At Holocaust memorial, Trump praises Jewish resilience and State of Israel

“From the depths of the suffering, the Jewish people have built a mighty nation,” Trump declared at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, vowing “Never Again.”

On the second and last day of Donald Trump’s whirlwind visit to Israel and the Palestinian Authority, the US president spent 30 minutes at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem Tuesday afternoon.

In a flawlessly choreographed ceremony broadcast live on Yad Vashem’s website, Trump was presented with a replica of a Holocaust-era personal album that belonged to Ester Goldstein of Berlin, who in 1942 was deported to Riga, Latvia and murdered there at the age of 16. Ester’s older sister, Margot Herschenbaum, 91, the sole survivor of her immediate family, attended the event. Herschenbaum, who today lives in Australia, escaped Nazi Germany in 1939 in the Kindertransport.

The album bears the inscription “Love life, and don’t be afraid of death.

Believe in God and a better future,” written by Ester’s classmate Bella Lassore, who herself was deported to Auschwitz in 1943 where she was murdered. Sonja Strenger, another Berlin classmate similarly deported to Auschwitz that year, wrote, “Do not forget me.”

Participating in a memorial ceremony in the Hall of Remembrance, Trump rekindled the eternal flame and laid a wreath on a stone slab under which ashes from death camps are buried. El Maleh Rachamim, a dirge-like prayer for the souls of the martyrs’ of the Holocaust, was sung by a cantor.

“We are here at Yad Vashem to honor the memory of six million Jews who were sent to their deaths. Words can never describe the bottomless depth of that evil,” Trump declared.

He referred to the Holocaust as history’s “darkest hour.” It was “the most savage crime against God and His children, and it is our solemn duty to mourn every life that was so viciously taken.”

Accompanied by his wife, Melania, and daughter and son-in-law Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, the president laid a wreath, carried by two American Marines in formal uniform.

In his remarks, Trump praised the Jewish people for persevering after the tragedy: “They have thrived. They have become so successful in so many places. The State of Israel is a strong, a soaring monument to the solemn pledge we repeat and affirm: Never again.”

“From the depths of the suffering, the Jewish people have built a mighty nation,” Trump stated.

“As long as we refuse to become bystanders to the barbaric, then we know peace and justice will ultimately prevail,” the US president concluded

Participating in the memorial ceremony at Yad Vashem’s somber Hall of Remembrance, Trump rekindled the eternal flame and laid a wreath on a stone slab under which ashes from extermination camps are buried. El Maleh Rachamim, the prayer for the souls of the martyrs’ of the Holocaust, was sung by a cantor.

Shortly after entering the White House at the beginning of this year, Trump issued a statement on International Holocaust Remembrance Day on January 20 that failed to mention the Jews. Equally glaring, speaking of poison gas atrocities committed by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Trump’s press secretary Sean Spicer said that Adolf Hitler had not used chemical weapons during World War II.

Trump’s Yad Vashem visit will likely help correct those ill-spoken words.

By: Gil Zohar, World Israel News

AssadChemical weaponsHolocaustHolocaust remembranceYad Vashem