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EDMONTON — Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany systematically eliminated nearly two-thirds of European Jewry; around six million people perished in mass shootings, pogroms and in extermination camps established in occupied territory.

“It is obvious,” wrote Elie Wiesel, whose book about surviving the Holocaust, Night, won the Nobel Prize, “that the war which Hitler and his accomplices waged was a war not only against Jewish men women, and children, but also against Jewish religion, Jewish culture, Jewish tradition, therefore Jewish memory.”

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Yet, decades later, only 43 per cent of Canadians can correctly identify how many Jews were killed, according to polling released this week.

“Never shall I forget those moments that murdered my god and my soul and turned my dreams to ashes,” Wiesel wrote of his first night at Auschwitz.

The polling suggests there are gaps in Canadians’ historical knowledge of the Holocaust and anti-Semitism, said Jack Jedwab, president of the Association for Canadian Studies.