Israel, Poland flags raised in memorial to Warsaw ghetto uprising
(FromTheDepths.org)
President Issac Herzog on Wednesday, joined Polish President Andrzej Duda and German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier in a ceremony marking 80 years since the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
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"I come here today from Jerusalem, the eternal capital of the free, sovereign, Jewish, and democratic State of Israel," Herzog said in his remarks. "We have come here, eighty years to the day since the outbreak of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, the emblem of heroism, during humanity’s darkest hour.
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President Issac Herzog at the ceremony marking 80 years since the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
(Photo: Reuters)
Herzog went on to speak of the bravery of the many who fought to resist the Nazis, facing certain death but sure that the Jewish spirit would live on.
“'We had no chance of victory in battle,' recalled Zivia Lubetkin, a woman I have admired my whole life, a member of the leadership of the Jewish Combat Organization, a heroine of the revolt, whose granddaughter Eyal, named for the Hebrew acronym of the Jewish Combat Organization, is here with us today. 'It was clear to us that we had no chance of victory, in the usual sense of the word. But we knew that at the end of the day, we would emerge victorious. We are the weak ones. But our strength lay in this: we believed in justice. We believed in humanity.” Zivia Lubetkin and her comrades were right, and doubly so. Most of the warriors of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising did not survive. But their spirit, the spirit of man, won here, on this soil, sanctified with the blood of our heroic brethren," he said.
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Presidents of Israel, Poland and Germany at the ceremony marking 80 years since the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
(Photo: GPO)
He then noted the valor of those who lent a hand to save Jews.
"In a heroic battle against the Nazis and their accomplices, in every country, were the Righteous Among the Nations and members of the local resistance movements, including, of course, here in Poland, the Polish Righteous Among the Nations and members of the Polish underground, who risked their lives and chose to not stand idly by," Herzog said.
Turning to the Polish leader whose government had feuded with Israel over the responsibility of Poles in the destruction of that country's Jewish citizens, Herzog said. "Your Excellency, the President of Poland, my friend, Andrzej Duda, I thank you for your colossal efforts and your commitment to the task of remembrance and commemoration, including right here, in this place. We must remember: there is nothing postmodern or relativistic about Holocaust remembrance. Absolute evil existed, in the form of the Nazis and their accomplices. And absolute good existed, in the form of the victims and the rebels, from every nation. And in passing this heritage down to posterity, it must reflect this indisputable axiom," he said.
"The heroism of the resistance and the rebels and the imperative to remember that terrible chapter of history, when the Jewish People faced complete annihilation, and destruction rained down upon Poland and many other countries, offer a platform for important dialogue between Poland and Israel and for the advancement of friendship between our peoples. A friendship that I believe and hope will flourish and develop and allow us to elucidate and analyze in-depth disagreements and pain, while also building important partnerships, not only on the foundations of the past but also on the basis of our shared future," he said.
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Presidents of Israel, Poland and Germany at the ceremony marking 80 years since the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
(Photo: GPO)
"Your Excellency, my friend, the President of Germany, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, he said. "in your unforgettable remarks at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, at the ceremony marking the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Death Camp, you repeated two keywords, which point to the important connection between past and present: “guilt” and “responsibility.” Thank you for your moral leadership and for being such an important and significant force in deepening the friendship between our peoples, centered on our eternal commitment to remembrance, responsibility, and to the future, security, and prosperity of the State of Israel," he said.
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Crowds including survivors of the Holocaust and families of victims, gather to mark 80 years since the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
(Photo: EPA)
"Dearly beloved Holocaust survivors, families, ladies and gentlemen. Today we salute heroism, but heroism must be sanctified thus: through learning, drawing lessons, and through handing down this heritage and the torch of responsibility from generation to generation. This responsibility is, for us, a lifelong duty. When we stand here together, in the heart of one of the loftiest symbols of both the Holocaust and heroism, we remember that as great as the threat is, so too is the common front that we must form against it. There was no precedent for the fusion of solidarity, humanity, and mutual responsibility that alone defeated Nazi Germany and the Axis powers. Here, we understand well the sacred alliance that the family of nations forged in light of terrible tragedy: to sanctify the memory of the victims; to stand firmly and collectively for the State of Israel’s right to exist and to thrive as the sovereign home of the Jewish people; to teach and educate in light of the lessons of the historic catastrophe that was the Holocaust; and to fight with all our might against any manifestation of racism, antisemitism, and hatred.