violence and methodical, sophisticated and civilized coldness

Israel's Holocaust museum grapples with Holocaust diminishment
CNN's Izzy Lemberg sent this report on a major Holocaust conference in Jerusalem:

Yad Vashem, Israel’s main museum and research facility for preserving the memory of the Holocaust–including concentration camps like Auschwitz, above–devoted much of its annual conference on Monday to grappling with the challenges of Holocaust denial and diminishment. . . .

Alain Finkielkraut, a prominent French philosopher, keynoted the event, arguing that “Post-Nazi Europe knows that neither culture nor progress is a safeguard against ferocity."

"It knows that modernity does not necessarily overcome cruelty," he said of Europe, "and that the most egregious evil is produced by a combination of unleashed violence and methodical, sophisticated and civilized coldness."

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2010/06/15/israels-holocaust-museum-grapples-with-holocaust-diminishment/?hpt=Sbin