From 1933 to 1945, Nazi ideology permeated and consumed German society, administration, and armed forces, first to exclude and then to eradicate all Jewish-born Europeans both physically and culturally from the face of the Earth.

In France, between 1940 and 1944, the Jews suffered the double blow of French and German anti-Semitic legislation, by internment and deportation. Altogether, 76,000 Jews, included more than 11,000 children, were torn from their lives and deported by the Nazis with the help of the Vichy government.
This history is close to us, it took place in our country, our villages and towns, and tragically extended to the killing centers built by the Nazis in Poland, in the heart of Europe. Let us make this crime our own, live and build with – and in spite of – this crime. Let us use the history of the Holocaust, without distorting, trivializing, or exploiting it, to examine the events of our present and preserve our future freedoms.
Jacques Fredj