By Yoram Getzler. Theodore Seuss Geisel, was better known to several generations of children as just plain Dr. Suess. The author of delightful silly children s books such as Green Eggs and Ham, The Cat in the Hat, One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish, Horton Hatches the Egg, Horton Hears a Who!, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas! . These books were illustrated with a group of characters with unmistakeably characteristics of the Dr. Suess menagerie.
Turns out that our Dr. Suess was also a political cartoonist as well. How could he not be. A child of immigrants from Germany, he came of age in the turbulent 1930’s. The exaggerations and intentions of German politics were becoming widely known so the good doctor used his skills at illustration to make appropriate political statements.
The one I just found that is particularly striking for our time as well. It is a perfect statement of comparison between the 1930’s and our own days. Then as now, the western powers prefer to ignore the blatant statements of a totalitarian government and as then, I believe that by the time they are forced to act…many innocents will suffer. Bibi Netanyahu was fond of warning the western world of the dangers the 1930’s ultimately heralded for the Jews.
The six million Jews murdered by the Germans and their collaborators throughout Europe pale in comparison to the the 20 million soldiers and 40 million civilians killed during these same years. Thees were; Germans, Russians, French, Belgian, Italian, Polish, Ukrainian, Norwegian; Finish; Greek; Yugoslav; American, Algerians; Moroccans; Egyptians, Syrians, Iraqis, and Iranians..
The danger of a replay of the 1930’s would not have lesser consequences today
Yoram Getzler [email protected]
