While I think the author of the piece expressed his idea rather poorly, his point is a good one, and could actually help us better understand the Holocaust, its importance, and the ways we can try to prevent it from happening again.
All he is saying (in between all the controversy-inducing language and hyperbole) is that we should stop thinking about the Holocaust as an historical anomaly, something unprecedented, unnatural, and inexplicable, and start thinking about it the same way we think about other historical events. American do not only morn the losses of the Civil War, they study them as an historical reality to better understand their causes, effects and continuing implications. The same is true for Pearl Harbor, or the way the Japanese think about Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or the way Russians think about the Second World War (let’s not forget they lost over 25 million people in the war). These events are not looked at as one-time events, they or their equivalents happened before, and will happen again, and understanding them as historical processes enables us to deal with them, and address potential repetitions.
We have not dealt with the Holocaust in this reasoned way. We have treated it as something unnatural, and inexplicable, and as a result we don’t understand it as well as we might. We have an emotional connection to the Holocaust, and it is understandable that as a result, our thoughts about the subject are highly reactionary. But that does not mean we cannot think about the Holocaust as an historical event, and analyze and understand it as such.
In addition to understanding the religious implications of the Churban, for example, we can also understand the historical processes that led up to, culminated in, and followed events like the destruction of the Second Temple, the defeat of the Bar Kochba Revolt, the Crusades, the Inquisition, Tach V’Tat, and the Holocaust.
Again, the author expressed his ideas using some very poorly chosen words, turns of phrase, and arguments. His underlying point, however, is well-taken.
Dare I say, the very fact that reactions to the piece have been so caustic and reactionary indicates that he may well have a point: We simply seem unable to get past our deep emotional connection to what happened in 1933-1945 so as to be able to think logically about what happened, why it happened, and what it has done.