Angry Atheist Attack on Star of David in Holocaust Memorial Reprehensible

The Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) is at it again. The atheist group, which continues attack Christians in an attempt to remove religion from the American landscape, has now set its sights on Holocaust survivors.

The group that sports a poor track record in its legal battles against Christianity has demanded that a Holocaust Memorial, recently approved by the Capital Square Review and Advisory Board, not be constructed on the front lawn of the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus. The memorial is the first of its kind to be approved for statehouse grounds.

Because the memorial includes a Star of David—Israel’s national symbol—the FFRF is attempting to deny its construction. The memorial will honor Holocaust survivors and the 6 million Jews exterminated by Hitler’s Nazi regime during World War II and will remember Americans who fought and died to help free Holocaust victims from Nazi concentration camps.

In a letter to Ohio State Sen. Richard Finan, the FFRF—which “works to protect the constitutional principle of church and state”—voiced supposed “constitutional concerns” over the Holocaust memorial. The recently drafted letter claimed the inclusion of the Star of David is “exclusionary” and a dishonor.

“As the Star of David was deemed by European Jews to be the symbol that would represent Judaism just as the cross did Christianity, its prominent inclusion in the memorial gives the impression of an endorsement of Judaism,” the letter says.

The Star of David is not only a symbol of the Jewish religion, but also a symbol of the Jewish people. It is a symbol of the Jewish state, the state of Israel. Millions of Jews were forced to wear the Star of David on their clothing by their Nazi oppressors.

Daniel Libeskind, the son of Holocaust survivors who designed the memorial, said, “One cannot separate the Holocaust from the star.”

The Freedom From Religion group, with 19,000 members, recently lost a court case in which a Montana federal court ruled that the “Big Mountain Jesus” statue, erected as a World War II tribute to soldiers of the 10th Mountain Division, will remain overlooking the Flathead Valley and the Whitefish Mountain Resort.

It is one of the many judicial failures the group has suffered over the past few years. Matt Clark, of the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), called the FFRF’s attack on the Holocaust memorial “anti-Semitic.”

Clark says, “The ACLJ will be sending Ohio a letter explaining, in detail, why the inclusion of the Star of David in a Holocaust memorial does not violate the Constitution.

“The Supreme Court has made clear that the Constitution’s ‘goal of avoiding governmental endorsement does not require eradication of all religious symbols in the public realm.’ And in this case, the Star of David is far from a strictly religious symbol. It is the symbol emblazoned on the Israeli flag. It is a symbol of the Jewish people.  It is the symbol the Jews were forced to wear during the Holocaust itself. It is a historically significant symbol that cannot be allowed to be stricken because it offends a few atheists.”