Nick Robinson has urged young people not to allow the Holocaust to be used as a “weapon”.
The Today programme presenter told teenagers at the annual conference for Holocaust Educational Trust ambassadors: “It is not a game of Top Trumps where you or your people use your knowledge of the Holocaust to trump everything else.
“If you do that you might think you’ll persuade them — but you’ll put up their barriers.”
He said that as the generation of survivors dies, there will “inevitably be people who didn’t live through it”, opening the way to increasing denial.
The former BBC political editor also suggested questions about the Holocaust might arise because “one in 20 of our population is now Muslim and they will learn something different about Jews and Jewish people”.
The journalist, whose maternal grandparents were Jewish, said it was important to engage the Muslim community in conversations about the Holocaust and not use it as a tool to “beat them round the head with by saying ‘my suffering is worse’.”
Over 300 HET ambassadors — young people who have taken part in the Trust’s Lessons from Auschwitz project and run events and talks in their schools and regions to educate others about the Shoah — attended the conference in central London on Monday.
They raised concerns about “fake news”, Holocaust denial and the future of Holocaust education.
Mr Robinson, who was speaking alongside Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, told the packed audience that in his own experience he thought humour was sometimes the best way to challenge antisemites.
“When I hear people question the Holocaust, or when I hear people in politics say that ‘the Zionists worked with Hitler’, I want you to respond with the facts you learn today.
“But I want you to respond with other emotions as well, particularly on social media.”
The veteran journalist said he thought the most effective way to challenge politicians such as Ken Livingstone was “to edit together all the times he said ‘Hitler’ and ask if he has Nazi Tourette’s?
“I think to ridicule would be more effective than rage or facts alone,” he said.
Mr Robinson said the large numbers of young people who voted for Labour in the general election proved “no idea survives on its own”.
“In my world, the news world, we saw that huge generational gap. Whether you love or loath Theresa May or Jeremy Corbyn, the assumptions of one generation can be torn up by the next.
“The assumption was that ‘no one could ever vote for a man like Corbyn’, yet so many young people like you did.”
Tolu Mohammed was one of many regional ambassadors at the conference. She said she used social media to educate other young people about the Holocaust.
The 19-year-old ambassador for Thames Valley and Chiltern said as a Christian she often struggled with the ethical and moral questions that the genocide can bring up.
“I don’t think that we can blame God for what happened. Human beings are responsible for their own actions.
“It is important to understand God couldn’t have intervened because humans have free will and it was humans who allowed it to happen.”
She said she recently organised a trip for Year 8 students in her region to visit the Imperial War Museum, where they got to speak to a survivor.
“Nothing is better than hearing survivor testimonies first-hand. When you have heard one it is your job to make sure it is never forgotten,” she said.
The conference also featured Strictly Come Dancing star Robert Rinder in conversation with survivor Harry Spiro, workshops, and a panel discussion with Mark Gardner of the Community Security Trust.
