Yom hashoah

WATCH: Four alumni - three decades of marching - reflect on the experience that transformed their understanding of memory, identity, and responsibility.

On Yom Hashoah, objects, letters, and fragments of lives cut short remind us that the Holocaust was not only about death, but about vibrant life.

Some Israeli public figures did not make standalone Holocaust Remembrance Day statements, choosing instead to respond to current events in light of the solemn day. 

Kufiyas in Buchenwald argued that their protest would honor the memory of Buchenwald’s victims together with all “victims of genocide and fascism.”

October 7 was the day of massacre. October 8 was the day of reckoning: the moment when Europe, 80 years after the Holocaust, was tested on whether it had truly learned anything from its past.

Lanzmann’s genius was to understand that the details were the story, that in the deepest sense, it was impossible to memorialize the Holocaust without knowing exactly what happened.

The IDF stated that “even in the midst of ongoing missions, we remain mindful of our past and those we have lost."

On this Holocaust Remembrance Day, we embrace more than ever our responsibility to fulfill the promise and potential that was taken from so many of our Jewish people.

As he shares lessons of survival from his grandmother, The Jewish Agency’s CEO writes that knowledge about the Holocaust must be more than facts and ceremonies.

This shared date should stir more than remembrance. It should inspire a deep sense of kinship between two ancient peoples who have both endured existential trauma.