Cleveland, Ohio, January 22, 2013… The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), outraged at the comparison of administration’s efforts to enact new gun control restrictions in the U.S. with Hitler’s policies leading up to World War II, today called on the president of the Ohio State Board of Education to apologize for using a photo of Hitler on her Facebook page to criticize the Obama Administration’s policies.
State Board of Education President Debe Terhar reportedly posted a picture of Hitler with the comment, “Never forget what this tyrant said: ‘To conquer a nation, first disarm its citizens.’” Terhar has since denied that she was directly comparing President Obama to Hitler.
“Whatever one’s position on the gun control issue, analogies – whether direct or implied -- to Hitler and the Holocaust have absolutely no place in the debate over gun control,” said Martin H. Belsky, ADL Cleveland Board Chair, and Nina Sundell, ADL Regional Director. “While one can disagree with the Obama Administration’s position on gun control, comparisons of his proposals to Hitler’s trivialize the memory of the six million Jews and the millions of other who perished in the Holocaust and are deeply offensive to Holocaust survivors.
“Clearly Ms. Terhar needs an education about the history of the Holocaust,” added Mr. Belsky and Ms. Sundell. “As a public figure she should know better. We hope that Ms. Terhar will retract the comparison and apologize. She should make clear that Holocaust comparisons are inappropriate and a terrible distortion of the history of World War II.”