"I learned about the Holocaust even in rural Oklahoma. I read the Diary of Anne Frank when I was 10 years old. My mom watched Holocaust documentaries with me. We talked about it in high school -- to always, always, always look around and make sure we weren't BEING Nazis in some way...." Pamela Olson, author of Fast Times in Palestine

 

Pamela Olson  https://pamolson.org/

https://www.facebook.com/pamolson4/posts/pfbid02B46Qg3dgY9LaoGTjqRnfC9HDtioQYTizhiXqdEqXtuhEc8fmyH4tqo2qHYSuTg6al

   [AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES (or quotes or watch videos) IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine]

Pamela Olson

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A sponsored post on my feed asked people to share their experience of learning about the Holocaust as kids, and if they feared they might have to hide from Nazis one day.

 

I commented:

 

I learned about the Holocaust even in rural Oklahoma. I read the Diary of Anne Frank when I was 10 years old. My mom watched Holocaust documentaries with me. We talked about it in high school -- to always, always, always look around and make sure we weren't BEING Nazis in some way.

 

I felt like the US was being Nazi-like when we sanctioned Iraq and starved all those children. I felt like the US was being Nazi-like when we invaded Iraq and murdered hundreds of thousands based on a lie. (I would later learn that was just the tip of the iceberg.) So I went to the Middle East to meet Arabs and Muslims for myself -- to see if they were really the demons our news media made them out to be.

 

I traveled solo from Cairo to Istanbul in 2003, when I was 23 years old. It took about three months, and it was one of the most magical stretches of my life. "Beautiful and friendly" doesn't begin to describe it.

 

I did skip Iraq (too dangerous), and I planned to skip Israel / Palestine. But in the Sinai, I met an Israeli man who invited me to Israel, and in Jordan I met a British guy who invited me to visit the West Bank. I took it as a sign.

 

And I'm so glad I did. I was totally enchanted by the Holy Land and ended up living there for two years. I wrote a book about it that anyone can read for free here:

 

Get a Free PDF of the book here

(Also available as Kindle, Audible, paperback)

Anne Frank 1929-1945 Hind Rajab 2018- 2024 ... NEVER AGAIN MEANS NEVER AGAIN FOR ANYONE !

Gaza City, Gaza: A displaced Palestinian girl looks out from her tent in Gaza City- Photograph: Dawoud Abu Alkas/Reuters- Holocaust remembrance and a tsunami museum: photos of the day –The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world Tuesday 27 January 2026 ... & "“I represent one and a half million children who were murdered and who are not here to speak for themselves,” Friedman told German media. “My story is representative of all their stories because we all had similar experiences. I was simply luckier than them, because I survived.”"

Gaza City, Gaza

A displaced Palestinian girl looks out from her tent in Gaza CityPhotograph: Dawoud Abu Alkas/Reuters

 

Holocaust remembrance and a tsunami museum: photos of the day – Tuesday

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

https://www.theguardian.com/news/gallery/2026/jan/27/holocaust-remembrance-and-a-tsunami-museum-photos-of-the-day-tuesday?CMP=share_btn_url#img-7

AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES (or quotes) IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine, or at least fair and just laws and policies]    

& 

‘I was simply luckier’: Holocaust survivors warn against forgetting Nazi atrocities

People urged to stand up against populism and antisemitism as the world marks International Holocaust Memorial Day

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jan/27/i-was-simply-luckier-holocaust-survivors-warn-against-forgetting-nazi-atrocities 

"... Friedman, who emigrated to the US where she became a successful therapist, warned against the rise of the populist far-right in Europe. She said she would directly address the AfD, which is up for election in five states this year and is predicted to do well in at least three of them.

The anti-immigrant party, which backs policies such as the mass deportation of non-naturalised citizens, has repeatedly called for an end to what it calls “Schuldkult” or a “culture of guilt”, to describe the perpetuation of the memory of Nazi crimes.

“I want very much to face up to them, not to hide away from them,” said Friedman.

Kaja Kallas, the European Union’s top diplomat warned that antisemitism was more rampant than at any time since the Holocaust, and was “taking on new and disturbing forms”. She also warned of AI-generated content which was being deliberately created “to blur the line between fact and fiction, distort historical truth and undermine our collective memory”. 

The Frankfurt-based Anne Frank Educational Centre drew attention to a “flood” of AI-generated content being used like propaganda, in which the victims were ridiculed, with the aim of denying or trivialising them.

Representatives of the Jewish community across the world, including Josef Schuster, president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, urged people to show “civil courage” and stand up for democracy at a time when ...."  READ MORE   https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jan/27/i-was-simply-luckier-holocaust-survivors-warn-against-forgetting-nazi-atrocities

Candles were placed at the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin. Photograph: Liesa Johannssen/Reuters

 

AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES (or quotes) IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine, or at least fair and just laws and policies]   

As of now ANNE FRANK RULES APPLY

Anne Frank 1929-1945 + Hind Rajab 2018-2024... NEVER AGAIN MEANS NEVER AGAIN FOR ANYONE

Sign seen in Berlin Germany 2025

Please no more funds, weaponry, and support for war mongering Israel

Children stand amid the rubble of a building hit by an Israeli air strike in the centre of the Gaza Strip. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images The Observer

Dear President Biden.. etc...

Anne Frank  & the Holocaust have been expropriated, abused & misused for decades to build anti-Arab, anti-Muslim, Anti-Palestine, anti-Iran armies of hate here in America.

Israel bombing Iran's embassy in Syria was wrong & should have been firmly condemned with ironclad disgust, not greeted with ironclad support for Israel.

Your support for Israel as "Jewish" shows people worldwide that arming religion with lethal weaponry is the best way to gain power: Please stop fueling religious extremism & bigotry here, there and everywhere.

Israel is in long term & flagrant violation of international law on multiple counts.  Israel constantly seeks to control the narrative- the stories told in our newspapers and on our college campuses, to manipulate our elected leaders on all levels in order to gather up more money & weaponry for an endlessly cruel war on the native-non-Jewish people of the Middle East and beyond.

Many Israelis have multiple passports with citizenship & job opportunities in multiple sovereign nations. Helen Thomas, an amazing American hero to many, a trail blazer in journalism, was demonized in 2010 for daring to say that Jews should leave Israel to the Palestinians and return to "Europe, Russia and America".  Was she really that wrong?  Mileikowsky's family was from Russia, and he was a nobody in Philadelphia, but sure is a big fish in Israel as he bombs Gaza into ruin and rubble. 

Israeli crusaders recently convinced our myopic Congress to stop funding UNWRA while terrorized Palestinian children starve to death in that Israeli-created concentration camp called Gaza. 

I believe land grabbing Israel aims to destroy the United Nations- not just sabotaging respect for every refugee's inalienable right to return, but also totally crippling the rule of fair and just laws.   

Universal basic human rights matter, and so does hope for a just and lasting peace based on the ruby red slippers of the Right to Return to original homes and lands. 

Sincerely,

Anne Selden Annab

NOTES  https://anniesnewletters.blogspot.com/search/label/Notes

CSM: Snapshots from Gaza: By sheer will, Palestinian women eke out a life

Israel bombs UN school in central Gaza twice in 24 hours... the school shelters a large number of displaced people, mostly women and children.

Settlers rampage through West Bank, burning cars and injuring Palestinians Palestinians in the West Bank faced large-scale attacks by Israeli settlers on Friday and Saturday, as cars were set alight and dozens injured

CNN: Israeli settlers storm village in West Bank and kill at least 1 Palestinian.

"... and birds shall return" The Deluge and the Tree poem by Fadwa Tuqan, written in 1967, right after the Naksa (ongoing israeli made Nakba) & remembered #Gaza 2024

17 children’s books for Arab-American Heritage Month - 2024 - Rebekah Gienapp [nurturing antiracism]

Christians for a Free Palestine just shut down the US Senate cafeteria. If our leaders don't let Gaza eat, then they don't deserve to eat lunch.

Eid Mubarak: Remember our brothers & sisters from Palestine in your prayers

Debating ancient Middle East history is a distraction from the death and human suffering now ravaging Palestine | Opinion in my local newspaper

Palestine Is Poetry by Sabrin Hasbun ..... "Grief and loss and violence and pain have been forced on us constantly, for over 75 years."

NBC News- Class destroyed: The rise and ruin of Gaza's revered universities

The indiscriminate killing, the manmade starvation and the bombing of aid workers must bring the west to a moment of decision -Chris McGreal

UN rights body demands Israel be held accountable for possible war crimes..."in just six months, more humanitarians have been killed in this conflict than in any war of the modern era.”

“From the River to the Sea.” A Poem by Samer Abu Hawwash, translated by Huda Fakhreddine "every whisper, every touch, every street, every house, every room..."

Dear President Biden- American taxpayers should not be forced to fund Israeli crimes against humanity

Palestine was not an empty piece of land before Israel

Dean Obeidallah: Two words  [#FreePalestine] that made Ramy Youssef’s ‘SNL’ monologue historic 

Israeli army destroyed completely Al Shifa hospital, Gaza, Palestine - Witnesses say hundreds of bodies were found inside al-Shifa Medical Complex and outside in the surrounding streets.

Easter Sunday: The Nazarene (الناصري), oil on canvas, 1993 painting by Sliman Mansour

Palestinian cartoonist Naji Al Ali's Handala & the Palestinian Diaspora

Easter Vigil for Gaza - Rev. Dr. Munther Isaac in Bethlehem Palestine 2024

A big reason so many of us are speaking up for Palestine is because we recieved Holocaust education not because we lack it: NEVER AGAIN FOR ANYONE

Palestinian artist: Rawan Anani “Women and Olive Trees- Jerusalem” (2024)

Land Day 2024 Palestine: In 1976 it was 6 unarmed farmers murdered by Israeli forces, this year it is more than 32,704 + Palestinian people murdered by Israeli forces, mostly women & children have been killed

Israel’s attempt to destroy Unrwa is part of its starvation strategy in Gaza

Hate is evil and leads to evil things. Please no more wars and weaponry for Israel.

1963 Martin Luther King Jr's I Have A Dream speech about equity for all still rings true: "Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children"      https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/i-have-a-dream-speech

Where, after all, do universal human rights begin?

The UN Mediator for Palestine, Count Folke Bernadotte, believed that the Palestinians displaced had a right to return to their homes and wrote several UN reports to that effect.

"It would be an offence against the principles of elemental justice if these innocent victims of the conflict were denied the right to return to their homes while Jewish immigrants flow into Palestine, and, indeed, at least offer the threat of permanent replacement of the Arab refugees who have been rooted in the land for centuries."

Bernadotte was assassinated on Friday 17 September 1948 by members of the group Lehi, a Zionist terrorist organization, commonly known in the West as the Stern Gang

 

Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world

 PALESTINE REMEMBERED

A big reason so many of us are speaking up for Palestine is because we recieved Holocaust education not because we lack it: NEVER AGAIN FOR ANYONE

weirdmomart  #artforpeace  #artforpalestine 

"I grew up learning about the Holocaust. I learned of the horror European Jews went through, the way most Germans went along with it, the way most of the world turned a blind eye and wouldn't even let Jews immigrate. I also learned about courageous people from many backgrounds who saved Jews and resisted occupation.

From there, I learned about other genocides including of Indigenous peoples in my own country. I learned how to tell the signs of genocide like how people spoke of Jews or Indigenous peoples as dirty, inhuman, or as inherent threats to security.

I can now recognize the signs of genocide against Palestinians thanks to this education. I learned never again for anyone and if it ever happens we need to speak out even if we're called names and threatened.

Never again is now."

#genocide #holocausteducation #jewishartist #neveragain #illustration #art #artforpeace #artforpalestine #art4palestine #ceasefirenow🇵🇸