Karen Pollock MBE, Chief Executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust, reponds to Jackie Walker's claims at Labour Party Conference. 

"The Holocaust was a defining episode in history where 6 million men, women and children were brutally murdered simply for being Jewish, the very epitome of man's inhumanity to man.

Whilst Holocaust Memorial Day rightly and proudly commemorates the Holocaust and subsequent genocides, one has to wonder why Ms Walker takes issue with commemorating the mass extermination of Jews in its own right. The deliberate use of term 'HolocaustS' - plural - undermines and belittles the distinct nature of the tragedy itself, ignores that genocides are the result of diverse and unique factors, and also deprives the Jewish community of their collective memory."