He was one of three major directors to have been offered the opportunity to direct Schindler’s List (1993) by producer Steven Spielberg, the other two being Roman Polanski and Billy Wilder. Scorsese thought a Jewish filmmaker should direct it; Polanski wasn’t yet ready to deal with the painful subject (having lost his parents in the Holocaust); and Wilder (who was retired and who lost his mother and grandmother in the Holocaust) finally told Spielberg that he should do it himself. (imdb.com)