Nazi analogies
[20][21] Historian of science Robert N. Proctor speculates that Nazi associations "forestall[ed] the development of effective anti-tobacco measures by several decades".
[26] In July 2020, British Jewish leader Marie van der Zyl said that there were "similarities" between the treatment of the Uyghurs in China and the crimes which were committed by Nazi Germany.
[40] Some Eurosceptic politicians, including UKIP's Gerard Batten[41] and Finns Party MP Ville Tavio, have compared the European Union to Nazi Germany.
[47][48] However, Native American demographic collapse was mostly caused by introduced disease, rather than warfare, and historians disagree as to whether the Indian Wars, or parts thereof, can be considered a form of genocide.
[49] Some historians, including Matthias Küntzel, Wolfgang G. Schwanitz and Barry Rubin, argue that there is a high degree of similarity between the ideologies of Nazism and Islamism, especially in their radical antisemitism and xenophobia.
[60][61] Others state such comparisons lack historical and moral equivalence, risk inciting Jew hatred, and may serve as a form of Holocaust denial or minimization.
[74] While Susan Sontag said that "It's wrong to compare a situation in which there was real culpability to one in which there is none", it is also the case that homophobic views resulted in dismissal of the suggestion of research and treatment being supported, severely exacerbating the epidemic.
[80] This remark was made in the context of an offensive in the DRC launched by the March 23 Movement, a rebel group widely considered to be directly supported by Rwanda,[81][82][83][84] despite official Rwandan denials.
[87] In 2018, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said "Iran wants a second Holocaust" and to "destroy another six million plus Jews", after his Iranian counterpart described Israel as a "malignant cancerous tumor".
[89] Various historians and other authors have carried out a comparison of Nazism and Stalinism, with particular consideration to the similarities and differences between the two ideologies and political systems, the relationship between the two regimes, and why both came to prominence simultaneously.
[90] Political scientists Hannah Arendt, Zbigniew Brzezinski, and Carl Joachim Friedrich, and historian Robert Conquest were prominent advocates of applying the totalitarian concept to compare Nazism and Stalinism.
[93] Historian Henry Rousso defends the work of Friedrich et al., while saying that the concept is both useful and descriptive rather than analytical, and positing that the regimes described as totalitarian do not have a common origin and did not arise in similar ways.
[95] In 2014, venture capitalist and billionaire Thomas Perkins wrote to The Wall Street Journal to compare what he called "the progressive war on the American one percent" to what Jews faced during Kristallnacht.
[107][108] Perkins was also criticized on Twitter, with The New York Times journalist Steven Greenhouse writing, "As someone who lost numerous relatives to the Nazi gas chambers, I find statements like this revolting & inexplicable".
"[110] Jonathan Greenblatt, director of the Anti-Defamation League, said that "misplaced comparisons trivialise this unique tragedy in human history... particularly when public figures invoke the Holocaust in an effort to score political points.
