Actress and talk show host Whoopi Goldberg offered her “sincerest apologies” after saying during the show “The View” that the Holocaust wasn’t “about race.”
Goldberg made the comment Monday during a discussion on the daily talk show about the decision by a Tennessee school board to ban the Pulitzer Prize-winning Holocaust graphic novel Maus.
Goldberg argued that the Holocaust went beyond the issue of race.
“The Holocaust isn’t about race. No, it’s not about race,” Goldberg, 66, said repeatedly. “It’s about man’s inhumanity to man.”
She went on to say that the genocide was between “two groups of white people.”
One of “The View’s” co-hosts, Ana Navarro, interrupted Goldberg saying the Holocaust was “about white supremacy. That’s what it’s about. It’s about going after Jews and Gypsies.”
“But these are two groups of white people,” Goldberg argued. “You’re missing the point. The minute you turn it into race, it goes down this alley. Let’s talk about it for what it is. It’s how people treat each other. It’s a problem. It doesn’t matter if you’re Black or white because Black, white, Jews, Italians, everybody eats each other.”
People on social media immediately called out Goldberg after the show aired. Goldberg issued an apology Monday night.
“As Jonathan Greenblatt from of the Anti-Defamation League shared, ‘The Holocaust was about the Nazi’s systematic annihilation of the Jewish people, who they deemed to be an inferior race’. I stand corrected.
“The Jewish people around the world have always had my support and that will never (waver). I am sorry for the hurt I have caused.
“Written with my sincerest apologies. Whoopi Goldberg.”
Gleenblatt responded to Goldberg’s apology and thanked her for “acknowledging the Holocaust for what it was”.
“Thanks WhoopiGoldberg for correcting your prior statement and acknowledging the #Holocaust for what it was,” he tweeted. “As #antisemitism surges to historic levels, I hope we can work together to combat ignorance of that horrific crime and the hate that threatens all.”
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