Commenting on the Gerald Scarfe cartoon in The Sunday Times, the Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks said;
“This week we have seen the great power images can have. At the official commemoration for Holocaust Memorial Day on Monday, we saw images from the concentration camps, the ghettos, and other genocides. This is the positive power of images: to leave an imprint in our minds, to teach us lessons of how humanity fell so that we may not sink to such depths again.
“But we have also seen this week the great danger an image can have. The deplorable cartoon published in The Sunday Times on Holocaust Memorial Day, whether antisemitic or not, has caused immense pain to the Jewish community in the UK and around the world. Whatever the intention, the danger of such images is that they reinforce a great slander of our time: that Jews, victims of the Holocaust, are now perpetrators of a similar crime against the Palestinians. Not only is this manifestly untrue, it is also inflammatory and deeply dangerous.”
For further information, please contact Dan Sacker, Director of Communications for the Office of the Chief Rabbi on dan@chiefrabbi.org or 0208 343 6301.