On Monday, April 17th, Israel’s national Holocaust memorial and museum, Yad Vashem, held a ceremony to mark the annual Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Day. This year’s Yom HaShoah is dedicated to “Jewish Resistance during the Holocaust.” The day of commemoration will last through Tuesday, marking the day when the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising began.
The opening ceremony took place at Yad Vashem’s Warsaw Ghetto Square on Jerusalem’s Mount of Remembrance. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Isaac Herzog spoke at the event, which was also attended by Reza Pahlavi, the son of Iran’s last Shah.
President Herzog called for unity within the Jewish society and emphasized the importance of always remembering the horrors of the “Nazi monster.” He also stressed that even amid strong disagreements about political or religious issues, Israelis should “never compare” their opponents to the Nazis.
Prime Minister Netanyahu praised Holocaust survivors who “chose light” and the Jewish victory which resulted in a “free and democratic” country, the Jewish state. He also warned against the calls to destroy the Jewish people, which he said now “come from the horror regime in Tehran,” adding that Israel is fighting against any Iranian nuclear deal.
According to Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics, at the end of 2022, there were 15.3 million Jews around the world, with seven million of them living in Israel, which amounts to 46 percent. The second biggest diaspora outside Israel is in the United States with six million Jews.
“On the eve of Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Day 2023, there are 147,199 Holocaust survivors and victims of anti-Semitic acts perpetrated during the Holocaust living in Israel,” the Bureau’s report said.
The report also highlights that before World War II, the global Jewish population was 16.6 million with only 449,000 of them living in Israel.
The ceremony comes as Israel and the world continue to grapple with the aftermath of the Holocaust and the ongoing threat of anti-Semitism. On this day of remembrance, Israel honors the memory of those who perished and the bravery of those who fought back against the Nazi regime, while also recognizing the continued need to combat anti-Semitism in all its forms.
Photos Via Michael Katz
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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4 Responses
Why is a Yeshiva site commemorating a zionist day?
“The USSR’s joint victory over Germany and Japan together with Western allies gave rise to a geopolitically unjustified, “friendly” attitude towards Western countries. Ordinary Soviet people just couldn’t see how people that helped them throughout the war suddenly became the enemy in a new, ‘cold’ war.
To fix this cognitive dissonance, the USSR launched a campaign against cosmopolitanism. The authorities advocated the idea that the war against Hitler was won by one great nation – the Soviet people, as Stalin proclaimed in his famous toast on May 24, 1945.”
This nation defeated the world’s evil and must be remembered. Just my personal opinion…
Again Holocaust Remembrance Day.
We never seem to be able to stop agonizing over the holocaust.
For many Jews it has, unfortunately (for lack of a true Torah centered Jewish identity), become an identity badge.
There is one huge problem here; the holocaust is always treated as a Jewish issue.
It is not!
It is a Christian issue!
Yes, I know, six million innocent men women and children (including members of my family) were brutally murdered in cold blood.
But that is not the real issue.
The real issue is that each and every one of these inhuman murderers was a Christian.
Born and baptized a Christian, educated in a Christian educational system, brought up in a Christian society. Almost all denominations were represented. And in those days, most people took their Christianity seriously.
Instead of remembering the victims we should be asking what it is about Christianity that turned so many normal human beings into vicious animals.
If we really want it to happen “never again” we should concern ourselves with what made it happen in the first place.
Will these “remembrance ceremonies” ever have the courage to deal with this issue?
Are they afraid of the truth?
Or are they afraid of “offending” the Christian murderers?
It is a Christian terrorist ideology, I can’t agree more with this. But what can I tell you? Look they even invited the son of the Shah, and that freak started bragging about Cyrus helping jews, something quite disturbing when you know that the Shah was the closest Hitler collaborator. It may have offended many people, he could have been invited at a different time, he could have said I apologize for what happened durring WW2 with the Shah, instead of trying to portray Iran, the country he left as a “Jew savior country sort of things, especially when you know how his current country (usa) is treating Jews right now, he was in the us army too btw.. I was really disapointed. To not hold a grudge against anyone and seek for peace, I agree, but not with a narcissic guy like that one… Thanks Bibi, it was really hurtfull, no wonder why people don’t want to get involved in politics…