Lately, I’ve been hearing a painful and confusing message in Jewish spaces: that Holocaust education isn’t working. The idea became more prominent after Dara Horn’s widely read essay in The Atlantic questioning whether Holocaust education, as it is often taught, is sufficient on its own to address contemporary antisemitism, particularly when it is disconnected from broader Jewish history and identity.

I admire Dara Horn’s work in many ways, and I agree with her that Jewish life cannot be reduced to Jewish death. But I also believe that the way her argument has been received has had unintended consequences. Many people came away with the impression that Holocaust education itself is somehow failing. For educators, survivors’ families, and grandchildren like me who dedicate our lives to preserving memory, that message has been quietly devastating.

I don’t experience what I do as fruitless. I experience it as one of the most meaningful ways I give back to the Jewish community and to the world. And I worry that when we expect Holocaust education to “fix” antisemitism, we misunderstand what it was meant to do in the first place.

Antisemitism Was Not Created by the Holocaust

Antisemitism did not begin with Hitler, and it did not end with Auschwitz. It has existed for over two thousand years, shaped by religious, cultural, and political forces that........

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