Commander, Navy Installation Command’s (CNIC) Jewish Heritage Employee Resource Group (ERG) hosted a Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremony through Microsoft Teams, April 17. This remembrance was attended by more than 80 employees from around the CNIC enterprise and others, making it one of the most well attended ERG events to date by the CNIC community.

The Department of the Navy observed the Holocaust Days of Remembrance from April 16-23, 2023. The Holocaust was a systematic genocide, killing over six million Jews, and millions of others, from 1938-1945. Captain Joshua Frey, CNIC Director of Public Affairs and Jewish ERG Military Champion hosted the event.

“The full name of the day for Jews around the world to commemorate the victims of the Holocaust is ‘Yom Hashoah Ve-Hagevurah’– literally the “Day of Remembrance of the Holocaust and the Heroism,’” said Frey, “It is marked on the 27th day in the month of Nisan on the Hebrew calendar — a week after the seventh day of Passover.”

Dr. Lorenzo York, CNIC Force Chaplain’s Department and Jewish ERG Member provided the first reading called “in Observance of Yom Hashoah.”

“Nothing is more moving and sobering than Yom Hashoah—Holocaust Remembrance Day,” said York. “I was deeply touched in delivering the first reading. At the end of this reading, there is an expressed resolve to remember the Six Million by ‘linking our silences’. In my mind, this is the essence of community—a common broken heart over unmerited suffering inflicted by the Nazis. In my mind, remembering is the essence of community. Remembering is a resolve that we will never forget the atrocities; our hearts will remember the Six Million lives lost at the hands of evil doers; and in our remembering, we hold fast to an everlasting covenant, ‘Never again!’.”

Remembrance candles are traditionally lit on the anniversary of a loved one’s passing and is also done on Yom Ha Shoah. In place of the memorial candles for Yom Ha Shoah and to reach everyone in the virtual workforce, spanning multiple time zones and places. Throughout the event, various members of CNIC’s ERGs joined Frey in reading poetry and historical background on the Holocaust, as well as viewed Holocaust survivor video testimonies and interviews.

Leutisha Stills, EEO specialist and Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility (DEIA) program manager for CNIC, participated in the event by reading a Hebrew text authored by Hannah Sinesh. Frey read in original Hebrew, while Ms. Stills provided the translation.

“The Holocaust serves as a painful, yet necessary reminder of just how connected human beings are, regardless of race, gender, religious or national heritage,” said Stills. “While we may not personally have experienced those horrors, or know someone who survived those atrocities, there is room for empathy, and where there is empathy, there is connection, understanding, and emotional support. You do not have to be Jewish to have empathy for remembering what horrors we have lived through, as well as being educated to ensure such atrocities are never repeated.”

Frey explained that Hannah Sinesh, a poet and Special Operations Executive (SOE) member, parachuted into Yugoslavia during the Second World War to assist anti-Nazi forces and ultimately in the rescue of Hungarian Jews about to be deported to the German death camp at Auschwitz.

She was eventually tried and executed by firing squad.

Penny Lumley, CNIC Women’s ERG member gave remarks on Kristallnacht, which is literally, “Night of Crystal,” often referred to as the “Night of Broken Glass.” The name refers to the wave of violent anti-Jewish pogroms which took place on November 9 and 10, 1938 throughout Germany, annexed Austria, and in areas of the Sudetenland.

The remembrance continued as Charles Dansby, Civilian Champion to the Black ShIP (Shore Installation Professionals) ERG, participated and also helped plan the event.

Dansby explained, “Preparing to read the words from Elie Wiesel, a Romanian-born American writer, professor, political activist, Nobel laureate, and Holocaust survivor, was very emotional for me. I was inspired by his story and believe him when he says ‘…when one listens to a Holocaust witness, they too become a witness’”.

By the end of World War II ended in 1945, more than 6 million European Jews were killed by the Nazi regime or by the conditions they faced while in concentration camps. In 1980, the U.S. Congress established the Days of Remembrance as our nation’s annual commemoration to victims of the Holocaust and their families.

Commander, Navy Installations Command is responsible for worldwide U.S. Navy shore installation management as the Navy’s shore integrator, designing and developing integrated solutions for sustainment, development of Navy shore infrastructure, and execution and oversight of multiple quality of life programs and services. CNIC oversees 10 Navy regions, 70 bases, and more than 48,000 employees who sustain the fleet, enable the fighter and support the family. Follow CNIC on social media: Facebook, Facebook.com/NavyInstallations; Twitter, @cnichq; and Instagram, @cnichq.