November 9 is the day in 1938 when Hitler’s gangs attacked Jewish property in a prelude to the Holocaust, and the very same day 51 years later when the wall dividing East and West was breached, signaling the end of the cold war. People lined up in Berlin for an exhibition of photographs celebrating the opening of the Bornholmer Strasse border crossing in 1989. Nov 9 has always presented the dilemma of how to celebrate the joy of the wall’s coming down while at the same time commemorating the night of terror known as Kristallnacht, or the night of broken glass. ‘I think it’s the beginning in the shift in narrative,’ said Deidre Berger, director of the American Jewish Committee’s Berlin office. ‘It’s a concern of what young people know about this day.’ The nightly news seemed to support her view, reporting Germany’s celebrating the wall coming down, followed by a report on the ‘Jewish community’ marking Kristallnacht.

Pray: that the world may always remember the devastating lessons of fascism and genocide. (Ps.107:39)

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/10/world/europe/10germany.html?_r=1&ref=global-home