Foreign dignitaries mark opening
of Yad Vashem museum
March 16, 2005
The Holocaust was not "man's inhumanity to
man," Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel said Tuesday, at the dedication
of the new Holocaust museum at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. "No. It was man's
inhumanity to Jews. Jews were not killed because they were human beings. In the
eyes of the killers, they were not human beings, they were Jews."
Wiesel, a survivor, said only those who were there know the
meaning of "being there," but that we all have the obligation to try
to tell and not to bury the memories in silence.
Wiesel's closing remarks summed up the moving ceremony held in the presence of
foreign dignitaries from 40 countries, among them 15 heads of government and
state, as well as UN Secretary General Kofi Annan.
Annan said the UN felt a sacred obligation to fight hatred and intolerance, an
obligation that tied him to the Jewish people, and that the state of Israel,
like the UN itself, had risen from the ashes of the Holocaust.
"Our global mission of peace, freedom and human dignity was literally
forged in fire," he said, "in fact the most awful fires humankind has
ever seen."
President Moshe Katzav called on the members of the European Union not to allow
Nazism to reside in the imagination of young people as some sort of entertaining
horror show.
"We are concerned about Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism," he said.
Europe "must accept the burden of the memory and lessons of the Holocaust
for the future it is building. It owes this to the millions of Jews who were
murdered on its soil."
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said that "The state of Israel is the only
place in the world where the Jews have the right and the power to protect
themselves by themselves. This is the only guarantee that the Jewish people will
never know another Holocaust."
The chairman of Yad Vashem, Shevah Weiss, remarked of the cold weather at the
two-hour ceremony, which began a few minutes after 6:00 P.M., saying that it
reminded him of his feeling six weeks ago at Auschwitz in Poland, during the
ceremony marking the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the concentration
camp.
In a news conference called by the U.S. delegation to the ceremony, New York
Mayor Michael Bloomberg said that Yad Vashem must make known the triumph of good
over evil.
"Freedom is something we constantly have to fight for, and if we ever
compromise our standards, we see just how far it goes," Bloomberg said.
"We cannot allow intolerance any
place against any people."
Among the 2,000 or so guests invited to the ceremony were Holocaust survivors
from several countries, contributors, heads of other Holocaust commemoration
institutions, and about 100 mostly foreign journalists. Dozens more journalists
covered the event from a press center at Jerusalem's David's Citadel Hotel.
The ceremony opened with a rendition by Dudu Fisher of the national anthem,
Hatikva. Numerous video clips, among them that of artist Michal Rovner on the
vanished Jewish world, readings of survivors' and victims' testimonies, and
musical renditions interspersed the speeches that followed.
Among the readings was a rendition of the poem by Israeli poet Zelda Mishkovsky,
"Every Person Has a Name," that was set to music by Hanan Yovel. The
ceremony ended with the singing of Jerusalem of Gold by Rita, and Dudu Fisher
sang the Hebrew prayer oseh shalom.
Following the ceremony, Katzav hosted a dinner for the dignitaries at the
Chagall Hall in the Knesset.
Other events marking the opening of the museum will begin at 8:30 this morning,
with a memorial ceremony at the Hall of Names in the new museum. A special
assembly of the
dignitaries will be held at Yad Vashem on the subject of "remembering the
past, ensuring the future."
In addition to speeches by the dignitaries, ministers Silvan Shalom and Natan
Sharansky will speak, as well as former chief rabbi Israel Lau and Professor
Yehuda Bauer, now a consultant to Yad Vashem. Following the assembly, Sharon
will host a luncheon at the King David Hotel.
The museum was built at a cost of $40 million, and financed mainly by the
contributions of Jews and non-Jews throughout the world, and by the
International Commission on Holocaust Era Insurance Claims. The Foreign Ministry
contributed $5 million to the museum's construction.
SOURCE: Haaretz
