How we cite our quotes: (Sentence)
Quote #1
In the place that I come from, society was composed of three simple categories: the killers, the victims, and the bystanders. (67)
Sure, the killers were obviously the really guilty, and the victims were the innocent party—but what about the bystanders? It becomes clear throughout his speech that Elie Wiesel sees the folks who stood idly by as being part of the problem. Wiesel believes that indifference is on par with what the Nazis did—sure, the bystanders might not have killed anyone, but they also didn't try and stop it.
And he wasn't the only person who feels that way. In fact, after the Americans liberated Buchenwald in 1945, they forced locals to march through the camp to see what had happened there and what they'd ignored. It's pretty powerful footage, so take a look at it here.
Quote #2
And our only miserable consolation was that we believed that Auschwitz and Treblinka were closely guarded secrets; that the leaders of the free world did not know what was going on behind those black gates and barbed wire; that they had no knowledge of the war against the Jews that Hitler's armies and their accomplices waged as part of the war against the Allies. If they knew, we thought, surely those leaders would have moved heaven and earth to intervene. They would have spoken out with great outrage and conviction. (70-72)
Millions of people, including Elie Wiesel, were forced to endure hellish, inhumane treatment at the hands of the Nazis. And throughout it all, they believed the rest of the world had no idea what was going on. Imagine their collective sense of betrayal when they realized that world leaders had known what was going on…and did nothing.
Quote #3
Roosevelt was a good man, with a heart. He understood those who needed help. Why didn't he allow these refugees to disembark? A thousand people—in America, the great country, the greatest democracy, the most generous of all new nations in modern history. What happened? I don't understand. (86-91)
Elie Wiesel is talking about FDR's response to the St. Louis (which we discuss in the "Timeline" section). When the ship of Jewish refugees arrived in Cuba and was turned away, the captain turned to the United States for help. But FDR and his government didn't help, and while the passengers were eventually granted refuge in various countries in Europe, some 200 were murdered at the hands of the Nazis.
America was built by folks searching for religious freedom, and Wiesel doesn't understand how such a place could turn its back on 1,000 people looking for that same freedom—especially when they'd heard whispers about the kinds of horrors happening in the Nazi-controlled parts of Europe.
Quote #4
But then, there were human beings who were sensitive to our tragedy. Those non-Jews, those Christians, that we call the "Righteous Gentiles," whose selfless acts of heroism saved the honor of their faith. Why were they so few? Why was there a greater effort to save SS murderers after the war than to save their victims during the war? Why did some of America's largest corporations continue to do business with Hitler's Germany until 1942? (93-97)
Elie Wiesel paints a vivid and disturbing picture of the suffering and tragedy that occurred throughout the 20th century, and he repeatedly mentions how very few people stepped in to try and stop it.
But Wiesel does give a shout-out to the Righteous Gentiles, non-Jews who saw what was happening around them and took a stand against it. According to Wiesel, the selflessness and heroism of the Righteous Gentiles is the kind of behavior the rest of the world needs to emulate going into the next century. That way, if and when horrible things happen, larger populations step up and fight for the victims who can't fight for themselves.
Quote #5
But this time, the world was not silent. This time, we do respond. This time, we intervene. (104-106)
The horrors Elie Wiesel and millions of others experienced during the Holocaust weren't the result of a single person, or even a single group. Multiple factors contributed to the Holocaust—including mass indifference to the suffering and the killing simply because it was easier to feign ignorance than to fight against atrocity.