Holocaust Memorial Day 2024

You couldn’t do this, and you couldn’t do that, but life went on’. – Anne Frank

People in Redditch are invited to attend this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day event to remember the millions of people killed in the Holocaust and genocides worldwide.

**Updated 25 Jan 2024** We have made some changes to our Redditch Holocaust Day Memorial Event, which will now take place at Redditch Library, in response to guidance from the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust. The event will now begin at 10.30am at Redditch Library and refreshments will be served.

All are welcome to attend. Local schools, groups and partner organisations are taking part in the event which is being co-ordinated by the Holocaust Memorial Committee. Light refreshments will be available after the event in Redditch Library.

As part of the commemoration, from Monday (22 Jan), Redditch Library will also be coordinating the construction of a piece of community artwork of birds, fragile but free and escaping from a cage. Residents who would like to contribute to the artwork and commemorate HMD 2024, can pick up a blank bird outline at the library and decorate it however they choose. Schools and groups are also being encouraged to take part.

No two birds in the artwork will be the same, celebrating the differences between people, cultures, religions, genders, and everyone being free to be their true themselves. The artwork will be available for all to see after the main event. More details of how to get involved in this are available on the library’s social media channels.

Cllr Peter Fleming, Chair of the Steering Group, said: “The theme of this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day is “Fragility of Freedom”, and this seems more poignant than ever given that this year also marks 30 years since the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda.

“Freedom means different things to different people: identity, speech, religion, love, movement. Freedom can be empowering and uplifting but also vulnerable and easy to take away. Sadly, this has been experienced by hundreds of thousands of people throughout history.

“On HMD 2024, we can all reflect on how freedom is fragile and vulnerable to abuse. As a community, let’s pledge not to take our freedoms for granted, and consider what we can do to strengthen freedoms around the world.”

Holocaust Memorial Day is the day for everyone to remember the millions of people murdered in the Holocaust, under Nazi Persecution, and in the genocides which followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur.

This year’s theme of ‘the fragility of freedom’ aims to highlight how easily freedom can be taken and how it is fragile and vulnerable to abuse.