Turks attend Holocaust conference, despite political tensions

Despite tense relations between Turkey and Israel, a special delegation of Turkish educators and academics was expected to arrive in Israel this week to participate in the Eighth International Conference on Holocaust Education at Yad Vashem, Israel’s main Holocaust memorial site and museum, which begins Monday in Jerusalem.

In 2010, the Turkish government cancelled its delegation of educators to the Holocaust education conference following the events of the Gaza flotilla, in which nine Turkish nationals were killed.

Despite the decision in 2010, this year two teachers from the Turkish Education Ministry, as well as two teachers from Jewish schools and five university lecturers from Turkey are slated to attend Yad Vashem’s biannual conference.

The delegation’s arrival at the conference comes despite diplomatic and political hostility between Israel and Turkey, and reflects the Turkish acknowledgement of the importance of Holocaust education for youth in a Muslim country.

The conference will open Monday with a speech by Education Minister Gideon Sa’ar, who has been active in trying to promote Holocaust education in Europe. Sa’ar recently signed cooperation agreements on the subject with his counterparts in Italy and Hungary.

The conference is organized biannually by Yad Vashem’s International School for Holocaust Studies. It is four days long, focusing on strengthening educators’ dedication worldwide to teaching core issues about the Holocaust. This year’s theme is „Telling the Story, Teaching the Core.” The main objective of the conference, according to Yad Vashem’s website, is to „present educational opportunities for expanding knowledge of the core issues of Holocaust history, literature, art, music, medicine, law, theology, and philosophy and to make them applicable in the lives of students.”

In addition to the Turkish delegation’s participation, the conference will include more than 370 educators from 53 countries, among them China, Australia, India, Japan, Canada, the U.S., Poland, Germany, Taiwan, Venezuela and South Africa.

Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev commented on the significance of the Turkish delegation’s arrival, saying, „Turkey’s desire, in the current political situation, to explore the possibility of promoting Holocaust education in its country is important and encouraging. We hope that following the conference, we will see additional activities on Turkey’s part in the field of Holocaust education. We are ready to assist Turkish educators and offer them the knowledge and pedagogical tools we have developed at the International School for Holocaust Studies at Yad Vashem.”