Israel Stands Still to Remember

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At 10am this morning in the Holy Land, sirens sounded and the nation of Israel came to a stop. The moment of silence kicked off Yom HaShoah ceremonies, The Times of Israel's Michael Bachner reports, which include events both in Israel and abroad to remember the six million Jews murdered during the Holocaust:

Israel came to a standstill at 10 a.m. Thursday as sirens wailed throughout the country in memory of the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis during World War II.

Buses and cars halted on streets and highways as Israelis stepped out of their vehicles and stood with heads bowed.

The sirens were followed by ceremonies marking Holocaust Remembrance Day in schools, public institutions and army bases. Later in the day the traditional “March of the Living” began in Poland.

The traditional wreath-laying ceremony was held at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, at the memorial to the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. It was followed by various events and activities, including the main memorial ceremony at 1 p.m., and a youth movements assembly was to be held at 5:30 p.m.

At 11 a.m. the Knesset marked the day with its annual ceremony titled “Unto Every Person There is a Name,” in which lawmakers recite names of victims of the Nazis for nearly two hours. A similar ceremony was also held at Yad Vashem. The ceremony’s name comes from a famous poem by the Israeli poet Zelda Schneersohn Mishkovsky (commonly referred to by her first name alone). The song version of the poem is often played at memorial ceremonies.

Meanwhile, the annual “March of the Living” began in Poland at 2:30 p.m. (Israel time), led by President Reuven Rivlin. IDF chief Gadi Eisenkot and the heads of Israel’s Mossad spy agency and Shin Bet security service also attended, along with over 10,000 people. They participated in a three-kilometer (two-mile) march from the main Auschwitz concentration camp to the Birkenau extermination camp, which housed the gas chambers and crematoria...

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