corrected. But it will take time,” he said in an interview with the weekly Der Spiegel. In the interview, he also renews his criticism against Vatican II, accusing the council of causing “the theological chaos that we have today” and denouncing the “dictatorship of relativism” imposed by “liberal bishops.”

Der Spiegel says that they were not able to conduct a face-to-face interview with Richard Williamson. The bishop only agreed to answer questions via e-mail from Argentina where he lives. The answers, though, were confirmed by the bishop through telephone.

The lifting of his excommunication has sparked an outcry in many countries, especially in the Catholic circles of Germany, and triggered a crisis that has affected the Vatican’s relations with Jews, thereby tarnishing the image of the pope. According to theologians and church leaders, hundreds of Germans were outraged with Pope Benedict’s decision to rescind the excommunication of Bishop Richard Williamson.

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Via ZEENEWS

The United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, urged the citizens of the world to honor the victims of the Holocaust that was perpetrated by the Nazi regime during World War II, through the reaffirmation of the belief in the values and standards promoted by the UN. In a corporate message on International Day in Memory of Victims of the Holocaust, Ban said that people should continue to teach future generations the lessons learned in “the darkest chapters of history.” “We must fight Holocaust denial, and denounce hatred and intolerance and we must enforce the standards and laws created by the United Nations to protect people and fight impunity for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity,” Ban said.

Ban laments that the world is “plagued by relentless violence, the total disregard for human rights and an attack on people because of their identity.” He is encouraged by the academic and educational initiatives started in recent years around the world to prevent the neglect of this tragedy. In November 2005, the member countries of the UN adopted a resolution which stated that each January 27 be commemorated worldwide for the liberation in 1945 by Russian troops of the Nazi concentration camps of Auschwitz.

The Holocaust was the systematic ethnic cleansing of the Jewish population in Europe that was sponsored and perpetrated by Hitler’s Nazi regime. In many popular accounts, the death toll is pegged at approximately 6 million Jews who perished. A more careful look into history, taking into account all those affected by the Holocaust network, will reveal a total death toll of 17 million people that includes non-Jews.

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Via UN News Centre

The Jews have always borne the trauma of the Holocaust. The rest of the laymen world defines Judaism in terms of the systematic cleansing of Jews by the Nazis. Visitors to Israel are more interested in stopping over the Holocaust Memorial museum before any place else in the country. The Jews have also been living on the psyche of a psychological stigma. If they didn’t blindly march into those gas chambers and had they fought the systematic purging of their race, they wouldn’t be as oppressed to this day as they are. Their destiny should not be defined within the parameters and confines of one sick man’s sick mind.

Israel has been living far too much on the past. What it needs is forward thinking if it were to shake off the collective stigma that besets it. Of course, close association with a hegemonic power that wants considerable control in the Middle East doesn’t help the country any. Judaism as a moral doctrine, more than being one of the three biggest religions on earth, has a higher purpose that just wastes its worth in the mire of the intricacies of human politics.

Israel should always remember that genocide should never happen again. This doesn’t mean that genocide should never happen again to the Jews, but that genocide should never occur again at all. The Jews, more than any people on earth, should not forget the legacy of their bitter past. They should instead use it to be humanity’s reminder of how it is to survive evil on earth. Avrum Burg’s new book entitled “The Holocaust Is Over: We Must Rise from Its Ashes” says it all.

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Via TIME

Jews all around Europe have been shocked at the vandalization of Jewish graves in Bucharest. Up to 200 graves in the Jewish cemetery have been vandalized and ruined and authorities speculate that many valuable monuments have been damaged in the cemetery. About 40,000 Jews are buried in this particular graveyard and many of them are holocaust victims too.

However, none of the graves that were vandalized belonged to the holocaust victims. The police have launched a thorough investigation and have tried to curb Anti-Semitic feelings among the Romanian youth who could be blamed for the recent anti social behavior. Presently, Romania has a very small Jewish population most of which is elderly.

The police are baffled as to why the Jewish graves were targeted and the authorities have been largely embarrassed and shocked. Jewish organizations worldwide have condemned and accused the Romanian authorities of not safeguarding Jewish interests in the country.

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Via: BBC