To confront the alarming rate of antisemitism in our nation, the New Jersey Italian Heritage Commission (NJIHC) developed a video series titled The Italians and the Holocaust, as part of The Universality of Italian Heritage curriculum. This five-part video collection was produced in collaboration with the New Jersey Office of Holocaust Education. 

The central theme throughout the project is to foster zero tolerance when confronted by injustice and discrimination, and for each of us to become a righteous person. Examples are provided of how Italian citizens, clergy, and others, became “Righteous Upstanders” during the Nazi Holocaust in WWII, by risking their lives to save more than 80% of the Jewish population in Italy.

On Monday, 27 January 2025, the 80th anniversary of the international Holocaust Remembrance Day will commemorate the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, by Soviet troops, in 1945. We invite you to view this unique video program and share it with your local school districts, organizations and clubs. At that dark time in history, let us look with great pride to the unselfish courage of many Italian citizens to save others, thus providing a ray of light to all generations.