For over two decades, the United Kingdom has marked International Holocaust Memorial Day every year on January 27, the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi death camp. Across the country, citizens of all ages take part in local and national ceremonies, vigils, lectures, and film screenings, organized around an annual theme.

This year, just weeks away from the commemoration, Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, HMDT, the government-funded charity tasked with running the event since 2005, found itself the subject of a boycott effort led by the Islamic Human Rights Commission, IHRC.

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IHRC is an umbrella group of Islamic organizations in the United Kingdom which has been linked to the Iranian government and criticized for its antisemitic rhetoric. In late November, IHRC Chair Massoud Shadjareh sent a letter to the HMDT requesting that the charity add Gaza to the list of recent genocides mentioned in the mission statement on their website, which currently includes Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur.

“There is no hierarchy of genocides or suffering, and remembrance is not limited by the background of the victims or perpetrators,” Shadjareh wrote. “Every genocide is morally abhorrent.”

He added, “It is with grave concern that we note the absence of the ongoing genocide in Gaza from the list of genocides mentioned by HMDT. Failing to include it undermines the fundamental aim of Holocaust remembrance: to prevent and stop genocides, rather than being a symbolic exercise in remembering historical atrocities.”

When the request went unanswered, IHRC sent a letter to 460 councils and universities across the U.K., urging them to boycott this year’s official Holocaust Memorial Day and replace it with “alternatives that recognize the horrific genocide taking place in front of our very eyes.” The HMDT’s failure to uphold the “never again” principle, it claimed, “reflects the racial exclusivism now characterizing official commemorations.”

In recent days, IHRC has added a template to their website which can be downloaded and sent, as suggested, to local politicians and organizations asking them to join the boycott.

In a statement given to Haaretz, Olivia Marks-Woldman, CEO of the HDMT, slammed the campaign, calling it “an offensive and cynical effort to distort and diminish the memory of the Holocaust.”

“The core purpose of Holocaust Memorial Day must be acknowledged with absolute clarity: to honor the six million Jewish men, women and children systematically murdered by the Nazis, a crime driven by rabid antisemitism,” she added. “We must confront the IHRC’s nefarious agenda and ensure that we all come together in remembrance on 27 January.”

Karen Pollock, a prominent British educator, activist and CEO of the Holocaust Educational Trust (HET), whose year-round efforts to raise awareness and understanding include collaborating with HMDT on Memorial Day events, said IHRC is “drawing false parallels between the Holocaust – a unique and unprecedented episode in history – and unrelated current events.” Pollock added: “Such demands, including calls to make the day ‘more inclusive’ or to insert contemporary political agendas… also undermine the fundamental purpose of Holocaust Memorial Day.”

It is not immediately clear how effective IHRC’s campaign has been. So far, no group outside IHRC has officially announced it is joining the boycott. However, sources within HET say they do know of organizations that will not be participating in Holocaust Memorial Day. At least one event, according to them, has opted to avoid “singling out any one cultural group,” framing the day around all cultures instead.

Practical ramifications aside, the boycott points to the challenges Holocaust educators are facing in an increasingly polarized U.K.

“Holocaust distortion and inversion have become alarmingly pervasive,” Pollack told Haaretz. “We are seeing troubling comparisons equating the Jewish Star of David to the swastika, Israeli leaders to Hitler, and Zionism to fascism.”

Navigating these tensions is hardly a new challenge for HMDT. Back in 2010, former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn hosted a Holocaust Memorial Day event in the House of Commons entitled “Never Again for Anyone – Auschwitz to Gaza,” during which Hajo Meyer, a Jewish survivor of Auschwitz, repeatedly compared Israeli actions in Gaza to the mass murder of Jewish people by the Nazis. Corbyn would later apologize for his participation in the event – though not for another eight years.

Since October 7 and Israel’s ongoing military campaign in Gaza which has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians, the challenges have only intensified.

“The horrific attacks carried out by Hamas and the subsequent war in Gaza have fueled a rise in antisemitism worldwide, including the U.K.,” Marks-Woldman noted, speaking at the Trust’s 2024 impact review event last April. “Certain individuals and far-right groups have also seized upon the situation to incite anti-Muslim hate.” She also reported a 20 percent drop in the number of organizations and schools that participated in Holocaust Memorial Day compared to 2023, which was “more than we initially feared.”

Last January, the Anne Frank Trust confirmed to the Jewish News that at least three U.K. elementary schools had suspended their participation in their educational program, which the trust’s CEO Tim Robertson attributed to October 7-related “tensions.”

On the other hand, efforts to acknowledge Palestinian suffering are not always welcome by members of the Jewish community. In November, HMDT chair Laura Marks issued an “unreserved” apology over a mention of “devastating violence against Palestinians” in the text of the official invitation for 2025’s Holocaust Memorial Day, after some survivors had accused the trust of “trivializing” the tragedy. Marks told the Jewish Chronicle that referring to the Israel-Gaza conflict was “not appropriate and should not have happened.”

For Pollock, the recent surge in antisemitism, coupled with the dwindling number of survivors, has only heightened the urgent need for educational initiatives which focus specifically on the atrocities committed against the Jews. “Survivors, now in their 80s and 90s, have dedicated their lives to sharing painful memories, helping future generations understand the dangers of unchecked antisemitism and the devastating consequences it led to,” Pollack said.

“Now eighty years after the Holocaust,” she continued, “efforts to dilute its historical truth persist, including attempts to make Holocaust Memorial Day less ‘exclusive’ by broadening its focus in ways that risk undermining the uniquely Jewish experience of this tragedy.”