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Israel marks Holocaust remembrance day

Xinhua, April 16, 2015 Adjust font size:

Israel marked its annual Holocaust Remembrance day with an official ceremony held in Jerusalem late on Wednesday.

Six Holocaust survivors, each representing one million of the six million Jews killed in the holocaust, lighted six torches at the ceremony in Jerusalem's Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Museum.

From Wednesday sunset to Thursday, Israel will officially commemorate the genocide of six million Jews by Nazi Germany during the World War II.

The annual ceremony at Yad Vashem marked the beginning of 24 hours during which shops, restaurants and places of entertainments are closed.

TV channels and radio stations are broadcasting solely Holocaust-related content, such as documentaries, interviews with survivors and melancholic songs.

This year's ceremony marked 70 years for the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp in Poland and the end of the World War II.

The ceremony, attended by Israeli President Reuven Rivlin and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, begun with the national flag lowered to half-mast.

Rivlin said that Israel will continue to struggle against anti-Semitism around the world. "But at the same time," he added, "fears of the past and threats of the present cannot dictate our lives. We need to build a good society that has more compassion and ability to contain (the other)."

In his address, Netanyahu spoke of the framework agreement reached with Iran by world powers and called for the dismantling of the Islamic Republic's nuclear activity.

The prime minister vowed to protect the Jewish state at all costs, "Even if we are forced to stand alone, we will not be afraid in every scenario, in every situation, we will preserve our right, our capability and our determination to defend ourselves," he added.

"We will not allow the state of Israel to be a passing phase in the history of our people," Netanyahu said.

On Thursday morning, Israel's government will participate in a wreath-laying ceremony at the Yad Vashem where names of Holocaust victims will be recited and a two-minute siren will be heard throughout Israel. Endit